The Top Ten Conservative Idiots (No. 131)
October 20, 2003
 Animal Crackers Edition

Watch out, endangered species! The Bush Administration (1) has got a plan to save you by killing you. (Got that?) This of course, is typical for the current administration, where killing is pretty much the highest form of virtue. Speaking of killing, if you're someone who's got a problem with all the killing going on (like, say, a Democratic U.S. Senator) don't expect to get any respect from the Pentagon (2), who'll roll out the red carpet for the GOP, but leave you standing on the tarmac. George W. Bush (4,7) himself is up to his usual idiocy, earning two mentions on the list. Colin Powell (5) gets busted, and Dick Cheney's former employer Halliburton (6) fleeces the U.S. taxpayer. And rounding out the list, we've got a couple of religious nuts Saudi Arabia (8) and William Boykin (10). As usual, don't forget the key!

1The Bush Administration dumb anti-environment
So apparently the Bush administration has decided that it's time to ease restrictions on the killing, capturing and importing of endangered species. And why would they want to do this? The answer, to anyone who's been following the antics of the Bush administration over the last couple of years, should be quite familiar - they believe that killing and capturing endangered species is the best way to protect them. Isn't it obvious? Here's how it works: part of the money spent by U.S. zoos and circuses to import endangered animals would be simply be funneled back to the animals' country of origin to support conservation projects. Clever, huh? The more endangered animals we import, the more money goes overseas to help protect them. In fact, if you think about it, the more animals we remove from their natural habitat, the more money will go back into their conservation, and the more animals there will be to capture or hunt! It's brilliant! Reopen the ivory trade - soon there will be wild elephants teeming across the Serengeti! Build more whaling ships - before long the oceans will be crammed full of whales! Put a price on Pandas' heads - and you'll have Pandas as far as the eye can see! I can't understand why nobody but the circus, zoo, pet industry, and hunting lobbies thought of this before now...

2The Pentagon covering your ass partisanship
Last week Our Great Leader kept up his push to explain to America that everything is going just fine in Iraq, while U.S. soldiers continue to die on an almost daily basis. But Bush's optimistic proclamations of great success were given a healthy boost by Republican lawmakers who were recently taken on carefully-planned guided tours of Baghdad and returned from Iraq bearing - surprise - good news. Take Rep. George Nethercutt, for example, who said, "The story of what we've done in the postwar period is remarkable. It is a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day." Well I guess that depends on whether you're related to one of those soldiers or not. But if you think you might not be getting the whole picture here - you're right. Last week Senator Chris Dodd and other top Democrats were denied entry to Iraq by the Pentagon. Why? Because according to the Pentagon, "no planes were available to ferry the group from Jordan to Iraq." Yeah, right. So the next time you see George W. Bush complaining about how the news coming out of Iraq isn't fair and balanced you'll know that he's right - only Republicans are allowed to see what's going on over there.

3Leaders of The War On Terror dumb helping the terrorists
Last week the International Institute for Strategic Studies released a report called "The Military Balance" which, according to the UK Guardian, says that "War in Iraq has swollen the ranks of al-Qaida and 'galvanised its will' by increasing radical passions among Muslims." Are you shocked? Perhaps if you'd been given the same information as the prime movers behind the war in Iraq, you wouldn't be. The Guardian article goes on to note that "The parliamentary intelligence and security committee reported last month that Tony Blair was warned by his intelligence chiefs on the eve of war that an invasion of Iraq would increase the danger of terrorist attacks." Funny... I thought that the whole point of the war was to reduce the danger of terrorist attacks. Or was it to find weapons of mass destruction? Or free the Iraqi people? It all seems so fuzzy these days.

4George W. Bush hypocrisy covering your ass
Looks like Our Great Leader is really getting a handle on this White House leak thing. Two weeks ago he simultaneously promised to catch the senior administration official who revealed Valerie Plame's identity as a CIA agent, and said that he had "no idea" if the person would be caught (see Idiots 130), which is pretty impressive. But last week he really put his foot down, telling top officials to "stop the leaks" - or else. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Bush "'didn't want to see any stories' quoting unnamed administration officials in the media anymore, and that if he did, there would be consequences." And how do we know all this? Because it was told to the Inquirer by "a senior administration official who asked that his name not be used." Good job, George. You'll have those pesky leaks under control before you can say "The Floccinaucinihilipilification Administration."

5Colin Powell lying warmongering
It was time for Colin Powell to be taken down a peg or two last week when former chief State Department intelligence analyst Greg Thielmann appeared on the PBS documentary "Truth, War and Consequences." Thielmann described how the Bush administration were "cherry-picking the information that we provided to use whatever pieces of it fit their overall interpretation," and said that Powell's speech to the UN was "probably one of the low points in his long distinguished service to the nation." "They knew what they wanted the intelligence to show," said Thielmann. "They were really blind and deaf to any kind of countervailing information the intelligence community would produce." Which would probably explain why the only weapons of mass destruction that have turned up in Iraq so far are a couple of trucks used for blowing up balloons, a metal tube buried under a rose bush, half a jar of botulism toxin which is probably just some three-year-old mayonnaise, and a pair of Qusay's old socks.

