Top Ten Cloves: Reasons For Nobel Peace Prize Winner Al Gore Not To Run For President

News Item: Gore Wins the Nobel. But Will He Run?

10. Holding off making any kind of announcement, anxiously waiting to see if his real dream job comes through - Managing the New York Yankees

9. James Baker just scares the bejeezes out of him

8. Thinks the phrase "First Lady Tipper" sounds like something off a Sexual Predator List

7. Can drag out the suspense of the firm denial for a few months and relish seeing the Clintons twisting with the thought of his running

6. Holding out - If he can solve this Global Warming thing, some country will surely offer him a Kingship

5. Would be too tempted to do those primetime, national television speeches with his Oscar and his Nobel Peace Prize sitting on the desk in front of him

4. Doesn't want to be petty - Likely, in his first official act as President, if elected, would be to issue a Signing Statement on how much now-former-President George Bush sucks

3. Knows he'll catch shit from the Green crowd when he flies into those Global Warming concerts in Air Force One

2. Oh God, the diets...

1. Doesn't want to be the one to evict Vice President Dick Cheney, who, being addicted to the power as he is, will refuse to leave his office on January 20th, 2009

Congratulations! ... Way To Go There Big Al!


Bonus Gore Wins! Links

Josh Marshall: On Gore

Steve Benen: Gore has quite a decade

Scarecrow: Al Gore Wins the Nobel Peace Prize

Carl Pope: Why Al Gore deserves the Nobel Peace Prize; Gore's epic effort to focus attention on the perils of climate change supports the goal of preventing wars.

Breaking News! Romney On Debate Gaffe: "Meant To Say I Would Consult With My Sons"

Candidate Feverishly Works To Correct Impression; Campaign Said To Be Firing All Its' Lawyers

"I meant to say my sons ... I would definitely consult with my sons."

Not content to let the moment pass away, former Massachusetts Governor, and Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney hounded news media this morning, attempting to clarify his gaffe in answering a question in Tuesday's Republican Candidate Debate in Dearborn, Michigan.

In what was supposed to be the spotlight-stealing debut of Fred Thompson, has been anything but.

Romney, with his answer, reinforced the public image of the candidate, that of a cold, passionless, calculating business executive.

In the debate, co-moderator Chris Matthews put to Romney a hypothetical question;

MATTHEWS: Governor Romney, that raises the question, if you were president of the United States, would you need to go to Congress to get authorization to take military action against Iran’s nuclear facilities?

ROMNEY: You sit down with your attorneys and tell you want you have to do, but obviously the president of the United States has to do what’s in the best interest of the United States to protect us against a potential threat. The president did that as he was planning on moving into Iraq and received the authorization of Congress...

MATTHEWS: Did he need it?

ROMNEY: You know, we’re going to let the lawyers sort out what he needed to do and what he didn’t need to do. But, certainly, what you want to do is to have the agreement of all the people— leadership of our government as well as our friends around the world where those circumstances are available.

Romney has been ridiculed and lampooned since, including during the debate, when fellow candidate, Texas Congressman Ron Paul fired back at the former Governor "This idea of going and talking to attorneys totally baffles me. Why don't we just open up the Constitution and read it? You're not allowed to go to war without a declaration of war."

Romney's campaign office has been on overdrive, firing out a blizzard of press releases and statements, all shouting how the candidate would consult with his sons before taking the military action suggested in the debate question.

One release obtained by The Garlic reads, in part "The experience the Romney boys have received serving their country during this campaign has been immeasurable. The Governor is confident, that if called upon, his sons would give sound, professional advise as to any military action considered. These boys are veterans now, they have the campaign battle scars, and they would act accordingly."

Earlier this year, in August, Romney credited his sons with serving their country, versus enlisting in the military, by working on his presidential campaign;

"One of the ways my sons are showing support for our nation is helping me get elected because they think I'd be a great president."

