[Mb-civic] Shots Across the Brow: Taking on Frist, DeLay, McClellan, Kerry, Brownie, and al Qaeda's Pecking Order

[Arianna Huffington]

This has not been a very good week for the GOP -- Frist, DeLay, Brownie's deer-in-the-headlights testimony. Here are my posts on Frist's shady stock sale, DeLay's indictment, John Kerry's clueless comments on Iraq... plus quick hits on Brownie, the Deli Defense, al Qaeda's pecking order, and more. And be sure to check in at huffingtonpost.com for the latest news and opinion.

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Sen. Frist: Avoiding Conflict for Fun and Profit
Posted September 26, 2005 at 8:35 p.m. EDT

For over a decade Bill Frist has steadfastly rejected all suggestions that his ownership of up to $25 million worth of stock in HCA -- the nation's largest for-profit hospital chain, founded by his father -- created a conflict of interest for a Senator deeply involved in shaping health care policy.

Then, this past June, Frist suddenly changed course and, in what he claims was an effort to avoid any conflict of interest, decided to sell off the stock. Nine days before the share price hit an all time high. And just one month before a company warning of weakening earnings sent the stock price tumbling.

As the Church Lady would say: "How convenient!" 

After all, the Good Doctor has had ample opportunity to examine the conflict question. He insisted owning HCA stock wasn't a conflict back in 1994 when he first ran for the Senate -- and the stock was trading at $27 a share. He was just as adamant in 1999 when the issue was raised during his efforts to block President Clinton's patients' bill of rights -- and the stock was at $24. And again in 2003, when he championed the Medicare prescription drug bill that directly benefited HCA -- and the stock was at $41. And again in 2004, when consumer groups cried foul about his involvement in the debate over malpractice reform (another potential financial boon to HCA) -- and the stock was at $40. 

So, if owning HCA stock wasn't a conflict of interest when it was trading at $24, $27, $40, and $41 a share, why did it suddenly become a problem at $58 a share? Was the Majority Leader's sudden burst of ethical sensitivity due to the latest round of complaints raised by... oh, sorry, there weren't any complaints. Then maybe it was the brewing firestorm over... hmm, there wasn't a firestorm either. 

Or could it, just maybe, I don't know... have been part and parcel of a massive stock sell-off by HCA insiders? Now, I'm not saying that Frist was pulling a Martha Stewart. But, if he wasn't, then he sure is one lucky SOB.

Forget running for president. Frist's next gig should be doling out stock tips on CNBC (although he clearly hasn't always been so blessed when it comes to playing the market).

Which bring us to the other big question facing Frist: why has he spent so much time and energy lying about how blind his not-at-all-blind trust actually is? 

According to Senate rules, Frist is allowed to receive information about the trust, and has the power to order the sale of a stock. Then why has he long been painting such a dramatically different picture? 

"I have absolutely no input," he said of the trust in 2000. "[The trustees] have 100 percent control." An out and out lie -- unless determining when to sell the stock doesn't qualify as "input."

And that's far from the only time Frist has been deceptive about his level of awareness and input regarding his stock holdings.

In January 2003, Frist told a television interviewer, "It should be understood that I put this into a blind trust. So as far as I know, I own no HCA stock." Sounds very reasonable and very convincing. I mean, it's called a "blind trust," right? Only problem is, we now have the documents that show that just two weeks before making that claim, Frist had been informed that more HCA stock had been added to his trust. And eight months earlier he had been advised that the trust had purchased $750,000 to $1.5 million in HCA stock. 

In that same interview, Frist said of the trust, "I have no control. It is illegal right now for me to know what the composition of those trusts are. So I have no idea." But it isn't illegal -- and Frist had a damn good idea about the makeup of the trust, having received nearly two dozen updates from the trustees between 2001 and July 2005.

Even after the story broke last week, Frist's staff steadfastly stuck to playing the clueless card. "Frist had no control over when the stocks were sold," said his spokesperson, Amy Call. Other than knowing the perfect moment to dump it, that is.

Politicians clearly want to have it both ways, and not-really-blind trusts let them do just that -- able to control their assets while giving voters the illusion of absolutely no control. But Frist went that extra mile, repeatedly lying through his teeth not to cover up a crime -- but to make himself look better.

