Bush's Earpiece

Will Sarah Palin Be Wired for the Debate?

Bob Fertik — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 19:13:29 -0400

Based on her interviews with Charlie Gibson and Katie Couric, it's obvious Sarah Palin's head is filled with lots of rightwing attitude but virtually no facts. For parts of her Couric interview, Palin needed McCain sitting by her side to throw her lifelines.

Obviously McCain won't be next to her tonight. To make up for it, will Sarah Palin rely on an earpiece - just as George Bush did in the 2004 debates (first uncovered by Dave Lindorff in Mother Jones) and for 3 years afterwards? And if she does, how will we know?

Over at HuffPo, Keith Thomson did some great research and uncovered some surprising facts.

The CIA has equipped its agents with earpieces since the 1970's. (Guess who ran the CIA in the 70's? Yup, George H. W. Bush.)
State-of-the-art earpieces (visit http://customearpiece.com) can send radio signals over 4,000 channels, which makes it hard to detect.
The Commission on Presidential Debates employs a Frequency Coordinator who uses a spectrum analyzer to detect radio signals. ("Sarah, what's the frequency" might not be a joke.)
Infrared signals cannot be detected by a spectrum analyzer, and they can deliver sound right to the target's ear as long as there is line of sight (or mirrors).
Infrared signals can be detected with a broadband microwave probe (visit researchelectronics.com) but the Commission on Presidential Debates won't say if it has one.

So how will we know if Palin is wired? We won't see anything in her back or in her ear. But if we watch her eyes, she may give it away - just as Bush does - by looking oddly inward as she tries to listen to the answers, mumbling to buy time, then reciting information that is clearly not in her head.

I encourage all Youtube fans to record the debate and try to upload such answers. If we're lucky, we might just score political gold!

Update 1: I love how Thomson describes infrared devices:

Infrared signals can be transmitted wirelessly and require that a candidate wear no special device -- not even a receiver in the ear. The infrared signal transforms into sound that only the recipient can hear -- undetectable even by someone standing right next to him.

This technology is being used in the war on terror to transmit messages to individual terrorists, so it seems they are hearing from Allah himself -- hence it's nickname: "The Voice of God."

No wonder George Bush believes God speaks to him! I'd sure hate to be the one to tell him it was just Karl Rove.

Update 2: ipsos beautifully lays out all the technical difficulties of giving Palin an earpiece using radio, wifi, or cellphone technology, but doesn't mention infrared.

Williamsgate! Bush Gives Earpiece Interview to Brainless Brian Williams

Bob Fertik — Tue, 29 Aug 2006 17:29:24 -0400

It's time to give Brainless Brian Williams the "Rathergate" treatment. The airhead anchor stood inches away from George W. Bush for an hour while Bush relied on his earpiece to answer Williams' questions (full transcript). The earpiece is obvious from Bush's rambling answers, his stringing together of non-sequiturs, his little mumbles waiting for the next sentence, and the turning of his eyes off into the distance while he listens to his ear. Yet Williams didn't have a clue of the scam going on right in front of his eyes - and ears!

Or did he? Was NBC in on the scam? Email NBC (viewerservices@msnbc.com) and demand an investigation of Williamsgate!

Update 1: John Amato rightly highlights this:

"BUSH: Well those are two different questions, did we fight the wrong war, and absolutely — I have no doubt — the war came to our shores, remember that. We had a foreign policy that basically said, let’s hope calm works. And we were attacked."

Last week Bush said that he never implied any connection between Iraq and 9/11, yet both Iraq and the War on Terror have again been lumped together and Bush says that the war "came to our shores". Sure the war with terrorism did, but the war with Iraq did not come to our shores. Is it any wonder why people say the White House has tried to link Saddam and 9/11?

Bush Earpiece Moment Caught on Tape

Bob Fertik — Sun, 27 Aug 2006 20:53:49 -0400

Bush clearly lost the feed through his earpiece at 1:23 in this video, as captured by Veredictum. Bush spoke to reporters briefly at Camp David on 8/17/06 after a Federal judge in Detroit ruled Bush's warrantless wiretapping program unconstitutional and was asked about that ruling.

"I made my position clear about this war on terror.
I uh...
And uh... by the way, the enemy made their position clear, yet again, when they...
when... wwwwww... when... when umm... we were able to um... stop 'em, see."

Try to make sense of Bush's words: "The enemy made their position clear when we were able to stop 'em." It's impossible to make sense of them.

Obviously Bush never composed that sentence in his own mind. It only came out of his mouth because it was fed to him through an earpiece that failed.

