Village Voice regular Rick Perlstein tells us of his encounters with a strange and unshakable cult — true believers who know in their hearts and minds that george w. bush is Christ-like, incapable of sin or error, worshippers who, when faced with facts that may prove otherwise, simply block them out.

It brings to mind the reverence the Chinese once held for Chairman Mao, or the way North Koreans are taught to revere their Dear and Great Leaders, lapping up the nonsense of their ability to move mountains and reshape the universe. The sentimental idiocy of this movement is breathtaking, and as Perlstein notes, their unyielding hero worship keeps them well divorced from reality, helping to propel American conservatism in a new and unhealthy direction.

For the faithful, there are lots of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq; no one high up ever knew of any memo licensing torture of prisoners; bush can’t be blamed for the deficits, and he always speaks honestly. Perlstein describes his attendance at a surreal “Party for the President,” one of many such events organized by the bush campaign, a kind of love-fest that includes a call-in from Laura bush and a lot of starry eyed reverence. Perlstein asks why they so adore our preznit.

Ponytailed Larry, who wears the stripes of a former marine gunnery sergeant on his floppy hat, bursts into laughter; it’s too obvious to take seriously. “Honesty. Truth. Integrity,” he says upon recovering. “I don’t think there’s any difference between the governor of Texas and the president of the United States.”

Gingerly, I offer one difference: The governor ran for president on a platform of balanced budgets, then ran the federal budget straight into the red.

Responds Larry (of the first president since James Garfield with a Congress compliant enough never to issue a single veto): “Well, it’s interesting that we blame the person who happens to be president for the deficit. As if he has any control over the legislature of the United States.”

Larry’s wife, Tami Mars, the Republican congressional nominee for Oregon’s third district, proposes a Divine Right of Eight-Year Terms: “Let the man finish what he started. Instead of switching out his leadership—because that’s what the terrorists are expecting.”

Larry is asked what he thinks of Bush’s budget cuts for troops in the field. He’s not with Bush on everything: “I hope he reverses himself on that.”

I note that he already has, due to Democratic pressure.

Faced with an existential impossibility—giving the Democrats credit for anything—he retreats into a retort I’ll hear again and again tonight: Nobody’s perfect. “I don’t think we’re going to find a situation in which we find a person with which we’re 100 percent comfortable.”

The article offers insights to the confused and out-of-touch liberal like myself, who struggles to get into the heads of the die-hard bush worshippers. Hearing them live and in person is illuminating and disturbing. They really do see our tongue-tied, frightened, helpless little leader as angelic. They even buy bush kitsch reminiscent of the Mao memorabilia sold everywhere in China.

It’s important to know what people in America are thinking, especially those whose beliefs are farthest from your own. I just wish it didn’t have to be this depressing. If they see bush as God, will they not see Kerry as the Antichrist and seek to undermine him after he’s elected? I sure hope not.

“Read the whole thing,” as bloggers like to say; there’s a lot more there.

It’s quite interesting to see the human side of people like Liu Di (aka the Stainless Steel Mouse), whose situation causes them to achieve a mythical stature. Anyone who has followed her case will want to read this excellent interview that explains who she is, how she ended up in jail and what her future looks like. A brief snippet:

She began participating in discussions on Democracy and Freedom, a Web site that is often at odds with the government. By 2001, she opened her own Web site, much of it dedicated to literature, but she also published some articles calling for more freedom and openness. And as cyberspace became her home, she began to be more bold.
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She wrote an essay defending a man jailed because of political postings on his Web site. She defended another intellectual who was targeted by the government for organizing a reading association and for posting political essays online. She wrote a critical attack on an advocate of nationalism, and also began dabbling in satire and parody at the expense of the government.

In one posting, she called for the organization of a new political party in which anyone could join and everyone could be chairman. She says it was a spoof. But by September 2002, college administrators summoned her with a warning. “They said the postings I published on the Web went too far,” she said. “Some of the stuff I thought was written in a joking manner. But they thought it was too far.”

Terrified, she said she scaled back on her online writing. But two months later, administrators ordered her to the campus police station, where officers took her to a Beijing prison. She was put into a cell with three other women, including a convicted murderer. Even today, she says she does not know which of her essays led to her arrest.

“I think a normal government should not be challenged by these writings,” she said. “We are not promoting violence. We’re not organizing to challenge the government.”

