Gem's Perspective

Obama takes 1st step in presidential bid - Yahoo! News

2007-01-16T10:59:00.001-05:00

Democratic Sen. Barack Obama said Tuesday he is taking the initial step in a presidential bid that could make him the nation's first black to occupy the White House.

Obama announced on his Web site, http://www.barackobama.com/, that he was filing a presidential exploratory committee. He said he would announce more about his plans in his home state of Illinois on Feb. 10.

"I certainly didn't expect to find myself in this position a year ago," Obama said in a video posting. "I've been struck by how hungry we all are for a different kind of politics. So I've spent some time thinking about how I could best advance the cause of change and progress that we so desperately need."

Obama, a little more than two years into his Senate term, is the most inexperienced candidate considering a run for the Democratic nomination, but nonetheless ranks as a top contender. His appeal on the stump, his unique background, his opposition to the Iraq war and the fact that he is a fresh face set him apart in a competitive race that also is expected to include front-runner Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Other Democrats who have announced a campaign or exploratory committee are 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards, former Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack, Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd and Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich.

Obama tried to turn his biggest weakness — his lack of experience in national politics — into an asset.

"The decisions that have been made in Washington these past six years, and the problems that have been ignored, have put our country in a precarious place," he said.

"America's faced big problems before," he said. "But today, our leaders in Washington seem incapable of working together in a practical, commonsense way. Politics has become so bitter and partisan, so gummed up by money and influence, that we can't tackle the big problems that demand solutions."

He said Americans are struggling financially, dependence on foreign oil threatens the environment and national security and "we're still mired in a tragic and costly war that should have never been waged."

Independent Online Edition: Blood and oil: How the West will profit from Iraq's most precious commodity

2007-01-09T23:06:00.001-05:00

Hat tip to The Randi Rhodes Show for this article from the Independent Online:

In Iraq, there is a draft for a new law that would give Western oil companies a massive share in the third largest reserves in the world. To the victors, the oil? That is how some experts view this unprecedented arrangement with a major Middle East oil producer that guarantees investors huge profits for the next 30 years.

(There are other sites with articles about this, here and here. However, neither of these online publications are considered "mainstream").

So was this what the Iraq war was fought for, after all? As the number of US soldiers killed since the invasion rises past the 3,000 mark, and President George Bush gambles on sending in up to 30,000 more troops, The Independent on Sunday has learnt that the Iraqi government is about to push through a law giving Western oil companies the right to exploit the country's massive oil reserves.

And Iraq's oil reserves, the third largest in the world, with an estimated 115 billion barrels waiting to be extracted, are a prize worth having. As Vice-President Dick Cheney noted in 1999, when he was still running Halliburton, an oil services company, the Middle East is the key to preventing the world running out of oil.

Now, unnoticed by most amid the furore over civil war in Iraq and the hanging of Saddam Hussein, the new oil law has quietly been going through several drafts, and is now on the point of being presented to the cabinet and then the parliament in Baghdad. Its provisions are a radical departure from the norm for developing countries: under a system known as "production-sharing agreements", or PSAs, oil majors such as BP and Shell in Britain, and Exxon and Chevron in the US, would be able to sign deals of up to 30 years to extract Iraq's oil.

PSAs allow a country to retain legal ownership of its oil, but gives a share of profits to the international companies that invest in infrastructure and operation of the wells, pipelines and refineries. Their introduction would be a first for a major Middle Eastern oil producer. Saudi Arabia and Iran, the world's number one and two oil exporters, both tightly control their industries through state-owned companies with no appreciable foreign collaboration, as do most members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, Opec. Much more>>>>

AlterNet: Blogs: Video: Updated: Olbermann drives O'Reilly crazy [VIDEO]

2007-01-09T19:41:00.001-05:00

Hat tip to Media Matters for finding this roundtable discussion of Bill O'Reilly's descent into madness.

This is Calgon for progressives, the soothing sounds of a once-popular blabbermouth raked over the coals by a right-leaning nerd and some media regulars. Problem is, it's about 3 years late. The schadenfreude's run dry.

I do enjoy it as much as the next guy, don't get me wrong, it's just that I can't help but wonder whether MSNBC's self-serving discussion isn't doing for O'Reilly what they claim he did for MSNBC... give them publicity.

I'd consider it one big case of logrolling if we weren't talking about the spittle-flecked O'Reilly... More>>>

A Young Marine Speaks Out - by Philip Martin

2007-01-08T01:19:00.001-05:00

December 8, 2006

Source: LewRockwell.com

I'm sick and tired of this patriotic, nationalistic and fascist crap. I stood through a memorial service today for a young Marine that was killed in Iraq back in April. During this memorial a number of people spoke about the guy and about his sacrifice for the country. How do you justify 'sacrificing' your life for a war which is not only illegal, but is being prosecuted to the extent where the only thing keeping us there is one man's power, and his ego. A recent Marine Corps intelligence report that was leaked said that the war in the al-Anbar province is unwinnable. It said that there was nothing we could do to win the hearts and minds, or the military operations in that area. So I wonder, why are we still there? Democracy is not forced upon people at gunpoint. It's the result of forward thinking individuals who take the initiative and risks to give their fellow countrymen a better way of life.

When I joined I took an oath. In that oath I swore to protect the Constitution of the United States. I didn't swear to build democracies in countries on the other side of the world under the guise of "national security." I didn't join the military to be part of an Orwellian ("1984") war machine that is in an obligatory war against whoever the state deems the enemy to be so that the populace can be controlled and riled up in a pro-nationalistic frenzy to support any new and oppressive law that will be the key to destroying the enemy. Example given – the Patriot Act. So aptly named, and totally against all that the constitution stands for. President Bush used the reactionary nature of our society to bring our country together and to infuse into the national psyche a need to give up their little-used rights in the hope to make our nation a little safer. The same scare tactics he used to win elections. He drones on and on about how America and the world would be a less safe place if we weren't killing Iraqis, and that we'd have to fight the terrorists at home if we weren't abroad. In our modern day emotive society this strategy (or strategery?) works, or had worked, up until last month's elections.

My point in this; to show that America was never nationalistic. If anything they were Statalistic (giving their allegiance to the state of their residence). This is shown in the fact that the founders created states with fully capable and independent governments and not provinces that were just a division of the federal government. These men believed that America was a place where imperialistic values would be non-existent. Where the people trying to make their lives better by working hard, thinking, inventing and using the free market would tie up so much of normal life that imperialistic colonization and the fighting of wars thousands of miles away for interests that are not our own would be avoided. They believed this expansion of power could be left to the European nations, the England, France and Spain of their time. However this recent, and current influx of nationalistic feeling has created an environment where giving up your rights, going to a foreign country to fight a people who did not ask for us to be there, nor did their leader do anything to warrant us being there, and dying would be considered honorable and heroic. I don't believe it anymore. I don't believe it's right for any American to go along with it anymore. Yes I know that we in the military are bound by the UCMJ and somehow don't fall under the Constitution (the very thing we're suppose to be defending) but sooner or later there is a decision that every American soldier, marine, airmen and seamen makes to allow themselves to be sent to a war that is against every fiber this country was founded on. I know that when April rolls around I will be thinking long and hard on that decision. Even though we in the military are just doing as we're told we still have the moral and ethical obligation to choose to do as we're told, or to say, "No, that isn't right." I believe that if more troopers like me and the professional military, the officers and commanders, start standing up and saying that they won't let themselves or their troops go to this illegal war people will start standing up and realizing what the heck is going on over there.

The sad fact of the matter is that we are not fighting terrorists in Iraq. We are fighting the Iraqi people who feel like a conquered and occupied people. Personally I have a hard time believing that if I was an Iraqi that I wouldn't be doing everything in my power to kill and maim as many Americans as possible. I know that the vast majority of Americans would not be happy with the Canadian government, or any other foreign government, liberating us from the clutches of George W. Bush, even though a large number of us would like that, and forcing us to accept their system of government. Would not millions of Americans rise up and fight back? Would you not rise up to protect and defend your house and your neighborhood if someone invaded your country? But we send thousands of troops to a foreign country to do just that. How is it moral to fight a people who are just trying to defend their homes and families? I think next time I go to Iraq perhaps I should wear a bright red coat and carry a Brown Bess instead of my digitalized utilities and M16.

Notice I never once used the word homeland in any of this. I have a secondary point I want to bring up now. Never once was the term homeland ever used to describe the country of America until Mr. Bush began the department of homeland security after the 9/11 attacks. Taking a 20th century history class will teach us that the most notable countries in the last century that referred to their country in this way were Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Hitler used the term fatherland to drum up support, nationalistic support, for his growing war machine. He used the nationalism he created in the minds of the Germans to justify the sacrifice of their livelihood to build the war machine to get back their power from the oppressive restrictions the English and French had put on them at Versailles. This is the same feeling that has been virulently infecting the American psyche in the last hundred years. This is the same feeling that consoles a mother after her son is killed in an attempt to prosecute an aggressor's war 10,000 miles away. It's also known as Patriotism these days, but I say, "No more." No more nationalistic inanity, no more passing it off as patriotism. Patriotism is learning, and educating oneself to understand what their country really stands for.

I heard a lot during the memorial service about how the dead Marine did so much good for others and how his helping others was like a little microcosm of America helping because we have the power to do so. Well if we have the power to help people why aren't we helping in Darfur where hundreds of thousands of people have died in the last 10 years. Saddam was convicted and sentenced to death for killing 143 Shiites who conspired to assassinate him. (I know all you "patriotic" Americans would be calling for the heads of anyone who conspired to assassinate supreme leader Bush). And yet we spend upwards of 1 trillion dollars and nearing 3,000 lives to help these Iraqis when they don't even want us there. Not to mention we don't have the legal justification to be there. I guess we should wait around for the omnipotent W Bush to decide who we should use our superpowerdom to help next. It's about time to throw him and the rest of the fascists out. Moreover it's about time to start educating Americans about their past and history, and letting them know that imperialistic leaders are not what the founders of this great country wanted.

Philip Martin [send him mail] has been a Marine for 2 years. He is in the infantry (a "grunt"), and spent 7 months in the al-Anbar province of Iraq. He went on more than 180 combat patrols in and outside of the city of Fallujah, where he was hit with 2 IEDs (luckily never injured) and was involved in a number of firefights. He is currently stationed in Twentynine Palms, CA, and due to return to Iraq for a second deployment in April 2007. He is 21-years-old.

Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran - Sunday Times - Times Online

2007-01-06T22:32:00.001-05:00

ISRAEL has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons.

Two Israeli air force squadrons are training to blow up an Iranian facility using low-yield nuclear “bunker-busters”, according to several Israeli military sources.

The attack would be the first with nuclear weapons since 1945, when the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Israeli weapons would each have a force equivalent to one-fifteenth of the Hiroshima bomb.

Under the plans, conventional laser-guided bombs would open “tunnels” into the targets. “Mini-nukes” would then immediately be fired into a plant at Natanz, exploding deep underground to reduce the risk of radioactive fallout.

“As soon as the green light is given, it will be one mission, one strike and the Iranian nuclear project will be demolished,” said one of the sources. More>>>

Army asks dead to sign up for another hitch - CNN.com

2007-01-06T01:11:00.001-05:00

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Army said Friday it would apologize to the families of about 275 officers killed or wounded in action who were mistakenly sent letters urging them to return to active duty.

The letters were sent a few days after Christmas to more than 5,100 Army officers who had recently left the service. Included were letters to about 75 officers killed in action and about 200 wounded in action.

"Army personnel officials are contacting those officers' families now to personally apologize for erroneously sending the letters," the Army said in a brief news release issued Friday night.

The Army did not say how or when the mistake was discovered. It said the database normally used for such correspondence with former officers had been "thoroughly reviewed" to remove the names of wounded or dead soldiers. More...

Poll: High Hopes For New Congress, 68% Are Optimistic About 110th Congress, But Half Doubt Democrats And Bush Will Cooperate - CBS News

2007-01-05T17:10:00.001-05:00

(CBS) Americans are generally optimistic about the new Democratic-controlled Congress that convened on Thursday, according to a CBS News poll. But half the public doubts that President Bush and the Democrats will be able to work together to get things done — including dealing with the situation in Iraq.

Sixty-eight percent of those polled said they had optimistic feelings about the 110th Congress, which will be led by Democrats for the first time in 12 years. Just 25 percent said they were pessimistic.

Nearly half expect that this Congress will accomplish more than usual over the next two years.

FEELINGS ABOUT NEW CONGRESS:
Optimistic
68%
Pessimistic
25%
But when asked if Democrats and President Bush can cooperate — in general and on Iraq, which is overwhelmingly Americans' top priority — half those polled were doubtful.

Read the complete CBS News poll results.

Fifty-one percent said the White House and Congress will not be able to work together on Iraq, while 41 percent said they will.

WILL PRESIDENT BUSH AND THE DEMOCRATS WORK TOGETHER ON IRAQ?
Yes
41%
No
51%
Iraq was far and way the No. 1 issue Americans want the new Congress to address, easily outpacing other concerns like the economy/jobs, health care and immigration.
More than 70 percent expect Democrats in Congress will try to start bringing at least some U.S. troops home from Iraq — something a majority of Americans hope will happen.

WANT NEW CONGRESS TO CONCENTRATE ON:
War in Iraq
45%
Economy/jobs
7%
Health care
7%
Immigration
6%
Still, there is little confidence that either the Democrats or President Bush have a clear plan for Iraq. Less than one in 10 say the Democrats have a plan, while just one in five say Mr. Bush has one.

Starting off 2007, Mr. Bush's overall approval rating remains low at just 30 percent, his worst number ever in a CBS News poll, while his approval rating for handling Iraq is even lower at 23 percent — even after the execution of Saddam Hussein.

DO DEMOCRATS HAVE A CLEAR PLAN FOR IRAQ?
Yes
8%
No
82%
DOES PRESIDENT BUSH HAVE A CLEAR PLAN FOR IRAQ?
Yes
20%
No
76%

Americans don't think the execution of the former Iraqi president will improve the situation in Iraq. In fact, 40 percent believe Saddam's execution will make things worse and result in more attacks on U.S. troops. Just 5 percent think it will lead to fewer attacks against U.S. troops.
Mr. Bush did get a bump from last month in his handling of the economy, with 41 percent now saying they approve of the job he's doing — his highest rating on this measure since July 2005. Six in 10 Americans now rate the economy as being in good shape.

BUSH'S JOB APPROVAL RATING
Approve
30%
Disapprove
63%

BUSH'S JOB HANDLING IRAQ
Approve
23%
Disapprove
72%

Turning to how the new Congress will handle domestic issues, the poll found two-thirds of Americans expect a raise in the minimum wage, while 39 percent expect a tax increase.
Americans were split, 42 percent to 42 percent, on whether immigration reform would be passed.

The poll also found Americans have positive feelings about former President Gerald R. Ford, who passed away on Dec. 26. Sixty-nine percent approved of the way Ford handled his job as president, while just 4 percent disapproved.

For detailed information on how CBS News conducts public opinion surveys, click here.

This poll was conducted among a random sample of 993 adults nationwide, interviewed by telephone January 1-3, 2007. The error due to sampling for results based on the entire sample could be plus or minus three percentage points. The error for subgroups is higher.

Crooks and Liars » Calling the Waaaahhhhmmbulance

2007-01-05T16:33:00.001-05:00

We're now in the Congressional Democratic majority's first 100 hours to clean things up and make some positive changes. More power to them. However, I would be remiss to not mention David Dreier's (R-CA) little petulant press conference before the swearing in. Poor "wittle wamb" doesn't think the Democrats are going to be nice to the minority party. Gosh, can anyone think of where a precedent like that originated? Hey David, does this ring a bell?

News Hounds describes the fun, as covered by Major Garrett on FOX News Special Report:

Major Garrett: "Key Republican, David Dreier, a member of the outgoing GOP leadership who has to date been reluctant to criticize Pelosi, today lashed out."
David Dreier: "There is tremendous inconsistency in virtually everything we are seeing in their plans, and I'm so disappointed. They've basically said they're going to stomp all over minority rights."
Comment: Dreier is complaining about what he sees in their plans, not in anything they've actually done. On top of that, Dreier, who was a part of the GOP controlled Congress is complaining about "minority-rights" when the Congress he was a part of refused to even respond to Pelosi when she asked for a "Minority Bill of Rights", which Dreier and fellow Republicans are now seeking for themselves.

In 2004, Pelosi submitted this "Minority Bill of Rights" to former Speaker Dennis Hastert, who refused to respond. The Washington Post reported on this in 2004. More>>>

Eat The Press | Fox News Is 8th-Most-Watched Cable Network | The Huffington Post

2007-01-05T16:00:00.001-05:00

The Fox News Channel ranks 8th on the 2006 primetime ratings list for cable networks, with 1.4 million average primetime viewers. It's the only news network in the top 20, says TVNewser. CNN lags at #26, MSNBC at #35. FNC primetime viewership is down 20% from last year, according to the Hollywood Reporter, and MSNBC is the only news network to gain both total-day and primetime viewership over last year.

FNC still has more viewers than CNN and MSNBC combined, but the other two are catching up. MSNBC's Keith Olbermann's popularity is pulling the network up, but he's implied that MSNBC needs him more than he needs them. Meanwhile, the Democratic Congress could give FNC more bad news to tell its viewers. This year could be anyone's game.

Rep. Goode Has It All Wrong About Rep. Ellison

2007-01-03T16:17:00.001-05:00

Representative Virgil Goode (R-Va) has publicly stated that:

"The Muslim Representative from Minnesota was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don't wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Qur'an."

Ellison is an African American Muslim who expressed the desire to take his oath of office with his Qur'an in place of the Bible.