Bush Wired Again; Is Bret Baier the New "Jeff Gannon"?

Bob Fertik — Mon, 21 Aug 2006 10:31:02 -0400

Once again George Bush went before the Corporate Media and repeated answers fed into his earpiece by Karl Rove. And once again the Corporate Media pretended the answers were coming out of Bush's alcoholism-impaired brain. When will the Corporate Media acknowledge what everyone in the world can see with their own eyes - that Bush is always wired?

And here's another question: is Fox News' White House correspondent Bret Baier spending his nights at the White House - like former White House correspondent "Jeff Gannon"?

The reason I ask is because Bush repeatedly smiled and winked at Baier - which was especially weird and disturbing because the topics being discussed were the death and destruction across the Middle East resulting from Bush's utterly failed policies.

Baier is Bush's type, both physically (built like "Jeff Gannon") and career-wise (never served in the military but spent a lot of time "sucking up" to military men).

Calling all Gannon watchers - what do you think?

Bush's Earpiece Malfunction Caught on Tape!

Bob Fertik — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 21:21:53 -0500

During his press conference on Tuesday, Bush had a massive "earpiece malfunction" - and Blogenlust caught it on tape.

While Bush listens to a reporter ask his question, Bush nods with mild contempt and mentally formulates his dismissive answer.

But then Karl Rove starts speaking into his earpiece (always kept in his right ear), which causes Bush to turn reflexively towards his right - a dead giveaway that he is wired!!!

Bush immediately realizes his mistake and quickly jerks his head back to face the reporter who asked the question - a move he has probably practiced hundreds of times.

But the jerk is so conspicuous on tape that Blogenlust calls it Tourette's.

This isn't Tourette's - it's video proof that Bush is wired!!!

Even with Earpiece, Bush Can't Defend Himself Against Impeachment

Bob Fertik — Tue, 21 Mar 2006 10:40:57 -0500

Once again, George Bush went before the world without a single idea in his head, just an earpiece in his ear feeding canned answers from Karl Rove. And once again, the press acted completely oblivious to the farce in their faces. When the truth about Bush's earpiece comes out, the entire corporate media will collapse with the Bush administration and the GOP.

Bush appeared to answer the first question from the AP - whether Iraq was in a civil war, as Iyad Allawi said this weekend - from his own head. But then his brain was too fried to answer Reuters reporter Steve Holland's question, so he tuned into the earpiece and mumbled his way through the answer.

Bush's reliance on his earpiece produced at least one glaring error: when babbling about the strategy of Al Qaeda, he first said they wanted to overthrow "modern" Arabic governments. But that was not the word Karl Rove had used, so in the next sentence he had to correct himself, referring instead to moderate Arab governments.

Now on to the "substance" of the press conference.

1. Helen Thomas hit Bush right between the eyes with the question Bush cannot answer: why the hell are we in Iraq, wasting thousands of American lives and trillions of America's taxpayer dollars?

Thomas pointed out that every reason Bush gave for the war turned out to be lies. She also pointed out that Cabinet officials like Paul O'Neill said Bush wanted to invade Iraq from the day he stole the White House.

Bush replied with his Biggest Lie: that Saddam refused to allow UN inspectors into Iraq, and refused to disclose all of his government's records on WMD's.

I have blogged about this Big Lie repeatedly, but the Corporate Media - and even most of the progressive blogosphere, with the sole exception of Robert Parry of Counterpunch - refuses to discuss it. It's time for the silence to end - it's time for the progressive blogosphere to start screaming about Bush's Big Lie.

2. FOX's Carl Cameron (the "journalist" who published invented lies about John Kerry and was never fired or punished) gave Bush a journalistic blowjob in front of the world with his ludicrously biased question on impeachment.

At a time of war, what kind of a message does it send the terrorists for Democrats to talk about impeachment?

Yet Bush's answer was still a catastrophe. First he dismissed censure and impeachment as purely political - this from a man who started a disastrous war that has cost thousands of lives and trillions of dollars for purely political reasons.

Then he tried dared Democrats to debate him on whether we should cancel the "terrorist surveillance program."

Of course this is another outrageous lie, because there isn't a single Democrat - not one! - who has called for an end to terrorist surveillance as defined under the FISA law, which was written specifically to permit terrorist surveillance.

The whole problem is that Bush is deliberately and openly breaking the FISA law to go beyond terrorist surveillance in order to spy on innocent American citizens!!!!

Russ Feingold has made this distinction abundantly clear in every word he has written. If Bush wants to debate his innocent citizen spying program on these terms, there is only one reply:

BRING IT ON.

