Sheila Stuff

Nuts, Fruitcakes, and Turkeys

2011-12-31T11:10:00.000-08:00

By Richard Walrath

Who will be the Republican nominee?

NOT Tim Pawlenty!

But will it will be the New Jersey baboon?

Or, the Texas buffoon?

Or, a Mormon tycoon?

Who can tell? Could it be Michele?

How about Herman Cain, and will the

Donald announce again?

But then it may be Ron Paul who takes it all

About Palin, I'm not sayin'

The end is near -- Ryan, Santorum and

Gingrich bring up the rear.

How things do change!!!!

A Hopeless Legion of Loons

2011-12-06T09:30:00.000-08:00

"Oh, big conniver, nothing but a jiver, done got hip to your jive,
Slippin' and a slidin', peepin' and a hidin', won't be your fool no more."
~~Little Richard

Fear and despair are billowing across the US political landscape, due in no small part to nearly three years of President Barack Obama's soaring jive even as he was breaking promises to millions of jobless, homeless, helpless Americans. Many of us watched, aghast, as Obama repeatedly took careful aim and shot himself in both feet; then, rather than deciding to fight on his knees, began scrambling around on them in a futile search for bipartisanship.

Ain't gonna happen. Those hoary old Republicans with whom he has strenuously attempted to bond have been around the political block more than once. Most are sexist; homophobic to the core, and racist from the core...on in. They’re absolutely committed to -- obsessed with -- not only Obama's failure, but his complete destruction.

Obama should have learned by now there is no compromising with these filthy connivers -- that every single one of them is hell-bent on his destruction even if the nation goes down with him. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) has brazenly bragged since Obama's election that, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president." They spent the first two years of his administration in an obsessive campaign to prove that not only was he (shudder) black -- but he wasn't even an American citizen. They continue to insanely double down on blocking every piece of legislation he suggests, no matter how minute; and delight in blaming him for the resulting chaos.

Indeed, Republicans hold Obama in such contempt (he's black, remember?) that they make no effort to hide their political goal. Four days before Obama's inauguration, radio jiver Rush Limbaugh was spewing hate across the airwaves, blatantly calling for Obama to fail. It was a call to arms. The response was immediate, and continues to pick up steam.

If anyone doubts that Limbaugh is the titular head of the Republican -- or Grand Old Dittohead (GOD) -- Party, they have but to recall his bouncy, drug-addled hour-and-a-half hate screed in 2009 to the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC). Or calling Obama a "jackass" during his debt "compromise" speech ... “He’s a jackass." Limbaugh screeched. "He’s an economic illiterate. He’s an economic ignoramus. And that’s being charitable.”

No, you don't have to wonder where their loyalties lie. When elevated to House Speaker, John Boehner (R-Oh) briefed Boss Hog Limbaugh on his debt-ceiling plan before even showing it to his conference, let alone his President.

These creatures claim self-righteously that, ultimately, the horror they are inflicting on the people is for the people. The Stockholmed masses just need to hang on to hope -- to understand that once the corrupt McConnell and his rapacious gang destroy the government prior to the election and blame it on Obama, things will get better. Much better.

Those on the right who fall for that crap are little more than frogs basking in the slowly increasing "warmth" of right-wing water. Sadly, those of us on the left are in as bad -- or worse -- shape, if only because we realize we are in serious political trouble. Many of us have been stumbling around in an Orwellian fog for so long our hope tanks are dangerously close to running on empty.

Like Robert Reich wrote recently...

"President Obama will be supported by progressives and the Democratic base, but without enthusiasm. His notorious caves to Republicans and Wall Street -- failing to put conditions on the Street’s bailout (such as demanding the Street help stranded home owners), or to resurrect Glass-Steagall, or include a public option in health care, or assert his constitutional responsibility to raise the debt limit, or protect Medicare and Social Security, or push for cap-and-trade, or close Guantanamo, or, in general, confront the regressive Republican nay-sayers and do-nothings with toughness rather than begin negotiations by giving them much of what they want -- are not the stuff that stirs a passionate following."

However, when Obama comes soaring in once again, slippin' and slidin', grinning from ear to ear, proudly claiming to be a "warrior" for the middle class, many will be unable to keep from hoping for hope -- from ultimately voting for hope. It's not that they've forgotten the recent years of betrayal; of abandonment. It's that, somehow, when considering the alternative -- Obama's campaign jive sounds better and better to them.

French novelist Jean Giraudoux once joked, "The secret to success is sincerity. Once you can fake that, you've got it made." Well, if you look at those who are challenging Obama, you can't help but hope he's got it made. And that's no joke.

Even with Sarah Palin, who was leading the pack, locked and loaded and firing away at Obama until she ran out of ammo and slipped and fell into a pool of "blood libel" -- and Herman Cain, with five women accusing him of sexual harassment and a sixth of a 13-year affair -- gone from the race, it's still a shuddering mess. And it ain't "fixable." Like C.S. Lewis once wrote, "No clever arrangement of bad eggs ever made a good omelet."

From Perry poop to Gingrich garbage to Bachmann blather, the stench billowing from the Republican presidential wannabes is overwhelming. The entire gang appears disjointed -- in total disarray -- mired in ideological confusion. It's impossible to come up with a single issue that this tangled mass can agree upon -- other than running that black guy out of town.

If it weren't so ghoulishly frightening, it would be amusing to watch the shallow, dumb-as-dirt little creatures shucking and jiving out there, racing madly from one media outlet to another in a desperate attempt to find a message that will catapult them to the top of the presidential heap. And what a heap it is. Just a gang of thin-skinned, egocentric Charlie Sheenians who are interested in one thing -- D'UH ... Winnnning!

With few exceptions, they have proudly announced they are pro-torture; most are panting for war -- have promised to attack Iran before the sun sets on their inauguration. Think about it. Because, as Robert Parry succinctly points out, the "hard reality" is ...

"Even if the two candidates' policies were identical, temperament would also be important, since the U.S. president controls a nuclear arsenal that can literally end all life on the planet."

It is possible -- even probable -- due to the masturbatory media coverage this bunch is getting, that one of this hopeless legion of loons will kick back from their crack buffet and emerge with the keys to the White House in one hand and a jug of tiger blood in the other.

If we have learned but one thing from these fools, it is that they will not compromise, regardless of the destruction they leave in their wake. Therefore, we need to wake up and realize that the November 2012 election is quite likely a matter of life or death.

Confession of an old War Hawk...

2011-09-24T22:54:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, long ago and far away, when I was a (civilian) Public Information Officer for the U.S. Army, I was like a modern-day Donald Rumsfeld -- in love with the beautiful, shiny, erotic toys of war. The devastation caused by these toys to the "boys" of war was light years away from even approaching the periphery of my understanding.

One beautiful fall day, after an exhilarating live-fire exercise at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, home of the Field Artillery, wherein the sheer beauty and brute force of the Army's newest "shoot and scoot" weapons system -- the Multiple Launch Rocket System (MLRS) -- was displayed to visiting D.C. officials and packed bleachers of cheering Redlegs, I was consumed with patriotic fervor; my ears rang with the sounds of freedom...

Later that evening, at a local Underwood's Barbeque restaurant -- still quivering with exhilaration -- I drew on a sauce-stained napkin a rough picture of my perception of the battlefield of the future -- a perfectly functioning artillery "Robot." I showed it to Lee Gibson over at Fort Sill's Audio/Visual shop, who drew the basic illustration. Gibson sent it to Wayne Crawford at the Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC) at Fort Monroe, Va., who adapted it for an upcoming publication, and sent it to C.B. Pritchett at Martin-Marietta in Orlando, Fla., who painted it for the final publication.

The illustration below, on the cover of TRADOC's October 1980 Casemate Chronicle, depicts this mighty beast in all his destructive glory. His feet are the Abrams Tank and the MLRS. The MLRS Missile Pod and the Pershing II (PII) Missile form his hands. His heart is the magnificent Target Acquisition System, and his brain (of course) is the Remotely Piloted Vehicle (RPV), from which today's destructive drone evolved.

My problem is -- I know I should apologize, but when I look at all this glorious power, I still get a Rumsfeld "rush." When I open my mouth to say I'm sorry -- to beg your forgiveness -- all that comes out is "Hoo-AHHHH!"

So, my question is -- do ya'll love me any more? No? Well, okay then. I understand.

But ... do you love me any less?

Politics -- Spinning Out of Control

2011-04-24T18:27:00.000-07:00

"The two parties have combined against us to nullify our power by a 'gentleman's agreement' of non-recognition, no matter how we vote ... May God write us down as asses if ever again we are found putting our trust in either the Republican or the Democratic Parties."~~W.E.B. DuBois (1922)

In January, after the mid-term election blowout dumped the House of Representatives into the corporate lap, the Reverend Daniel P. Coughlin opened the 112th Congress with the standard prayer, asking the Lord's Spirit to "descend upon this Chamber; that from here may come forth good news for the poor and healing for the broken-hearted of this nation."

The good Reverend then demanded of the Lord -- "Let there go forth a proclamation to the people that captivity is ended. And the action of true politics will set this nation free."(emphasis added)

There was immediate news for the poor and broken-hearted, but it was hardly good. House Speaker John Boehner, awash in tears and incoherently mumbling over and over "the American people...the American people," set about blocking all Democratic legislation. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announced that the "single most important" issue for the Republicans is to make "President Obama a one-term president."

And then there's House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who is arguably the most frightening Republican -- and that's saying a lot -- for "the American people." Cantor is adamantly opposed to anything that does not inflict further pain and sacrifice on the already suffering poor and middle classes, and struggled to shut down the government and blame it on President Obama.

Not only would Cantor and his Republican cohorts privatize Social Security and eliminate Medicare and Medicaid, but they are against all facets of health-care reform, Planned Parenthood, and any initiative that would ease the suffering of children, the elderly or those struggling in poverty.

One need go no further than the Table of Contents of Rep. Paul Ryan's grotesque Path To Prosperity budget resolution for 2012 to see the stark Republican agenda, and to realize that in no way are "the American people" on that prosperity path. Listed under . . .

Efficient, Effective and Responsible Government -- Restraining the Growth of Government by Repealing the Health Care Law
Strengthening the Social Safety Net -- Stopping the Abuse of Medicaid by Repealing the Health Care Law
Fulfilling the Mission of Health and Retirement Security for All Americans -- Stopping the Raid on Medicare by Repealing the Health Care Law
Pro-Growth Tax Reform -- Stopping Job-Destroying Tax Hikes by Repealing the Health Care Law

Once in power, most politicians can be depended upon to do whatever it takes to remain in power, regardless of the destruction they leave in their wake. In his penetrating Drifting Too Far From Shore: The Unresisted Rise of the Elite, Chris Floyd writes...

"Politicians are, with the rarest of exceptions, venal, preening, shallow-minded third-raters. Many of them are psychologically damaged, which is what draws them into the pursuit of power -- of dominating other people -- in the first place. Mostly, they like the perks (material and emotional) of power. They are not figures of deep character and solid principles. Strong political resistance -- or even a great lot of noise -- can scare them out of whatever 'principles' they find expedient to hold at any given moment. The Right has triumphed because no one has resisted it. Big Money has bought off and/or subsumed almost all of the institutional forces that once offered some resistance to its iron-fisted rule."

I have a real problem with Democrats who refuse to get off their knees long enough to stand up for what they believe in. What do they believe in? Community organizing? Democrats are not evil; they really really want to do what is right, but with few exceptions, they are timid, hypocritical little cave-inskis when it comes to walking their talk. They take the money and call it bipartisanship. I call it betrayal.

However, Republicans, for the most part, are sociopaths -- morally and politically corrupt. In her Editor's Preface to Andrew M. Lobaczewski's critically important Political Ponerology, Laura Knight-Jadczyk quotes Martha Stout, who appears to be eerily describing modern Republicans, in her book, The Sociopath Next Door . . .

"Imagine -- if you can -- not having a conscience, none at all, no feelings of guilt or remorse no matter what you do, no limiting sense of concern for the well-being of strangers, friends, or even family members. Imagine no struggles with shame, not a single one in your whole life, no matter what kind of selfish, lazy, harmful, or immoral action you had taken.
[...]
"If you are born at the right time, with some access to family fortune, and you have a special talent for whipping up other people's hatred and sense of deprivation, you can arrange to kill large numbers of unsuspecting people. With enough money, you can accomplish this from far away, and you can sit back safely and watch in satisfaction . . . Crazy and frightening -- and real, in about 4 percent of the population. . . .
"The high incidence of sociopathy in human society has a profound effect on the rest of us who must live on this planet, too, even those of us who have not been clinically traumatized. The individuals who constitute this 4 percent drain our relationships, our bank accounts, our accomplishments, our self-esteem, our very peace on earth."

Keenly aware that fair elections are beyond their grasp, Republicans rely on entities such as the Supreme Court (Election 2000 and the recent Citizens United decision), corporate billionaires such as the Koch Brothers (who organized and funded the Tea Party movement as well as the campaigns of neoconservative governors), and a myriad of fawning, right-wing media.

And, as added insurance, "the American people" most likely to vote Democratic need to be kicked to the curb. According to Think Progress...

"Since taking office in January, conservative legislators in state houses across the country have raised the specter of voter fraud to quietly -- and quickly -- push through a series of bills that would make it significantly more difficult for large swaths of the population to vote, including college students, rural voters, senior citizens, the disabled, and the homeless. Proposed legislation would dramatically change how the country votes ahead of the 2012 elections, requiring Americans in some states to present their birth certificates before registering to vote and show a DMV-issued photo identification at the polls.
"These voter ID bills would not only dampen voter turnout -- depressing Hispanic turnout by as much as 10 percent -- but also cost cash-strapped statehouses (and taxpayers) millions of dollars. Yet in dozens of states, Republicans have made bills restricting voting a central part of their legislative agenda -- passing voter ID bills before they even begin to work on budgets. Conservatives have claimed their assault on voting rights is necessary to combat the threat of mass voter fraud. Yet the Brennan Center for Justice notes that voters are more likely to be struck by lightning than commit voter fraud, and the Bush Justice Department's five-year "War on Voter Fraud" resulted in only 86 convictions out of 196 million votes cast. As The Progress Report's Alex Seitz-Wald notes, 'The only fraud in voter fraud is the allegation of fraud.' Instead, like their assaults on unions, Planned Parenthood, and AARP, conservatives' anti-voter agenda is aimed at silencing the voices of those who disagree with them."

North Carolina is targeting its elderly, disabled and college students. South Carolina said too many blacks voted for Obama in 2008 and they didn't want that to happen again. Kansas is working to require a "two-fer" -- proof of citizenship upon registering to vote and photo identification at the polls.

Well, alrighty then. That pretty much knocks a hole in the Democratic voting base, but when you consider the roster of Republicans straining at the bit to storm the Oval Office, it's difficult to imagine "the American people" turning out to vote for any of them either.

Think about it. Our world -- our political world -- has been knocked off its axis and is spinning out of control. Neither party can be trusted to do anything that is not totally self-serving.

When we see these selfish, immoral, corporate-owned money changers -- both Democrats and Republicans -- being hurled out of House windows and doors, it's possible that the Lord responded to the good Reverend Coughlin, and His Spirit -- at long last -- will have descended upon the Chamber.

Then -- and only then -- will our captivity be ended, and we can get about the business of true politics which, hopefully, will set this nation free.

Hey, American People!

2010-12-12T17:49:00.000-08:00

By Sheila Samples

"The time is always right to do what is right"~~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Whew. Nasty. That was one hell of a campaign season; one hell of an election. Democrats emerged, bruised and broken, yet their mindset seems to be -- hey, we survived Bush, how bad can it be? Sadly, the grim truth they refuse to face is -- we didn't survive Bush...

The radical right-wing, neo-conservative, religious-based, hate-empowered GOP once again owes the half-crazed ideologues in the Supreme Court a hearty thanks for plunging yet another dagger into the heart of democracy with its Citizens United corporate giveaway. And no Justice on that venerable body is more ideologically rigid than Dick Cheney's hunting buddy Antonin Scalia, who ramrodded the Court's 2000 Presidential "Selection" for George W. Bush, and is now out there taking aim at the century-old 17th Amendment to the US Constitution, which is literally the last barrier to a corporate-owned nation.

The 17th Amendment allows U.S. Senators to be elected by the people, rather than by individual state legislatures. Recently, referring to the Constitution, Scalia said the 17th Amendment "has changed things enormously. We changed that in a burst of progressivism in 1913, and you can trace the decline of so-called states’ rights throughout the rest of the 20th century..."

We need another "burst of progressivism" -- and soon. We are in the throes of a political convulsion, an intellectual and moral battle that we are increasingly in danger of losing. It's time to stop, take a deep national breath, and then...take a deep national bath. This nation has been in a spiraling nose dive for a decade...We need to make a genuine effort to actually see what we've only been looking at -- actually listen to what we've only been hearing.

Neither party spent much time talking about the issues; the real problems facing this country. Perhaps that's because the Republican party is a greedy force, too corrupt and venal to change -- and the Democratic Party is a shameless enabler, too timid and flabby to make a difference. Throw the corporate media in there, where it's all politics all the time because that's where the money is, and it's easy to see -- if you're really looking -- why we're caught up in the patriotic spirit of waving the flag for more tax cuts, trading freedoms for safety and following our presidential Pied Piper into the quagmire of endless war.

Republicans are dangerous. Like Bush, they are morally depraved, in that they feel no guilt or remorse for anything they say or do, regardless of the outcome. It's far too easy in this Tea Party sodden society to rationalize that murdering, wounding, displacing millions of innocent human beings was, and continues to be, necessary in order to protect the American people.

They say they are against big government, and justify their destruction of the social network by repeating "the american people...the american people...the american people" in mind-numbing repetition, much as Bush justified his bloodlust with a constant "september the 11th...september the 11th...september the 11th."

The only things Republicans have ever given to the American people is depression, poverty and despair. And their foot-stomping threats to shut down the government until their billionaire donors get a tax cut is a clear warning that more is on the way.

Having a Black man within a country mile of the Oval Office has driven a majority of Republicans, and some Democrats -- as liberal radio personality Mike Malloy says -- "bat-shit crazy," and they are determined to destroy President Obama. Just days before the mid-term election, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell declared, “the single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

Really? With the barrage of critical issues swirling throughout this nation -- more than 15-million American people unemployed and, every day, more losing jobs, homes, unemployment insurance, health insurance, their very lives -- yet nothing is more important than destroying the President?

Lest anyone think the old Kentuckian was racist, just days after the election, he chucked his hood and went into safe, regressive "american people" spin, saying for all practical purposes -- the american people reminded us this week that we work for the american people and we owe it to the american people and to future generations of the american people to work together to find solutions to present troubles of the american people and to help guide our nation of american people to better days...

“The formula is simple, really," McConnell said. "When the administration agrees with the American people, we will agree with the administration. When it disagrees with the American people, we won’t … If the administration wants cooperation, it will have to begin to move in our direction.”

Simple translation -- what all Republicans are saying if you listen -- Our way, or the highway -- and to hell with the American people.

Neither party can escape its history. American people struggling to prevent the American Flag from becoming their funeral shroud should remember that the Great Depression did not come about by accident. While Americans were standing in soup lines, the Republican administration was carrying Big Business through the crisis. Banks, insurance companies and corporate donors all got bailed out; big business got tax cuts -- but there was no relief for "the american people."

Sound familiar? Yes, because President Obama, in his cowering attempt at bipartisianship, is taking us "forward to the past" so rapidly that our knees are hitting our chins for nothing less than endless war, a recession caused by a permanent rich-man's tax cut and the final shredding of our social safety net. It is likely that our veterans, our children, our elderly will be forgotten or cast aside simply for the enrichment of lobbyists who paid for Republican campaigns and are now swarming all over the Capital.

Time is running out. Like Jon Stewart said when explaining the reason for his Oct. 30 Rally to Restore Sanity on the National Mall, the American people -- regardless of their political affiliation -- "Know instinctively as a people that if we are to get through the darkness and back into the light we have to work together."

So let's do it. The time is right. Let's give Scalia another badly needed "burst of progressivism." After all -- like McConnell says -- we're the american people...

Only If We Let It

2010-10-03T13:40:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

"History will repeat itself -- only if we let it"~~Mike Malloy

Hardly a day goes by that we are not inundated with demands to attack Iran. Our media, our Congress -- packs of neoconservatives -- have been howling for war on Iran for years. And years.

This reckless axis has been relentless in its orchestrated effort to manipulate and influence public opinion. And, if we are to believe the myriad of polls, it's working. According to investigative journalist Gareth Porter, who wrote on July 30 that "polling data for 2010 show a majority of Americans have been manipulated into supporting war against Iran -- in large part because more than two-thirds of those polled have gotten the impression that Iran already has nuclear weapons."

