On Oct. 8, I posted Reaffirming US-Japan Accords, referencing the need to validate agreements which have evolved for approximately 60 years.

I had no idea those Accords would be tested so quickly.

What I did know was that we have pledged to defend both South Korea and Japan in the event they are attacked by other nations. 

On the diplomatic front, we have literally dragged our mighty feet in confronting (albeit enabling proliferation during the Clinton era) Korea's development of nuclear weapons. 

We now have a deceitful, irrational madman -- who we (ala Clinton) provided with nuclear reactors for non-military use -- in possession of a weapon of mass destruction.   

Is the world going to wait until this madman either launches an attack on another country or shares his nuclear weaponry with another madman? 

Kim Jong Il has already thumbed his nose at the prospect of U.N. sanctions. 

Will Russia, France and China actually honor sanctions against Korea?  They were deceitful in honoring sanctions against Saddam.  They failed to intervene in either Syria or Iran -- why should they be trusted now?  What effect would an air or sea  blockade around Korea actually have when they share borders with China and Russia?

China is the key, but will China assume a responsible role in curtailing the Korean threat? 

The U.S. must act quickly. 

While this is not the ideal option, I anticipate  that  the only true deterrent to the proliferation of nuclear weapons among irrational nations is to inform our faux-friends in China and Russia that IF they don't intercede  in Korea, we will make these weapons available to our reputable Asian-Pacific allies:  Japan, Taiwan, Australia and South Korea.   

It's time to call Congress back to Washington, Mr. President.  Our nation needs a unified front in addressing this critical issue.

Although government officials have delayed official discussions on federalizing Iraq's provinces  into 3-4 aligned Iraqi states,  political discourse is moving in that direction. 

Critical to this decision will be a centralized, representative  government which assures  control (with equitable distribution of services and profits) from Iraq's greatest resource: oil. 

Recently, Sunni tribal leaders united to form the equivalence of three infantry divisions (30,000 fighters) to combat insurgents and terrorists along the Syrian border.

The immediate impact?  Over 80% of the al-Anbar region has now joined Iraqi government forces in confronting al Qaeda.  A significant gain for Iraqi and coalition forces is that they are now joined by fighters who know the local terrain.

The long-term effect?  The region will receive critical government services administered by a more secular Shia-dominated government in Baghdad. 

Most importantly,  Shia and Sunni Iraqis have crossed ethno-religious barriers for a common cause.

And the third ethno-religious  group located in northern Iraq, the Kurds? 

Therein may lie the key to Iraq's nationalization. 

 The US-Japan Accords:  Remember them? 

They cover strategic economic, political and security interests and have been around for some time.

Hopefully, GWB remembers them, also. 

As North Korea continues to lob nuclear threats throughout the region (and at the United States), we need to reaffirm these Accords and encourage our friends in Japan to bolster their military forces for self-defense. 

We've already piqued Europe's critical eye by recent economic accords with Japan ....  Russia, and especially China, have long invaded  Japan's maritime boundaries to search for oil reserves.  

It is time to publicly announce our reliance on Japan as a primary co-negotiator with North Korea, in the Middle East AND beyond. 

Why?  One reason is that "Toshiba has become the dominant force in nuclear reactor construction worldwide. The firm currently holds a 35% market share in Japan. Its controlling stake of Westinghouse Electric will now give it a 28% share in the global market. Investors who fear that the recent slide in the price of oil will be short-lived, who are perhaps inspired by China's plans to build as many as 40 nuclear reactors over the next 15 years, might want to give Toshiba a serious look as one of the few 'alternative energy' plays that we know can actually work."

It is not a coincidence that Japan recently visited China and will visit South Korea in the immediate future.

It would also boost both the US and Japan's interests to re-affirm our agreement to support/defend Japan militarily if needed -- in exchange for continued strategic placement of our defense systems.

As important -- a public re-affirmation by President Bush would certainly divert current pre-election attention toward a region of critical concern. 

Ben Stein can either jolt you with his humor or his perspective.  Today, it's his perspective:

... in a world where 3,000 women and children are raped and/or murdered every day in Congo, a member of the United Nations, in which a genuine genocide is going on in Sudan, a member of the United Nations, in which more than fifty men and women per day are being tortured with electric drills and murdered in Iraq, in which two of the world's most dangerous and insane men, Kim Jong Il and Mohammed Ahmadinejad, are developing nuclear weapons, the e-mail of one deranged middle class white man does not really count to me as much as it might to some other people.

......

