Energy Secretary SPENCER ABRAHAM, who as a Republican
senator advocated abolishing the department he now leads under the Bush
Administration.
Statesman and U.S. president JOHN ADAMS, who fought the
good fight for liberty during the American Revolution...then after becoming
America's second president turned around and gave us the Alien and Sedition
Acts, which made a crime out of criticizing the government. Editors and
journalists were jailed on charges of treason...but were finally released
when Thomas Jefferson followed Adams as president and repealed the acts.
Virginia governor GEORGE ALLEN. While slashing
funding for the arts and and consistently refusing to support them in
Virginia, he got publicly angry when his wife and daugher were unable to
get free ballet tickets as perks of being the governor's family.
Drug czar WILLIAM BENNETT, who wore a nicotine patch
while emphasizing the "national" committment that nothing addictive could ever
be legalized.
U.S. Senator BARBARA BOXER (D-CA) for her criticisms
of President Bush's energy policies and accusations that he is in the pocket
of the energy companies. While levelling these accusations Senator Boxer
herself, along with her husband Stewart, had her own substantial holdings
in energy companies: up to $100,000 of stock in the El Paso Corporation, which
at this writing (6/01) is the target of an inquiry about driving up energy
prices in California during 2000; investments in a power wholesaler named
Mirant (formerly Southern Energy); Diamond Offshore Drilling in Houston,
Texas; and Haliburton Energy Services Corporation, until recently run by
Vice-President Dick Cheney.
Boxer heavily criticized Dick Cheney during the 2000 presidential
campaign even while reaping benefits from her investments in Cheney's company,
and continued criticising both Cheney and Haliburton up until just a few days
before her own connections with those companies were revealed. With that
revelation, she now says that she had left "investment decisions to a
professional" instead of knowing herself what was going on, and that she
would sell off her energy stocks.
U.S. President GEORGE W. BUSH, for protesting
and trying to stop the Florida ballot hand recounts when his own Texas state
law allowed similar recounts. Likewise to the five Supreme Court justices who
somehow managed to connect stopping a hand recount with Constitutional equal
protection laws.
Also for sending $43 million to Afghanistan in April of 2001, despite the
hideous records possessed by the Taliban on human rights and archaeological
preservation. The Taliban's finances are very much buttressed by the
country's opium crops; Bush sent them the money as part of the "War on Drugs"
to entice the Taliban to stop producing it. Claiming to destroy the opium,
the Afghani leaders instead harvested it and stored it away in warehouses.
After the 9/11/01 terrorist attacks on the United States, the Taliban added
their own push against the U.S. by flooding the market with heroin and thus
halving the price of the drug worldwide.
Cuban dictator FIDEL CASTRO, most recently for his
comments about the 2000 American presidential election: "Let me tell you a
secret. The Democrats didn't lose the White House, they had it stolen!"
What, exactly, would Castro know about elections when he never bothers to hold
any, and simply throws his opponents in jail?
U.S. vice-president DICK CHENEY. Despite denouncing
the Iraqi regime before and during the April 2003 Iraqi war, Cheney was
actually the CEO of the Halliburton energy company when Halliburton signed
$73 million worth of contracts with Saddam Hussein to get Iraqi oil.
The negotiations were part
of the Iraqi oil-for-food program, and done through two of Halliburton's
subsidiaries, Dresser-Rand and the Ingersoll Dresser Pump Company.
U.S. President BILL CLINTON. First, in the 1992
presidential campaign, Clinton accused President Bush of reneging on his
"Read my lips" promise to cut taxes, then made a campaign promise of a
middle class tax cut. The following year, Clinton reneged on his own tax cut
pledge, and instead gave the U.S. the highest tax hike in its history.
Second, for selling arms and classified technology to China while claiming to
be working towards making China a more humanitarian country. As chronicled
by the New York Times, between 1993 and 1997 Clinton personally signed off (as required by a federal weapons non-proliferation act) on the sale to
China of parts for nuclear missiles (classified), guidance satellite tech
(also classified), and supercomputers China wanted in exchange for going
along with the 1994 nuclear test ban treaty--since they could use the
computers to simulate tests. Clinton stopped the sales only after the
House of Representatives convened a committee (chaired by Rep. Fred
Thompson, R-TN) to investigate them.
Furthermore, after Janet Reno spent most of a year building a case against
a company called Hughes for illegally selling classified tech to the
Chinese, Clinton ruined her case by allowing another company called Loral
to do the same thing. The head of Loral was Bernard Schwartz, who at the time
was the biggest individual contributor to the Democratic Party.
Former Al Gore campaign manager WILLIAM DALEY
(first recipient of the IWOG Medal of Dishonor).
