Egypt Chaos: It’s All Bush’s Fault

This article in The Daily Telegraph, which is based on leaked cables from Wikileaks, has been getting a lot of play since Drudge linked to it.  To me, the key graph is the second paragraph where we’re given a timeline:

Egypt protests: America’s secret backing for rebel leaders behind uprising

The American government secretly backed leading figures behind the Egyptian uprising who have been planning “regime change” for the past three years, The Daily Telegraph has learned.

The American Embassy in Cairo helped a young dissident attend a US-sponsored summit for activists in New York, while working to keep his identity secret from Egyptian state police.

On his return to Cairo in December 2008, the activist told US diplomats that an alliance of opposition groups had drawn up a plan to overthrow President Hosni Mubarak and install a democratic government in 2011.

So the leader of the uprising was brought into the U.S. while Bush was still president!

I’ll say this.  After the November 2008 election, President Bush kicked the can on several issues and left the final decision to his successor, particularly economic decisions.  A classic example would be whether to allow GM to go into liquidation or to keep the company afloat until the Obama Administration came into office.  Bush chose to have the federal government loan GM enough money to stay in business till Obama was sworn in, at which point the new president chose how to bail out the failed car maker.

But when it came to national security issues in the Arab world, President Bush did not put those decisions on the back burner.  What’s more, just imagine how Dick Cheney would have reacted if an Egyptian opposition activist had been brought to the U.S. without anybody in the administration knowing about it.  There is no way that this  person came into this country without the full knowledge and backing … if not the active participation of … the Bush Administration.

If The Telegraph story is true — and no one has denied that the leaked cables contain false information — this would make a lot of sense and fits into the pattern that the dreaded neocons in the Bush Administration saw as the long-term solution to terrorism emanating from the Arab world: Freedom and Democracy.

— uo

Corporate Takeover of Obama Presidency Nearly Complete

Out with the old, in with new corporate friends.

I already talked about bailout boy and GE chief Immelt getting appointed to an advisory post in the Obama administration.

Late last week, EPA Administrator Browner (a big proponent of getting tough on air pollution) getting the boot.

To top it all off, it looks as though we’re on the verge of getting a former RIAA lawyer as the new solicitor general (that’s the guy who argues cases in court on behalf of the country).

This administration has never been a friend of the middle class. It’s all about the large corporations getting fat at the trough. Just look who were the biggest proponents of the healthcare reform: the evil drug companies.

— uo

The Prosecutor’s Name was Javert

I’ve been in this situation.  I live in an area where the public schools in our district are total crap.  The middle school has been one of those “failing” schools that are so bad that low income kids can transfer out.

I happen to be one of those rich bastards who have enough money to pay for private school.

But not everybody who is in my situation goes with the private school solution.  I have heard of some families who live in bad school districts, yet they still send their kids to public schools.  But here’s the catch.  They buy condos or small houses in a good district and register that as their home address so that their kids don’t have to go to the bad school.

With that in mind, read this: You’ll Stick With Your Crappy School, and You’ll Like It

Crazy case in Ohio, where a 40-year-old single mother lied about the residency of her children in order to get the kids into a better public school. Kelley Williams-Bolar claimed her kids lived with their grandfather rather than with her in Akron. Instead of merely transferring the kids back to the bad school, local officials instead decided to charge Williams-Bolar with two felonies, claiming that by enrolling her kids in the better school, she defrauded taxpayers of more than $30,000.

Williams-Bolar was convicted and sentenced to five years in prison earlier this month …

So the rich can buy an empty condo whose only purpose is to get an address in a school district so their kids get into the most desired schools.  But a poor black woman does something not that different than those rich families, and she gets convicted of felonies and sentenced to five years in prison.

I hear the prosecutor’s name was Javert.

By the way, wasn’t government-mandated busing supposed to have made all school districts equal so that this kind of thing wouldn’t be necessary?

— uo

Surprise Solution To Deficit Reduction

I’m not going to weigh in on the spending cuts that the Republicans have identified.  It’s a lengthy list, which means I’m sure there are some things I agree with, and some that I disagree with.  But here’s one that stood out: Require collection of unpaid taxes by federal employees. $1 billion total savings.

Here are the facts, according to Richard Oppedisano, national secretary for the Federal Managers Association, who fears that proposed legislation in Congress goes to far attempting to collect delinquent tax bills:

“… [I]n 2008, federal employees, retirees, and active-duty and retired members of the armed services owed $3 billion in back taxes, former members of the military owed the largest portion of that amount — $1.3 billion. That year, 97,000 federal employees owed $962 million in unpaid taxes, Oppedisano said; that figure was down from 171,000 federal workers in 2007. He noted that almost 700 congressional staffers currently owe back taxes…”

Even well-paid Capitol Hill staffers felt that you should pay taxes, but they needn’t bother.

Obviously, these people got their tax advice from either Tom Daschle, Hilda Solis, Nancy Killefer, Ron Kirk or Tim Geithner.

— uo

On the Media’s Coverage of the Arizona Shootings

On the media’s coverage of Jared Loughner and the Arizona shooting:

“It’s strange, but when it comes to getting inside the mind of this human being who seems to possess no empathy, sense of morality, or hold on reality, and who is motivated only by personal animus and self-glorification, the nation’s major political pundits have been amazingly adept,” said Horizon Media analyst Bob Cullen, who has studied extensive tape of commentators on all major TV news programs and found their remarks on “what the killer is thinking” to be consistently thorough and detailed across the board. “It’s almost as though they have some way of knowing, firsthand, exactly what this demented and highly dangerous individual with the eyes of millions upon him is going through.”

Multi-layered Source

— uo

Interesting Coincidence

Time line:

1. Several years ago, Keith Olbermann becomes a GE employee (via GE’s ownership of MSNBC).

2. Keith Olbermann becomes a devout Obama supporter.

3. Keith Olbermann transforms into a disillusioned Obama supporter.

4. President Obama names head of GE to run the president’s economic advisory panel.

5. Unexpectedly, GE employee Olbermann resigns under pressure.

6. Like Olbermann’s perenially 2nd-place-rated show, the ratings for the story of Keith’s departure take a back seat to stories about Justin Timberlake’s texts and speculation that a star in the Orion nebula could go supernova next year.

— uo

P.S. – I have to admit, that I am NOT happy about Immelt getting that presidential appointment.  After all, this is just another bailout boy getting fat at the government trough.

Colleges Fail to Deliver – Evidence #1,287,432

What do kids learn in college?  Apparently, not much.

My favorite reaction is probably the most truthful statement I’ve read in the news in a long time.  It’s from a professor who says, “I am part of a great credentialing mill.”  I couldn’t agree more.

Perhaps that explains why so many college graduates — realize that I am talking about graduates here, not just people who attended college — are in jobs that don’t even require a high school diploma.

If all you get is a bachelor’s degree from a liberal arts college, you’re destined to be an underachieving money waster.

— uo