Excuses, excuses

"My judgment is, if we weren't in Iraq, they'd find some other excuse, because they have ambitions." - President Bush, explaining why invading Iraq has not encouraged terrorism. (AP)

It doesn't hurt to ask

By Dr. Julio Chavez, M.D.
Special to Howlin' Leroy Eenk

SEATTLE -At long last, Seattle has a mayor who gets it.

I for one would like to express my gratitude to Mayor Nickels
for having the courage to finally say what needs to be
said: the voters of Seattle -- god help 'em -- just aren't
that bright.

By reversing his previous position favoring an advisory
referendum, he has done this city a great service.
Furthermore, I completely agree with Hizzoner's stated
reason: that the revised cost estimates will
"create too much confusion."

(Seattle Post-Intelligencer "Public might be dealt out
of decision on viaduct," Sept. 21, p. A1)

It would be foolhardy for any civic leader to assume that
the average grapefruit could tell the difference between
$3.6 billion and $5.5 billion.

One would have to be some sort of mathematical genius
to figure it all out.  This kind of esoteric arithmetic should
be left to experts like Mr. Nickels.

As I sat in my chair, trying to decipher the highly complex
two-color bar graph accompanying the story that I just read
out loud to myself -- where blue represented the previous
cost estimate and red represented the revised estimates
-- I nearly had an aneurysm!

Thankfully, our esteemed mayor and his compadres on the
City Council are set to spare us voters from such tasks.

In the mayor's words: “I think this is the kind of thing that
voters pay us to work through.”  You got that straight.

Now, some might argue there's no harm in letting voters
air their opinion.

But once you give the rabble an advisory vote now,
they'll want a binding resolution next time. Before you know it,
we'll be at the mercy of a bunch of buffoons!  So hats off to
Mayor Nickels for nipping this thing in the bud.

He demonstrates the kind of clear-headed, tough-love honesty
lacking in many of today's politicians.  We here in Seattle have
a mayor with the confidence to know that we are intellectually
inferior -- and the good sense to tell us straight out.

I mean, could anyone imagine the results of an advisory
referendum? Most likely, the city would descend into a spiral
of unchecked stupidity. Fortunately, it looks as though cooler
-- and smarter -- heads will prevail, and spare this city the
catastrophe of letting the feeble-minded voters advise them.

Apocalypse set for January 2009

By Lance Carbunkle
Howlin' Leroy Eenk Staff Writer

WASHINGTON - Information that terrorist interrogators extract through inhumane and cruel methods can be used in special tribunals for detainees, just so long as a secret judge OKs it and the cruel and inhumane treatment happened before Congress passed a law in 2005 that outlawed torture.

That's part of a deal between Republican leadership in the U.S. Senate and a rebel band of GOP senators, the Associated Press reported Thursday. It also allows terrorist suspects to see evidence against them, something that is generally considered a human right and something the White House opposed.

The rebels had balked at President Bush's package of terror-related laws intended to be used as talking points for November's election, where Republicans are expected to suffer deep losses in the majorities in both chambers of Congress.

The rebels, led by John McCain of Arizona, objected to the more draconian elements of Bush's package in order to distance themselves from unpopular Bush before in the mid-term elections.

Congressional Democrats, sidelined for the past four years, without any substance in their proverbial nut sacks, continued with their "give them enough rope" strategy implemented on Sept. 12, 2001.

A source familiar with the various torture programs within the government said, on the condition of anonymity, that if approved and signed into law, the package would not change detention and interrogation tactics.

"Everybody knows that torture rarely reveals information valuable in the field, let alone information that could stand up in an American court," the source said. "We torture because it gives us a warm feeling of satisfaction."

"And besides," he added, "These tribunals are kangaroo courts. We do what we want."

In related news, a new tally shows that August averaged slightly less than 100 dead Iraqi civilians per day, an improvement over July, the Associated Press reported Thursday.

According to the United Nations, which releases the figures every two months, violent civilian deaths in July reached an unprecedented high of 3,590, an average of about 116 a day. The August toll was 3,009, an average of 97 a day.

The U.N. report also elaborated on evidence found on at the scenes of the deaths or the recovery of bodies. Evidence that indicated torture, secret detentions, a burgeoning sectarian militia and death squad scene, and a spike in "honor killings" of women, where women are murdered by the men in their families or otherwise to protect the honor of the men in their families or society at large.

Often, in these circumstances, women are murdered by males because the woman is suspected of consensually spending time with a man or because she had been raped.

A rise in honor killings may signify a grimly oppressive turn toward widespread religious fundamentalism, and I think that's a reasonable statement to make and leave hanging out there without attribution.

The U.N. report also said the new Iraqi government is facing "a generalized breakdown of law and order which presents a serious challenge to the institutions of Iraq."

These circumstances suggest a vibrant and active civil war underway, but officials associated with or intimidated by the Bush Administration proved that Iraq was not in the throes of a civil war by saying Iraq is not in the throes of a civil war..

"If there was a civil war in Iraq, then we'd see it," Bush spokesman Tony Snow told reporters during Thursday's daily briefing."There would be thousands of people killed, violently. And multiple organizations like the U.N. and the press would be issuing studies and reports, and we just aren't seeing that."