Scarborough has not always supported Bush. SM

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hasn't always supported Bush doesn't make it true. In fact, if people like you (Bush groupies) say it, it probably isn't true at all.

I watch Scarborough's show every night. Do you? Scarborough has always supported Bush. But he doesn't follow him blindly like some people, and when Bush does lies or spits on the Constitution, Scarborough calls him on it. Of course, to you, I guess if someone believes in defending the Constitution, that's a direct insult to your president. What kind of values do you have?

The transcript is copied below. If you read it, you might find that Bush didn't even lift a finger to try to get this terrorist, and you might walk away with a slightly different take on the situation. Believe me, If Scarborough is upset with Bush, there's a reason. He's always supported Bush. Even the family of the Mr. Stethem is basically pro Bush.

'Scarborough Country' for December 27
Read the transcript to the Tuesday show

Guest: Erich Ritter, Tyson Slocum, Joseph Bruno, Ric Robinson, Clinton

Suggs, Ken Stethem

JOE SCARBOROUGH, HOST: Right now in SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY, a terrorist is set free. Will our government now stand up and finally do the right thing? This terrorist hijacked a TWA plane and murdered a U.S. Navy diver. And the German government let him out of prison, and our government didn't do much to stop them. Tonight, the diver's brother and a close Navy friend who was also on that plane and beaten on that plane, they both come to SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY to say what our government must now do and how we can all help get justice for Robert Stethem.

Welcome to SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY, no passport required, and only common sense allowed.

ANNOUNCER: From the press room, to the courtroom, to the halls of Congress, Joe Scarborough has seen it all. Welcome to SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY.

SCARBOROUGH: Hey, thanks so much for being with me tonight. I hope you and your family had a very merry Christmas.

Tonight on the show, we are going to be also talking about a quick-thinking surfer who fought off a great white shark and lived to tell about it. Now, wait until you hear where he says he learned the skills that saved his life, and should you try this at home?

Plus, blonde bombshell Anna Nicole Smith back in the news. So, why exactly is the Bush administration hooking up with the former �Playboy� centerfold in court? We will tell you the full story later in the show.

But, first, let's start with the outrage over why a terrorist is out of jail tonight, even though he was convicted of killing a U.S. Navy diver. Now, this is a story we first brought you last week, after this man, Hamadi, walked free from a German prison. Now, this thug hijacked a TWA jet in 1985. You remember these scenes? And he brutally beat and tortured 23-year-old Robert Stethem, Robert obviously in the Navy, and Stethem was so severely beaten that his body was unrecognizable when they finally dumped him onto the runway in Beirut.

And now, for reasons we talk about, Hamadi is walking free in the Middle East.

With me to talk about this outrage, and it is an outrage, friends, and our government needs to hear about it, we have got Ken Stethem with us. He's a brother of that murdered Navy diver, and also Clinton Suggs. He was sitting next to Robert on that hijacked flight, and he was also beaten by the terrorist who was set free.

Ken, let's start with you.

What did the American government do once you and your family started notifying them back in the spring that you were afraid that this terrorist thug, who murdered your brother, might walk free?

KEN STETHEM, BROTHER OF MURDERED NAVY DIVER: Well, Joe, the simple answer is nothing.

Our family had asked for meetings through the Justice Department, and to the State Department for meetings, because of concerns we had over this possibility and some other points that we wanted to bring up. And we never once were given a response even as to why no meetings would be able to take place.

SCARBOROUGH: Well, Wait a second, Ken. Did you try to get in touch with Condoleezza Rice or anybody? Who did you try to get in touch with at the State Department?

STETHEM: My parents were going through an intermediary through the Justice Department, and we absolutely tried to get ahold of Condoleezza Rice to get a meeting with her, and this is one of the few times since my brother was murdered that we have not been able to get access to the secretary of state.

