A Nation Bamboozled
This week marks the anniversary of one of the most avoidably-idiotic moments in American history—the day Republicans shot our country in the face and expected a parade of sweets and flowers for it. It's the 21st dumbstickiversary of the invasion of Iraq. Seems appropriate to mark the occasion with our annual reminder of some of the lying and/or moronic statements made by the band of Very Serious People who orchestrated and/or promoted the debacle. Feel free to hurl rotten tomatoes as you see fit…
"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us." ... "My belief is we will, in fact, be greeted as liberators."
—Dick Cheney (8/28/02) and (3/16/03)
"Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof—the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud."
—George W. Bush (10/7/02)
Continued...
“I will bet you the best dinner in the gaslight district of San Diego that military action will not last more than a week. Are you willing to take that wager?”
—Bill O’Reilly (1/29/03)
The cafeteria menus in the three House office buildings changed the name of "french fries" to "freedom fries," in a culinary rebuke of France stemming from anger over the country's refusal to support the U.S. position on Iraq.'
—CNN (3/12/03)
We know where [the WMDs] are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat."
—Donald Rumsfeld (3/30/03)
[T]he antiwar crowd is still spinning a doomsday scenario. But it's getting harder and harder to take seriously the claim that freeing Iraq will make it harder to win the war on terrorism. Indeed, there's plenty of evidence to the contrary. [...] Who said war never solved anything?
—Brendan Miniter, The Wall Street Journal (4/8/03, now scrubbed from the site)
"The only people who think this wasn't a victory are Upper Westside liberals."
—Charles Krauthammer (4/19/03)
Ted Koppel: [Y]ou’re not suggesting that the rebuilding of Iraq is going to be done for $1.7 billion?
Andrew Natsios [Agency for International Development]: Well, in terms of the American taxpayer's contribution, I do. This is it for the U.S.
—Nightline (4/23/03 at 2:30 mark)
4,516 American service personnel lost their lives during the war, with another 32,000 wounded. Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians who died. But please: do continue telling us why the Bush II administration’s image deserves to be rehabilitated. I’m all ears. (And lest we forget, Lord Dampnut, aka Cadet Bone Spurs, was rah-rah on Iraq, too, until it all went south and he started lying to try and cover for his terrible judgment.)
P.S. Minimum amount of time that U.S. taxpayers will be paying costs associated with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to an AP analysis: 100 years. Only 89 years to go. Yay us.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Thursday, March 21, 2024
Note: Prepare yourself for the coming Billypocalypse: I regret to inform you that there will be no C&J Monday as we will be stuck in a bar with a priest, a minister and a rabbi. Back Tuesday with the hilarious punchline, assuming I make bail.
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Tax Day: 25
Days 'til the Southwest Chocolate & Coffee Fest in Albuquerque: 16
Percent of total ballots cast before Election Day in, respectively, 2000 and 2022: 14%, 50%
Year-over-year increase in housing starts for February, the third straight month of increases: 5.9%
Percent of annual freshwater withdrawals in the U.S. used for agriculture: 42%
Rank of California, Nebraska, and Arkansas among states where farms use the most water: #1, #2, #3
Years since the first compact discs were pressed: 41
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
Gosh, it was good to hear from President Bush's alternative universe in the State of the Union address. "Jobs are on the rise."
As we say in Texas, "No shit?"
At the December rate of 1,000 new jobs a month, it would take 166 years just to replace the two million jobs lost since Bush became President, and that, of course, would be 166 years of not creating enough jobs for new workers. Or as John Kerry puts it, that leaves us only 249,000 jobs a month short of where we need to be and where, incidentally, the President promised we would be by now.
But then Bush also promised to cut the deficit in half. Instead, it grew by 100 percent from his prediction of last year. The guy is not exactly on target. And didn't you love the weasel-wording of "weapons of mass destruction-related program activities"?
I also liked Bush urging Congress to make his tax cuts permanent "for the sake of job growth." Excuse me, but hasn't Bush just spent three years conclusively demonstrating that giving tax cuts to the rich doesn't do a thing for job creation?
—March 2004
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Home from school…
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JEERS to an unpleasant look under the hood. The primary elections are over in Ohio, and now we know who incumbent Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown—a close personal friend of mine because I once walked down the sidewalk with him at the Netroots Nation convention in Providence a dozen years ago without getting a restraining order filed against me—will face this November. Real piece of work. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Bernie Moreno:
» He's a car dealer. That's strike one.
» Favors a total ban on abortion—no exceptions.
» Wants to "end wokeness," a thing that everyone stopped talking about when Ron DeSantis dropped out of the primary race for president.
» Even though his oldest son is gay, he has gone from supporting LGBT equality to fighting its non-existent "agenda" or "radical indoctrination."
» Wants an end to birthright citizenship among poor brown people south of the border, but is fine with it among wealthy foreigners who come here to drop babies on American soil.
