Crime and Punishment

Again with Nielsen Hayden:

"We are led by knaves, criminals and morons. Bullies, sadists, and fools. Even by the standards of everyday politics, this Administration is made up of notably ghastly and hapless human beings."

Yup. Need proof? (The "Q" is Russell Mohbiker is a White House reporter and the editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter)

Q Ari, other than Elliott Abrams, how many convicted criminals are on the White House staff?

MR. FLEISCHER: (Laughter.) You tell me, Russell. You seem to keep count.

Q Can you give me a list of convicted criminals on the White House staff, other than Elliott Abrams?

MR. FLEISCHER: I'll go right to the convicted criminals division and ask them to turn -- (Laughter.)

Q No, seriously -- why isn't being convicted of a criminal a disqualifier for being on the White House staff?

You might want to check out his "Ari & I" postings at Common Dreams. They are quite...telling.

What's really going to bake your noodle is that we are going to be trying to dig our butts out of this huge hole we've dug for ourselves. It's not only about being led by thugs and charlatans, it's the damage being done every day to the relationships that took decades to build that are being torn down in mere months.

Fatalism? Not yet. If there is one thing America usually has going for it, it's our ability to bounce back. I still have hope that we will bounce back, solve our problems, and mend our fences. It won't happen as fast as we tore them down, for destruction is always faster than construction. But I doubt it will take as long as it originally took to build. We have the plans. Somebody in the country remembers how foreign policy needs to work. We just have to hope they get in a position to use their knowledge.

Someday we will even go back to insulting the French by calling potato slices cooked in grease french fries.