Pass the Duct Tape (Dowd alert)

The New York Times ^ | 02/11/03 | Maureen Dowd

[Pokey78]

WASHINGTON — OSAMA bin Laden came to the rescue of George W. Bush yesterday.

The president and his secretary of state had been huffing and puffing to prove a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. George Tenet, who presides over a C.I.A. full of skepticism about the tie, did his best for the boss, playing up the link to the Senate.

Ignoring all the blatant Qaeda hooks to Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen and Pakistan; ignoring the fact that Osama has never had any use for the drinking, smoking, womanizing, secular Saddam; ignoring the fact that Saddam has no proven record of sharing weapons with Al Qaeda, the Bushies have been hellbent on making the 9/11 connection.

The world wasn't entirely buying that rationale for war.

And then who but Osama himself should pop up on an audio tape, calling on Muslims to fight the U.S. if the "infidels" attack "our brothers in Iraq."

Osama's disdain for Saddam still gleamed through. He barely mentioned the Iraqi leader and seemed to be holding his nose when he gave permission to his Qaeda brethren to fight "the Crusaders" alongside Saddam's Baath Party, "even if we believe and declare that the socialists are apostates," and whether Saddam remains in power or not.

Still, the administration pounced on the tape, hoping it would prove to those epicene Old Europeans, with their poufy blue-helmeted U.N. force, that Al Qaeda and Iraq were "bound by a common hatred," as the State Department's Richard Boucher said.

Mr. Powell was so eager to publicize Osama's statements that he broke the news himself at a Senate Budget Committee hearing, hours before Al Jazeera even acknowledged it had the tape.

He said the tape showed that Osama was "in partnership with Iraq," and proved that the U.S. could not count simply on a beefed-up inspection force in Iraq.

In the past, Condi Rice has implored the networks not to broadcast the tapes outright, fearing he might be activating sleeper cells in code.

But this time the administration flacked the tape. And Fox, the official Bush news agency, rushed the entire tape onto the air.

So the Bushies no longer care if Osama sends a coded message to his thugs as long he stays on message for the White House?

To get Saddam, the Bush administration is even willing to remind the American public that it failed to get bin Laden. Its fixation on Saddam seems to have blinded it to the possibility that Osama might be perversely encouraging America in this war.

The administration and Al Qaeda both have a purpose for invading Iraq, and both want a regime change.

Both talk about "liberating" the Arab people, but Osama's vision is apocalyptic. He wants the Middle East - Israel and the Arab monarchies - to go up in flames. By Zionizing our battle with Iraq and promising an anti-American theocracy, he hopes to radicalize recruits for a jihad against an American occupation of Arab land.

Osama's own fanaticism was forged by foreign occupations - the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan and American forces stationed in Saudi Arabia.

The Bush hawks want to go to war in a non-apocalyptic way, to stabilize the Middle East, not to inflame it. They have a grandiose - if risky - plan to transform Iraq into a model kitchen of democracy, a buffer for Israel that the Palestinians and other Arab autocracies would be pressured to emulate.

Senators quizzed Bush officials yesterday, asking whether Gen. Tommy Franks, the future mukhtar of Baghdad, would be choosing new Iraqi leaders. They pressed about the time and cost of an American occupation.

Chris Dodd suggested that there could be unforeseen explosions in the model kitchen, citing an alliance between the Iraqi exiles who might run a post-Saddam government and conservative Iranian clerics who think we're the Great Satan.

"You have to level with the American public," he lectured the Bush officials. "It could be very costly and take a long, long time."

But it is the Bushies' dream of a model kitchen in Iraq, rather than a Saddam-Qaeda link, that makes this war seem noble to them. That's why they were so busy hawking the Osama tape, rather than coming up with ways we can protect ourselves from the coming Osama attacks - other than plastic and duct tape.

[Pokey78]

2003 Oscar nominations: Best Supporting Actress

Kathy Bates: "About Schmidt"
Julianne Moore:"The Hours"
Queen Latifah: "Chicago"
Meryl Streep: "Adaptation"
Catherine Zeta-Jones: "Chicago."

From Oxblog:

IMMUTABLE LAWS OF DOWD

1. Ashcroft never deserves credit.

2. Offering constructive solutions to problems, instead of whining endlessly about them, is a sign of weakness.

3. The People Magazine principle: all political phenomena can be explained with reference solely to caricatures of the personalities involved ("Dubya" is stupid; "Poppy" is an aristocrat; Cheney is macho-man; etc.). Any reference to the common good or even to old-fashioned politicking is, like, so passe.

