Wednesday, December 27, 2006

Developing Story - Polar Bears Added To Iraq Options

Bush Administration Wavering On Polar Bears; Considering Employing In Iraq, War Against Terror

Rove Claims He Also Has “The Science”, Says Bears “Will Do Fine In Desert Heat”

After initially deciding to place the polar bear as an Endangered Species, the Bush Administration has halted the formal filing of the paperwork, with a weary President Bush adding to his deliberations while in Crawford, Texas, possibly deploying polar bears in Iraq and with the War Against Terror.

Sources tell The Garlic that the plan to use polar bears in Iraq will be discussed tomorrow, when the President conducts a National Security Council meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley and Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel would not confirm or deny the use of polar bears, stating that “all options are on the table.”

Stanzel also dismissed rumors that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, now that his death sentence has been upheld, as asked to be executed by polar bear and would not comment on reports that polar bears may be part of the 3,500 troops the Pentagon is planning on sending to Kuwait as a standby force.

Polar Bears? That Would Really Take The Cake, Says Biden

Critics charge that the discussion about polar bears is another way the President is avoiding and delaying serious debate about the U.S. role in Iraq and, at the same time, giving indications that he is likely to offer as “his way forward”, an escalation of the occupation of Iraq.

“Did he pull this one out of his Iraq Jar,” asked a not-amused Senator Joseph Biden, who announced he’s planning on fighting any troop build-up in Iraq.

“I mean, c’mon, is he serious about this? Polar bears? ... I mean, that would really take the cake if does something like this ...”

The move to place the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act comes after numerous studies have shown that the effects of Global Warming has been melting the Artic ice cap, and impacting the animals natural habitat and ability to feed itself. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officials say, without any measures being taken the polar bear could become extinct within 45-years.

How polar bears could be deployed in Iraq is also questioned by experts, citing that the animals and their fat-layered 1,000+ pound bodies would not survive the heat of the desert and Middle East. There’s questions about their diet and the cost the military would face with having to bring the polar bears main staple of food - seals - into Iraq

“This is insane,” offered William DeMers, owner of the website and portal www.mypolarbear.com, that is a popular on-line meeting space for polar bear researchers, scientists and enthusiasts.

“These are cold climate wild animals,” huffed an angry DeMers. “You can’t just slap a flak jacket on them and throw them in the middle of the desert and expect them to perform like it was a matinee show at Sea World ... It doesn’t work that way!”

Rove Has “The Science” To Shoot Down Critics

Reports have circulated around the Crawford Ranch that President Bush made some off-hand comment about using polar bears, after seeing a Coca Cola television commercial. The iconic soft drink company has used the polar bear in advertising campaigns over the years.

Upon hearing this, Special White House Council Karl Rove announced that he had “The Science”, quickly dismissing critics of using the polar bear in Iraq. Rove also added that he still has “The Math”, which the special skill under served him for his calculations of a Republican victory in the recent Midterm elections.

Rove claims that he has studies that show jihadists’ insurgents with a near-death-inducing fear of polar bears.

While not offering where the study results came from, many believe they were from practical studies conducted in the Administration’s “robust interrogations” at Guantanamo and other secret CIA prisons. Reports also surfaced that in some of the Bush Administration’s Extraordinary Renditions, terror suspects were chained to cages containing polar bears down in the cargo hold of the planes, within inches of the huge animals reach.

“They will do fine in the desert heat,” boasted Rove.

Rove would neither confirm or deny that the use of polar bears were sections heavily redacted in the recent New York Times Op-Ed article, “What We Wanted to Tell You About Iran”.

Vice President Dick Cheney’s Iran Study Group also declined comment.


President Bush may end up in the rough if his way forward includes using polar bears in Iraq

Top Ten Cloves: Other Surprising Things Found With Microsoft’s New Windows Vista Software

News Item: Vista Flaw Discovered, Risk Believed Low

10. All on his own, Donald Trump announced he’s giving Microsoft a second chance with Vista, which you can see on his “Apprentice” show next month

9. In conjunction with the release, Microsoft suing the City of Chula Vista, so product isn’t associated with “the Cleveland of California”

8. Promises LonelyGirl15 that with Vista, she won’t be lonely any longer

7. Knowing Microsoft’s history, Apple launching a “Frequent Crash Points” program to PC Users; Possible to earn enough to get a Mac

6. While Russian Hackers may be able to break into Vista, Microsoft assuring that there is no threat of Polonium 210 poisoning

