trblmkr

2010-11-12T11:45:00.003-05:00

Why Does NY Times' Sheryl Gay Stolberg Hate Obama?

In articles today and yesterday Stolberg seems to be just itchin' to propagate the meme that his party's losing the House on Nov. 2 has all but made him a lame duck in the eyes of world leaders. I haven't seen this kind of vindictiveness since Jodi Wilgoren covered the Howard Dean campaign.

2010-01-22T09:56:00.002-05:00

NY Times Cohen Gives China an Editorial Reach-Around

Roger Cohen's slathering over how great China is in today's Times comes across as some kind of post-coital euphoria after a night on the town with senior Party cadres. I hope he makes sure to pick up some non-bootleg tetracycline in the hotel apothecary!

Sadly though, he is on to something in that, on their respective current trajectories, China and the US (EU too?) will meet, in the not-too-distant future, at a point called corporatocracy.

Long live Stability!

2010-01-19T08:21:00.000-05:00

Google and China - the Big Picture

Is this a turning point? Doubtful. Will 'western' multinationals and their respective lapdog governments begin to reevaluate and reconsider 'engagement' policy vis a vis China? Don't bet on it. 'Engagement' was a fraud from the time the phrase was coined. Corporations had been longing to regain access to cheap Chinese labor ever since China was 'lost' in 1949. When Deng opened the door, corporations quickly discovered a manufacturing heaven; not only was the labor cheap but unable to complain about anything and easily replaced should they have the temerity to do so.
What if the 'West' spent 30 years investing in the USSR after the end of WWII, strengthening its economy and its ability to challenge us around the world? Well, wake up people, China is challenging us everyday in the UNSC(Iran, Sudan), in resource-rich developing nations around the world(laissez-faire FDI, bribes), etc.
'Western' FDI created China. The real danger is that we become more like China than the other way around. Keep a weather eye out for words like 'stability', 'appropriate', 'harmony', 'security' when politicians, controlled by their corporate masters, start making excuses for surveillance laws, anti-union laws, censorship laws, 'free speech zones', obstacles to freedom of assembly. Oh wait, some of that has already happened.

2009-09-22T16:22:00.001-04:00

Climate Change Debate: China and India say, "We wanna smoke too!"

Today's NY Times reports on the UN's daylong climate change summit and though more sophisticated than my crude title implies, China, India and other developing nations are essentially arguing that despite knowledge gained since the West "smoked"(grew by burning fossil fuels) they want the right to "smoke" too because the West did.

I did a little research and, though still in their nascent stages, both China's and India's governments have embarked on anti-smoking(cigarettes) campaigns. I assume they are doing this because they accept the science that smoking is bad for human health.

Yet, even though they seem to equally accept the science on climate change they want the right to "smoke" for growth.

This by no means is meant to absolve the West from their responsibility to aggressively pursue real cuts in CO2 emission regardless of what China and India's stance is.. I'm merely pointing out the dichotomy.

2009-09-19T13:07:00.001-04:00

'The Biggest Political Blunder in Modern History'

Today's NY Times op-ed page features a warning against the advent of an all out US-China trade war. How did we get to this point where China holds so many cards? The same way that Max Baucus came up with his outrageous health 'reform' bill, by putting the interests of huge corporate contributors over the well being of the people. Some history:

The West, as defined by G-7 or the OECD, back in 1989 struck a Faustian deal that they would 'engage' China like they never would have the Soviet Union.
COCOM, which had very successfully kept western technologies out of Soviet hands, denying them a source of economic growth, was allowed to die in the early '90s.
G-7, at that time, controlled over 75% of the world's economy and could have used that primacy to engender real change in the remaining non-democratic countries. That was supposed to have been the real 'peace dividend'.
Instead, western leaders kowtowed to their respective corporate constituents and set of a race to the bottom in pursuit of China's cheap, compliant labor force.
The rationale given to the gullible public was the 'engagement' theory in which we would 'change China from within' because 'economic reforms would lead to political reforms.'
Now, in 2009, China blocks almost all UN Security Council initiatives aimed at stemming corruption, oppression of minorities and women, sanctions on despotic regimes, etc. The Central Commitee is stronger(and richer) than ever.
China is a champion of 'no strings' investment in myriad bad regimes in Africa and we can't complain because the West did the very same thing with China!
The decision of our leaders to trade with China in hopes of changing it instead of the other way around will eventually be recognized as their biggest political blunder in modern history. Even bigger than abandonning Afghanistan after we expelled the Soviets. Talk about 'blowback'!

