Bush’s bungles have dragged his poll numbers to the basement, but no Democrats fill the vacuum. Iraq is the big problem, but liberal candidates offer no solutions – many won’t admit it was wrong. Republicans send opportunities knocking, Democrats must answer with a more convincing greeting.

the 45 day review of the port decision is as phony as WMDs. The deal will close Thursday. The review will be just another piece of paper unless Congress acts before then to stop Bush.

Whether it’s Cheney or Pentagon officials looking forward to retirement and new careers, Halliburton is blessed with friends in high places. They can steal, get caught and then walk away with virtually all their loot, leaving nothing behind but a bunch of frustrated auditors. Democrats running for Congress should forget about the war and Abramoff. [...]

The Bush administration can’t see any real difference between a foreign company and a company owned by a foreign government. The first has a profit motive, the second has a political agenda. The first has lawyers, the second has an army, navy and air force. We have lots of experts in dealing with foreign companies. [...]

Bigger airlines are lobbying the Transportation Department to let them exclude “surcharges� from their advertised fares, thus making price comparisons difficult. This seems like a bad idea to almost everyone else, but the high-cost carriers probably will get their way. After all, the Bush administration seems dedicated to deception.

If Congress lets Bush decide there is no significant risk in foreign governments owning critical port operations, then they should let the rest of us decide for ourselves when we need to wear seat belts. Don’t parse this UAE deal, make it illegal for government owned companies to participate in our security related industries. And [...]

It is doubtful Rummy has a plan for safely extracting our troops from Iraq, so we may be forced to pick a side. With no unified government to defend, and not enough troops to maintain order, we’re left with Shiites, Sunnis, or Kurds. Shiites are the only choice ‘cause they’re a big majority, so odds [...]

President Bush may think port security means locking up the wine.

Turning control of any port operations over to any foreign government would be foolish. The details don’t matter – there’s no upside. The only reason Bush offers for this fiasco is he doesn’t want to send the wrong message to Arab countries he hasn’t invaded yet. To paraphrase Cheney, “It’s been pretty well established that [...]

Bush’s final study of Katrina says the response was poor, but no one was at fault He took five months to define 125 recommendations – do things not done last time. He’s allowed four months for the same disaster duds to implement them. Isn’t that comforting?

Is it easier to fight Congress than friends at the Carlyle Group?

Turning port management functions over to a firm owned by an Arab country with ties to 9/11 seems dangerous, but Bush says there’s no need to worry. “If there was any chance that this transaction would jeopardize the security of the United States, it would not go forward.” In other words, “A slam dunk.â€? The [...]

In his State of the Union address the President said he’d develop new energy sources, like clean burning coal, to cut imports of Middle Eastern oil by 75%. OPEC complained so reducing Mid-East imports was redefined as a “for-instance.� The budget revealed clean coal research was all but zeroed-out – whoops! Before Bush got to [...]

Chertoff learned about ports in New Orleans, and thinks it’s fine to sell of some of our major facilities to a company owned by an Arab government that supplied people and money for the 9/11 attacks. After explaining that we have secret safeguards, the Homeland Security Secretary said, “We have to balance the paramount urgency [...]

Police charged a teacher in Pensacola with bribery because he let students pay a dollar a day to skip his gym class. Had he called the money campaign contributions, he might still have a job. In any case, he should run for office. He’s a natural politician.

Warmonger At last, finally, it took long enough. you shot a man now, can we leave Iraq? by Tim Tuthill

The same Bush team that planned to get rid of Iraq’s imaginary WMD with a quick, easy, cheap war, now thinks they can stop Iran’s real nuclear program with radio and television broadcasts. Condoleezza Rice asks for $75 million for the effort and Senator Sam Brownback says it is “absolutely right move at this point [...]

Congressional investigation of NSA’a warrantless wiretaps is now in doubt. Last week it looked like a sure thing, but after the weekend the Congress appears to be backing off. Some think it was the briefings, others credit pressure from the Vice President. I wonder why.

The Vice President turned an accident into real news by keeping it secret until after Sunday morning talk shows. I called the shooting his first honest mistake, that must have been wrong – otherwise why is he hiding something?

Senator DeWine had problems in Ohio, but Democrats solved them. They made Iraq war veteran, Paul Hackett, who almost won a seat in congress, so angry he quit the senate race, and politics. Senators Schumer and Reid claim they were avoiding a costly primary. More likely, they wanted to get rid of an audacious straight [...]