Romney later attempted to claim the remark was taken out-of-context, however, the five sons of Romney, according to sources, never came off the campaign battlefield.

"Look," pleaded Romney, attempting to hold the attention of a group of reporters, "no other candidate in this race - in either party - has my sons ... I know they can deliver, they can advise and I am eager for the opportunity to show that ... When I am elected President, they will be at my side, ready to continue serving ..."

The campaign office also went to great lengths to say that Romney would not seek council on military or national security matters from former campaign manager Jay Garrity, who allegedly was caught, earlier this year, impersonating a police officer.

With rumors circulating, neither Romney, or any of his staff would confirm reports that the campaign was firing all the lawyers working on it, as a means to dispel any conflicts, or suggestions, that Romney was letting the lawyers conduct his military or national security policy.

Additionally, staffers were given copies of a joke book, a compilation of lawyer jokes, to better handle any inquiries about Romney's debate answer.

Bonus Links

John Nichols: Mitt Romney Goes All Alberto Gonzales on the Constitution

Barry Crimmins: Upcoming Presidential Debate Schedule

Retro Garlic: Karen Hughes, Our National Tupperware Lady

Well, Well, Well ... Our soccer-Mom-loving, globe-trotting, Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Karen Hughes, is getting some much-deserved attention today.

Sidney Blumenthal, over on Salon, penned "An open letter to Karen Hughes", urging Ms. Hughes about "Your duty is to defend America's reputation in the world. To do so, you must persuade the Bush administration to renounce its abhorrent and hypocritical policy on torture."

The letter is an invitation to Hughes, to attend the opening of a new documentary, "Taxi to the Dark Side", which Blumenthal tells our intrepid diplomat "The film has been described by the New York Times as "a meticulous examination of American policy on the interrogation of prisoners. It traces the scandals at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere to official changes of policy originating in the vice president's office and approved by the secretary of defense. We see documents listing approved methods of interrogation, including waterboarding, which simulates drowning."

Then he explains;

Your complicity in the torture policy is one reason that I am writing you. Despite the futility of those inside the administration in bringing the problem to you, you still remain in place to redress it. As the undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, responsible for defending America's reputation in the world, you must engage the issue that has most seriously damaged our image. Your obligation will continue so long as you hold your post. Those who care about the good name of the United States will not cease viewing you as a last resort, even if you disdain or ignore them, because they cling to the desperate hope that a nagging conscience or its sudden awakening will compel you actually to do your job.

And, he compliments Hughes on getting her crony position;

The genius of your appointment is that the president and his advisors understood ahead of time that they would need your services to repair the nation's reputation. After all, this position has never existed before; and it has never been so drastically needed. While it is true that there have been organizations within the government, such as U.S. Information Agency, under directors such as Edward R. Murrow and John Chancellor, that built libraries and conducted international educational exchanges, the idea of a public diplomacy czar is novel. Having someone to paper over the country's mistakes by telling people what they should think despite the reality would in the past have been considered undemocratic. Form and content, it would have been said, needed to complement each other. But your position is one in which form and content (words and deeds) stand in opposition to each other. Ironically, therefore, your job has never been more important than now.

Then, some parting advice;

While you are rethinking how to calm fears and rebuild America's image as a global leader perhaps you ought to begin to think of yourself not as a tool of the Bush administration but as a citizen of the world, not as a propagandist, constantly trying to formulate a hollow ideological phrase or distraction, but as someone who can admit mistakes and correct them.

If you receive this letter as simply a partisan broadside and can't envision your transformation into a true diplomat at large, an envoy of healing, perhaps you should just resign. Nothing will be served by continuing on your current course. Nothing different will happen. You might as well return to Texas now. To date, your diplomacy has consisted of excuses for leaving the damage to the next president to remedy.

