Flush twice... it's a long way to Sally Quinn's place!

Pundit Pap
No Signs of Intelligence (Reform Bill, That Is...)
by the Pundit Pap Team
Sherrie G | Jane Grice | Jodi Schmidt

Nov. 21, 2004 (apj.us) -- The loudmouths of Sunday were beside themselves with... well, some sort of opinions about the failure of Congress to give the go-ahead for reforms recommended by the September 11th Commission. Corporate news was putting the blame on the Pentagon -- but reading between the lines, it was pretty clear that Democrats and moderate Republicans may turn out to be a more formidable bloc than George W. "Preznit Codpiece" Bush had bargained for. The vast majority of the country has finally realized that Bush doesn't really have all that much political capital to spend after all, and as for a broad green light for his agenda -- well, it's turned into a girly mandate.

The intelligence bill debacle was supposed to be a crowning moment in a week that also saw the major all-yes-man and -woman cabinet "shuffle" engineered by Dear Leader (actually, more likely his inner circle of delusional Neocon ). Instead, the bill's failure drowned out the changes within Junior's Regime -- which is a shame since any monicum of moderation is out the door with Colin "UN Speech" Powell.

Brace yourself for scene one from the Sunday spin...


These Freaks
No, not George and their guests, but who they were talking about!
Cast: George Stephanopoulos, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV (D-WV), Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), Sen. Mitch "Cabbage Patch" McConnell (R-KY), Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), Big George Will, Maureen Dowd, Walter Isaacson.

Back in the day when rock n' roll made the world go round, there was this band called the Beau Brummels. They had a big hit with a song called "Laugh, Laugh", which began, "I hate to say it, but I told you so...."

(One thing about dating yourself, you don't have to dress your best).

I have licked my wounds long enough. Time to give other folks a few.

I've heard people say for years that Republicans eat their young.

I have big news for you: if you believe half of what they were saying on This Week today, they have graduated from eating their young to nibbling parents, siblings and, in fact, anyone in their party who isn't nailed down, to include Gutless W. and "Erich von Stroheim" Cheney, who should have stopped when a mandate was merely something he wished his daughter would find.

Little Georgie began by announcing that CAN YOU IMAGINE, the REPUBLICAN-DOMINATED HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES of all people have scotched their very own president's desire to implement the findings of the 9/11 Commission, despite the fact that their leaders received personal calls from Gutless and Cheney stressing the importance of passing the bill! Golly, wonders Georgie, can this be a sign of things to come?

Betcherass it is, dearie. The election is over, Gutless can't run again, Cheney can't because if his heart wouldn't kill him the harpy he's married to would -- and now it is all about them, because they have the power and the people gave it to 'em. Now get out of their way.

The first segment consisted of a discussion with Little George and four members of the Senate; Mitch McConnell, Republican Drip - uh, whip, Jay Rockefeller, Chuck Hagel, and my personal favorite, Carl Levin.

Gutless was blown off by Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA). Apparently Hunter claimed he couldn't go along with the President because this bill would give the director of the new mega-intelligence agency too much power and take it away from the Pentagon and the idiot who is the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Carl Levin said that Hunter is wrong; the bill protected the Defense Department and the command structure of the commanders in the field. He pointed out that if Gutless wanted the bill passed, that spoke volumes as to the balance and acceptability of what the Senate had produced.

Jay Rockefeller said that Americans should remember the names of Hunter and of F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), the man who ignored Cheney, because if there was any kind of attack on America these are the guys who refused to play ball. He said Americans should also find it a little scary that Gutless and Cheney have no control over the very people they wanted to have in there.

Finally, Georgie slipped in the zinger that the main reason Hunter and his buddy Sen-Sen refused to let the matter go for a vote was because it would pass WITH THE HELP OF THE DEMOCRATS and they didn't want to allow that to happen so they kept it off the floor. Chuck Hagel, who was not a happy camper, said that he wasn't a party to the "machinations" that went on behind the scenes, but this was an example of the "extraneous political maneuvering" that is failing the American people. He said this was proof that the process needed more accountability and less bureaucracy.

