Bush Defying Congress: Who will Blink First?

Bush is throwing down the gauntlet. The wannabe dictator is openly challenging the Democrats to a showdown. Its a shootout at the OK Corral. The problem is that the only reall victims are the American people:

President Bush and Senate Democrats clashed angrily this afternoon, as the president said he would not allow his key aides to testify under oath about the dismissal of United States attorneys, while the Democrats insisted they would settle for no less.

There was one possible casualty to the American civil war to come: Dick Cheney:

Vice President Dick Cheney went back to George Washington University Hospital on Tuesday after experiencing discomfort in his left lower leg — the same leg in which a blood clot was found two weeks ago — NBC News reported.

And all the commotion has to do with e-mails. Imagine that, the world is going up in flames and our government is fighting over comments made in some e-mails:

"A sarcastic internal e-mail message from one top Justice department official to another appears to confirm that personal and policy differences drove the termination of Carol C. Lam, the San Diego prosecutor who initiated investigations of Randy Cunningham when he was a Republican representative from California and Representative Jerry Lewis, as well as some defense department officials," the New York Times reports Tuesday.

For example, you have the refugee crisis in Iraq due to the war there. Which begs the question, how are we helping that country when the people are fleeing in droves:

The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) says there has been an "abject denial" around the world of the humanitarian impact of invading Iraq.

What is ironic is that Syria, described as a villain in the Middle East by the Bushists, are the biggest recipients of those refugees:

The UN faces an enormous task in helping countries such as Jordan and Syria cope with the huge influx of Iraqi refugees, a spokesman said.

He said the international community had to step in to help address their food, health and education needs.

Syria says it is home to 1.2m Iraqi refugees, with up to 800,000 in Jordan.

Looking on the bright side, at least the neocon controlled administration finally stood up to Israel and recognized the Hamas partnered Palestinian government:

The year-long boycott of the Palestinian Authority by the west is coming to an end, with the US and the European Union moving towards establishing contacts with independent members of the new government of national unity.

Who knows it could be the start of real peace in the Middle East. And maybe George Bush might renounce his fascist methods and become a champion of peaceful negotiations. What do you think:

After conferring with the Arab League Secretary
General Amr Musa King Abdullah II of Jordan Tuesday urged the United
States and European Union to "adopt" the Arab Peace Initiative as a
basis for relaunching negotiations between Israel and the
Palestinians, according to an official statement.
"The monarch urged the world community, particularly the United
States and the European Union to adopt the Arab initiative as a basis
for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state as well as
a just and comprehensive peace in the Middle East," the royal court
said.

...And maybe pink elephants will start flying over Manhattan. Meanwhile, more disconcerting news on the Iraq war:

An Iraqi police chief cannot trust one third of his officers because they are loyal to illegal militias, he has told the BBC.

General Abdul Hussein Al Saffe, head of policing in Dhi Qhar province, told the BBC's Paul Wood he could not sack them as they had political protection.

We are spread too thin because of the two wars. This means we are totally vulnerable if another crisis breakouts. And it will happen:

For decades, the Army has kept a brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division on round-the-clock alert, poised to respond to a crisis anywhere in 18 to 72 hours.

Today, the so-called ready brigade is no longer so ready. Its soldiers are not fully trained, much of its equipment is elsewhere, and for the past two weeks the unit has been far from the cargo aircraft it would need in an emergency.

And how do you defeat an enemy that is capable of such tactics:

Insurgents detonated a bomb in a car carrying two children after using the children as decoys to get through a military checkpoint in Baghdad, an American general said Tuesday.

Speaking at a news briefing at the Pentagon, Maj. Gen. Michael Barbaro, deputy director for regional operations at the Pentagon’s Joint Staff, said that American soldiers had stopped the car at the checkpoint but allowed it to pass after they seeing the two children in the back seat.

Gloria Borger put it best on why things are going so bad and why it will only get worse:

The White House that was once seen as muscular — even invincible — is being tagged as something else: incompetent. How else to explain the ham-handed Justice Department management of the dismissal of U.S. attorneys? Or the lack of oversight of conditions at Walter Reed Army Medical Center? Or an FBI that abused intelligence-gathering powers provided for in the Patriot Act? "The whole thing just isn't competent," a Republican senator close to the White House tells me. "It looks like the wheels are coming off."