Insane McCain

A Little Close for Comfort?

Senator McCain was once named honorary board member of the Coalition of Republican Environmental Activists.

The Coalition of Republican Environmental Activists was the former name for the Council of Republicans for Environmental Advocacy, or CREA.

CREA's "honorary board" is the only board of the organization.

During CREA president Italia Federici's November 2005 Senate Indian Affairs Committee sworn testimony, McCain never disclosed his former position in the organization. What's going on here?

  Wampum post

No, I don't suppose he would, considering that Italia Federici's testimony we're talking about here was in the investigation of the Abramaoff federal influencing racket.

[T]he GOP should be afraid, very afraid, should Federici turn state's evidence. Much more than her old boyfriend, Griles, Federici has the potential to bring down many more with her.

[...]

[Grover] Norquist was one of CREA's initial founders back in 1997, and helped moved Federici to Washington. CREAs official office was for some time located within Norquist's own ATF offices, and Federici used Norquist's home address as her own in contributions reported to the FEC. It was Federici's friendship with Norquist which got her hooked up with Abramoff in 2001. With all the indications that Norquist actively participated in Abramoff's influence and access-peddling schemes, he has much to worry should Federici sing. Frankly, I'm surprised he's not personally footing her attorney bills, forcing her instead to turn to the Public Defender's Office.

[...]

It is a mistake to underestimate the importance of the DoJ's investigation of Italia Federici. The question we should all be asking ourselves, will the caged bird sing?

  Wampum post

Shopping In Baghdad

I missed which Congressidiot it was shopping with McCain in the Baghdad market, but on NPR last evening there was a report about that jaunt, and whichever one it was (might have been the Indiana idiot, but am not sure) was practically in tears describing the wonderful reception from a carpet salesman who wouldn't even take any money for an attempted purchase. He just offered up his carpets with a smile and a hand on his heart. NPR's reporter then talked to the carpet seller who had a little insight into that transaction.

He said he realized these were guests, and he wanted to show them what nice people Iraqis are. And besides, he said, they were surrounded by soldiers with guns - the Occupiers - and he was quite angry about them even being there. (That, and the lost money on sales, no doubt. Which makes me wonder, beyond the possible casualties incurred in Iraq due to having a company of soldiers protecting these Congressidiots instead of whatever they would normally have been doing, I wonder how much money was lost by the market sellers from sales they could have made without the interruption.)

In a blogpost titled: Once Again I Say McCain is Unfit and Unstable, Joy Tomme writes about Senator McCain's insane campaign move:

Earlier in the week, McCain had said “General Petraeus goes out there almost every day in an unarmed humvee.” Retired General Barry McCaffrey contradicted McCain and said, “No Iraqi government official, coalition soldier, diplomat, reporter, foreign NGO [nongovernmental organization], nor contractor can walk the streets of Baghdad, nor Mosul, nor Kirkuk, nor Basra, nor Tikrit, nor Najaf, nor Ramadi, without heavily armed protection."

[...]

Semple wrote, “At a news conference shortly after their outing, Mr. McCain, an Arizona Republican, and his three Congressional colleagues described Shorja as a safe, bustling place full of hopeful and warmly welcoming Iraqis — ‘like a normal outdoor market in Indiana in the summertime,’ offered Representative Mike Pence, an Indiana Republican who was a member of the delegation.’”

[...]

“’They paralyzed the market when they came,’ Ali Jassim Faiyad, the owner of an electrical appliances shop in the market, said during an interview in his shop on Monday. ‘This was only for the media.’”

It’s hard to imagine what McCain thought he was doing. Did he not know he was being photographed wearing a bulletproof vest? Did he not realize journalists, generals and shop owners would be interviewed who would tell the real story? Does he, like George W. Bush, think he is the Great Oz and therefore his word will be believed in spite of proof positive that he’s lying?

What I would suggest is that the people who are still supporting the occupation are not believers of proofs, but rather, believers of an ideology, and so, it matters not what lies are told, as long as they support the delusion. (Grover Norquist might agree with me.)

And for those people who do believe the lies, I only have one suggestion: stay out of Indiana this summer.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.