Good Satire Alert - Al-Qaeda Announces Move To CD/DVD

We got hip, recently, to the site 'Cap News', which bills itself as "News satire and parody, covering comedy and humor from politics to sports and health to technology."

For our money, it is sharper, and more sophisticated than 'The Onion', targeting current events daily, versus the latters' "Average Man Shocked To Discover He Has Above-Average Problems"-type stories.

And today, 'Cap News' delivered another howler;

Al-Qaeda Announces Move To CD/DVD

SAN DIEGO, Calif. (CAP) - Following continued complaints of poor audio quality and amateurish video, al Qaeda has announced a deal with Sony Corp. to begin distributing its terrorist messages in the CD/DVD format.

"We're proud to announce this strategic initiative with one of the world's leading terrorist organizations," Sony CEO Sir Howard Stringer said in a prepared statement. "We understand the extreme importance of communication in their industry and the explosive risks of failure and are prepared to meet those head on."

Go to 'Cap News' to check out the full piece, as well as others.

And, we recommend signing up for their daily email.

Round and Round and Round ...

Get ready for a dizzily, spinning week.

Between yesterday, and this morning, a handful of storylines have broken, that is going to generate forceful spinning, counter-spinning and blowback, likely enough to jar the needles on the Fujita and Saffir-Simpson scales.

Exhibit A - McCain's War Record/Qualifications for President

Dday, over on Hullabaloo, has a title for this - "Get Ready For The Mother Of All Hissy Fits"

It started yesterday, when retired General Wesley Clark, and Barack Obama supporter, questioned McCain's war record, saying (after giving Stumblin' Bumblin' John some props), that “I don’t think getting in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to become president.”

John Aravosis jumped in, with the question that Brilliant at Breakfast didn't have to, of "Honestly, besides being tortured, what did McCain do to excel in the military?"

Let loose the hounds! ... Game On!

No doubt, the Stumblin' Bumblin' McCain Campaign will come out swinging on this one, despite the fact that their candidate, at nearly every conceivable opportunity, plays off his time in the service.

And, to bone-up for the ensuing gale winds, you can read TPM's Paul Kiel, from February, on Stumblin' Bumblin' Johns' tough stance on torture, and Ted Rall's "Puffing up John McCain, POW"

Update

From the time I wrote this, earlier today, all hell is breaking loose!

Go to Memeorandum, and check out the brewing dog fight on this one ...


Exhibit B - My Sister/My Daughter ... We're Attacking Iran/We're Not Attacking Iran ...

Sy Hersch provided the match-to-the-fuse yesterday, with his "Preparing the Battlefield - The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran", detailing we're already conducting Special Forces operations inside Iran, and it's just a matter of time before the whole thing explodes ...

And, if you have been paying attention, Little Billy Kristol has already predicted that the Bush Grindhouse will let the bombs fly, especially if it looks like Obama is going to take the election.

This drum has been beating for some time now .... If you have to go with one, or the other, bet on The Commander Guy donning the flightsuit again, and after they transform Tehran into the Flintstones' Bedrock City, another 'Mission Accomplished before passing on the baton (and if Stumblin Bumblin John McCain does manage to win, or steal, the election, then no baton passing, the bombs will keep dropping).


Exhibit C - My Sister/My Daughter ... We're Hunting OBL/We're Not Hunting OBL ...

The NYT kicks the dust up today, with their "Amid Policy Disputes, Qaeda Grows in Pakistan", detailing how the military has been set to rush through Afghanastan and into Pakistan to go get - now some 7-years after-the-fact - Osama bin Laden, and other top Al-Qaeda chieftains ...

But, the Big Cheeses in Washington won't pull the trigger.

Which leads Oliver Willis to observe, "Republicans Soft On Terror", and Jill, over on Brilliant at Breakfast, to question "You'd almost think they WANTED a stronger Al-Qaeda"

The Garlic speculates Vegas will post this one as a "Pick'em"

So, with the Lapel Pin orgy-of-a-holiday approaching, July 4th, expect the jingoistic fur to be flying, spinning and counter-spinning, and every tiny iota of it making it's way, blaringly so, at times, into your news.

If you need some help in getting through it, grab a dance partner ...

Perry Como ~ Round And Round (1957)

Wanted Dead Or ... Ahh, The Hell With It .. I'll Let The Next President Get'em ...

Maybe, instead of having him classified as a terrorist, the FBI's #1 Wanted Man, The Commander Guy can call Osama bin Laden a tax cut, that way, he'll be motivated, like all-get-out, to see that the mission gets accomplished.