In doing so, he has transformed himself from ready-made 2008 frontrunner into instant political punchline: "Bill Frist has this all upside down," said Rahm Emanuel. "He thought Terri Schiavo could see and his trust was blind."

A Majority Leader who is a proven serial liar -- and probably an insider trader -- is the last thing the GOP needs right now. Frist should remember what happened to Trent Lott (after all, he helped shove him aside) and resign while he can.

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/sen-frist-avoiding-conf_b_7922.html>

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Iraq Burns; Dems Look on the Bright Side
Posted September 27, 2005 at 5:04 p.m. EDT

If you need yet another reminder why the Democrats continue to teeter on the verge of becoming a permanent minority party, I suggest you pick up the Boston Herald and watch CBS News.

At the same time the situation in Iraq continues to deteriorate, with CBS reporting on the "undeclared civil war" raging between Shiites and Sunnis and the Saudi Foreign Minister telling the world that Iraq is "going toward disintegration," there was John Kerry giving a speech arguing that "progress" was being made. As the Boston Herald put it, Senator John Kerry "back-pedalled on blistering criticism of the war."

Unbelievable.

Andrew Gumbel's latest HuffPost turns a flashing red spotlight on why we need to reform our voting systems. But even the most corruption-free voting system in the world isn't going to help Democrats if they keep offering up candidates who make the kind of absurd pronouncements on Iraq Kerry did this week.

It's the clueless candidates, stupid!

This is not about rehashing the '04 debacle. It's about an object lesson in what not to do and say. Whether the Democratic standard is being borne by Kerry or Hillary or Biden or whoever else comes out of the pack, the party needs to stop making the same mistakes over and over again.

The winning strategy for Democrats in '06 and '08 needs to be fueled by a willingness to go after Bush's supposed strengths -- his ability to keep us safe and wage war on the terrorists. And how can you do that if you refuse to speak honestly about what is going on in Iraq -- indeed, if you end up using the White House's own talking points on the war?

The president likes to nutshell his "strategy for success in Iraq" by saying. "As Iraqis stand up, we will stand down." And there was Kerry yesterday at the Park Plaza hotel in Boston: "There is some schedule showing what you (need) to do to get Iraqis standing up and defending themselves which is now suddenly beginning to happen, so there are some signs of progress."

"Suddenly beginning to happen"? "Signs of progress"? Tell that, Senator, to CBS News correspondent Lara Logan, who reports that "there is a secret, ruthless cleansing of the country's towns and cities. Bodies -- blindfolded, bound and executed -- just appear, like the rotting corpses of 36 Sunni men that turned up in a dry riverbed south of Baghdad."

Kerry's comments echoed his infamous Grand Canyon declaration that even if he knew that there were no WMD in Iraq he still would have authorized the use of force in Iraq. This equivocating blast from the past is important because it was no accidental slip but a strategic decision fueled by the Kerry campaign's obsession with not upsetting America's fence-sitting voters.

This timid, step-on-no-toes approach will soon be on display once again in "Inside the Bubble," a new behind-the-scenes cinematic look at the Kerry camp. As reported by Lloyd Grove, the documentary's press release says the film shows a campaign team "that thought they could win by 'not making mistakes,' and keeping their candidate in the public eye without clarifying a position on anything."

Sounds like an absolute must-see for any Democratic kingmakers. If they learn nothing else from sifting through the ashes of '04, it's got to be that their candidates can't try to have it both ways -- paying lip service to opposing Bush's disastrous policy in Iraq while offering no alternative strategy.

Democrats lost in 2004 despite having just about everything that mattered go against Bush: Abu Ghraib, the rising insurgency, the 9/11 Commission finding no link between Saddam and al-Qaeda, the Duelfer no-WMD report, and Osama returning to the scene at the 11th hour looking tanned, rested, and ready to rumble.

And here they are, making the same damn mistakes again. Iraq is going up in flames, 60 percent of the country wants to go in a "significantly different direction than Bush," and John Kerry wants to look on the bright side of the war.

Forgive me while I tear my hair out.