We do not devote more than a few instants each month to the rape and murder in Congo. We barely notice the rape and genocide in Darfur. No one on earth except George W. Bush and John Bolton and Condoleezza Rice is trying to stop two maniacs from acquiring nuclear weapons even though one of them has promised to wipe out Israel if he gets them. But we can devote 24 hours a day, day after day, to the e-mails of one nutty Member of Congress to a teenage boy.

A country with its priorities so out of whack does not deserve to be the world's shining city on a hill. Let's take a moment, pray for guidance, turn Mr. Foley over to the proper mental health authorities, and try to, as the moral exemplar of the world, use every bit of strength we have to stop the slaughter of the innocents now and in the future. Mark Foley is important, but to me, he's no more important than those teenage girls in Congo who get raped, have their arms chopped off, and then are murdered...and there are a lot of them. Let's get our priorities straight.

Thanks.  We need that jolt, Mr. Stein. 

SUB-TITLE I:  Don't let your kids grow up to be politicians.  Or pundits.  Or pages.  Or punsters, for that matter.

SUB-TITLE II:  Somebody Oughta Write a(nother) Book.  Or as Nancy Pelosi's friend was supposedly doing -- script it like a B-grade movie!

Frankly, I'm far *too old to be electronically-stimulated by repulsive IMs between some latent-to-active homo-savvy page-boy and a power-pandering peccadillic poliwag. 

*Euphemism for totally uninterested in some old-enough-to-know-what-he-was-doing political operative's edited exposè of an Over-the-Hill [pun intended]  homosexual hag. 

For those who want to read REAL "page" sex --  flip through that dog-eared paperback classic of yester-year:

Maxine for President.

.... May be your own?

"We're getting into very dangerous territory, and I've warned my colleagues to be careful." That's what a Democrat leadership aide was saying on Wednesday, as word circulated about David Corn's blog posting that revealed that a list of gay Republicans congressional staffers was circulating through emails.

 to The American Spectator:

Just as troubling are concerns among some House Democrat staff that there are potential scandals lurking of a similar vein for them. According to another Democrat source, "I've been warning my people to stay away from this story because you just don't know what will come back to bite you."

Of concern: that House Democrat leadership or Rep. Dale Kildee (Mich.), the Democrat member of the page board, who has served on it since 1985, or his staff have received complaints about Democrat colleagues' perceived inappropriate communications or contact with pages or former pages, and have not brought those complaints to the board or House management, such as the House Clerk's office. Kildee has been vocal about the Foley complaints not being brought before the full board prior to the scandal breaking, and the secretive nature of the Republican leadership's attempts to bring closure to the scandal.

"We all know this kind of scandal isn't just a Republican problem," says a Democrat political consultant in Washington. "We don't want to see what is out there about Democratic House members or former members."

But other Democrats say more is to come, that talk among Democrats around town is that researchers at CREW and the House Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee have in recent weeks been in contact, and that there are additional stories involving Republicans and questionable ethics behavior to be leaked closer to election time.

If this is the only way the far left can win in November -- then we deserve to be governed by hypocritical smutt-butts.

vote.vote.vote.vote.vote.vote. Foley is gone, but the slime trail continues .....  Don't let Pelosi's Posse win until we know the truth and players behind the "timeline" for the Foleygate disclosures.

SUB-TITLED:  Draining the Swamp

 Self-proclaimed Congressional cleaning-lady-in-waiting NANCY PELOSI might should begin by rinsing out a few rags ..... Including, but not limited to --

* An associate's son who allegedly "gay-baited" Mark Foley for a couple of years before releasing a series of disgusting IMs -- of questionable authenticity -- just in time for the November elections.

* Those expensive junkets she and hubby took to Asia and other parts -- oh yeah, she "reimbursed" the gov a portion of the expenses .....

* Her political action committees that were charged with attempting to circumvent to legal limits on campaign giving -- oh yeah, she reimbursed $21,000 ...

Hey -- Pelosi pledged to clean things up --- just wanted to suggest a few spots that need wiping up ....

More to come.

Democrats race to get scoop on Foleygate before elections ....

Credit:  Lucianne.com

hee hee hee.  Forgive me.  I couldn't resist.

Let outrage reign.  Lots of outrage.  About that louse Foley.  Why not keep the rage going for the next few weeks?  Let's just declare the next few weeks as a political feeding frenzy!

Nevermind that Republicans have expressed their disgust and have accepted Foley's resignation with obvious relief. 

Nevermind that the party of traditional values is likely being blind-sided by the party of self-serving values!