The Retro Part

The Garlic also noted Ms. Hughes rise to power, from Bush aide to Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy, shortly after we launched, in which one Arab League official offered "When America starts talking about planting the seeds of democracy, that's usually our sign to start building our bomb shelters";

Bush Appointment Has Mid-East Fearful With New Hughes Role

Then, a few months later, after she was confirmed, we got the real scoop on her work;

Hughes Makes Official Debut With Mid-East Jaunt; Fall Tupperware Line Just In; Says Flood Victims could have "saved heirlooms"

Karen Hughes, Our National Tupperware Lady!

Bonus Karen Crony Links

Juliette Kayyem: Karen of Arabia

The Moderate Voice: Ripken Diplomacy

The Belgravia Dispatch: Great Moments in Public Diplomacy

Fred Kaplan: Karen Hughes, Stay Home!; What on earth is she doing in the Middle East?

Hysterical Barry Crimmins Today - The Gipper still tearing up turf!

A fall down, piss-your-pants offering today from satirist Barry Crimmins

No sneak peaks ... Go over to it and be prepared to have tears in your eyes from laughing

The Gipper still tearing up turf!

Visit Barry Crimmin's website

Other Barry Crimmins on The Garlic

Good Post Alert - Glenn Greenwald's 'A nation of Rich Lowrys'

They're trying to pass around the Kool-Aid again.

Glenn Greenwald takes note today of those cheerleading, flag-waving, dwarfs-finks-phonies-frauds-band of neocons telling us, once again, how rosy everything is over in Iraq.

This time, it's the lost, "My Three Sons" wannabe, National Review Editor Rich Lowry (who must have missed the "Smear The Frosts" email).

It's a great, well-linked and documented push back on the Neoncon's through-the-looking glass boasts.

Check out "A nation of Rich Lowrys"

Bonus Links

Rich Lowry on Media Matters

It Takes A Neocon To Raise A Legacy ... They're Drinking The Kool-Aid Again ...

Where's Ernest Borgnine when you need him?

Top Ten Cloves: Things About Fred Thompson Participating In His First Republican Presidential Candidates Debate

News Item: Thompson survives his first debate

10. Very surprised, since CNBC and MSNBC were televising the debate, they didn't throw in the 'Law & Order' sound effect every time he spoke

9. Prepared by taking a nice, long nap

8. Was relieved, seeing the all the other candidates on the stage, that he didn't mistakenly show up at a Black College

7. Was overly-conscious of tapping his foot

6. Kept his cellphone on, hoping his wife would call during the debate

5. Had trouble stifling the urge, to report back to former Nixon Administration staffers, dirt on the other candidates in the debate

4. Lobbied before the debate to allow him to have his red pick-up truck parked behind him on-stage

3. Forgot to give some of his answers in the persona of SNL's Darrell Hammond, doing his imitation of himself

2. Sweating bullets, hoping none of the other candidates caught the news of the Nixon Tapes, and start asking him if he really is "Dumb as Hell"

1. Tired ... Expended too much energy beating away Debate Moderator Chris Matthews, who was drooling, asking if he could lick the Aqua Velva off his neck

Bonus Links

Michael Scherer: What you missed while watching "Oprah"; Salon watches the latest Republican debate (economy special) so you don't have to. Chevron down! Alcoa up! And Fred Thompson goes public.


SNL Skit On Fred Thompson

Mirror, Mirror ... She's Still The Sickest! ... But The Bush Grindhouse Is Gaining Ground ... Follow-Up On The Graeme Frost Conflagration

The battle of bullshit continues ...

And it gets sicker ...

The stalker-harasser, self-anointed healthcare insurance inspector, M-Squared continues to bang her obnoxious drum on the 12-year-old Graeme Frost, and his family, proudly flapping her excrement-spewing lips on her response to a NYT reporter, still screaming at this horrible injustice, symbolizing the decline of the country due to the entitlement-hording Frost Family, and, ready for this, yelping that she, and the rest of the Rightwing Freakshow, are being victimized by the well-deserved blowback of these cretins attacking a child.