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/iraq-burns-dems-look-on-_b_7974.html>

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Shots Across the Brow: On Integrity, Iraq, and al-Qaeda's Pecking Order
Posted September 28, 2005 at 9:30 p.m. EDT

If This Is Integrity...: Delay, Frist, Abramoff, Safavian... Wasn't this the crowd that was going to "restore honor and integrity" to Washington? If this is what integrity looks like, let's bring back Oval Office blow jobs.

Take the Scotty Quiz!: C-SPAN left me in suspense this morning. There I was, feeding my Scott McClellan addiction by watching the latest White House press briefing. Suddenly, a question piqued my interest: a reporter wanted McClellan to clarify remarks the president had made earlier in the day about "the way we're changing our strategy" in Iraq. But before Scotty could reply, C-SPAN abruptly and without warning cut away from the gaggle and over to Sen. John Warner on the Senate floor waxing lyrical (and vaguely Blue Boy) about John Roberts: "He is a magnificent man."

It was a couple of hours before I could finally track down a transcript of the press briefing -- hours spent speculating on what Scotty's answer might have been. I thought you might enjoy playing along. So, what was Scotty's reply?

A) "The president said what???"
B) "Why would we want to change our strategy, when things are going so well?"
C) "We have a strategy in Iraq?"
D) "Actually, when the president said 'changing our strategy,' he actually meant 'changing our talking points.'"
E) "We're fighting them there so that we don't have to fight them here at home."

(correct answer below)

# 2 at Al Qaeda...with a Bullet!: After reading that U.S. forces had killed Abu Azzam, identified by the LA Times as the "No. 2 Al Qaeda Leader in Iraq," I couldn't help but wonder: Where do they get these rankings? Are they based on raw stats like the Billboard 100 (ie most beheadings or suicide bombers recruited)? Some kind of playoff system? Or is there a ridiculously complicated poll like the BCS? And do they factor in intangibles like the blackness of your heart?

And what about Al Qaeda's #3? Does he automatically move up to #2 now that Azzam is dead, or can someone leapfrog the order of succession? For instance, can #5 suddenly become #2 if he has an IED hot streak?

And will the new #2, whoever he is, be happy for the promotion? Will he get a congratulatory e-mail from Osama bin Laden? A catchy job title like Azzam, who was known as the emir of Baghdad? Will it mean a big end-of-year bonus and a corner office down the hall from Abu al-Zarqawi or a million-dollar bounty on his head? Inquiring minds want to know.

Answer to the Scotty Quiz: E) "We're fighting them there so that we don't have to fight them here at home." I'm not kidding. He really said that -- as well as, "This is a strategy that was developed by our military commanders, because they're the ones who are on the ground, the ones on the ground who are in the best position to understand how to defeat the enemy. And it's a strategy that will succeed." In other words: Meet the new strategy; same as the old strategy.

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/shots-across-the-brow-on_b_8043.html>

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Shots Across the Brow: On DeLay's Deli Defense, Iraq, and Brownie
Posted September 29, 2005 at 4:25 p.m. EDT

The Deli Defense: It was inevitable. As soon as the DeLay indictment was announced, you just knew that shopworn references to a grand jury indicting a certain lunchtime favorite wouldn't be far behind. And, indeed, the ham sandwich analogies were flying last night on the cable shows.

"Everybody says you can indict a ham sandwich with a grand jury," said the man of the hour himself, Tom DeLay, on Hardball. "This is a ham sandwich indictment without the ham." Picking up this latest GOP talking-point twist on the cliché was Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen who told Larry King: "This is a ham sandwich indictment with one correction. There's no ham in the sandwich." Over on Fox, Charles Krauthammer piled on, adding his own 'special sauce' to the mix: "As the lawyers like to say, you can indict a ham sandwich and ... Tom DeLay is going to be a Big Mac for [the prosecutor]."

Putting aside the question of DeLay's similarity to a ham sandwich, and the ease with which a prosecutor could indict either of them, can we all agree that the time has come to retire the metaphor? I mean, there are lots of other perfectly good sandwiches on the menu. Why not "You can indict a hot pastrami sandwich"? Or a roast beef sandwich? Or turkey and swiss? Or tongue? Or any of the salads (tuna, chicken or egg)? Or, for health conscious indictees, avocado and sprouts on pita? Or the new Larry David sandwich?