Update 1: Progressive bloggers are beginning to wake up. Here's Josh Marshall:

Of course, that's not what happened. We were there. We remember. It wasn't a century ago. We got the resolution passed. Saddam called our bluff and allowed the inspectors in. President Bush pressed ahead with the invasion.

His lies are so blatant that I must constantly check myself so as not to assume that he is simply delusional or has blocked out whole chains of events from the past.

Bush Wired for Alito Remarks

Bob Fertik — Mon, 09 Jan 2006 23:24:33 -0500

On Monday morning, Bush spoke a total of 250 words to the media on behalf of Sam Alito.

Even though it was a trivially short speech, filled with talking points he's recited many times before - and even though Bush was wide awake in the best hour of his day - Bush couldn't even deliver those 250 words without waiting for most of it to be fed to him through his earpiece!!!

Here's the word-by-word analysis, breaking down the video from BradBlog, which begins with the fourth sentence from Bush's remarks.

To show the operation of the earpiece, I start a new line with each pause. I invite you to play the video while reading my notes to double-check my conclusions.

By my count, Bush was fed 29 soundbites through his earpiece to deliver the 216 words below - that's less than 8 words per soundbite.

That low ratio may be because the earpiece was malfunctioning, as evidenced by several extremely noticeable breakdowns in Bush's delivery that led to phrases of just one, two, or three words.

If you study Bush's face, you'll see the clues I've mentioned many times that give away his "audio monitoring" - his eyes turn inwards, he blinks conspicuously, he extends his "uh," and at his most difficult moments he shakes his head from side to side to stall for time.

Now let's roll the video tape...

Sam Alito is [uh]

eminently qualified to be a-a member of the bench.

I-I'm not the only person who feels that way --

the American Bar Association looked at his record, looked at his opinions, looked at his [uh] temperament, [uh]

and came to the same conclusion, that he is [shp]

well qualified

to be a Supreme Court judge.

Sam's [uh]

got [uh]

the intellect necessary to [uh]

to bring [uh]

a lot of class [uh]

to that Court.

He's got a judicial temperament necessary to make sure that

that the Court [uh]

is a- is a- is a- is a body that interprets the law and doesn't try to write the law. [uh]

And so I'm looking forward to your hearings.

I know the American people will be impressed,

just like I have been impressed and a lot of other members of the Senate have been impressed.

And my hope, of course, is that the [uh]

the American people will be impressed by the process.

It's very important that members of the Senate [uh]

conduct a dignified hearing.

The Supreme Court is a dignified body; Sam is a dignified person. And [uh]

my hope, of course, is that the Senate [uh]

bring dignity to the process

and give this man a fair hearing

and an up or down vote on the Senate floor.

Sam, good luck to you. Thanks for your agreement to serve. I appreciate you. Thank you.

So there it is, word by trivial word. Unless he's completely reckless, Bush must have practiced it a couple of times. Yet even with practice he couldn't deliver it without Karl Rove feeding it into his ear.

When will the Washington Press Corps report that the most powerful man in the world is too stupid to deliver 250 simple well-rehearsed words without an earpiece??????

Update: Since Alito is testifying before the Senate under oath, maybe a Senator could ask him whether he saw anything in Bush's ear as he stood a foot away from him, or whether he heard any voices leaking out!

Another Bush Bulge!

Bob Fertik — Thu, 22 Dec 2005 20:02:43 -0500

Paul -V- has the scoop, with a photo assist from jbnow of DemocraticUnderground.

"I'm not into conspiracy theories, but I suspect Bush may have been wearing a receiver during his press conference earlier this week. (a.k.a. "Bush Bulge".)

Watching President Bush on Monday as he attempted to justify warrantless wiretaps of Americans, I was struck with a massive case of deja-vu when he made this statement:

"We will, under current law, if we have to. We will monitor those calls. And that's why there is a FISA law. We will apply for the right to do so. And there's a difference -- let me finish -- there is a difference between detecting so we can prevent, and monitoring. And it's important to know the distinction between the two." (Emphasis added)

That "let me finish" phrase, made to a reporter who was not interrupting him, reminded me of Bush's September 2004 debate with Kerry during the presidential election when said the same thing...

When Bush made that "Let me finish" comment in the debate he has 30 seconds left to speak, no one was interrupting him then either."

Way to go, Paul -V-!

Let me add one more dimension to this: last Friday the NY Times reported that Bush's NSA was illegally wiretapping hundreds or thousands of Americans. But the Times had the story more than a year ago - possibly before the 2004 election - but kept its readers ignorant.