Gee, ya think, Chuck?

Next on the agenda was Porter Goss and the bloodbath at the CIA. Georgie displayed a portion of a memo which Goss wrote stating that the CIA would refrain from politics, particularly partisan politics, and would simply provide the information and allow the policy-makers to make the policy.

Yeah, sure, right. Goss has already moved four of his minions from Congress into powerful positions at the Agency, leading to an exodus of longtime effective agency employees.

Jay Rockefeller, who opposed Goss's appointment from the get-go, said he wanted to believe what Goss was saying but had serious doubts. That led McConnell to smirkingly announce that the Senate couldn't say on the one hand that the agency was failing its intelligence function and on the other hand bemoan the shake-up. Chuck Hagel got a bit exercised at that remark and at McConnell, saying that this was not an assembly line at a car company. Intelligence is based on experience, not structure, and the agency cannot perform if all the experienced personnel are pushed out. He said that if the agency was as dysfunctional as John McCain and McConnell claimed, the country would have suffered much more damage in the past two years than it has.

We moved on to the Iraqi elections, which have now been scheduled for January 30th. Georgie wanted to know if the panel thought it would happen. Carl Levin said that it was extremely important for the elections to go off as scheduled. He added that any delaying or rescheduling will be proof to the insurgency that terrorism and murder work, and will cause even greater chaos than presently exists. He thinks we need to use the carrot and the stick to convince the Sunni community that it is in their best interest to become involved in these elections.

Mitch McConnell, apparently having had his happy pills finally kick in, stated blandly that the sky is not falling, of COURSE the elections will go off as scheduled, there is absolutely NO chance there will be any delay or problem and that the elections themselves WILL go off "basically" without a hitch and with no major incidents. All four of the other people on stage looked at him as if he had grown a second head -- and Georgie actually said, "WHAT? General Smith says they need at least (fill in your number here) more troops...." Hagel chimed in to say that these elections are indeed critical and will be the first real milestone to Iraqi self-governance. He went on to add that if these elections do come off (shooting a glance at Mitch) and an Iraqi assembly is elected, the United States needs to start considering withdrawing our troops. As he sees it, the United States is not only the present guarantor of Iraqi safety but the largest contributor to Iraqi insurgency, inasmuch as every time we bomb another town or hear reports of accidental death or injury to innocents, we create more enemies in Iraq. Hagel also pointed out that Iraq cannot live in a hostile neighborhood with constant arrival of foreign fighters. He was honest enough about declaring that there is no good choice we can make at the present time.

The discussion returned to the number of troops we need to succeed, and McCain's numbers of 40-50 thousand came up. Carl Levin noted that the numbers are increasing because while new people are cycling in, the current troops are not being returned on schedule and are being kept in-country. Levin was firm that the Sunni minority cannot be given veto power over the upcoming elections because it will demonstrate that there is no validity to the elections.

Colin Powell's recent comments on the Iranian nuclear program was discussed almost as an afterthought, with Rockefeller saying that nobody really knew where the information Powell gave came from. As far as the statements that Iran is pursuing nuclear power, Rockefeller agreed that they are definitely pursuing that power, but how close they are to achieving it is entirely another matter.

McConnell chimed in that while Gutless' opponents are always complaining that he is too unilateral, in this particular case Gutless is getting real cooperation from our European allies and there is a real chance that the UN will apply sanctions. So there, you big sillies. Carl Levin all but guffawed as he marveled that suddenly everyone thinks sanctions WORK. They certainly didn't think so when the sanctions were against Iraq. How convenient memory is. When Georgie asked him if Powell was giving reliable information, Levin had the chance to say that nobody knows, which is, full circle, back to the issue of intelligence. He said that we have to restore confidence in American intelligence-seeking, and we need more than one point of view.