SCARBOROUGH: You know, Ken, this is the thing that I don't understand. Obviously the Bush administration has been waging a fierce war on terror over the past four or five years since 9/11, and yet in this case, here you have a terrorist thug with connections�his whole family has had connections to Hezbollah for some time�murdered an American, not only any American, but a guy that served in the United States Navy.

The murder was broadcast across the Arab world, and America, and everywhere else, and when you find out that he may be released, you try to contact this government, this president, this secretary of state, and they give you absolutely no assurances that they are going to work to try to keep him in jail?

STETHEM: We never heard word one back from them, Joe, and when you look at the timing, what is not just shameful but absolutely disgraceful is that the same time Bush was and the administration was preparing the speech that went public to the public, asking for continued support on the war on terrorism last week, at the same time he was planning and giving that speech, the administration knew that Germany was about to release Hamadi, and they did nothing.

SCARBOROUGH: You know, Ken�and the thing is, it's very interesting that despite the fact that you couldn't get the Bush administration, you couldn't get the secretary of state, you couldn't get anybody to call your family when this terrorist, who murdered your brother in cold blood on the international stage 20 years ago was about to set free, they finally did call your parents Christmas Eve.

Talk about the president's chief of staff, Andy Card, calling your parents on Christmas Eve, and talk about that discussion. What went on?

STETHEM: Andrew Card called my parents, and my parents�our family was appreciative at the gesture, but he basically called to pass along the president's condolences, to pass along the fact that he was not satisfied with any answer that he got within the administration as to why the family hadn't been contacted, either before or after, and that he wanted us to know that phone calls have been made at the highest level.

SCARBOROUGH: What did your parents say?

(CROSSTALK)

STETHEM: You know, my parents, for 20 years, have supported five different administrations and have just trusted and hoped that action would be taken. And you know what, my parents understood the truth.

And the truth is the administration would have had to simply make a phone call at the presidential level, demand that Hamadi not be released or be released into U.S. custody, and pressured Germany to make that happen, and because they didn't do those three simple things, we are now supposed to believe that the administration is going to spend the time, money, effort, energy, manpower, and put the political capital at risk to go get him and bring him back? You know what?

SCARBOROUGH: Well, and, Ken, let me just say, that is what is so absurd to me tonight, listening, reading this story over the past week. Now you are hearing the administration saying that they are going to do everything they can to hunt this guy down, to track�I would say if they had a clean shot at him, they should take him out for what he did to your brother 20 years ago, send a real message to terrorists across the Middle East.

But that's not going to happen. The guy slipped into Lebanon. He's got connections. His family has connections to Hezbollah. They had a chance to keep him in custody and they wouldn't even return your phone calls. Do you think the fix was already in? Do you think the State Department knew what Germany was going to do, and so they decided not to talk to you, to let them go ahead and do it because they didn't want to offend an ally?

STETHEM: You know what, absolutely.

And whether it was apathy or indifference or ineptness, you know what, it doesn't matter. You can't say, you can't say that we are fully, totally committed to this war on terrorism and then let a convicted murderer and terrorist go.

SCARBOROUGH: And, Ken, let me just say, I mean, you have for the most part supported this president's war on terror, as have I. I mean, the guy has aggressively gone after terrorists across the globe, but they have one in custody that killed your brother 20 years ago, and they do absolutely nothing to stop the Germans from letting him go on parole.

Is that a fair characterization, that you and your family have been supporters of this president, but you just feel like it was a disgrace how this administration let you all down?

STETHEM: That's right, Joe, and I will tell you, nobody can accuse the Stethem family or myself for not supporting, absolutely supporting this war on terrorism.

We absolutely recognize the president and his administration and the fact that he has done more in this presidency than all the other presidents, the last four or five, six combined, against terrorism. But you know what, I think the obvious mistake that is being made is this. Too much, too much of the burden for this war on terrorism is being placed on the military and the military actions, and really the military actions are only as good as the policies that they support.

And we do not have the clear, concise, and deliberate policy that we need on terrorism yet, because if we did, this wouldn't have happened.