2009-09-18T08:55:00.002-04:00

NY Times Laments US Style Democracy?

On September 9th Tom "we've turned the corner in Iraq" Friedman openly lamented our inability, unlike China, to "...impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century.... from the top down."
It's true his lament comes in the broader context of exposing the GOP in 2009 as "...standing, arms folded and saying “no.” " and it is, after all an op-ed.
Yet today, in the News Section(page a4) we get this from China correspondent Keith Bradsher.
He breathlessly reports "The image of laid-off workers here returning to jobs stands in sharp contrast to the United States, where even as the economy shows signs of improvement, the unemployment rate continues to march toward double digits."
Though it's clear in reading the article that China's central govt is purposely replacing one bubble (global demand) with another (domestic demand) through fiat, Bradsher wants to emphasize how well it's working now while giving short shrift to the inevitability of the coming bubble burst; "The state-controlled banking system here...unleashed $1.2 trillion in extra lending to Chinese consumers and businesses in the first seven months of this year. That money is financing everything from a boom in car sales, up 82 percent in August from a year earlier, to frenzied factory construction." Never mind that "As much as a third of the extra bank lending in China appears to have gone into real estate and stock market speculation.", stay focussed on "...the bulk has gone into investments by companies and local governments, with tangible results."
He breezes through eye-poppers like "Government agencies have been told not to buy imported goods with money from economic stimulus programs unless no domestic alternative is available." and "Beijing also has given huge tax breaks and other assistance to exporters. They include placing broad restrictions on imports and intervening heavily in currency markets to hold down the value of the renminbi, to keep Chinese exports competitive even in a weakened global economy." That looks like fodder for a whole article to me!
Only in the final paragraphs does he touch on the the dangers with "Cheap cash has a way of inflating bubbles — just ask Wall Street — that could damage China’s economy and its banks when they pop." But ends with the oddly editorial-sounding "But such concerns are so 2008."

For more than 20 years we have pursued an illusory 'engagement' policy vis a vis China in hopes of 'changing China from the inside.' Looks like WE'RE becoming more like China instead.

2009-09-12T14:42:00.000-04:00

Insurers and the Financial Crisis - The Link

One major reason healthcare insurers and malpractice insurers are so adamant about 'tort reform' and 'junk lawsuits' and 'defensive medicine'(see previous post) is that focussing on these as the blame for their poor earnings performance of late gives them cover for their dismal investment performance.

Most insurers invest premium income either internally or on a contract basis with a money manager, ostensibly to 'maximize returns to shareholders.' The combination of financial dereg under Clinton/Bush II and persistently low yields on Treasury Bonds led insurers to the siren song of 'AAA' mortgage-backed securities (CDOs) and derivatives thereon (CDSs).

I imagine many of these losses have yet to be 'realized' in the open market or 'written down' on financial statements but sure as hell are keeping CEOs awake at night.

This is a huge motivator to keep the emphasis on small potato issues like 'junk lawsuits.'

2009-09-04T00:48:00.001-04:00

WashPost claims Corker(R-TN) wants to 'meet halfway'

In a poorly written article that makes it sound as if both sides have been acting crazy and that Democratic reform proposals are just crazy, Shalaigh Murray makes the GOPs behavior look reasoned and logical. The public option is a 'non-starter' but govt subsidies to private insurers to cover the poor is a good idea. Oh yeah, an open 'policy exchange' (as if there would be such a difference between companies that would never, ever collude) is also floated.
So, even some GOPers believe "the status quo is not a popular alternative" yet it's the public option that's gotta go.
I remember the mocking tone these same people had about anyone who doubted the logic of invading Iraq; "What would you do, give him(Saddam) a stern warning?"
Well, unlike Saddam, private insurers ARE killing Americans and Republicans just want to issue them a 'stern warning.' I say they're 'soft on terror', the terror of seeing your family fall apart because of untreated illness and/or unpaid bills.

2009-09-03T11:30:00.002-04:00

Is the White House setting us up for more vapid 'compromise'?

Today's NY Times, acting as trial balloon conduit, gently probes readers for a compromised on the already compromised upcoming healthcare legislation. Here's the money (non)quote:

“It’s so important to get a deal,” a White House official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to be candid about strategy. “He will do almost anything it takes to get one.”