A normal government? You’d think someone this bright would know that the CCP is not quite your normal government, and that in its eyes, everything stated via a public medium like the Internet is automatically a potential threat to its stability. She certainly learned the hard way. And she’s damned lucky that she made it out — thanks to a worldwide outcry. The tragedy is that many others were not so lucky, and every time I think of them, I feel sick and helpless.

To all those trying to stoke this non-story, see Josh Marshall’s post today.

A difference of opinion between Tucker Carlson and the 9/11 Commission …

“There is nothing random about the documents he took. Berger stripped the files of every single copy of a single memo which detailed the Clinton administration’s response to the Y2K terror threat.”
Tucker Carlson, Crossfire, July 22nd 2004

Then there’s 9/11 Commissioners Gorelick and Gorton …

DOBBS: Let me ask you, not necessarily directly on point, but certainly related. Sandy Berger, the former head of the national security — national security adviser under the Clinton administration, accused of, and admitting taking classified documents from the National Archives, those notes, whether copies or originals still unclear. Did the commission review that material, to what — can you shed any light on what happened there? Slade Gorton, first.

GORTON: Well, we can’t shed any light on exactly what happened there and on Sandy Berger’s troubles with the Justice Department and the Archives. What we can say unequivocally is we had all of that information. We have every one of those documents. All of them have — are infused in and are a part of our report.

DOBBS: So the commission was denied no information as a result of whatever Sandy Berger did or did not do at the National Archives?

GORTON: That’s precisely correct.

GORELICK: And we have been so assured by the Justice Department.
Dobbs, Gorton & Gorelick
Lou Dobbs Tonight, July 22nd 2004

Soon, Andrew Sullivan will have shed his Republican cocoon altogether, and emerge as a free-flying, lustrous butterfly soaring toward the heavens.

I was going to quote from a few of his posts today, like his quote of the day and Bush’s refusal to even acknowledge the existence of gays and lesbians. But it’s all so good, it’s all so indicative of a fundamental shift, that I’ll just give the link and urge you to check out the individual posts under it. I think it’s safe to say that Sullivan, once Bush’s fiercest attack dog, is now urging his readers to vote Democratic.

Apparently the remake of the 60s thriller is even more partisan than Moore’s propaganda screed.

According to Drudge, this is what Frank Rich will say in his upcoming review of Manchurian Candidate in the NY Times.

“Freed from any obligations to fact, MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE can play far dirtier than FAHRENHEIT 911,” writes Rich in a column set for release this Sunday, newsroom sources tell DRUDGE.

“This movie could pass for the de facto fifth day of the [Democrat] convention itself.”

“The American people are terrified,” says Streep’s villainous senator early on as, John Ashcroft-style, she wields a national security report promising “another cataclysm, probably nuclear.” And so we watch her and the rest of the Manchurian Global cabal exploit that fear in any way possible, using the mass media as a brainwashing tool, manipulating patriotic iconography for political ends. “Compassionate vigilance” is one campaign slogan. A televised election night rally features a Mount Rushmore backdrop (as in a signature Bush photo op) and a chorus line of heroic cops and firemen (reminiscent of the early Bush-Cheney ads exploiting the carnage at ground zero).

If Drudge got hold of the real copy (which I’m sure he did), it sounds like Bush is up for a double-whammy in America’s movie theaters this summer. And unlike F 9/11, Manchurian Candidate won’t be cursed with the “D” word (“documentary”). As a suspense thriller, it will appeal to the mainstream, and with stars like Meryl Streep and Denzel Washington it’s bound to be a big draw. Very big. And publicity like Rich’s will bring in the political types (like me).

I think it’s wonderful. It sounds like it’s depicting on screen exactly what Bush does every day, with his orchestrated photo opps and cynical “compassionate conservatism.” And it’s perfectly fair for the GOP to turn around and do the same thing. Let them put out a movie showing a hapless Democratic security bigwig stuffing classified documents into his pants if they think it will sell.

(Unfortunately, it would never work. Republicans are simply too square to create a hip, thrilling movie. I’d love to see them try it.)

Update: Great piece on the movie and Drudge over at the most creative blog I know.

How many stories can come out in one week about the possibility of China invading Taiwan? It seems like they’re everywhere. Every possible scenario has been described and every opinion expressed.

