Today I read an article in the Wall Street Journal which indicated that the so-called “neo-conservatives” are, essentially, “smelling blood.” They think a “comeback” is underway. Their logic is that because of the “happenings” in North Korea, Russia, and Iran the American public is going to be vulnerable to their lies again. I really hope they’re wrong, but this is why I wrote a letter to President Obama tonight (of course, I fully understand none of his surrogates will ever give him the letter, but it made me feel better writing it) explaining to him why I won’t send any more money for his agenda depite the fact that I support much of it. While I certainly hope that the incredible failures of the Bush neo-cons is still fresh in the minds of enough Americans to keep them at bay for at least the next few years, I have no doubt that they will keep trying to come back like a bad dream and, at some point, succeed – largely because of the failure of President Obama and the Democratic Congress to hold Bush/Cheney et al to ANY accountability for the damage they’ve done to this great nation.

We’ve all been witnessing the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity and others going along as if nothing wrong had happened under the “watch” of their cronies. They started to blame the economic meltdown on President Obama months before he actually took office. How many of the “liberal news media” called that for the absurdity that it was? Yes, you’re correct, VIRTUALLY NONE OF THEM. And, they’ve been hammering ever since on their “Fox News” – which is nothing more than a Republican party water carriers network – that EVERYTHING President Obama has done is socialist, communist, fascist, or a combination of those absurd statements. We’ve had to listen to both Dick Cheney and George W Bush defend their indefensible positions on foreign policy claiming that President Obama is not keeping us safe. THAT IS ABSURD AS WELL! Lately, their push – these are the people who claimed Obama was not a citizen, he’s a Muslim, he wants death squads – is that he’s trying to brainwash America’s school children because a couple schools had their students (during Black History month) sing songs that referred to our first African American President. OK, you know what’s coming: THAT’S ABSURD AS WELL!

Before I get to my point, these Republicans are such overt racists – I can’t believe there’s not more of a discussion on that on the public airwaves as well. I know that Obama doesn’t want to be involved in that discussion, and I understand why, but the rest of us have to quit beating around the bush on this stuff. Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Michael Savage, Sean Hannity – all these guys are spewing their racist hate speech on our national airwaves – none of these guys can handle the thought that America could elect a Black President. I’m sure what’s going on in their minds is something like, “What’s next? maybe a Latina.” These people are disgusting and I have no idea how they can manage to stay on the public airwaves (I keep wondering, WHO SPONSORS THEM – I have to make sure I’m not buying their products). Well, actually, I do have an idea. The Republican party thinks just like they do – what’s left of it – and they have the money to keep these guys spewing the hate for them indefinitely – UNLESS PROGRESSIVES STAND UP AND STOP THEM. The “leaders” of our nation can look the other way on this stuff, but I’m not going to. And, based on this article I read today, there’s a lot of “neo-cons” in America who feel there’s enough White resentment to get them back into power – and in the near future.

Recently I’ve written a couple posts talking about the incompetence of the Bush administration in prosecuting the “War” in Afganistan. They had no idea going in what they were doing, who they were dealing with, and how to succeed. In fact, the more I read about their “doings” in Afganistan, I wonder if they ever had an idea of what success was. Most of us always were under the impression that we went into Afganistan to “get” Osama bin Laden and to wipe out his Al Qaeda terrorist network. However, everything that was done in that endeavor, would indicate otherwise. The United States had two opportunities to capture or kill bin Laden, first at Tora Bora – General Tommy Franks refused to bring in American ground troops to “seal the deal,” and in Kunduz when Al Qaeda and the Taliban were completely surrounded – along with a few hundred members of the Pakistan ISI (their version of our CIA) – again, Franks refused to bring in the troops (when the Taliban were ready for an organized surrender) and, unbelievably, the Bush administration allowed an airlift to get the ISI out and, in the process, they took all the Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders with them – estimates of over 1000 escaped – yes!, I’ll say it again – UNBELIEVABLE! Al Qaeda and the Taliban have now reconstituted themselves to be stronger than when we originally entered Afganistan – BECAUSE BUSH/CHENEY/RUMSFELD IGNORED THEM – and now, unbelievably, they are claiming that President Obama is showing weakness by reconsidering our mission there! The Bible says that satan is the “father of lies,” but I don’t know how he can outdo these neo-cons!

I believe it’s true that we are less safe than we were prior to 9/11. However, the reason is because of the actions of the Bush administration since then. Not only have they allowed terrorism to flourish in Pakistan (which has somewhere around 100 nuclear warheads) – THEY HELPED TO FINANCE IT! (Well, actually, it was all Americans, because it was our tax dollars that Bush was giving to Pervez Musharraf – a known supporter of both the Taliban and Al Qaeda). It was Bush/Cheney who were “played,” not only by Musharraf, but by the Afgan warlords who received the money that should have gone to the Karzai Government and instead virtually guaranteed that Afganistan would not be rebuilt and would not have a strong central government. The more I read about what Bush/Cheney were doing the more I consider them IDIOTS! I realize that Cheney and Rumsfeld and Feith and many of their friends profited handsomely from the Iraq and Afganistan fiasco’s, so for them they probably feel these adventures were worthwhile – but for President Obama and the rest of us – well, the MESS remains, as does the terrorist threat that Bush was supposedly saving us from. I actually believe that they (the neo-cons) WANT to see another terrorist attack so they can blame it on Obama and try to get back into power – AND CONTINUE THE PILFERING OF OUR TREASURY! (stop and think who got the $700 billion bailout – for one example – not to mention the billions pilfered out of Iraq/Afganisan by Bush/Cheney’s contractor buddies through no-bid contracts – to the detrement of our troops or the 1.7 TRILLION dollar tax cut for the people who needed it the least!)