Horror Tent Revival

Is it possible that a majority of Americans can be lured again into the tent of horror to support yet another bloody war? Have we learned nothing from history -- the blatant lies that catapaulted us into Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Pakistan? It's amazing how easily our handlers control us; enrage us; shape our beliefs, our opinions. As George Orwell wrote in 1948 about those controlled by Big Brother...

"A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one's will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp.”

For centuries, those in power have known that fear is the easiest of emotions to work with. As with Iraq, and now Iran, we are paralyzed with fear; fear of "known unknowns" -- of factually unsubstantiated threats about Iran's lust for Israeli blood. Many of us have been ducking and covering for so long that we have lost the ability to reason; even to think beyond the "truth" that is hammered into our national consciousness with blow after blow of an Orwellian sledge hammer -- we must support, and protect, Israel, no matter the cost.

It's tempting to pretend that we believe Iran's refusal to give up its nuclear energy program -- which it has every right to pursue as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty -- is proof that it is an "evil Islamic regime" whose maniacal leaders are feverishly working to wipe Israel off the map. Tempting to take at face value the sinister warnings of those like Reuel Marc Gerecht, a resident fellow at AEI and Weekly Standard contributing editor, who warned in his April 2006 article, "To Bomb, or Not to Bomb -- That is the Iran Question"...

"Given the Islamic Republic's dark history, the burden of proof ought to be on those who favor accommodating a nuclear Iran. Those who are unwilling to accommodate it, however, need to be honest and admit that diplomacy and sanctions and covert operations probably won't succeed, and that we may have to fight a war -- perhaps sooner rather than later -- to stop such evil men from obtaining the worst weapons we know."

Gerecht, a former consular officer for the State Department and CIA Mid-East specialist, is, like most of his neoconservative peers, pathologically obsessed with Iran's destruction, and is as good as it gets when using fear and misinformation to justify that destruction.

Porter also wrote in his July article that "the aim of Gerecht and of the right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu is to support an attack by Israel so that the United States can be drawn into direct, full-scale war with Iran." Porter pointed out that Gerecht first revealed his "Israeli-neocon fantasy as early as 2000, before the Iranian nuclear program was even taken seriously, in an essay written for a book published by the Project for a New American Century." Gerecht argued that, if Iran could be caught in a "terrorist act," the U.S. Navy should "retaliate with fury."

Now, a decade later, that appears to still be Gerecht's position. In his ponderous July 26, 2010 Weekly Standard piece, he writes...

"...if nuclear weapons in the hands of Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards are an existential threat to the Jewish state -- and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, like his predecessors, has said that they are -- Jerusalem has little choice. Bombing is the only option that could likely alter the nuclear equation in Iran before Khamenei produces a weapon. The Obama administration might fume, but it is hard to imagine the president, given what he has said about the unacceptability of Iranian nukes, scolding Jerusalem long. [...] The left wing of the Democratic party has been going south on the Jewish state for 30 years, but congressional Democrats, who’ve been pushing for new sanctions against Iran more aggressively than the White House, are not that far gone. By and large, the Republican party would hold behind the Israelis."

Here, Gerecht is echoing the belief blurted out by Netanyahu in 2001 when talking about a broad attack on Palestine and undermining the Oslo Accords -- "I know what America is," Netanyahu said. "America is a thing you can move very easily, move it in the right direction. They won't get in the way."

Sadly, there many more like Gerecht -- Dick Cheney and his efforts to do an "end run" around a balking Bush to force an attack on Iran; Norman Podhoretz with his constant refrain "bomb Iran before Iran bombs us"; National Review's Larry Kudlow who says if Israel furiously attacks Iran, it will be "doing the Lord's work"; the Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol and Daniel Pipes with their confident forecast that Bush would attack Iran before leaving office if Obama won the election.

Then, there's the US Congress, whose members can agree on absolutely nothing to ease the suffering of their own citizens, but stand shoulder-to-shoulder in passing resolution after shameful resolution for Israel's right to defend itself and against Iran's right to do the same. If Senator Joe Lieberman's mouth is moving, you can bet he is demanding an attack on Iran -- and he was joined by his cohort Senator Lindsey Graham just last month, who said we must sic our military on Iran, "with the goal of overthrowing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad."

But by far the the most strident is the wild and woolly former UN ambassador John Bolton. He runs at top speed from one media outlet to another, calling for Iran's destruction -- just as he did for Iraq. I can't help it. This guy is grotesquely fascinating. As I wrote in September 2008 about this issue...

It's no laughing matter, but the sight of this tousle-headed, "got milk?" maniac running in circles, warning of -- demanding -- a nuclear holocaust is good for a grin, albeit a grim one. Even as he was being forced onto the United Nations over national and international objections, Bolton was hot on Iran's trail. He insisted that Iran is the most dangerous critter out there -- harboring terrorists, arming terrorists, training terrorists -- sending bombs, IEDs, weapons to Iraq to kill Americans. If it weren't for Iran, there would have been no 9-11 attack because Iran provided safe haven for the box-cutting killers headed our way. Bolton warned if Iran managed to produce a single nuclear weapon, Israel, the United States -- the world -- was toast. He promised that Iran will come after us. "That's the threat," Bolton barked, "that's the reality whether you like it or not. And it will be just like Sept. 11, only with nuclear weapons this time."

Time Out

Considering the consequences of history repeating itself, perhaps we should call a "time out" and take a closer look at Iran. We didn't bother to check out the accusations made by these same bloodthirsty warmongers against Iraq -- false cries of weapons of mass destruction, lies about Saddam Hussein aiding and harboring Al Qaeda terrorists -- we had but a scant 45 minutes to dive under our duct-taped plastic or we would surely die. Now, after hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings have been destroyed -- millions displaced -- trillions of dollars wasted, far too many of us say we were not to blame. Hey -- we were lied to. Besides, that was years ago. It's all history now.

Iran, as a major civilization, dates back to 4000 BC and, although it has been invaded by Greeks, Arabs, Turks, even Mongols, it has no modern history of attacking or occupying other nations. However, unlike other areas that continue to be devastated by US and Israeli assaults, history shows that Iran is capable of defending itself. Both its Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and frisky little president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have promised to do exactly that if attacked.

In August, Khamenei said "the consequences of a US attack would be grave...not merely regional, but will cover a vaster scene." If our warmongering babblers took a closer look at that "scene," they would see the destruction of the 32 US bases in the region as well as the shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz -- the gateway to the world's oil.

Regarding Iran's nuclear ambitions, both Khamenei and Ahmadinejad have said over and over (and over) that Iran seeks nuclear power for generating electricity for medical purposes and for its growing population. In 2005, Khamenei issued a Fatwa that "the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons." And, in spite of blatant lies and distortions to the contrary, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) continues to verify Iran's pursuit of peaceful nuclear energy.

The timeline of Iran's nuclear program from the 1950s shows that Iran has never sought nuclear energy for anything other than peaceful purposes. In 1957, the Shah opened the American Atoms for Peace in Tehran, and signed an agreement with the US for cooperation in research on peaceful uses of nuclear technology. And, in 1968, Iran signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty on the first day it opened for signature.

Before we buy into railings from those like Gerecht about evil Iran's "dark history" in pursuing nuclear weapons, perhaps we should study the dark history of two other nations -- one that obliterated the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in mere moments just 65 years ago...that used napalm, chemical weapons, and deadly toxins against the Vietnamese...that uses deadly depleted uranium to wipe out entire generations, to deform future generations...or perhaps the other one that takes great delight in dropping white phosphorus bombs on a trapped civilian population with nowhere to run...

The Choice is Ours

If our evil axis succeeds in its lust for war on Iran, yet another March 19, 2003 "Shock and Awe" will come roaring through. We can choose to sit, once again transfixed by sounds of explosions, gunfire, sirens, screams -- and once again listen to Mike Malloy say in a dead voice stripped of all emotion...

"This is a dark day.
This is a filthy day.
This is a day for shame..."

Or we can rise up and stand firm. As Malloy also says, over and over (and over) -- "We know the truth. We no longer have an excuse for remaining silent."

History is replete with examples of citizens uniting and changing the course of history. When that happens, empires -- even a shining empire on a hill -- must change...or fall.

History. Round and round it goes. Will the US and Israel attack Iran? Will history repeat itself?

Yes, but only if we let it. The choice is ours.

The Glory of White-Wing Politics

2010-05-29T18:55:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress...but then, I repeat myself."~~Mark Twain

Much has been written -- argued heatedly by ideological TV pundits -- over the past several years about the inability of members of Congress to agree on anything. Republicans stomp around like elephants in a china closet, shouting "No! No! Hell No!" no matter what legislation comes before them. Democrats, in a timid effort to reach across the aisle, stumble and fall down, where they just sit, plaintively begging, "Please don't hurt me..."

Both parties are adrift; cut loose from their moorings -- in total disarray. Much of the chaos is a result of the previous administration lighting a myriad of fuses before slinking into the shadows, setting off a string of political and financial explosions designed to blow this republic all to hell. What they failed to consider -- and what the bumbling members of Congress have yet to realize is -- when the ship of state sinks, everybody on board is going down with it.

Which appears to be what the race-baiting Rush Limbaugh, the self-appointed "leader" of the Republican Party, is feverishly attempting to provoke. Anybody who doubts that Limbaugh hasn't been in racist meltdown since 2007 when it became obvious that Barack Obama was a threat to White-Wing Limbaughesque "values" just hasn't been paying attention. Throughout the campaign -- from constantly airing the insulting Barack, the Magic Negro jingle to calling Obama and actress Halle Berry "Halfrican-Americans," to accusing Obama of "disowning his white half and deciding to go all in on the black side" -- Limbaugh led the pack.

And he still does. Republicans are united in support of the "I Hope He Fails" Limbaugh Doctrine which El Rushbo announced as millions of relieved -- even giddy -- Americans gathered at the nation's capitol for Obama's inauguration. Just a day later, Limbaugh hit the racist trail, telling Fox's Sean Hannity...

"[r]acism in this country is the exclusive province of the left. We're witnessing racism all this week that led up to the inauguration. We're being told that we have to hope he succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles. Bend over forward, backward, whichever, because his father was black, because this is the first black president. We've got to accept this. The racism that everybody thinks exists on our side of the aisle has been on full display throughout their primary campaign. So I think they've done a great job, the media has, of covering up his deficiencies."

So, it's all the Democrats' fault. The Democrats are militantly racist. If we buy into Limbaugh's rationale, none of his hateful, cruel, racist remarks would have been necessary if the Democrats hadn't selected a Halfrican-American who threw his grandma under the bus and then backed over her before going over to the black side as their candidate for president. On his October 12, 2009 show, Limbaugh explained just how innocent and colorblind he is...

"I'm interested in people's hearts and their souls, because that's what animates us as human beings. Not our skin color. I'm colorblind. I have reached the point where everybody professes we need to go. I treat everybody equally. Nobody is -- in the political arena -- I don't care. Male, female, black, white, gay, straight, bisexual. If you are opposed to the things I think are great for the country, I'm going to say so. I'm going to criticize you. Not because of whatever it is distinguishes you from me on a surface basis, but because of ideas. I'm just a lone guy here, in the arena of ideas, sharing mine."

The Democrats quake with fear at the thought of being labeled "racist." When Mark Halperin and John Heilemann in their January 2009 book, Game Change, wrote that, during the campaign, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was delighted that Obama was the Democratic presidential candidate, and had said privately that "Obama, as a black candidate, could be successful thanks, in part, to his "light-skinned" appearance and speaking patterns "with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one," all hell broke loose.

Reid immediately apologized to the media, to "any and all Americans," and personally called President Obama, as well as "House Democrats Jim Clyburn of South Carolina and Barbara Lee of California; the Rev. Al Sharpton; CNN political contributor and Democratic strategist Donna Brazile; NAACP chairman Julian Bond; and the head of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, Wade Henderson."

If there is evidence of Limbaugh or any of his White-Wing cohorts in the media, in Congress, or in the dangerously leaderless, out-of-control Teabagging movement offering even the semblance of an apology for their hateful rhetoric, I am unaware of it. Just last week, on July 2, Limbaugh was in full, bouncing racist fervor. According to Media Matters...

Rush stated that President Obama is "no different than Castro, in the sense that neither will be stopped by a governing document." He also asserted that "[w]e are not a Third World country here, putting up shacks and huts like the president's brother lives in." And if that wasn't bad enough, Rush "speculate[d]" that Michelle Obama did not attend the late Sen. Robert Byrd's funeral because of her "authentic slave blood."

Is anybody, other than a bunch of Dittoheads or his obedient followers in Congress, listening to this guy? As if we didn't have history to remind us, racism rots the soul of a nation, and the upheaval in Congress has its roots in racism.

This is about so much more than destroying one man, or even one party. Americans -- not just Democrats -- must find the courage to shout "No! No! Hell No!" to the destruction planned for this republic. Unless we stand up, shake ourselves off, and dare to fight back, the evil glory of White-Wing Politics will devour us.

We have no choice. Because this ship is going down.

Even One of These Little Ones...

2010-05-02T19:47:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

"Going to church no more makes you a Christian than sleeping in your garage makes you a car."~~Garrison Keiler

Do you ever wonder what Jesus would say about the sadistic cesspool that is swirling throughout the Catholic disfunctional structure at tsunami speed? Unfortunately, since the New York Times drew attention to the issue in March, the answer to that is getting buried deeper each day under fresh accusations of child molestation, counter accusations, denials and sordid attempts at justification.

It's been an eye-opener for those attempting to struggle through the damage-control rhetoric coming from the Catholic hierarchy -- priests, cardinals, bishops -- all running around in such a frenzy that only a guy like Boots Randolph can keep up with them.

Just days after the March 25 Times article by Laurie Goodstein revealing the church's handling of sex abuse charges against Father Lawrence Murphy who was accused of abusing hundreds of deaf children at Milwaukee's St. John's School for the Deaf -- Cardinal William J. Levada, who succeeded Pope Benedict XVI as prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, was on her case. The National Catholic Reporter quotes Levada as saying that Goodstein and the Times were not after the truth; their prey was Pope Benedict himself...

"She uses the technique of repeating the many escalating charges and accusations from various sources (not least from her own newspaper), and tries to use these 'newly unearthed files' as the basis for accusing the pope of leniency and inaction in this case and presumably in others," Levada said. He then shrugged the entire matter aside, saying he did not "have time to deal with the Times' subsequent almost daily articles by Rachel Donadio and others, much less with Maureen Dowd's silly parroting of Goodstein's 'disturbing report.'"

Then, back in the U.S., Brooklyn's Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio jumped into the mix, telling his flock to "send a message loud and clear that the pope, our church and bishops and our priests will no longer be the personal punching bag of The New York Times." But don't boycott the paper, he admonished, because "we need to know what the enemy is saying."

For weeks, they were in a frenzy. Bill Donahue, head of the Catholic League, pooh-poohed any crime committed or damage done to deaf children by Father Murphy. As Daniel Tencer wrote in Raw Story, Donahue stunned a panel of commentators on CNN's Larry King Live show by insisting that homosexuality -- not pedophilia -- was the church's problem...

"You've got to get your facts straight," Donahue said, addressing sex abuse victim Thomas Roberts. "I'm sorry. If I'm the only one that's going to deal with facts tonight then that'll be it. The vast majority of the victims are post-pubescent. That's not pedophilia, buddy. That's homosexuality."

On Easter Sunday, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, a Vatican official, denounced the "petty gossip" about sexual abuse of children, and said the Church would not be intimidated by spurious attacks on the Pope. Just two days earlier, on Good Friday, Reverend Raniero Cantalamessa, the papal household preacher, said the violent attacks on the church reminded him of the Jews, and such attacks were equal to anti-Semitism. However, because of the uproar, the Vatican quickly backed off that talking point.

The more they talk, the more apparent it becomes that the frocked molesters are the victims here, not the thousands of children forced into sexual bondage -- children at the mercy of those chosen to protect them -- with no help, no one to turn to. It's obvious that if the kids had just kept their mouths shut; had honored their forced vows of silence, there would be no scandal threatening God's House. Besides, didn't folks know there is a statute of limitations on sin?

Even Pope Benedict, who said at the beginning of his papacy that he was just "a simple humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord," appears unable to grasp the magnitude of the problem. Does the good Pope not see that the Lord's vineyard is overgrown with weeds? It's not just a priest here and there who should be removed to engage in a period of penitence and prayer as the Pope suggests. The scandal is sweeping the universe and, like the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, it appears to be uncontrollable. Cases continue to emerge, not just in the United States, but in Austria, Germany, Ireland, Holland, Switzerland, the Netherlands, France, and on and on...

There are those who say that others routinely abuse children, such as parents, teachers, medical personnel -- even the Boy Scouts. It's a "cultural" thing, they say -- so what's the big deal about the Catholic Church? Well, although raping a child is a sin (and a crime) no matter who does it, the Catholic Church claims to be holy -- God's own beacon of truth and light, with its moral authority authorized by Jesus Christ Himself. That's a big deal.

I have always viewed the Catholic Church as an organization that does unbelievable good in this world on many levels. As Nicholas Kristof wrote recently in the New York Times...

"In my travels around the world, I encounter two Catholic Churches. One is the rigid all-male Vatican hierarchy that seems out of touch when it bans condoms even among married couples where one partner is H.I.V.-positive. To me at least, this church — obsessed with dogma and rules and distracted from social justice — is a modern echo of the Pharisees whom Jesus criticized.

"Yet there’s another Catholic Church as well, one I admire intensely. This is the grass-roots Catholic Church that does far more good in the world than it ever gets credit for. This is the church that supports extraordinary aid organizations like Catholic Relief Services and Caritas, saving lives every day, and that operates superb schools that provide needy children an escalator out of poverty.

"This is the church of the nuns and priests in Congo, toiling in obscurity to feed and educate children. This is the church of the Brazilian priest fighting AIDS who told me that if he were pope, he would build a condom factory in the Vatican to save lives."

But these pedophile preachers have indelibly tarnished the image of the entire Church, as well as the reputations of those chosen to care for its children. It's time for the empty accusations, excuses and justifications to stop. I agree with Stephen King, who wrote on page 922 of his latest thriller -- Under the Dome -- "When the Devil got a preacher, he was apt to fall low -- low enough to put on a top hat and crawl under a rattlesnake." Creatures who roam hallowed youth halls in the middle of the night like ravenous zombies are not Christian, and it is my personal belief that they are committing a sin for which there is no atonement.

Some are saying, with justification, that Pope Benedict and the Catholic hierarchy are weary and confused. Perhaps they should ask Jesus what HE thinks about all of this, for Jesus said...

Matthew 18:6 -- But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.

Mark 9:42 -- And whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea.

Luke 17:2 -- It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.

Case closed.

Keep the Change...

2010-03-22T07:38:00.001-07:00

By Sheila Samples

Change is the process by which the future invades our lives~~Alvin Toffler, "Future Shock"

Each time it appears that Republicans can't get any nastier, any more bereft of morality, they wrap themselves in the flag, grab their guns and Bibles, and manage once again to hit the bottom of the ethical barrel. A good example is Ben Smith's recent startling revelation in Politico.com, which exposed the dirty tricks Republican National Committee (RNC) operatives were planning to play, not only on Democrats in the upcoming elections -- but on their own donors. Smith writes...

"Manipulating donors with crude caricatures and playing on their fears is hardly unique to Republicans or to the RNC -- Democrats raised millions off George W. Bush in similar terms -- but rarely is it practiced in such cartoonish terms.

"One page, headed “The Evil Empire,” pictures Obama as the Joker from Batman, while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leaders Harry Reid are depicted as Cruella DeVille and Scooby Doo, respectively."

Ruh-Roh. I can't help it -- that's good for a grin, albeit a ghoulish one. And the “tchochkes,” or swag, such as T-shirts, tote bags, baseball caps, and other useless crap they planned to give to their donors in exchange for big bucks made some of us laugh out loud.

But that's just the funny part. The far more frightening aspect is the lengths the rabid radical right -- not just the Republican Party -- is willing to go in order to destroy President Obama and the "socialist commies" who elected him. They are very open about it; proud to be the "Party of No," and brag about burying Obama under a burning health-care pyre. Nearly a year ago, South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint gloated -- "this health-care issue is D-Day for freedom in America...If we’re able to stop Obama on this it will be his Waterloo. It will break him."

Former Bush speech writer David Frum admitted to MSNBC's Ed Shultz on his March 18 show that negotiation has never been on the Republican's health-care table. Frum said...

"It's critical for everybody, and not just the president. It's critical for us on the Republican side, too. If this thing passes, there is going to be an accountability moment on the Republican side. We had a choice, do we negotiate and try to get some of our values in the bill? Or do we go for total defeat of the president and bet everything on that?
"I was one of those who said negotiate. That advice was rejected. We went for total defeat of the president. If he prevails, it is going to be a shutout of Republican views in one of the most important pieces of legislation ever passed in the United States."