How is that being 'candid'?

We are at a real crossroads here. 2/3 of Americans want some sort of single payer system so 'public option' is already a compromise!

Even so, it looks like corporate interest is set to overcome even that compromise. The carrot(campaign cotributions) and the sticks(contributions for your next opponent and smear ads in your district) seem to far outweigh quaint ideas like 'will of the people' or 'the right thing to do'.

On every major policy there will be a lobbyist-enacted campaign vs. the will of the people. If we lose on this one we'll lose on the rest.

The system is broken. We face a future of slavery.

2009-09-01T11:46:00.001-04:00

My take on David Brooks' Column Today

So let me get this straight. President Obama has abandoned the center by not shaping his policies to appease an opposition party that has abandoned the center? As GOP strategy crystallizes around 'whatever it takes, prevent any Obama success', it's Obama's fault? As it becomes clear that a lack of government, more than anything else, brought us to the current crises (fiscal, economic, moral) we should fault our president's attempts to restore government's rightful place as regulator and overseer of institutions that have the size and power to ruin us? Who's out of touch here?

2009-08-26T15:33:00.002-04:00

Pump the brakes on Bernanke

As the Obama admin's commitment to financial sector regulatory reform seem lukewarm at best I would implore the liberal senators on the Finance Committee to hold up Bernanke's confirmation for a second term as Fed Chairman until meaningful (no 'too big to fail', position limits on all commodities derivatives, all derivatives traded on open exchanges, etc.) financial regulatory reform is signed by the President.
This is one of the few times senators who REALLY want to rein in the run amok risk-takers will have some real political leverage. Summers and Geithner certainly don't seem inclined to do much...

2009-08-25T13:31:00.007-04:00

Question on a legal term
What’s it called when a lawyer’s client tells the lawyer exactly what he/she wants as a result of the lawyer’s ‘opinion’?
This is exactly what happened with Yoo and Bybee with the ‘client’ being Addington representing Cheney and, by extension Bush.
In reading today’s NY Times Business section article about how Bank of America claims it ‘relied’ on outside lawyers to determine the legality of keeping Merrill Lynch bonus information secret from B of A shareholders I was struck by the similarity.

There must be a cute word for this in the legal world. Does anybody know what it is?

2009-08-21T12:34:00.002-04:00

A VERY sensitive question - DON'T MISUNDERSTAND
If, like me, you sense a certain timidity in our President's tactics and strategy in dealing with a clearly obstructionist opposition, do you think it's possible he is considering the affect his performance as President will have on the fate of future African-American candidates? Does being 'the first' neccesitate an inherent lack of forcefulness? Will the same thing happen when we elect the first woman?
I wish there were some way we could reassure President Obama (and ourselves) that this is the one thing HE DOESN'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT.
Readers, please weigh in and keep it thoughtful.

2009-08-21T12:22:00.002-04:00

Well,
After a lengthy hiatus back in cubicle world your faithful trblmkr is back. Yippee.
Like many of you I am teetering on the razor's edge of 'giving the benefit of the doubt' and 'this ain't what I signed up for' vis a vis the Obama administration.
Part of me (shrinking by day) wants to believe the the Prez and those around him are Mr. Spock-like geniuses, 7 moves ahead of their opposition in a game of three-dimensional chess. The other, growing part of me is beginning to fear they are a reincarnation of Carter's Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight minus the idealism.
Is it just me but is the admin 'cooperating', equivocating, or just 'moving on' on EVERY MAJOR ISSUE from addressing the Cheney/Bush Constitutional asswipe to prosecution of financial criminals?
What do you think?

2005-08-09T21:33:00.000-04:00

Media Matters Reports on more right-wing lies about what we knew/didn't know about Iraq's Infrastructure

Lowry baselessly pinned failures of Iraq postwar plan on faulty U.S. intelligence

In an August 5 speech before the Young America's Foundation's National Conservative Student Conference, National Review editor Rich Lowry falsely blamed intelligence failures for America's lack of planning for a postwar Iraq. He asserted that intelligence agencies harbored a vision of Iraq as the "most sophisticated, modern country in the Middle East," but "we had no idea of the nature of Iraqi institutions and society, ... no idea the electricity basically didn't work."(emphasis added)

Media Matters goes on to rightly debunk the "ignorance" argument.