SCARBOROUGH: This would have never happened, and again, to put a proper perspective on this, there is no doubt, I agree with you, this administration has done more to fight terrorism.

STETHEM: Absolutely.

SCARBOROUGH: Obviously, part that is just the times�than the past four or five combined. I think they are doing a great job in a lot of areas, but here, again, a shameful lapse.

Clinton, let me bring you in here. Talk about Robert. Talk about the situation when you knew that this terrorist had killed your friend.

CLINTON SUGGS, TWA FLIGHT 817 SURVIVOR: Well, right from the beginning, when they singled out Robert and myself as being in the military, they started with Robert, and they brutally beat him, and they executed him, Hamadi did. And he was brought to justice, and now he is released, and, you know...

SCARBOROUGH: And, Clinton, he was killed, right�he was killed and you were tied up and beaten. Why? Because you all were in the military, right?

SUGGS: Correct.

SCARBOROUGH: How did they find that out?

SUGGS: We were traveling with military documents and military I.D. cards. And...

SCARBOROUGH: And the second you handed those over, you said you knew you made a big mistake, right?

SUGGS: Well, it wasn't a big mistake.

It was to surrender our I.D. cards to not bring as much attention to ourselves for not having passports at the time, so it seemed better to surrender than to make a fuss and then really become noticeable.

SCARBOROUGH: Yes. Right.

And you also�you were blindfolded, along with Mr. Stethem, and both of you were beaten very badly, weren't you?

SUGGS: That is correct. Robert was beaten several times, from the beginning of the flight, within 20 minutes, and then he was severely beaten in Beirut, the first trip.

And the second trip, it was just�it's when they killed Bob. It was

� he had no way to defend himself. He was tied with his hands behind his back, blindfolded, and there was nothing he could do. And, you know, that's terrorism, and that's what terrorism is, and our government went out as steaming to bring terrorism to justice. And then when it was brought to justice, the ball was dropped several administrations ago, and then now, we have come back to make a full force, like we are going to do something.

But when it comes to making sure these people are convicted and spend their time for the crimes they commit, they just walk, and now they are back home. And he's a hero, and he has slipped away, and he is probably back up to where he started.

SCARBOROUGH: Well, I will tell you what, Ken, let me bring you back in here and ask you a question.

Just I got to believe�and I know, Clinton, you have got to be completely disgusted by this, as much as, Ken, you and your family are�but what do you think our government should do? What do you think the Israelis should do? If they have a clean shot of this guy, you think they should take him out?

STETHEM: I think the Israelis should do what they know they can do and what the right thing to do is. I think Israelis do real well on their own. I will tell you, Joe, I will tell you what I would like to see.

SCARBOROUGH: But you think�you think the right thing, though, is to shoot him, kill him, like kill him the way he killed your brother?

STETHEM: You know what, Mohammed Ali Hamadi is running around free to commit more acts of terrorism, and my brother's wasn't the only case. He was actually arrested bringing in liquid explosives into Germany. He needs to be taken out, whether it's with a bullet or with a sentence, and in jail to stay. He needs to be taken out.

SCARBOROUGH: You know, we are in a war on terror, and this thug is one of the key players in the war now, as far as I am concerned.

Ken, final question. And, again, I have supported the Bush administration. I will continue to support them in the war on terror. They have got guts. The president has got a lot of guts that all of his adversaries don't have, and I salute him for that.

But, tonight, they have screwed this up badly, Ken. Tonight, what can you and what can me, what can our viewers in SCARBOROUGH COUNTRY do to help your family out?

STETHEM: I will tell you what, Joe. I would like the American people to pick up the phone and call the White House and call the State Department.

I would like them to do that on January 3, between 9:00 a.m. and 12:00 a.m. East Coast time. I would like them to tell the president and the elected representatives, their elected representatives, we expect the same courage, commitment, and devotion to duty from there that we all expect of our men and women in uniform.

SCARBOROUGH: All right.

STETHEM: We expect�Joe, if I could.

SCARBOROUGH: Yes. Go ahead.