» Wants to build a wall across the entire Mexican border, which is actually quite a popular position among Mexico's ladder industry.
» Favors Russia over Ukraine.
» Believed his entire life that Trump was a "lunatic" and "maniac" who would under "no scenario" get his vote…right up until he swallowed the MAGA Kool-Aid and groveled for Trump's endorsement at Mar-a-Lago.
» Got busted for wage theft and shredding crucial documents that law enforcement told him to preserve.
Evil Bernie beat two other primary challengers, who likely would've gone on to beat Senator Brown. But given the propensity for the MAGA movement to bump into every piece of furniture in the room, the oddsmakers are moving their little arrows from the "R" side closer to the "D" side, thanks to this slime bucket straight out of central casting. Sherrod should send Trump a thank-you bouquet.
JEERS to today's edition of This Is Your Country On Republican Obstruction and MAGA Doom-screaming. Courtesy of ABC News:
The United States has fallen eight spots and is no longer in the top 20 happiest countries in the world, falling behind countries like Canada, Israel, Kuwait, Lithuania and the United Arab Emirates, according to the 2024 World Happiness Report released by Gallup and its partners. […]
The top 10 countries overall this year are Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, Israel, Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, Switzerland and Australia.
This has been today's edition of This Is Your Country On Republican Obstruction and MAGA Doom-screaming. Any questions?
CHEERS to the Nailbiter Heard Round the World. Ah, yes…I remember it like it was just 4,084 days ago. On March 21, 2010, after a huge amount of debate, committee hearings, number-crunching and input from the entire health care and insurance industry—y'know, all the responsible rule following that the Republicans never bother doing—the Nancy Pelosi-led House passed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
And what a collection of moments we saw. From blue dogs Bart Stupak and Dan Lipinski's grandstanding over abortion, to the late John Dingell showing off his historic Medicare gavel, to the House leadership locking arms and walking through a canopy of teabaggers like the protagonists of The Wizard of Oz skipping down the yellow brick road, to the hecklers that created "mass hysteria" (Barney Frank's words), and finally the moment that nobody wanted to arrive because they were all having so much darn fun: the 219-212 vote shortly before midnight. There was still work to do in the Senate, but this was nothing less than historic. Today Democrats will mark the occasion with quiet reflection on a job well done (like eliminating discrimination based on pre-existing conditions), a commitment to expand and improve it, and the satisfaction of knowing signups (20+ million this year) and savings are still robust. Republicans will mark the occasion by gnawing the bark off a tree.
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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JEERS to self-righteous knuckledragging. 386 years ago this week, in 1638, progressive preacher Anne Hutchinson was booted from the Massachusetts Bay Colony by the Puritan leadership after being accused of "Blasphemy" and "Lewd conduct." Today Justice Sam Alito will unveil a statue to commemorate the event. In honor of the Puritans.
JEERS to disorder in the court. Let's check in and see how the judicial branch is dealing with Texas's new law granting police Gestapo-like powers to round up anyone they suspect of not being a white American citizen:
Appeals Court: We're placing this law on hold.
Supreme Court: Nah, it's all good. Proceed.
Appeals Court: Hold up there, Umpire Roberts. We're putting the brakes on it again until we can sort it all out.
Supreme Court: Screw you, pal. We say the law can start doing its law thing, so butt out.
Appeals Court: Don’t make us come up there and show you the short end of the stick…because it's the end with the knuckle sandwich on it.
Supreme Court: Oh, we're sooooooooo scared of an appeals court. Y'know what's in the word appeals? Pee pee! Ha ha ha ha, you guys are all pee pees!!!! Thomas came up with that one.
Appeals court [in a barely audible whisper]: The law is on hold, people. But don’t tell the Supremes. Not until they've sobered up.
So glad to know we're ruled by adults.
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Ten years ago in C&J: March 21, 2014
CHEERS to a good show. If you live in the northeast and you're wondering what went whizzing by your house at 10,000 miles per hour in the wee hours of the morning, it was just an asteroid the size of Rhode Island. In fact, it was so big that it actually caused a brief "eclipse" of the brightest star in the constellation Leo. The last time illumination disappeared that quickly was when Michele Bachmann walked into a committee meeting.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to snatching victory from the full diaper of defeat. Down yonder at the University of North Carolina and Duke University at Chapel Hill, the sporting event of the year was held last month, and only through an amazing network of couriers using perilous back roads and secret tunnels (and, I was just told, a pole-vault stick to get over a nasty briar hedge) did the news make it to our C&J home office. After independent verification, this morning we’re happy to report that the result of the Diapers To Dorms Dash was a thrilling come-from-talcum-powdered-behind finish:
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So congratulations to 2023 champion Baby Monroe. And runner-up Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Have a nice Thursday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
"[It] looks like a country club, but actually Cheers and Jeers is not a country club. We’ve reported on inspector general reports where the food was moldy, the kiddie pool conditions are terrible, so no one should be looking forward to spending time there.”
—Ken Dilanian
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