Jay Rockefeller jumped in to agree with Levin, and to point out that if there is no contrarian point of view, there is no way to verify which reports are true. And on that note, Georgie closed the discussion, promising to return shortly with the panel discussion.

Dunno about your station break, but mine was a trailer for the new movie "The Aviator", starring Leonardo diCaprio as Howard Hughes. Cool, but he still looks ten years old. Maybe twelve.

The panel was rather interesting. The only regular was Big George F. Will, still cranky, but that may have been because his panel mates were Bob Woodward, Maureen Dowd and Walter Isaacson of Aspen Communications.

And the topic? Gutless' new cabinet, natch.

The fun began with Condolizzard as the new Secretary of State. Oh, please -- this woman never got the hang of the National Security Agency, and the Bush boy is giving her the State Department?

First on the table was an unsourced comment that Colin Powell really had wanted to stay longer to deal with the new situation in Israel, the Iranian issue and the elections in Iraq. Georgie suggested that Powell's problem had been a difficult relationship with Cheney.

Bob Woodward remarked that there had been a movie called "They were Expendable" released right after WWII. (Plot summary: shortly after Pearl Harbor, a squadron of PT-boat crews in the Philippines must battle the Navy brass between skirmishes with the Japanese. The title says it all about the Navy's attitude towards the PT-boats and their crews.) He said that clearly Colin Powell was expendable, and that Rumsfeld was equally involved in helping grease the "dump Powell" skids. Woodward said that Powell had remarked that Rumsfeld followed a "Rubber Gloves" theory, leaving none of his fingerprints on any of the Defense Department actions for which he held primary responsibility.

MoDo basically repeated her recent column about loyalty trumping competence, saying that the Gutless toadies were being rewarded for being yes-men and women, and that Gutless may as well go ahead and fire all those who didn't agree with him, since he never paid attention to anything they said anyway.
Walter Isaacson said that Colin Powell's legacy was going to be that he was right in almost every point he made, the mortal sin in the eyes of the Gutless administration. Big George intoned that Powell was the consummate soldier who soldiered on when he was asked. Will said that when asked, Powell had gone before the United Nations with an impressive speech and presentation and that when the facts he presented were proven to be wrong, he continued to soldier on as he was expected to do. Big George said that he couldn't understand why Powell would even want to continue under the constraints and indignities imposed on him.

Little George played a video of Gutless' effusive praise of the Lizzard, concluding with the tremulous announcement that truth, particularly her truth, has guided this nation to a better light. I really got the impression that not one member of the panel believes that Condolizzard is going to be an asset to the State Department. Isaacson remarked that she is merely Gutless' messenger, they share the core belief that the spread of democracy is the only way to guarantee American security but that above all she believes what her "client" believes, and her client is Gutless.

Rumsfeld is obviously going to remain in place for the foreseeable future, despite an apparently general consensus that he is the primary architect of the Iraqi situation. Mo said that the handwriting was on the wall when Rummy had a diplomatic dinner for the allies of the Iraqi war and Powell was not even invited to attend.

Woodward said that going from National Security Advisor to Secretary of State was going to eliminate the tension which should exist between those agencies and had always existed with the exception of the Nixon Administration when Henry Kissinger filled both positions.

There was some talk about the pre-election position of Gutless that it is "intolerable" for Iran to have nuclear capabilities. Isaacson said that the key phrase is "pre-election" and that these things are absolutely intolerable to Gutless only until they become fact, at which time a different song is sung -- as in North Korea, for example.

Big George said that Iran's decision to continue their nuclear policy was entirely rational and was in fact the only rational decision they could arrive at. He said that Iran is surrounded by Russia, Israel, India, Pakistan and Iraq; Russia, Israel, India and Pakistan are already nuclear powers and Iraq is occupied by the only remaining superpower.

Their views on the intelligence situation was that policy was being made based on faulty and erroneous intelligence, and unproven intelligence is as bad as no intelligence at all. Isaacson ended the segment by saying that when the president makes policy statements he must be able to prove the facts he uses to make the policy.