(CROSSTALK)

STETHEM: We expect them to develop a clear, concise, and deliberate policy against terrorism that includes identifying Lebanon for what it is, which is a terrorist nation. They give safe harbor to 25 percent of the terrorists on the top 23 terrorists of the FBI's list, and one of them was more responsible�was responsible for killing more Americans than anyone else before bin Laden.

SCARBOROUGH: All right.

Ken, we got to go. Thank you, Ken.

Thank you, Clinton.

We are going to be following this story.

SCARBOROUGH: Now, today, President Bush again refused to answer questions about the White House CIA leak case. But he did have this to say.

GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don�t know all the facts. I want to know all the facts. The best place for facts to be done is by somebody who is spending time investigating it.

I would like this to end as quickly as possible, so we know the facts. And if someone committed a crime, they will no longer work in my administration.

SCARBOROUGH: Ah, nuance. I love nuance. Before, it was, if somebody leaked this information, they are not going to work in the administration. Now it has been elevated to, if somebody committed a crime, they are not going to work in our administration.

Now, a far cry, obviously, from what the White House had to say back in September 2003. Listen to what White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan had to say back then.

SCOTT MCCLELLAN, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: If anyone in this administration was involved in it, they would no longer be in this administration.

With me now to talk about this boiling Washington summer scandal are Peter Beinart�he�s the editor of �The New Republic��and also Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway.

You know, I have been saying all along that somebody lied to George Bush, because George Bush would not have gone out a year ago and said, hey, if somebody was involved in this leak, they wouldn�t work in my administration, if he knew that Karl Rove was involved. Now we�re talking about obviously an indictment. Does this mean the White House now understands they are going to have to backtrack?

PETER BEINART, EDITOR, �THE NEW REPUBLIC�: They have already started backtracking.

I mean, Scott McClellan said the idea that Karl Rove was involved with this was�quote, unquote��ridiculous.� Now, of course, it is undisputed that Karl Rove was involved in this. That alone seems to me is reason for Scott McClellan, if he has any dignity at all left, to resign.

BEINART: Because once a press secretary loses all credibility by being lied to by his bosses and then lying to the press as a result, the only honorable thing to do is resign. It�s pretty well�it�s pretty�because has no credibility left. He is now basically a walking pinata.

SCARBOROUGH: All right, Peter, let�s talk about what we know. Let�s talk about what we do know, Peter.

SCARBOROUGH: We know that either Karl Rove or Scooter Libby or the president or somebody in the Cheney-wing of the White House lied to Scott McClellan. Is that safe to say? Somebody is lying here.

BEINART: Yes. Someone lied to him, because he would not have gone out and said it was ridiculous that Karl Rove was involved without someone telling him that.

There is no way this guy would have gone out and made the statement that he made last year had he not been lied to, right?

CONWAY: There is no evidence that anybody lied to Scott. And there is certainly no evidence that Karl Rove was a producer of any information.

If anything, the two most recent news accounts about this issue suggest that Karl was the recipient of the information from a media source, not the producer of that information. And, look...

SCARBOROUGH: Well, he produced�he produced it to �TIME� magazine and Cooper, didn�t he?

CONWAY: No. There is no evidence of that. In fact, when Joe Wilson himself testified before the..

SCARBOROUGH: Where have I been? I mean, I am sorry. I thought I read the �TIME� magazine article. I thought I saw Matt Cooper on �Meet the Press� this weekend saying that he got the information from Karl Rove.

SCARBOROUGH: I mean, was I�was it all a dream? Was it like the last season of �Dallas�?

But that�again, when you are the subject of a grand jury investigate, as it is going on now, you are not allowed to discuss it. So, Karl can�t really defend himself.

What other reports have suggested is that, perhaps, immediately, perhaps, hypothetically speaking, someone in the media called Karl and said, I have this information. I am going to do a story about it.