Goode made several television appearances during which he pushed the above line, even after it was pointed out to him that Ellison was born in the United States and traced his families roots in this country back at least to 1742.

Ellison will be using Thomas Jefferson's Qur'an to take his oath. Meanwhile, Goode et al continue to try and establish a religious test for those who hold office.

The Nation sums it up very well by stating:

The objections to allowing Ellison, the first Muslim to be elected to Congress, to take the oath as he chooses were so absurd in its character and contention that they could easily be dismissed as a sideshow. But it would be dangerous to do so. The fact is that there has for a number of years now been a concerted effort by sincere if misguided religious zealots and conservative political strategists who delight in exploiting fears of diversity to redefine the American experiment as a Christian religious endeavor.

History does not provide even a soft grounding for this fantasy. The founders of the country were men and women of the enlightenment who, while surely imperfect in their thoughts and deeds, wisely sought to burst the chains of what Thomas Jefferson referred to as "monkish ignorance and superstition." They revolted against the divine right of kings, rejected the construct of state-sponsored religion, and wrote a Constitution that not only guaranteed freedom of religion but required that: "The Senators and Representatives... and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States."

CNN Apologizes for "Obama/Osama" Gaffe

2007-01-02T23:48:00.000-05:00

From Raw Story: A Monday night broadcast of CNN's Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer confused America's "number one enemy" with one of America's most popular senators, RAW STORY has learned. CNN apologized for the error, which came after a series of incidents in recent months in which Illinois Democrat Senator Barack Obama was subtly or directly linked with militant Islamic personalities who have been hostile to the United States.
During the Jan. 1 broadcast of Wolf Blitzer's nightly news program, a pre-commercial preview of the show's next segment included a story on the hunt for Al Qaeda's leadership. Over a photo of Osama Bin Laden and his second-in-command Ayman Al-Zawahiri, Blitzer stated, according to the transcript, "Plus, a new year, but the same mission. Will 2007 bring any new changes in the hunt for Osama bin Laden?" More>>>

Keith Olbermann's Special Comment on "Sacrifice"

2007-01-02T23:33:00.000-05:00

From Crooks and Liars: Keith Olbermann stepped up and slapped Bush's plan to use the word "sacrifice" as an excuse to send more troops to Iraq. Bush needs a new catch phrase to try and deceive the nation with, but Republican talking points won't work on the people anymore. They are fed up with Bush and this war and sending more troops to die is not an answer. John McCain and Lieberman will now wear the McCain Doctrine around their necks—as Bill Kristol drools with glee as he'll finally get his wish. More>>>

U.S. Troop Casualties Hit 3000

2007-01-01T00:47:00.000-05:00

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq has reached 3,000 since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, an authoritative Web site tracking war deaths said on Sunday.

The milestone comes as President George W. Bush weighs options, including more troops, for the deteriorating situation in Iraq, where daily violence plagues Baghdad and much of the country and has killed tens of thousands of Iraqis.

The Web site, www.icasualties.org, listed the death of Spec. Dustin R. Donica, 22, on December 28 as previously unreported, and said that 3,000 U.S. military personnel had now died.

More>>>

The Cost Of The War

2006-12-31T13:48:00.000-05:00

As you can see from the above figures, the cost of the war continues to spiral. The cost of killing Sadaam, securing Iraqi oil and assuring carte blanche contracts to the likes of Haliburton, Bechtel, et al, COULD have:

Paid for 46,966,968 children to attend a year of Head Start.

Insured 212,335,757 children for one year.

Provided 17,190,268 students four-year scholarships at public universities.

Hired 6,145,277 additional public school teachers for one year.

More here>>>

Happy New Year!

2006-12-31T13:36:00.000-05:00

Well, the Democratic controlled Congress will be in session later this week. Many are talking about various oversights and some are talking impeachment. Lets hope that this year will be the beginning of a more constructive and ethical Congress. More on that in a later post. Happy New Year everyone!

On January 1st, 2007 we will be up and running!!

2006-12-24T21:37:00.000-05:00

THAT is a promise :)

Happy Holidays...Merry Christmas...Happy Kwaanza!

My Apologies

2006-10-18T10:24:00.000-04:00

I WILL be back soon....

Fmr. Homeland Security Chief Ridge Slams Cheney For Saying Lamont's Victory Would Encourage "Al Qaeda Types"... | The Huffington Post

2006-08-13T17:14:00.000-04:00

Fmr. Homeland Security Chief Ridge Slams Cheney For Saying Lamont's Victory Would Encourage "Al Qaeda Types"... The Huffington Post:

As Americans stood in newly long lines at airports, wondering if they would ever again be able to carry a tube of toothpaste or hair gel in their carry-on bags, there was a feeling of helplessness, a return of the persistent low-grade anxiety that had lingered for months and years after 9/11. Bush tried to reassure Americans that they are safer than they were before the attacks. At the same time, his vice president, Dick Cheney, darkly warned that the Connecticut primary victory of antiwar candidate Ned Lamont over Sen. Joseph Lieberman would only encourage "Al Qaeda types." (Interviewed by NEWSWEEK, former Homeland Security secretary Tom Ridge bridled at his former colleague's remark: "That may be the way the vice president sees it," he said, "but I don't see it that way, and I don't think most Americans see it that way.") More>>>

Spike Lee's 'Requiem' for New Orleans - Newsweek Entertainment - MSNBC.com

2006-08-13T17:00:00.000-04:00

Spike Lee's 'Requiem' for New Orleans - Newsweek Entertainment - MSNBC.com:

By Allison Samuels
Newsweek
Aug. 21-28, 2006 issue - Spike Lee is a proud New Yorker—he lives for the Yankees, dies for the Knicks and bleeds for all things Brooklyn—but for the past year, his heart has been in New Orleans. To make his new four-hour HBO documentary about Hurricane Katrina, "When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts," the 49-year-old director visited the Gulf Coast region nine times and interviewed more than 100 people, including the mayor of New Orleans, the governor of Louisiana, Sean Penn, Soledad O'Brien, Kanye West, engineers, historians, journalists, radio DJs—even the guy who spotted the vice president during a post-Katrina photo-op and told him, "Go f--- yourself, Mr. Cheney." But the voice you'll remember best belongs to a 42-year-old woman named Phyllis Montana LeBlanc, a survivor from the city's obliterated Lower Ninth Ward and one of the rawest specimens of classic Nawlins spitfire you'll ever find.

In Lee's devastating film, LeBlanc is a frequent, and frequently hilarious, presence, a fuming Greek chorus of one who still can't believe that, for nearly a week, her country left her and her neighbors for dead. "There were two things I asked Spike when we first met," says LeBlanc, sitting in a lawn chair outside her government-issued trailer home in New Orleans—the one she finally received four months after applying for it. "First I asked him, 'Are you going to tell the whole story and make it clear that all black people aren't poor, ignorant looters?' And then I asked if I could cuss." She laughs. "When he said yes to both, I said, 'Hot damn, we've got a deal!'" More>>>

NBC: Disagreement over timing of arrests - British Wanted to Continue Surveillance on Terror Suspects

2006-08-12T23:16:00.000-04:00

NBC: Disagreement over timing of arrests - British Wanted to Continue Surveillance on Terror Suspects:

LONDON - NBC News has learned that U.S. and British authorities had a significant disagreement over when to move in on the suspects in the alleged plot to bring down trans-Atlantic airliners bound for the United States.

A senior British official knowledgeable about the case said British police were planning to continue to run surveillance for at least another week to try to obtain more evidence, while American officials pressured them to arrest the suspects sooner. The official spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the case.

In contrast to previous reports, the official suggested an attack was not imminent, saying the suspects had not yet purchased any airline tickets. In fact, some did not even have passports.

More>>>

Lieberman, on the Offensive, Links Terror Threat and Iraq - New York Times

2006-08-11T13:15:00.000-04:00

Lieberman, on the Offensive, Links Terror Threat and Iraq - New York Times - Apparently Lieberman will stop at nothing to score political points against his opponent Ned Lamont:

Senator Joseph I. Lieberman of Connecticut seized on the reports of a terror plot yesterday to attack Ned Lamont, his Democratic opponent for re-election, saying that Mr. Lamont’s goal of withdrawing American troops from Iraq by a fixed date would constitute a “victory” for extremists.

“If we just pick up like Ned Lamont wants us to do, get out by a date certain, it will be taken as a tremendous victory by the same people who wanted to blow up these planes in this plot hatched in England,” Mr. Lieberman said at a campaign event in Waterbury, Conn. “It will strengthen them, and they will strike again.” More>>>>>

War Crimes Act Changes Would Reduce Threat Of Prosecution

2006-08-10T23:34:00.000-04:00

The Washington Post - War Crimes Act Changes Would Reduce Threat Of Prosecution - Bushco is taking no chances I see. They want to cover all bases. When you read this article in the Washington Post, your outrage will be justified:

The Bush administration has drafted amendments to a war crimes law that would eliminate the risk of prosecution for political appointees, CIA officers and former military personnel for humiliating or degrading war prisoners, according to U.S. officials and a copy of the amendments.

Officials say the amendments would alter a U.S. law passed in the mid-1990s that criminalized violations of the Geneva Conventions, a set of international treaties governing military conduct in wartime. The conventions generally bar the cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime prisoners without spelling out what all those terms mean.

The draft U.S. amendments to the War Crimes Act would narrow the scope of potential criminal prosecutions to 10 specific categories of illegal acts against detainees during a war, including torture, murder, rape and hostage-taking.

Left off the list would be what the Geneva Conventions refer to as "outrages upon [the] personal dignity" of a prisoner and deliberately humiliating acts -- such as the forced nakedness, use of dog leashes and wearing of women's underwear seen at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- that fall short of torture. MORE>>>>

The Raw Story | Ambassador claims shortly before invasion, Bush didn't know there were two sects of Islam

2006-08-06T11:06:00.000-04:00

The Raw Story: Ambassador claims shortly before invasion, Bush didn't know there were two sects of Islam

This should come as no suprise, given the outcome of the occupation of Iraq. However, one must wonder: "what color is the sky on Bush's planet?"

Former Ambassador to Croatia Peter Galbraith is claiming President George W. Bush was unaware that there were two major sects of Islam just two months before the President ordered troops to invade Iraq, RAW STORY has learned.

In his new book, The End of Iraq: How American Incompetence Created A War Without End, Galbraith, the son of the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith, claims that American leadership knew very little about the nature of Iraqi society and the problems it would face after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

A year after his “Axis of Evil” speech before the U.S. Congress, President Bush met with three Iraqi Americans, one of whom became postwar Iraq’s first representative to the United States. The three described what they thought would be the political situation after the fall of Saddam Hussein. During their conversation with the President, Galbraith claims, it became apparent to them that Bush was unfamiliar with the distinction between Sunnis and Shiites.

Galbraith reports that the three of them spent some time explaining to Bush that there are two different sects in Islam--to which the President allegedly responded, “I thought the Iraqis were Muslims!” MORE>>>

The Lunatics Are Running The Asylum - Re-Post

2006-08-03T22:47:00.000-04:00

Note: I posted this late last year. Given the current events developing between the Isreali/Lebanon "conflict", the Senate hearings regarding the status of the occupation in Iraq and its civil war, the faux pas made by the President on a constant basis and Cheney talking about the 'dark side', I felt this article needed to be resurrected:

George Bush has change over the last year. He went from being a Texas Governor Jerk who said if he lost the election, "life goes on," to a dogmatic, closed-minded man who apparently believes God has chosen him to bring the deluded dream of "democracy" to the Middle East. People have suggested to me that Bush is either insane or a psychopath (i.e., he has no conscience). Perhaps, there IS another answer: Maybe Bush and Company are suffering from what the Greeks noticed thousands of years ago: Koros (stability...or the appearance thereof) to Hubris (arrogance, moral blindness) to Ate (a kind of "madness") to Nemesis (destruction). One of the problems of the afflicted is that they never know what is happening to them. Sounds like Bush and Company most certainly have this affliction. The lunatics are now in charge of the asylum!!!! Prominent Conservative Leader: Government in Hands of Psychopaths: May stage terror attacks By Alex Jones and Paul Joseph Watson.

Former associate editor of the Wall Street Journal and former Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury Dr. Paul Craig Roberts expressed his dire warning that the US government has fallen into the hands of psychopaths and that the Neo-Cons in the Bush administration may be set to stage another terror attack in the US as part of a black operation to demolish growing dissent and coerce the public to rally behind the government once again. More...

Bush Admin May Have Violated 26 Statutes, Dems Say

2006-07-31T23:57:00.000-04:00

TPM Muckraker: Bush Admin May Have Violated 26 Statutes, Dems Say

By Justin Rood - July 31, 2006, 1:53 PM

The Bush administration may have broken over two dozen federal laws and regulations -- some of them multiple times -- according to an unreleased report from the House Judiciary Committee Democrats.

"The misconduct I have found is not only serious, but widespread," reads a draft summary of the report by Ranking Member John Conyers (D-MI):

The laws implicated by the Administration’s actions include federal laws against making false statements to congress [sic]; federal laws and international treaties prohibiting torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment; federal laws concerning retaliating against witnesses and other government employees; Executive Orders concerning leaking and other misuse of intelligence; federal regulations and ethical requirements governing conflicts of interest; the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act; communications privacy laws; the National Security Act; and the Fourth Amendment. More>>>

Think Progress » Zakaria: Rumsfeld ‘Seems In A Parallel Universe and Slightly Deranged’

2006-07-30T18:17:00.000-04:00

Think Progress » Zakaria: Rumsfeld ‘Seems In A Parallel Universe and Slightly Deranged’ - Well...glad to see I'm not alone in thinking that Rummy is from another planet.

See Video Here

Transcript Here

US Has "Quietly Reversed Its Goal" Of Troop Withdrawal From Iraq... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-29T21:31:00.000-04:00

US Has "Quietly Reversed Its Goal" Of Troop Withdrawal From Iraq... The Huffington Post - No suprise here:

The US administration has quietly reversed its goal from whittling down troop numbers in Iraq before the mid-term congressional elections in November.

A Pentagon spokesman on Friday confirmed that US troop levels in Iraq rose to 132,000 during the past week – the highest since late May – from 127,000 at the start of the week. The spokesman said troop numbers often fluctuated and “there might be temporary spikes during periods of troop rotation”. More at Financial Times>>>

C-Span Airing Of L.A. Conference Shows Mainstreaming Of 9/11 Truth

2006-07-29T17:23:00.000-04:00

Paul Joseph Watson/Prison Planet.com July 28 2006
8:00pm EDT and repeated at 11:00pm EDT C-Span

A decision that many of us were waiting on with baited breath - C-Span's scheduling of the American Scholars Symposium highlights - infuses the 9/11 truth movement with a fresh injection of credibility and exposure to more mainstream audiences.

The panel features incredible presentations by 9/11 Scholars for Truth founder James Fetzer, BYU Physics Professor Steven Jones, President of the Institute for Space and Security Studies Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, ret., Filmmaker and Radio Broadcaster Alex Jones, and Terrorism Expert Webster Tarpley.

C-Span viewers will witness what many consider to be the most hard hitting conference to date including the most professional and credible speakers ever assembled. More>>>

Audit Finds U.S. Hid Actual Cost of Iraq Projects - New York Times

2006-07-29T14:28:00.000-04:00

Audit Finds U.S. Hid Actual Cost of Iraq Projects - New York Times - This should be of no suprise to anyone. The only suprise is that Mainstream Media is actually reporting it:

BAGHDAD, Iraq, July 29 — The State Department agency in charge of $1.4 billion in reconstruction money in Iraq used an accounting shell game to hide ballooning cost overruns on its projects there and knowingly withheld information on schedule delays from Congress, a federal audit released late Friday has found.

The agency hid construction overruns by listing them as overhead or administrative costs, according to the audit, written by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, an independent office that reports to Congress and the Pentagon.

Called the United States Agency for International Development, or A.I.D., the agency administers foreign aid projects around the world. It has been working in Iraq on reconstruction since shortly after the 2003 invasion.

More>>>

Gore Vidal Interview | The Progressive

2006-07-28T00:13:00.000-04:00

Gore Vidal: Bush Is A Thug. There Is Something Really Wrong With Him.

By David Barsamian August 2006 Issue

Gore Vidal is a gold mine of quips and zingers. And his vast knowledge of literature and history—particularly American—makes for an impressive figure. His razor-sharp tongue lacerates the powerful. He does it with aplomb, saying, “Style is knowing who you are, what you want to say, and not giving a damn.” He has a wry sense of noblesse oblige: “There is no human problem which could not be solved if people would simply do as I advise.”

Now eighty, he lives in the Hollywood hills in a modest mansion with immodest artwork. I felt I was entering a museum of Renaissance art. A stern painting of the Emperor Constantine was looking down upon us as we sat in his majestic living room. A Buddha statue from Thailand stood nearby. But all was not somber. He had a Bush doll with a 9/11 bill sticking out of it on a table behind us.

His aristocratic pedigree is evident not just in his artistic sophistication but also in his locution. In a war of words, few can contend with Vidal.

“I’m a lover of the old republic and I deeply resent the empire our Presidents put in its place,” he declares.

Vidal moved gingerly and was using a cane. A recent knee operation left him less mobile. He says, “The mind is still agile but the knees have grown weak.” We sat in upholstered chairs. On a nearby table I saw the galleys of his second memoir, Point to Point Navigation. It will be out this fall. His earlier one, Palimpsest, came out in 1995.

Prolific does not even begin to describe Vidal’s literary output. He’s the author of scores of novels, plays, screenplays, essays. In 1993, he won the National Book Award for his collection of essays, United States. His recent books (he calls them “pamphlets”)—Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace, Dreaming War, and Imperial America—have sold in huge numbers. When I asked him what was the point of his work, he said, “I am chronicling America.” The prose, whether polemical or fictional, is elegant.

