Here is Bush lying to Coast Guard graduates:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20070523/us-terrorism

President Bush portrayed the Iraq war as a battle between the U.S. and al-Qaida on Wednesday and shared nuggets of intelligence to contend Osama bin Laden was setting up a terrorist cell in Iraq to strike targets in America.

Here is the reality as articulated well by Juan Cole:

Bush was out there again on Wednesday trying to link Iraq to al-Qaeda and maintaining that the US was mainly fighting it in that country. In fact, No Mahdi Army Shiites are al-Qaeda. Almost all Sunni Arab guerrilla cells are Baathist or Salafi rather than al-Qaeda. Probably of 100,000 guerrillas fighting in Iraq, perhaps 2% could be categorized in some vague way as "al-Qaeda" if you take that term as referring to a franchise. They are mainly foreign fighters and if the US left Iraq, the local Sunni Arabs would slit their throats. Some slitting is going on even now, and the Bushies celebrate that while not seeming to recognize the implication that "al-Qaeda" doesn't amount to anything as an Iraqi political force.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/5/25/92839/8509

When is they lying going to stop?

Jerome Corsi author of the book 'Unfit for Command', feels betrayed by President Bush.

IN case of emergency (vaguely defined) the Executive Branch usurps all power, in order to "protect" the nation as revealed by a new Homeland Security Directive.

make plans for "National Essential Functions" of all federal, state, local, territorial, and tribal governments, as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president's directives in the event of a national emergency.

When one of the architects of Bush's re-election feels betrayed by the President should we be worried? Yes! Corsi is trying to bring this secret directive the forefront of the American people attention so that at least it can be discussed out in the open.

Why are private enterprises included in this directive and what exactly constitutes a national emergency?

Ironically, the directive sees no contradiction in the assumption of dictatorial powers by the president with the goal of maintaining constitutional continuity through an emergency.

The troubling aspect of this Directive is that it was all done in secret, much like the Dubai Ports Deal.

Will there be a strange new alliance of Swiftboaters and Liberals working together to take power away from this President.

Delcaring a national emergency around Nov. 2,008? Could it happen? Mr. Corsi thinks it is not an impossible case scenario.

Link and quotes:

Sales of existing homes fell by a larger-than-expected amount in April while the median price of a home sold during the month fell for a ninth straight month as the troubles in the subprime mortgage market acted as a further drag on housing.

[...]The drop in existing home sales for April followed news that sales of new homes surged by 16.2 percent last month, the biggest one-month rise in 14 years. However, that big jump was accompanied by a record drop in median new home prices. Analysts saw that as a sign that builders are getting more aggressive in slashing prices as a way to move a glut of unsold new homes.

My impression is that we should not expect a rebound for at least 6-12 months... dunno if that's reasonable or not.

attacks on civilians? Glenn looks at polling data from 5 primarily muslim nations and the US and finds that:

"Among four key predominantly Muslim countries -- Iran, Pakistan, Egypt and Indonesia -- the percentage which believes that there is never any justification for violent attacks on civilians is between 77-84%. By extremely stark contrast, the percentage of Americans who believe that such attacks are never justified is only 46%."

He also discusses the topic of torture wrt the current Repub party:

"But what is happening to the Republican party -- the transformation of its base from Falwell/Robertson social conservatism obsessed with abortion and gay rights into a macro version of the Little Green Footballs comment section, obsessed instead with, literally excited by, detaining and torturing people, maximizing government domestic surveillance, starting still new wars in the Middle East and being far more brutal with the current ones ("doing what needs to be done") -- is too extreme to ignore."

"The GOP debate in South Carolina two weeks ago was something of a watershed moment in American politics. It really was like watching a debate between Michelle Malkin, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Reynolds and Michael Savage -- with the LGF commenters as the audience, cheering most boisterously for the most extreme warmongering, pro-torture and pro-lawless-detention sentiments. It is one thing to encounter that level of extremism in the right-wing blogosphere or on talk radio. But to see that embraced so openly and so eagerly by virtually all of the GOP presidential candidates is rather staggering, and self-evidently meaningful."

Deny it if you choose. We've seen it stated here by some of us. Republicans seem to love them some torture. They seem to want to have unilateral detention without charges.

Funny thing too, when I was growing up and going to school, if someone had said those were proper American Values, I would have thought that person was crazy. To suggest that Executive fiat trumps citizens Constitutional & Bill of Rights....well, I wouldn't have believed it. Why do they feel it's OK? They only need reply one thing and they & their like minded bretheren nod their heads approvingly. That one phrase that justifies everything? 9-11.