But her coveted "Sickest Person in the Worrrrrrrld!" title is being seriously challenged by, none other, than the Bush Grindhouse.

As the flames of this hate-filled vitriol lick at the Frost Family, the Compassionate Conservative, The Decider Guy, has, once again, demonstrated his uncanny skills of failed leadership.

Rather than sitting back (perhaps laying out the spin on the Osama bin Laden videotape leak), apparently relishing the work of the Rightwing Freakshow (and M-Squared) in battering this family (Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell stated he was "relieved" his office didn't denounce the family - Way to step up there Mitch, really putting yourself on the line) it was a moment that called for a real president, a real leader, to step to the podium and repute the red hot, partisan bullshit, lay down the law (for a change, instead of subverting it) to lay off the family, further pointing out the sickness of attacking children for solely political purpose.

But not a word was issued.

Sigh ... The folly of my thinking ... To expect this, from a President who allowed his staff to leak the identity of a covert CIA agent - for mere political purpose ... Why would I possible think he would step up to stop the bashing of a young child?

M-Squared doesn't show signs that she will relinquish her crown, so, for The Commander Guy, he'll have to settle for "Sickest President in the Worrrrrrrld!"

More-To-Wade-Through Links

Joe Gandelman: The War Against Graeme Frost: Get That School Kid

Joan Walsh: Right-wing bullies pick on children

The Carpetbagger Report: Conservatives target 12-year-old boy and his family in S-CHIP debate

Ezra Klein: What Has Happened To The Right?
















If Lt. Barney Greenwald (from 'The Caine Mutiny') ever met M-Squared;

"I wanna drink a toast to you, Ms. Malkin. From the beginning you hated the Frosts. And then you thought up this whole idea and you managed to keep your skirts nice and starched and clean, even in the smearing and stalking. Mitch McConnell will always be remembered as a mutineer. But you, you'll publish your novel, you'll make a million bucks, you'll marry a big movie star, and for the rest of your life you'll live with your conscience, if you have any. Here's to the real author of the Frost Smear. Here's to you, Ms. Malkin."

(Greenwald then splashes a drink in Malkin's face)

Retro Garlic: Is Chrysler Now Adopting The HuffPo Business Plan?

Is Chrysler is following suit, after GM, with adopting the Huffington Post Business Model?

Well, we did quote Former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich, who called the GM move "breathtaking";

"This will be a economic revolution like we've never seen before," gushed Reich. "My God, if a relatively new, intellectual property-based, on-line entity can raise that kind of money - and via a free labor pool - General Motors will set profit records that will stand for decades to come."

Today

Thousands of Chrysler Workers Walk Out

The Retro Part

Breaking News! GM Cancels UAW In Favor of Adopting Huffington Post Business Model; Celebrities, Auto Enthusiasts and Bloggers To Build Cars For Free; Huge Spike In Profits Forecast

Mirror, Mirror .. If Only Keith Olbermann Offered A "Sickest Person In The World", Sighs Michelle Maudlin, "I Would Surely Be The Sickest"

Do you like children?
Only if they are properly cooked ...

Boy, what I would pay to have W.C. Fields weigh in on this one.

The Rightwing Freakshow, led by the sludge-dwelling Michelle Maudlin, who, if Keith Olbermann offered a "Sickest Person In The World" rather then just the worst, M-Squared would win it in a landslide, are, mercilessly, attacking a 12-year-old child.

There is a full-fledged conflagration raging on in the blogosphere, over Graeme Frost, the above-referenced child, injured in an automobile accident and medically served by the very same SCHIP program (State Children's Health Insurance Program) The Decider Guy vetoed last week.

Young Master Frost was chosen by the Democrats to offer the rebuttal to The Decider Guy's radio address, in which in announced his veto, of the bill which had bipartisan support.

Officials are now viewing security camera footage around the radio station Frost gave his speech at, to see exactly where the big red bullseye was painted on the youngster.

Healthy debated over policy, and even budget, regarding health care, fine.