Some are disillusioned with Obama because they feel he has not been forthcoming with his promise of change. They do not seem to realize that, for more than a decade, change in this nation has been overwhelming. Since the Kafkaesque mutation of the Republican establishment, whose metamorphosis into a destructive force was sudden as a result of five right-wing justices on the U.S. Supreme Court stopping the Florida recount in December 2000 and handing the presidency to one of their own even though his opponent won the national popular vote by more than a half million ballots, the change within the Republican party has been nothing less than frenetic.

This is no longer about politics, where opposing sides butt heads, twist arms and kick ass until they manage to agree on legislation that will benefit American citizens on both sides of the aisle. It is not, as Frum said, about merely defeating this president. It is about destroying him; about weaving a noose for him out of lies and dirty tricks; about sending a message to future generations of African Americans that the "White" House means just that.

If you doubt that the right-wing crusade is about race, you are either so oblivious of the past that you see nothing unusual about the present -- or you haven't been to a Tea Party lately. At Tea Parties across the nation, Obama is not only portrayed in hideous caricatures as the Joker, but as others such as Adolph Hitler, Karl Marx and Osama bin Laden.

Initially, the Tea Party movement was started by Congressman Ron Paul to appeal to Americans who were frustrated and fed-up with such things as taxes and wars, but it was immediately co-opted by right-wing think tanks and by Fox News whose target-eyed pundits brayed 24/7 about a massive "white culture" crusade taking over the nation. Racist hatemongers joined the party, especially Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and,in no time at all, had David Duke, a "white nationalist" and former Grand Wizard of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan,looking like a rank amateur.

These guys aren't crazy -- okay, maybe they are -- but they know exactly what they're doing. They learned from eight years of K-K-Karl Rove and Dick Cheney that fear and hate are the two easiest emotions to work with. Stir in a generous helping of rage, and entire cultures can be manipulated into a frenzy. And, when those emotions feed on racism, a gathering can be turned into a mob, which can then be whipped into a destructive, extremist riot.

In the Spring 2010 Intelligence Report published by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), Mark Potok examines the "Rage on the Right." He writes...

"Since the installation of Barack Obama, right-wing extremists have murdered six law enforcement officers. Racist skinheads and others have been arrested in alleged plots to assassinate the nation’s first black president. One man from Brockton, Mass. -- who told police he had learned on white supremacist websites that a genocide was under way against whites -- is charged with murdering two black people and planning to kill as many Jews as possible on the day after Obama’s inauguration. Most recently, a rash of individuals with anti-government, survivalist or racist views have been arrested in a series of bomb cases.
"As the movement has exploded, so has the reach of its ideas, aided and abetted by commentators and politicians in the ostensible mainstream. While in the 1990s, the movement got good reviews from a few lawmakers and talk-radio hosts, some of its central ideas today are being plugged by people with far larger audiences like FOX News’ Glenn Beck and U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn). Beck, for instance, re-popularized a key Patriot conspiracy theory -- the charge that FEMA is secretly running concentration camps -- before finally “debunking” it.
"Last year also experienced levels of cross-pollination between different sectors of the radical right not seen in years. Nativist activists increasingly adopted the ideas of the Patriots; racist rants against Obama and others coursed through the Patriot movement; and conspiracy theories involving the government appeared in all kinds of right-wing venues."

The SPLC also reports that just in the first year of the Obama presidency, "an astonishing 363 new Patriot groups appeared in 2009, with the totals going from 149 groups (including 42 militias) to 512 (127 of them militias) -- a 244% jump."

We are falling apart. We have lost our sense of decency, our sense of direction. The past is overtaking us, and will soon be our future. We are surrounded by increasingly violent gun-toting "Patriots" who are eager to water the Tree of Liberty with the blood of loony liberals, Commies, and Socialists -- starting with their Black President who, according to the mad dogs on the right, is determined to destroy the freedoms of loyal Americans.

Are we going to stand here, suffering from change shock -- too much change in too short a period of time -- and do nothing? It's tempting, but as Chris Hedges warns,

"To give up acts of resistance is spiritual and intellectual death. It is to surrender to the dehumanizing ideology of totalitarian capitalism. Acts of resistance keep alive another narrative, sustain our integrity and empower others, who we may never meet, to stand up and carry the flame we pass to them. No act of resistance is useless. ... But we will have to resist and then find the faith that resistance is worthwhile, for we will not immediately alter the awful configuration of power. And in this long,long war a community to sustain us, emotionally and materially, will be the key to a life of defiance. As long as we are willing to defy these forces we have a chance, if not for ourselves, then at least for those who follow."

I agree. We must resist -- in order to stop the right-wing's race to destruction before it's too late -- and to change the shock of our children's future.

Walk a Mile...

2010-02-05T20:10:00.000-08:00

I know you need your sleep now,
I know your life's been hard.
But many men are falling,
where you promised to stand guard.
~~Leonard Cohen

My friend Bernie says he's suffering from Afghanistan information exhaustion. "During all those months that Obama was dragging his feet about escalating the war in Afghanistan, did you ever get the impression," he asked, "that foxes were in the hen house, chickens were squawking and running around crazily, wolves were tearing the foxes to pieces, and farmers were shooting wildly into the coop with no regard for the innocent?"

I stared at him, mouth agape, my mind trying to shore up all that activity. "Well ... I --"

"And that's just the generals -- David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal -- and their boss, or cohort, defense secretary Robert Gates. They were everywhere -- everywhere!" Bernie said, rolling his eyes. "And still are. Turn on the TV, pick up a newspaper, open a magazine, check out Congress, look under a rock -- peek behind a tree -- and there they are. They're a three-man brigade -- "we're going in, we're coming out -- we're winning, we're losing. Or maybe not. We won't know for 15 years...20 years...or until it's over --"

Bernie shook his head in disgust, and headed for the door. "You keep telling me to walk a mile in Obama's shoes; that he's got a lot on his plate. Well," Bernie said grimly, "every time I try to do that, I nearly drown. And, if you're paying attention, you know he's having trouble keeping his own balance out there on those turbulent partisan political seas."

President...who?

Bernie says he'd like to give President Obama credit, or blame him, for the decision to expand the war in Afghanistan, but is convinced that Obama's input was neither wanted nor accepted by the three top war dogs. I agree. What those of us familiar with military protocol -- with a properly functioning chain of command -- witnessed was a crude, but effective, military coup.

Aided by an eager and complicit media, for months these insubordinates fueled the fire of Obama's inability to come to a quick decision to meet their demands. They brushed him aside as idealistic and inexperienced. Commander-in-Chief? C'mon, get real. During the recent health-care fiasco, Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) put into words what all Republicans, not a few Democrats, and far too many military brass think of Obama...

"...I believe he didn't serve in government long enough to understand really how things work...Remember, he was in the Senate four years, but effectively only two years because he spent two years where he was hardly ever here at all -- he was campaigning for president. He really does not have an understanding of how Congress operates."

The hateful audacity of Chuck "Obama wants to kill your grandma" Grassley is the typical Republican mindset concerning this president. Each time Republicans push him or challenge him, rather than push back or kick ass, Obama backs down, preferring to compromise to reach a bipartisan agreement. Unfortunately, Republicans don't work that way. They want it all, and the only way they know to get it is to -- as Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol said -- "go for the kill."

The military also goes for the kill. But that is its mission -- what it is trained to do. And Obama needs to understand the military does not function on compromises or bipartisanship. It has a chain of command, and when the Commander-in-Chief, after considering input from field commanders, makes his decision -- gives an order -- all those throughout that chain of command, whether they agree or not, salute and continue to march.

That is not happening here. After ten "war council" meetings and months of considering input, an angry Obama rejected McChrystal's plan that had been leaked to Bob Woodward at the Washington Post, and informed McChrystal that his goal of doubling the force would not be met.

Two days later, on Dec 1, Obama announced his decision from the US Military Academy at West Point. He didn't mention smoking terrorists out, getting them on the run and bringing them to justice, but he dredged up 9/11 and why we should remain convulsed in fear. He spoke of "huge challenges," "bold action," "seizing the initiative," and "long-term consequences." While we were trying to figure out if former president George Bush had left a copy of his speech on the Academy podium, Obama announced he was sending an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan but insisted since America has no interest in fighting an endless war, 2011 was a definite time frame. He said unequivocally that there would be no counterinsurgency and, beginning in July of 2011, the troops would begin to come home.

Or not. Nobody saluted. Gates, Petraeus and McChrystal, along with Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Adm. Michael G. Mullen continued to march in lockstep. They raced to the media both here and abroad, where they shrugged aside Obama's promise of a July 2011 transition, saying it was an "open issue." They insisted that counterinsurgency and special ops remained "embedded" in their war strategy. Ten days after being rejected by Obama, McChrystal's request to double the size of the Army and police to 400,000 remained unchanged.

Foxes, Chickens and Wolves

Obama should take a long, hard look at the Dick Cheney "stay behinds" who are wreaking havoc, especially in defense; insubordinates who openly challenge his decisions and defy his orders while whipping up confusion with daily conflicting announcements and interviews. Perhaps he should start with Cheney who not only stayed behind but remains in his Virginia bunker, just a stone's throw from CIA headquarters, where he "goes for the kill" by giving hate speeches and issuing press releases accusing Obama of being a coward that are published verbatim by the media.

Just hours after Obama's speech, the placid, eerily serene Gates, along with Mullen and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, testified before Congress that troop withdrawal depended on conditions on the ground rather than a deadline. The consensus seemed to be that their commander-in-chief was simply indulging in "wishful thinking."

Days later, according to Think Progress, Gates, Petraeus, Clinton, and another Cheney "stay behind," National Security Adviser James Jones, were all over the Sunday talk shows. Gates told CBS Meet the Press, "We will have a significant -- we will have 100,000 forces -- troops there. And they are not leaving -- in July of 2011."

Jones agreed with Gates on CNN's State of the Union, repeating what he had told BBC two days earlier -- "It's very important that people in Afghanistan hear this very clearly: this is not a withdrawal of the United States from Afghanistan in 2011, it is a decision to turn over to the Afghans some of the responsibility where they are ready to accept that responsibility. But in no manner, shape or form is the United States leaving Afghanistan in 2011." (emphasis added)

These stay behinds, their shoulders blazing with stars, now so eager to expand their military industrial killing spree throughout Afghanistan and Pakistan -- even Iran -- are like wolves circling their prey. They are presenting a powerful, united front against Obama.

And none has refused to follow orders more relentlessly than McChrystal, former commander of the clandestine Joint Special Operations Command, whose secret assassination teams answered only to him, and he answered to no one. McChrystal is a frightening lone wolf. Check him out here, here, here, and here.

It's difficult to imagine President Obama, after promising change -- promising to stand guard and end our wars of aggression -- deliberately putting himself in a position where he appears impotent when he is ignored and over-ruled by subordinates. He has been warned by those who have been there, done that. He is being warned by the people who are gathering for massive national anti-war marches in Washington D.C., Los Angeles and San Francisco on March 20 -- the seventh anniversary of Bush and Cheney's illegal war of aggression against Iraq.

It's time for Obama to put aside empty, soaring speeches and come to grips with who his enemies really are. It's time for him to step onto dry land and walk a mile in his own shoes -- while he still has a pair.

God Has Left the Building...

2009-11-23T13:05:00.000-08:00

If you talk to God, you are praying; If God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.~~Thomas S. Szasz, The Second Sin

Several months ago, CNN published the results of a couple of disturbing polls about Americans and their religious beliefs. The first found that more Americans are rejecting religion and thus, according to CNN, America is becoming "less Christian." The second, a Pew survey of only 742 mostly white evangelical Protestants, revealed that more than six in 10 of them believe that torture is often or sometimes justified.

More than six in 10? What this says about those claiming to be God's own is that perhaps they should use their Bibles for more than "thumping." Because not one in 10 -- not one in 10 thousand -- not one in 10 million -- Christians believes that torture can ever be justified. Ever.

Anyone who has paid attention to the growing number of evangelical zealots over the past couple of decades must be aware that there is a growing chasm between Religion and Christianity. Today, the term, "religious Christians" is nothing if not oxymoronic. It seems when folks become apocalyptic frothing-at-the-mouth religious, they ultimately stray from the light and life of Christianity, while descending deeper into the darkness and death of Religion.

Because, all religion is politics. CNN quoted Mark Silk of Trinity College, who said, "In the 1990s, it really sunk in on the American public generally that there was a long-lasting 'religious right' connected to a political party, and that turned a lot of people the other way." Silk cited the obvious link between the Republican Party and groups such as the Moral Majority and Focus on the Family.

Tony Perkins, the right-wing evangelical president of the Family Research Council, told CNN not to worry. He said people will return to their faith in droves; that soon, the decline will ease and religion will be an even greater part of people's lives. The good news, according to Perkins, is, "As the economy goes downward, I think people are going to be driven to religion." (emphasis added)

Yes, as more Americans lose their jobs, their homes, their very reasons for living, those like Perkins see them as Manchurian congregations -- flocks driven to religion like cattle -- bawling, shuffling, pushing, milling around with tags in their ears, looking for a leader. Even now, they can be seen in mammoth mega-churches, some with arms raised -- fists clutching at dead air -- others writhing in the aisles, moaning, begging for some "sign" from their rigidly religious God. Perhaps their panic stems from the instinctive knowledge that God, unable to get a word in edgewise, has left the building.

The conservative religious right is a frightening political force driven in its efforts to divide and conquer by greed, an insatiable lust for power, and an ideology of hate. Its members, unable to drag God down to their level, have no qualms about elevating themselves to what they perceive as His level. They succeed in controlling the flock because fear -- especially fear of God -- is a great motivator. They use God not only as a weapon against millions who stand between them and their goals of replacing democracy with theocracy and of controlling the worlds resources and its people -- but as a divine justification for the destruction they leave in their wake.

No one was more adept at giving God credit for his killing fields than former president George W. Bush, who openly bragged that God had hired him to remove evil from the face of the earth. "I trust God speaks through me," Bush said in 2004. "Without that, I couldn't do my job." And, even before that, in 2003, Bush tried to round up a "coalition of the willing" for his Iraq slaughter on God's behalf. According to Charleston Gazette editor James A. Haught, Bush told then French President Jacques Chirac that "Iraq must be invaded to thwart Gog and Magog, the Bible’s satanic agents of the Apocalypse." Haught wrote...

"Chirac recounts that the American leader appealed to their “common faith” (Christianity) and told him: “Gog and Magog are at work in the Middle East…The biblical prophecies are being fulfilled…This confrontation is willed by God, who wants to use this conflict to erase his people’s enemies before a New Age begins."

But some presidents, such as Lyndon Johnson, were not so magnanimous. God got the blame, not the credit, for the Vietman atrocity. Ronnie Dugger, in his book, "The Politician: The Life and Times of Lyndon Johnson," writes that Johnson told Austrian ambassador Ernst Lemberter in 1966 that the Holy Ghost regularly visited him..."He comes to me about 2 o'clock in the morning," Johnson said, "--when I have to give word to the boys, and I get the word from God whether to bomb or not."

Now, you don't have to be a Christian to reject the right-wing bull hockey that the God who appeared in a blinding flash of light and spoke to Paul on the road to Damascus has sunk to the evangelical depths where He emits not even a glimmer as He bends our presidents' ears on who to slaughter, urges televangelist Pat Robertson to ask a woman about her sex life, and is still deciding if He wants Michelle Bachman or Sarah Palin to be president.

Christians should be lauded for rejecting modern-day Religion. When the God they are taught to love is either credited -- or blamed -- for all hell on earth; when they search in vain for Jesus, and finally find Him, hanging out in a secretive townhouse on Washington's C Street with the greedy, war-mongering gang who refer to themselves as "The Family," it's time to take a second look at the direction in which this nation is hurtling.

For years, conservative right-wingers have hidden out in the C Street "church," where they are free to conduct all manner of fraud and to carry on adulterous affairs. People who have sold their souls; who have no sense of morality, and who use God as a Trojan Horse to hide their political manipulations to replace both Democrats and Democracy are quite mad, you know. Right-wing evangelicals and neocon operatives are consumed with religious hate, not Christian love. Their modus operandi is, as Weekly Standard operative William Kristol said, "go for the kill."

And, those who are familiar with Kristol know he wasn't referring just to health care. Pat Robertson's Christian Coalition protege, the now disgraced Ralph Reed, dubbed in 1995 by Time magazine as "the right hand of God," was a master at evangelical politics, which he said was like Viet Cong-style guerrilla warfare. Reed said, "I want to be invisible. I do guerrilla warfare. I paint my face and travel at night. You don't know it's over until you're in a body bag. You don't know until election night."

Anyone doubting the viciousness with which Reed would "go for the kill" should have a talk with Vietnam War hero and amputee Max Cleland, who not only found himself crammed into a body bag on election night 2002, thanks to Ralph Reed, but was in there with Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden.

But Reed and others are tyros when it comes to those most likely to cause Christians to reject religion -- those whom CNN failed to mention who incite violence by preaching sermons laced with politics, religion, racism -- and hate. Those like Tempe, Arizona's Steven Anderson, who has no college degree nor formal Bible training, but is qualified to preach because he "has memorized almost half of the New Testament." Anderson started his own church -- Faithful Word Baptist -- in 2005 on Christmas Day. A firey right-wing preacher, he's against homosexuality, liberalism -- and President Barack Obama.

In August, Anderson gave a breathtakingly vile speech entitled, "Why I Hate Obama," in which he said about President Obama, among many other things...

"Obama is a madman in control of this country."
"Obama is NOT my president."
"Obama mocks the Bible."
"Obama is a socialist devil murderer."
"I hope he dies and goes to hell."
"God looks down and says, 'Man -- I HATE that guy!'"

Anderson, and those like him, epitomize the breach between Religion and Christianity. The religious believe that God belongs to them. Christians know that they belong to God. It's that simple. Thus, CNN polls notwithstanding, America cannot become "less Christian" as a result of members of the flock jerking the tags from their ears -- and rejecting modern-day religion.

Rack 'em and Screw 'em, Boys!

2009-11-01T10:14:00.000-08:00

Is there anything scarier than the New York Times' Halloween treat entitled, "Documents Detail Conditions Found at Secret C.I.A. Jails"?

Pardon my Palinese, but -- You betcha! You damnbetcha!

For starters, the "conditions" the Times mentions only briefly are depraved, corrupt, immoral, inhumane torture. According to the Times...

"F.B.I. agents who arrived at a secret C.I.A. jail overseas in September 2002 found prisoners “manacled to the ceiling and subjected to blaring music around the clock,” and a C.I.A. official wrote a list of questions for interrogators including “How close is each technique to the ‘rack and screw’. . ."

What is more frightening -- that the C.I.A. got its jollies by torturing, even murdering human beings in its secret sodomy frat-houses -- or that the F.B.I. took one look and fled the scene and remained silent for years?

Perhaps it's the two-page memo President George Bush had circulated seven months earlier wherein he determined -- under his authority as Commander in Chief and Chief Executive of the United States --

"...none of the provisions of Geneva apply to our conflict with al Qaeda in Afghanistan or elsewhere throughout the world because, among other reasons, al Qaeda is not a High Contracting Party to Geneva." (emphasis added)
[...]
"...I determine that the Taliban detainees are unlawful combatants and, therefore, do not qualify as prisoners of war under Article 4 of Geneva. I note that, because Geneva does not apply to our conflict with al Qaeda, al Qaeda detainees also do not qualify as prisoners of war."

Bush then added piously that our values as a nation that we shared with many nations (?) required us to treat humanely even those not qualified as humans nor entitled to such treatment. So -- wink, wink -- rack 'em and screw 'em, boys!

According to the Times, the documents were released as a result of several Freedom of Information Act lawsuits filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and Judicial Watch. Makes you wonder if this nation's mainstream media, both print and electronic, has no access -- nor interest -- in freedom of information, doesn't it?

The Times did provide links (see below) to the released documents -- 953 pages it knew most of us would never read. To offset that, the Times assigned two of its top investigative reporters -- Scott Shane and Charlie Savage -- to get the critical information out.

These guys hopped right on it and, after yawning through the assignment, their bland 306-word "news" article was published on page A28.

I don't know about you, but even for Halloween -- that's scary!

Links to released documents via New York Times
A.C.L.U. vs. C.I.A. (SDNY) (pdf) (13 pages)
A.C.L.U. vs. D.O.D. (DDC2) (pdf) (441 pages)
Judicial Watch vs. C.I.A. (DDC) (pdf) (34 pages)
A.C.L.U. vs. D.O.D. (SDNY) (pdf) (98 pages)
A.C.L.U. vs. D.O.D. (DDC2) (pdf) (61 pages)
A.C.L.U. vs. D.O.D. (pdf) (141 pages)
Feinman vs. C.I.A. (DDC) (pdf) (163 pages)
Judicial Watch vs. D.O.J. (DDC) (pdf) (2 pages)

Charge of the Beckerheads...