Distantly related to Jackie Kennedy, he does not romanticize JFK. “He was one of the most charming men I’ve ever known,” says Vidal. “He was also one of the very worst Presidents.”
He’s been a Democratic candidate for the House from New York and for the Senate from California. Today, he ridicules the Democrats for supineness.

He sees a certain continuity in U.S. foreign policy over the last fifty years. “The management, then and now, truly believes the United States is the master of the Earth and anyone who defies us will be napalmed or blockaded or covertly overthrown,” he says. “We are beyond law, which is not unusual for an empire; unfortunately, we are also beyond common sense.”

I talked with him on a hot afternoon in mid-April.

The Q&A follows....here.

Guardian Unlimited | World Latest | 49 Katrina Victims Remain Unidentified

2006-07-27T15:31:00.000-04:00

Guardian Unlimited World Latest 49 Katrina Victims Remain Unidentified
Thursday July 27, 2006 8:01 PM

AP Photo LAAB104
By MICHELLE ROBERTS
Associated Press Writer

NEW ORLEANS (AP) - They lie in silvery airtight caskets in a rented warehouse near the Superdome or in black body bags stacked in a refrigerated truck behind an abandoned funeral-home-turned-morgue.

Nearly a year after Hurricane Katrina, 49 of the storm's 1,300-plus victims in Louisiana are stuck in a kind of purgatory, with no final resting place, because their identities are still a mystery.

The anonymous souls died undignified deaths, their bodies left in muddy water for days or buried in rubble for months. Many died in the flood-leveled Ninth Ward.
Not much else is known about them. Many had no clothing or ID, and their bodies were bloated from exposure or reduced to skeletons before medical examiners could begin looking for clues.
The nameless dead wait for medical records, dental charts or DNA analysis - anything that might tell the world who they are.

"We're not going to give up,'' said Dr. Louis Cataldie, Louisiana medical examiner. Cataldie said authorities will keep trying until they have exhausted all possibilities; New Orleans Coroner Dr. Frank Minyard has set no deadline on the task.

Altogether, local, state and federal officials identified more than 1,300 people found dead in Louisiana after Katrina struck on Aug. 29. (The official Louisiana death toll is close to 1,600, but the number includes nearly 300 who died outside the state shortly after fleeing the storm.)

More>>>

Rumsfeld On Whether Iraq Is In A Civil War: "Oh, I Don't Know. You Know, I Thought About That Last Night"... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-26T19:12:00.000-04:00

Rumsfeld On Whether Iraq Is In A Civil War: "Oh, I Don't Know. You Know, I Thought About That Last Night"... The Huffington Post

His detachment from his own responsibility is breathtaking. The glibness with which he describes tha mass slaughter of innocents in a country whose security he is responsible for is astonishing. Check this transcript out. Money quote:

Q: Is the country closer to a civil war?

SEC. RUMSFELD: Oh, I don't know. You know, I thought about that last night, and just musing over the words, the phrase, and what constitutes it. If you think of our Civil War, this is really very different. If you think of civil wars in other countries, this is really quite different. There is - there is a good deal of violence in Baghdad and two or three other provinces, and yet in 14 other provinces there's very little violence or numbers of incidents. So it's a - it's a highly concentrated thing. It clearly is being stimulated by people who would like to have what could be characterized as a civil war and win it, but I'm not going to be the one to decide if, when or at all. Read Whole Story - ReadTranscript

Re-Post of PNAC 101 - How We Got To Where We Are Today

2006-07-24T15:37:00.000-04:00

This post is reproduced from The Democratic Underground. It is a very clear and concise analysis of the Neocon Agenda: The Project For A New American Century. That treatise is actually the framework from which the Bush administration has mapped out its foreign policy stratergy...long before September 11, 2001. Take a look:

George W. Bush constantly reminds the nation about the threat of terrorism that began with 911 but he leaves out a few important details that you should know...

June 1997 - The Project for a New American Century (PNAC) was born. Populated by influential Movers of industry and Shakers of public opinion, the PNAC is an organization united in the vision for a global U.S. empire - "Pax Americana" - through coercion and military domination. Their philosophy can be simply summarized:

There are countries to plunder and fortunes to be made. You have it, we want it. Do as we say or suffer the consequences.

The U.S. already has a powerful military but we plan to nurture and grow it until it's massive and we are indominable. Resistance is futile. We are...

Dick Cheney, Jeb Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, Steve Forbes, William J. Bennett, Frank Gaffney, and I. Lewis ("Scooter") Libby, signator's - among others - of the PNAC's "Statement of Principles".

"We need to...challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values."

"We need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future."

"It is important to shape circumstances before crises emerge."

http://www.newamericancentury.org/statementofprinciples...

JANUARY 1998 - The PNAC knew that he who owns the oil also owns the world so they sent a letter to President Clinton urging him to attack Iraq and remove Saddam Hussein from power since he put "a significant portion of the world's supply of oil at hazard". Clinton didn't grant them their wish and the PNAC was disheartened that they couldn't manipulate the military while outside of the White House power structure.

http://www.newamericancentury.org/iraqclintonletter.htm

MARCH - APRIL 1999 - In an effort to capture and control the castle and all its warriors and weapons, the PNAC offered up members Steve Forbes, Dan Quayle and Gary Bauer to run as Republican candidates in the upcoming Presidential election.

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/news/election/profile.htm

JUNE 1999 - Ever persistent and determined to maximize their potential for success in the Presidential campaign, the PNAC exercised their power of nepotism and member-Jeb Bush's brother George stepped up to the plate to join the race.

SPRING 2000 - The PNAC may have felt confident with their candidate's chances for winning the White House but they were absolutely smug over what they saw as a possible Fallback Plan...electronic voting machines with severe security flaws that included hidden backdoors, erasable audit trails and multiple vote totals with the potential to propel vote tampering to new heights through the magic of remote access.

How To Rig An Election In The United States.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0307/S00065.htm

Can the votes be changed?
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/access-diebold.htm

GAO Report Finds Flaws in Electronic Voting http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/102105Q.shtml

Bettter yet, Chuck Hagel - a fellow Republican loyalist - owned the ES&S voting machine company that counted 60% of all U.S. votes. He had already won one election and was part of the U.S. Senate power team in Washington.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0301/S00166.htm

Assured that the White House would soon be theirs, the PNAC debuted their 76-page blueprint to achieve world domination. "Rebuilding America's Defenses" became the PNAC's manifesto, detailing the ideal level of military power to specifically eliminate the hostile regimes of Iraq, Iran, Syria and North Korea and it endorsed pre-emptive strikes against them, tradition be damned. Iraq was given star billing as Control Central for their Mideast base of operations.

"At present the United States faces no global rival. America’s grand
strategy should aim to preserve and extend this advantageous position as far
into the future as possible."

"American landpower is the essential link in the chain that translates U.S. military supremacy into American geopolitical preeminence.

"We cannot allow North Korea, Iran, Iraq or similar states to undermine American leadership."

"While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein."

What is particularly foreboding and chilling in view of events to later unfold, is this statement bemoaning the lengthy process of rebuilding the existing U.S. military according to the heightened standards and specifications the PNAC aspired to.

"...the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor."

http://cryptome.org/rad.htm

NOVEMBER 2000 - Saddam may have sensed an ill wind in the air when he made the first strike, turned his back on the U.S. Dollar and accepted only Euros as payment for his oil. This had the potential of seriously destabilizing the U.S. economy and the PNAC considered this an hostile act of aggression towards their personal and business interests. The heat was on for them to make their first move.

http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/11/0111200016084...

DECEMBER 2000 - In a highly contentious Presidential vote battle on the home turf of PNAC-Jeb Bush, the Supreme Court decided that George Bush was the new President. Bush now had the green light to seamlessly merge members of the PNAC into his Administration with no one the wiser. PNAC members elevated to the Bush hierarchy include, among others:

Donald Rumsfeld - Secretary of Defense
Paul Wolfowitz - Deputy Secretary of Defense
Elliott Abrams - Member of the National Security Council
John Bolton - Undersecretary for Arms Control and InternationalSecurity
Richard Perle - Chairman of the advisory Defense Policy Board
Richard Armitage - Deputy Secretary of State
John Bolton - Undersecretary of State for Disarmament
Zalmay Khalilzad - White House liaison to the Iraqi opposition
An Honorable Mention was awarded to Condoleezza Rice - National Security Advisor - who is a former oil-company consultant having been on the board of directors of Chevron as its main expert on Kazakhstan.

The PNAC agenda had now passed "Go". The most powerful military machine in the world stood at their ready and Saddam was in the crosshair.Wasting no time, Cheney secretly assembled an advisory panel of oil and gas executives from Enron, Dynergy, Shell Oil, Chevron/Texaco and British Petroleum under the direction of James Baker (former Secretary of State under George Bush Sr.) to help shape our national energy policy and justify the PNAC's anticipated war with Iraq.

Contributing substantially to the task force discussions and recommendations was a shadowy group of unidentified observers who still remain unknown. Sheikh Saud Al Nasser Al Sabah, the former Kuwaiti oil minister, also made a contribution to the group's final report which was funded through Khalid Al-Turki (a Saudi Arabian oil and gas enterprise) and the Arthur Ross Foundation (a non-profit organization that - on the surface - appears to be a supporter of the Arts.)

http://www.yuricareport.com/PoliticalAnalysis/FraudinWh... http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/20...

MARCH 2001 - Cheney closely guarded the details surrounding his energy task force but documents released through the Freedom of Information Act reveal a map of Iraqi oilfields, pipelines, refineries and terminals, as well as 2 charts detailing Iraqi oil and gas projects, and “Foreign Suitors for Iraqi Oilfield Contracts.”

http://www.judicialwatch.org/071703.c_.shtml

As one internet poster pointed out:

"The Iraq map is not a map, it's a plan "There are several areas marked 'earmarked for production sharing' (look at the map legend), which means privatized oil fields. Iraq did not have privatized oil fields and production sharing agreements before the US took it over.

"There are also parcels marked on the Iraq oil field and exploration map (numbered 'Block 1' through '9'). Iraq did not have an active, privatized oil exploration program going on before it was conquered by the US.

"If you read the footnotes and entire contents of the other documents, there is a heavy emphasis on business concerns, such as contracts and vendors over items one might think would be more important in a government discussion, such as capacity, long term reserves, etc.

"One footnote (in UAEOilProj.pdf) even contains investment advice for the participants at the meeting, suggesting opportunities in downstream projects, such as power desalination and pipeline projects.

"These are not 'just maps'. Read them."

It can be argued that the spoils of war were being doled out two years before Iraq once again became a household word. Perhaps this explains why Cheney worked so hard and so long to keep this information suppressed until Iraq was under U.S. military control...by then it would be too late for the public to object to the invasion.

Not by coincidence, the United States Agency for International Development (USAid) began coordinating infrastructure and engineering contracts to rebuild post-war Iraq. Halliburton, where Cheney formerly served as chief executive, acquired the contract to oversee firefighting operations at Iraqi oilfields.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2837657.stm

Iraq, circa March 2001, painted a completely different picture than the Evil Empire the Bush Administrations tried to portray in their determined rush to war.

"Iraq was one of the more progressive Islamic countries in the region. It provided full rights for women and public education for its citizens who enjoyed a decent standard of living."

"Despite the years of bombings and the even greater toll on human life taken by the sanctions, visitors to Baghdad don't see a city in ruins. Much of the wreckage has been cleared away, much has been repaired.

"In our hotel, there's running water throughout the day, hot water in the morning. Various streets in Baghdad are lined with little stores, surprisingly well-stocked with household appliances, hardware goods, furniture, and clothes (much of which has a second-hand look).

"We see no derelicts or homeless people on the streets, no prostitutes or ragged bands of abandoned children, though there are occasional youngsters eager to shine shoes or solicit spare change. But even they seem to be well-fed and decently clothed. ......large swaths of the city used to be shrouded in complete darkness; today, there are lights just about everywhere.

"People used to feel hopelessly isolated and now there seems to be more hope and better morale.

Sadly though, "more and more children are turning up with leukemia" (a result of the tons of depleted uranium the U.S. military used and left behind after Gulf War I.)

"The Iraqi leadership could turn US policy completely around by uttering just two magic words: "free market." All they have to do is invite the international Monetary Fund and World Bank into Iraq, eliminate free education and free medical care, abolish the minimal food ration that goes to every Iraqi, abolish the housing and transportation subsidies, and hand over the country's oil industry to the corporate cartels. To lift the sanctions, Iraq must surrender to the tender mercies of the free-market paradise...

"Until then, Iraq will continue to be designated a "rogue nation" by those policy makers in Washington who themselves are the meanest profit-driven, power-mongering rogues on earth."

http://www.michaelparenti.org/DefyingSanctions.html

The issue of trade sanctions against Iraq put the Bush Administration in a bind - the sanctions had been designed to punish Saddam for not conceding to U.S. demands but it ended up handicapping U.S. corporations and undermining the PNAC's drive for U.S. economic supremacy. The Bush Administration was on a tight four year schedule to oust Saddam and launch the PNAC's Grand Plan for World Domination but they still didn't have a viable script to sell to the public. Yet.

"It is important to shape circumstances...... ." - PNAC Statement of Principles

May 2001 - The U.S. State Department met with Iran, German and Italian officials to discuss Afghanistan. It was decided that the ruling Taliban would be toppled and a "broad-based government" would control the country so a gas pipeline could be built there.

http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/7969.pdf .http://www.gasandoil.com/goc/features/fex20867.htm

Even as plans were being made to remove the Taliban rulers from power, Colin Powell announced a $43 million "gift" to Afghanistan.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-091701scheer.column http://www.cato.org/dailys/08-02-02.html

Meanwhile, the U.S. Embassy in the UAE received a call that Bin Laden supporters were in the U.S. planning attacks with explosives. It was rumored that Bin Laden was interested in hijacking U.S. aircraft.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/images/04/10/whitehouse.pdf

June 2001 The decades-old procedure for a quick response by the nation’s air defense was changed. NORAD’s military commanders could no longer issue the command to launch fighter jets because approval had to be sought from the civilian Defense Secretary and PNAC-member, Donald Rumsfeld.

http://www.9-11commission.gov/hearings/hearing7/for_the_record_ashley.pdf

July 2001 The private plot formulated in May for toppling the Taliban was divulged during the G8 summit in Genoa, Italy. Immediately after the conference, American, Russian, German and Pakistani officials secretly met in Berlin to finalize the strategy for military strikes against the Taliban, scheduled to begin before mid-October 2001.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1550366.stm http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,556254,00.html http://www.gasandoil.com/goc/features/fex20867.htm

September 2001 - The "catastrophic and catalyzing" modern-day Pearl Harbor envisioned years earlier by the PNAC came to pass when the WTC and Pentagon were attacked as Rumsfeld sat passive and unresponsive. The finger of blame was pointed at Osama bin Laden, a former CIA operative with ties to Afghanistan. Suddenly, the U.S. "gift" of $43 million to the Taliban in May was cast in a new light. Coincidentally, Pakistan had participated in the plan to attack Afghanistan and the chief of Pakistan's Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) agency was later linked to a 911 hijacker after wiring him $100,00 just days before the WTC fell. Pakistan's ISI also had a long-standing working relationship with the CIA.

http://cryptome.org/rad.htm http://www.observer.com/pages/story.asp?ID=8830 http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO109C.html http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=1454238160 http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1266317,00.html

The PNAC had scored a home run with the bases loaded with the 911 event: shock, horror and fear gripped the nation, the war on "terrorism" had been established in no uncertain terms, attacking Afghanistan with public approval was a foregone conclusion and the stage was set for building a public case against Saddam. Not one to let a good attack go to waste, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld sprung into action.

He told his aides to come up with plans for striking Iraq, even though Saddam wasn't linked to the attacks.

PNAC-James Woolsey, former CIA director, was dispatched to London to look for and 'firm up' evidence of Iraqi involvement in the 911 attacks.

PNAC-member and Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz was authorized to create the Office of Special plans.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/09/04/september11/main520830.shtml

"It is important to shape circumstances..........."- PNAC Statement of Principles

The Office of Special Plans (OSP) was a secret group of analysts and policy advisors with no status in the intelligence community. Nevertheless they reported directly to the White House and National Security office with cherry-picked intelligence from questionable sources to support the case for invading Iraq. The OSP circumvented formal, well-established oversight procedures, ignored intelligence that didn't further their agenda, expanded the intelligence on weapons beyond what was justified and over-emphasized the national security risk. They became more influential than the C.I.A. or the Defense Intelligence Agency who didn't even know the ultra-secret OSP existed for at least a year.

Because they were based in the Pentagon, it was assumed that the OSP was an intelligence-gathering agency that was second-guessing the C.I.A. but in actuality it was the White House Military Marketing Machine charged with the task of writing the PNAC's "Get Saddam" sales pitch for the public. Shading and bending reality to suit their own purpose, it wasn't important for the OSP's stories about Saddam to be factual, only that the average American believed them to be - in true Hollywood fashion.