Not exactly a head-shaker, being his consistent detachment, his always-growing disinterest in capturing Osama bin Laden, going back to, well, first, the left turn he took out of Afghanistan to attack and occupy Iraq, his closing the CIA office that was after the #1 terrorist, his admission that Bid Laden's capture wasn't a "top priority", and now, to this;

Bush: Bin Laden Will Be ‘Gotten By A President’ (But Probably Not This One)

"It has been 2,326 days since 9/11, and the chief mastermind behind those attacks, Osama bin Laden, has not yet been captured. “If we could find the cave he is in, I promise you — he would be brought to justice or wherever he’s hiding,” President Bush tells Fox News in “George W. Bush: Fighting to the Finish,” a documentary scheduled to air Sunday night. Fox reports:

Bush says in the interview he’s confident bin Laden ultimately will be found.

“He’ll be gotten by a president,” Bush says.

And to critics who say he hasn’t done enough to find bin Laden, Bush is blunt:

“They don’t know what they’re talking about,” he says."

And neither does he!

Now, this isn't to be confused, with the profound and proficient Lying Operation that has been conducted.

When it came to fearmongering, or scoring political points for a political victory, The Commander Guy didn't shy away from putting on his ten-gallon hat and six-shooter and he, and his henchmen and woman, attempting to scare the bejeezes out of everyone, that Bin Laden and/or other terrorists were going to pop out of your closet.

In fact, the Bush Grindhouse continually inflated the size and importance of Al Qaeda in Iraq, whenever it deemed to serve their talking points.

Keith Olbermann pointed out the Wednesday evening, the Center for Public Integrity report on the lying of the Bush Grindhouse, noted the spikes in the number of lies, based on the calendar of political events, and/or Grindhouse scandals

Opening the segment, a wry observation;

OLBERMANN: If you have ever said this administration lied to us 1,000 times about the Iraq, the war and al Qaeda, it turns out you owe Mr. Bush an apology. In our third story tonight, a new study confirming the administration only lied about those vital matters 935 times.

Then, with Rachel Maddow, of Air America, and a newly-anointed MSNBC political pundit;

OLBERMANN: Only 935. In gambling terms the under won. Who knew?

MADDOW: Looking back, before today, before we had a bullion keyword searchable database of lies about to lead up to the Iraq War. You had the sense that we were lied to a lot about weapons of mass destruction, about Saddam having links to al Qaeda and to 9/11.

But having all of these instances in a list now, literally in a searchable database of lies kind of plugs up the memory hole in a way.

It means that we have the evidence at hand to rebut the assertion every time somebody asserts that oh the intelligence was a little fuzzy or I never made that sort of claims, 935 lies may feel low or they may feel high, but they are all provable, documents lies that can‘t disappear again that can‘t disappear in a public record or down the memory hole.

OLBERMANN: So that‘s 532 occasions so it‘s basically a two to one ratio to lies to opportunities for lies. It‘s kind of spectacular in its own way.

MADDOW: Compound sentences is what I think that means.

OLBERMANN: The center did not include false implications. Indirect follow-ups like Iraq has dangerous weapons. Or Iran has dangerous weapons, for that matter. The Republican echoing, actual other Republicans outside the administration saying the same things. We‘ve got all the senators and congressmen are not included in this list. Fox News chicken little moments are not included in this. But what base is there for claiming that this was planned deceit as opposed to innocent, albeit voluminous incompetence?

MADDOW: Well, I spoke with the director of the Center for Public Integrity about that fact today. I said how do you get from there were a lot of lies to the lies were plants. He said one of the things that they found was they organized this information was that there were these really noticeable quantitative spikes in the number of lies being told. At certain times they were lying a lot faster than other times. For example in the lead-up for the Congressional authorization, midterm elections. At specific politically moments, the lies got faster.

There is no way to explain that unless they were lying to accomplish the political objective

Much like the 160,000+ troops in Iraq that he will dump on the next President, The Commander Guy will exit the Grindhouse, an utter failure in HIS War on Terror, leaving the Osama bin Laden problem as well.

After all, The Commander Guy closed the CIA office in charge of hunting bin Laden (which he, a few days later, attempted to deny), then, a few months later, telling rightwing pundit Fred Barnes "Bin Laden Is Not A Top Priority Use of American Resources".

This, after his chicken-heart, phony bravado, following the attacks of September 11th, with his swaggering "I want justice," Bush said. "And there's an old poster out West… I recall, that said, 'Wanted, Dead or Alive.'"

Hmmm ... I wonder, have they raised enough funds, for the Bush Presidential Library, to have a wing of it house all the lies? Or, is that question, about where to house his lies and his Presidential Library, a redundant one?


The Commander Guy's Legacy

Bush uses bin Laden to defend Iraq war policy

Digby: Hyping the intelligence again?

Juan Cole: Bush's incompetence gives al-Qaida new life; The White House hints at military action as the terror organization regroups in northern Pakistan and the Musharraf government begins to wobble.

Sidney Blumenthal: Cooking the intelligence, again; The latest government estimate of the terrorist threat is just a rehash of the same old script, produced under pressure to support the president's efforts to sell the Iraq war.

Why the Bush Administration Didn't Care About Al Qaeda


An empty bullhorn