End of discussion. The show ended as always, with a smattering of comedy and melodrama from the political and late-night sides of life.

The only bright spot in a thoroughly depressing state of affairs is that with the exception of Mitch McConnell, there were no cheerleaders for any of the right wing whackofest that has become more strident since the election. As the end of the year plays itself out, morning-after regrets seem to be the order of the day.

Another four years of whatever. I can hardly wait. Note to Comedy Central: It may be time for new episodes of "That's My Bush."...

Stay tuned, boys and girls.

-- Sherrie Gogerty Geeting



Pundit Pap Invades McLauglin's Romper Room
The "Are The Conservatives Out Of Their Flipping Minds?!?" Edition

This chapter of today's Pundit Pap was delayed by having to deal with a few family issues (don't ask!), but here it is:

John McLaughlin opened it up with "Shock and Awe 2!" He was referring to the battle for Falluja, the City of Mosques.

But to me, it refers to how Johnny Mac has shocked and awed me with what verges on a David-Brock-like conversion. He's got into the shocking and awesome habit -- for a Republican, anyway -- of speaking sensibly about the issues!

But anyway...

McLaughlin mentioned that November 2004 has been the second-deadliest month for US ever since the invasion commenced in March of 2003 -- and November is only two-thirds done! He also brought up a report from the US Marine Corps' own intel department that says what we all know: unless the US keeps troops in Falluja, it will fall again to the insurgents -- as it has twice before -- and that we will have nothing to show for it but a bunch of dead bodies and a larger number of Iraqis who hate our guts enough to join the resistance.

Johnny Mac asks: What can we do?

Pat Buchanan's take: If only the Iraqi troops we hired would actually do their jobs, we'd be OK! (Well, Pat, maybe somebody should have told Paul Bremer not to disband the freaking Iraqi Army last year after it surrendered. Most of the regular army were quite willing to work for us -- but then Bremer screwed them over, hard. Guess what? They're now fighting against us, and unlike the poor schlubs the coalition forces are raising from the dust and calling 'soldiers', they actually know how to fight.)

Eleanor Clift said, rightly, that we simply don't have enough troops to secure all of Iraq, and that this shows the failure of the Rumsfeld Doctrine. (You do remember Donald Rumsfeld, don't you? Secretary of Defense? Guy who thought that we could take and hold Iraq with one-quarter the troops used in Desert Storm?)

Tony Blankley, who looks like Jabba the Hutt in a Savile Row suit (or very good Hong Kong knockoff), joined Pitchfork Pat on the Pollyanna bench. His take: things will be just peachy once we get more Iraqi suckers (er, I mean 'troops') trained.

Johnny Mac then played a tape of the UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, saying what the USMC's own intel unit said: attacking Falluja played into the insurgents' hands.

And the cons' reaction? Why, Attack The Messenger, of course! How totalitarian of them. Even Hitler and Stalin reacted to bad news better than this.

Vaughn Ververs, of the National Journal Hotline -- and who looks eerily like Damien from The Omen -- led the Kill The Messenger charge. According to him, Kofi Annan's comments weren't helpful at all, and Annan and the UN had better watch their step.

Brilliant, Comrade Ververs! Your career as Beltway zampolit is assured.

Pitfork Pat, eager to atone for his anti-invasion stance and to regain his status among the Busheviks now that they've stolen another four years of power, seconded Ververs' comments. So, of course, did Tony Blankley. One of the three made some bizarre comments about a UN sex scandal -- which has absolutely zero relevance to the question of whether or not invading Falluja for the third time was a wise move on the US' part. But that, of course, was the point: they can't face the facts, so they must distract.

Eleanor Clift tried not to laugh too hard as she twitted the boys for scapegoating poor Kofi Annan and the UN.

Johnny Mac then brought up the videotaped attack on the mosque (and on the wounded Iraqi in the mosque) in Fallujah -- and how the attack has likely ensured that the Sunnis will stay out of the elections scheduled for January.