Now, letting it fly out there in the ether does not mean that Karl provided the information. Nor does it mean that he corroborated, verified or encouraged it. If anything, he may have tried to kill it on the�on the�with the inference that the person not go out and use inaccurate information.

Now, let�s remember what this information is about, serious stuff, that the vice president allegedly sent Joe Wilson over to Niger to check out the uranium story. And then, when Joe�when Joe Wilson, the same guy, testifies to the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, he says, I may have used a little bit of literary flair, the same guy who poses in �Vanity Fair.� This is not a credible person.

SCARBOROUGH: Let me ask you this, Peter. I want to bring this up. The thing that I found very interesting�and, obviously, I respect Kellyanne and have for some time and agree with her a lot more than I disagree with her.

But it seems, in this Karl Rove case�if we want to call it a scandal, we can call it a scandal�that if every time you start talking about Karl Rove, Republicans start talking about Joe Wilson. Now, I think Joe Wilson is a liar. I think he is a joke. But it seems to me he is not relevant to this leak, is he?

What Kelly is doing is repeating exactly the same talking points that every other Republican has been repeating all week.

BEINART: And the point is, I happen to think Joe Wilson has a lot more credibility than Karl Rove. But it is totally irrelevant.

The question�even if you think that Joe Wilson is the biggest liar in Washington, it is absolutely sleazy to go after him by going after his wife. That is not...

BEINART: The people who went out and said, who said that his wife is a covert operative for the CIA, which got the CIA so upset that they asked the Justice Department to do an investigation, those people.

And is very likely those people are either Karl Rove, Lewis Libby, Ari Fleischer, or all of the above.

What we do know is that�is that there was a State Department memo which had this information. We know that Fleischer was reading that memo.

And we know that this information got to Robert Novak. It is conceivable -yes, I will grant it is conceivable that, somehow, some reporter got it and spit it back to these guys in the administration. But it is more likely that they got it from the State Department memo and then they fed it to Novak in an effort to discredit Wilson.

SCARBOROUGH: Kellyanne, let me ask you a question here. I am just curious. And I have been asking my Republican friends this question for the past couple weeks. Let�s say Bill Clinton�s top political adviser had decided to reveal the identity of a CIA agent to a reporter from �TIME� magazine to get back at that person�s spouse? What would you be saying? What would Republicans be saying about Bill Clinton and Bill Clinton�s top political adviser?

SCARBOROUGH: ... that what everybody in Washington knows is actually the case, that this was passed on from Karl Rove to Matt Cooper at �TIME� magazine. What would you say if the Clinton administration had engaged in this type of activity?

CONWAY: I would say exactly what I said when the Clinton administration was engaged in far worse, something called Whitewater, which Peter was against investigating, even though people...

SCARBOROUGH: I�m talking about the outing of a CIA agent in a time of war. That is all I�m asking.

CONWAY: And my answer is what it was then, which is that I respect the rule of law enough to allow the investigatory process to work its way out.

If we all respect the law as it is written and the investigatory process that is currently undergoing, Joe, then the facts will be known. And the president will keep to his commitment that anyone who broke the law will be out of there, including�anybody.

SCARBOROUGH: Well, that is a different commitment from what we heard in the fall.

SCARBOROUGH: The commitment that was made before was anybody that revealed the identity of a CIA agent would be fired.

CONWAY: Joe, Karl beat the Democrats twice now, though, Karl has beaten the Democrats black and blue in two presidential elections.

The bottom line is that a CIA agent has been outed. I don�t care whether a Republican did it.

SCARBOROUGH: She went to �Vanity Fair.� And, again, I think Joe Wilson and his wife are shameless. But they did that after they were already revealed.

SCARBOROUGH: So, I just�again, I don�t like�I think Joe Wilson is a joke. The fact that this guy lied about just about everything involved in his African trip and then wrote a book called �The Politics of Truth� is shameless.

Now that I have preached, the question is this. Is somebody going to jail over this? Is somebody going to be indicted?