2009-10-11T16:33:00.000-07:00

I didn't know Van Jones. I didn't know Van Jones was a friend of mine -- at least not until the stench billowing from the Fox Hate Channel became so foul I was forced to take a closer look at this terrifying creature. No -- not Jones, whom President Obama wisely had hired as Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the Council on Environmental Quality -- but the sobbing, lying, deliriously insane Glenn Beck.

According to Beck, who began his assault on Jones in a July 23 disjointed rant, wherein he claimed Jones is not only "a communist-anarchist radical," but a former black nationalist, avowed communist-anarchist radical. Or something. Anyway, according to Beck, Jones is really really dangerous -- a racist just like Obama, who has a "deep-seated hatred for white folks" and whose entire agenda is restructuring America into a land of reparations, social justice and jobs for minorities.

The appalling thing about the intellectually challenged Beck, like the Limbaugh-loon he so desperately struggles to impersonate, is that he is given a podium from which to spew his hate. Even more appalling is that he is allowed -- encouraged -- to do so with no reservation, no regulation, and no repercussion. Unless, of course, you consider the multi-million-dollar salary he receives for telling lies and for whipping paranoid masses of gun-toting racists into glassy eyed fury, then it's easy to see Beck is hitting the repercussion jackpot -- over and over again.

As Alexander Zaitchik points out in his three-part Salon series on Beck's background, Beck has always been desperate for two things -- attention and ratings. And he learned early in his career that nothing works as quickly nor as well with the media as personal insults, public humiliation and character assassination.

With few exceptions, the mainstream media fawn over him, laugh at his blatant lies, his death threats and his fake tears. Beck has long been obsessed with destruction -- even murder. In March 2001, he fantasized about killing Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) with a shovel as well as lining up several others and shooting them in the head. On his May 17, 2005 Glenn Beck Program, he chortled...

"Hang on, let me just tell you what I'm thinking. I'm thinking about killing Michael Moore, and I'm wondering if I could kill him myself, or if I would need to hire somebody to do it. No, I think I could. I think he could be looking me in the eye, you know, and I could just be choking the life out -- is this wrong? I stopped wearing my What Would Jesus -- band -- Do, and I've lost all sense of right and wrong now. I used to be able to say, "Yeah, I'd kill Michael Moore," and then I'd see the little band: What Would Jesus Do? And then I'd realize, "Oh, you wouldn't kill Michael Moore. Or at least you wouldn't choke him to death." And you know, well, I'm not sure."

And more recently, on his Aug 6 Fox program, Beck regaled at least himself by giggling about putting poison in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's wine....

Not a pretty picture. No -- not Beck, who should have the FBI nipping at his heels like other "homegrown terrorists" for threatening the lives of legislators and sowing dissent within the government -- but the media, going all Hunter Thompson on us, curled up at Beck's feet like so many chimps in a zoo cage, feverishly pumping out masturbatory praise for the low-class dirty trickster.

When Jones, rather than sink to Beck's level, resigned his position over the Labor Day weekend, some in the media were ecstatic. NBC Deputy Political Director Mark Murray whooped it up in his 8 Sep "First Read"...

"Van Jones resigns: Speaking of distractions, Glenn Beck got his man -- Van Jones, who resigned from the administration over the weekend. And judging by how Beck responded to the news of the resignation of the mid-level staffer, he won't be satisfied with this scalp. Beck made it sound like he might even have a list of "Who's next," which will embolden defenders of the administration to start focusing on Beck and others. [...] As for Jones, clearly, that 9/11 stuff made him indefensible and does call into question the White House's vetting process. The irony in all of this: Beck never lost his job for calling Obama a racist, but Jones did…"

Time Magazine, a partner of CNN, has led the charge to cover Beck's every move, every word, every teardrop in a desperate effort to get a piece of Beck's attention-and-ratings action. See here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Then, of course, there's Time's photo gallery" and the much-heralded Sep 17 cover story wherein author David Von Drehle takes 3,598 words to debunk his own headline, "Mad Man: Is Glenn Beck Bad for America?" and to paint Beck as nothing more than a feisty, lovable -- albeit controversial -- little whippersnapper...

"Glenn Beck: the pudgy, buzz-cut, weeping phenomenon of radio, TV and books . . . The old American mind-set that Richard Hofstadter famously called "the paranoid style" — the sense that Masons or the railroads or the Pope or the guys in black helicopters are in league to destroy the country — is aflame again, fanned from both right and left. [...] No one has a better feeling for this mood, and no one exploits it as well, as Beck. He is the hottest thing in the political-rant racket, left or right. A gifted entrepreneur of angst in a white-hot market.
[...]
Beck is 45, tireless, funny, self-deprecating, a recovering alcoholic, a convert to Mormonism, a libertarian and living with ADHD. He is a gifted storyteller with a knack for stitching seemingly unrelated data points into possible conspiracies — if he believed in conspiracies, which he doesn't, necessarily; he's just asking questions. He's just sayin'. In cheerful days of yore, he was a terrific host of a morning-zoo show on an FM Top 40 station. But these aren't cheerful times. For conservatives, these are times of economic uncertainty and political weakness, and Beck has emerged as a virtuoso on the strings of their discontent."

Not to be outfoxed by her peers, on Sep 22, CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric premiered her new one-on-one high-profile online interview show "@katiecouric" with Beck, whom she introduced as a "one-man cottage industry." Beck fielded Couric's painfully shallow questions, such as, "Do you feel that you're...you're kind of being divisive?" with sly grins and winks. "Let me see, here," Beck said, giggling and rolling his eyes while tapping his forehead, "how can I answer that? You're just trying to make some news -- you just want me to give you a sound byte..."

But the most interesting -- and entertaining -- take on Beck comes from Fox News' Chief Beckerhead Chris Wallace, who boasts that he "is on the Glenn Beck bandwagon," and insists that "Beck is a meteor here at Fox News." Wallace was taking the irrepressible Shepard Smith to task for not giving Beck the proper respect; even accused Smith of being jealous of Beck's fame. "Oh no," Smith proclaimed, fighting back fake tears -- "We are here to celebrate, worship and adore..." You gotta watch this.

Most mainstream media -- if they acknowledge Beck's attacks -- present them as news, such as the czars fiasco, the fake Fox ACORN videos, etc. However, there are some, even on the right, who are concerned enough about the damage being done to sound the alarm. The New York Times' David Brooks writes, not only about Beck, but Limbaugh, Hannity and others whose lust for power (attention and ratings) knows no bounds...

"For no matter how often their hollowness is exposed, the jocks still reweave the myth of their own power. They still ride the airwaves claiming to speak for millions. They still confuse listeners with voters. And they are aided in this endeavor by their enablers. They are enabled by cynical Democrats, who love to claim that Rush Limbaugh controls the G.O.P. They are enabled by lazy pundits who find it easier to argue with showmen than with people whose opinions are based on knowledge. They are enabled by the slightly educated snobs who believe that Glenn Beck really is the voice of Middle America.

So the myth returns. Just months after the election and the humiliation, everyone is again convinced that Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and the rest possess real power. And the saddest thing is that even Republican politicians come to believe it. They mistake media for reality. They pre-emptively surrender to armies that don’t exist.

They pay more attention to Rush’s imaginary millions than to the real voters down the street. The Republican Party is unpopular because it’s more interested in pleasing Rush’s ghosts than actual people. The party is leaderless right now because nobody has the guts to step outside the rigid parameters enforced by the radio jocks and create a new party identity. The party is losing because it has adopted a radio entertainer’s niche-building strategy, while abandoning the politician’s coalition-building strategy.

The rise of Beck, Hannity, Bill O’Reilly and the rest has correlated almost perfectly with the decline of the G.O.P. But it’s not because the talk jocks have real power. It’s because they have illusory power, because Republicans hear the media mythology and fall for it every time."

Like Chris Wallace says, they are all just meteors exploding across this nation's sky. Perhaps someone should remind Wallace and others in the media that the shining streak they're hanging onto is nothing but a trail of gas, and when it enters Truth's atmosphere, it will disintegrate -- taking the Beckerhead Bandwagon with it.

Fading Into Mist...

2009-07-18T20:25:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

If you keep on excusing, you eventually give your blessing to the slave camp, to cowardly force, to organized executioners, to the cynicism of great political monsters; you finally hand over your brothers ~~Albert Camus

There is no subject more restricted nor more controlled in the United States than a critical discussion of Israel. Balanced argument is ignored while each word is parsed -- and condemned. It's strange that we are free to rant and rave and point out the war crimes of our own administration -- of all other administrations throughout the world -- but not those of Israel. The few who dare to question the damage Israel has wrought throughout the Middle East for decades are immediately labeled "anti-Semitic," and are in danger of losing their friends, jobs, their reputations and, if they persist, their country -- for America has zero tolerance for those who recognize Israel's brutality.

Why is this? Are not crimes against humanity just that, regardless of who is committing them? For example, when one-and-a-half million human beings are imprisoned like caged animals, with no food, electricity, medical care, clean water, and then are exterminated like so many insects -- cut to pieces, burned to a crisp with illegal weapons banned by the Geneva Conventions -- is that not a crime against humanity? Are the men, women and children trapped behind the walls of Gaza with nowhere to run -- nowhere to hide -- not human?

Kill Them All

If you've been listening to the Israeli leadership for the past 60 years, the last 10 years -- the last year -- you know very well that Palestinians are many things, but not human. In 1982, former Likud leader and prime minister Menahim Begin said Palestinians "are beasts walking on two legs." The next year, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces Raphael Eitan gloated, "When we have settled the land, all the Arabs will be able to do about it will be to scurry around like drugged cockroaches in a bottle." And, in 1988, Yitzhak Shamir, a Likudnik elected Prime Minister twice, told the settlers taking over the Palestinian land, "The Palestinians will be crushed like grasshoppers...heads smashed against the boulders and walls."

But it was our own Evangelical, oxy-moronic (sic) Judeo-Christian (sic) cloven-hoofed Pat Robertson, who chats often with God who gave us the real lowdown on Israel's "moral" savagery. Robertson explained God's rationale to his 700 Club members in May 1985...

"The wars of extermination have given a lot of people trouble unless they know what was going on. The people in the land of Palestine were very wicked. They were given over to idolatry; they sacrificed their children; they had all kinds of abominable sex practices; they were having sex, apparently, with animals; they were having sex men with men, and women with women; they were committing adultery, fornication; they were worshipping idols, offering their children up; and they were forsaking God.

"God told the Israelites to kill them all -- men, women and children, to destroy them. And that seems to be a terrible thing to do. Is it? Or isn't it? Well, let us assume there were 2,000 of them, or 10,000 of them living in the land, or whatever number there was of them. I don't have the exact number. Pick a number. God said, 'Kill them all.' . . . the abomination was there like a contagion. God saw that there was no cure for it. It wasn't going to change; their hearts weren't going to change; and all they would do is cause trouble for the Israelites, and pull the Israelites away from God, and prevent the truth of God from reaching the Earth. So, God, in love, took away a small number that he might not have to take away a large number."

Beasts. Insects. Victims of a relentless, methodical genocide that grinds away, day after day, year after year, with no analysis, no reflection, no questions -- subsidized with US equipment, US political support, US taxpayers' money.

How easily we have not only excused, but given our blessing to Israel's crimes -- handed over our brothers -- from the 1967 attack on the USS Liberty using US-financed French aircraft leaving 34 dead and 174 injured American sailors, to massacres using US-furnished weapons in Jenin, Rafah, Sabara, Shatila, Lebanon, and repeatedly in Gaza.

How silently we stood on March 16, 2003 when an Israeli soldier in a US Caterpillar bulldozer crushed to death 23-year-old Rachel Corrie -- shot and seriously wounded 26-year-old Brian Avery on April 5, 2003 -- and, on April 11, 2003, shot and killed 21-year-old Tom Hurndall while he was attempting to save three terrified Palestine children who were being shot at as they played.

Political Monsters

Israel's grotesque 22-day foray into Gaza earlier this year shocked the world with its savagery -- with one notable exception -- the United States. Perhaps that's because, according to the Australian Herald, one week before the invasion, the US shipped 989 containers of munitions, including white phosphorous, to Israel. Three months earlier, Congress approved a $77 million sale to Israel of 1,000 Boeing Corp. GBU-39 bunker-buster bombs which arrived just in time to wreck havoc on the Gaza infrastructure.

Despite the layers upon layers of justification Israel cites, there is only one reason it continues its heinous extermination of the Palestinian people -- because it can. Because the United States supports such atrocity. Because the United States finances, arms and equips Israel, and -- more important -- protects it from having to account for any of its crimes. So, who's to blame here? From whose hands does the blood of Palestinian men, women and children run? Israel or the United States? Who are the monsters?

Speak, memory.

Scarcely a week after the "war" on Gaza began, the jubilation in both houses of Congress was palatable. Members elbowed each other out of the way to co-sponsor and vote for resolutions condemning Hamas for forcing Israel to maim and kill its Gaza population. Resolutions were submitted and passed by voice vote on Jan. 8. The Senate Resolution had 34 co-sponsors; the House Resolution chalked up 116. The votes and the blame were shamefully one-sided, with Hamas being blamed for both the war and the death of its own citizens. Israel did not receive a single rebuke; was praised throughout -- ironically, for facilitating "humanitarian aid to Gaza with hundreds of trucks carrying humanitarian assistance and numerous ambulances entering the Gaza Strip since the war began."

Three days later, investigative journalist Max Blumenthal covered a 10,000-strong rally in New York City. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) whipped the crowd into a frenzy, shouting about the morality of Israel text-messaging Palestinians to "vacate their homes because there were weapons in them..." Schumer, giddy with pride, his fist waving in the air, cried -- "What other country would do that!"

According to Blumenthal, the rally was pulsating with hate. He said...

"Right in front of the stage, a man held a banner reading, “Islam Is A Death Cult.” Rally attendees described the people of Gaza to me as a “cancer,” called for Israel to “wipe them all out,” insisting, “They are forcing us to kill their children in order to defend our own children.” A young woman told me, “Those who die are suffering God’s wrath.” “They are not distinguishing between civilians and military, so why should we?” said a member of the group of messianic Orthodox Jewish Chabad-Lubavitch group that flocked to the rally.

"No one I spoke to could seem to find any circumstance in which they would begin to question Israel’s war. No number of civilian deaths, no displays of extreme suffering -- nothing could deter their enthusiasm for attacking one of the most vulnerable populations in the world with the world’s most advanced weaponry. There are no limits, no matter what Israel does, no matter how it does it."

As I watched those caught up in the shockingly racist excitement of that rally, I could not help but wonder what these people -- what US politicians -- would do if the children being blown to bits, the homes bombed and bulldozed, the families mutilated, the livelihoods destroyed --were theirs. And, I also am forced to wonder -- is the inability to hold back tears at the sight of so much inhumane lust for blood anti-Semitic -- even anti-American?

Blame the Jews?

Perhaps I am the wrong person to address this issue. I was raised, for the most part, in the wilds of New Mexico by parents completely devoid of racism, bigotry or hate. Those ugly ideologies weren't just ignored -- they didn't exist. This may sound naive, but I never met a Jew until I was married, my husband was in the Army and stationed at Fort Monmouth in Long Branch, New Jersey. We rented a bedroom "apartment" from the Brodskys, a Jewish family -- wonderful, joyous, good-natured people who welcomed us into their midst as if they had been waiting for us all their lives. For me, for years, the Brodskys personified all Jews.

So, when I look to the Middle East and see human beings abused, without food or adequate health care, their infrastructure destroyed, their children slaughtered for sport, it is difficult for me to believe such barbaric savagery is being committed, or even condoned, by Jews who are aware of what is happening. American Jews, Jews in Israel, Jews around the world are vigorously opposed to such treatment. Far more Jews than non-Jews in this country speak out about Israel's relentless execution of Palestinians. They protest, engage in "die-ins," hold 24-hour vigils with signs heralding their dissent. They scream to heaven -- but their voices are silenced and the media steadfastly refuses to cover their views.

There was no mention in the US media of the rally in New York City in support of Gaza on the same day as the Schumer Screamer; no mention of IDF soldiers who refused to serve because of the violence against innocent Palestinians; no mention of the 700 Israeli citizens arrested in the first two weeks for protesting the assault; and no mention of a Jan 8 meeting of prominent Canadians who spoke out against the war on Gaza.

Toronto psychotherapist Judith Weisman, a Jew who is a member of Independent Jewish Voices, Jews for a Just Peace, the Jewish Women's Committee to End the Occupation of Palestine, and a founding member of Not In Our Name, said, "Zionism is the scourge of the Jewish people. It is Zionism that has created all of this." Weisman, herself a former "committed Zionist," said, "it took many years for the scales to literally fall off of my eyes and for me to see what Israel has wrought among the Palestinians."

Weisman says she is frightened at the influence Israel now has around the world, and of the "power that Israel and the United States are using to control so much of what is happening around the world."

It's not that nobody is listening, it's that -- for those hog-tied to the US media -- there's nothing to hear but silence, propaganda and lies. Gideon Levy wrote in Haaretz that fully a third of those killed were children. Levy said...

"The public's shocking indifference to these figures is incomprehensible. A thousand propagandists and apologists cannot excuse this criminal killing. One can blame Hamas for the death of children, but no reasonable person in the world will buy these ludicrous, flawed propagandistic goods in light of the pictures and statistics coming from Gaza."

No matter. We here in the United States have moved on. We have given our blessing to the great political monsters. We now live in a world where, as George Orwell wrote in his prescient 1984...

"Everything faded into mist. The past was erased, the erasure was forgotten, the lie became truth."

Breaking the Chain

2009-06-19T13:54:00.001-07:00

I can't help it. I'm suffering from intense guilt because I refuse to forward 50-billion freaking chain letters sent to me by folks who actually believe if I send them on to everyone I know, a poor little karma-deficient girl in the backwoods of Arkansas with a penis growing out of her forehead will be able to raise enough dough to have it removed before her enterprising redneck parents sell her to a traveling freak show where someday she may escape and become president of the United States.

I'll admit, back in 2002, I did get my hopes up when I got this notice from Bill Gates that he was gonna send me -- and everyone to whom I forwarded "his" email -- a thousand bucks.

Call me gullible, but -- hey -- if I could believe that priests grope innocent children, that corporate CEOs snicker while their hands are working feverishly in my pockets, that pasty draft-dodging cowardly vice presidents beef up calls to send my babies to chemical death, and nobody trusts nobody anymore -- why wouldn't I think the world's richest geek, a scholarly-looking little nerdy high-school dropout who serenely vacuums up the dollars of the universe, would be adverse to sending me a few measly bucks? After all, if anybody in this country could afford to do that it's little Billy Gates for God's sake...

Unfortunately, the only thing that was in the mail back then was hope, and it died there. So I broke the chain.

But I'll admit the old adrenalin started pumping again recently when I was told if I scrolled down while simultaneously closing one eye, making a wish and loudly breaking wind, I'd get a new Boy Toy who looks just like Al Pacino. And -- here's the best part -- I would meet him the very next day!! Oh yes yes scroll wink wish blast!...scroll wink wish blast!

All I got out of that little adventure was a nervous tic and a room of my own out behind the barn.

I keep getting told that what I'm promised is straight from the horse's mouth and I can take it to the bank. No way I'm taking anything to the bank that I receive from someone who can't tell one end of the horse from the other. Huh-uh. No way.

And don't threaten me with evil chain-letter leprechauns who will swarm on my house and sodomize me in my sleep for not continuing a chain letter that St. Peter started in 5 AD and was covertly brought to this country by tiny little itty-bitty rogue pilgrims on the Mayflower. Screw them. That's what I always say...

Don't try to send me on a guilt trip about one of my fellow Americans with no teeth who was captured in Botswana and has been shackled against his will to the ass of a dead elephant for 27 years and whose only salvation is the 5-cents per letter he'll receive if I forward your email.

Hey -- I've been suffering the same fate for nearly a decade myself. Unless my nickel will get that unfortunate twit to the polls where he'll be motivated to ram his marker up that Rooster's ass until the freaking bird squawks, I don't have time for him...

So, if I break the chain -- don't threaten me with my underwear turning carnivorous and consuming my nether regions. I don't care. If it's funny, I'll send it on. Okay? Otherwise, I don't need no steenkin' chain letters.

Point is -- don't piss me off. Make me laugh.

Now, forward this to everyone you know.

Love,
Sheila

Seeds of Truth

2009-05-08T11:12:00.000-07:00

I have learned over the past decade if I want to know what's really going on in the United States, I have to cruise through the foreign media to see what's creating a furor or causing a stink. So, while searching for the status of Spain's on-again, off-again criminal proceedings against six Bush Administration war criminals, this headline in Der Spiegel caught my eye -- "Frankenfood Ban is Neither Populism nor Panic-Mongering."