(I want to note what was not noted by any one on the program: that while the Shhites are the majority in Iraq, the Sunnis are a significant minority in Iraq [not the majority, as noted in the original version of this article -- we regret the error]. A government without Sunnis is not a government that can claim to represent the whole of Iraq, or claim anything approaching a mandate.)

Of course, the conservatives were still in Pollyanna Mode: "It'll be just fine! Really!" Clift and McLaughlin, on the other hand, predicted that it would lead to elections for only a small part of Iraq at best, and civil war at worst. I detected a growing dismay on the part of Clift and McLaughlin at their conservative friends' refusal to so much as exchange e-mails with reality, much less actually face it.

McLaughlin asked, to sum it up: "Did the Falluja offensive work?"

Pitchfork Pat: Yes. Clift: No -- and the shooting of the wounded Iraqi (the video of which has now been seen by every Middle Easterner with access to a TV, thanks to Al Jazeera) didn't help matters.

Issue 2: Clearing the Decks! (Or the Neocons' recreation of the Night of the Long Knives.)

By now, everyone knows the score. So far, six major members of the Bush Administration -- including John Ashcroft, Colin Powell and Spencer Abraham -- are gone. More will follow.

Jabba was excited over this. He gleefully compared it to how Nixon cleaned house in 1972. Yes, children, Tony Blankley thinks that Bush's surrounding himself with sycophants and yes-men, in finest paranoid Tricky Dick style, is A Good Thing. And so does former Nixon Administration employee Pat Buchanan.

But Johnny Mac, another former Nixon employee, disagreed, and so did Eleanor Clift. Clift pointed out that Bush elevated Condoleeza Rice, who was known mostly for "parroting" Cheney/Rumsfeld (aka PNAC, but no pundit dares say PNAC's name on TV) doctrine, but who was utterly incompetent at her job. In short, Bush is rewarding incompetence and refusing to admit mistakes. Jabba's response was to feebly swat at Clift for insulting Condi Rice with the "parroting" remark. (Again, the standard neocon tactic: they can't face the facts, so they must distract.)

Issue #3: DeLay and Lame Duckery!

McLaughlin: Was it a good idea -- politically or otherwise -- for Tom DeLay to force his House Republican caucus to undo the ethics rule they'd put in place in 1993, just to save DeLay's own skin from getting nailed come indictment time?

Do I even have to tell you what they all said? Oh, okay, I will anyway.

The cons, including "Damien" Ververs, all said that this was a splendid idea, and besides that evil Ronnie Earle, the Texas DA with DeLay's machine in his gunsights, was just an evil partisan Democrat. Never mind that Earle's prosecuted four times as many Democratic pols as he has Republicans -- the cons stuck to their "evil partisan Democrat" chant with the precision and fervor of Soviet members of the Young Communists League -- or the Hitler Youth, in Pat's case.

Eleanor Clift had the perfect rejoinder: "I have no sympathy with Republicans whining about partisan prosecutions after what they did to Clinton." That shut up the cons but good.

Issue #4: Iraq War Costs and Rising Debt!

McLaughlin rattled off the rising Iraq war costs -- over five billion a month now, bucking for six -- and asked: What's the political impact?

"Damien" was the only one of the cons (You remember those folks, right? The people in favor of balanced budgets?) who dared open his mouth -- and when he did, it was only to mumble.

Issue #5: The Clinton Library!

McLaughlin asked: Was impeachment justified, or was it a power grab and effort to undo two elections?

Clift: By 1998, seven separate independent counsel investigations, costing hundreds of millions of dollars by the time they were all done, were in progress -- and that all resulted in one (1) indictment. So, no, it was NOT a good use of our money!

Final Question: How long will Rumsfeld stick around?

