If I Can't Have It My Way...

Fuck this jerk.

The fucking Bush administration is at it again. They're going to block an anti-terrorism bill.

Why, you ask? Not tough enough? Leaves glaring holes that are easily exploited? Doesn't include a Cheney-prostate-massage provision?

No, no, and, thank god, no.

The Bush people and the craziest of the Republicans in the Senate don't like this bill because--get this--it includes a provision that will let airport screeners unionize.

The horror.

WASHINGTON - President Bush and his Senate allies will kill a Sept. 11 antiterror bill if Congress sends it to the White House with a provision to let airport screeners unionize, the White House and 36 Republicans said Tuesday.

"As the legislation currently stands, the president's senior advisers would recommend that he veto the bill," said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel.

Senate Republicans swiftly backed up the threat with a pledge by more than enough senators to block any veto override attempt.

"If the final bill contains such a provision, forcing you to veto it, we pledge to sustain your veto," they wrote to the president. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., planned to offer an amendment to strip the provision from the bill.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said that allowing screeners to unionize would impede the department's quick response to possible threats. Fast redeployment of screeners, such as in response to Hurricane Rita and the failed London plot to blow up airliners, cannot wait for negotiations, he said.

Chertoff said screeners are as much on the front lines in the war against terror as military troops.

"Marines don't collectively bargain over whether they're going to wind up, you know, being deployed in Anbar province or in Baghdad," Chertoff told reporters after a briefing with senators. "We can't negotiate over terms and conditions of work that goes to the heart of our ability to move rapidly in order to deal with the threats that are emerging."

Other federal employees have collective bargaining and whistle-blower protection rights.

Chertoff's reasoning, according to the American Federation of Government Employees, is "an insult to the hundreds of thousands of dedicated public safety officers with collective bargaining rights — from border patrol agents to firefighters to the Capitol Hill police," said John Gage, president of the federation.

So can someone please talk about how Bush and the Republicans are "playing politics with national security"?

Not that, you know, I expect the elite press to be aware that this is actually happening. Republicans strong, Republicans manly, protect us, big daddy.

Also, and you didn't need me to tell you this, Jim DeMint and Michael Chertoff are world-class turds.