So, at the risk of boring everyone, I’ll cite the latest from the Straits Times, an opinion piece that suggests the US is consciously and irresponsibly fanning the flames of war. It’s by David Lampton, director of China Studies at Johns Hopkins University and he things Bush is so preoccupied with Iraq he’s letting his policy toward Taiwan and China zigzag and contradict itself.

In its late May ‘Report to Congress on PRC Military Power’, the DoD [Defense Department] seemingly endorses the view that the island should present ‘credible threats to China’s urban population or high-value targets, such as the Three Gorges Dam’, to deter Chinese military coercion against the island. At another point, the report says: ‘Asymmetric capabilities that Taiwan possesses or is acquiring could deter a Chinese attack by making it unacceptably costly.’

Offensive deterrence is a terrible idea for Taiwan. Were Taipei to launch such an attack on the mainland it almost assuredly would lead to the destruction of the island as we know it. Moreover, this approach is entirely inconsistent with the rest of the Bush administration’s effort to de-escalate cross-Strait tensions….

Beyond Pentagon encouragement, why is Taiwan moving in such a dangerous direction? It is doing so because China is building the capacity to deliver a quick military stroke to the island before the US could respond effectively; Taiwan’s land army still inappropriately dominates the island’s defence in a naval, air force and missile age; its military services are poorly coordinated with one another; and its citizens and leaders do not wish to spend the necessary resources on their own defence, while at the same time they refuse to accept Beijing’s ‘one-China principle’ as a basis for negotiation.

In short, those advocating offensive deterrence are seeking the cheap way to seem to be doing something while avoiding making hard budgetary or political decisions. They jeopardise the island’s survival and increase the odds of conflict that could embroil America. Indeed, in moving in offensive directions, Taipei could well provide Beijing a pretext for preemption.

As you can probably see, Lampton is pretty outspoken. He sees the Defense Department policy as out of control, and Bush unable to rein it in — a recipe that might make war more likely. I’d say he has a good point.

Sounds right to me.

Clearly, no one in-the-know breathed a word of this until a couple days ago — as the Kerry campaign found out to its own moritification. Yet from the moment the story broke every paper seems to be finding multiple sources who are willing to talk freely about minute details of the case. Look over at Google News and you’ll see that even the Akron Gazette and the Curryville Crier seem to be getting hourly exclusive scoops.

In my experience criminal investigations aren’t nearly that porous — with multiple sources talking to multiple publications, and all on cue — unless someone on the inside has greenlighted the leaks.

The good thing is that the US media appear to have tired of this story very quickly, and there’s nearly nothing about it on cable news today. No legs, no traction.

UPDATE: Instapundit himself agrees about the media and Bergergate, quoting an email he received:

Here are the top stories on my (customized) yahoo news page, all AP stories:

1) 9/11 Panel Suggests Intelligence Overhaul
2) Video Shows 9/11 Hijackers’ Security Check
3) U.S. Reports 94 Cases of Prisoner Abuse
4) House Takes Up Gay Marriage Issue Again
5) Marines Kill 25 Insurgents in Ramadi
6) Threatening Note Found on Amtrak Train
and

7) ‘Fahrenheit 9/11’ Making GOP Nervous

I’ll spare you the rest of the headlines. Not one of the 20 stories on that page says anything about Berger. Now it makes sense for most of the stories to be there, but why the Michael Moore story and not the Berger story? That has much deeper implications that a movie. I get similar results for my customized Netscape page, including the Moore story. Not only are the news outlets ignoring Bergergate, they are in its place pushing anti-Bush stories.

Even Fox News seems to have all but killed the story. Smart.

I saw the poor frightened writer and her husband on CNN last night, and was struck by her refusing to give in. She’s convinced those swarthy Syrian musicians were on board to hold a “dry run,” and there’s no giving in. And why should she give in? After all, the Syrian terrorists went to the bathroom a lot and gave her a funny look.

As earlier, World O’Crap has a delightful take on the CNN appearance.

“If it was a dry run, what did they learn?” [CNN’s Aaron] Brown asked. Well, says Annie, they learned that they wouldn’t get arrested, since they apparently weren’t arrested, just interrogated and let go. (So, it’s not necessarily illegal to glare at women while being Arab — good to know.) They also learned “how far they could go” (to the restroom with a McDonalds sack), and “how flight attendants work” (apparently they pass out the drinks, then collect the cups). So, all in all, a very successful operation, and well worth the years spent learning to play those musical instruments. (Actually, real terrorists could have learned some interesting tips on how the airlines and the federal authorities handle various occurrences — not from the musicians, but from Annie’s articles, which include helpful info from the FAM public affairs guy.)