Various time frames were suggested, but no one thinks he'll be around in 2008. In fact, most have him gone by next Christmas. This is a tacit admission that Rumsfeld and his fellow PNAC Platoonies screwed up big-time when they railroaded us into Iraq. But Rumsfeld will be the only PNACer to pay for PNAC's sins -- Dick Cheney will still be in DC.

And that was that.

-- Jodi Schmidt



FAUX News Sunday

The truth is, FAUX News is so phony, I can usually take only about the first segment of their fake "public affairs" show, "FAUX News Sunday" -- anything more and I feel as if I'm going to give into the overwhelming urge to smash the picture tube of my television with the nearest wieldable piece of furniture.

This particular Sunday, Chris Wallace began with his thong all in a bunch because the House of Representatives blocked that intelligence reform bill Snippy's been eager to sign into law. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts claimed there was resistance from within the "intelligence" community (he must mean the Office of Special Plans -- in the Pentagon) and he declared that "Congress gets a big fat F" for not ramming the legislation through. Roberts actually accused some in the House of committing "sabotage" -- and, predictable, Chris put on his best outraged tone and parroted back, "Sabotage?" as a rhetorical question. Chris's other guest, Intel RMM Sen. Jane Harman, said Roberts gives the Senate too little credit; the bill, she added, came unglued in the House, some GOPers never wanted a reform bill, and Hastert could not go around them (translation: Hastert and Bush failed, and Democrats should remind them of it at every turn). She added that Dick Cheney's handwritten language was shot down.

Roberts also took a swat at the Pentagon's claim that the bill would hobble their ability to use intelligence, saying none of the bills had anything to do with doing harm to battlefield intelligence -- and that Don Rumsfeld's wrong when he asserts that the military is the top consumer of intel, because the President is.

In his best ersatz tone of concern, Chris asked if the nation is "endangered," and Harman said the nation has had massive intel failures -- and now there are claims that Iran is ramping up nukes. Does the rest of the world believe us? Pretty doubtful. (My guess is that that would be a big "yes" from Harman.) Roberts said that what we do (i.e. the legislation) influences intelligence globally at a time when there's a war against terrorism. (Make that a second "yes.")

Chris then asked if Porter Goss is involved with a heavy-handed purge at the CIA. Roberts said no, he's a friend of Goss, who is worried about leaks and criticism. (Translation: yes, the leakers have made Rummy and Cheney look bad, and the rank-and-file had best get with the PNAC program.) Goss's memo, added Roberts, says "We do not make policy." (Translation: Bush's handlers make the doctrine, we provide the facts to justify it, and screw the reality-based world.) Harman said punishing leakers is fine -- and she wants to find out who leaked Valerie Plame's name!

(You could see Chris cringe. Jane Harman's my new hero. you GO, girl!)

Harman continued, saying she's been called a vicious partisan, but she's worried about "baby spies," the newest agents who take risks they never took before -- they are undermined by disarray, and Goss must get control over agency management and rein in those who are undermining the agency. (Translation: Goss had better not take a partisan stance in his management and personnel decisions.)

Chris, summoning up his best quasi-indignation, said that one agent wrote a critical book! (See below; said agent appeared on Meet the Press.) Harman said she had no idea how that book got published -- she wants to see a stop to undermining from within (i.e. politicization of intelligence). Goss MUST deliver on the promise of speaking truth to power.

Chris asked how solid intelligence on Iran is; Roberts said the Senate Intel Committee's looking into it, and worried about it; they are working with foreign intel agencies. After all the intel that turned out to be wrong about Iraq, asked Chris, what about this Iran intelligence? Harman replied that she's a more sophisticated consumer now, and we don't know enough -- we need precise data before cobbling out policy. The junior recruits are going to get us solid, actionable data.

FAUX cut to a commercial, and we changed the station when Chris said that they'd be looking at (read: bashing) the opening of the Clinton Presidential Center.

-- Jane Grice



From: "Sherrie G"
To: "Jane G"
Subject: Oh, Jane, you SHOULD have stayed with faux...