5. Former President Ford tried to hang on for the Vista release, but the delays were too much

4. Rep Tom Tancredo (R-CO) misheard the news and has already prepared legislation to shut down Microsoft so they don’t make “Visas for illegal aliens available on the Internet”

3. White House staff had a pool going on what would come first - The release of Vista or Bush’s new Iraq Strategy

2. Bugs and flaws are guaranteed to have you throwing chairs and cursing just like Steve Ballmer

1. Code written into Vista that sends all your data directly to NSA, so they don’t have to bother with the FISA Court or take the time and trouble to tap into you

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Twelve Days of Dubya ...The Second Day

Editors Note: We’re going Old School and stretching out this Christmas Season with a special Garlic rendition of the holiday classic, The Twelve Days of Christmas, with postings of a stanza each night, beginning tonight, and running through January 6, 2007.

Keeping with the spirit of things, feel free to sing out loud.

Twelve Days of Dubya ...The Second Day

On the second day of Christmas,

my Dubya sent to me

Two Fed-Soc Judges,

And a backrub at the G8


Links

Twelve Days of Christmas (Or Twelvetide)

A Tip-of-the-Hat to Carols.org

Twas The Night Before The New Congress

Garlic Christmas Special - David Sedaris Christmas Letter


Monday, December 25, 2006

Twelve Days of Dubya ...The First Day

Editors Note: We’re going Old School and stretching out this Christmas Season with a special Garlic rendition of the holiday classic, The Twelve Days of Christmas, with postings of a stanza each night, beginning tonight, and running through January 6, 2007.

Keeping with the spirit of things, feel free to sing out loud.

Twelve Days of Dubya ...The First Day

On the first day of Christmas,

my Dubya sent to me

A backrub at the G8


Links

Twelve Days of Christmas (Or Twelvetide)

A Tip-of-the-Hat to Carols.org

Twas The Night Before The New Congress

Garlic Christmas Special - David Sedaris Christmas Letter


Happy Holidays! ... Coming Soon - The 12 Days of Dubya

Good Morning Garlic Fans!

Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas!

We hope it's a great day for you, wherever you are ... And come tonight, it will get even better.

The Garlic will kick off it's rendition of the "The 12 Days of Christmas", appropriately titled "The 12 Days of Dubya" this evening, beginning with Day 1 and counting down until January 6, 2007. Posting will be approximately 11PM each night.

Be sure to check out (or, warm-up, as you will) with yesterday’s post of Twas The Night Before The New Congress, or add some mirth to your day with Garlic Christmas Special - David Sedaris Christmas Letter.

So enjoy your day and once again, Merry Christmas!


Sunday, December 24, 2006

Twas The Night Before The New Congress

Editors Note: Our regular Weekend Special - Sautéed Cloves is being replaced today with a Garlic Special, to commemorate the Christmas Holiday. What else could that be but to take a classic, tweak it and ... Well, we’ll let you decide ...

Have a very Merry Christmas!

Garlic Special: Twas The Night Before The New Congress

Twas the night before the New Congress, when all through the White House
Not a Neocon was stirring, not even the Decider-in-Chief, that louse
The plans to attack Iran were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that William Kristol would soon give a cheer


The Joint Chiefs were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of surges danced in their heads.
And Laura in ‘kerchief, bemoaning Condi’s being mateless,
And I, plotting and scheming to avoid the press


When out in the Rose Garden there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew off my butt,
Tore open the shutters while thinking a new tax cut


The moon on the breast of the climate-warmed snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature Congress, and all Democrats, I fear


So lively and quick, was a big ol’ Bertha
I knew in a moment it must be John Murtha.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!


"Now Nancy! Now, Harry! Now, Levin and Hoyer!
On, Connors! On, Waxman! On, Biden and their lawyer!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"


As dry leaves that before the Hurricane Katrina fly,
When they meet with a Signing Statement, alas, could only cry.
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of Subpoenas, one for Cheney too


And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The boasting they had a handful of proof
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney Big Murtha came with a bound


He had the look of grrr, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with lies and soot.
A bundle of Subpoenas he had flung on his back
And he looked like a prosecutor going after DeLay’s PAC


His eyes were on the WMD’s and how it was a slam dunk
And the intelligence and Niger and all the other junk
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
Now that my public opinion ratings are ever so low


The copy of the Constitution he held tight in his teeth,
Its clear law encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a serious face showing it was all biz
That shook and laughed when I countered I have the Math Whiz


He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old Rep,
And I laughed when I saw him, as he explained my misstep
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had everything to dread


He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings, with warrants from the House Clerk.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
He warned not a CIA Agent should get exposed!