Nevermind that the Woodward book has an early release -- chockful of criticisms of the Bush administration -- just in time for another distraction before the election ....

Nevermind that I have a problem with those to the left of the aisle and their media. 

Nevermind that there is a reason why Democrats and the media continue to release IM's detailing repulsive interactions between Foley and a receptive youth.   Of course Foley is to blame.  He is the adult in this scenario.  As an adult, he has betrayed -- not only his constituency -- but also his duty as a responsible adult.

Nevermind that, if talking heads are correct, Foley may have broken no laws.  Too bad.  He deserves to be punished beyond the stripping of his dignity. 

Nevermind that the media and democrat operatives have deliberately delayed releasing these IMs -- simply to gain a political advantage in the upcoming elections.  They should be be guilty of either enabling and/or hiding Foley's  behaviors.

Nevermind -- heck --- I do mind seeing the public duped and distracted.  I do mind feigned outrage. 

Hopefully -- the FBI will expedite their investigation to identify the source, validity and "timeliness" of the IMs.  I certainly mind that their investigation will likely be stymied by restraints and appeals ....

I also "mind" that Foleygate may be credited with bringing about the loss of Republican seats in the House and Senate.  Why?  Because Republicans -- by their failure to work together during the past few months -- have most likely already splintered themselves into defeat.  [For which you can thank the leadership -- including Frist, McCain AND Hasert.  BTW, we know what Hasert has been doing for the last few days -- but where are Frist and McCain on the outrage?]

Foley doesn't deserve credit for anything beyond being the low-life sick person that he is. 

And if riding the backlash to a sick pervert is the only way democrats can win -- they don't deserve credit either.

Subtitled:  Slugs Under Stones un-Slanged

Yep.  While not excusing Foley's alleged mis-conduct -- there WERE Democratic operatives behind the timing of the release of still-unconfirmed email/IM's.

Recognize the names  Soros .... Biden .... ABC ... Clinton?  Now meet their associates called the  C.R.E.W. -- the group behind the timing of this sordid scenario.

This is an article by investigative reporter and Washington attorney, Clarice Feldman.

Foley and the Blame Game
October 1st, 2006

Pardon me, but I smell something very peculiar in the way we have learned of the disgrace of Rep. Mark Foley.

The email scandal which led to the resignation of the Republican Congressman is reverberating throughout the capital and the nation, as Democrats attempt to capitalize on bad news for Republicans. The seamiest of the released emails, which Foley has not denied, are right up there with Rhodes Scholar and Illinois Democratic Congressman Mel Reynolds’ taped phone conversations lusting for 15 year old Catholic school girls in their uniforms.

But Democrats are attempting to make hay by alleging that the Republican leadership may have known about the inappropriate emails and covered them up for months. Their hope, no doubt, is to discourage turnout by disillusioned evangelical and other voters sensitive to moral issues. But the emerging background detail suggests that this is simply not the case, and that an attack strategy has been devised by parties anxious to damage the GOP and swing the coming election.

In July a blog  appeared, designed it said to trace sex predators. Few posts were made in that month or the following month. All recounted years old stories. Then on September 18, the blog printed the fairly innocuous email exchange between Congressman Foley and an unnamed page.In this correspondence initiated by the former page, Foley asks the former page how he is after Katrina (the boy lived in Louisiana) and asked for a photo. Thus began the latest political kerfuffle which swirls through the final five weeks of the campaign. How likely is it that this site with virtually no readership , few posts and hardly any history or posts of interest suddenly receives this bombshell? I’d say slight. About as likely as Lucy Ramirez handing Burkett Bush’s TANG papers. Let’s track back what else we know of this story. Sometime last year a former page contacted the St. Petersburg Times with an exchange of emails between himself and Congressman Foley. In the words of the editor, they never ran the story. (The following has been realeased by the office of the Speaker of the House, but does not yet appear online at the time of this writing.) 

In November of last year, we were given copies of an email exchange  Foley had with a former page from Louisiana. Other news organizations later  got them, too. The conversation in those emails was friendly chit-chat.  Foley asked the boy about how he had come through Hurricane Katrina and about  the boy’s upcoming birthday. In one of those emails, Foley casually asked  theteen to send him a “pic” of himself. Also among those emails was the  page’s exchange with a congressional staffer in the office of Rep. Alexander,  who had been the teen’s sponsor in the page program. The teen shared his exchange he’d had with Foley and asked the staffer if she thought Foley was out of bounds.