Attacking and smearing the boy, his family and even, as M-Squared did, going to his house, and the business of his parents to snoop and pry ... And not doing this out of concern for the boy or his family, but merely to discredit them ...

That is just plain, outright, sick ...

And it's not the first time M-Squared , an Asian-American who wrote a book defending and endorsing the Internment policy during World War II, has acted so recklessly and immorally.

So, Michelle Maudlin, confident of Mr. Olbermann's endorsement, I borrow from his program to announce "Michelle Maudlin ... The Sickest Person in the Worrrrrrrld!"

Bonus Have-At-It Links

Jamie Holly/Crooks and Liars - Graeme Frost: What Would You Do If This Was Snooping Around Your House? (Updated)

Christy Hardin Smith/FireDogLake: What Is Wrong With You?!?

Digby: Fetid Compost Where Their Hearts Should Be

Think Progress: Rush Smears 12-Yr Old: ‘They Filled His Head With Lies Just As They Have Some Of These Soldiers’

Larisa Alexandrovna/At Largely: Ah, Malkin continues her stalking...


"I went to Michelle Malkin's brain once ... But it was closed ..."

Top Ten Cloves: How History Would Be Different if Bush & Co. Were The Ones To First Discover America

News Item: The DNA Age; Seeking Columbus’s Origins, With a Swab

10. We would now be celebrating Dick Cheney Day in October

9. All the crew, from all the ships would be Stop-Lossed, and forced to serve another 15-months

8. Critics of the expedition would be branded as "Viking sympathizers and appeasers"

7. Bush would set out to prove his bigger goal, that the world was flat, which would include invading and occupying Iraq

6. Native population would be immediately declared "Enemy Combatants", and shipped off to Cuba for detention

5. Burning Spear's song, "A Damn Blasted Liar" would still be apropos

4. 2nd Mate Paul Wolfowitz would boast that the new land's natural resources would pay for the expedition

3. History would show conch shells to be the early, rudimentary beginnings of the NSA Illegal Wiretapping program

2. 1st Mate Donald Rumsfeld would deflect criticism by saying "You set sail with the ships you have, not the ships you you might want or wish to have at a later time."

1. Best of all, Captain Bush would start issuing "Signing Statements ", and go about making up the law as he went along


Happy Dick Cheney Day Links

BBC: They Discovered America

Franklin W Knight: The legacies of Christopher Columbus

James Carroll: A troubling turn in American history

Top Ten Cloves: Ways To Tell Your Newly Constructed Iraq Embassy Is Poorly Built

News Item: Iraq Embassy Cost Rises $144 Million Amid Project Delays

10. The office pool is firmly betting on the Chicago Cubs winning the World Series over when they get to move into the Embassy

9. Whispers in Washington are surfacing, that this wouldn't be happening if Condi Rice had a husband

8. You keep getting unsolicited suggestions from the contractors building Iran's nuclear plants

7. Even Andy Card says he couldn't market, no matter what month he tried, something this fucked up

6. Everytime General Petraeus criticizes Prime Minister Maliki, Maliki just snickers back "Embassy"

5. Instead of sending and receiving cables, cables are what’s holding the building up

4. You reach out, but architect Frank Gehry turns you down, wanting no part of it

3. Embassy staff prefers to work and live in the moving vans

2. Your query on how to fix it stumps the Ask This Old House guys

1. You keep getting unsolicited suggestions from the people that run the Winchester House


Bonus Bad Embassy Riffs

McClatchy Newspapers: Even sprinkler systems fail at U.S. embassy in Baghdad

TimesOnLine: Welcome to the new US embassy; It’s bigger than Saddam’s palace and, with a cinema, gym and pool, is the safest and smartest place to live in Iraq...

Tom Engelhardt: Imperial life in a brand-new city; What plans for a gigantic new U.S. Embassy in Iraq say about the Bush administration, the occupation of Iraq, and Americans themselves.