A closer look at the article revealed it wasn't a Norm Coleman ploy to get folks in Minnesota to quit eating burgers and fries, nor a menu for the genetically obscene monster in Mary Shelly's "Frankenstein," but an announcement by Germany's Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner that Germany is banning the cultivation of MON 810, a genetically modified (GM) corn produced by US biotech giant Monsanto.

The GM Monster

It appears that MON 810 is also believed to be the "Frankenstein" of GM crops by at least five other European countries -- France, Austria, Hungary, Greece and Luxembourg -- all of whom have banned its use. MON 810 was approved by the European Union in 1998, and was the only GM crop approved for cultivation in Germany. Aigner said she had legitimate reasons to believe that the genetically modified Monsanto seed "presents a danger to the environment." The plant produces a toxin that not only destroys the larvae of the corn borer moth, but other, beneficial, insects as well.

Andreas Thierfelder, spokesman for Monsanto Germany, responded that Monsanto would decide "as quickly as possible" whether to take legal proceedings. She said the "matter was very urgent as the planting season was about to start." Just how urgent was evident days later when Monsanto filed a lawsuit against the German government, claiming that its ban on MON 810 is arbitrary and contravenes EU rules. Although Monsanto sued France in an effort to overturn its ban on genetically modified corn, and lost that battle in March when France's highest court ruled that the corn "may" harm the environment and wildlife, the German government is justifiably edgy, as it must prove conclusively to the German court that MON 810 damages the environment.

But the feeder GM corn is just one tiny blip on the Frankenfood radar. And, it's not just Europeans who should worry. As Jim Hightower, former two-time Texas agriculture commissioner warned way back in June 2004...

"For some time, the likes of Monsanto have had their white-smocked engineers tinkering merrily and dangerously with the very DNA of food, genetically modifying the natural composition of things like potatoes so they contain a pesticide in every one of their cells, or altering rice so it contains a diarrhea drug in every bite. This is no mere lab experiment, for unbeknownst to the vast majority of Americans, Monsanto and a handful of other global biotech giants have quietly spread the seeds of these genetically altered Frankenfoods to so many farms over the past decade that about a third of the foods on U.S. supermarket shelves now contain organisms with tampered DNA -- everything from baby food and milk to products made with soybean and corn. Thanks to well-placed campaign donations and powerhouse lobbying, this infiltration of our food supply has been done with practically no consumer awareness, since both Bill Clinton's and George W's administrations have let these foodstuffs be sold in America without so much as a label on them to tell us that we're buying something that our families might prefer to avoid."

Kinda ruins the appetite, doesn't it? Not just the fact that Monsanto has infiltrated the bulk of our food chain, but that it clearly believes it has the right to do so with or without our knowledge. It has fought oversight, regulation, labeling and scientific research for years. The arrogance with which multinational biotech corporations such as Monsanto are disrupting and modifying life's natural genetic order -- from seeds to food to animals to humans to the environment -- is creepy. The Almighty must surely be watching in slack-jawed amazement.

The Profit Plan

These giants are "chemical" corporations, and one of their goals is to create seeds that will withstand more (and more and more) of their herbicides. Monsanto, which gave us the deadly Agent Orange and the toxic weed killer Roundup, is not alone in its quest to manipulate, or to control the world's order. Germany's chemical giant Bayer, well known for its popular and effective Bayer aspirin, and for Alleve and Alka Seltzer, was the first to introduce heroin as well as mustard gas, and produces a series of neonicotinoids -- insecticides that attack the central nervous systems of insects, such as bees. Other mega-corporations dealing in both pharmaceuticals and pesticides, to name a few, are Merck, Dupont, Dow Chemical, and Syngenta -- but Monsanto has been around for more than a century, produces 90-percent of genetically modified seed -- and has many friends in high places. Many high places.

Last year, Vanity Fair's Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele teamed up to present a well-researched background article, "Monsanto's Harvest of Fear," wherein they listed some, but not all, of these friends...

(...) Monsanto has long been wired into Washington. Michael R. Taylor was a staff attorney and executive assistant to the F.D.A. commissioner before joining a law firm in Washington in 1981, where he worked to secure F.D.A. approval of Monsanto’s artificial growth hormone before returning to the F.D.A. as deputy commissioner in 1991. Dr. Michael A. Friedman, formerly the F.D.A.’s deputy commissioner for operations, joined Monsanto in 1999 as a senior vice president. Linda J. Fisher was an assistant administrator at the E.P.A. when she left the agency in 1993. She became a vice president of Monsanto, from 1995 to 2000, only to return to the E.P.A. as deputy administrator the next year. William D. Ruckelshaus, former E.P.A. administrator, and Mickey Kantor, former U.S. trade representative, each served on Monsanto’s board after leaving government. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas was an attorney in Monsanto’s corporate-law department in the 1970s. He wrote the Supreme Court opinion in a crucial G.M.-seed patent-rights case in 2001 that benefited Monsanto and all G.M.-seed companies. Donald Rumsfeld never served on the board or held any office at Monsanto, but Monsanto must occupy a soft spot in the heart of the former defense secretary. Rumsfeld was chairman and C.E.O. of the pharmaceutical maker G. D. Searle & Co. when Monsanto acquired Searle in 1985, after Searle had experienced difficulty in finding a buyer. Rumsfeld’s stock and options in Searle were valued at $12 million at the time of the sale.

Bartlett and Steele go into some detail about the lengths Monsanto will go to protect its patent rights, not only against GM or GE (genetically engineered) farmers, but organic farmers as well. They write...

Monsanto goes after farmers, farmers’ co-ops, seed dealers -- anyone it suspects may have infringed its patents of genetically modified seeds. As interviews and reams of court documents reveal, Monsanto relies on a shadowy army of private investigators and agents in the American heartland to strike fear into farm country. They fan out into fields and farm towns, where they secretly videotape and photograph farmers, store owners, and co-ops; infiltrate community meetings; and gather information from informants about farming activities. Farmers say that some Monsanto agents pretend to be surveyors. Others confront farmers on their land and try to pressure them to sign papers giving Monsanto access to their private records.

Once you opt to buy Monsanto seeds, you are no longer a farmer, you're a "grower" -- a serf -- and you must sign a Technology/Stewardship Agreement wherein you agree, among many other restrictions, to use Monsanto seed for planting only a single commercial crop...not to sell or give seeds to any other person for planting...to pay annual technology fees (in addition to the price of the seed) due Monsanto...to turn over your records and receipts anytime Monsanto asks for them. In short, you sign your life -- and your livelihood -- over when you become a "grower." And, if you're ever taken to court (and it's likely you could be), and you lose (and it's likely you will) -- you will find you agreed to pay Monsanto and its attorney fees and all related court costs.

The End Game

This goes way beyond garnering profits for agriculture conglomerates such as Monsanto. It is about disrupting the natural order of life -- whether plant or animal. And, for those orchestrating this havoc, it is about control. As Henry Kissinger once said matter-of-factly, "If you control the oil you control the country; if you control food, you control the population." Kissinger has long been obsessed with two things -- depopulating the world and establishing a New World Order.

What better way to control the food than to ban seed saving -- what better weapon is there to use against starving populations than food? The answer is laid out in detail in F. William Engdahl's November 2007 critical book about genetic manipulation, "Seeds of Destruction." Engdahl is no conspiracy theorist. He is a leading researcher as well as an economist and an associate and regular contributor for the Centre for Research on Globalization.

In his extensive three-part review of "Seeds," investigative journalist Stephen Lendman reveals "... the diabolical story of how Washington and four Anglo-American agribusiness giants plan world domination by patenting life forms to gain worldwide control of our food supply and why that prospect is chilling."

Lendman reminds us that Kissinger has been both at the forefront and behind the scenes since the 1960s when, as Engdahl wrote, "the Rockefellers were at the power center of the US establishment (and) Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (was) their hand-picked protege." Kissinger was there as Nixon's Secretary of State in 1973 when the food crisis hit and, as Engdahl said, he decided US agricultural policy was "too important to be left in the hands of the Agricultural Department so he took control of it himself." Even back then, Kissinger's goal was to go global and seize control of the agricultural food market. Kissinger's "food diplomacy" was to use food to "reward friends and punish enemies."

Lendman writes, "Food is power. When used to cull the population, it's a weapon of mass destruction." He says "One way or another, the Rockefeller Foundation aims to reduce population through human reproduction by spreading GMO seeds." And the "world's number one" in patenting seeds is Monsanto. He explains...

Like it or not, they're advancing their agenda, and a 2004 Rockefeller Foundation report shows it. GM crop production achieved nine consecutie double digit year increases since 1996. More than eight million farmers in 17 countries now plant them, over 90% in developing nations. Far and away, the US is the world's leader "with aggressive Government promotion, absence of labeling, and the domination of US farm production." Here, "genetically engineered crops (have) essentially taken over the American food chain." In 2004, over 85% of soybeans were genetically modified, 45% of corn, and since animal feed is mainly from these crops "the entire meat production of the nation (and exports) has been fed on genetically modified animal feed." What animals eat, so do humans.

According to Engdahl, agribusiness giants, aided by the Rockefeller Foundation, the US government and the World Trade Organization (WTO) are progressing relentlessly toward the second pillar of Kissinger's end game -- controlling food to control (and expunge) populations of lesser nations. In December 2007, Engdahl sounded the alarm about yet another seed venture (adventure?), "Doomsday Seed Vault in the Arctic," a steel-reinforced concrete seed bank built deep inside a mountain on the remote Norwegian island of Spitsbergen. This "program" is funded by the Rockefellers, by such seed giants as Syngenta and Monsanto -- and by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who knows a bit about monopoly.

The Way Out

Engdahl says that, since 2007, Monsanto and the US Government together hold the patent for a commercial seed called "Terminator," designed to commit suicide after just one harvest, and farmers will be forced to return to Monsanto or other seed giants to purchase new seeds each year for crops needed to feed their populations. He said if they're allowed to continue their reckless pursuit of power, in a decade or so, the small farmer will be but a memory and the majority of the world's food producers would be little more than feudal serfs in bondage to three or four giant seed corporations. "Those who say 'it can't happen here' should look more closely at current global events," he wrote. "The mere existence of that concentration of power in three or four private US-based agribusiness giants is grounds for legally banning all GMO crops even were their harvent gains real, which they manifestly are not."

The good news is that Europe is fighting back against being forced to plant genetically manipulated seeds for plants and food. Countries like Austria and Denmark, France -- and now Germany -- are standing up, and standing together, to ban biotech products. As is always the case, when those who lust for power and control concoct their grand schemes, they fail to factor in the human response. Lendman says public opinion throughout Europe is strongly opposed to GMO foods and ingredients. He writes...

Several EU countries, including France, Germany, Austria and Denmark, even ban some EU-approved biotech products to further cloud the outlook. Polls show why, with European public opinion strongly opposed to GMO foods and ingredients, with hostility levels in France as high as 89% and 79% wanting governments to ban them. This shows European consumers are far ahead of Americans and much better protected (so far) by their overall exclusion as well as having labeling requirements for those allowed to be sold. That provision is crucial as it empowers consumers to use or avoid eating these foods. If enough people abstain, food outlets won't carry them.

It's not that Americans don't care that the Rockefeller-Gates-Monsanto plan to solve world hunger is but a ghastly scheme to cull the population of its nonproductive bottom-feeders. Thanks to conspiratorial US media, most of us are either blissfully unaware or are unable to make a sound because, as Hightower said, our "Congress and the White House (and the media) have Monsanto checks stuffed in their ears."

The way out is to become informed -- and just say no to having unlabeled, untested products crammed down our throats. If we do nothing, we will reap what we sow. We will, as Charles Galton Darwin, grandson of evolutionist Charles Darwin, wrote in his 1952"The Next Million Years," be condemned to the status of workers in a beehive.

We must stand up and support Europe's attempt to organize a ban on genetically modified crops and food. It is the way -- the only way -- out of this mess. Lendman, who maintains "the stakes are much too high -- human health and safety must never be compromised for profit," suggests that we read Engdahl's book, which is a "wake-up call" for all of us.

I suggest we start by reading Lendman's review of that book, which is a much louder wake-up call.

It's Time for the Madness to Stop

2009-03-01T20:22:00.000-08:00

By Sheila Samples

Sometimes it's hard to come to grips with the truth -- especially if that truth is about our own country, and is in direct opposition to everything we've been taught since childhood. Patriotism is in our genes, and through the years it has been a national conviction that, if our country needed us, serving in the military to protect our freedom was not only the right thing to do, but the only thing to do. We still believe that. We still leap to our feet at the first beat of a drum at a military parade, clutch our hearts at the sight of the Stars and Stripes, weep at the refrain of the National Anthem. However, far too many of us succumb to the pomp and pageantry of war -- of mission accomplished -- with little concern for the human beings who made that possible -- what they went through, what they're still going through -- so we can maintain our arrogant national pride.

From the beginning, those in the military have served their country with unswerving loyalty. They continued to march even after Henry Kissinger belched out the truth that Duty--Honor--Country is a one-way street because "Military men are dumb, stupid animals to be used" as pawns for foreign policy. And, it has long been a dead-end street for those captured or left behind on foreign soil -- for those who return from battlefields maimed both mentally and physically, and for those who are innocent victims of malicious life-destroying experiments who have no chance of the extent of their injuries being recognized and are refused the necessary health care.

The most ghastly experiment the military ever conducted was Operation Crossroads, a series of "Manhattan Project" tests requested by the Joint Chiefs of Staff in 1946 to study the effects of nuclear weapons on ships and equipment. After bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki the year before, US officials knew the effect of massive radiation on human beings and animals. They had to know. So what else were the thousands of navy personnel positioned on ships from five to eight miles from the Bikini Atoll bomb site in the central Pacific if not guinea pigs?

One young sailor stationed at the Bikini Atoll in 1946 was Anthony Guarisco who, like thousands of others, has suffered horribly for the last 63 years as a result of radiation poisoning and like those others, has been denied the proper health care. Guarisco is the founder of both the National and International Alliance of Atomic Veterans. In 1994, Academy Award-winning team Vivienne Verdon-Roe and Michael Porter produced a documentary, "Experimental Animals," featuring Guarisco who, very calmly, describes the horrors of that 1946 July. (Note: Ecological Options Network has just re-released "Experimental Animals" on-line and as a DVD, because EON filmmaker/activist Jim Heddle says, "we think it's as relevant today as it was when it was produced.")

The first bomb -- Able -- was dropped from a B-29 on July 1. As a health precaution, military personnel in the area were told to "cover their eyes." Guarisco said it was awesome. He said it immediately "came home to me what happened at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I could see how 55-65 thousand people could die in one-and-a-half seconds."

But the second one -- Baker -- was beyond awesome. Guarisco said it was detonated beneath the ocean from a depth of 90 feet, and "sucked a target array of approximately 100 ships into the air like little toys. I saw the U.S. Arkansas soar into the air about 200 feet and come down in two pieces. I saw aircraft carriers just flinging around as if they were toys."

According to the Navy's historical report, "The inability to complete inspections on much of the target fleet threatened the success of the operation after BAKER. A program of target vessel decontamination was begun in earnest about 1 August. This involved washing the ships' exteriors using work crews drawn from the target ships' companies under radiological supervision of monitors equipped with radiation detection and measurement devices. Initially, decontamination was slow as the safe time aboard the target ships was measured only in minutes. As time progressed, the support fleet itself had become contaminated by the low-level radioactivity in marine growth on the ships' hulls and seawater piping systems."

Ironically, although the ships were towed out of the area just 10 days after the blast where the work could be done in uncontaminated water, no warning was given to the human experimental animals, who were allowed to swim in contaminated water, walk barefoot on beaches and breathe poisonous air.

Guarisco said, "We went back into the ground zero area immediately after each of the detonations, and I spent a total of 67 days in the Bikini lagoon within one mile of the epicenter. And I became ill after the second detonation, approximately four or five days after that...I had symptoms similar to having a bad case of influenza. I had welts on my body -- I broke out with welts -- and it was scary for me. I was urinating blood, I was very sick."

And Guarisco wasn't the only one who became ill. In a 1998 National Radio Project interview with Michael O'Rourke, who monitors veterans health issues for the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States, Guarisco said, "Other people on my ship were also feeling very sick. And for many, many years I thought that, well, certainly if there was anything wrong surely they would let me know. But," he said, "I found out many years later that’s not how it is. You know, the government and the U.S. military are not about to say anything about anybody who’s exposed to high levels or low levels of radiation. It was hard for me to come out of denial, to understand that I was dealing with people who really were not interested in anything else but waiting for me to die."

Guarisco says that, in one -- two -- blinding flashes, "we saw what World War III will look like. We have seen the firestorm, we have been witness to the sacrilegious devastation that nuclear weapons put forth, and we have seen our brother and our sister veterans die from being exposed to this terribleness." He says the bottom line of nuclear weapons is the bottom line of the profit margin -- that "deterrent" or "first strike" are fear code words used to keep the population at bay and to pave the way for the nuclear industry to keep building more expensive (profitable) weapons.

In his March 2008 tribute to both of his parents, Guarisco's son, Vincent, goes into greater detail about his father's lifelong battle, not only with the effects of radiation but with the nuclear industry and government itself. For more than 60 years, both Anthony and Mary Guarisco were out there, militant activists armed with the truth, relentlessly attempting to derail the nuclear train before it goes over the cliff, taking human survival with it.

The United States has more nuclear weapons than any other nation. Although we have avoided the instant, negative repercussions of another Nagasaki or Hiroshima, we have nevertheless managed to contaminate most of the world with Depleted Uranium.

In 2006, Japanese professor Dr. K. Yagasaki, by using the known amount of uranium used in the Hiroshima bomb -- about the size of a two-litre milk container -- calculated that a ton of DU used on the battlefield results in the equivalent of 100 Hiroshima bombs worth of radiation released into the atmosphere. So, when it was reported that 2,000 tons of DU were dropped on Iraq from 2003 to 2006, we need to understand that what was released in the Iraqi atmosphere, and then spreading worldwide, was the equivalent of 200,000 Hiroshima bombs.

The total amount of DU the US has used since 1991 is approximately 4,600 tons (1,000 in the first Gulf War, 800 in Kosovo, 800 in Afghanistan and a further 2,000 tons in the second Iraq war.) This amounts to approximately 460,000 Hiroshima bombs, ten times the amount of radiation released into the atmosphere from all previous nuclear testing worldwide. And, it's important to note this calculation was three years ago. Since that time, we've had three more years of non-stop DU bombing...

Throughout the '60s, the US conducted numerous toxic and chemical weapons tests on its military personnel. In July 2008, Nic Maclellan, journalist, researcher and development worker in the Pacific, wrote...

"Under Project SHAD, the US Navy conducted six tests in the Marshall Islands and off the coast of Hawai’i between 1964-68. Pentagon documents released in 2002 show the US Defense Department sprayed live nerve and biological agents on ships and sailors, and sprayed a germ toxin on Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

"These Cold War-era experiments to test the Navy's vulnerability to toxic warfare involved about 4,300 US military personnel, mostly from the Navy. Most were never informed that the tests were being conducted, breaching all ethical principles about informed consent for test subjects."

It's time that we, as a nation, not only face the truth -- but come to grips with it. Those who serve with such trust and loyalty cannot imagine that they are, at best, "experimental animals" to be used and cast aside by ruthless corporate thugs.

How many generations of Anthony Guariscos must we lose before we realize that "support the troops" means protect the troops? Like Guarisco said, we must stand up, stand together and demand the abolition of all nuclear weapons if human beings on this planet are to survive.

It's time for the madness to stop. Before we are all atomic veterans.

He's Everywhere -- Thank God

2008-12-05T17:23:00.000-08:00

The Eerie Vision of Edgar Allen Poe

2008-12-03T21:54:00.000-08:00

I love the magic of Edgar Allen Poe. He has had a great influence on my writing and thinking (alas)throughout my life... "The Tell-Tale Heart" is one of his best -- and "The Bells" drives me to the edge of the abyss.

Most people, when they think of Poe can only come up with "The Raven," and I doubt if they have read it in its entirety. For the past eight years, when I look at George Bush, I see "The Imp of the Perverse," and it would not surprise me at all to see him dashing madly through the crowd, screaming his guilt at the top of his lungs as he crosses that finish line.

But the one piece to which I turn again and again -- usually when I am alone; it is the witching hour, and the high-pitched barks and yelps of coyotes on the creek behind my house sound ominiously close -- is "The Fall of the House of Usher."

Buried within that masterpiece is the greatest poem ever written -- "The Haunted Palace." Anybody with any perception can read that poem and see that Poe is eerily describing what has happened to this once proud and beautiful nation as it has descended into corruption and madness...

We are now in the throes of Verse VI. Where do we go from here?

THE HAUNTED PALACE
By Edgar Allen Poe

I.
In the greenest of our valleys,
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace--
Radiant palace--reared its head.
In the monarch Thought's dominion--
It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair.

