State of the Union

It's ironic, isn't it; George Bush, currently (illegally and illegitimately in my view) residing in the White House, is set to give the annual State of the Union address tonight to a joint session of Congress, one of the few regular imperial spectacles of the American Republic.

But the only thing people are talking about is the question of who's going to be giving that speech in two years (as an aside, the Democratic insider conversation right now concerns the extent of the expected electoral cataclysm should Hillary Clinton secure the nomination. The word of the day: ruinous).

There's a lesson in all of these conversations: George Bush is a political corpse. With two years left in his term, people are ready to be rid of the man; and by people, clearly, we're not just talking about Democrats.

At some point in the next few months, Bush will, if present trends continue on their steady march, become a greater liability for republicans in office than removed from it. The day will likely dawn when defending the political corpse of George Bush will become too politically painful and expensive for republicans; at which point, the country can begin to have the serious conversation about impeachment that our Constitution demands.

If you're watching the speech tonight, pay close attention to who claps, and how hard. The extent of the customary adulation rendered to the office, not the man, may be significantly less than expected.

This comes from Bob Fertik, our friend at Democrats.com. Seems the media jumped on a story about terrorists coming into the US on student visas. This is expected to be something Bush focuses on in his misState of the Union message and is the latest attempt by Bush to boost his sagging popularity (now finally dipping below Nixon's lowest low) using fear. There are two problems with this. First, people aren't turning to him and trusting him when he whips up the fear machine. They actually realize that if they are still afraid, it shows he has failed. But more importantly, it seems the whole story is based on one single document that has been unsubstantiated. This is reminiscent of the use of false intelligence reports to claim that Iraq was getting enriched uranium from Africa which was used as a (false) excuse to justify invasion. That was also unsubstantiated rumor.

So here, in Bob Fertik's words, is the scoop:

The incomparable Joseph Cannon has once again scooped the media by discovering the Big Lie that will be the centerpiece of Bush's SOTU: the fictional tale of an Al-Zarqawi plot (under direct written orders from Bin Laden and Al-Zawahiri) to send 19 terrorists into the U.S using student visas.

After reviewing the three published versions of this story [see Fertik's diary for his review of each version], it's perfectly clear there are no credible facts - no independently verified documents, no identified witnesses, and no suspects. The whole story hinges on a single document, which was not seen by any of the reporters and probably does not exist.