Of course, no one has asked the most glaring question of all: If poor Annie was shaking with fear, on the verge of tears, and everyone on the flight was witness to the horrors, why has not a single other passenger of the flight (aside from her husband) spoken up? Why the deafening silence?

Kevin Drum also has a good post on frightened Annie today. It blows a big hole in her story; turns out the Syrians were searched by the TSA.

After seeing her on the news, I’m willing to bet the farm Annie’s going to be back in the news soon. She now has her name everywhere and has brilliantly set the stage for a book launch. Just wait and see.

UPDATE: Be sure and see my follow-up post. As suspected, she’s nuts.

That’s what the article says.

Companies are increasingly moving staff and offices to global investment hotspot China, but while still a developing country it has some of the world’s highest living costs for expatriates, according to a new survey.

Conducted by the US-based Mercer Human Resource Consulting firm, the survey says the cost of apartments and tuition for children in China’s expat hubs was even more expensive than cities like New York and Tokyo.

Luckily I didn’t have to deal with the tuition costs for kids. But I think the headline of this article is misleading, as the survey seems to apply only to senior executives sent overseas by big MNCs willing to pay for them to have the best of everything. (It looks at apartments in Shanghai, for example, that rent for nearly $10,000 USD a month.) In these cases, Beijing and Shanghai certainly rank among the most expensive places to live.

Having lived in several different countries, I can safely say an expat can live like a prince in Beijing on a relatively small salary. I had to take a $3,000-a-month drop in pay when I moved from Hong Kong to Beijing, and I was scared to death about it. It turned out the amount of money I spent on a daily basis was so dramatically less in Beijing, I had more to spare than I ever expected. Taxis are almost free; restaurants (outside of tourist spots) are an incredible bargain, and cheap shopping abounds. I had a bigapartment in the fashionable Tuan Jie Hu complex for about $600 a month, far less than half of what I payed in HK.

So if you’re considering moving to China to live the expat life, do not be intimidated by reports that it’s “as expensive as Tokyo.” That’s BS, unless you insist on living a Park Avenue lifestyle, and if you need to send the kids to the best schools. You can live there for next to nothing, especially if you’re willing to give up some of the not-so-necessary niceties like indoor swimming pools and a jacuzzi in the bathroom.

Yesterday I thought Samuel (Sandy) Berger was headed to jail. I thought he surreptitiously stuffed secret documents into his pants and that maybe he was trying to hide embarrassing information on how Clinton dealt with the millennium terrorism threat. I thought this was a very serious and ugly story.

It may still be an ugly story, but I now believe it’s completely unserious, and maybe just a dumb mistake. Most ridiculous are the frenzied charges that Berger was spying for Kerry. When even James Taranto says that Josh Marshall is most likely right in calling such charges absurd, we know there’s probably not much to it. Instead, Taranto subscribes to Sullivan’s theory:

My best bet is that Berger was engaging in advance damage control–saving the drafts to help concoct a better defense of his tenure. If so, it’s classic Clinton era sleaze–not exactly terrible but cheesy subordination of national security for partisan political advantage.

Call it dumb, selfish, stupid, wrong, inexcusable, and I’ll agree. Call it treason or a crime that merits imprisonment, and I’ll disagree. And I believe the Justice Department will not indict Berger, nor should they.

My favorite post on this kerfuffle comes from the Center for American Progress. Allow me to bore you with a healthy chunk, because it’s very smart.

Attack and Distract

One day before the bipartisan 9/11 Commission is scheduled to release its final report, Bush administration allies on Capitol Hill have put their partisan spin machine into high-gear. Despite overwhelming evidence that President Bush underfunded counter-terrorism, ignored repeated memos warning of an imminent attack by Osama bin Laden, and took one of the longest vacations in presidential history while the pre-9/11 security threat boiled, Republicans are seeking to blame 9/11 on the Clinton administration even before the Commission’s report has been published. Their current target: former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, who in October 2003 acknowledged inadvertently losing two documents from the National Archives. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist claimed Berger was trying to deceive the 9/11 Commission. They failed to mention the Commission refuted that charge, and that even the Bush Justice Department admits the incident is so innocuous, that CBS News reports “law enforcement sources say they don’t expect any criminal charges will be filed.”