II.
Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow;
(This--all this--was in the olden
Time long ago)
And every gentle air that dallied,
In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
A winged odour went away.

III.
Wanderers in that happy valley
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically
To a lute's well-tuned law,
Round about a throne, where sitting
(Porphyrogene!)
In state his glory well befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.

IV.
And all with pearl and ruby glowing
Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing
And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty
Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.

V.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate;
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)
And, round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.

VI.
And travellers now within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows, see
Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While, like a rapid ghastly river,
Through the pale door,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh--but smile no more.

You GO Bush!

2008-12-03T14:20:00.000-08:00

The Village Idiot is sprinting to the finish line -- and for the first time in his sorry, murderous "presidency," the entire world is rooting for him... He says he is counting the days. Good for him. We are counting the minutes -- the seconds -- until we never have to see this psychopath again...

Thanks to Jim Hightower, here's the lowdown...

Through a Hole in the Air...

2008-11-28T09:51:00.000-08:00

Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State!

Sail on, O Union, strong and great!

Humanity with all its fears,

With all the hopes of future years,

Is hanging breathless on thy fate!

~~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The recent blowout election that gave us President Barack Obama resulted in a flood of emotion that engulfed both parties. The one thing they had in common was that neither party could believe it. Political comedian Mort Sahl once said, "Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve everything they've stolen."

If we have learned nothing else about Republicans, it's that, with few exceptions, they are vindictive, immoral, blood-thirsty, and just plain power-mad. Republicans are so much better at destroying things than Democrats are. They say and do whatever it takes to win. And if that doesn't work -- they seize it anyway.

So we were braced for another disappointment -- not because we didn't share Obama's vision of change and his hope for a better life for all Americans, but because voting machines were frantically flip-flopping votes from Obama to John McCain, minority voters were purged, telephones jangled with robocalls smearing Obama as an alien terrorist -- and John King over at CNN kept ramming solid red "magic" maps in our faces as proof that McCain could not lose.

So, what happened?

We woke up. After snoozing through massive homicide, refusing to confront genocide, ignoring fratracide and the hopelessness that has driven an alarming number of our military to commit suicide...we woke up. We stood united against a national addiction to chaos, bloodshed and corruption. We voted for a leader who promised to break that addiction, and to heal this nation in the name of the people.

By election night, we were giddy with relief. We clambered aboard that ship of state and rode the wave of long-lost hope -- free at last. Obama's win ripped a hole in the political air, and millions of us stood weeping as the blissful sound of Democracy wafted through every nook and cranny to swirl around this magnificent moment in our history.

But that was election night. Republicans, terrified of change, were in shock -- in total disarray. But the next morning, they were out in force -- maggots streaming from rotten turds whose blossoms had been stomped on.

The Heritage Foundation warned against the danger of the Left's "radical agenda" of health care, education and energy. House majority leader John Boehner was either drunk or stupidly arrogant, or both, when he maintained that Obama may have won, but his "far-left agenda" was out of step with the majority of Americans. Boehner did concede, however, that House Republicans might work with Obama "when it is in the best interest of our nation," and only when it promoted "superior Republican alternatives..."

Boehner's predecessor, Dick Armey, was quick to point out that Obama didn't win -- Republicans lost. And they lost because they were just too damned compassionate. Armey is chairman of Freedom Works, which advocates scrapping the Federal Income Tax, kicking older folks out of Social Security to keep from overburdening the young, and of course freedom -- such as that of network carriers to manage and control Internet content. According to Armey, Republicans have simply forgotten their principles.

Richard Haass, Council on Foreign Relations president, hissed, "The one thing I'm sure of is, events will test him. ...There will be coups. ...There will be genocide. ... There will be terrorism." Gee, Bush hasn't completed his sprint to the finish line yet, and those like Haass are already waxing nostalgic for the Bush Doctrine.

Georgia Congressman Paul Broun called Obama a "Marxist" who was determined to set up a jack-booted Gestapo civilian security force to use against citizens -- an ominious tactic taken right out of Hitler's playbook. In the ensuing flap, Broun refused to apologize, or to acknowledge that the "civilian national security force" proposed by Obama is, in reality, a two-year-old pilot program -- The Civilian Response Corps of the United States of America trained and equipped to "deploy rapidly to countries in crisis or emerging from conflict, in order to provide reconstruction and stabilization assistance." The State Department has already deployed members to Sudan, Chad, Haiti, Lebanon, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Intolerance, hate -- racism -- runs deep within the heart of this country. It's easy not to be racist, to support civil rights, equality -- but when confronted by a change so abrupt, so momentous as the election of an African-American president, many white Americans have problems calming their inner beast. William Ferris, senior associate director of the Center for the Study of the American South at the University of North Carolina, said when discussing the hundreds of threats against Obama that the election of a black president is "the most profound change in the field of race this country has experienced since the Civil War. Racism is like cancer," Ferris said, "It's never totally wiped out, it's in remission."

Remission? Perhaps, except for those like the feral, all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling, all-concerned -- pretty much all-everything -- "Maha Rushie" Limbaugh, who has been in shrieking racist meltdown since the day Obama announced his candidacy. Referring to Barack Hussein Obama early and often, Limbaugh stoked racist fear by warning millions of Dittodeadheads they were being taken over by a "half-minority." In April 2007, Limbaugh aired an insulting Paul Shanklin parody, "Barack The Magic Negro," and went from that to trying to whip up murderous riots at the Democratic National Convention.

Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and their gang of slimy supremacist clones inflame the fires of fear and hate on a daily -- hourly -- basis. They know exactly what they're doing. "The economic mess Bush has gotten us into is all Obama's fault! The Obama recession is in full swing! We will soon be in the throes of an Obama depression! Obama's going to raise our taxes! Obama's coming after our 401k retirement checks! Millions more will lose their jobs! Quick -- burn a cross -- hang a noose in your tree before it's too late!"

And Michael Savage warns that Blacks don't want just a foot in the door; they are poised to take over the entire nation. On his Nov. 18 broadcast, Savage said, "I am telling you that there's gonna be a wholesale firing of competent white men in the United States government up and down the line, in police departments, in fire departments. Everywhere in America, you're going to see an exchange that you've never seen in history..."

If that's not enough to send us screaming into the night, our knees hitting our chins, Lisa Miller, former front-page religious writer for the Wall Street Journal, now Newsweek's Society/Religion editor, asks, in a shameful, code-word laden piece -- "Is Obama the Antichrist?"

Miller quotes several right-wing evangelicals, and she says conservative Christians believe a great battle is imminent. "After years of tribulation -- natural disasters, other cataclysms (such as the collapse of financial markets) -- God's armies will vanquish armies led by the Antichrist himself. He will be a sweet-talking world leader who gathers governments and economies under his command to further his own evil agenda." Miller says, given Obama's liberal positions on abortion and traditional marriage, it's no wonder that "Obama triggers such fear in the hearts of America's millennialist Christians." And, if we want proof -- one of the winning lottery numbers in Obama's home state of Illinois was 666 -- which Miller says everyone knows is the sign of the Beast, or the Antichrist.

The fascist lies and smears of Republicans and their doppleganger radio creeps should come as no surprise to those paying attention. However, the ripples of uneasiness and fear surging through Democratic ranks as a result of these assaults is a bit puzzling. Perhaps it's because after eight years of covering -- and uncovering -- deceit, lies, and monstrous war crimes perpetrated by George Bush, they are hesitant to trust another president regardless of his party affiliation. Or, perhaps they're afraid to have hope because they believe George Orwell's flat, no-wiggle-room assertion that -- "All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia."

Whatever the reason, each day brings a new rash of criticism about Obama's choices for his transition team, his economic team, his foreign policy team. His selection of Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff, probable selection of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, and his decision to keep Robert Gates as Defense Secretary for at least a year resulted in cries of betrayal throughout the left-wing blogosphere.

For two Democrats to agree on any one thing would indeed be change. Everybody has his/her own views as to who should make up the cabinet. And, since I'm the most liberal Democrat I know, it seems obvious that Obama should have put the environment into the hands of award-winning former vice president Al Gore, justice into the hands of Constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley, and Defense into the hands of former Supreme Allied Commander General Wesley Clark.

Those on the left who complain that Obama is "loading up his administration with Clintonites" should pause and take a deep breath. Anybody old enough to serve -- who has the experience to serve -- would necessarily come from either the Clinton or the Bush era. Which would you prefer? We should remember it is Obama's policies, not theirs, that will be put into effect. He promised change -- to be honest and up-front with all the people. He is keeping that promise.

Last week, in three days Obama held three press conferences wherein he outlined policies that reach far beyond the immediate crisis, such as his long-range plan to boost the economy by creating 2.5 million jobs. "We’ll put people back to work rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, modernizing schools that are failing our children," he said, "and building wind farms and solar panels; fuel-efficient cars and the alternative energy technologies that can free us from our dependence on foreign oil and keep our economy competitive in the years ahead."

Millions of us who voted for Obama are weary of fighting our way through the tangles of an Orwellian world. We yearn to live in a Wellstonian world, one where "...politics is not about observations or predictions. Politics is what we create by what we do, what we hope for, and what we dare to imagine."

Obama is not perfect. The problems Bush is only too happy to dump on him are almost insurmountable and getting worse by the day. Obama will make mistakes, but he has promised that, with our help, the hopes of all Americans can be realized. Together -- we can change the direction of the country.

We will not jump ship. Come hate or high water -- we can do it.

Yes. We. Can.

The Revolution Will Not Be Organized

2008-10-18T14:35:00.000-07:00

A heartfelt thanks to the hard working Michael D. Ivey for the following. Read it. Read it again. Prepare yourself...

The Revolution Will Not Be Organized

The revolution will not be organized,
the revolution will not be organized.com,
the revolution will not be Yahoo Grouped, Meetuped,
downloaded, uploaded, QWERTY'd, or blogged.

The revolution will not be handled by webmasters,
think-tankers, authors of policy position papers,
authors of anti-policy position papers,
secretaries, executives, executive assistants,
insiders, whistle-blowers, informants, counter-informants,
committees or sub-committees.

Your neighbor with excellent leadership qualities
will not lead you into, through, or out of the revolution.
The revolution will not be inspired, instigated, managed
or controlled by him, her, or them.
The revolution will not be organized.

No matter if you eat at McDonald's and can barely walk,
no matter if you drive an S.U.V. and rarely walk,
no matter if you were public school indoctrinated,
vaccinated, humiliated, ostracized, terrorized, minimized,
no matter if you live in a house owned by BofA,
no matter if you eat cat food, dog food,
Puppy Chow for your inner child,
no matter if you shop at Salvation Army, Saks, TJ Maxx,
when the Cold Hand of Power touches you,
it touches revolution.

They will come to chip you, rape you,
tell you you are theirs, imprison you in FEMA camps
because you spoke out,
because you doubted the official story,
because you looked with your own eyes,
spoke from your own heart.
They will come for you in black uniforms, black helmets,
swinging black batons, symbols of the New Authority,
and you will say, "No, my children and I will not come with you."

You will say no – not because Charlie Sheen
inspired you one night on FOX News
to look more closely at falling towers.
You will say no – not because Alex Jones
led you through the darkness with a bullhorn.
You will say no – not because Howard Zinn
handed you the Book of Truth on a silver platter.
You will say no because you are your own
star of truth shining the way.

At your unique hour, in the dark,
beneath a burning paper currency moon,
the Cold Hand of Power will touch you and revolt you.

At your unique hour,
when they come for you because you asked questions,
because you did not lower your eyes,
because you did not bow down,
at your unique hour,
in your unique circumstance,
you will find yourself in the grip of a courage
you have not known but which you are.
You will stand in front of black helmets with invisible faces,
and you will say,
"No, my children and I will not come with you."

Daughters and sons of revolutionaries,
blood burning for freedom,
eyes set toward tomorrow,
each of you alone in the darkness,
beneath tender constellations burning gold and silver,
each of you will remember the path to take
when the Cold Hand of Power comes for you,
each of you will make your way without direction or encouragement,
as those before you made their way without direction or encouragement,
forging history, embracing destiny.

You will not march in file.
You will not march.
The revolution will not be organized.

In your darkest hour,
beneath the burning moon,
you will pledge allegiance to the truth,
as those before you pledged allegiance to the truth.

The truth cannot be organized.

"The Revolution Will Not Be Organized"
written by Jock Doubleday
September 24, 2008

The Peter Principle Playoffs

2008-09-26T09:53:00.000-07:00

We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men~~George Orwell

So here we sit, our heads jerking back and forth so rapidly most of us are suffering severe whiplash. Will the US attack Iran? Will Israel attack Iran? Or will the two war-mongering bullies join forces and "bomb, bomb, bomb" that belligerent twit-nation into subservience?

It's a great game. A deadly game. The momentum to attack Iran has been building for so long that we're conditioned to watching it like some grotesque international tennis competition. It's the Peter Principle Playoffs, with neoconsters and ziomonsters out on the court milling around, working at their highest "levels of incompetence," feverishly plotting Iran's destruction. Foul lines mean nothing to them. There are no rules, no officials, no scores, no accountability.

Bolton's Law

Immediately before Bush invaded Iraq, the criminally insane John Bolton, then Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, made a personal trip to Israel to assure Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that as soon as we destroyed Iraq, we'd "deal with threats" from Syria, Iran and North Korea. However, it's obvious Iran has always been at the top of the list.

Since 2003, both US and Israeli governments, the corporate media, especially Fox News, and the US Congress have been unrelenting in their campaign to convince the world that Iran is an immediate nuclear threat, although Iran insists it is seeking nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. In August 2003, the UK Guardian's Simon Tisdall wrote, "They call it a trap. But we call it Bolton's first law of international power politics; keep the other guy guessing; wear him down. When he gives a little, demand a whole lot more. Then zap him anyway."

Bolton's Law: Make wild accusations. Escalate terror and confusion. Kill. Repeat.

It's no laughing matter, but the sight of this tousle-headed, "got milk?" maniac running in circles, warning of -- demanding -- a nuclear holocaust is good for a grin, albeit a grim one. Even as he was being forced onto the United Nations over national and international objections, Bolton was hot on Iran's trail. He insisted that Iran is the most dangerous critter out there -- harboring terrorists, arming terrorists, training terrorists -- sending bombs, IEDs, weapons to Iraq to kill Americans. If it weren't for Iran, there would have been no 9-11 attack because Iran provided safe haven for the box-cutting killers headed our way. Bolton warned if Iran managed to produce a single nuclear weapon, Israel, the United States -- the world -- was toast. He promised that Iran will come after us. "That's the threat," Bolton barked, "that's the reality whether you like it or not. And it will be just like Sept. 11, only with nuclear weapons this time."

Bolton keeps showing up for work even though his paycheck is now signed by the second most powerful Israeli Lobby, the American Enterprise Institute . He's determined that Iran is going down and, if he can't goad the US into action, he will whip Israel into a frenzy. Like the Batman's Joker, Bolton leaps from the pages of the Wall Street Journal in catastrophic convulsions on a regular basis. On July 15, Bolton insisted "we should be intensively considering what cooperation the U.S. will extend to Israel before, during and after a strike on Iran. We will be blamed for the strike anyway," Bolton reasoned, "...so there is compelling logic to make it as successful as possible. At a minimum, we should place no obstacles in Israel's path, and facilitate its efforts where we can."

Who's On First?

Bolton is surrounded by fellow psychopaths like Norman Podhoretz who insists our only choice is to bomb Iran before Iran gets the bomb and bombs us. Podhoretz is a key figure in the Playoffs with his constant drumbeat that Iran is the "leading sponsor of terrorism in the world," and once it achieves nuclear technology, we're all gonna die!

And National Review's Larry Kudlow, who swooned ecstatically when Israel cluster-bombed Lebanon two years ago. Israel was "doing the Lord's work," defending freedom against the "Iranian cat's-paw" of terrorism. Kudlow says Israel must not stop, but furiously attack "all the terrorist sanctuaries, training camps, weapons caches, and missile systems it can find." Scary Larry enthusiastically supports at least half of Bolton's Law -- the last half.

Others joining Bolton for whom the destruction of Iran is a political game include Bill Kristol, virtuous "bookie" Bill Bennett, Joe Lieberman, and Daniel Pipes, whose harsh and raucous predictions center around whether Bush will attack Iran before or after the upcoming election. If McCain wins, most say that Bush will pass the nuclear baton to him while sprinting to the finish line to pardon his fellow war criminals. However, if McCain should lose, they agree that Bush will get his war on and leave the mess for Obama to clean up.

Those who continue to beat the drums of war trust that we will believe what they say without considering the obvious. Just last week, to coincide with President Ahmadi-Nejad's visit to the UN, former UN ambassador Richard Holbrooke, former CIA director James Woolsey, former Clinton Middle East coordinator Dennis Ross, and former UN representative for management and reform Mark Wallace wrote an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal regurgitating rigid neoconservative talking points.

Channeling Cheney, they wrote that we shouldn't believe Iran when it says it "needs nuclear energy and is enriching nuclear materials for strictly peaceful purposes." Hey, Iran has "vast supplies of inexpensive oil and natural gas," so there's no "legitimate economic reason for Iran to pursue nuclear energy."

Then, unable to resist an unsubstantiated "Bushism" or two, these heavy hitters warned that "Iran is a deadly and irresponsible world actor," and should it get the bomb, Iran would "sponsor terror, threaten our allies, and support the most deadly elements of the Iraqi insurgency."

Finally, they whipped out Bolton's Law with the wild -- and discredited -- accusation that "President Ahmadinejad specifically calls for Israel to be 'wiped from the map,' while seeking the weapons to do so."

The constant discordant barrage of accusations and demands is so outrageous we attempt to shrug it off as mostly ideological clatter-babble, yet we sit paralyzed with fear. We are unable to recognize the real danger that looms just beyond the shadows.

But we know he's there. When Dick Cheney emerges, we are bewitched by the horror he evokes as he piles lie upon bloody lie about Iran's nuclear activities -- in spite of international findings and US intelligence lack of evidence. He accuses Iran of smuggling weapons of mass destruction into Iraq to kill Americans. Iran is training insurgents, is joined at the hip with Al-Qaeda, is the world's most dangerous sponsor of terrorism, and if it can get its hands on just one nuclear weapon, it will immediately lob it in Israel's direction.

In 2005, Cheney instructed the Pentagon to draw up a plan for a nuclear attack on Iran should another 9-11-type terrorist attack on the U.S. occur, even if Iran had nothing to do with it. To provoke a war, Cheney suggested dressing up Navy Seals as Iranians, putting them on fake Iranian speedboats, and shooting at them. Murdering Americans in cold blood, exterminating 60-70 million innocent Iranians and contaminating millions more throughout the region is a small price for Cheney to pay. Iran must face the consequences for having the audacity to possess two-thirds of the world's oil.

Bad, Bad Ahmadi-Nejad

Since being elected in June 2005 as Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad has rhetorically stepped in it and tracked it all over the Persian rug. Scarcely in office four months, he gave a speech in which he quoted the Ayatollah Khomeini who had said years earlier -- "This regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)." That comment was transcribed as Ahmadi-Nejad threatening to wipe Israel off the map, and despite repeated efforts to get the correct translation out, the world's media went into a shrieking frenzy that has yet to abate.

Ahmadi-Nejad has made numerous public and private diplomatic overtures to the United States in the last three years, and all have been rejected -- with insults, sneers, and threats. It is critical to the outcome of the Playoffs that spectators see Ahmadi-Nejad as a criminally insane killer who is a threat to the entire world. He is sort of cocky, and his arrogance at insisting that Iran has the same rights and privileges under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as the other members, that Iran has the right to pursue nuclear power for peaceful purposes, and that George Bush is not Iran's "Decider" is driving guys like Bolton over the edge.

Which -- when you think about it -- is not necessarily a bad thing...

So, who is this guy? Few know that Ahmadi-Nejad is an Engineer with a Ph.D on transportation engineering, a university professor, a working member on the Iran Civil Engineering Society, and the Islamic Association of Students in the Science and Technology University, as well as others. He is an accomplished journalist and former managing director of the Hamshahri newspaper. He was the mayor of Tehran before running for president. Even fewer know that, in reality, he wields no power other than that allotted to him by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader. He's deeply religious, stubborn and reckless. He's unpredictable and, at times, dangerous. Ohmigod -- Ahmadi-Nejad is "Bush with Brains!"

Should We Fear Iran?

Iran's nuclear ambitions for other than peaceful purposes are as elusive as Iraq's WMD, which defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld said were "in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat." Yet we are in danger of being swept up in the propaganda catapulted by the Bush administration and the corporate media once again. Perhaps we should take a deep breath and apply a bit of logic here, pay close attention to the obvious. If Iran is truly a threat to the entire world, then we should be afraid. However, demanding that Iran either prove a negative or face extermination of millions of its citizens does not, and should not, pass the terror smell test.