First, for preaching that all votes must count and be counted while simultaneously leading the charge to disqualify even military ballots that fell within the realm of acceptability within federal law. He advised (with a booklet on how to disqualify military ballots) to stamp them "ILLEGAL" if they came without a postmark before checking for a valid date and signature. As long as they arrived before November 17th, the date and signature would have made them legal regardless of whether or not the ballot was postmarked.
Second, for ranting about the unfairness of such practices as throwing out uncertain ballots in places like Palm Beach County, Florida, while in the 2000 election his own home of Cook County, Illinois threw out 20,000 ballots for similar reasons (not to mention possessing a grand total of 120,503 ballots the machines couldn't count).
Third, for urging Democratic lawyers to persuade Florida judges to accept the so-called "dimpled chad" ballots with a 1990 decision (Pullen vs. Mulligan, 561 NEd2 58) that had not only ruled against dimpled chads unless the entire ballot was dimpled (upheld by an appellate court), but was also from Daley's own home of Cook County, Illinois, not Florida.
And finally, in January 2001, Daley joined the Democratic pundits who believe that Gore lost the election due to being "too liberal" and not "populist" enough. He added that he thought the Gore campaign in general had been run poorly, apparently forgetting already that he himself was Gore's campaign manager.
Senate Majority Leader TOM DASCHLE (D-SD). During the
Clinton presidency when Republicans blocked the nominations of up to 75
judgeships, Daschle referred to the situation as a "judicial emergency."
As of 11/01/01, however, Daschle has spearheaded the blockage of 106
judicial appointments...and after September 11th, used the terrorist
attacks as justification for his stonewalling.
U.S. Senator DIANNE FEINSTEIN (D-CA), who opposes
private ownership of guns while simultaneously privately owning a gun.
Also for her opposition to any aggressive stance towards China, and offering
her own apology to China for the EP-3E spy plane accident. Her husband,
RICHARD ("DICK") BLUM, is a businessman with multimillion dollar
investments in China and whose investment firm has raised more than $100
million for the Chinese government.
U.S. Vice-President AL GORE for his handling of the
Florida Recount and saying that he only wanted to "let the people have
their say."
First, instead of asking for a statewide recount, he requested one
only in four counties, saying he would ask for one statewide if Bush did
first. During the first court case, when a Florida judge asked Gore's lawyers
if they would like a statewide recount, Gore authorized his legal team to say no.
Second, for allowing campaign manager William Daley to fight to disqualify
as many
military ballots as possible, regardless of whether or not they were legal
under Florida and federal laws.
And finally, for waiting until an 11/26 court decision in Bush's favor--nearly
three weeks after the election--to ask for a count of the under/overvotes,
in a circumvention of Florida election law. (His "Let the people have their
say" speech was the following day.)
Also, in 1997 Gore supported the Kyoto Global Warming Treaty in defiance of
the U.S. Congress. The Senate had voted 95-0 to reject the Kyoto accords
if they exempted third world nations, and if significant damage could be done
to the American economy. The treaty did both...but Gore nevertheless (and
unconstitutionally) signed it.
U.S. Representative HENRY HYDE (R-IL), who led the
House impeachment proceedings against President Bill Clinton despite admitting
that he had his own "youthful indiscretion" at the age of 41.
General and U.S. president ANDREW JACKSON. After
ordering the removal of the Cherokee nation from the southeastern United
States, the Supreme Court told him he had overstepped his authority and
that their removal would be illegal. Jackson demanded that the
Supreme Court show him its army, commenced with the removal, and
forced the Cherokee onto what became known as the Trail of Tears.
Adding insult to injury, Jackson ignored the fact that his life had been
saved in 1814 by the leader of his Cherokee allies, Junuluska
(Tsunu-lahun-ski), at Horse Shoe Bend, Alabama, when a Creek warrior tried to
run Jackson through with a bayonet. In gratitude, then-General Jackson swore
an oath of everlasting friendship with the chief. Junuluska later said about
Jackson's refusal to stop the Cherokee Removal, "If I had known he would
break his oath, I would have killed him that day at the Horse Shoe."
African-American leader JESSE JACKSON, for counselling
President Bill Clinton on marital fidelity while he himself was having an affair
that fathered a child whose existence he hid for several years. This
wouldn't necessarily earn an IWOG status in itself, except for the fact that much
of the support he paid to the mistress and child came from tax-exempt
donations to his social organizations, the Rainbow Coalition and Operation
PUSH (later merged as the Rainbow / Push Coalition).
Democratic National Committee chairman TERRY
MCAULIFFE, for his unbalanced stand on voters' rights.
In a May 2001 column for the Washington Times, McAuliffe wrote
that "every citizen of this nation has the right to...enter a polling place
without impediment...ensuring that the thousands of voices that were silenced
during the last election cycle because their votes were not counted will
never have their democracy denied again."
