From the Best of the Web…

If you survived 9/11–and this is true no matter who you are–you are more than five years closer to death now than you were then. Reuters should look into this aspect of the story. No doubt they can find some experts to explain that it’s President Bush’s fault.

And it’s almost certain that by the time Bush has left office, that number will increase to almost 7 years.

Net worth of U.S. households skyrockets
Unemployment Rate Dips to 4.5 Percent
US trade deficit shrinks to 59.1 billion dollars
AIDS Vaccine Nearing Reality

Look what a mess of things Bush has made!

The Internationl Herald Tribune
Libby trial reveals inner workings of Bush White House

[excerpts]

In some of their efforts, Cheney and his agent, Libby, appeared even maladroit in the art of media management.

Since the vast majority of the media hate republicans with a pathological passion, one has to wonder how the reporter expects a GOP vice-president to handle the snarling pit-bulls known as "reporters".

Wilson wrote that he returned from Africa highly doubtful about the claim and reported that to the CIA and the State Department.

When Bush repeated the claim months later — in a now infamous 16- word sentence of his 2003 State of the Union Address weeks before the Iraq invasion — Wilson wrote that he was compelled to question publicly whether Cheney had ignored his findings because they were inconvenient to the case against Iraq.

Even prosecution witnesses have testified that while Cheney had asked for more information about the accusation that Saddam sought uranium in Africa more than a year before the invasion, he did not know that Wilson was sent to investigate. And, witnesses said at the trial, he did not learn about the trip — or about Wilson’s findings in any great detail — until Wilson had begun to make his case publicly.

This might explain why Cheney was so intent on debunking Wilson.

But the fact that Wilson was a biased, partisan hack whose "investigation" was disputed by many others, including British intelligence, would have had no part in Cheney’s motivation, right?

For a "news" story, the piece certain reads like a poorly investigated, poorly thought out OpEd.

From AFP (some French news service):

US President George W. Bush has defended his much-criticized policies toward Iraq, Iran and North Korea, even as Congress moved toward a vote assailing his Iraq troop increase.

In his first White House news conference of 2007, Bush said a group within the Iranian government was supplying weapons to Iraqi insurgents, but said he did not know if top Iranian officials had ordered their activity.

IHT (Interntaional Herald Trbune) adds:

Speaking at a news conference in the East Room of the White House, Bush dismissed as “preposterous” the contention by some skeptics that the United States was drawing unwarranted conclusions about Iran’s role. He publicly endorsed assertions that had until now been presented only by anonymous military and intelligence officials, who have said that an elite branch of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps known as the Quds Force has provided Shiite militias in Iraq with the sophisticated weapons that have been responsible for killing at least 170 American soldiers and wounding more than 600.

With Iran’s sterling reputation for peace and goodwill toward both the US and Iraq one must wonder what Bush is thinking. It’s a good thing both the US and the foreign press are so quick to defend terrorists and radicals, otherwise they could get accused of all kinds of nasty stuff. Next they’ll be accusing the Iranian president with being a holocaust denier.

From the Washington Post…

The president played host to Vaccarella, a Hurricane Katrina survivor trailed by a documentary crew, for coffee at the White House yesterday to demonstrate concern for those still afflicted a year after the storm. Vaccarella, it turned out, had another idea in mind as well.

"I just wish the president could have another term in Washington," he said as cameras rolled on the South Lawn, where the two appeared together after coffee.

"Wait a minute," Bush interjected with a laugh.

"You know, I wish you had another four years, man," Vaccarella said. "If we had this president for another four years, I think we’d be great."

Of course Democrats were quick to grab the media’s attention with their own spin on it…

Democrats quickly responded with a statement noting that Vaccarella once ran for local office as a Republican and with a report blasting the administration’s post-Katrina work.

"In our Gulf Coast, the tens of thousands of Hurricane Katrina survivors are still engaged in an unparalleled struggle to rebuild their lives," said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (Calif.). "Meanwhile, back in Washington, President Bush is holding a public relations blitz that the survivors of Katrina can ill afford."

But, isn’t their press release, just as much a public relations "blitz"?

Leave it to Democrats to continue to bewail the efforts to rebuild after Katrina by referring to is as "an unparalleled struggle to rebuild their lives". I can think of quite a few people who’ve had a worse job rebuilding their lives, say 9/11 survivors for one. And why is it the Katrina survivors can "ill afford" Bush’s press conference? What harm is it doing them?

Katrina is another area where the worse things go for the regular people, the better Democrats like it. With that kind of immoral pragmatism, do we really want more in office?

Ann Althouse writes in a New York Times Op/Ed…

TO end her opinion in American Civil Liberties Union v. National Security Agency — the case that enjoins President Bush’s warrantless surveillance program — Judge Anna Diggs Taylor quoted Earl Warren (referring to him as “Justice Warren,” not “Chief Justice Warren,” as if she wanted to spotlight her carelessness): “It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of … those liberties … which makes the defense of the nation worthwhile.”

As long as we’re appreciating irony, let’s consider the irony of emphasizing the importance of holding one branch of the federal government, the executive, to the strict limits of the rule of law while sitting in another branch of the federal government, the judiciary, and blithely ignoring your own obligations….

For those who approve of the outcome , the judge’s opinion is counterproductive. It will be harder to defend upon appeal than a more careful decision. … Look at that juicy quotation from Judge Taylor’s ruling: “There are no hereditary kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution.”

But this is sheer sophistry. The potential for the president to abuse his power has nothing to do with kings and heredity. (How much power do hereditary kings have these days, anyway?) And, indeed, the president is not claiming he has powers outside of the Constitution. He isn’t arguing that he’s above the law. He’s making an aggressive argument about the scope of his power under the law.