There was nothing overtly sexual in the emails, but we assigned two reporters to find out more. We found the Louisiana page and talked with him.He told us Foley’s request for a photo made him uncomfortable so he never responded, but both he and his parents made clear we could not use his name if we wrote a story. We also found another page who was willing to go on the record, but his experience with Foley was different. He said Foley did send a few emails but never said anything in them that he found inappropriate. We tried to find other pages but had no luck. We spoke with Rep. Alexander, who said the boy’s family didn’t want it pursued, and Foley, who insisted he was merely trying to be friendly and never wanted to make the page uncomfortable.

So, what we had was a set of emails between Foley and a teenager, who wouldn’t go on the record about how those emails made him feel. As we said in today’s paper, our policy is that we don’t make accusations against people using unnamed sources. And given the seriousness of what would  be implied in a story, it was critical that we have complete confidence in  our sourcing. After much discussion among top editors at the paper, we  concluded that the information we had on Foley last November didn’t meet our standard for publication. Evidently, other news organizations felt the same way.

Since that time, we revisited the question more than once, but never learned anything that changed our position. [b]The Louisiana boy’s emails broke into the open last weekend, when a blogger got copies and posted them online. Later that week, on Thursday, a news blog at the website of ABC News followed suit, with the addition of one new fact: Foley’s Democratic opponent, Tim Mahoney, was on the record about the Louisiana boy’s emails and was calling for an investigation. That’s when we wrote our first  story,for Friday’s papers.

After ABC News broke the story on its website, someone contacted ABC and provided a detailed email exchange between Foley and at least one other page that was far different from what we had seen before. This was overtly sexual, not something Foley could dismiss as misinterpreted friendliness. That’s what drove Foley to resign on Friday.

So, the paper had nothing it could act on. But Foley’s opponent somehow got wind of the story which had appeared before only on a very new, utterly obscure blogsite and demanded an investigation. ABC then picked up the story and when it did , further anonymous sources with far more salacious and troublesome evidence appeared on the scene. What an amazing-and unlikely to me-turn of events. Like that paper, the Republican leadership only knew of the innocuous email exchange:

Late night Congressman Hastert said of the incident (in terms remarkably similar to the editor’s):

In the fall of 2005 Tim Kennedy, a staff assistant in the Speaker’s Office, received a telephone call from Congressman Rodney Alexander’s Chief of  Staff who indicated that he had an email exchange between Congressman Foley and a former House page.  He did not reveal the specific text of the email but expressed that he and Congressman Alexander were concerned about it.

Tim Kennedy immediately discussed the matter with his supervisor, Mike Stokke, Speaker Hastert’s Deputy Chief of Staff.  Stokke directed Kennedy to ask Ted Van Der Meid, the Speaker’s in house Counsel, who the proper person was for Congressman Alexander to report a problem related to a former page.Ted Van Der Meid told Kennedy it was the Clerk of the House who should be notified as the responsible House Officer for the page program.  Later thatday Stokke met with Congressman Alexander’s Chief of Staff.  Once again the specific content of the email was not discussed.  Stokke called the Clerk and asked him to come to the Speaker’s Office so that he could put him together with Congressman Alexander’s Chief of Staff.  The Clerk and Congressman Alexander’s Chief of Staff then went to the Clerk’s Office to discuss the matter.

The Clerk asked to see the text of the email.  Congressman Alexander’s office declined citing the fact that the family wished to maintain as  much privacy as possible and simply wanted the contact to stop.  The Clerk asked if the email exchange was of a sexual nature and was assured it was  not. Congressman Alexander’s Chief of Staff characterized the email exchange as over-friendly.

The Clerk then contacted Congressman Shimkus, the Chairman of the Page Board to request an immediate meeting.  It appears he also notified Van Der Meid that he had received the complaint and was taking action.  This is entirely consistent with what he would normally expect to occur as he was the Speaker’s Office liaison with the Clerk’s Office.

The Clerk and Congressman Shimkus met and then immediately met with Foley to discuss the matter.  They asked Foley about the email.  Congressman Shimkus and the Clerk made it clear that to avoid even the appearance of impropriety and at the request of the parents, Congressman Foley was to immediately cease any communication with the young man.

The Clerk recalls that later that day he encountered Van Der Meid on the House floor and reported to him that he and Shimkus personally had spoken to Foley and had taken corrective action. 

Mindful of the sensitivity to the parent’s wishes to protect their child’s privacy and believing that they had promptly reported what they knew to the proper authorities Kennedy, Van Der Meid and Stokke did not discuss the matter with others in the Speaker’s Office.