Yet during the 2000 presidential election recount, McAuliffe was one of the
Democrats who sent lawyers to Florida to challenge military ballots in all
of that state's counties, ensuring that approximately 1,000 members of the
armed services were disenfranchised.
Also, for giving his own biased definition to the word "carpetbagger". In
2000 he supported Hillary Clinton's move to New York so she could run for
the Senate in that state...and yet in August of 2001, when Elizabeth Dole
considered moving back to her home state of North Carolina to run for
Sen. Jesse Helms' soon-to-be abandoned seat, McAuliffe then chose to label
Dole a "carpetbagger".
Attorney General EDWIN MEESE, who included feminist
rhetoric about the exploitation of women in his report on pornography,
while never actually doing anything substantive to relieve the exploitation
of women.
Russian KGB colonel-turned-prime minister VLADIMIR
PUTIN.
In 1995, Putin and U.S. vice-president AL GORE signed a secret so-called
weapons nonproliferation treaty--so secret that Congress and the American
public didn't know about it until 2000--which contained a loophole
allowing Russia to sell weapons and nuclear technology to Iran. After the New
York Times broke the story about the treaty on 10/13/00 and
members of Congress demanded they be allowed to see it, Prime Minister Putin
declared that since the treaty's contents had been made public he was no
longer bound by it, and would "resume" shipping arms and nuclear technology to
Iran.
Also, for his criticism of America's ventures into a missile defense system,
since Russia is in the process of developing one as well. Like the U.S.,
the radar systems needed for such a defense have begun construction, with some
of the major sites already completed or altered to serve the system in
violation of the ABM Treaty. In mid-June of 2000, Putin and German Chancellor
Gerhard Schroeder agreed that a joint Russian-European missile defense system
would be in their best interest, and Schroeder pledged his cooperation with
Russia in defense matters.
(On a related note, a Russian microprocessor company called Elbrus
International boasted in a 2/25/99 press release that their new
"E2K" chip was partially designed by the same scientists who built the
supercomputers that run the Russian missile defense system.)
U.S. President RONALD REAGAN, for his reaction to the
downing of Korean Airlines Flight 007 by the Soviet Air Defense Force.
The plane's destruction had been a case of bad timing: almost simultaneously,
KAL 007 was flying over Kamchatka, hundreds of miles off-course but still
within Soviet airspace (which Reagan never
denied); two Soviet missiles fired from different locations were heading to
a test range in Kamchatka; and a U.S. radio and radar spy satellite was
orbiting overhead. The Air Defense Force--which was always finding threats
to Soviet air space, partly in an attempt to justify its budget while
competing with the homeland defensive air force--misassessed the plane's
threat and shot it down.
In the rhetoric over the plane, Congress gave Reagan 100% of his military
budget that year. He would complain about cutbacks in the annual increases
later, though they never dropped below what Reagan would have normally
received had the shoot-down never occurred.
Later, after the U.S. shot down an Iranian Airbus liner during the Tanker
War, Reagan said there was no comparison between the two downings. In fact,
the liner had been exactly where it was supposed to be within a civilian air
corridor, and the shoot-down killed more innocent people.
Attorney General JANET RENO, for her handling of the
Waco, Texas assault on the Branch Davidian compound in April of 1993. It was
only much later
when she admitted that she and her agents knew that cult leader David Koresh
went outside every day to jog, and knew the times and places where he would
be jogging. Instead of arresting him on a daily constitutional, however,
they went ahead with the assault on the compound while TV cameras
looked on.
Soviet dictator JOSEPH STALIN. As a boy (then known
by his birth name Iosif Dzhugashvili), Stalin and his mother were both the
victims of his violently abusive stepfather. Finally unable to take the
regular beatings anymore, young Iosif wounded his stepfather with a knife,
ran away from home, and swore that he would never be that cruel to anyone.
Several decades later, in the 1930's, Stalin's paranoia led to the deaths of
millions of his own countrymen.
U.S. Senator ROBERT TORRICELLI (D-NJ), for his righteous
anger about President George W. Bush's decision to withhold information from
Congress over fears of leaking sensitive information (which Bush later
rescinded).
Said Sen. Torricelli on MSNBC's "Hardball" in October of 2001, "No matter how
angry (President Bush) may be that people leaked that information we're more
angry. It's very upsetting. We cannot not have the Congress briefed, can't
not have the Congress involved in a democratic society. Therefore, both bodies
have to trust each other with the information."
Except that Torricelli himself was guilty of leaking classified information
in 1995, including said information about a paid CIA asset in Guatemala
in a letter to President Bill Clinton. A House ethics committee later found
the action "contrary" to Congressional rules.