4. It is much better to be cute than coherent.

5. Maureen knows best. Her long years as a columnist (doing basically what your great-aunt Tillie does in the nursing home bull sessions, but getting paid for it) have given her deep insight into foreign relations, politics, welfare, the Constitution, and all other topics. To disagree with Maureen in any way is not only a sign of being wrong, it's a hallmark of pure evil...or at least membership in the NRA, which is pretty much the same thing.

6. It is usually possible and always desirable to name-drop and name-call in the same sentence.

7. The particulars of my consumer-driven, shamefully self-involved life reveal universal truths.

[Reagan Man]

Maureen Dowd is an intellectual lightweight and should never be taken seriously.

[CFC__VRWC]

The president and his secretary of state had been huffing and puffing to prove a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. The world wasn't entirely buying that rationale for war.

Mr. Powell was so eager to publicize Osama's statements that he broke the news himself at a Senate Budget Committee hearing, hours before Al Jazeera even acknowledged it had the tape.

Isn't it amazing how quickly Colin Powell went from the media's penthouse to their outhouse?

[toupsie]

What is this? The E! Channel chat board?

[dighton]

Mr. Douglas looks tired, as who wouldn't under the circumstances.

[CyberAnt]

"Bushies"

How rude and arrogant! I guess we're supposed to be grateful she bothered to capitalize his name.

[VRW Conspirator]

That's why they were so busy hawking the Osama tape, rather than coming up with ways we can protect ourselves from the coming Osama attacks - other than plastic and duct tape.

Dowd - Confound it - There is another use for duct tape. Draw a four inch strip from a roll and press it firmly over your pie hole.

[ewing]

The more Zeta Jones glows the more spiteful Dowd becomes.

If Catherine wins the Academy Award Mo may just drink her self to death...pass the cherry quick!

[ewing]

[ewing]

Douglas may be liberal, but he is no dummy..

[Miss Marple]

Pokey, we really need to have a concise history of the Dowd-Douglas relationship at the beginning. Newcomers don't know the connection and think we are simply posting Hollywood gossip.

toupsie-Ms. Dowd was escorted around New York and DC for many months by one Michael Douglas of Hollywood fame and fortune. She got to go to all the best parties, was photographed for the tabloids, and was picking out a gown to wear at the Oscars. Of course, Michael had become interested in her during Clinton's impeachment, when she had written some very anti-Clinton columns. After a few weeks of the Michael treatment, she began to write anti-Starr, ant-Newt columns, ignoring Clinton.

Then Clinton was acquitted by the Senate. In an amazing coincidence, Michael Douglas dropped Ms. Dowd like a hot potato, and instead picked up a hot tomato, Catherin Zeta-Jones, who subsequently bore him a son and they were married.

Ms. Dowd cannot get over her tragic loss. Her columns are increasingly anti-Bush, in the hope of impressing her lost love, Michael.

In addition, we think she has a secret crush on the President and is trying to get him to pay attention to her. Ha!

[F16Fighter]

Dowd rambling on through yet one more incoherent alcohol induced essay...

The Times doesn't care -- why should she?

[mcenedo]

Riiiight Mo.

Osama is playing "boy" George into invading Iraq.

Every time the left's reasons for not invading Iraq are exposed as shameless lies, they invent new reasons why we shouldn't attack.

All hail the queen of the "Axis of Weasels".

[ewing]

[dighton]

"How's that for a bit of pi r-squared?"

-- The Entertainer.

[F16Fighter]

Thanks for filling in the gaps on the Douglas-Dowd thing...

"Ms. Dowd cannot get over her tragic loss. Her columns are increasingly anti-Bush, in the hope of impressing her lost love, Michael."

The alcohol-induced incoherence make a bit more sense now ;-)

[ladyinred]

That Bushies term angered me too!
I would love to wipe that nasty little smirk off that horrid woman's unattractive face!!!!

[Miss Marple]

Send her a copy of Michael and Catherine's wedding photo. That ought to do it.

[jwalsh07]

Ignoring all the blatant Qaeda hooks to Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen and Pakistan; ignoring the fact that Osama has never had any use for the drinking, smoking, womanizing, secular Saddam;

The woman's an idiot. This is exactly how the miserable jihadist bastards spent there last weeks on earth before heading straight for hell. How freakin ignorant cab she get?