Link:

2005-08-03T11:48:00.000-04:00

7/26 WSJ Iraq Mismanagement Story Piques Our Interest
Link to Raw Story report: http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Bush_aide_turns_critic_on__0726.html

Why? The story is mainly about Mr. Stuart Bowen, a man who has greatly benefitted from his proximity to Gov. and President Bush. His latest task was to be a toothless, "go along to get along" type of inspector general for Bremer's CPA. Fortunately, he actually took his job seriously and issued a string of "just the facts ma'am" reports that uncovered everything from negligence to outright theft on the part of CPA and US military personnel.
Why does this concern trblmkr? Isn't my main beef how the US miscalculated (lied about?)Iraq rebuilding costs before the war and then lied about why afterwards? Yes, and here's the overlap. Bremer is quoted as follows when rebuking his erstwhile employee, Mr. Bowen:

"Mr. Bremer chided the auditor for expecting conventional levels of accountability, saying that "given the situation the CPA found in Iraq at liberation, this is an unrealistic standard."" (emphasis added)

"...CPA found in Iraq..."
This, like Powell's 10/03 Madrid conference comments, makes it sound like the US had no means to even formulate a guess about Iraq'a prewar situation, ranging from infrastructure to existence of corruption. This is simply not true and to insinuate otherwise is a blatant lie to US taxpayers and our soldiers. Do reasoned readers think that we really entered this Iraq war with that degree of ignorance, 2000-page State Dept. memos, specifically written for "Phase IV" would suggest otherwise. If it wasn't ignorance on a massive scale, already bad enough, that leaves only the worse alternative...

2005-07-29T16:18:00.000-04:00

Iraq reconstruction costs written up in today's Wash Post

The article focuses on how the high cost of security due to the "unexpected" insurgency is eating into reconstruction project budgets.
It touches on prewar rosy assessments of those costs but forgets the phony reasons given after the fall of Baghdad as to how we were so far off.
They were either lying before or after the war...

2005-07-22T02:22:00.000-04:00

Unanswered Questions, Part II

I watched George Bush's State of the Union speech live January 2003 and remember that when he uttered the words "...purchase significant quatities of uranium from Africa", I jumped up and yelled "where in Africa?" Did anyone else share this moment with me? Apparently, no one at the New York Times. Even in their article today rehashing that event, they stumble. They change it to "in Africa."

See my letter to the Times's Public Editor below:

Johnston, Yale, Stevenson, and Kornblut have Rove's fingerprints in sight...

...but don't see them, they report in "For Two Aides in Leak Case 2nd Issue Rises" July, 21:

"In his State of the Union address in January 2003, Mr. Bush cited reports that Iraq had sought to acquire a form of uranium in Africa as evidence of Mr. Hussein's intentions to gain weapons that he might provide to terrorists, use to threaten the United States or employ against other nations in the Middle East." (emphasis added)

When the President stated on that fateful moment that he had evidence from British intelligence that Iraq had sought uranium "from Africa", I yelled at the TV, "From where in Africa?"

Which presidential speech is pored over the most, each word carefully calculated for meaning and deniability? SOTU, of course. Who are the final arbiters of this task? Karl Rove on politics and Dick Cheney on policy. Any dispute so far?

It is literally and physically impossible to obtain anything "from Africa" and Bush's speechwriters, ever the wordsmiths, would have known that. Therefore, it begs the question, who, being less eloquent yet more politically savvy, would see that naming a specific country or "in Africa" would be too restricting in that it would foment natural questioning as to where exactly Bush was referring to. The "from Africa" construction was a calculated gamble that the WH press corps wouldn't catch it. Sadly it worked and continues to work brilliantly two and a half years after the event.

I'm no great seer, but if I was able to pick up on that, as a lowly layman, in real time, what does that say about the abilities or, more ominously, the motivations of our fourth estate?

Best regards,

PS I was unable to find the e-mail addresses of any of the contributing reporter for this article in the provided NYTimes e-mail list. Is there an updated version and how can I obtain it?

Readers, you see, the White House can't simultaneously be precise enough to include the words "significant quantities" but so general as to use the ridiculous phrase "from Africa." This shows that there were many cooks in the kitchen, so to speak.