There was another story the Times had before the 2004 election that it also chose to hide from its readers - the proof that Bush was wired for the Presidential debates against John Kerry. Dave Lindorff blew the whistle on the Times this past February:

How the New York Times Killed the Bush Bulge Story
By DAVE LINDORFF

Almost as astonishing as the likelihood that President Bush cheated and wore a device--most likely a wireless magnetic induction hearing device--during his three presidential debate appearances-and definitely lied about what was under his jacket--is the fact that the nation's two leading newspapers, the New York Times and the Washington Post, had the story but failed to report it in any serious way.

When NY Times readers complained to Public Editor Daniel Okrent (now gone but not missed), Okrent replied with nothing but disinformation. Lindorff shredded Okrent's response for FAIR:

Okrent Charges Extra! With "Distortion"

... whether it was a cueing device, an atrial defibrillator or a back brace, the public had and continues to have a right to know what it was. Any one of these things would indicate a profound disability on the part of the president-- either intellectual, medical or skeletal.

Equally important, and a point that Okrent conveniently ignores, is the fact that Nelson's photos prove without a scintilla of doubt--as reporter Andy Revkin courageously observes in his initial published comment to Okrent-- that the president, the White House and the Bush/Cheney campaign lied, blatantly and repeatedly, regarding the object under the president's back, which they alternately described as "Internet conspiracies," "grassy knoll" thinking, a wrinkle in the jacket or a wrinkle in the underlying shirt.

The Times let a year pass before publishing the NSA wiretapping story. So why doesn't the Times publish the story it killed about Bush's bulge? Email the new Public Editor Byron Calame, Editor Bill Keller, and reporter John Schwartz: public@nytimes.com, keller@nytimes.com, jswatz@nytimes.com - and cc: your favorite bloggers, who have not paid enough attention to Bush's Bulge.

Bush's Ventriloquist Declares Katrina Response "Not Acceptable"

Bob Fertik — Fri, 02 Sep 2005 09:37:47 -0400

The secret cabal that controls Bush's mouth through his earpiece declared "the results are not acceptable."

Bush mouthed the words, but his brain didn't produce them.

Just watch his delivery. Watch how he utters sentence fragments, not full sentences. Watch how he pauses while he waits for the full sentences to be delivered into his ear.

Here's the play-by-play. Every time Bush pauses, he is listening to his earpiece. Usually this is accompanied by some telltale gesture - shaking his head, clenching his jaw, or waving his arms.

"Secretary Chertoff and I just finished a meeting with [uh...] Secretary Rumsfeld, General Myers, other members of my Cabinet, as well as [uh...] General Honore, [uh...] Admiral Keating, in charge of NORTHCOM -- General Honore is active duty general on the ground in Louisiana -- and Mike Brown, who's the head of FEMA.

[uh...] There's a lot of aid surging toward [uh...] those who have been affected: millions of gallons of water, millions of tons of food [....] Making progress about pulling people out of the [....] Superdome.

There's an issue right now at the convention center of New Orleans that General Honore briefed us on, trying to get food and medicine [uh...] to the convention center.

[....] Working with the governor and the adjutant general and the mayor to deploy 600 [....] of the newly arrived MPs to [uh...] secure the site so that the food and medicine and water can get in there.

[....] A lot of people working hard [uh...] to help those who've been affected. And I want to thank the people for their efforts. The results are not acceptable.

I'm headed down there right now. I'm looking forward to talking to the people on the ground.

I want to assure the people [....] of the affected areas and this country that we'll deploy the assets necessary [....] to get the situation under control, [uh...] to get the help to the people [uh...] who've been affected, and that we're beginning long-term planning [uh...] to help those who have been displaced, [uh...] as well as [....] long-term planning to help [uh...] rebuild the communities that have been affected.

Looking forward to my trip down there and [uh...] looking forward to thanking those on the ground and looking forward to assure people that [uh...] we'll get on top of this situation and we're gonna help people who need help.

Thank you. That's it."

Bush was wired again!

Bob Fertik — Fri, 29 Apr 2005 13:14:43 -0400

Another press conference, another earpiece.

Crooks and Liars nails Bush again:

Right after the woman from CNN asks her question, Bush says about 10 words, stops, looks down like he's listening to something, mumbles something like "hold on" or "OK", and continues talking. This lasted about 2-3, maybe 4 seconds.

We'll ask our question once again: Is there a single journalist in Washington DC with the guts to ask Bush or his taxpayer-funded liars whether Bush was wired?