He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
"God Bless America, everyone knows we are right!"


A Tip-of-the-Hat to Carols.org


A sleigh, full of subpoenas, is heading their way







“Really, It’s Just A Coincidence" ... The Results - The Garlic Week Poll

Well, with the cool embrace of the Iraq Study Group, you could just tell it wasn’t going to be added to President Bush’s Ek-A-Lec-Tic" Reading List.

Then there’s Vice President Cheney, who hasn’t indicated if he will back basic civil rights for the parents of his new grandchild, but nonetheless, is looking forward to that event (boy, to be a fly-on-the-wall in that hospital on the night of the delivery).

So, it didn’t come to any surprise for our Garlic Poll voters that the delay the President has engaged in, as to announcing his new, new, new Iraq strategy, the only logical reason, given the history of this administration, is politics. Step on the Democrats as they take over the Congress, put a dent into Speaker-of-the-House Nancy Pelosi’s 100-hours and otherwise, man the battle stations to take control of the sound bites and messages flowing out of Washington.

Sounds like it has to be coming from the man-with-a-plan, “The Math” genius boy, Karl Rove. We’ll just have to wait and see, after the beating he took in the Midterms, if Rove has his chalk back on the blackboard, of if he’ll be clapping erasers behind the White House.

The Results - Garlic's Weekly Poll December 17 - December 23, 2006

President Bush is delaying his new strategy for Iraq until next month because...

1. He wants to upstage the Democrats when they officially take over the majority in the Congress Tally 26%

2. Dick Cheney, who’s preoccupied with the prospects of having a new grandchild, hasn’t told the President what it is yet Tally 25%

3. Government Printing Office hasn’t finished the phonetically-spelled edition of the Iraq Study Group Report yet for the President to review Tally 24%

4. Hoping people will forget about it so he can keep delaying it until the end of his term and it’s not his problem any longer Tally 14%

5. He’s waiting to see what he gets for Christmas presents first, that maybe he’ll get a solution as a gift Tally 11%

This week’s Poll - When it is all said-and-done this Christmas, who will have ended up with more coal in their stocking?

Scroll up to the top right corner to place your vote


Will Vice President Cheney go against the administration he serves, and back basic civil rights for the parents of his new grandchild?

Saturday, December 23, 2006

Garlic Christmas Special - David Sedaris Christmas Letter

Yes, it is that time of year, where all your hip friends will be introducing you to David Sedaris, and his Christmas essays, ‘Holiday On Ice’ (or, if they are true hipsters, they’ll be giving you his ‘Barrel Fever’).

Now, in an overwhelming number of circumstances, you’ll be directed to Sedaris’s “Santaland Diaries”, the recounting of his working as an elf at Macy’s.

While extremely funny in it's own right, the killer, fall-down-pee-your-pants-laughing is his other essay, 'Seasons Greetings To Our Friends and Family!!!' … The Dunbar's Christmas letter …

Well, lucky for us, as This American Life, on their website, has a reading of Sedaris’s work, in a stage production titled ‘A Very Special Sedaris Christmas’ including The Dunbar Christmas Letter (which begins, read by Julia Sweeney, at approximately 14:55 and runs for approximately 18-minutes).

If you choose to read the essay, do it in the privacy of your own home. Attempting to read it at Starbucks or on the bus, you’ll end up annoying those around you, as every few seconds, you’ll be bursting out in uncontrollable laughter.

Oh yeah, it will definitely give you a different perspective on any Christmas letter you receive from family and friends.

Season’s Greetings!

Links

‘A Very Special Sedaris Christmas’

David Sedaris

This American Life


Friday, December 22, 2006

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

Joyeux Noel!

Felice Navidad!







The Garlic wants to wish all a very happy, healthy Merry Christmas.

Check in over the holiday lull, as we are planning on posting, and with a holiday surprise or two.