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?030512fa_fact

While the nation was stripped to the emotional bone and painfully vulnerable, the White House capitalized on the opportunity to reshape public perceptions and responses to conform with the PNAC's new American agenda. Rather than buoy the "can do" American spirit with optimism and hope for the future as Presidents before him had done in times of crisis, Bush spoke with an alarmist and pessimistic tone that served to perpetuate the high anxiety, excitability and fear in the populace.To hear him speak, the world was a dark, evil and dangerous place....terrorism was here to stay....it would be a long struggle....America was helpless without the military might of the Government to keep the nation safe. The intent was to create a psychologically broken, weary and docile populace that would be easier to lead into war.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/130534_focusecond13.html

Fear became the Administration's strategic tactic for reprogramming the public into accepting the PNAC's militaristic designs. Still shell-shocked and exhausted from the enormity of the WTC and Pentagon tragedies, the public's panic shifted into frenzied over-drive when anthrax-laced envelopes arrived in government and media offices, killing five people. A perpetrator was never identified but the investigation eventually centered around the Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, one of the nation's main anthrax research centers.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,126244,00.html

Using classic "operant learning" techniques from the realm of consumer psychology, the public was purposely kept on High Alert and continually "shaped" with ominous sound bites on the nightly news and "Level Orange Terror Alerts" at regularly scheduled but discrete intervals.

http://www.consumerpsychologist.com/#Perception

October 2001 - With flags waving, crowds cheering, and anthems playing, the "War On Terror" and the hunt for Osama began when Afghanistan was attacked right on schedule of July's secret meeting.Immediately afterwards the PNAC and White House collaboration of "GET SADDAM" played relentlessly on televisions and in newspapers across the nation and the World as the "War on Terror" waged on and the litany of lies began.

Pass It On This has been a presentation of The Whispering Campaign - an opportunity to become ACTIVELY involved in educating the American public without drawing attention to yourself. This is a game of Political "Gossip" where the story of our Government's deception and betrayal gets passed from one person to another.

Anyone can play. The rules are simple: make ten copies of this timeline and leave it in a public place where someone else will find it and read it. Ideal locations for maximum exposure include book stores, copy shops, libraries and train stations. Buses, taxis, laundromats, and check-out lines at the grocery store. Hair salons, rest rooms, gas stations and convenience stores.

Anywhere you happen to be will work just fine. The American public deserves to know the TRUTH!

Cheney uses Mideast as campaign issue - Yahoo! News

2006-07-24T01:34:00.000-04:00

Cheney uses Mideast as campaign issue - Yahoo! News - It's no suprise that the Vice President says that the war in Lebanon shows that Americans should vote to keep the republican congress in control to combat terrorism. I cannot believe that these crazy sons of bitches are actually capitalizing on the deaths of innocent humans to politicize THEIR VIEW:

Vice President Dick Cheney on Friday pointed to the fighting between Isreal and Hezbollah as fresh evidence that the ongoing battle against terrorismthat underscores the need to
keep President Bush's Republican allies in control of Congress.

"This conflict is a long way from over," Cheney said at a fundraising appearance for a GOP congressional candidate. "It's going to be a battle that will last for a very long time. It is absolutely essential that we stay the course."

Cheney's visit to Tampa helped raise about $200,000 for the campaign of Gus Bilirakis, a state legislator who is running for the Tampa Bay area congressional seat his father, Michael, is vacating.

"Gus is going to remember that the first order of business is to protect the American people and to support the men and women who defend us in time of war," Cheney told the audience at a $500-a-ticket fundraising reception. "There's still hard work ahead in the war on terror."

Cheney said that as Republicans make their case to voters in the midterm elections, "it's vital that we keep issues of national security at the top of the agenda." He faulted Democrats in Congress who have pushed for a timetable for withdrawing Americans from Iraq, saying that would send the wrong message to terrorists.

"If anyone thinks the conflict is over or soon to be over, all they have to do is look at what's happening in the Middle East today," he said. More>>>

Quote Of The Week

2006-07-22T23:01:00.000-04:00

Quote of the Week: Charles Barkley: “I Was a Republican Until They Lost Their Minds”

Read article here.

The Shame of Being an American

2006-07-22T20:32:00.000-04:00

The Shame of Being an American - By Paul Craig Roberts

Do you know that one-third of the Lebanese civilians murdered by Israel's attacks on civilian residential districts are children? That is the report from Jan Egeland, the emergency relief coordinator for the UN. He says it is impossible for help to reach the wounded and those buried in rubble, because Israeli air strikes have blown up all the bridges and roads. Considering how often (almost always) Israel misses Hezbollah targets and hits civilian ones, one might think that Israeli fire is being guided by US satellites and US military GPS. Don't be surprised at US complicity. Why would the puppet be any less evil than the puppet master?

Of course, you don't know these things, because the US print and TV media do not report them.

Because Bush is so proud of himself, you do know that he has blocked every effort to stop the Israeli slaughter of Lebanese civilians. Bush has told the UN "NO." Bush has told the European Union "NO." Bush has told the pro-American Lebanese prime minister "NO." Twice. Bush is very proud of his firmness. He is enjoying Israel's rampage and wishes he could do the same thing in Iraq.

Does it make you a Proud American that "your" president gave Israel the green light to drop bombs on convoys of villagers fleeing from Israeli shelling, on residential neighborhoods in the capital of Beirut and throughout Lebanon, on
hospitals, on power plants, on food production and storage, on ports, on civilian airports, on bridges, on roads, on every piece of infrastructure on which civilized life depends? Are you a Proud American? Or are you an Israeli puppet? More>>>

Troops: Under orders to kill - Conflict in Iraq - MSNBC.com

2006-07-22T20:21:00.000-04:00

Troops: Under orders to kill - Conflict in Iraq - MSNBC.com
Soldiers say officers commanded them to ‘kill all military age males’ in Iraq

This order HAS TO BE in violation of the Geneva Conventions!! Hell..it HAS TO BE a crime against HUMANITY!

Article:

EL PASO, Texas - Four U.S. soldiers accused of murdering suspected insurgents during a raid in Iraq said they were under orders to “kill all military age males,” according to sworn statements obtained by The Associated Press.

The soldiers first took some of the men into custody because they were using two women and a toddler as human shields. They shot three of the men after the women and child were safe and say the men attacked them.

“The ROE (rule of engagement) was to kill all military age males on Objective Murray,” Staff Sgt. Raymond L. Girouard told investigators, referring to the target by its code name. More>>>

Diplomats See Nominee Bolton "As A Stand-In For The Arrogance Of The Bush Administration"... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-22T15:56:00.000-04:00

Diplomats See Nominee Bolton "As A Stand-In For The Arrogance Of The Bush Administration"... The Huffington Post

Last week John Bolton stated that there is no "moral equivalence" between the death of Isreali citizens and the death of Lebonese citizens in the ensuing battle between Hezbollah and Isreal.

Diplomats at the UN have spoken out about the arrogance of the Bush administration manifested via Bolton and his rhetoric:

In recent months, as one international crisis followed another, John R. Bolton has fulfilled the role of the United Nations’ most influential ambassador at full strength, firmly articulating the position of the United States government regarding Iran, North Korea and the Middle East.

His performance won over at least one crucial critic, Senator George V. Voinovich, Republican of Ohio. Mr. Voinovich’s opposition a year ago forced Mr. Bolton to take the job as a presidential recess appointment, an arrangement that expires at the end of this Congress in January. More from NYT>>>

NY Times: US Speeds Up Bomb Delivery To Israel... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-21T23:52:00.000-04:00

NY Times: US Speeds Up Bomb Delivery To Israel... The Huffington Post - I have wondered why our country has not intervened in calling a cessation to the slaughter going on in the Middle East. However, THIS is not the intervention I had imagined:

The Bush administration is rushing a delivery of precision-guided bombs to Israel, which requested the expedited shipment last week after beginning its air campaign against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon, American officials said Friday.

The decision to quickly ship the weapons to Israel was made with relatively little debate within the Bush administration, the officials said. Its disclosure threatens to anger Arab governments and others because of the appearance that the United States is actively aiding the Israeli bombing campaign in a way that could be compared to Iran’s efforts to arm and resupply Hezbollah. More>>>>

Gates Foundation to Finance Search for H.I.V. Vaccine - New York Times

2006-07-20T01:39:00.000-04:00

Gates Foundation to Finance Search for H.I.V. Vaccine - New York Times - Say what you will about Bill Gates' and Microsoft, but this man and his wife have comitted to humanitarian causes like no one I have seen in my lifetime.

NYT reports:

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation awarded more than a quarter of a billion dollars today to researchers in 19 countries to speed the lagging development of an H.I.V. vaccine.

The grants are the largest private investment in making such a vaccine, the foundation said. They represent a significant shift in emphasis, to large-scale collaborative projects instead of small teams of researchers working independently.
The money will be given over five years to 16 scientific teams, including two New York groups. The scientists applied for the grants before Warren E. Buffett announced last month that he was giving $31 billion to the Gates Foundation.

The Gates Foundation has made development of an effective vaccine against H.I.V., the virus that causes AIDS, a major goal, and the new grants bring to $528 million the foundation’s investment for this purpose.

By contrast, the National Institutes of Health has spent $3.4 billion since the 1980’s to develop a vaccine.

A vaccine to fight H.I.V., the human immunodeficiency virus, is the best hope to control the AIDS epidemic, health officials and experts say. But that hope had been frustrated again and again.

GOP Talking Points Document Uses Psychological and Verbal Manipulation To Win Their Case for Further Global Aggression

2006-07-19T15:12:00.000-04:00

The GOP and its media pundits always seem to repeat the same talking points in one week. For example, starting with Newt Gingrich declaring on Meet The Press that we are at the beginning of World War III, every Fox News pundit as well as other media people used the term "world war III" when referencing the goings on in the Middle East. Here, in part is one of the "talking point strategies" reccommended. This document was authored by Frank Luntz, GOP pollster and consultant. Here is the link to the entire document. Hat Tip to Randi Rhodes for this info.

COMMUNICATING THE
PRINCIPLES OF PREVENTION & PROTECTION
IN THE WAR ON TERROR

WHAT MATTERS MOST

1) "9/11 changed everything" is the context by which everything follows. No speech about homeland security or Iraq should begin without a reference to 9/11.

2) The principles of "prevention and protection" still have universal support and should be addressed prior to talking about Iraq.

3) "Prevention at home can require aggressive action abroad" is the best way to link a principle the public supports with the policies of the Administration. "It is better to fight the War on Terror on the streets of Baghdad than on the streets of New York or Washington."

4) "Terrorism has no boundaries, and neither should efforts to prevent it." Talk about how terrorism has taken the lives of the British, the Spanish, Italians, Germans, Israelis, innocents from all across the globe. Remind listeners that this is truly an international challenge. "Americans are not the only target."

5) "The world is a better place without Saddam Hussein." Enough said.

CNN.com - Israeli troops enter southern Lebanon - Jul 18, 2006

2006-07-18T23:53:00.000-04:00

CNN.com - Israeli troops enter southern Lebanon - Jul 18, 2006 - BEIRUT, Lebanon (CNN) -- Israeli ground troops have entered southern Lebanon on a mission to destroy outposts of Hezbollah, an Israel Defense Forces spokesman told CNN early Wednesday.
The spokesman said the troops are "close to the border." No further details were immediately available.

Hours earlier, Israeli airstrikes pounded the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital near the airport, lighting up the night with explosions. MORE>>>

IMHO this seems a lot like the Biblical metaphor of "David and Goliath".

Murtha Compares Iraq Policy to Domestic Policy

2006-07-17T18:02:00.000-04:00

This info was sent to me by a friend and I felt this had to be posted. Hat tip to Ozy at www.mainstreampolitics.com for sending this to me and Chad Shue of "The Left Shue Blog" the author of the post:

As anyone who reads this humble Blog should know, I seldom relate the cost of the invasion and ongoing occupation of Iraq to dollars. Today, however, this item from Lynn Allen over at Evergreen Politics (which she credits to Taylor Marsh at the Blog of the same name) and, in particular, the source of the information caught my eye.

As most people know, Congressman John Murtha (D-PA), a decorated Marine, was an early supporter of the debacle that is the Bush Iraq policy. He has since come to recognize that our continuing presence there is a mistake. He has spoken to top military leaders inside the Pentagon and on the ground in that country to reach this conclusion. For his dedication to country (both in uniform and in the Congress) Rep. Murtha has been branded a "lefty" and an advocate of the infamous "cut and run" policy so widely embraced by the Democrats (tongue firmly planted in cheek here). For some six months, until just a couple of weeks ago, it seems Democrats couldn't run away from him fast enough.

It is with this introduction that I proudly present:

Murtha compares cost of war and domestic expenses.
A Report by Congressman John Murtha

(Washington D.C.)- We are spending $8 billion a month in Iraq. That equates to $2 billion a week, or $267 million a day, or $11 million an hour.

The following are some comparisons between what we are spending in Iraq as we "stay the course" indefinitely and what those funds could be used for instead.

I've been fighting for our military to get out of Iraq because I'm concerned about the loss of our troops and the future of our military, and also because I believe they have accomplished their mission there and the Iraqis must resolve their internal conflict themselves. However, I also wanted to demonstrate what these expenses mean to domestic policy in the United States and give you an idea of just some of the things that we could accomplish with this amount of money.

NATIONAL SECURITY

$31.7 billion/yr Homeland Security budget FY 07 = (4 months in Iraq)

$10 billion (1-time) Equipping commercial airliners with defenses against shoulder-fired missiles = (5 weeks in Iraq)

$8.6 billion/7 years Shortage of international aid needed to rebuild Afghanistan = (one month in Iraq)

$5.2 billion (1-time) Estimated need for capital improvements to secure public transportation system (trains, subways, buses) = (3 weeks in Iraq)

$1.5 billion/year Radiation detectors needed at all US ports (rejected due to cost) = (5 days in Iraq)

$1.4 billion/ year Double the COPS (community police grants) program (5 days in Iraq)

$800 million/year Public transportation personnel training and technical support = (72 hours in Iraq)

$700 million/year 100% screening of all air cargo - rejected because of cost (1/4 of domestic shipping and 1/2 of international shipping is done on passenger planes) = (2 days in Iraq)

$350 million (1-time) Make emergency radio systems interoperable (5 years after 9/11, this hasn't happened yet) = (1.2 days in Iraq)

$500 million/year Double the firefightersÃ‚’ grant program = (2 days in Iraq)

$94 million/year Restore cuts to cities hit on 9/11 in Homeland Security budget = (8-1/2 hours in Iraq)

HEALTH CARE/VETERANS

$36 billion/5 years reduction for Medicare spending in president's fiscal year 2007 (FY 07) budget = (4-1/2 months in Iraq)

$5 billion/5 years Cut in Medicaid in President's FY 2007 budget = (2-1/2 weeks in Iraq)

$2.5 billion/5 years VA health care premium increases in this year's budget. Premiums will double or triple and drug co-payments will increase, costing our military retirees $2.4 billion over 5 years = (9 days in Iraq)

$100 million Additional funding recommended for mental health research for veterans = (9 hours in Iraq)

$48 million Medical and prosthetic research for veterans = (half a day in Iraq)

$65 million/yr National Institutes of Health research funding cuts in this year's budget (scientists are leaving the field of health research because funding has been cut so severely) = (6 hours in Iraq)

$15 billion/yr Provide health insurance to 9 million children with no health insurance = (1-1/2 weeks in Iraq)

$118 million/yr The Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which provides nutritional food packages for less than $20 a month to more than 400,000 elderly people - eliminated in the president's budget ... = (12 hours in Iraq)
**********************************************************************************
Shue continues:

There is more to the report (including things specific to Murtha's home state of Pennsylvania. I recommend that you read the entire report. You should write the numbers down and then you should ask your Congressional Delegation (Rs and Ds) if they are familiar with these numbers. You should ask them if the are concerned about Homeland Security and National Defense and the healthcare needs of our nation's veterans. Then you should ask when they are going to start working with Congressman Murtha to end the travesty in Iraq and start working on the needs in this country.

Think Progress » Williams Confronts Kristol: ‘You Just Want War, War, War, And You Want Us In More War’

2006-07-17T01:15:00.000-04:00

Think Progress » Williams Confronts Kristol: ‘You Just Want War, War, War, And You Want Us In More War’

This morning on Fox News Sunday, William Kristol argued that the Bush administration’s “coddling” of Iran had “invited” the latest outbreak of violence, and that the United States should join in the current fighting. Juan Williams pushed back:

You just want war, war, war, and you want us in more war. You wanted us in Iraq. Now you want us in Iran. Now you want us to get into the Middle East. … You’re saying, why doesn’t the United States take this hard, unforgiving line? Well, the hard and unforgiving line has been, we don’t talk to anybody. We don’t talk to Hamas. We don’t talk to Hezbollah. We’re not going to talk to Iran. Where has it gotten us, Bill?
Kristol threw up his hands and didn’t answer. Watch it

The Blog | Arianna Huffington: Bush on the World Stage: While Events Heat Up, the President Hams it Up | The Huffington Post

2006-07-17T01:04:00.000-04:00

The Blog Arianna Huffington: Bush on the World Stage: While Events Heat Up, the President Hams it Up The Huffington Post - Arianna is right about President Bush. Just as he did when Katrina hit our gulf coast, Bush is hamming it up in Russia and Germany rather than addressing the global implications of this Isreali/Hezbollah/Hamas conflict. Here is what she says:

I picked the wrong week to spend more time than usual on the treadmill, flipping channels from one horrific occurrence to another and another and another. And, in between, watching snippets of our president looking lost on the world stage.

As the significance of the play of current events has increased, the stature of the lead actor seems more dwarfish then ever.

So it wasn't the intensity of my workout but our president in stark relief with the magnitude of world events that made me sweat.

There he was at his press conference in Russia, where he unwittingly gave Vladamir Putin one of the great set-up lines in recent history. Responding to a question about his concerns over the state of Russia’s democracy, Bush said he had talked to Putin “about my desire to promote institutional change in parts of the world like Iraq where there's a free press and free religion, and I told him that a lot of people in our country would hope that Russia would do the same thing.”