BEINART: I think it is�I would say the chances of someone being indicted are a bit better than 50-50. The chance of someone going to jail I think are relatively low. I would say less than one in four. That is my guess.

the right to free speech. Thanks to the moderator for straddling the fence and electing not to ban me. That said, I will not hide (change my name) and I will not go away. I will not allow those who are afraid of opposite opinion to stop me from posting mine. That is not the America I want to live in, and I think it is time that more of us stood up againt bullying tactics. I am standing.

In deference to those of you who would seek to silence me....I am an Independent and I will post independently. I will not reply directly to any of you, you can keep your threads all to yourselves. If I have a rebuttal I will post it separately. You are free to do as you have been doing without me entering your threads. That is me, reaching across the aisle.

I will also retract a statement I made yesterday. I was wrong to lump all Democrats into the same barrel. As Oldtimer so astutely pointed out, I fell into the same trap I accused others of, and in retrospect and after McCain's speech it became more clear to me. All Democrats/liberals/progressives are not of the same cloth as what I have experienced on this board. I apologize for that.

What I do not apologize for is being a conservative and having conservative values. Too many of us have been too quiet for too long. We sat down. We need to stand up with John and Sarah. There is nothing wrong with nor to be ashamed about in the way we feel and we are as much entitled to that as liberals are to liberalism. And part of that is tolerance. So, as a compromise....

Democrats/liberals, start your threads, and I will not encroach upon them. I would ask for the same respect from you as I post independently. There will be no need for you to open any of them or to spend half a page piling on. I will respect your threads. Kindly respect others.

As McCain said last night, we are all God's children (even if you don't claim Him, He claims you), we are all Americans. So let's allow both sides to present views, support their candidates, exercise our right to free speech, have diverging opinions. I would like to see the America back where I grew up, when the old fellas sat and played checkers in front of the library in town and bantered back and forth about politics, but it was good natured and they were still best of friends. I miss that. We need to stop belitting others for where they live or for their religion or the lack thereof. We need to stop attacking each other, period. A house divided against itself cannot stand. We do need to try to be one America again. No politician can rejoin us. That is a task we must do ourselves.

Largely unappreciated and attacked by his own Party Congressman Ron Paul has, in fact, done a great service to the Republican Party this election season. Paul enlarged the Republican �tent� to again include disaffected core Republicans, Independents and real Conservatives who have been forced outside that �tent� in the last two decades.

Paul uses classic Republican language to defend that point of view which demands small-government, constitutionally-oriented, fiscally-responsible and true free-market adherents actually be recognized and accommodated, rather than just paying lip-service to those positions.

Most importantly, that message has motivated a generation of young people to join the Party who are technically savvy, constitutionally-smart and extremely enthusiastic about spreading the message of freedom, liberty and free markets. They have been inspired by a candidate who really understands and believes in a Republic and, one would think, be embraced by incumbent Republican Party members.

However that, it seems, is not the case. Too many existing Republicans do not understand the language of those positions any more and can�t speak it in public. It also seems the NeoCon members are intent on forcing out of the party the very people that represent its future. I urge my Republican brothers and sisters to reject such collectivist, herd mentality which is indicative of Democrats while being logically and historically repugnant to Republicans.

In the 1960s and 70s that same �insurgent� group within the party was represented by Goldwater/Ronald Reagan conservatives. For those of you who don�t remember, the �Reaganites� were ostracized and isolated throughout that period right up to the 1980 election, when they were fully embraced. That is why in March of 1980, even former President Gerald Ford was still quoted as saying, �.....the Man is unelectable,� seven months before Reagan was elected President. It is worth noting that Congressman Paul was one of only 4 Congressman who endorsed Reagan in 1976.

However, the Goldwater/Reaganites were never treated as badly as the Paulites have been this season. The NeoCon/establishment faction within the Party has diligently worked to eliminate all true vestiges of the real Reagan Revolution from the party, as exampled by their behavior this election season. They have but one thought: Power and control at any cost. Yet, the record shows they keep losing running against historic principles of the Party.