2005-07-21T01:18:00.000-04:00

Natsios on Koppel 4/23/03 re: Reconstruction costs
Go to Air America's "Al Franken Show" July, 20 show audio archive. From about the 23rd minute they play Andrew Natsios, head of USAID emphatically telling Ted Koppel that "$1.7 billion will be the extent of US taxpayers' contribution" or something very close to that. He says it over and over.

2005-07-18T23:55:00.000-04:00

Here is an excerpt and link to a State Dept. Press Brief of 9/4/03, topic, the upcoming donor conference for Iraq to be held Oct 23-24 in Madrid:

"U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE Office of the Spokesman September 4, 2003

SPECIAL BRIEFING

With Alan P. Larson Under Secretary for Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs On Financing Reconstruction in Iraq and Donors Conference held in Brussels

September 4, 2003 Washington, D.C."

"...Q: And I was wondering, the U.S.'s -- Americans, the taxpayer, simply, is bearing a heavy burden for reconstructing Iraq. There are figures like $60- and $70 billion floating around, and as money the U.S. will have to spend on reconstruction.

Number One, I have lost track of the argument the administration made before and during the war that Iraq is an immensely rich country, rich resources, very skillful people, and if they could just get out from under Saddam Hussein -- it isn't like Afghanistan, you know, poor country -- they'd be off and running.

And all of a sudden, I find, you know, we're raising -- we're spending $60-$70 billion on this allegedly, potentially very rich country which produces oil, and we've looked at the gas station price -- the prices at the gas station. So here -- let me boil it down.

What will these donations do to the proportion that -- if you can estimate, that America now bears? How many tens of billions of dollars do you think can be raised by donations? And most of all, why is the world obliged to bail Iraq out, first of all, from the U.S.-led war, but secondly, bail out a country that's supposed to be potentially enormously rich?

LARSON: OK. Let me work backward.

First of all, we have made the case everywhere, including in testimony before the Congress and in meetings like the one we had yesterday, that this is about a responsibility the international community has to the Iraqi people; and that if you look at the hole that they find themselves in, it was not the result of a 25- to 30-day war, it's the result of a long period of neglect, misrule and so forth. And I think that argument is fairly substantially accepted by our friends in the international community.

Secondly, we have expressed the view that Iraq does, because Iraq has oil and other resources including a fairly well educated elite, that one can shoot for a reconstruction process that very quickly is financed predominantly by their own resources and by foreign investment and domestic investment. But there is no doubt that in the very short run there is going to need to be substantial requirement for foreign government assistance.

Now, the numbers you quoted -- the Secretary [Secretary of State Colin Powell] -- I'm not going to add -- the Secretary commented on the numbers today, basically, by saying he wasn't going to comment. I'm not going to go any further than --"

Link: http://newdelhi.usembassy.gov/wwwhpr0909a.html

2005-07-18T12:45:00.000-04:00

This is an excerpt from an article before the Madrid conference that paints Powell as the good cop on the Iraq infrastructure question. Just a few weeks later, Powell would prove to be quite willing to spread pentagon lies.
Excerpt:
"While Bush was listening to Powell's arguments for going to the UN, the US's viceroy in Iraq, Paul Bremer, paid him a visit and explained that the reconstruction effort would fail without an infusion of "tens of billions" of dollars. Most of it that money will be earmarked for rebuilding Iraq's water and electrical infrastructure, much of it damaged by a US bombing campaign made necessary by Rumsfeld's insistence on using the minimum number of US troops during the invasion. In spite of the Pentagon's insistence that the infrastructure was in bad shape before the war, subsequent looting has made the problem much worse and, of course, there aren't enough troops on the ground to guard these "key structures.""

Link to article: http://eatthestate.org/08-01/RumsfeldsFallFrom.htm

2005-07-18T12:36:00.000-04:00

Here is an op-ed piece written by Colin Powell in which he furthers the lie that only saddam is to blame for the destruction of Iraq's infrastructure.