In any case, the Deli Defense definitely needs some fresh meat.

The Iraq-9/11 Connection Rides Again: Proving that if you wish for something hard enough, sometimes you can make those wishes come true, Gen John Abizaid, testifying at a Congressional hearing on Iraq today, said that Al Qaeda is seeking to acquire and use WMD in the Middle East. "The enemy that brought us 9/11," said Abizaid, "continues to represent one of the greatest dangers to this nation." On one level, you've got to admire the stick-to-itiveness. These guys will connect Iraq to 9/11 if it's the last thing they do. Even if it means making America less safe in the process.

Testifying alongside Abizaid was Gen. George Casey, the commander of coalition forces in Iraq, whose testimony was a case study in what a high-ranking military officer who's had his knuckles rapped by the White House sounds like. Back in July, Casey strayed off the administration's no-timetable-for-withdrawal talking points, and predicted that U.S. forces could start making "fairly substantial reductions" in the spring of '06. But today he was singing a different tune -- one more in harmony with his Commander-in-Chief. "Success in Iraq will require patience and will," he said. "To be sure, the next couple of months are going to be tough." When asked about the shift in his thinking, Casey replied: "I think right now now we're in a period of a little greater uncertainty than when I was asked that question back in July."

Adding to that uncertainty was DoD spokesman Lawrence Di Rita, who said of Gen. Casey, "In July he had one assessment. He has an assessment now that could still result in what he said earlier, it could result in no change, it could result in more." Thanks for the clarification, Larry!

Of course, the president is still gung ho. "We're on the offensive," he said on Wednesday. "We have a plan to win." Or lose. Or maintain the status quo.

Download this!: My favorite line of the week (so far) came from Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke, who in explaining why FEMA foul-up Michael Brown was being kept on the taxpayer payroll for a full month after his resignation, said that the agency wanted to get the "proper download of his experience."

That should be the shortest info dump in history. One memo, one line: "Guys, Whatever I did... don't do it!" Shouldn't take a month to knock that puppy out. Not even for Brownie.

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/shots-across-the-brow-on_b_8094.html>

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Russert Watch: To Watch or Not To Watch
Posted September 25, 2005 at 9:30 p.m. EDT

Tim has finally done it -- the King of Conventional Wisdom, the Baron of Borderline-Hysterical Banality came out like a pit bull today and demanded accountability. The only problem is whom he demanded accountability from.

At the risk of giving Tim too much credit, inspiration for today's show must have come from Hamlet (or rather from Tom Stoppard's play) in which the bit players Rosencrantz and Guildenstern end up taking the blame (in the form of execution) for a crime they didn't commit and for the purpose of taking the heat off one of the main players.

Basically it breaks down like this. If you're a local official with very little power or resources, you're on notice: Tim is comin' after you. If you actually do have power, if you are, say, the President, the Vice President, or a columnist with a tremendous amount of influence -- like roundtable participant Tom Friedman, for instance -- i.e., a person who might be sharing a D.C Martini (two parts gin, one part vermouth, four parts received wisdom) with Tim, no need to worry: Tim's got your backside.

Playing the part of Rosencrantz today was the President. Not the President of the United States, of course, but the President of Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, Aaron Broussard.

In Tim's interview with Broussard, we saw a classic illustration of the Russert M.O.: the obsessive focus on small, meaningless detail in an effort to distract attention from much larger and actually meaningful points. It's such a Tim staple, I'd be surprised if he hasn't patented it.

You may remember Broussard from his appearance on MTP three weeks ago, in which he emotionally illustrated the disastrous incompetence of the Bush administration's response to Hurricane Katrina with the story of the 92-year-old mother of one of his staffers who died before help arrived.

Russert replayed the clip. And leaving aside the fact that it was clear from Broussard's reaction that he hadn't been told the clip was going to be played, the only point of replaying it was because Russert had found some discrepancies in the timeline of the woman's death. And this was worth a third of Meet the Press? More time than dozens of discrepancies from people at the top with the power to actually make life-and-death decisions?

Act Two featured no less than three columnists from the New York Times. If you've balked at subscribing to Times Select, here was your chance to get a little for free.