Congressman Tom Reynolds in a statement issued today indicates that many months later, in the spring of 2006, he was approached by Congressman Alexander who mentioned the Foley issue from the previous fall.  During a meeting with the Speaker he says he noted the issue which had been raised by Alexander and told the Speaker that an investigation was conducted by the Clerk of the House and Shimkus.  While the Speaker does not explicitly recall this conversation, he has no reason to dispute Congressman Reynold’s recollection that he reported to him on the problem and its resolution.

Sexually Explicit Instant Message Transcript

No one in the Speaker’s Office was made aware of the sexually explicit text messages which press reports suggest had been directed to another individual until they were revealed in the press and on the internet this week.  In fact, no one was ever made aware of any sexually explicit email or text messages at any time.

It is not only the recent, unread blog spot breaking the story which raises my suspicions. The  rest of the genesis of the story is as murky.

Brian Ross of ABC ran the story, beginning with the same “overly friendly” but not sexually suggestive email exchange and adding a series of  instant messages dating to 2003 previously unseen by anyone in Congress between Foley and anonymous recipients said to be former pages. The Republican leaders, seeing the more damning correspondence, sought and got Foley’s resignation.

As soon as the ABC story ran, and organization called C.R.E.W., which said it had the original exchange which Hastert had heard of and the St Peterburg paper had seen, put them on their website .They said they’d earlier conveyed them to the FBI, were releasing them because of the ABC story, and asked for the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the Republican leadership.It is abundantly clear to me that C.R.E.W. and ABC communicated and may have coordinated the release of this story.

Who is C.R.E.W.?

Here’s what The Hill wrote:

One target of Republican criticism is Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), the group that last year assisted former Rep. Chris Bell (D-Texas) in drafting an ethics complaint against DeLay, which resulted in an admonishment of DeLay from the ethics committee. At last week’s press conference, Melanie Sloan, CREW’s executive director, said that DeLay should step down as majority leader.

From 1995 to 1998, CREW’s Sloan served as minority counsel for the House Judiciary Committee under Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.). Before that, Sloan served as the nominations counsel on the Senate Judiciary Committee under Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.).

According to GOP research, Mark Penn, who had been a pollster for President Clinton, and Daniel Berger, a major Democratic donor, are on CREW’s board. Spokeswoman Naomi Seligman declined several requests to reveal the membership of CREW’s board, although she confirmed that Penn and Berger are members. Last year, Berger made a $100,000 contribution to America Coming Together (ACT), a 527 group that was dedicated to defeating Bush in the presidential election, according to politicalmoneyline.com, a website that tracks fundraising.

CREW declined to respond to the RNC talking points or House GOP research.

C.R.E.W. is one of four “public interest” organizations which the RNC has long identifed as  major donors of George Soros richly-funded Open Society Institute. It is backing  the risible Wilson/Plame  civil suit against Cheney and others.

What do we know of Brian Ross?

My favorite media watcher, Steve Gilbert reports:

Brian Ross of ABC News is the reporter behind the story that Rep. Dennis Hastert is being investigated by the Department Of Justice. Ross is sticking to his charges despite vehement denials from both the DOJ and Hastert himself.

Some may recall that Brian Ross has been involved in past journalistic controversies. Just last week, Mr. Ross reported he was tipped off by unnamed “senior federal officials” that his cell phone was tapped by NSA.

Last month, Ross was one of the first (if not the first) to report that Rush Limbaugh “had been arrested.” Reports which turned out to be greatly exaggerated, but which Ross never corrected.

In January, Brian Ross was the first to promulgate the claims of the self-proclaimed NSA whistleblower, Russell Tice. Ross treated Tice has a highly credible source even though Tice had been cashiered from the agency due to “psychological problems.”

ABC has not disclosed the names of the recipients of the instant messages which were sexually explicit, years old, and not seen by anyone else. We do not know how anyone but the recipients could have retrieved them. We do not even know if they are authentic. None of the recipients has come forward and identified himself. What we do know is that reputable media and the Republican leadership acted appropriately on the initial innocuous correspondence and could not proceed further in view of the parents’ demand that their son’s privacy be respected only to find  months later just before the election that same correpondence showing up on an unlikely blog site and then almost simultaneously on ABC and on  C.R.E.W.’s site. As for the demand that a special prosecutor be appointed, maybe Patrick Fitzgerald can be appointed. Then he can fail to ask ABC or C.R.E.W. how they got the correspondence, ignore their political motivations, conflate their partisanship with “whistleblowing”, not look for the sources of the later sexually explicit emails, and nab Hastert for forgetting when he went to the bathroom on the day he heard about the emails.

The buzzards.