They are attempting to make stillborn the Paul movement. Why? Because we are strong supporters of the original values of the Party? My friends, we are being weakened further by the poor leadership of that NeoCon faction and its adherents. Check the record.

The results since 2004 have been abysmal. In Colorado, while having a 200,000-vote advantage of registered Republicans over Democrats, we have lost the State Senate and the House, the Governor�s mansion, the Treasurer�s seat and two Congressional seats.

Nationally, we already have lost the US House and Senate and it is nearly a foregone conclusion we will lose 25-30 more House seats and 6-9 Senate seats in November.

In early tests, we have already lost seats in Illinois, Louisiana and Mississippi. Seats that Republicans have held for decades. The damage is mounting. We are CONTINUING to lose Governor�s seats left and right. The Democrats are out-raising us in funding $3 and $4 to one (in Congress $6 to $1) as noted recently by Republican Congressional leaders. The leadership should be forced to explain where it is that we have a winning strategy in constantly compromising our historic principles rather than firmly re-establishing them each generation? That is what the Founders taught.

From McKinley to Taft to Goldwater to Reagan, this Party used to promote and celebrate the core Republican message and historical principles of the Party. That seems to be all but banished from the party, except to pay it lip service. The result of that banishment are, and will be, clearly evident in the election results this November and after. If establishment Republicans persist in ostracizing and obstructing every attempt for the classic Republican message to have a voice in the Party, than who are Republicans, really? I did not spend the last 33 years as a conservative to start voting for liberals. Please join me today in supporting and promoting what should be the real message of the Republican Party in 2008 and beyond. Send the message to the Party leadership that we no longer support any further erosion of this party�s principles! Don�t allow them to keep rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. Regardless of whether or not you would ultimately have voted for Congressman Paul, every Republican should have respected the message. That was the Republican way for the first 140 years of this party. At this point, even if he wins, John McCain will likely be another Millard Fillmore presiding over the complete demise of the Whig Party from 1850-54.

Since Proposition 8 passed, several legal challenges to Proposition 8 have already been filed in California courts, and more than 40 state legislators filed a friend-of-the-court briefs to support legal efforts to void Proposition 8. A series of protests have spread across California, and are sweeping the country, and now they've moved onto the Internet with blacklists that are outing those who gave money to get Proposition 8 passed.

Reminiscent of Christian boycotts against companies who supported gay rights, and the ever popular War on _____ boycotts, now gay right activists are calling for the same action. Several new websites have launched that list all the names and businesses of all the donors. Evidently those who made political donations to Prop8 did not realize that their contributions are a matter of public record... or that publishing those records is legal.

"Anyone in my office involved with a leak will be fired" to "Anyone who is found guilty of leaking," I figured he had a handle on what the decision is going to be by the special prosecutor, who, incidentally, was appointed by BUSH.

A year ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed to study how New Orleans could be protected from a catastrophic hurricane, but the Bush administration ordered that the research not be undertaken. After a flood killed six people in 1995, Congress created the Southeast Louisiana Urban Flood Control Project, in which the Corps of Engineers strengthened and renovated levees and pumping stations. In early 2001, the Federal Emergency Management Agency issued a report stating that a hurricane striking New Orleans was one of the three most likely disasters in the U.S., including a terrorist attack on New York City. But by 2003 the federal funding for the flood control project essentially dried up as it was drained into the Iraq war. In 2004, the Bush administration cut funding requested by the New Orleans district of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for holding back the waters of Lake Pontchartrain by more than 80 percent. Additional cuts at the beginning of this year (for a total reduction in funding of 44.2 percent since 2001) forced the New Orleans district of the Corps to impose a hiring freeze. The Senate had debated adding funds for fixing New Orleans' levees, but it was too late.

The New Orleans Times-Picayune, which before the hurricane published a series on the federal funding problem, and whose presses are now underwater, reported online: No one can say they didn't see it coming ... Now in the wake of one of the worst storms ever, serious questions are being asked about the lack of preparation.