REPUBLICANS ADMIT THE TIMING SMELLS: CBS News reported last night that even Republicans “say the timing of the investigation’s disclosure smells like politics, leaked to the press just two days before the 9/11 Commission report comes out.” Republican strategist Eddie Mahe said, “somebody is manipulating the process.” Why? Because, as the WP reports, the final report by the commission concludes Iraq “never established operational ties” with al Qaeda. In other words, the Commission is about to formally conclude that one of the two major justifications the administration gave for war in Iraq was a fraud. With the WMD justification also proving false, the administration is desperate to distract from polls that show a majority of Americans say the war was a mistake. Even more troubling for the White House, almost half the public now says the White House “deliberately misled” America about Iraq. It was this fear that the Commission would embarrass the Bush administration that led the White House to oppose its creation. And it is no surprise that yesterday Commission Chairman Tom Kean admitted that some wanted the 9/11 Commission to fail.

MOTIVE ACCUSATIONS JUST PLAIN SILLY: Reuters reports “Republicans accused Berger of taking the documents so they could be used by the Kerry campaign at a news conference on port security.” Said Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA): “Right after the documents were taken, John Kerry held a photo op and attacked the president on port security. The documents that were taken may have been utilized for that press conference.” Although the timing in this fable may be accurate, one thing is clear: neither Kerry nor any citizen in America needs secret documents from the National Archives to know the Bush administration and Republicans in Congress have dangerously underfunded seaport and airport security. As American Progress fellow PJ Crowley notes, while the Coast Guard has said it needs $7.5 billion for key port security upgrades, the White House has requested just $45 million this year. Similarly, as the Century Foundation reports, while “the Transportation Security Administration estimates there is a 35% to 65% chance that terrorists are planning to place a bomb in the cargo of a U.S. passenger plane” the administration has only provided funding to make sure that 5% of air cargo is screened.

SAXBY CHAMBLISS – A RIGHT-WING SMEAR ARTIST: As the Dallas Morning News reports, the Berger affair “took on a slightly comic note” as Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) claimed without any proof that Berger “put some papers in his trousers” (Berger categorically denies this charge). Chambliss, of course, has made his career dishonestly smearing decorated war heroes who lost limbs in Vietnam, even while he refused to explain how he avoided all military service during the war. In his 2002 race against triple amputee veteran Max Cleland, Chambliss “ran a TV ad picturing Cleland with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.” At the same time the ads were running, Chambliss refused to explain how he received three draft deferments – including two for a “bum knee” even though he still found a way to play baseball in college.

WHERE IS THE LEAK OUTRAGE?: CBS News reports the controversy “was triggered by a carefully orchestrated leak” about the FBI’s investigation of the matter. Yet, top administration officials and Republicans who have previously expressed outrage about leaks were nowhere to be found. There was no statement of outrage or call for an investigation from Attorney General John Ashcroft who in 2001 said leaks “do substantial damage to the security interests of the nation.” Similarly, there was nothing from the Chambliss, who one year ago said “leaks have always been a problem and continue to be a problem.” And it was all quiet at the Pentagon, despite Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld stating last year that leaks are “disgraceful, they’re unprofessional, they’re dangerous.”

NO SIMILAR OUTRAGE ABOUT BUSH RECORDS BEING DESTROYED: Even as Rush Limbaugh and the GOP’s congressional leadership insinuate without proof that Berger was deliberately trying to destroy records, they have made little mention about last week’s disclosure that President Bush’s key military draft records were destroyed by Pentagon officials. The documents in question would have proven whether the President was lying about whether he fulfilled his military service that allowed him to avoid going to Vietnam. The destruction of the documents has forced the Associated Press to sue for copies of them, which are legally required to exist in the Texas archives. Despite promises to release all documents, the president has refused to release the Texas copies.

The timing certainly does smell. That doesn’t mean Berger didn’t do a bad, dumb thing. But there are two stories here: Berger’s dumbass behavior, and the leak — an infamous tool of the Bush dirty tricks arsenal.This administration has gone ballistic over leaks in the past, at least when the leak made them look bad. Why the silence this time?