... because when they came back from the station break Chris read a note from the Defense Department that they had sent over after Jane Harman's comments -- not two minutes later, they are on the HORN with FAUX! Jesus, Mary and Joseph.



Beat the Press
Fear, fear and fear as Timmy talks Iran, Iraq, Failed Intel and 9/11
Playas: Tim Russert, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ; member, Senate Armed Services Committee), Michael Scheuer (just-retired CIA Senior Analyst and "Anonymous" Author of "Imperial Hubris")

Tim Russert did his best to position the Regime's desire for conflict with Iran by making it issue one.

No surprise there -- anyone reading between the lines can tell the "W Is For War Boy" Bush and Don Rumsfeld really, really want to take out the rest of the Axis of Evil.

Timmy's first guest, Sen. McCain, was more than happy to help the rotund pundit peddle more than the requisite two minutes' hate, saying "we certainly should be very concerned, disturbed and even alarmed" about single-sourced rumors that there are secret uranium enrichment facilities in Teheran. He also pushed the Bush Boy's doctrine of unilateral preemption ("...at the end of the day it's the United States of America that may have to act if we act" -- well, of course, if we act, it's the US that acts -- jeez). In a moment of levity, Tim asked McCain if he'd be disappointed if Israel took out Iran's nuke facilities (and wouldn't that be just like Ariel Sharon, taking all the fun away from Junior). McCain called it a tougher challenge.

But the whole gambit was quite clear -- Iran has nukes! Be scared1 Islamic bombs! Osama! Saddam! Creepy Muslim tairists!

McCain did say Iran has "a matter of months" to give up on the nuclear aspirations. Hoo-boy -- he sounded like he's definitely speaking for his jailhouse groom, the former Texas governor. Count on that to make tomorrow's front page above the fold.

Tim and JJ turned to Iraq, and made a flippant comparison of the present qWagmire to "Whac-a-Mole." (Problem is, those moles whack back with AK-47s.) McCain said "The operation in Fallujah was very successful. We killed over a thousand of these people and captured almost an equal number. It is a significant setback." (Unbelievable -- and wrong on so many levels. Dead civilians are hardly a "success." And a significant setback/ The insurgents weren't even in Fallujah for the most part!) In fact, McCain undermined his gushing with the admission that more troops are needed: ""I would say at least 40,000 or 50,000 more." (Put that "above the fold" forecast into reruns. And can you feel a draft? Jenna? Barbara?) McCain also admitted, "We made mistakes at the beginning of this conflict. We made mistakes at the beginning of World War II." (JJ, we've learned a helluva lot since World War II, and the Feith-based errors Rummy, Condi, Colin and Chimpy made could have been prevented.)

McCain also had words of wisdom about that video of an American Marine shooting an insurgent inside a Fallujah Mosque: "People of the world should interpret that film as an American Marine under the most difficult and trying circumstances, having seen his friends killed in the worst way." (They won't, John -- in fact, that Marine had been wounded the day before and should NOT have been back in action -- and his tragic blunder has given aid and comfort to insurgents, Islamic extremists and Al Qaeda. Guarantee you that this horrid error will help recruit hundreds of kids in the region into barbarism.)

But we cheered McCain as he put a new layer of smackdown on the Pentagon for interfering with post-9/11 intelligence reform legislation: "This is one of the more Byzantine kind of scenarios that I have observed in the years that I have been in Congress. It's hard for me to imagine the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff sending that letter without at least consulting with the secretary of defense. It's well-known that the secretary of defense wasn't enthusiastic about this loss of budget authority." (Uh-oh, Rummy -- someone's a little miffed at you now!) McCain later said that he thinks the Bush boy called Uncle Donald and told him to get with the program.