To which Putin replied: “We certainly would not want to have the same kind of democracy as they have in Iraq, I will tell you quite honestly.”
Ouch. After that one, Bush may have to change his nickname for Putin from “Pootie-Poot” to “Vlad the Presidential Impaler.”
Bush reacted to Putin’s spot-on zinger like a petulant third-grader, saying “Just wait.” Somehow he resisted the urge to stick out his tongue and say, “Wanna bet a million-zillion dollars on that, Pootie-Poot?” More>>>

The Wisdom Of Tony Snow

2006-07-15T18:40:00.000-04:00

Funniest Quote Of The Week From The Bush White House:
Tony Snow: It’s Important Israel Tries To “Limit As Much As Possible The So-Called Collateral Damage, Not Only On Civilians But Also On Human Lives”…

Israel Attacks Central Beirut…Says Iran Helping Hezbollah…

2006-07-15T18:22:00.000-04:00

Huffington Post:
Witnesses said Israeli aircraft attacked central Beirut Saturday for the first time in a four-day offensive, striking a lighthouse and the capital's seaport.

In Lebanon's northernmost city, Tripoli, witnesses said Israeli helicopters carried out the deepest strike yet into Lebanon, firing four missiles into the city's port area and hitting grain silos. Read Complete AP Story Here>>>

U.S. accused of kidnappings in Iraq | Salon News

2006-07-15T02:44:00.000-04:00

U.S. accused of kidnappings in Iraq Salon News - Congress demands that the Pentagon release documents that could show U.S. forces kidnapped family members of terror suspects.
By Mark Benjamin:

July 14, 2006 Congress has demanded that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld hand over a raft of documents to Congress that could substantiate allegations that U.S. forces have tried to break terror suspects by kidnapping and mistreating their family members. Rumsfeld has until 5 p.m. Friday to comply.

It now appears that kidnapping, scarcely covered by the media, and absent in the major military investigations of detainee abuse, may have been systematically employed by U.S. troops. Salon has obtained Army documents that show several cases where U.S. forces abducted terror suspects’ families. After he was thrown in prison, Cpl. Charles Graner, the alleged ringleader at Abu Ghraib, told investigators the military routinely kidnapped family members to force suspects to turn themselves in.

A House subcommittee led by Connecticut Republican Christopher Shays took the unusual step last month of issuing Rumsfeld a subpoena for the documents after months of stonewalling by the Pentagon. Shays had requested the documents in a March 7 letter. "There was no response" to the letter, a frustrated Shays told Salon. "We are not going to back off this."

The subpoena demands that the Pentagon turn over documents about apparent retribution by the military against Army Spc. Samuel Provance, a whistle-blower, who sought to expose abuse at the infamous prison by talking to military investigators and the press. Following his revelations, the Army demoted Provance from sergeant and revoked his security clearance.

The subpoena also includes a separate demand, at the behest of Government Reform Committee Ranking Member Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., for any documents that might show that U.S. forces were systematically detaining family members of suspects at Abu Ghraib, and mistreating them to force suspects to talk.

In a hearing before Shays' Government Reform subcommittee last February, Provance testified that the Army had retaliated against him. Provance also made the disturbing allegation that interrogators broke an Iraqi general, Hamid Zabar, by imprisoning and abusing his frail 16-year-old son. Waxman was shocked. "Do you think this practice was repeated with other children?" he asked Provance. "I don't see why it would not have been, sir," Provance replied.

Zabar's son had been apprehended with his father and held at Abu Ghraib, though the boy hadn't done anything wrong. "He was useless," Provance said about the boy in a phone interview with Salon from Heidelberg, Germany, where he is still in the Army. "He was of no intelligence value." More>>>

ABC News: Activists Sue to Block Electronic Voting

2006-07-13T22:38:00.000-04:00

ABC News: Activists Sue to Block Electronic Voting - Electronic Voting Machines, Thought to Be the Solution to Electoral Errors, Come Under Legal Attack

Jul 13, 2006 (AP)— Computerized voting was supposed to be the cure for ballot fiascos such as the 2000 presidential election, but activist groups say it has only worsened the problem and they've gone to court across the country to ban the new machines.

Lawsuits have been filed in at least nine states, alleging that the machines are wide open to computer hackers and prone to temperamental fits of technology that have assigned votes to the wrong candidate.

Manufacturers say their machines are more reliable than punch cards and other traditional voting technologies.

But they face a determined opponent in Voter Action, which has filed lawsuits in Colorado, California, Arizona and New Mexico. Similar bans have been sought by voters in Texas, Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania. On Thursday, a coalition of groups filed a lawsuit in Georgia.

"The designers of video games have built far more sophisticated security into their systems than have the manufacturers of voting machines," said Lowell Finley, co-director of Voter Action, a nonprofit and nonpartisan group based in Berkeley, Calif. "The biggest problem is security against tampering."

About 80 percent of American voters will use some form of electronic voting in the November election, where every seat in the House of Representatives is up for re-election, as are 33 Senate offices and 36 governorships. More>>>

USATODAY.com - House overwhelmingly votes to renew 1965 Voting Rights Act

2006-07-13T18:13:00.000-04:00

USATODAY.com - House overwhelmingly votes to renew 1965 Voting Rights Act - Finally Congress came to their senses.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House voted Thursday to renew the 1965 Voting Rights Act, rejecting efforts by Southern conservatives to relax federal oversight of their states in a debate haunted by the ghosts of the civil rights movement.
The 390-33 vote sent to the Senate a bill that represented a Republican appeal to minority voters who doubt the GOP's "big-tent" image. Southern conservatives had complained that the act punishes their states for racist voting histories they say they've overcome. More>>>

nbc6.net - Politics - Former CIA Operative Sues Rove, Cheney, Libby

2006-07-13T17:10:00.000-04:00

nbc6.net - Politics - Former CIA Operative Sues Rove, Cheney, Libby - The Wilsons are suing Rove, Cheney and Libby! Details here:

WASHINGTON -- The CIA officer whose identity was leaked to reporters sued Vice President Dick Cheney, his former top aide and presidential adviser Karl Rove on Thursday, accusing them and other White House officials of conspiring to destroy her career.

In a lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court, Valerie Plame and her husband, Joseph Wilson, a former U.S. ambassador, accused Cheney, Rove and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby of revealing Plame's CIA identity in seeking revenge against Wilson for criticizing the Bush administration's motives in Iraq.

Several news organizations wrote about Plame after syndicated columnist Robert Novak named her in a column on July 14, 2003. Novak's column appeared eight days after Wilson alleged in an opinion piece in The New York Times that the administration had twisted prewar intelligence on Iraq to justify going to war. More>>>

Hat Tip to Talking Points Memo who has posted the actual complaint HERE.

If Fox News Had Been Around Throughout History

2006-07-13T16:25:00.000-04:00

If Fox News Had Been Around Throughout History - I got this link from my son a couple of days ago. This is a must see. The author of this site is very much on point with this one:

http://mysite.verizon.net/vze1ldyn/id2.html

Ga. judge blocks voter ID law enforcement - Yahoo! News

2006-07-13T11:01:00.000-04:00

Ga. judge blocks voter ID law enforcement - Yahoo! News - This is good news for us Georgians!

ROME, Ga. - The same federal judge who threw out Georgia's voter ID law last year blocked the state Wednesday from enforcing its revised law during this year's elections.

The ruling came less than two hours after the Georgia Supreme Court denied the state's emergency request to overrule a state court order that blocked enforcement of the new photo ID law during next week's primary elections and any runoffs.

U.S. District Judge Harold Murphy's ruling, which he delivered verbally from the bench, was much broader, also including the Nov. 7 general elections and any runoffs. More>>>

THE GREATEST STORY EVER SOLD: The Decline and Fall of Truth from 9/11 to Katrina

2006-07-12T23:23:00.000-04:00

THE GREATEST STORY EVER SOLD: The Decline and Fall of Truth from 9/11 to Katrina - I, for one can't wait to read this book. The timing is perfect. Between this book and John Dean's "Conservatives Without Conscience", perhaps now the Sheeple who still hold on to the idea that BushCo is the greatest thing since the coming of Christ will finally wake up. Here is the review...in part:

New York Times columnist Rich delivers a savaging sermon on the US government's "rampant cronyism, the empty sloganeering of 'compassionate conservativism,' the reckless lack of planning for all government operations except tax cuts"—and so much more.

Anyone who knows his work will know that Rich is no fan of either George Bush, a man "not conversant with reality as most Americans had experienced it," or the Bush administration. In this blend of journalism and mentalits-style history—that is, the study of the mindsets that underlie and produce events—Rich looks closely and critically at the White House's greatest hits, from the 2001 defense of gas-guzzling as essential to the American way of life to "Heckuva job, Brownie" to the ongoing morass of Iraq. By Rich's account, of course, that parade of missteps is organic; Bush and company cannot help but err. In an effort to disguise that track record, the Republicans have exercised single-minded control of the grand narrative of the last five years, at least in part because they have exercised quasi-totalitarian control over the news media. (They are nearly forgotten already, but one needs to remember Judith Miller, Jeff Gannon, Karen Ryan and various columnists and commentators paid off to repeat the party line.) More>>>

Rove Tells of 'Shared Values' With Latinos - Los Angeles Times

2006-07-12T23:17:00.000-04:00

Rove Tells of 'Shared Values' With Latinos - Los Angeles Times - One gets the feeling that these vile, insidious slimeballs are approaching THEIR "end of days". Ya know!!!

Enron Witness Found Dead... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-12T23:06:00.000-04:00

Enron Witness Found Dead... The Huffington Post - I tell ya...Tom Clancy couldn't make up THIS stuff. I'll keep my conspiracy theories to myself on this one.

The BRAD BLOG : Former Bush-Appointed EAC Chair Decries Lack of Standards for Running Elections in the U.S.

2006-07-12T00:04:00.000-04:00

The BRAD BLOG : Former Bush-Appointed EAC Chair Decries Lack of Standards for Running Elections in the U.S.:

Says Little Interest in Washington for True Election Reform, Federal Agency Created after Florida 2000 Election 'Put Together With Spit'.

"We really had to put together a federal agency with spit," says Rev. DeForest Soaries in a great interview by Tim Dickinson for Rolling Stone exposing (again) the cruel federal hoax.

Soaries was the first chair of the Elections Assistance Commission (EAC) created by the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) in the wake of Florida 2000. He's a Republican and a Bush appointee. Apparently, one of the few honest ones left.

He resigned some time ago, apparently out of frustration with the EAC and the fact that the entire commission seems to be little more than a bad joke. More>>>

In Big Shift, U.S. to Follow Geneva Treaty for Detainees - New York Times

2006-07-11T23:12:00.000-04:00

In Big Shift, U.S. to Follow Geneva Treaty for Detainees - New York Times:

WASHINGTON, July 11 — The Bush administration called today for Congress to fix, rather than scrap, the system of military tribunals that was struck down by the Supreme Court last month, while the Pentagon pledged to treat detainees in accordance with the Geneva Conventions as the court required.

But a key Republican senator warned that the administration was risking a “long, hot summer’’ if it pushed Congress to retain the tribunal system for the suspects now held at the detention center in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, instead of working to adapt traditional military courts to meet the demands of the war on terror.

The new Pentagon policy, outlined in a memo released today, and the proposal for modifying military tribunals, outlined in testimony before a Senate panel, represent the administration’s most detailed response to the Supreme Court ruling so far. The court found that the tribunals were illegal, and contradicted President Bush’s assertion that terror suspects were not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions.

President Bush said last week that he “would comply’’ with the court’s ruling, but he has given no details of how he would do so.

The Pentagon memo, issued last Friday and released today, orders that all detainees be treated in compliance with what is known as Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, a passage that requires humane treatment and a minimum standard of judicial protections for prisoners.

More>>>

Courts, Congress, Allies Telling White House To Rethink War On Terror... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-11T16:01:00.000-04:00

Courts, Congress, Allies Telling White House To Rethink War On Terror... The Huffington Post:

Five years after the attacks on the United States, the Bush administration faces the prospect of reworking key elements of its anti-terrorism effort in light of challenges from the courts, Congress and European allies crucial to counterterrorism operations.

The Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee and other members of Congress have complained about not being briefed on classified surveillance programs and huge unprecedented databases used to monitor domestic and international phone calls, faxes, e-mails and bank transfers. More on this WAPO article here>>>

Violence Flares in Divided Baghdad

2006-07-10T21:43:00.000-04:00

Violence Flares in Divided Baghdad:
BAGHDAD, July 10 -- A barrage of bombings and gunfire killed at least 40 people in Iraq on Monday in a burst of sectarian warfare a day after Shiite Muslim militiamen terrorized a Sunni Arab neighborhood in Baghdad.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki called on Iraqis to "unite as brothers" and stop the cycle of retaliatory violence.

But the killings that started Sunday morning -- with mobs of gunmen pulling Sunnis out of their cars and storming their homes in the neighborhood of al-Jihad -- spread to Shiite enclaves in the capital and other cities across Iraq.

Many in Iraq expressed fear that the recent attacks were pushing the country past isolated killings into civil war.

Two car bombs exploded Monday morning on a commercial street in the Shiite slum of Sadr City in Baghdad in apparent retribution for the killings of Sunnis the day before. The two bombs, within 10 minutes of each other, crumbled buildings, killed 11 people and injured 17 others, Col. Sami Jasim of the Interior Ministry said. The second explosion was aimed at a police patrol, a frequent target of attacks in recent months. More>>>

PNAC 101- How We Got To This Point

2006-07-09T07:07:00.000-04:00

"We need to...challenge regimes hostile to our interests and values."

"We need to increase defense spending significantly if we are to carry out our global responsibilities today and modernize our armed forces for the future."

"It is important to shape circumstances before crises emerge."

"At present the United States faces no global rival. America’s grand
strategy should aim to preserve and extend this advantageous position as far
into the future as possible."

"American landpower is the essential link in the chain that translates U.S. military supremacy into American geopolitical preeminence.

"We cannot allow North Korea, Iran, Iraq or similar states to undermine American leadership."

"While the unresolved conflict with Iraq provides the immediate justification, the need for a substantial American force presence in the Gulf transcends the issue of the regime of Saddam Hussein."

"The Iraq map is not a map, it's a plan "There are several areas marked 'earmarked for production sharing' (look at the map legend), which means privatized oil fields. Iraq did not have privatized oil fields and production sharing agreements before the US took it over.

"There are also parcels marked on the Iraq oil field and exploration map (numbered 'Block 1' through '9'). Iraq did not have an active, privatized oil exploration program going on before it was conquered by the US.

"If you read the footnotes and entire contents of the other documents, there is a heavy emphasis on business concerns, such as contracts and vendors over items one might think would be more important in a government discussion, such as capacity, long term reserves, etc.

"One footnote (in UAEOilProj.pdf) even contains investment advice for the participants at the meeting, suggesting opportunities in downstream projects, such as power desalination and pipeline projects.

"These are not 'just maps'. Read them."

He told his aides to come up with plans for striking Iraq, even though Saddam wasn't linked to the attacks.

PNAC-James Woolsey, former CIA director, was dispatched to London to look for and 'firm up' evidence of Iraqi involvement in the 911 attacks.

PNAC-member and Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz was authorized to create the Office of Special plans.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/09/04/september11/main520830.shtml

"It is important to shape circumstances..........."- PNAC Statement of Principles

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?030512fa_fact

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/130534_focusecond13.html

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,126244,00.html

http://www.consumerpsychologist.com/#Perception

Anywhere you happen to be will work just fine. The American public deserves to know the TRUTH!

Neocon 101

2006-07-09T06:43:00.000-04:00

While discussing the Bush Administraion's foreign and domestic policies, I realized that many people had no clue as to what a Neocon is or even what PNAC is and how they connect. In my opinion if more people read and/or understood the PNAC document, written by staunch neocons, they would begin to "connect the dots" as it were, regarding the Bush administration and their policies.

The Christian Science Monitor online has an article called: Neocon 101 which answers some basic questions:

What do neoconservatives believe?
"Neocons" believe that the United States should not be ashamed to use its unrivaled power – forcefully if necessary – to promote its values around the world. Some even speak of the need to cultivate a US empire. Neoconservatives believe modern threats facing the US can no longer be reliably contained and therefore must be prevented, sometimes through preemptive military action. MORE>>>

What are the roots of neoconservative beliefs?
The original neocons were a small group of mostly Jewish liberal intellectuals who, in the 1960s and 70s, grew disenchanted with what they saw as the American left's social excesses and reluctance to spend adequately on defense. Many of these neocons worked in the 1970s for Democratic Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson, a staunch anti-communist. By the 1980s, most neocons had become Republicans, finding in President Ronald Reagan an avenue for their aggressive approach of confronting the Soviet Union with bold rhetoric and steep hikes in military spending. MORE>>>

How have neoconservatives influenced US foreign policy?
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 moved much of the Bush administration closer than ever to neoconservative foreign policy. Only days after 9/11, one of the top neoconservative think tanks in Washington, the Project for a New American Century, wrote an open letter to President Bush calling for regime change in Iraq. Before long, Bush, who campaigned in 2000 against nation building and excessive military intervention overseas, also began calling for regime change in Iraq. In a highly significant nod to neocon influence, Bush chose the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) as the venue for a key February 2003 speech in which he declared that a US victory in Iraq "could begin a new stage for Middle Eastern peace." AEI – the de facto headquarters for neconservative policy – had been calling for democratization of the Arab world for more than a decade. MORE>>>

Democracy in Chains

2006-07-08T18:05:00.000-04:00

Revisiting: Voting Rights Act Nailed To Burning Cross Greg Palast

(This article is reproduced in its entirety from The Guardian).

US Republicans are planning to change the law to stop black, Hispanic and Native American voters going to the polls in 2008.

Don't kid yourself: the Republican party's decision yesterday to "delay" the renewal of the Voting Rights Act has not a darn thing to do with objections of the Republican's white sheets caucus.

Complaints by a couple of good ol' boys to legislation have never stopped the GOP leadership from rolling over dissenters.