Once again, thank you for visiting The Garlic and have a very happy holiday

Peace

JTD

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Top Ten Cloves: How Rep. Virgil Goode Believes His Letter and Comments Against Rep Ellison and Muslims Are In The Christmas Spirit

News Item: Lawmaker Stands Firm on Quran Criticism

10. Since Ellison has already been elected, doesn’t think he’ll have to ask new Congress for a fence or wall to be built around Minnesota

9. Nothing wrong, now that there’s a Muslim in Congress, to reinforce the walls of his office and suggests other members do likewise if they want to enjoy future Christmas Holidays

8. Didn’t call or refer to him as a “Macaca”

7. As soon as he’s finished with Ted Haggard, would like to see Rep. Ellison sit down with James Dobson for some "Spiritual Restoration"

6. Denies that he said he wants, after a vote in Congress that Rep. Ellison walk around with purple dye on his finger

5. Hasn’t asked Rep. Ellison to prove he’s a good American by going out, as President Bush advocated, shopping

4. Sending new letter ... Instead of causing trouble, would like to see Rep. Ellison take his six imam constituents to the airport and sing Christmas carols

3. Wouldn’t think of defacing, in any way, the Koran Ellison will use for his swearing-in ceremony

2. Hasn’t called for any Danish cartoonist to draw anything that would insult Ellison

1. Willing to go up to Minnesota with Rep. Ellison, drop in the snow and see who makes “Snow Angels” or who makes “Snow Allahs”


Didn’t call or refer to him as a “Macaca”

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Top Ten Cloves: Signs That Christmas Is Coming In The White House

News Item: Presidential Message: Christmas 2006

10. Miss USA dropped by, with a little too much Holiday Cheer for the Bush Twins

9. All of Scooter Libby’s Subpoenas have been hung by the fire with care

8. Everyone is mournfully reminiscing about the great gifts they used to get from Jack Abramoff

7. Josh Bolten has started coming to work dressed - completely - like an elf

6. President Bush took his own advice about shopping and is banging away on “The Google”, looking for some gifts

5. Staff is using the Iraq Study Group Report for wrapping paper

4. CIA decks out the plane and prison they use for Extraordinary Renditions to look like the Polar Express

3. Condi Rice has parked herself under some mistletoe, and mumbling about snaring herself a husband

2. Vice President Cheney is resigned to his usual Christmas - His stocking stuffed with stocks in Coal companies


1. President keeps calling the Postmaster General every hour, asking if his letter to Santa Claus has been delivered

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Top Ten Cloves: Things Overheard At Vice President Dick Cheney’s Holiday Party

News Item: Cheney Holiday Party Sponsored By Kazakh "Snow Queen" Vodka...

10. I asked for a Gin-and-Tonic and what I got was a Gin-and-Caffeine-Free Diet Sprite

9. Nice touch, sending out the party invitations in the margins of newspapers

8. I’m surprised Cheney didn’t come out and announce that Rumsfeld was in his final throes

7. I heard that right after Christmas, Cheney’s going to begin rehearsing his testimony for the Libby Trial

6. Don’t worry about Cheney having a cocktail, or two ... The guns are locked up in a different location

5. Bush wants to put his Presidential Library at SMU, where’s Cheney going to put his Vice Presidential Secret Bunker?

4. Too bad Judith Regan got fired, I heard Cheney was up for writing “If I Lied, Here’s How I Would Have Fabricated The Case For WMD’s”

3. If only the President had a “Bush’s Bush”, just like “Cheney’s Cheney”, we’d be a lot better off

2. You’ll find out who was in his Energy Meetings before you’ll discover who the father is of his daughter’s baby

1. You want to see fireworks? Get a few drinks into the wife and say the words “Wolf Blitzer”


Nice touch, sending out the party invitations in the margins of newspapers
















Monday, December 18, 2006

Minced Garlic - Year of the Special Comments

On MSNBC’s Countdown tonight, our anchor-hero Keith Olbermann offered not the typical 5 Top news items, but rather a review, titled Year of the Special Comments: Lies, Lessons, Cowardice and More (which must mean that next week, being the holiday lull of Christmas to New Years, were in for a “Super Package of Doc Blocs”)



With adding some introductory comments, Olbermann only had time to represent four of his Special Comments.

Visit Year of the Special Comments: Lies, Lessons, Cowardice and More for links, with video, to all of the Special Comments Olbermann has offered.

You can also scroll down the right sidebar to Garlictorials and view the Minced Garlic’s


Garlic Special - The Sounds of Christmas

To get into the swing of the season, The Garlic took a very informal survey of what people were listening to, in regards to Christmas Music.

We can trust that Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly is blasting it 24/7 but who else was out there groovin’ to the Sounds of the Season.