It is obvious that, in this unstable era, we should be aware of, and even fear, those countries bristling with nukes. For starters, the United States has more nuclear weapons than any other nation. Then there's Russia, China, France, Britain, India, Pakistan, North Korea and...shhhhh...Israel. Currently, Pakistan is in turmoil and threatening to shoot down US planes that fly across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and kill civilians, Russia refuses to back off from its Georgia stance no matter how vigorously Condi Rice wags her finger in its face, China has abruptly cut off financial deals with the US because of the plummeting dollar, and North Korea is restarting its Yongbyon nuclear reactor because Bush broke his promise to remove it from Washington's list of state sponsors of terror.

Yet, amidst all this fury and instability, we are obsessed with destroying Iran -- a nation that, in modern history, has never attacked another country -- and which has repeatedly maintained it seeks nuclear power primarily for generating electricity for its growing population. In 2005, Ayatollah Khamenei issued a Fatwa that "the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons."

What is obvious to anyone familiar with the timeline of Iran's nuclear program from the 1950s is that Iran has never sought nuclear energy for anything other than peaceful purposes. In 1957, the Shah opened the American Atoms for Peace in Tehran, and signed an agreement with the US for cooperation in research on peaceful uses of nuclear technology. And, in 1968, Iran signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty on the first day it opened for signature. In the late 70's, the US supplied Iran with two nuclear power reactors and enriched uranium fuel, and granted Iran the "most favored nation" status so it would not be discriminated against when seeking permission to reprocess US-origin fuel.

To restate the obvious -- if we are to fear Iran, it is not because, as Bush said in June -- "They refuse to abandon their desires to develop the know-how which could lead to a nuclear weapon" -- it is because Iran threatens to defend itself if attacked. It is because other nations, such as Russia, refuse to stand idly by as Iran is "wiped off the map."

We need to get our minds around who is the aggressor here. Because if we continue to passively watch the evil unfold; if Dick Cheney wins the behind-the-scenes, off-court power struggle, the Peter Principle Playoffs will be over and the entire Middle East will explode in nuclear flames.

EVERYBODY KNOWS...

2008-05-15T14:10:00.000-07:00

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded.
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows the war is over.
Everybody knows the good guys lost.
Everybody knows the fight was fixed.
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich.
That's how it goes. Everybody knows.
~~Leonard Cohen

The fate of millions was sealed the moment Dick Cheney selected himself as The Destroyer whose charge to keep for the next eight years would be -- as Capitol Hill Blue's Doug Thompson so succinctly described George W. Bush -- a "criminally insane, pill-popping dry drunk." I don't know about that. I've seen some drunks in my time -- even dry ones -- and George Bush appears to be more than a little moist.

Bush was the perfect foil for Cheney. The Scalia-driven 2000 election coup catapulted Bush to the top of the political heap. For the first time in his worthless, impotent, cruelly indifferent life, Bush was suddenly important -- the most powerful man on the face of the earth -- and all because he had been told to scream, "Jezus! Jezus is my philosopher!" to the swooning masses. Makes one wonder at the rigid consent of those same "believers" for the ensuing slaughter of so many innocents -- when murdering even one in the name of Jesus should have sent a collective shriek reverberating throughout the religious universe. (See Matthew 18:14; Mark 9:42; Luke 17:2)

Everybody knows that Bush isn't remotely qualified to be at the helm of the world's superpower. He can neither think nor speak coherently, can recognize little other than Texas on a map, has completely torpedoed every business venture he attempted, and admittedly was a hard-partying sot until he was 40. Cheney was another matter. He was a household word. He had been a public servant throughout his career. He served as President Gerald Ford's chief of staff, earned six terms in the House of Representatives where he ascended to the position of minority whip and, finally, was the elder Bush's Secretary of Defense.

We trusted Cheney to keep Bush from making rash decisions. Was it not Cheney who, at the conclusion of the 1991 Desert Storm assault, made the assessment that to expand the exercise to include regime change in Iraq was not morally sustainable because of the chaotic bloodletting -- the needless toll on our uniformed military?

We were wrong. Had we bothered to check the "other priorities" that allowed Cheney to dodge the draft five times on his rise to power, his chilling congressional voting record, his efforts to enrich the military industrial complex by privatizing defense duties and granting massive contracts to Halliburton, we would have known that Cheney was consumed with lust for power and money. We would have known Cheney had been champing at the bit for more than a decade to impose a new order wherein the American Empire controls the world and its resources.

Had we checked, we would have known Dick Cheney was the wrong babysitter for a kid who gets his jollies by blowing things up.

Cheney Unbound

In 1991, Cheney was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But the upheaval of the following decade, the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress, and the expanding manipulative power of the corporate media created the axis of corruption necessary for a Cheney reign of terror. Cheney was ready, as were the militant warmongers of the Project for the New American Century who had been demanding Saddam Hussein's head for years. At least 12 of the 18 co-signers of the January 1998 letter to President Bill Clinton, and another letter four months later to then House Speaker Newt Gingrich, demanding the overthrow of Saddam were given key positions on Cheney's destructive team.

The fix was in. Four days before the 2001 inauguration, PNAC's deputy director, Thomas Donnelly, wrote a memorandum to "Opinion Leaders," reminding them that "the task of removing Saddam Hussein’s regime from power still remains...Many in the incoming Bush Administration understand this challenge..."

Four months after the inauguration, the White House issued a press release warning that the threat of terrorist-nations using weapons of mass destruction against the American "homeland" was very real. To counter this danger, Cheney put himself in charge of the entire government -- departments of Defense, Justice, Health and Human Services, Energy, Environmental Protection Agency, FEMA, and "other federal agencies," which would naturally include both FAA and NORAD. A new department -- the Office of National Preparedness -- was created so Cheney could protect us from catastrophic harm and deal with "consequence" management.

The next four months were busy ones. With malicious indifference, Cheney set about screwing the American people; destroying 225-year Constitutional protections, passing secret laws to seize unlimited executive power, and locking both Congress and the public out of the legislative process. Bush provided cover by regaling us with hilarious "Benny Hill" bits of linguistic derring-do, strutting from one presidential photo op to another, falling off couches and bicycles, choking on pretzels, and attacking brush with a chainsaw at his Crawford ranch.

Cheney in Charge

Then it was 9-11. Suddenly Bush was no longer a spoiled, bumbling, schizophrenic little president. In an instant, he was transformed into a loaded codpiece -- The Commander in Chief, The Decider of life and death -- a modern-day Caligula towering above mankind with lighted depleted uranium firecrackers gripped in both fists. Cheney could not have picked a more willing accomplice to export death and violence to the four corners of the earth...

With smoke still rising from the ashes of Afghanistan, the drive to topple Saddam, who was demanding Euro for his oil, quickly turned into a crusade. It was Cheney-orchestrated and Cheney-driven. Under the deepening shadows of mushroom clouds, administration neoconservatives teamed up with ecstatic corporate media co-conspirators to terrify an already traumatized public. Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith launched a separate intelligence unit, the Office of Special Plans, to create the propaganda needed to invade Iraq.

Since Bush can't be trusted to maintain a single train of thought in one-on-one interviews, he hit the campaign trail with a prepared speech he delivered over and over -- is now delivering about Iran -- frantically catapulting the propaganda that Saddam was "threatening America and the world with horrible poisons and diseases and gases and atomic weapons." Bush convinced a majority of Americans that the Iraqi dictator was allied with Al Qaeda and provided a "safe haven" for terrorists, and if we didn't wipe him out, he would "strike us again without leaving any fingerprints."

Cheney's fingerprints are all over every aspect of the drive for war. For a year and a half, Cheney bullied the entire intelligence apparatus, especially the CIA, into making a false case that Saddam was an immediate nuclear threat. He denigrated the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report that there was no evidence, sneering that the intelligence was faulty, and IAEA Director-General Mohammed El-Baradei had no credibility where Iraq was concerned.

But it was Secretary of State Colin Powell who rolled the loaded dice at the UN Security Council on February 8, 2003, in a presentation even he admitted was "bullshit." Powell, who is adept at leaving no fingerprints, but whose shadow lingers over decades of slaughtered innocents, carried the water for his masters one last time. When Powell completed his somber charges that Al-Qaeda was in Iraq running "poison camps" full bore, that Saddam was obtaining magnets for uranium enrichment -- charges backed up with photos and vials of poison -- we were sold. Because we trusted him.

A Moral Fork in the Road

I don't want to go off on an Aristotelian rant here, but thanks to Cheney and those around him obsessed with world government, this nation appears to be running on empty where morality, or ethos, is concerned. Values such as compassion, sympathy, prudence, virtue, decency, ethics -- cannot thrive in a nation controlled by war criminals who force its citizens into submission through fear, violence and propaganda. How can a society be "just" when natural laws have fallen by the wayside and nobody is held accountable for crimes against God and humanity?

We are under the control of the criminally insane. Cheney has turned the greatest democratic republic ever conceived into a world corporation and anointed himself its Chief Executive Officer (CEO). He has supplanted two centuries of protections afforded by the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights with executive orders and secret laws. In their lust for power and riches, Cheney and Bush have managed in just seven grueling, sadistic, morally corrupt years to destroy entire nations, including their own. And they accomplished this in the only way possible. Because we permitted it. Because we lost our moral compass.

So we stand here in the blood-sodden mess of two lost wars. Millions -- millions -- have been displaced, destroyed, dishonored in Cheney's quest for oil. Tens of thousands of our own citizens are injured, maimed -- 4,077 dead -- an entire generation of Americans lost in a depleted uranium wasteland. "So?" Cheney says, "They were all volunteers." He admitted that losing sons or daughters could "be a burden" on families, but reminded us sternly that "the biggest burden" is on the President, who has to send even more to their deaths.

We're at the crossroads. We can no longer remain neutral nor mill around in confused acceptance of the genocidal madness into which we have been swept. Thomas Jefferson said, "When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil."

Everybody knows the folly of the treasonous "corrections" made to counter the Iran-Contra evil in the 1980's and early '90's -- the flurry of Presidential Christmas-Eve pardons allowing convicted criminals to recede into the shadows only to return and metastasize throughout the current Cheney/Bush administration.

Cheney, Bush and their co-conspirators throughout the three branches of government must be removed. Indicted. Convicted. Imprisoned. Voting records of the 435 members of Congress and 33 Senators up for re-election in 2008 must be vetted, and those who do not reflect the will of the people must go. No exceptions. The remaining 17 Senators must either stand or fall on their voting records. If those who are guilty of the same breach of trust as their cohorts refuse to budge, they must be impeached and removed from office.

They have left us with but one choice, and one last chance to make that choice. We have reached a point in the "course of human events" where it is not only our "right but our duty" to throw off this destructive government and institute one which remembers it "derives its just powers from the consent of the governed."

The time has come for Americans to blink. Because the Abyss is staring back at us.

When Donkeys Fly...

2008-03-30T11:45:00.000-07:00

Of course there had to be Arabs on those planes -- how else could the murderers in the White House justify the genocidal assault and occupation of Iraq? And, if the immediate blaring of Bin Laden as being the mastermind wasn't enough, photos of the 19 perps were blazoned on every media outlet within hours of the attack. Still not convinced? Well, lookie here -- three passports and a bandana floating unsinged from the blazing inferno -- landing at the feet of the FBI...

Orwell said "The people will believe what the media tells them they believe." Not what the media tells them TO believe, but tells them they believe.

Well, I have a tendency to believe my own lying eyes. And anyone who has ever seen one -- just one -- controlled demolition knew by 9:30 am on 9-11 what happened.

Of course I have questions, but how hot steel has to get to sever myriads of beams cleanly into the exact lengths to fit onto waiting trucks and be rushed out of the country isn't one of them.

I want to know about...

1. Neil Bush's security company, which was responsible for security not only for the World Trade Center, but for the two airports from which the planes were hijacked.

2. The put stock option flurry on 9-10-01.

3. The security "stand down" the week before 9-11 so computer technology could be "upgraded." Workmen came and went, undeterred, throughout that period -- bomb sniffing dogs removed. Busy...busy...busy...

4. Building 7 falling neatly into its own footprints shortly after owner Larry Silverstein announced on TV that it was to be "pulled."

5. The lies and omissions of the criminal 9-11 Commission. Please read Chapter Two of David Ray Griffin's "Debunking 9/11 Debunking" for the sheer ghoulish audacity of this investigation. Condi's bud, Philip Zelikow, was executive director of the Commission, the primary author of the doctrine of preemptive warfare. Griffin says Zelikow "drove and organized the staff's work...called the shots...skewed the investigation and ran it his own way." When the report was complete, it was submitted to Zelikow and the White House who "edited" it before publication...

All roads lead back to 9-11. Everything this monstrous gang has done for the past five years is a direct result of 9-11. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are wounded, disabled, dead because of 9-11. Thousands of Afganistanis and millions of Iraqis have been slaughtered or displaced because of 9-11...

And I am to fret over how hot steel gets before it causes three buildings to collapse in "controlled demolition" fashion for the first -- and last -- time in history? That will happen -- when donkeys fly.

What It's All About...

2008-03-24T08:02:00.000-07:00

Rise like lions after slumber

In unvanquishable number.

Shake your chains to earth, like dew

Which in sleep had fallen on you--

Ye are many, they are few.

~Percy Bysshe Shelley

My friend Bernie says he can't believe the American people haven't figured out what it's all about. "The whole damn political scene is nothing but a corporate media freak show," he said. "There's no breathing room between elections -- no time nor interest in investigating, or even addressing, issues that are critical to our survival as a nation. The minute every last dollar is sucked out of the competition, the candidate who bought the most attack ads -- the most face time -- wins, and the election is over. Then," Bernie said with disgust, "it's time to start raising money for the next election, because the media is already out there campaigning."

"I hadn't thought of it that way," I said. "But, surely electing a president is more important than the media, or who can raise the most money --"

"It doesn't matter what you think," Bernie said flatly. The mainstream media, both print and electronic, are as important as the American people allow them to be. And we've allowed them total control over our thoughts, our beliefs. They're freaks -- actors whose role is to divert national attention, manipulate public opinion, and keep the public in a state of suspended paralysis. They're bullhorns for corporate Boss Hogs and administration creeps who are determined to seize power and keep the military industrial complex rolling in dough."

Bernie's right. With each presidential campaign, the list of candidates -- serious candidates -- grows shorter, and the media grow more brazen in either trashing or ostracizing those who pose a threat to the corporate status quo. The media is determined to choose the president no matter what voters want. Little by little, the media has inserted itself into the process until elections are no longer about candidates or issues. They're about the media and what the media thinks about candidates and issues.

If you doubt that, check out CNN's 24/7 "Ballot Bowl 08" with Wolf Blitzer and "the best political team in television," stumble into America's Election Headquarters over at the Foxhole's "Strategy Room," spend a rollicking evening in MSNBC, "The Place for Politics," where you can watch Chris Matthews throw his hard balls at Hillary, listen to Keith Olbermann scold all those who disagree with him, or just relax and let M.C. Rove's dancing partner, David Gregory, decide the winner in his new "Race for the White House" show...

The One World Order criminals who seized power in the 2000 election coup will not exit peacefully if defeated in November. They have ruled through brutality and fear and, with the eager help of the media, stoked that fear into seven long years of shameful "patriotic" panic. Their eyes are on the prize -- total US dominion and control of the world and its resources. They're in too deep to back off now, and will not willingly accept defeat. The person taking over the reins of leadership from Bush must be one of their own, regardless of party. That is why the media relentlessly ambushed, weeded out, and tossed six of the eight Democratic presidential wannabes unceremoniously aside.

From the outset, the only two Democratic candidates in the media race were Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The media and their corporate masters knew the hokey soap opera between a white woman and a black man would keep the masses panting for more "American Idol" drama and their attention diverted from more pressing matters, such as a landscape strewn with body parts, a desert stained red with innocent blood, dead and suffering children, grieving, horror-shocked parents on the one side -- and a smirking idiot madman on the other who chants mindlessly about "completing the mission...spreading freedom throughout the world..."

In their critical "George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography," Webster Tarpley and Anton Chaitkin warn that we are immersed in times of moral and cultural degradation wherein "rulers of great evil have inflicted incalculable suffering on humanity."

The book is less about Bush 41 or the Bush family than it is "an unveiling of the abuse and misuse of power, the shenanigans of egotism running rampant in high places." The authors strip aside the "curtain of secrecy, myopic journalism, and the illusion of a 'free' press," and stress that we must be "fully aware of the propaganda of the 'spin doctors' and the manipulations that benefit a few at the expense of the many." Tarpley and Chaitkin say we "are not to condone or advance this egoistic behavior, but to stand tall and say no to those who claim power."

Many more of us than the media will admit are doing just that -- from the courageous "Winter Soldiers" who stood up against the war machine last week, to the masses whose protests and arrests are blacked out by the media, to the growing numbers who speak truth to power on the Internet and on progressive radio. Fortunately, there are far too many to list, but if you're just waking up, and it's sheer, raw truth you're after, check out Chris Floyd anytime, or listen to Nova M Radio's Mike Malloy week nights from 9-midnight (EST).

Nebraska's Republican Senator Chuck Hagel says in his new book, "America: Our Next Chapter," that it's time for independent leadership and, perhaps, even for another political party. I agree. Those like Dick Cheney who have a death grip on power, and who will only tighten that grip if they remain in power, do not care what the American people think. White House press secretary Dana Perino echoed Cheney's sentiments last week when she told a reporter the American people have a right to speak only once every four years. After that, they can just shut up and follow the leader...

The current election is possibly the most important in US history. Yet, ironically, thanks to the media, few of us in either party have a horse in this race. We have one last chance to change that. We must stand together and support a candidate whose love for country overshadows party loyalty and media sound bites -- a candidate who will fight for the freedoms and rights bestowed upon us by the founding fathers -- who will work to restore our infrastructure and our environment. That candidate is former Vice President Al Gore, the man legally elected President of the United States in 2000. It's time to heal the wound and move on to the Inauguration.

Together, we must ask Al Gore to answer the call one last time. If it takes a new party, so be it. Because saving our republic, repairing our Constitution, and returning the power to the people is what it's all about.

Cal's Straight Talk -- Will the Party Crash the Party?

2008-02-21T13:01:00.000-08:00

I don't see us having martial law installed by Bush -- he's never been anything but figurehead and he really has no interest in running the country. For Bush, the whole president thing was just ego anyway. He is ready to get out and, as he said, "replenish his coffers," probably by sitting on Corp criminal boards and collecting huge fees.

I can see another election been rigged and stolen though.

The way I see it, "the corrupted system" is not going to change without some kind of revolution -- whatever kind may come about -- a mass one or one in the form of a rebel president. But obviously there isn't going to be a revolution any time soon because the sheeple are all caught up in hoping this election will change something.

So I say, put the Dems in -- the Repubs have already destroyed themselves -- give the Dems a chance to destroy themselves. The Dem congress certainly has destroyed itself since it was put in power. Its rating has hit bottom because of the members' incompetence, "neo" tendencies, and not listening to the voters who put them in control of congress. The same thing happening in a Dem White House should finish them off pretty well.

When there is no party left for the sheeple to run to -- then we will be ripe for a revolution.

So go ahead and give the Dems enough rope to hang themselves. Let's see what happens. Maybe they will suicide their party like the Repubs did. Or maybe not. Maybe they will wake up before it's too late and realize they work for us -- the people.

Cal45

Cal's Straight Talk -- Decisions...Decisions...

2008-02-06T09:45:00.000-08:00

After all comparisons of Hillary and Obama, I find they are so similar in their domestic issues, with a few minor exceptions like the health-care mandate, that I have settled on Obama. Not that it matters since we "all" the people don't get to choose the nominee. But the "line in the sand" on the Middle East and the war issue is becoming more clear between the two.

Hillary is the old bizness as usual, Obama is the new. A few things helped to bring me to this conclusion. In a Feb 3 speech, Obama said (and I am paraphrasing here) that "hope was not enough" to make the lions lay down with the lambs without a severe whipping applied to the lions. I think this indicates he at least has some "street smarts," and his kumbaya is his campaign shtick but underneath he knows how the dirty game works.

Then, in an a recent interview with Paris Match magazine, Obama advocated what I have been saying for years -- we need to talk to both Jews and Muslims. He rattled the Republican Jewish Coalition by suggesting we "hold a summit in the Muslim world, with all heads of state," to have "honest discussion about ways to bridge the gap that grows between Muslims and the West."

That is exactly what needs to be done in the ME. I would even go further -- some kind of regional UN should be established by Arab nations so they can work out their own differences and also present a united Arab front to the rest of the world to prevent further meddling in Arabia from outside powers which only stirs up more division and turmoil in the region.

Leaving out the emotion, hype and Obama groupies, the bottom line for me has become...