This is a strategic stall that is meant to decriminalise the Republican party's new game of challenging voters of colour by the hundreds of thousands.

In the 2004 presidential race, the GOP ran a massive, multi-state, multimillion-dollar operation to challenge the legitimacy of black, Hispanic and Native American voters. The methods used breached the Voting Rights Act, and while the Bush administration's civil rights division grinned and looked the other way, civil rights lawyers began circling, preparing to sue to stop the violations of the act before the 2008 race.

So Republicans have promised to no longer break the law - not by going legit but by eliminating the law.

The act was passed in 1965 after the Ku Klux Klan and other upright citizens found they could use procedural tricks - "literacy tests", poll taxes and more - to block citizens of colour from casting ballots.

Here is what happened in 2004, and what's in store for 2008.

In the 2004 election, more than 3 million voters were challenged at the polls. No one had seen anything like it since the era of Jim Crow and burning crosses. In 2004, voters were told their registrations had been purged or that their addresses were "suspect".

Denied the right to the regular voting booths, these challenged voters were given "provisional" ballots. More than 1m of these provisional ballots (1,090,729 of them) were tossed in the electoral dumpster uncounted.

A funny thing about those ballots: about 88% were cast by minority voters.

This isn't a number dropped on me from a black helicopter: they come from the raw data of the US election assistance commission in Washington DC.

At the heart of the GOP's mass challenge of voters was what the party's top brass called "caging lists" - secret files of hundreds of thousands of voters, almost every one from a black-majority voting precinct.

When our investigations team, working for BBC TV, got our hands on these confidential files in October 2004, the Republicans told us the voters listed were their potential "donors". Really? The sheets included pages of men from homeless shelters in Florida.

Donor lists, my ass. Every expert told us, these were "challenge lists" meant to stop these black voters from casting ballots.

When these "caged" voters arrived at the polls in November 2004, they found their registrations missing, their right to vote blocked or their absentee ballots rejected because their addresses were supposedly "fraudulent".

Why didn't the GOP honchos fess up to challenging these allegedly illegal voters? Because targeting voters of colour is against the law. The law in question is the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

The act says you can't go after groups of voters if you choose your targets based on race. Given that almost all the voters on the GOP hit list are black, the illegal racial profiling is beyond even Karl Rove's ability to come up with an alibi.

The Republicans target black folk not because they don't like the colour of their skin; they don't like the colour of their vote: Democrat. For that reason, the GOP included on its hit list Jewish retirement homes in Florida. Apparently, the GOP was also gunning for the Elderly of Zion.

These so-called "fraudulent" voters, in fact, were not fraudulent at all. Page after page, as we have previously reported, are black soldiers sent overseas. The Bush campaign used their absence from their US homes to accuse them of voting from false addresses.

Now that the GOP has been caught breaking the voting rights law, it has found a way to keep using its expensively obtained "caging" lists: let the law expire next year. If the Voting Rights Act dies in 2007, the 2008 race will be open season on dark-skinned voters. Only the renewal of the Voting Rights Act can prevent the planned racial wrecking of democracy.

Before the 2000 presidential ballot, then Jeb Bush purged thousands of Black citizens' registrations on the grounds that they were "felons" not entitled to vote. Our review of the files determined that the crime of most people on the list was nothing more than VWB -- Voting While Black.

That "felon scrub", as the state called it, had to be "pre-cleared" under the Voting Rights Act. That is, the US justice department must approve "scrubs" and other changes in procedures.

The Florida felon scrub slipped through this "pre-clearance" provision because Katherine Harris's assistant assured the government the scrub was just a clerical matter. Civil rights lawyers are now on the alert for such mendacity.

The burning cross caucus of the Republican Party is bitching that "pre-clearance" of voting changes applies only to southern states. I have to agree that singling out the old confederacy is a bit unfair. But the solution is not to smother the voting rights law but to spread its safeguards to all 50 of these United States.

Republicans argue that the racial voting games and the threats of the white-hooded Klansmen that kept African-Americans from the ballot box before the 1965 passage of the Voting Rights Act no longer threaten black voters.That's true. When I look over the "caging lists" and the "scrub sheets", it's clear to me that the GOP has traded in white sheets for spreadsheets.

Greg Palast:
Greg Palast is an investigator of corporate fraud and racketeering turned journalist. Tribune magazine called him “the most important investigative reporter of our time” and he is best known in his native USA for his investigative work on how thousands of black people were not able to vote in the Florida ballot at the 2000 election in which George Bush was elected president.

He has specialised in exposés on electoral manipulation, the “war on terror” and globalisation and, in the UK, his work has appeared in the Observer and on the BBC.

He wrote the New York Times bestseller The Best Democracy Money Can Buy, the academic book Democracy and Regulation and made the BBC documentary Bush Family Fortunes.
His latest book, Armed Madhouse, published by Penguin, is available now.

Judge issues restraining order Ga. ID Law

2006-07-08T17:20:00.000-04:00

I am a resident of Georgia and have been for the last eight years. So this story is of particular interest to me. Opponents of this law, including a Federal Judge in 2005 say that the law is equivalent to a "poll tax". Early this year, the Republican-led state Legislature amended it to provide the free IDs and make them available in every county. Of course THAT would eliminate the "poll tax" theory.

Supporters of the bill say the law is needed to prevent voter fraud. How ironic, since Georgia is one of the first states to completely use Diebold voting machines in the entire state! These machines have been tested and proven to be hackable, and yet Georgia's Secretary of State has maintained that they will be used. Coincendently the Secretary of State, Cathy Cox, is running for Governor while maintaining her SOS position! Hmmmm....

The Chicago Tribune Reports:

ATLANTA, GEORGIA -- With less than two weeks to go before the July 18 primary, a judge on Friday issued a restraining order blocking Georgia's voter ID law, saying that requiring photos as proof of identity is an unconstitutional burden.Superior Court Judge Melvin Westmoreland ruled that the legislature doesn't have the authority to enforce the law and an amendment to the state constitution would be required instead.

The law, he said, "unduly burdens the fundamental right to vote rather than regulate it."The law requires that every voter who casts a ballot in person provide a valid, government-issued photo ID. The state made such IDs available throughout the state. Former Georgia Gov. Roy Barnes, a Democrat, argued in court Thursday on behalf of two residents that the law would keep poor, elderly and minority voters from the polls. The 17 forms of identification that had been allowed in previous elections can be used for the primary, the judge ruled.

U.S. asks to exhume remains of Iraqi girl - Yahoo! News

2006-07-08T17:13:00.000-04:00

U.S. asks to exhume remains of Iraqi girl - Yahoo! News:

TIKRIT, Iraq - U.S. investigators have asked Iraqi authorities to help them navigate cultural sensitivities to exhume the body of a teenager allegedly raped and murdered with her family by American soldiers, a military official said Saturday.

U.S. Maj. Mark Wright said U.S. authorities are aware that Islamic tradition has strict rules governing exhumation and could require religious leaders to become involved in the investigation.

"You want to be aware of these cultural issues while at the same time making sure that the accused receives proper justice," Wright, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq told The Associated Press. More>>>

Iraqi PM To US: Keep Your "Reckless" Soldiers At Home... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-07T10:40:00.000-04:00

Iraqi PM To US: Keep Your "Reckless" Soldiers At Home... The Huffington Post:

Iraq's prime minister urged the U.S. military on Thursday to keep "reckless" troops from serving in Iraq in order to prevent abuses like the alleged rape and murder of a teenager and her family by U.S. soldiers in March.

Expanding on calls for an independent inquiry and a review of foreign troops' immunity from Iraqi law, Nuri al-Maliki said commanders should do a better job in preparing their soldiers. More>>>

"Large Numbers" Of Neo-Nazis And Skinhead Extremists Infiltrating Army... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-07T10:36:00.000-04:00

"Large Numbers" Of Neo-Nazis And Skinhead Extremists Infiltrating Army... The Huffington Post:

A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed "large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists" to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines. More>>>

Enron Founder Ken Lay Dies

2006-07-05T23:28:00.000-04:00

Death is better, a milder fate than tyranny. Aeschylus

By Shaheen Pasha, CNNMoney.com staff writer
July 5 2006: 6:39 PM EDT

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Kenneth Lay, who rose from a poor preacher's son to become a millionaire before being convicted of corporate fraud, died early Wednesday in Aspen, Colo., a family spokeswoman said.

Lay, 64, was awaiting sentencing after being found guilty of conspiracy and fraud in the Enron trial in May.

In a statement, spokeswoman Kelly Kimberly said, "The Lays have a very large family with whom they need to communicate, and out of respect for the family we will release further details at a later time."

"Apparently, his heart simply gave out," said Lay's pastor, Dr. Steve Wende of Houston's First United Methodist Church. More>>>

C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden - New York Times

2006-07-04T12:13:00.000-04:00

C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden - New York Times

Well, I guess its like President Bush said: "I don't know where he (Bin Laden) is, and frankly I don't worry that much about him."

The NY Times reports this:

WASHINGTON, July 3 — The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday.
The unit, known as Alec Station, was disbanded late last year and its analysts reassigned within the C.I.A. Counterterrorist Center, the officials said.
The decision is a milestone for the agency, which formed the unit before Osama bin Laden became a household name and bolstered its ranks after the Sept. 11 attacks, when President Bush pledged to bring Mr. bin Laden to justice "dead or alive."

The realignment reflects a view that Al Qaeda is no longer as hierarchical as it once was, intelligence officials said, and a growing concern about Qaeda-inspired groups that have begun carrying out attacks independent of Mr. bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri.

Agency officials said that tracking Mr. bin Laden and his deputies remained a high priority, and that the decision to disband the unit was not a sign that the effort had slackened. Instead, the officials said, it reflects a belief that the agency can better deal with high-level threats by focusing on regional trends rather than on specific organizations or individuals. More>>>

Air Force Pours $450,000 Into Three-Year Study Of Blogs... | The Huffington Post

2006-07-02T17:21:00.000-04:00

Air Force Pours $450,000 Into Three-Year Study Of Blogs... The Huffington Post: "Air Force Pours $450,000 Into Three-Year Study Of Blogs... "

In an effort to fight the war on terror, the Air Force is putting up $450,000 for a three year study of...blogs. One scientist involved in the project is already proving, with this revelation, that he is worth the money:
"Blog entries have a different structure," Ulicny said. "They are typically short and are about something external to the blog posting itself, such as a news event. It's not uncommon for a blogger to simply state, 'I can't believe this happened,' and then link to a news story."

Is this for real? I can think of a lot more effective and beneficial ways to spend our tax dollars. Here is the actual Department Of Defense Website about this story: Blogs Study May Provide Credible Information

The North American Union..."NAFTA on Steroids" says Lou Dobbs

2006-07-01T15:11:00.000-04:00

From Info Wars: On July 29, 2005, President Bush signed a bill which permits and promotes the charging of tolls on existing and planned interstate highways, bridges, and tunnels. Before the passage of the bill, known as SAFETEA-LU, or “Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users”, it was generally illegal to charge tolls on roads built with Federal funds. What’s more, the tolls collected will be automatic, requiring universally compatible toll transponder tags on every vehicle. More>>>

Lou Dobbs reported on this significant new legislation a few days ago:

BuzzFlash Editorial: Darkness at Noon for Democracy

2006-07-01T01:55:00.000-04:00

This BuzzFlash editorial is a hard hitting indictment on the Bush presidency. Too bad Bush will probably never see it. He and Cheney need a reality check.

BuzzFlash Editorial: Darkness at Noon for Democracy

Ideology doesn't matter.

You are a tyrannical thug whether you are Joseph Stalin, Benito Mussolini, or Francisco Franco.
And Cheney and his Puppet Bush are thugs in that infamous tradition.

People who are utter failures in executing policy often rise to power because they are experts at brutally seizing power and silencing dissent. It is the law of the political jungle. Kill off dissent -- and no one can expose your wretched failures.

Democrats on the Hill who still harbor an idea that what is going on is about an alleged "war on terrorism" or fight for liberty or "victory" in Iraq are in need of a new prescription for their glasses.

This is a about the raw, ruthless seizure of power and the machineries of state by one radical faction within a democracy.

And that radical faction has as one of its major goals the elimination of democracy.
Sure, they mouth platitudes about the glories of the homeland, as Hitler did. But take the Holocaust away from the history of the Third Reich and tell us, honestly, if you think the Busheviks are headed in a different direction? More>>>

Olbermann Slams O'Reilly: "Your Ratings Whoopin' Stick Is Now Smaller Than Your...Falafel"...

2006-06-29T23:57:00.000-04:00

I will always believe that Keith Olbermann is one of the best anchors on cable news TV. The man speaks his mind and thats refreshing in an era of sychophants for the Bush administration and "news models" who don't have a clue.

Take for example this clip which skewers Bill O' Reilly about his Fox news ratings. Or even this one which exposes the wingnuts attempt to swift boat John Murtha.

My favorite is Olbermann's analysis of the neocon attack on the New York Times. They claim that the NYT revealed classified information about a secret banking program the government has been using to track terrorists. The problem, as Olbermann shows, is that this program is public knowledge. There is even a website that explains the entire program.

Watch out wingnuts. KO is knocking out all the right wing talking points, one by one. Gotta love this guy!!

L.A. 9/11 Truth Conference Gets Fair Media Play

2006-06-28T23:05:00.000-04:00

There seems to be a turning tide in terms of the information that is finally being reported by Mainstream Media. Between Catherine Crier and Lou Dobbs reporting on voter fraud and irregularities, and now C-Span possibly broadcasting a 9/11 Truth Movement event, wow!

Maybe the Bush Crime Family and it's sychophant congress will finally be exposed before the 2008 election! Dare I dream?

Reuters:
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - They wore T-shirts asking "What Really Happened?," snapped up DVDs titled "9/11; The Great Illusion," and cheered as physicists, philosophers and terrorism experts decried the official version of the Sept. 11 attacks that shook America to its core.
Some 1,200 people gathered at a Los Angeles hotel on the weekend for what organizers billed as the largest conference on the plethora of conspiracy theories that see the 2001 attacks on Washington and New York as, at best, official negligence, and at worst an orchestrated U.S. attempt to incite world war.

"There are so many prominent people who are incredibly well-respected who have stated that the evidence is overwhelming that 9/11 was an inside job," syndicated radio talk show host Alex Jones told a news conference.

"There are hundreds of smoking guns that people need to be made aware of," said Jones, calling for the impeachment of President George W. Bush and charging that mainstream media had been slow to cover the growing movement of 9/11 skeptics. More>>>

Man behind anti-Clinton Ad Convicted of Child Molestation Charges

2006-06-28T13:54:00.000-04:00

CNN reports:

EDINBURG, Texas (AP) -- A political consultant whose company was behind a television ad accusing the Clinton-Gore administration of giving away nuclear technology was convicted of child molestation charges.

The sentencing phase of the trial was scheduled to begin Wednesday. Cramer faces up to 149 years in prison.

Cramer gained national attention during the 2000 presidential election when his company created the ad that accused the administration of giving nuclear technology to China in exchange for campaign contributions. More>>>

Well this is just one more notch in the GOP Crime Family Crime Spree. Talking Points Memo has a section called Grand Ole Docket. It lists the NUMEROUS people who call themselves members of the GOP that have been arrested, indicted or convicted of various crimes from perverted sex crimes to bribes and possibly worse.

Here is a list from TPM:

Jack Abramhoff - Pled Guilty - Sentenced to Minimum of 5 Years, 10 Months

Claude Allen - Arrested for Theft - Trial Date Set for June 30th

Gus Boulis Murder Trio - Indicted - No Further Court Dates Scheduled

Ed Buckham - Named by Prosecutors as Unindicted Coconspirator

Duke Cunningham - Pled Guilty - Sentenced to 8 years, 4 months incarceration

Tom DeLay - Indicted - Trial Pending Appeals Decision

Brian J. Doyle - Arrested - Status Hearing August 8

Ed Buckham - Named by Prosecutors as Unindicted Coconspirator

John Colyandro - Indicted - Trial Pending Appeals Decision

Jim Ellis - Indicted - Trial Pending Appeals Decision

Robert Fromm - Named by Prosecutors as Unindicted Coconspirator

Vernon Jackson - Pled Guilty - To Be Sentenced July 27th

Scooter Libby - Indicted - Trial Set To Begin January 8th, 2007

Chuck McGee - Pled Guilty - Time Served

John T. Michael - Named by Prosecutors as Unindicted Coconspirator

Bob Ney - Named by Prosecutors as Unindicted Coconspirator

David Safavian - Convicted - To Be Sentenced October 12

This is a partial list. Visit TPM's GOP Docket for complete list.

Quotes On Liberalism

2006-06-28T01:49:00.000-04:00

Most of the following quotes come from Liberal Forum. I was on that site trying to nominate my blog as "one of the most liberal blogs" on the net, and ran across these quotes. The first one is my absolute favorite:

Somebody came along and said 'liberal' means 'soft on crime, soft on drugs, soft on defense and we're gonna tax you back to the Stone Age because people shouldn't have to go to work if they don't want to. And instead of saying, 'Well, excuse me, you right-wing, reactionary, xenophobic, homophobic, anti-education, anti-choice, pro-gun, Leave it to Beaver trip back to the '50s, we cowered in the corner and said, 'Please don't hurt me.' The West Wing

Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives. John Stuart Mill

Of all the varieties of virtues, liberalism is the most beloved. Aristotle

Liberalism is, I think, resurgent. One reason is that more and more people are so painfully aware of the alternative. The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. John Kenneth Galbraith

Liberalism is trust of the people, tempered by prudence; conservatism, distrust of the people, tempered by fear. William Gladstone

A liberal is a man or a woman or a child who looks forward to a better day, a more tranquil night, and a bright, infinite future. Leonard Bernstein

VIDEO: Sen. Levin and Fox Anchor in On-Air Scuffle Over Iraq Plan

2006-06-27T13:45:00.000-04:00

I love this video from Think Progress.