Here’s a brief sampling;


President Bush - Go Where I Send Thee


Mary Cheney - I’ve Got My Love To Keep Me Warm


Donald Rumsfeld - Little Drummer Boy


Condoleezza Rice - Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas


Judith Regan - I’ll Be Home For Christmas


KKK, David Duke, Michael Richards - White Christmas


Medellin Cocaine Cartel - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow


Al Qaeda - Sleigh Ride


Existentialists - What Is Santa Claus? (Stan Kenton version)


Emmanuelle - O Come O Come Emmanuel


Eddie Murphy - What Child Is This


Former Wal-Mart VP of Marketing Communications Julie Roehm - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus


Former Sectary of the Interior Gale Norton - O Tannenbaum


(We Wanna See) Santa Do the Mambo

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Weekend Special - Sautéed Cloves 17 December 2006












In preparation for the President announcing his new Iraq strategy, old props and sets are getting moved out, cleaned up and repainted. White House Officials are telling The Garlic that the former “Plan For Victory” stage set is getting a makeover and will become “Resolutions For Victory” on January 1st, with the President revealing his New Years’ Resolutions right from the set













Following his dolphin-saving heroics last week, Bao Xishen, the world’s tallest man at 7-foot-9-inches, from Inner Mongolia, will be receiving an invitation from the Democratic Leadership when Congress returns to session next month. The hope is that, once Oversight Hearings start, Xishen can use his 41.7-inch reach to pull the lies out of witnesses appearing before the committees























Unconfirmed reports have Rev. Pat Robertson, founder of the Christian Coalition of America, meeting with Vice President Dick Cheney and his wife, Lynne Cheney, to assure them that he has already spoken with God, and that any tsunamis or earthquakes that he has asked God to strike homosexuals with, Mary Cheney, the couples expecting daughter will be spared. Robertson also echoed President Bush’s belief that the Cheney’s lesbian daughter will make a “loving mother”





















Publishers of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary announced today that they will immediately edit both their on-line and hard-cover dictionaries to include Time Magazine under the word “Lame”, after the magazine named their 2006 Person of the Year as “You, Yes, You. You Control The Information Age. Welcome To Your World”

Other dictionary publishers indicated they were likely to follow with placing Time Magazine under “Lame” as well

















If ESPN has anything to say about it, Senator Barack Obama will be joining the network’s Monday Night Football crew. Obama’s opening of the show last week, a tongue-in-cheek tease of the popular Senator possibly announcing his candidacy for President exploded over the Internet.

ESPN is said to be pursuing Obama “heavy” for ‘Monday Night Football’ and that it should be a “no-brainer” because “we’ll pay him a heck-of-a-lot more then what a president of the country makes”.

ESPN is also believed to be throwing at Obama, a package that includes his own show, a video game starring the Senator and ESPN will work with the NFL to see that Obama’s favorite team, the Chicago Bears, win the Super Bowl this year

'Ahh, Dick ... Isn't There Something We Can Do About All These Subpeonas? ...The Results - The Garlic Week Poll

Considering all the xenophobic rhetoric, phony terror alerts and smearing during their terms to-date, that it is all but certain President Bush and Vice President Cheney are the first two people that are the least happy with the House and Senate going over to Democratic Majorities in 2007, and our Garlic Poll Voters were, as usual, quite perceptive to that.

And with the Democrats promising a “back-to-business” in the new session, and Speaker-Elect Nancy Pelosi already announcing a return to the five-day work week, you can take all this talk about bipartisanship for what it is, and begin smelling the burning heat of those subpoenas being fired into the White House

While it would be fun to hear Keith Olbermann taunt “The Sleepiest Congressman of the Week” award, which placed a close second in the voting, or to have the Gregory-Snow version of the “Thriller In Manila”, duking it out in the Press Room (and, okay, Snow apologized but that was last week), we’ll have to be patient and see just how it will be when our congressman and senators truly get down to some serious work.

Stay Tuned ... After all, 2007, in the Chinese Calendar, is the Year of the Pig...

The Results - The Garlic's Weekly Poll December 10 - December 16, 2006

With the Democratic-led 110th Congress planning on working a 5-Day week, we can expect...

1. Pissing-and-moaning from Bush and Cheney, because the new oversight is impeding the gathering of more Executive Power Tally 30%

2. New C-SPAN or Keith Olbermann “Sleeping Congressman of the Week” award Tally 29%

3. NBC’s David Gregory to become even grouchier; A lot more podium head-banging from White House Press Secretary Tony Snow Tally 28%

4. More K Street Lobbyists, as they will have to work double-shifts to keep pace Tally 13%

This week’s Poll - President Bush is delaying his new strategy for Iraq until next month because

Scroll up to the top right corner to place your vote












The 110
th Congress will likely wipe the smiles of Bush and Cheney’s faces, and have them wishing that they received one of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s “Snowflakes”, telling them that you “Go with the Executive Powers you have, not the Executive Powers you wished you had at a later date”