Link: http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110004035

Hello and welcome

2005-07-18T01:32:00.000-04:00

This blog initially aims to accomplish two things. Given how quickly events are reported (if they are picked up at all), misreported, and then dropped by the MSM, we want to go back and see if we can't find some answers to questions that were and were not asked. Second, because the lazy MSM's chief tool for what passes as journalism these days is to quote pundits/experts/politicos without having done any prepatory homework, oftentimes the right questions don't get asked. We want to provide our readers, with their help, the contact information for these pundits/experts/politicos so we can ask them directly. Maybe by doing this they might be a bit more careful about what they say (one can dream) or become more reluctant to go on these shows or be quoted in an article.
Let's start the ball rolling:
For this first one, we have to go back about 2 years (there's alot of that going around, just ask Scott McClellan).
Does anyone remember the 9/03 Madrid donors' conference? It was attended by Colin 'the vial' Powell. It was intended to get our pesky peacenik friends in 'old Europe" to pony up money for the reconstruction of a new west-loving, democratic Iraq.
At the time, the BIG STORY was wmd, as in, where are they? That's a very important story that is still very much alive. But the whole Iraqi Survey Group project under Kay then Duelfer cost $1-2 billion tops, that's about 1-2 weeks worth of our current spending.
What if I told you there was another scandalous claim, based on lies, that is costing us far more in dollars and blood?
It is this, at that Madrid conference, Powell was asked how the US could have so drastically underestimated the cost of rebuilding Iraq. Does anyone remember the answer? Was it because Iraq had less oil than we thought? No. Was it because we didn't have hundreds of defectors to tell us about the state of Iraq's infrastructure before the war? No, Powell's own State Dept. interviewed hundreds for a 2000 page report on postwar Iraq. Was it because we didn't control Iraq's airspace and didn't have our best satellites trained on the country? No, we controlled Iraq's skies for 12 years prior to the war and we certainly had shifted the bulk of all our intel assets (including imaging) to Iraq from, guess where, Afghanistan.
So what was the reason we went from Wolfowitz: "Iraq will pay for it's own rebuilding", to the head of USAID: "The cost to US taxpayers will not exceed $1.7 billion" (in Senate tesimony, no less!) to the Madrid conference, where we hoped to garner commitments of, now seems paltry, $50 billion?
Powell's reason, which was repeated by various administration and really only reported overseas was, "We had no idea how 30 years' of neglect under Saddam had damaged Iraq's infrastructure."
No idea? Is anyone besides me even a little suspicious of this claim? As I mentioned above, we were watching this country like a hawk. But I want to bring up another point. Unlike wmd's, roads, power plants, water treatment centers, etc. are not hidden, they exist in plain sight. So even if, in our endless generosity, we could give Bush & Co. as "pass" on wmd's (hey, we were all wrong!) Do we have to give them a "pass" on this too? After all, this "misread" is costing us much more than the wmd snafu.
So, are you with me? Does anyone have any link to any info that will help us answer how we got this even wronger than wmd's? Of course, I have some theories. Like, why spend $10 million refitting an old Soviet-era power plant with parts that are either sitting in Iraq or Russia when you can 1) bomb it to smithereens and 2) rebuild it from scratch with gold-plated US materials and expensive "expertise?"
James Glanz of the NY Times wrote an article about unused construction materials being smuggled to Jordan and sitting in neat little piles to be auctioned off, possibly back to Halliburton. This is the closest I have seen a journalist get to this issue.
Does anyone know how to find our bombing target lists? Could this be the reason we were so nonchalant about the looting? Could this all be about profiteering? This is important. Because if we knowingly damaged that country's infrastructure more than was necessary in order for US corporations to make more money, well, that keeps our boys and girls there longer than it would have otherwise.
So you see, this is important on many different levels and barely one drop of ink has been spilled to shed light on it.
We await any response or leads/links on this.

Our second goal, to make talking heads a little uncomfortable will start with this guy. His name is Robert D. Luskin, he is an attroney with Patton Boggs, a heavyweight firm in DC. He has been all over the news both quoted by name and as "someone who has been briefed..." regarding the Karl Rove/CIA case. Even though every day sources "close to the case" request anonymity because "all parties have been requested by the prosecutor not to comment" Luskin is out there doing what poor Scottie McClellan can't(or won't, take your pick). If he can use the public airwaves and media to defend the indefensible, the public should be able to holler back at him.
Well we can!
You too can communicate with a legal titan! Let him know how great it is that he can make $500 an hour to defend a toad.
Robert D. Luskin's direct telephone number at his firm, Patton Boggs, is 202-457-6190. His e-mail address is rluskin@pattonboggs.com.Here is Luskin's bio page on the PB website:http://www.pattonboggs.com/Attorneys/detail.aspx?id=96ea6d2c-0a8f-4cac-9155-620a5fe0dbc4

I'm sure he will be happy to hear from you!

Ciao for now.