It seems Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) made an appearance on Faux News' Fox and Friends and pummled the anchor Brian Kilmeade.

The exchange took place during a discussion about the criticism that Dems are recieving over the issue of withdrawal of our troops from Iraq. Levin spoke of the similarity between the Dem proposal and that of General Casey.

Take a look HERE

Buffett calls for retention of estate tax - Yahoo! News

2006-06-26T20:11:00.000-04:00

Buffett calls for retention of estate tax - Yahoo! News - Warren Buffet is the second richest man on the planet. (Bill Gates is the first.) He suprised a lot of people when he decided to donate $30 Billion of his $44 Billion fortune to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. He will be donating another $6.4 Billion to other foundations on behalf of his late wife and their children.

I am certain that if there is a heaven, this man will definately be there because of his philanthropy and his benevelont spirit. If only we had some people in Congress and the Senate that could be as pure in heart and spirit as this man. What a different world we'd be living in right now.

Buffet spoke about Congress retaining the estate tax. I, personally have never seen a person so rich be so generous. Not only that, Buffet made this profound statement about the estate tax:

"It's a very equitable tax," Buffett said. "It's in keeping with the idea of equality of opportunity in this country, not giving incredible head starts to certain people who were very selective about the womb from which they emerged." More here>>> And here>>>

AlterNet: GOP Kills Bill to Police Halliburton

2006-06-24T15:54:00.000-04:00

AlterNet: GOP Kills Bill to Police Halliburton: "GOP Kills Bill to Police Halliburton"

Republicans in Congress have made it clear they're willing to fight for
military contractors' right to lie, cheat and defraud taxpayers.
I suppose it's old news at this point that the Bush administration lied us into the Iraq war, and that the cost of this mess will be fully realized by the next generation when Bush leaves office with the biggest budget deficit in U.S. history.
And, while Democrats have been complaining for years about the GOP-led Congress abandoning its oversight of the executive branch's wrongdoing, a vote that took place in the Senate last week shows how the Republican desire to ignore fraud and abuse extends right into killing legislation that would help stop defense contractors from ripping off the American people.
In an effort to stop companies like Halliburton and its subsidiaries from cheating our troops and stealing from Americans, Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., introduced S.AMDT.4230 and attached it to the Defense Authorization bill currently being debated in the Senate. The bill was intended to improve contracting "by eliminating fraud and abuse and improving competition in contracting and procurement." More>>>

Think Progress

2006-06-24T15:47:00.000-04:00

Think Progress: "Bolton Attacks U.N. Human Rights Official For Criticizing Flawed Administration Policies "

Yesterday, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Louise Arbour sharply criticized some of the tactics being employed in the war on terror, reminding all nations — including the United States — that they are constrained by an “absolute ban on torture and the right to a fair trial.” She added, “It is vital that at all times Governments anchor in law their response to terrorism.”
U.S. Ambassador John Bolton immediately slammed Arbour’s “misplaced priorities“:
For all the human rights problems in the world in places like North Korea and Iran and so on, to go after the United States and Israel — it is business as usual from the U.N. human rights machinery.

But just a month earlier, Bolton’s own deputy stated that the “U.N. human rights machinery” exists to inform all member states — including the U.S. — of their international duties and obligations:

The human rights machinery of the United Nations exists to assist UN Member States to meet their international obligations. Reflecting our strong support for human rights, the United States places a great deal of importance on the effective and efficient functioning of human rights bodies. … The United States holds the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in high regard and believes it has the potential to make even greater contributions to the protection of human rights around the world.

Bolton has once again shown he is willing to throw international cooperation by the wayside and employ double standards in order to defend flawed Bush administration policies.

CIA program expands Bush's power

2006-06-23T23:37:00.000-04:00

The madness of "King" George?

AP:
Bush has made broad use of his powers, authorizing warrantless wiretaps, possibly collecting telephone records on millions of Americans, holding suspected terrorists overseas without legal protections and using up to 6,000 National Guard members to help patrol the border with Mexico.

That's in addition to the vast anti-terrorism powers Congress granted him in the recently extended Patriot Act.

Civil liberties activists, joined by congressional Democrats and some members of Bush's own party, suggest the president has pushed the envelope too far — usurping authority from Congress and abusing individual privacy rights in the process. More>>>

VOTING RIGHTS ACT NAILED TO BURNING CROSS

2006-06-22T16:02:00.000-04:00

Whats foremost on my mind right now is the revelation by Palast and RFK, Jr. about the voting disenfranchisement of mostly African Americans in those swing states like Florida and Ohio.

To add insult to injury, I am now reading that the Republican side of the House is stalling on the extension of the Voting Rights Act because it objects to the the fact that the civil rights measure unfairly singled out Southern states and unnecessarily required ballots to be printed in foreign languages.

When did this country revert back to DE JURE and DE FACTO racism and xenophobia? I have no doubt that the Kristian Konservative Koalition is behind this.

Greg Palast:
Complaints by a couple of good old boys to legislation has never stopped the GOP leadership from rolling over dissenters.

Don’t kid yourself. The Republican Party’s decision to “delay” the renewal of the Voting Rights Act has not a darn thing to do with local objections of the Republican’s White Sheets Caucus.
This is a strategic stall — meant to allow certain states to slip into place new suspect voting machines, new suspect rules and new suspect ballot procedures for 2008 which would never get past the Voting Rights Act’s “pre-clearance” provisions.

The fix for ‘08 is ready to roll but this law is in the way. So the party of DeLay is killing it with “delay.”

Tom Paine:
What’s a bigger problem with American elections: disenfranchisment of minority voters or new electronic voting machines stealing votes?

Most people on the political left will answer electronic machines. But on Wednesday, House Republicans showed America exactly why old-school election thuggery is a far more pressing problem. In fact, it was Jim Crow tactics, not computer hacking, which gave George W. Bush his Ohio victory in 2004. And such tactics are exactly what a handful of southern GOP congressmen defended on Wednesday when they derailed renewing the National Voting Rights Act, complaining it does not end federal oversight of elections in their states and requires multilingual ballots. More>>>

People For The American Way:
A new voter suppression tactic has surfaced in Ohio. We must take action! This time, Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has implemented new rules making some legitimate voter registration activities punishable as crimes and severely restricting the ability of non-partisan civic participation organizations to register voters in historically disenfranchised communities. The new rules place hurdles in the way of any compensated voter registration workers returning voter registrations they collect to the organization sponsoring the voter registration drive - making it exceedingly difficult for organizations to keep the records necessary to follow up later to make sure these potential new voters actually make it onto the rolls. The Ohio Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review (JCARR) has the opportunity to reject these changes at its meting on June 26. Send them, and Secretary of State Blackwell, an email telling them to remove these roadblocks to democratic participation. Click this link to take action now!!

WWJD?

2006-06-21T21:06:00.000-04:00

The creator of this HuffPo Contagious Festival Film is 15 years old girl from Alabama, Ava Lowery.

Mia Culpa:

She calls herself a peace activist, and for the past year, she’s been producing her own short animations on her website, peacetakescourage.com. All in all, she’s made about seventy of them, she says, and most of them oppose Bush and his Iraq War.“I was just so mad about it,” she explains. “And the media are not showing the real images of the war, so I did a lot research and started my own website.”She submitted one of her latest creations, “WWJD,” to the monthly “contagious” contest that huffingtonpost.com is running. (It’s an open contest that ranks the number of viewers for each submission.) More>>>

Ava has gotten death threats for telling the TRUTH. It's amazing that so called Right Wing Christian Conservatives are threatening this child for telling the truth!

Here are ALL of her videos submitted to Contagious Festival.

Life in Iraq - From The Embassy - A Grim View

2006-06-19T14:10:00.000-04:00

The Washington Post Reports:

Hours before President Bush left on a surprise trip last Monday to the Green Zone in Baghdad for an upbeat assessment of the situation there, the U.S. Embassy in Iraq painted a starkly different portrait of increasing danger and hardship faced by its Iraqi employees. This cable, marked "sensitive" and obtained by The Washington Post, outlines in spare prose the daily-worsening conditions for those who live outside the heavily guarded international zone: harassment, threats and the employees' constant fears that their neighbors will discover they work for the U.S. government.

Compare Bush's View of Iraq to This Memo recieved by The Washington Post from Ambassador Khalilzad to The President's "rose garden view" of Iraq. Amazing! I wonder what color is the sun on Bush's planet?

Barack Obama: The End Of Small Politics

2006-06-19T13:34:00.000-04:00

Barak Obama has the spotlight on him on once again. Not since his 2004 Democratic National Convention Speech, has Obama been mentioned in a positive light. His speech at the "Take Back America" conference has made people seriously talk about Obama as a viable candidate in 2008. Here is the speech he made. See for yourself why folks want Obama to consider running:

The War On Terror Is Failing...

2006-06-19T13:08:00.000-04:00

I've oftened wondered about making war on a "concept". I mean after all, "the war on terror" is intangible, therefore, the war can be used in its perpetual context to perpatrate some of the most heinous constitutional infringements upon American citizens.

The following is excerpted from the Toronto Star:

Washington is failing to make progress in the global war on terror and the next 9/11-style attack is not a question of if, but when. That is the scathing conclusion of a survey of 100 leading American foreign-policy analysts.

In its first "Terrorism Index," released yesterday, the influential journal Foreign Policy found surprising consensus among the bipartisan experts.

Some 86 per cent of them said the world has grown more, not less, dangerous, despite President George W. Bush's claims that the U.S. is winning the war on terror.

The main reasons for the decline in security, they said, were the war in Iraq, the detention of terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay, U.S. policy towards Iran and U.S. energy policy.

The survey's participants included an ex-secretary of state and former heads of the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, along with prominent members of the U.S. foreign-policy establishment.

The majority served in previous administrations or in senior military ranks.

"When you strip away the politics, the experts, almost to a person, are very worried about the administration," says Joe Cirincione, vice-president of the Center for American Progress, the Washington think-tank which co-sponsored the survey.

"They think none of our front-line institutions is doing a good job and that Iraq has made the terror situation much worse."

The findings will be picked up immediately by politicians and policy-makers, he adds: "Just about any one of these people saying this would make news. When the opinions come together, it really carries weight."

Almost 80 per cent of the analysts said widespread rejection of radical Islamic ideologies is crucial if terrorism is to be eradicated, but that goal requires "a much higher emphasis on its non-military tools."

Across the board, they rated Washington's diplomatic efforts as abysmal, with a median score of 1.8 out of 10.

62% of those polled identify Saudi Arabia as the premier incubator for terrorists

More than two-thirds said the United Nations and other multilateral institutions must be strengthened.

In the survey's accompanying report, Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, said policy analysts have never been in such agreement.

"The reason is that it's clear to nearly all that Bush and his team have had a totally unrealistic view of what they can accomplish with military force and threats of force."

Some 82 per cent of participants said a pressing priority for the U.S. is to end its dependence on foreign oil.
"We borrow a billion dollars every working day to import oil, an increasing share of it coming from the Middle East," commented former CIA director James Woolsey.
"In Saudi Arabia, billions are transferred to the Wahhabis and like-minded groups who then indoctrinate young people to hate Shiites, Sufis, Jews, Christians and democracy, and to oppress women horribly."
The analysts were also highly critical of the U.S.'s intelligence and national-security apparatus.

The Department of Homeland Security, created in the aftermath of 9/11, was rated for effectiveness at only 2.9 out of 10. Changes in the intelligence structure were assessed at "poor to fair," with one participant noting that reform "in most cases has produced new levels of bureaucracy in an already overly bureaucratic system."

Almost 62 per cent identified Saudi Arabia as the premier incubator for terrorists.
It has helped halt the flow of money to terrorist networks and now has 30,000 troops guarding its oil fields, but Saudi leaders have been slow to move against extremist elements inside the country, says the report.
Asked what presents the single greatest danger to American security, nearly half the analysts said loose nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction. Only 4 per cent said Iran.
Cirincione says the fact that so few experts think Iran is a threat and so many regard Iraq as a mistake "turns the administration's policies on their head."

Thomas Slams WH Press: "I Ask Myself Every Day Why The Media Have Become So Complacent, Complicit And Gullible"...

2006-06-19T12:27:00.000-04:00

Helen Thomas has been a White House reporter for decades. She has seen it all...from JFK to King George. Her book, Watchdogs of Democracy? which comes out this week, claims that the White House Press Corps in particular and Mainstream Media in general never asked the tough questions regarding the Bush Administration for fear of being called unpatriotic or UnAmerican. Thomas says that only after Katrina, did the White House Press Corps become somewhat more courageous in asking "tough questions". I happen to agree with her. Katrina was in fact the turning point for the media.

USA Today has a report here on Ms. Thomas' book. I predict it will do very well in sales making the NY Times bestseller list.

Murtha Calls Out Karl Rove on MTP

2006-06-18T18:56:00.000-04:00

Congressman Murtha, once again speaks truth to power on Meet The Press, today.

MURTHA: He's in New Hampshire. He's making a political speech. He’s sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside-saying stay the course. That’s not a plan! We've got to change direction. You can't sit there in the air-conditioned office and tell troops carrying seventy pounds on their backs, inside these armored vessels-hit with IED's every day-seeing their friends blown up-their buddies blown up-and he says stay the course? Easy to say that from Washington, DC.

Here's the link to the video.

Center Square | The real coward

2006-06-18T18:44:00.000-04:00

It's very rare that we see mainstream media writing anything negative about Karl Rove. So imagine my suprise when I read this article in the Philadelphia Inquirer today:

By Chris Satullo
Inquirer Columnist

The only bullets Karl Rove has ever dodged were legal.
Last week, after learning he would avoid indictment for his role in the sliming of an Iraq war critic, Rove had this to say about two men who risked death in service of country, John Murtha and John Kerry:
"Like too many Democrats, it strikes me that they are ready to give the green light to go to war, but when it gets tough and when it gets difficult they fall back on that party's pattern of cutting and running."

In any sentence with the names Kerry, Murtha and Rove, there is only one possible coward. It's not the Pennsylvania congressman nor the Massachusetts senator.

The only combat for which Rove ever volunteered was political. In that realm, he's mastered the coward's way, the sly attack from the hidden place, the anonymous flier full of innuendo, the invective by surrogates, the timely leak to the friendly writer. The shiv goes in the back, but the fingerprints are smudged.

Sadly, it works. So it gets rewarded and imitated.

Jack Murtha, by contrast, served 37 years in the Marines and volunteered for duty in Vietnam. When he expresses despair over Iraq, he speaks for many fine warriors who have his ear. John Kerry also faced enemy fire in Vietnam. Despite the fierce efforts of Rove surrogates to defame his service, he remains the winner of five combat medals.

You want to call Murtha and Kerry "cut and run" cowards? Go to the Hill and do it to their face. Don't do it only at Republican fund-raisers.

By most accounts, Karl Rove is a friendly, hardworking, brilliant fellow. No doubt, in his mind he is a patriot trying to serve his country.

But much of what he's done while serving the genial bully whom he made into a president has been a disaster.

It was Rove whose political strategy led President Bush to fritter away the national unity forged by the grief of 9/11, turning the phrase war on terror into a partisan club. It was Rove who masterminded the selling of the Iraq invasion to the American people on false pretenses and a politicized timetable. It was Rove who pressed for the tax cuts that looted the nation's treasury in a time of war.

Now he's back at it. His prints are all over the "war on terror" resolution the House debated last week. Its bland language isn't meant to spur the full, fair, anguished debate on this war that Congress has never had. It's a campaign tool that seeks to frame a complex issue as: "Do you agree with everything President Bush does, or are you an unpatriotic fool putting our soldiers at risk?"

In other words, Rove once again uses America's brave and honorable warriors as a shield. He urges his political clients to cower behind that cover, to avoid the voters' wrath that their incompetence and greed have earned them.

In other words, a textbook example of cowardice. More>>>

Thefts of Sept. 11 Donations and Artifacts Go Unpunished

2006-06-16T17:13:00.000-04:00

I believe it was Justice Louis Brandeis who once said: Crime is contagious....if the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for the law.

Indeed the government (Executive and Legislative branches in particular) have become so corrupt that politicians and lobbyists breaking the law is merely par for the course these days.

This story is old news to the blogosphere, but it has come up again and I wanted to post it here:
The General Accounting Office reported in 2003 that the FBI stole artifacts from the 9/11 site and that in fact it was reported by Capitol Hill Blue back in March of 2004 that: The Justice Department investigation that criticized FBI agents for taking souvenirs from the World Trade Center site also found that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and a high-ranking FBI official kept items from the Sept. 11 attack scenes.

The Seattle Times writes that a disaster relief company that took supplies that were supposed to go to Sept. 11 rescuers at the World Trade Center escaped punishment after the government discovered its own employees had stolen artifacts from ground zero, once-secret federal documents show.

Kieger Enterprises (KEI) of Lino Lakes, Minn., managed a Long Island warehouse for the government that was filled with supplies donated by Americans for the rescue workers.

The FBI developed evidence from whistleblowers that the company had dispatched trucks to the warehouse and loaded hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of donated bottled water, clothes, tools and generators to be moved to Minnesota in a plot to sell some for profit, the records show.

Dan L'Allier, a Kieger supervisor at the time, told The Associated Press he witnessed 45 tons of the New York loot being unloaded in Minnesota at his company's headquarters. He and a colleague, Chris Christopherson, complained to a company executive but were ordered to keep quiet.

They went instead to the FBI. The two whistleblowers eventually lost their jobs, received death threats and were blackballed in the disaster relief industry. But they remained convinced their sacrifice was worth it to make sure justice was done.