In this segment were Maureen Dowd, David Brooks, and Tom Friedman. Friedman is, of course, the foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times. As such, he's in a hugely powerful position to influence foreign policy. Which he did, by giving Bush and Cheney intellectual cover for a disastrous war.

Friedman has had almost as many rationales for the war as the administration, but his distinguishing characteristic is his sunny optimism that things are gonna be just fine over there. Whether this is attributable to what occasional Huffpo blogger David Rees calls Friedman's "Mustache of Understanding" or just simple intellectual confusion, it's hard to say.

In any case, if Tom feared Tim might pull up a few of his past columns about Iraq that have turned out to be embarrassingly wrong, well, Tom needn't have worried. Here are some statements that Russert could have brought up and some questions he could have asked, but didn't:

"This is no time to give up -- this is still winnable." (New York Times, 6/15/05)

How is "no time to give up" different from Bush's "stay the course"?

"One senses, though, that liberals so detest Mr. Bush that they refuse to acknowledge the simple good that has come from ending Saddam's tyranny -- good for Iraqis and good for America, because it will inhibit other terrorist-supporting regimes. Have no doubt about that." (New York Times, 5/4/03)

Do you still "have no doubt" that the war "will inhibit other terrorist-supporting regimes"? Do you really believe Syria and Iran are chastened because they believe Bush has the resources and support to whip up another 150,000 to 300,000 troops, and another $200 billion, and do this all over again?

"It was still the right war and still has a decent chance to produce a decent outcome." (Slate, 1/12/04)

How has the chance for a "decent outcome" weathered the past 20 months?

"The real reason for this war -- which was never stated -- was to burst what I would call the 'terrorism bubble,' which had built up during the 1990s." (Slate, 1/12/04)

Did we burst the "terrorism bubble"?

"Maybe it is too late, but before we give up on Iraq, why not actually try to do it right? Double the American boots on the ground..." (New York Times, 6/15/05)

Do you still think we should "double the American boots on the ground" and send another 140,000 troops to Iraq?

But there were no challenging questions. Just Friedman, again and again, driving the discussion into cul-de-sacs of cute little phrases ("drive-by politics") and cute little theories like this: "Well, I believe 9/11 truly distorted our politics, Tim, and it gave the president and his advisers an opening to take a far hard right agenda, I believe, on taxes and other social issues." 

The opening 9/11 gave the president, above all else -- as Friedman surely knows -- was to invade Iraq. Bush was always going to be Bush on taxes and social issues. Tax cuts for the wealthy didn't require 9/11. Expensive, calamitous wars of choice did.

But because it's now impossible to make a case for the war -- even with the Mustache of Understanding -- Friedman kept pivoting to domestic issues, where he hasn't soiled himself.

Both Tim and Tom want to rewrite history so that everybody was wrong on the war. First, Tim: "George W. Bush said there were [weapons of mass destruction]. Bill and Hillary Clinton said there were. The Russians, French and Germans, who opposed the war, said there were. Hans Blix of the U.N. said there were."

So according to Tim, there was unanimity of opinion on WMD. As if nobody had spoken out with doubts and questions. As if no intelligence was cherry-picked and sexed up. 

But here is Tom topping Tim: "Well, I think there was a huge amount of projection after 9/11. We really wanted to believe, you know, that the president knew what was going on ... [Katrina] has really ripped the curtain away and we see the guy back there behind the curtain like in "The Wizard of Oz," and I think there's a lot of people now stepping back and saying, "Oh, my God. Maybe he doesn't know what's going on."

Maybe? MAYBE? What level of failure would it take for Tom to move from "maybe" to "probably"? Not to mention "certainly"?

And, second, no, Tom, the curtain on the Iraq failure wasn't ripped away by Katrina. The country came to the conclusion that you seem to be fighting off with all your might before Katrina, with 57 percent of respondents to a Gallup Poll saying the war wasn't worth it back in May.

But Friedman was still speaking in the future tense about the possibility of a "fiasco" in Iraq. We're two and a half years into this war. At what point will Friedman jump to the present tense and declare it a "fiasco" now? Enough time has elapsed. Enough data are in. And the American people have started drawing some conclusions, even if Tom Friedman hasn't.

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/russert-watch-to-watch-o_b_7863.html>


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