The Bush administration's policy of turning over wetlands to developers almost certainly also contributed to the heightened level of the storm surge. In 1990, a federal task force began restoring lost wetlands surrounding New Orleans. Every two miles of wetland between the Crescent City and the Gulf reduces a surge by half a foot. Bush had promised no net loss of wetlands, a policy launched by his father's administration and bolstered by President Clinton. But he reversed his approach in 2003, unleashing the developers. The Army Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency then announced they could no longer protect wetlands unless they were somehow related to interstate commerce.

In response to this potential crisis, four leading environmental groups conducted a joint expert study, concluding in 2004 that without wetlands protection New Orleans could be devastated by an ordinary, much less a Category 4 or 5, hurricane. There's no way to describe how mindless a policy that is when it comes to wetlands protection, said one of the report's authors. The chairman of the White House's Council on Environmental Quality dismissed the study as highly questionable, and boasted, Everybody loves what we're doing.

My administration's climate change policy will be science based, President Bush declared in June 2001. But in 2002, when the Environmental Protection Agency submitted a study on global warming to the United Nations reflecting its expert research, Bush derided it as a report put out by a bureaucracy, and excised the climate change assessment from the agency's annual report. The next year, when the EPA issued its first comprehensive Report on the Environment, stating, Climate change has global consequences for human health and the environment, the White House simply demanded removal of the line and all similar conclusions. At the G-8 meeting in Scotland this year, Bush successfully stymied any common action on global warming. Scientists, meanwhile, have continued to accumulate impressive data on the rising temperature of the oceans, which has produced more severe hurricanes.

In February 2004, 60 of the nation's leading scientists, including 20 Nobel laureates, warned in a statement, Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policymaking: Successful application of science has played a large part in the policies that have made the United States of America the world's most powerful nation and its citizens increasingly prosperous and healthy ... Indeed, this principle has long been adhered to by presidents and administrations of both parties in forming and implementing policies. The administration of George W. Bush has, however, disregarded this principle ... The distortion of scientific knowledge for partisan political ends must cease. Bush completely ignored this statement.

In the two weeks preceding the storm in the Gulf, the trumping of science by ideology and expertise by special interests accelerated. The Federal Drug Administration announced that it was postponing sale of the morning-after contraceptive pill, despite overwhelming scientific evidence of its safety and its approval by the FDA's scientific advisory board. The United Nations special envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa accused the Bush administration of responsibility for a condom shortage in Uganda -- the result of the administration's evangelical Christian agenda of abstinence. When the chief of the Bureau of Justice Statistics in the Justice Department was ordered by the White House to delete its study that African-Americans and other minorities are subject to racial profiling in police traffic stops and he refused to buckle under, he was forced out of his job. When the Army Corps of Engineers' chief contracting oversight analyst objected to a $7 billion no-bid contract awarded for work in Iraq to Halliburton (the firm at which Vice President Cheney was formerly CEO), she was demoted despite her superior professional ratings. At the National Park Service, a former Cheney aide, a political appointee lacking professional background, drew up a plan to overturn past environmental practices and prohibit any mention of evolution while allowing sale of religious materials through the Park Service.

On the day the levees burst in New Orleans, Bush delivered a speech in Colorado comparing the Iraq war to World War II and himself to Franklin D. Roosevelt: And he knew that the best way to bring peace and stability to the region was by bringing freedom to Japan. Bush had boarded his very own Streetcar Named Desire.

Sidney Blumenthal, a former assistant and senior advisor to President Clinton and the author of The Clinton Wars, is writing a column for Salon and the Guardian of London.

succeeded in passing his privitization of Social Security. Then we would be seeing all you gung-ho True Believer Repubs freaking out at the devastation of your retirement money. You would have to walk the walk instead of pontificating endlessly on your favorite subjects - scarey terrorists, Ayers, socialism, Salinsky, yak, yak, yak. It would serve ya all right.

Scarborough has not always supported Bush. SM

Ron Paul has performed a great service for the Republican Party