They were wrong.

Federal prosecutors eventually charged KEI and some executives with fraud for overbilling the government in several disasters, but excluded the Sept. 11 thefts. The company has gone out of business.

As a result, most Americans were kept in the dark for years about the fate of their donated goods, even as new requests for charity emerged for disasters like Hurricane Katrina. And Christopherson and L'Allier were left disillusioned.

"I wouldn't open my mouth again for all the tea in China," L'Allier said. Added Christopherson, a 34-year-old father of two: "It's not worth blowing the whistle unless you don't have anything to lose."

The government ultimately gave the whistleblowers $30,000 each after expenses, their share in a civil settlement against KEI. They say the sum was hardly worth their trouble.
"We all experienced the death threats," L'Allier said. "We all experienced the phone ringing at three in the morning and no one being there. I'd come home and the house would be wide open."
Christopherson recalled receiving boxes of white T-shirts stolen from the Long Island warehouse, sent back to him after KEI had embossed a Sept. 11 logo on the front. He was instructed by his boss to sell them to firefighters, police and volunteers for $12 apiece. He refused.

KEI had worked for years for the government, providing disaster relief services during tornadoes, floods and other catastrophes. It was picked to manage the New York warehouse for the government's main Sept. 11 relief contractor.

Officially, the government can't fully explain why the company wasn't charged with Sept. 11 thefts. More>>>

Latest Ann Coulter Outrage: On Fragging John Murtha

2006-06-16T13:43:00.000-04:00

I've already mentioned my disdain for Ann Coulter and her psychopathic ramblings about liberals, dems and the 9/11 Widows. Now she has targeted Representative John Murtha.

The woman has been given carte blanche to spew her vitriolic hatred on TV by NBC, Fox "News" and others. No elected official in the Republican Party has condemened this woman's hate and venomous rhetoric. Not One! Lets remember that when the mid-term elections come around this fall.

In an interview at a right-wing news site, Coulter actually suggests (in so many words) that Murtha be murdered!! Here is the article about Coulter as it appeared in Editor & Publisher, yesterday:

NEW YORK With the brief debate over Iraq in Congress producing such acrimony this week that one congressman suggested opponents of the war support al-Qaeda, it should come as no surprise that columnist and author Ann Coulter would top them all. In an email interview with John Hawkins at the Right Wing News web site, Coulter was asked, among other things, to offer short comments on several individuals. After harmlessly dismissing former Ambassador Joseph Wilson as the "World's most intensely private exhibitionist," she said of Rep. John Murtha, the hawkish ex-Marine and now antiwar congressman: "The reason soldiers invented 'fragging.'" Fragging, which became a well-known expression --and occurence -- during the Vietnam war, means soldiers attempting to kill their own officers for one reason or another. This was so over the top that conservative Mike Krempasky at RedState.org posted, "I've said before that's its kind of ironic that just about every phrase Stewie from Family Guy uses to describe Lois could easily be applied to Ann Coulter. Well - once again, Ann proves us right." He went on to call her "fragging" remark absolutely "disgusting....there's no excuse - NONE - for the allusion to soldiers who kill other soldiers. It's despicable - and frankly, so is Coulter."Coulter's column is syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate. On its home page, Universal hails her "witty, no-holds-barred commentaries on the Washington scene. She tackles the hot issues with fervor and stands up for the things that she believes in."

Another Bush Faux Pas

2006-06-14T21:21:00.000-04:00

After five years I shouldn't be suprised at anything our President does to embarass himself in front of the entire world. THIS time, while holding a press conference in the Rose Garden after his "sneek and peek" trip to Iraq, President Bush called on reporter Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times.

Bush has a way of bantering with the press, so when Peter asked a question about Karl Rove, the President asked him if he was going to ask his question with his shades on. Here is the transcript of that exchange and what followed:

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, Peter. Are you going to ask that question with shades on?

Q I can take them off.

THE PRESIDENT: I’m interested in the shade look, seriously.

Q All right, I’ll keep it, then.

THE PRESIDENT: For the viewers, there’s no sun. (Laughter.)

Q I guess it depends on your perspective. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: Touche. (Laughter.)Q Following up on the other Peter’s question about Karl Rove…

To the President's credit, he DID apologize later, once he learned that Wallsten has Stargardt’s disease, a form of macular degeneration that causes progressive vision loss.

There is a school of thought out there, like here, that thinks President Bush should not joke around with reporters as much as he does. Perhaps this event will cause him to ponder the wisdom of joking with the press so much.

MySpace as NSA database

2006-06-12T22:57:00.000-04:00

Since when did United States citizens become the "terrorists" in the "War on Terror"? It seems now that Poindexter's "Information Awareness is in fact alive and well as I mentioned in an earlier post last month. Now the NSA is data mining "MySpace" and other social networking type sites to gather information about its users, reports the New Scientist.

"I AM continually shocked and appalled at the details people voluntarily post online about themselves." So says Jon Callas, chief security officer at PGP, a Silicon Valley-based maker of encryption software. He is far from alone in noticing that fast-growing social networking websites such as MySpace and Friendster are a snoop's dream.

New Scientist has discovered that Pentagon's National Security Agency, which specialises in eavesdropping and code-breaking, is funding research into the mass harvesting of the information that people post about themselves on social networks. And it could harness advances in internet technology - specifically the forthcoming "semantic web" championed by the web standards organisation W3C - to combine data from social networking websites with details such as banking, retail and property records, allowing the NSA to build extensive, all-embracing personal profiles of individuals.

Americans are still reeling from last month's revelations that the NSA has been logging phone calls since the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. The Congressional Research Service, which advises the US legislature, says phone companies that surrendered call records may have acted illegally. However, the White House insists that the terrorist threat makes existing wire-tapping legislation out of date and is urging Congress not to investigate the NSA's action. More>>>

Blogger having grahic upload capability issues...

2006-06-12T16:29:00.000-04:00

From time to time I like to have graphics accompany my posts. However, for the past few days Blogger has been having technical issues with graphic uploads. Hence, my rather "empty" looking posts. Hopefully it will be resolved soon.

NY Times Columnist: Kerry Won Ohio...

2006-06-12T15:37:00.000-04:00

We in the progressive blogosphere already knew this, but for a columnist (Bob Herbert) in a MAJOR newspaper like the NY Times to write an op-ed article that says "Kerry almost surely won Ohio..." thats pretty big. The article is in the subscription based NY Times Select section, and therefore not available to the general reader.

Excerpts from Herbert's Op-Ed, Those Pesky Voters - thanks to Raw Story:

Republicans, and even a surprising number of Democrats, have been anxious to leave the 2004 Ohio election debacle behind. But Kennedy, in his long, heavily footnoted article ("Was the 2004 Election Stolen?"), leaves no doubt that the democratic process was trampled and left for dead in the Buckeye State. Kerry almost certainly would have won Ohio if all of his votes had been counted, and if all of the eligible voters who tried to vote for him had been allowed to cast their ballots.

.....

No one has been able to prove that the election in Ohio was hijacked. But whenever it is closely scrutinized, the range of problems and dirty tricks that come to light is shocking. What's not shocking, of course, is that every glitch and every foul-up in Ohio, every arbitrary new rule and regulation, somehow favored Bush.

.....

Walter Mebane Jr., a professor of government at Cornell University, did a statistical analysis of the vote in Franklin County, which includes the city of Columbus. He told Kennedy, "The allocation of voting machines in Franklin County was clearly biased against voters in precincts with high proportions of African-Americans."

Mebane told me that he compared the distribution of voting machines in Ohio's 2004 presidential election with the distribution of machines for a primary election held the previous spring. For the primary, he said, "There was no sign of racial bias in the distribution of the machines." But for the general election in November, "there was substantial bias, with fewer voting machines per voter in areas that were heavily African-American."

TIMES SELECT SUBSCRIBERS CAN READ FULL OP-ED HERE

Hat Tip Raw Story

Senate Seeks To Pardon Bush For Past Crimes - How Absurd!

2006-06-10T14:49:00.000-04:00

Why is Congress and the Senate giving George W. Bush absolute power? The concept of the legislative branch of government as envisoned by the framers of the constitution, was to make sure that the executive branch could have oversight over illegal or questionable policies. However, THIS Congress seems hell bent on giving up all of their oversight credentials that would insure a "balance of power". It seems they would rather play the lobbying game of "quid pro quo" for millions in ill gotten cash than to do the job they were elected to do as overseers of the executive branch.

Glenn Greenwald (author of "How Would A Patriot Act") speaks to this issue in his blog, Unclaimed Territory:

A new low -- the Senate seeks to "pardon" the President for past lawbreaking
by Glenn Greenwald

Observing and commenting on the behavior of Arlen Specter is one of the most unpleasant obligations a person can have, but for anyone following the NSA eavesdropping scandal specifically, and the Bush administration's abuses of executive power generally, it is a necessary evil. The principal reason that the Bush administration has been able to impose its radical theories of lawbreaking on the country is because Congress, with an unseemly eagerness, has permitted itself to be humiliated over and over by an administration which does not hide its contempt for the notion that Congress has any role to play in limiting and checking the executive branch. And few people have more vividly illustrated that institutional debasement than Arlen Specter, who, along with Pat Roberts, has done more than anyone else to ensure that Congress completely relinquishes its constitutional powers to the President.

Congressional abdication is so uniquely damaging because the Founders assumed that Congress would naturally and instinctively resist encroachments by the executive, and the resulting institutional tension -- the inevitable struggle for power between the branches -- is what would preserve governmental balance and prevent true abuses of power. But for the last five years, Congress has done the opposite of what the Founders envisioned. They have meekly submitted to the almost total elimination of their role in our Government and have quietly accepted consolidation of their powers in the President. More>>>

Forget That Coulter Person: Answer The "Jersey Girls" Questions About 9/11

2006-06-09T23:38:00.000-04:00

The attention that Coulter is getting for her statements about the 9/11 widows is priceless in terms of publicity and book sales. The problem with all of the attention (and yes I am guilty of a written tirade against the "woman") is that, as this blogger points out...everyone is paying attention to what Coulter said, but NOT what the "Jersey Girls" have said in reply.

"Save The USA Blog" makes some compelling observations:

Is anyone else outraged at all the attention that Ann Coulter is getting for attacking the Jersey Girls? How is it possible that everyone is talking about what Ann Coulter wrote, and no one is talking about what the Jersey Girls have to say? John Kerry wrote for Huffington post about how horrible it is that Ann is attacking them with the provocative headline “Shameless, but the Real Shame Is If We Don’t Act”. No folks, he is not talking about acting on the very important issue of demanding answers to what the hell happened on to our air defenses on 9/11…he wants us to act by calling the media and telling them we don’t like Ann Coulter.

Instead of jumping in to defend them from this insignificant hateful warmonger, I bet the Jersey Girls would rather have people pay attention to what actually happened on 9/11 andstart answering their questions!

1. Was NORAD aware of the four hijacked planes veering off course even before being reported by the FAA? If not, please explain why NORAD, which monitors 7000 flights a day, was unable to track the four aberrant flights.

2. At precisely what time was NORAD notified of each plane being hijacked? What was their response?

3. Who determined from which bases the F-16s should be scrambled? Why were fighter jets scrambled from such distant bases such as Langley Base in Va. instead of Andrews Air Force Base, a mere 10 miles from the Pentagon? Who were the pilots of these F-16s?

4. Why weren’t the jets able to intercept the hijacked planes if they were airborne within eight minutes of notification? What was their airspeed?

5. It is reported that there were two F-15s off the coast of Long Island while Flights 11 and 175 were in the air. If there were indeed fighters off Long Island, why weren’t they diverted to investigate Flights 11 and 175? Were any other military planes flying routine missions on the morning of September 11th which could have responded?

6. Why did NORAD wait until after the second plane hit the WTC to try and prevent possible further attacks? Why weren’t the fighter jets that tailed flights 11 and 175 as they crashed into New York’s WTC, immediately rerouted to intercept flights 77 or 93, before they crashed into the Pentagon and Pennsylvania?

7. Why wasn’t the Pentagon defended?

8. Were surveillance satellites orbiting North American airspace on 9/11?
• What exactly does the satellite imaging reveal?
• What companies own these satellites?
• Where are the records and logs for these orbits?

9. Why were these four planes able to evade all radar? Even when the transponders are disconnected, a plane is still able to be located by its “skin” on radar screens.

10. In June 2001, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld modified NMCC response procedure in the event of a hijacking. Could this procedural change have slowed NORAD’s response time?

11. Who was directing the defense of our country that morning?

12. What defensive actions were ordered to protect our nation during the crisis?Posted Jun 9, 2006 09:05 AM PSTCategory: 911

And 13... With a supposedly unknown number of planes in the air, with the President's presence at Booker Elementary announced in the media three days in advance, and with an airport just 4 miles away, how did the US Secret Service know President Bush was safe where he sat, reading about goats?

CNN Cuts Off Portions of Michael Berg's Comments

2006-06-09T22:06:00.000-04:00

CNN cuts Inflammatory Interview with Michael Berg Re Zarqawi writes Blake Fleetwood in Huffington Post. This story came out yesterday, but I found the entire video on Crooks & Liars and wanted to post the link here for all to hear and see.

This morning I watched CNN's Soledad O'Brien conduct an incredible interview with Michael Berg, the father of Nick Berg, who was beheaded by al-Zarqawi, but the most interesting and upsetting part of the interview was cut from further broadcasts on CNN later on in the day. They had Berg on many times, but they didn't have the following provocative thoughts. (SEE BELOW)

Fleetwood says: CNN must have considered the [following] words too inflammatory to put on the mainstream media. They balanced the coverage with predictable interviews with other relatives of Zarqawi victims (The partial transcript below is the end of a 5-6 minute exchange between Soledad and Michael Berg. See link below to hear it in its entirety).
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BERG: Democracy? Come on. You can't really believe that that's a democracy there when the people who are running the elections are holding guns. That's not democracy.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN: There is a theory that as they try to form some kind of government that, in fact, it's going to be brutal, it's going to be bloody, there's going to be loss and that's the history of many countries, that that's just a lot of people pay for what they believe will be better than what they had under Saddam Hussein.

BERG: Well, you know, I'm not saying Saddam Hussein was a good man, but he's no worse than George Bush. Saddam Hussein didn't pull the trigger, didn't commit the rapes. Neither did George Bush, but both men are responsible for them under their reigns of terror. I don't buy that. Iraq did not have al Qaeda in it. Al Qaeda supposedly killed my son. Under Saddam Hussein, no al Qaeda. Under George Bush, al Qaeda. Under Saddam Hussein, relative stability. Under George Bush, instability. Under Saddam Hussein, about 30,000 deaths a year. Under George Bush, about 60,000 deaths a year. I don't get it. Why is it better to have George Bush be the king of Iraq rather than Saddam Hussein?

Here is the LINK to the full length video (uncut) courtesy of C&L.

Coulter On 9/11 Widows: "I Have Never Seen People Enjoying Their Husband's Death So Much"...

2006-06-08T23:39:00.000-04:00

(Re-published from June 6, 2006)

This woman is a loose cannon. Then again almost every neocon pundit is a loose cannons. The video is on C&L.

Her new book comes out today so she is making the rounds...

C&L reports: Even her idiotic writing stunned Lauer. The last time she was on the show he treated her as a normal person. I would hope that stops, but NBC and the rest of cable news constantly give her a platform to rant on. When will that end? I think this is the first time Matt actually read anything she wrote.

Here's the transcript:

LAUER: On the 9-11 widows, an in particular a group that had been critical of the administration: " These self-obsessed women seem genuinely unaware that 9-11 was an attack on our nation and acted like as if the terrorist attack only happened to them. They believe the entire country was required to marinate in their exquisite personal agony. Apparently, denouncing bush was part of the closure process." And this part is the part I really need to talk to you about: "These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by griefparrazies. I have never seen people enjoying their husband’s death so much." Because they dare to speak out?

COULTER: To speak out using the fact they are widows. This is the left's doctrine of infallibility. If they have a point to make about the 9-11 commission, about how to fight the war on terrorism, how about sending in somebody we are allowed to respond to> No-No-No. We always have to respond to someone who just had a family member die--

LAUER: But aren't they in the middle of the story?...

COULTER: ...Because then if we respond, oh you are questioning their authenticity. No, the story is...

LAUER: So grieve but grieve quietly?

LAUER: What I’m saying is I don’t think they have ever told you, you can't respond.

COULTER: Look, you are getting testy with me. Lauer actually got to her at the end a little bit because he couldn't believe she would write something as repulsive as that. Wake up Matt, NBC and all the other networks. Ann was off from the beginning of the interview. She had trouble responding to Matt's questions about why Bush's poll numbers are in the tank. I'm glad he brought up her Harriet Miers statements.

So...Zarqawi is dead....again

2006-06-08T23:26:00.000-04:00

Well, this time it looks real because the military made sure they got a picture of the very dead Zarqawi. I suppose this will make Bush's numbers rise a bit...but I predict they will fall below his record before the fall elections as more facts come out about this administration's obsession with cheating, lying, stealing and pandering.

Why didn't Bush go after Zarqawi at the beginning of the war?

In HuffPo today, Eric Alterman sums it up best: Bush didn't go after Zarqawi because he was useful in developing an argument for war -- even though that argument was based on lies. Tens of thousands have died, trillions have been wasted and who knows how many terrorists have been created as a result of his all-but-criminal negligence. Read all about it here.

Forgive my cyinicism but the timing of these events is so convenient for this administration. So therefore all I can do is keep wearing my tin foil hat, when it comes to these people in power. By the way....has anyone heard anything about the guy that blew up the WTC on 9/11? Oh thats right! It was Bush who said: "So I don't know where he is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him..."