When the topic turned to the CIA, Russert quoted a column by Robert Novak -- you remember him, 6the "douchebag of liberty" whose big mouth compromised not only the identity of a top covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame, but her whole cover operation whose goal was to stop the proliferation of WMDs. Novak was putting words, it would appear, in John McCain's mouth -- or at least quoting him way out of context to boost Novak's destabilizing Neoconservative proclivities. McCain tried to clarify the situation by praising the midlevel operators at the CIA -- but also pushed the Official Bush Regime Talking Point ® that it was the CIA's fault that Powell said there were WMDs, citing an obviously hyperbolic comment by George Tenet that the Feithified case was a "slam dunk." But he also said that contrary to Novak's spew, he "didn't order [Porter Goss] or in any way, you know, say -- as much as I like Bob Novak, I was -- uh -- it was more of an agreement on our part that there has to be changes." He also tried to pitch Goss as non-political in his CIA "reforms" -- quite unconvincingly. He also said that agents like Michael "Anonymous" Scheuer should have the right to publish if it's cleared by the CIA.

After some gab about the Kerry campaign (and reports that Kerry blamed the Osama tape for his loss), McCain got a smile out of us as he lit into GOP greed in the $388 billion appropriations bill: "It's loaded with pork-barrel projects. Since 1990--in 1994, there were 4,000 earmarks. This year there were 14,000 earmarks. This is these special deal projects ranging from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame to studying the DNA of bears in Montana. It's outrageous. The system is broken. We need to fix it. We've got to have some kind of way of challenging these earmarks." Russert said Republicans control the government and it's their problem. McCain: "We're going to have to fix it, and I believe that part of our base -- of the Republican base -- is fiscal conservatives, and they're very unhappy." McCain was not happy with the language that would allow the Senate to snoop on YOUR tax returns -- but disappointed truth seekers when he blamed a couple of staffers for inserting the language. I hear from them all the time.

McCain also lit into the majority of House Republicans who voted late last week to change their rules to allow Tom DeLay to remain GOP leader if he is indicted. McCain said even Newt Gingrich disagreed with the move. (Whoa! Now THAT is some indication into just how quantifiably sleazy DeLay really is...)

Tim also brought up radical cleric Bob Jones III's demand that they have a "seat" at the Bush "table." McCain pointed out that he's had unspecified "disagreements" with Jones before going into a high dudgeon about how "uneasy" many Americans are with "Desperate Housewives" and (clearly satirical) racy sketches before football games. He also said, "I am a pro-life, pro-family, fiscal conservative and advocate of a strong defense, and yet Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and a few Washington leaders of the pro-life movement call me an unacceptable presidential candidate

Will he be a candidate for the 2008 nomination? (You've gotta love it -- Kerry hasn't even been sworn in [yes, Kerry -- watch the shenanigans in Ohio, you never know] and Russert's already salivating for his dry marker whiteboard again.) Even McCain said, "Isn't it a little, you know, unseemly to--for any of us to start on that path again?" before setting the theme for an '08 run: "... we are not as much red and blue as is portrayed here in Washington and is the case here in Washington.

There was some talk about Friday's unacceptable basketball melee, and then McCain beat a hasty retreat.

The whole segment was frustrating. McCain is clearly going along with the Bush agenda for political reasons -- but showed enough independence and rebel streak to make it clear that he is fully capable of being his own guy. When things begin to go south on the foreign relations front, look for McCain to start showing a lot more independence, and plenty of the withering rhetoric that he's capable of when the buffalo patties hit the blower.

The segment that followed was a fascinating interview with Michael Scheuer. Not much in the way of politics was touched on; Scheuer in effect gave the nation a briefing on what he sees as the continuing Al Qaeda threat -- particularly Osama's goal of economically destabilizing the United States and coveting of nuclear material. Naturally, this sort of "scare tactic" stuff plays right into the Bush agenda -- but Scheuer cane across as a man possessed, yet highly credible and thorough in his understanding of facts. And he did take a shot at Richard Clarke -- despite the fact that the two experts do seem to agree on almost every issue surrounding Osama, Al Qaeda, and the lead-up to September 11, 2001.

-- Jane Grice