I recently stated that I’m thinking about discontinuing my writing (it does make me feel better, but now there’s almost 100 people a day after I post my thoughts – and I don’t want to be piling on President Obama – because I support MOST of what he’s trying to accomplish), but after reading the article about the neo-cons feeling empowered again (remember, they have a HUGE pot of money to spend spreading their lies) I felt compelled to give President Obama my “main message” again! Before I do, a quick comment about the Republican lies. As a sixth grade teacher I spend a lot of time talking to counselors because I’m in a school where many of the students are extremely needy, and I need to try to understand how to help them. One of the things I’ve learned over the years from the counselors is that when a young person is lying continually you have about until they’re 14 years old before the lying becomes part of their character. What happens then is that they start believing their own lies and it becomes pathological. Well, it’s obvious to me (I checked a few websites of the Republican water carriers lately) that people like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Michael Savage (I’ve only recently discoverey this one – he might be the worst of the bunch) are pathological liars – it appears to me that they actually believe their own lies as the words come out of their mouths! THESE ARE EASILY PROVABLE LIES! They just keep doing it over and over again. And, Republicans in Congress are not much better! (I’m not calling the Democrats saints, because they’re not – and many of them are proving to be in the same class as Republicans as they rationalize voting against the will of the American people on health care) Someone HAS TO CALL A HALT TO THIS – and I believe that someone has to be President Obama!

How should he do this? you ask. Well, as I’ve stated on this site many times – IT WAS A HORRIBLE DECISION when President Obama decided to “Look forward and not backward.” Tonight, I wrote him a three page letter explaining why that was such a bad choice. If President Obama would allow (actually, by rights he shouldn’t be able to stop this – but he has) a thorough investigation of the Bush administration, this would accomplish two important things for starters. First, it would totally change the debate in America. Believe me, the neo-cons would stop talking about getting back into power, and they’d start talking about how horrible it is to investigate a previous administration. YOU’D NEVER HEAR THE END OF THIS ON FOX. Which would allow the rest of us to have a civil debate on the importance of including a “robust” public option in the health care legislation, along with Ron Wyden’s “free choice” proposal which would allow ALL AMERICANS the “choice” of signing up for the public option if it was the better choice (remember, Obama’s plan only gives the public option choice to those without insurance from their employer). Secondly, an investigation of the Bush administration would get out into the open ALL THE THINGS they did IN OUR NAME!

As far as I’m concerned President Obama doesn’t have the right to block this. He says he doesn’t want to have the “distraction” while trying to pass the health care bill, but WE STILL HAVE THE DISTRACTION. THE REPUBLICANS ARE GOING TO BE A DISTRACTION ON EVERYTHING no matter what Obama does. The American people not only deserve to have this information made public, IT IS ESSENTIAL! The fact that President Obama announced to the world that “we don’t torture” has NO MEANING to these neo-cons. The only way we can be somewhat sure that it won’t happen again, is to hold the ones who authorized it in the first place accountable. Here’s some of what I wrote to Obama: “Both President Bush and Vice President Cheney admitted ON NATIONAL TV that they authorized waterboarding – I saw it with my own eyes, heard it with my own ears. The same goes for the FACT that both President Obama and Attorney General Holder said on national TV that waterboarding is torture. Combine this with the FACT that President Obama PROMISED in the campaign that NO ONE IS ABOVE THE LAW and that if there is evidence of a crime, there will be an investigation coupled with both the Geneva Conventions and American law calling waterboading torture and I don’t see how either President Obama or Attorney General Holder can justify “looking forward.” I pointed out in my letter that President Obama seems to be supporting Richard Nixon’s claim that “if the President does it, it must be legal.” I’m old enough to know that MILLIONS OF AMERICANS went to a lot of trouble to prove that saying false.

As I said in my letter to the President, following that logic – there would never be another crime in the United States – because every prosecution HAS TO LOOK BACKWARD! The CRIME ALWAYS HAPPENS PRIOR TO THE INVESTIGATION! Is President Obama’s logic going to become precedent in this nation. After all, he’s the top protector of the constitution in the land. He put his hand on the Bible of Abraham Lincoln when he took the oath to uphold the constitution. I understand that if an investigation goes forward it will probably get VERY UGLY. There was not only torture but also illegal wiretapping (en masse), the outing of a CIA agent, both lying us into war and massive misappropriation of funds in prosecuting BOTH wars, politicizing the Justice Department, members of the Bush administration first perjuring themselves before Congress and then refusing to honor subpoenas, and probably more than any of us can imagine. Trillions was pilfered from our economy – money going from the hard working people of this nation to the wealthiest – who didn’t need it. I’m not the only one who suspects that many in the Bush administration – probably including Bush himself – were trying to destroy our government – by bankrupting it! I believe the only way to make these neo-cons go away is to fully investigate the Bush administration! If President Obama fails to do this, there will be a day when he will deeply regret that decision – and we’ll all, that is those of us who believe in the America that came out of the New Deal, pay dearly for his mistake.