6Halliburton dumb greed
What a surprise - Iraq is becoming a major cash cow for Dick Cheney's former company. And now Democrats are charging that Halliburton is screwing the U.S. taxpayer while importing gas into Iraq. Importing gas into Iraq? That's right - the invasion that was supposed to pay for itself through Iraqi oil revenues has ended with the U.S. importing oil into Iraq. Brilliant. But as if that wasn't bad enough, Halliburton is charging the Army between $1.62 and $1.70 per gallon - the average price for gas in the Middle East is 71 cents - while Iraqis are charged between 4 cents and 15 cents at the pump. Halliburton has already received $1.4 billion of the U.S. taxpayer's money through September and seems intent on continuing to gouge Joe Sixpack for every cent they get. Of course, the fact that Dick Cheney still holds Halliburton stock options and continues to receive deferred payments from his former company has nothing to do with the fact that they've been allowed to get away with this daylight robbery.

7George W. Bush (again) just plain evil
It's compassionate conservatism gone mad! The Washington Post revealed last week that the Bush administration "has been studying whether a private contractor should take over the custodial and food services provided by 21 federal employees at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda." As part of Bush's "competitive sourcing" initiative, civil servants working in all areas of government have to "prove they can do their work better and more cheaply than a private contractor, or risk seeing the work outsourced." Sounds like a good idea in principle, but here's the catch: the 21 federal employees providing custodial and food services at the National Naval Medical Center are all mentally retarded - "beneficiaries of federal policies that promote the employment of people with disabilities." See how this works? Bush is perfectly happy to throw $87 billion at Iraq, but then turns round and decides that he wants to shave a couple dollars off the budget by firing government workers with disabilities. That's compassionate conservatism in a nutshell, folks: more money for Halliburton in Iraq, more disabled Americans out of a job and out on the streets. Disgraceful.

8Saudi Arabia misogyny
I hope Laura Bush is paying attention to this: last week 17 schoolgirls were suspended from their school in eastern Saudi Arabia for the heinous crime of uncovering their faces on a school bus. The girls were caught during a surprise inspection. As expatriates they're probably lucky to get away with a suspension, as opposed to being suspended from the rafters - I mean, it's not as if the Saudis are particularly well known for their excellent treatment of schoolgirls (see Idiots 59). Still, despite being the home country of Osama bin Laden and most of the 9/11 hijackers, the Saudis are still our great allies. So we should probably ignore this kind of behavior and instead give them a big round of applause for all the support they've given us while we invaded Iraq, which, as you know, was not about weapons of mass destruction at all, but was instead about freeing the Iraqi people from the tyrannical dictates of their leaders. Hey, wait a minute...

9 Clear Channel DJs dumb
With the war on terror all but over - if you discount the fact that our soldiers are dying every day in Iraq, al Qaeda's membership is on the rise, and we can't find Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, or any weapons of mass destruction - Clear Channel DJs are looking for another group of evildoers to spew venom at. And they seem to have found a worthy target - cyclists! It appears that at least three Clear Channel stations - in Cleveland, Houston, and Raleigh, NC - have been instructing their listeners to run cyclists off the road or pelt them with bottles. And not only that, but they've been instructing them in the best way to do it; even getting advice from callers. Surprise - cyclists are pissed. Email campaigns and boycotts have forced at least one station to issue a formal apology, but the fact that this anti-cyclist campaign seems to be spreading across the Clear Channel airwaves concerns some people. "When you incite people to violence, you've crossed the line," said Houston cyclist Frank Karbarz, who helped organize against the station. "They did it almost like a tutorial. It wasn't humorous. It was how to hurt someone." Of course, I don't imagine that this has anything to do with the fact that most Clear Channel listeners associate cycling with liberalism - get off the road, you stupid environmentalist hippie! - and I'm sure that this isn't just an underhanded way of suggesting that red-blooded, pickup driving American patriots should get out there and start running down the scum-sucking liberal treehuggers - but I'm certainly interested to see where they go with this next...

10Lt. Gen. William "Jerry" Boykin religious nut
And finally, you'll be glad to learn that we have responsible, sane, diplomatic people in charge of finding Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden. Take Lt. Gen. William "Jerry" Boykin, for example. Boykin is the newly promoted deputy undersecretary of state of defense for intelligence, and is at the forefront of the hunt for Saddam and bin Laden. Unfortunately it was revealed last week that he's made some rather dubious comments in the past which make him look less like a top terrorist-hunter and more like a... well, not to put too fine a point on it - a religious nutcase. Boykin has apparently told religious groups that George W. Bush was "chosen by God" to lead the "global fight against Satan" - at one gathering he said, "Why is this man in the White House? The majority of Americans did not vote for him. He's in the White House because God put him there for a time such as this." Silly me - I could have sworn it was because of a bunch of Republican aides "rioting" in Florida followed by a hopelessly partisan Supreme Court decision. I guess God really does work in mysterious ways. Boykin has also said that his God is "bigger" than Allah, and that Muslims worship an "idol," which is exactly the kind of attitude you need when you're trying to recruit Muslims to help you track down Saddam and Osama. The good news though is that Boykin has decided to cut down on his public speaking while he's working for Bush, saying "I don't want to come across as a Right-wing radical." Goodness, no! That would never do! See you next week...