To be fair to the NYTs I’m limiting what I quote, but the rest of the Op/Ed is really good and recommend you go read it.

Ann hits the nail on the head in regards to Taylor’s silly ruling. That she dislikes Bush, the war and the GOP is abundantly clear. She insists the President be held to strict guidelines, while ignoring the guidelines established for judges (proper refusal process as well as revealing possible conflicts of interest). But then that’s Liberals for you.

The Boston Globe reports on Bush’s responsibility for AIDS in Africa:

One telling moment..[at the International AIDS Conference in] Toronto came last Sunday when Bill Gates, whose foundation has spent billions on global health in recent years, praised PEPFAR, prompting a chorus of boos from the audience. Earlier, Stephen Lewis, the passionate United Nations special envoy on AIDS in Africa, said that the Bush administration’s push for abstinence programs as part of its ABC policy-which calls for abstinence until marriage, being faithful to one’s partner, and failing that, using condoms-amounts to "incipient neocolonialism."

How horrible! Bush is blamed for the increase in deaths of Africans from AIDS. Oh, but wait, it seems the activists at the Toronto conference weren’t really payng all that much attention. The same Boston Globe article also said:

FIVE YEARS AGO, in Jos, Nigeria, a city on the country’s central plateau, Dr. John Idoko regularly made rounds in a hospital packed with people dying from AIDS because they couldn’t pay for the antiretroviral drugs necessary to keep them alive. Three years ago, as the price of the drugs plummeted, the Nigerian doctor was able to deliver the life-extending medication to 700 patients-until his government’s supply ran out for several months.

Today, the change for the better is astonishing: Idoko now treats nearly 6,000 HIV-positive patients. He has expanded his clinic three times in five years, and his waiting room once again is too crowded. “Now, we are eyeing an abandoned building nearby," he said last week, chuckling.

The major reason for Idoko’s success is the Bush administration’s AIDS program, which in the last three years has sent billions of dollars to Africa and helped save the lives of hundreds of thousands of people. When I moved to Africa three years ago, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, was just getting off the ground. As I return to Washington this month, the $15 billion program is just hitting its stride, and many Africans believe it has become the single most effective initiative in fighting the deadly scourge.

Oh well, they can’t blame Bush for killing Africans but they’ve still got that "incipient neocolonialism" thing. Liberals are assuming, as they usually do, that to ask Africans to live moral lives is demanding too much, after all, it’s not like they’re white, right? Liberals don’t expect Blacks in America to succeed on their own, why should they expect Africans to be capable of making moral choices. Only us "naive" Conservatives actually believe Blacks (American or African) are as smart, capable, intelligent and moral as people of any other race.

Hat tip: Talad’s Thoughts

From AFP (it stands for the name of some French wire service that refuses to publish their name, and I get tired of looking it up. (stupid frogs!) We’ll just call it Annoying French Press)…

France’s leading candidate for the presidency, Segolene Royal, described US President George W. Bush’s "axis of evil" as simplistic and the invasion of Iraq as a mistake.

"Preventive wars aggravate the problems they presume to tackle. Only George Bush could think that the world is safer since the occupation of Iraq," she told more than 2,000 members of her Socialist Party in this eastern town.

"In this world, neither simplism — such as the theory of an ‘axis of evil’ — nor fear are good advisors," she said.

Her speech marked an intensification of her efforts to get the party nomination in November to run in the presidential elections due in April next year.

Sounds like a whole lotta sour grapes to me. Also, is "simplism" a word? I’m trying to decide who would be lower on my list of people I really could not care less what they think than a French Socialist. Hm….I can’t think of anyone else.

From the Associated Press…

Bush called on Los Angeles Times reporter Peter Wallsten and asked if he was going to ask his question with his "shades" on.

"For the viewers, there’s no sun," Bush said to the television cameras.

But even though the sun was behind the clouds, Wallsten still needs the sunglasses because he has Stargardt’s disease, a form of macular degeneration that causes progressive vision loss. The condition causes Wallsten to be sensitive to glare and even on a cloudy day, can cause pain and increase the loss of sight.

Wallsten said Bush called his cell phone later in the day to apologize and tell him that he didn’t know he had the disease. Wallsten said he interrupted and told the president that no apology was necessary and that he didn’t feel offended since he hadn’t told anyone at the White House about his condition.

If memory serves me correctly, Wallsten’s reply to "For the viewers, there’s no sun" was something to the effect of, "That would depend on their perspective." I’m sorry my memory doesn’t work more literally. I saw the exchange and remember Wallsten’s quip as implying that many people see no hope in Bush’s administration. I guess he’s right. I doubt Saddam Hussein sees much hope in it. I know Zarqawi doesn’t, anymore. I’m pretty sure the terrorists don’t se the Bush administration as something to feel hopeful about. Now Liberals who consistently side against Bush and American, are definitely something the terrorists are gleefully hopeful about.

Hans Burkhart, 37, was sentenced to 15 years in Austrian prison early this morning for publicly declaring that the movie The Sound of Music was boring. The Sound of Music was based on the life of an Austrian family who escaped to the United States during World War II.

Burkhart pled guilty in a plea bargain with Austrian prosecutors after he was promised they would drop the additional charges that he had also called Austrian born Arnold Swartzenegger a "girlie-man". According to Austrian law, Burkhart would be eligible for parole in 2016.

During the sentencing phase of the trial Burkhart pled for mercy, "That movie is really long, and I’m not really that into music." The judge apparently was not impressed with Burkhart’s defense.

The court convicted Burkhart after his guilty plea under the 1984 law, which applies to "whoever maligns any movie depicting a singing Austrian family, or any other of the three Austrians who’ve managed to become famous." The law also forbids saying the word "plethora" while urinating.