Just when you thought it couldn't get any worse?

[captainsblog]

I need to get me one of those countdown clocks. I'll try this one for now but it's gorking the browser bigtime:

ETA Damn. This one's not second-by-second but it at least has the number of days right:

Designed by georgedorn and provided by Positronic Design.

Grab your own copy here.

With all the other trouble this moron has caused, the past week has brought out two stories which, on a grander scale, have managed to top all the corruption, incompetence and bad decision making of the previous six-plus years.

On May 9, Fearless Leader issued this: his Presidential Directive on National Continuity Policy. Sounds innocuous enough, right? Maybe an annual conference for policy wonks to discuss long-range planning?

Erm, no. The only two words lacking from this frightening document are "martial" and "law." And our own hometown newspaper (still being allowed to publish at the moment) is so far the only one in the country to have picked up on its potential for harm:

Quietly issued on the ninth day of May, with minimal notice by the mainstream press, the Presidential Directive on National Continuity Policy might be no more than a 21st century version of all those Cold War Doomsday scenarios that provided for government functions to continue in the event that the national leadership was vaporized in a nuclear attack. Sort of the proverbial rearrangement of deck chairs on the Titanic, but it made people feel better.

In the age of terror, however, the plan to ensure a continuity of operations is more frightening for a couple of reasons. One, as we saw on 9/11 and a few brutal days since, terrorist attacks are much more likely to actually happen than Soviet first strikes ever were.

Two, the events that would trigger the policy, putting the executive office of the president in immediate charge of all government functions, could be so small as to be no barrier at all. The “catastrophic emergency” that could change everything we’ve known about the separation of powers since 1789 is defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.”

And who decides when an incident is “extraordinary” or has risen to the level of a “catastrophic emergency”? The president does. Any time the president is really frightened, or thinks the rest of us are, he is legally entitled to take all the reins of government into his own hands, pat the Congress and the courts on the head in what the order refers to as “a matter of comity,” and order the mess cleaned up, the bad guys caught, the mail delivered, the stock market to open and the trains to run on time.

Someone needs to do something about this. And someone can, in, oh, about 595 days- if we've got that long.

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That hesitation is on account of the second news item, which, if you can believe it, frightens me even more.

Those "Soviet first strikes" might not be as unimaginable as the editorial writer seems to think. For this man has figured out a way to reheat the Cold War after his Daddy somehow managed to end it (with help from good Republicans like Lech Walesa and the Pope) almost 20 years ago:

Bush defends missile defense shield

Bush, in the Czech Republic as part of an eight-day trip to Europe, spoke as Russia's opposition to the proposed defense system mounts. Russia believes the shield in Eastern Europe is meant for it, and says it has no choice to boost its own military potential in response.

Bush dismissed those concerns. He said he will make his case directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin later this week on the sidelines of the Group of Eight summit.

"My message will be Vladimir - I call him Vladimir - that you shouldn't fear a missile defense system," Bush said. "As a matter of fact, why don't you cooperate with us on a missile defense system. Why don't you participate with the United States."

As Bugs Bunny used to say, "What a maroon! What an ignoramus!" (Of course, usually right after Bugs said this, a stupid guy with a shotgun was threatening to blow his head off.) And so it goes with the one war we thought we really had won. Resurrecting a "Star Wars" missile defense in a world where the terrorists have yet to develop a workable fleet of ICBMs is nothing short of instigation. On paper, at least, we can be sure of "winning" a nuculur war rather than getting all bogged down in these pesky firefights on the ground. We have more and bigger bombs, more and bigger bombers, and hey! The resulting nuculur winter might even slow down that global warming that all us Commies environmentalists are complaining about!

And what better way to invoke his newly-issued dictatorial powers than by bringing the world to the brink of destruction?

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The next post you read here will be my 1500th. I promise it will be incredibly more uplifting.

Comments

[glenmarshall.livejournal.com]

See http://frontdoor.glenmarshall.us

I've got a better countdown saying!

[revmary.livejournal.com]

In 595 days A villiage in Texas will get their idiot back!


Ugh, his insurgancy idea has caused the trouble with missing soldiers and the ID's maybe they're dead now? UGh

U R UMC, so here in West Ohio, we have a recommendation to vote on, standing for the war ending ASAp...Yeah, more words than that in it, we're UMC and Wordy! But, I voting for it.

It's delegate year, so vote vote vote over and over....Gen. Conference is next year.

[fangirlsays.livejournal.com]

God.

I'm having a sucky kinda morning, and that really makes me want to just crawl back in bed and cry.

[captainsblog.livejournal.com]

I am so sorry. I promise, the next one will be all sweet and mushy to everyone.

[fangirlsays.livejournal.com]

No, no, hon, it's not your fault, and this is something people need to know. It just freaks me out that it's all going to hell, you know?

*hugs*

[luckycee.livejournal.com]

I'm so scared.