1) Obama's view of how to handle relations with the rest of the world is better than Hillary's -- is least likely to lead to more wars, and more likely to settle the Israel-Palestine conflict.

2) Since we don't have a fricking thing to lose with Obama on the domestic front and "perhaps" something to gain on the foreign policy front -- and all other things being equal -- the worst-case scenario is he would be a Hilllary-lite instead of a Hillary hawk. And that is probably as good as we are going to get in this election.

Cal 45

Cal's Straight Talk -- Anyone But McCain

2008-02-01T11:40:00.000-08:00

Actually if you really study the positions of Hillary and Obama they are not that different. Obama makes much of his objection to the Iraq war, so that is in his favor. However, we have to take him at his word because he wasn't even in the Senate at the time and couldn't vote. "If" he had been in the Senate and had the "same access" to the information as Hillary, who knows how he would have voted?

As for Hillary I thinks she knows she screwed up, but won't admit it, preferring to take a tough stance for her campigning purposes. Not a good sign.

They are both "pandering" to the zionists on Iran. Hillary is forceful on that all the time; Obama is just as forceful, but only when he is addressing a strictly Jewish audience -- other times he taps it down a bit.

My main objections to Hillary are the Clintonian thing and Israel pandering. My main objection to Obama is the Israel thing and the "hope" thing because "hope" and "getting along" is not a good weapon against special interests, and he seems too light in the economics and financial departments to me.

All of the candidates are nothing but "franchises" of the money behind them. In Obama's case, we still don't have a complete picture of his franchise except for some big-time Jews in Illinois. In Hillary's case, her franchise is strictly the same Clintonian franchise that Bubba had in the ninties -- a mixture of shady and non-shady interests.

Oddly enough, Obama's "hope is on the way" campaign is a lot like Clinton's 1992 "help is on the way" campaign from Hope Ark.

The least corrupt candidate, John Edwards, is out.

So what is our choice now? Should we go with what we know about Hillary, since the Clinton years, despite their personal lives and shady character associations, did produce the best years we've had in a long time -- or go with Obama who has less experience, BUT is not much different than Hillary in his positions?

Here is the bottom line -- they are both "establishment" politicans, but the dem establishment is turning against the Clintons and bringing in a "new" establishment guy in Obama. The fact that Obama voted "present" 140 times during his time as a state legislator puts me off. Doesn't he have an opinion, or does he always play it safe and not rock the boat? I just think the dems and the repubs could both "have their way" with Obama easier than they could with a Clinton who has an axe to grind with both parties..

So, shall we go with the Clinton establishment or the Dem establishment? In thinking about that question I am somewhat drawn to having a Hillary who is pissed off at both, rather than a new member who will be eager to please the dem establishment that has done nothing for us since we put them in the majority but whine they can't get anything passed. They whine for everyone to be "bipartisan" -- bipartisan meaning saving their own asses since the public has given congress as a whole a 25% approval rating.

Beats the hell out of me....but I will be voting for anyone but McCain.

Cal 45

Truth From the Street

2008-01-29T17:05:00.000-08:00

THE SECOND SUCCUMBING

–Apologies to W.B. Yeats / The Second Coming

Turning and Spinning in the Widening Mire
The Congress cannot hear the Precedent;
Things fall apart; the Party cannot hold;
Sheer Conarchy is loosed upon Democracy,

The freedom-gouging tide is loosed, and everywhere
The Standing of America is downed;
The best convictions are too polite, while the worst
Are full of obtuse intensity;
Surely some Reason is at hand.

Yet there instead, the Patriot “Act”!
The “Patriot” Act!

Hardly are those words out
When an Orwelled image out of Posse Comitatus
Troubles my sight:

Somewhere in the martial curfews of this seminal Treachery
A shape with Oz-lion body and the head of a borne-again fool:
An ‘Aye’ blank and clueless as the GOP itself
Is moving its leaky Trojan Agenda, but who knew?
While overhearing guffaws & careless cheering
from the belly of the beast, that all about it now should
gather threats of patriotic fillibuster, lighting & passing torchfire.

…Wounded cowardice drops again; but indignant courage
finds unexpected stride, in the edifying irony
that a Sitting President was on his Game after all,
as if afloat, fishing! entirely untorn,
glued from National Nightmare to “My Pet Goat.”

And what Hellbent Vision Thing,
its Truthless Power come round at last,
$louches towards Liberty to be Borne?

--Artist General Michael Masley

Berkeley street musician Michael Masley has appointed himself "the Artist General." [http://ArtistGeneral.com] He is an accomplished player of the large hammered dulcimer and was grand marshal of the How Berkeley Can You Be Parade... "Patriots for a Fair Contract with America" [http://LieJinx.com] asks "Martial Planners"... http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2002/11/03/MN19057.DTL

Cal's Straight Talk -- Jumping Off the Change Train

2008-01-29T13:30:00.000-08:00

Okay, maybe I am over-analyzing here but has anyone noticed a "change"?

I'm talking about the change in how the dem "establishment" has changed the campaign issues. For six or more years the number-one complaint of the public has been about the political and government system -- the corruption that led to Iraq and most other problems. This public complaint and disgust put the dems in the majority in the last elections.

It has made no difference. Now we are even angrier.

Realizing this, the dem candidates all hit the 2008 campaign trail talking about change. That is getting a big response from the public because, having once voted for change and not gotten any, we're even more determined to get some change...

But the dems have changed the definition of change.

It's very clear that the dem establishment has gotten firmly behind Obama's "hope" campaign. Ted Kennedy's endorsement made that clear. "Obama is going to make America good again -- from sea to shining sea," Kennedy yelled to an ecstatic crowd. "I feel ch-a-a-a-a-nge in the air!" Since Kennedy has the oldest and biggest and most far-reaching political machine of anyone in congress, this resonated. Candidates heavy on specific issue details like Edwards and even Hillary have been either shut down by the establishment and the media or, in Hillary's case, are in the process of being beat up.

So now the Obama message of change is emphasizing even more heavily that it is "society" that must change. "We the people" must change for the better. When "we" get better, then we will have better government. All the change now talked about is a change in the "public attitude," not a change in the political system. The Obama onus is on us as a society to be better, not for the government to be better. Then after 'we" become a better society we can "take control" of our government.

So how do we do take control after we become better? Will the same politicians in DC listen to us any better after we become better? Will the disapproval ratings the public has given congress, the lowest in history, be taken seriously after "we" become a better society? Will the sit-in's, the petitions, the calls, the protests, the pleas, the votes millions of Americans have already cast be taken seriously when "we" and not "they" become better?

What is going on here by the dem establishment, considering how the repub party has imploded, is the failings of the dem party -- the corruption of the system that has been our main complaint -- is being tossed back to the public like a hot potato. Now, we discover that all our problems are caused by our failings as a society, not by the politicians' own corruption and failures.

Neat trick...I am not falling for it.

Cal 45

Traffic Jam on the Highway to Hell

2008-01-27T20:27:00.000-08:00

By Sheila Samples

"When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil."~~- Thomas Jefferson

Each new year ushers in a myriad of "Top Ten" lists -- 10 best things, 10 worst things, things we need to do, things we did but shouldn't have -- and this year, even a hilarious list of WTF? things popped up. I'll admit I'm not as well organized as those who progress in 10-step increments. My problem is narrowing the atrocities down to 10 -- and then narrowing those 10 down to a single year. I'm confident I could compile a really neat list if I could decide which in the tangle of loathsome assaults should be Number One.

It can't be done. Everything that happened in 2007 is a direct result of events in 2006, a continuation of 2005 crimes, the bloody mess of 2004, the shock and awe of 2003 and the vicious, ruthless lies of 2001 that led us to where we are today. It's impossible to appraise the malignant nature of this administration in any intelligible way. From the outset, it came at us -- at the world -- on all fours with fangs bared. Whether ripping the humanity from our Constitution or drowning the innocent in a sea of blood, its appetite is insatiable. It rises from each feast hungrier than before.

I used to think Americans had been whipped by 9-11 terror confusion into some sort of national stupor. That's not so. We're trapped in a massive spiritual paralysis. Normal people are simply not equipped to deal with remorseless psychopaths. We were not prepared to come face to face with evil, nor to be manipulated by lies and controlled through stark fear. Our refusal to address the mounting list of Bush-Cheney war crimes could be because we cannot force ourselves to admit our "one nation under God" spies upon its citizens, imprisons them without due process, engages in grotesque acts of torture and delights in mass murder. And so we stand here on the precipice of our own destruction, waiting for evil to run its course.

No Mercy

Evil never runs its course. With each success, it grows stronger, more ghastly and, like Dick Cheney, emerges a bit more from the shadows. Never doubt for a minute that these unfeeling creatures are not evil. They are incapable of compassion, of empathy, of mercy. Their eyes are on the prize of One World rule, and they will have it in spite of -- or as a result of -- all the chaos and carnage it takes to achieve it. There are no "Imps of the Perverse" among them who will be so overcome with guilt they will break from the pack and run through the populace shrieking, "We're guilty! We did it! We are murderers!"

Cheney and his destructive little sidekick, George Bush, have brazenly committed treasonous acts -- left piles of corpses in their wake since the 2000 election coup. If there is a God, they are bound straight for Hell. But they are not alone. They're protected by a merciless axis of courts, congressional conspirators and corporate media who cover up their crimes by issuing a steady barrage of terror threats and a relentless fog of twisted disinformation.

Our government is nothing but a Good Ol' Boys and Girls club, with judges, journalists, legislators and administration jesters whooping it up while pillaging the Treasury, ignoring the cries of their victims, turning a blind eye to millions of slaughtered and displaced innocents, and sending thousands of their own citizens to their deaths. They have mauled, raped and obstructed Justice until that once noble Lady is no longer recognizable.

Author Kurt Vonnegut, who died last April after a fall in his home, warned that corruption in this government must be removed and the perpetrators must pay for their crimes or our Republic is dead. In an October 2005 PBS interview, as his last book, "A Man Without a Country," soared to the top of best-seller lists, Vonnegut said, "...we have only a one-party government. It's the winners. And then everybody else is the losers. And the winners are divided into two parties. The Republicans and the Democrats...that's what a charade the combat between the Republicans and the Democrats is. It's rich kids. Winners on both sides. So the winners can't lose. And, of course, the losers have no representation in Congress..." Vonnegut said members of Congress, regardless of party, represent only those who bankroll their political campaigns; those making tons of money from Bush and Cheney's illegal war.

Enough is Enough

The 2006 elections, which gave the Democrats control of both houses of Congress, was a clear imperative to govern according to the will of the people. No Congress in history has ever been elected who knew better what that will was -- primarily to stop an immoral war, but also to hold accountable those responsible for the lies, torture, loss of freedoms, spying on their own citizens, and the relentless slaughter of US military as well as innocent Iraqi and Afghanistani citizens.

Nancy Pelosi, quivering at the thought of becoming the nation's first female Speaker of the House, said on Nov 9, 2006, "This new Democratic majority has heard the voices of the American people." She added, while apparently attempting to stifle a burst of wild, maniacal laughter, "Americans placed their trust in Democrats. We will honor that trust. We will not disappoint.”

Pelosi's counterpart in the Senate, Harry Reid, bowed his head and mumbled that “The days of the do-nothing Congress are over." He looked around furtively before whispering that Americans spoke “clearly and decisively in favor of Democrats leading this country in a new direction.” Reid then scurried off to crouch behind Bush, who smirked good naturedly while giving him a "good thumpin.."

They knew they were elected to stop the madness, to stem the onslaught of tyranny and to protect and defend the Constitution, but chose instead to fall on their knees before those who scorned them, threatened them, or perhaps offered them a "piece of the action." By choosing to suspend, rather than defend, the Constitution, they are guilty of high crimes.

We can no longer stand on the sidelines waiting for the evil to subside. They must go -- all of them -- starting at the top with the impeachment of the mad Cheney and Bush and continuing through both houses of Congress where all 435 House seats and 35 Senate seats are up for election this year.

The majority of Americans are demanding that both Bush and Cheney be impeached and removed from office, and those like David Swanson, Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich, and now Fla Rep. Robert Wexler, are working tirelessly to make that happen.

We've had enough. We not only agree with Vonnegut, but with Lee Iacocca, who pulls no punches in his April 2007 book, "Where Have All the Leaders Gone?" Iacocca asks, "Am I the only guy in this country who's fed up with what's happening? Where the hell is our outrage? We should be screaming bloody murder. We've got a gang of clueless bozos steering our ship of state right over a cliff, we've got corporate gangsters stealing us blind, and we can't even clean up after a hurricane much less build a hybrid car. But instead of getting mad, everyone sits around and nods their heads when the politicians say, 'Stay the course.' Stay the course? You've got to be kidding. This is America, not the damned Titanic. I'll give you a sound bite: Throw the bums out!"

Yes. Throw the bums out and watch them scatter. And when they do, there will be a traffic jam on the highway to Hell.

Cal's Straight Talk -- Middle East Can of Worms

2008-01-13T13:51:00.000-08:00

Something is definitely going on in the Middle East. Bush stressed quite hard in his speeches that Israelis should keep Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in power. Because inside Israel the Likud Party is gaining even more power and Binyamin Netanyahu is pushing to oust Olmert and assume power. There are growing calls in their parliament and among the public for Olmert to resign. Everyone knows if Olmert is out and Netanyahu and his Lukid party ascended, they would without doubt launch an attack on Iran, fully expecting the US to have to then back them up.

So some of what Bush says or tells the Israelis and Arabs is most likely a balancing game. Say something to make Olmert look good, say something in favor of Palestine, say something to Netanyahu to let him think you agree with him to stall him, say something else to the Arab countries. Telling is that Bush has not said he was going to discard the NIE on Iran but only that it isn't his "view." It is sort of like a "well I don't agree but..."

I am interested in watching Condi because she isn't going to do or say anything without Bush's blessing. Now, whether her tough talk to Israel of late is nothing but bull or if there is something behind it, we will have to wait to see. But her words have impact on the general populations in Israel and Palestine even if they are a wink and nod between those in the inside.

Most likely, the changes in Bush's rhetoric are influenced by members of the old gang who don't like Israel, plus the insider doings in Israel regarding the chances of Netanyahu replacing Olmert, which would up the chances of an Israeli attack, plus the Iraq situation, plus the obvious Saudi and gulf council coolness toward the US, plus a few other countries going along with Bush's sanctions on Iran -- Italy just signed a new oil deal with Iran -- plus Russia's announcement that an attack on Iran would be considered an attack on their interest...

Maybe it all boils down to just trying to keep the lid on the can of worms until Bush is out of office.

Cal 45

Cal's Straight Talk -- Campaign Buffoonery

2008-01-12T14:08:00.000-08:00

Nothing personal, but it appears to me that the Democrats endorsing Obama so we can get some "change and unity" in the country are trying to slip the country a mickey. The establishment is running scared because they see the public wants change, so much so that candidates like Ron Paul get 10% of a mixture of Republicans, Democrats and Independents, and John Edwards keeps peeling off 17%. So they think they can play like they're giving us "change" in the form of a new "personality." However, it isn't a real "change" in the political system the dems and repubs have set up for themselves, you know -- the system that serves them so well they can stay in congress for decades no matter how much they fail or how little they actually do for the people.

What do you think it would do to "establishment" politicians if real change hit, if some real change agent got elected they hadn't endorsed? They would be back on the interstate headed home after their current terms were up. The incest reunion would be over. Whatever one thinks of Edwards he has said he would nail shut the revolving door between politicians and lobbyists; he has said he would name names...expose corruption. Ron Paul has said the same thing. Therefore, Edwards and Paul must be margalinized or shut out because they might be real change agents.

Which is exactly what has happened.

If you investigate some of the current meetings and groups of big wigs, you will see that a lot of former long-time congressional good ol' boys have formed and convened all these "meetings" to discuss our dire straits. The dire straits they talk about are not Iraq or Iran or our plummeting economy, but how the two parties are being destroyed. I saw a whole gaggle of them on C-span spouting this line -- and the entire group was made up of all the well-known, go along to get along, self-servicing names from the past -- Sam Nunn, Christi Todd Whitman, Dan Burton, David Boren, and on and on, ad nauseam.

Hillary takes no prisoners, Edwards takes no prisoners, Paul takes no prisoners. They all have semi-enemies from their experiences and positions they fought for or advocated in the past. Obama has no enemies...it that a clue? If you don't have any enemies, it's likely you haven't done anything good or bad.

Obama may be a good guy but he is not his own guy. Look beneath the surface, look at the groups I am talking about, you will get the picture. Now, maybe Obama is the kind who will ignore his benefactors and "mentor club" and go against the establishment trait of collusion between the parties that they all practice so they can stay in DC, all comfy together. But I doubt it, it's never happened yet.

Cal.45

Cal's Straight Talk -- It Pays to be Paranoid

2008-01-12T13:38:00.000-08:00

A small, but interesting thing...I went online to pay my Citibank card and noticed they have suddenly changed the layout of their site. Previously, it was a simple procedure -- you accessed your current "statement" and clicked to pay it if you have it on bank draft. Now, you have to go through several steps to get your actual current statement.

First they show your current "balance" with the pay button to click -- meaning charges since the billing cycle ended that aren't due yet. If you don't look closely, you don't see that it's not really your current statement. If you click the pay button out of habit, you will realize too late that you have paid "in advance" or "forward" on your charges. On mine, the difference was about $200 -- so if enough customers make that same mistake, Citibank gets money not due yet. Let's say that even 10% of their customers make that mistake -- Citibank would be upping their "cash flow" considerably.

It pays to be paraniod....they all have their little tricks.

Cal.45

AT THE TOMB OF THE UNKNOWNS

2008-01-12T11:43:00.000-08:00

By Mary Pitt

Rise up! Ye heroes of the past,
Tear down these whited walls
Where once great leaders, brave and true,
Trod the marbled halls!

Purge out the pompous peacocks
Who pollute the public scene,
Parade in your golden mantles
For purpose far from clean,

Who take your honors as their own,
Bask in your reflected rays,
And try to use the glow to hide
Their cruel, mendacious ways!

They corrupt your sacred sacrifice
To exploit it and then
They pad their purses with putrid pelf
And take power over other men.

Rise up! Restore this benighted land
To the home of the free and the brave
So that you can rest, once more at peace
Within that hallowed grave.

Mary Pitt is a very "with-it" ol' lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and commom sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for societal "perfection."

A Christmas Story

2007-12-27T10:40:00.000-08:00

I have a cold. And I got it the only way I know how to do things -- the hard way. On Christmas Eve, I decided I'd give myself a present. I had this bright idea to get a head start on the new year by testing the strength of the Equal Rights Amendment -- you know, the ERA -- the free pass that enterprising women have used for years to back stubborn men into corners...

My friend Bernie is always bragging about what a success he is at snagging bass. He says it's too bad the Bass Club is men-only, and he lords it over me that bass fishing is a "man's" thing -- not for wussies. Not for women. Not for me. Well, I don't like to brag, but I've caught my share of fish over the years, and I can spin a tale with the best of them. I decided it was time to shut Bernie up and crash the "men only" bunch of happy hookers. So, when I approached the president of our local bassin' club, I was armed not only with the ERA, but with a myriad of rebuttals for his excuses, arguments or evasions.

"Sure you can join," he said, his eyes sparkling good-naturedly. "All you have to do is fish in two tournaments. If you pass muster, you're automatically voted into the club."

"Really...just like that?" I asked suspiciously. "Okay, then. When fishing weather rolls around --"

"Oh, no!" he countered, the sparkle now a glint. "Be out here at 3 in the morning. It's always fishin' weather, and we're having a tourney tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? But tomorrow is Christmas!"

"Three-ay-em. Unless, of course..."

"I'll be here!" I exclaimed hurriedly, determined not to be dispensed with so easily. "I'll be here. But -- don't the tournaments usually start at six?"

"Yeah," he grunted. "But you're gonna be fishing with the best -- good ol' Luther, and he likes to get out early and get the lay of the lake."

Thus, I became a willing and unsuspecting pawn in the hands of good ol' Luther. I was even buoyed by a feeling of camaraderie as, excited and shivering, I approached the icy, pre-dawn waters on Christmas morning.

"Where have you been?" An angry voice shattered the stillness. Peering into the darkness, I saw the lean, impatient Luther, gandy-dancing on the dock. He confronted me, blood in his eye, rod and reel poised like a lion-tamer's whip. His coveralls, zipped to the lip, were blazoned with a lightening bolt and the words, "Idi Amin Dada -- Conqueror of the British Empire!"

"Bu--but it's only 3 o'clock..."

"We leave at three," he snapped as he leapt lithely into the shallow bassing rig, leaving me to clamber unsteadily aboard and slink into the "tower seat" high in the sleek boat.

"...life jacket!" Luther mouthed as he started the engine -- a sudden explosion that sounded like a reverberating howitzer. While I groped in the darkness for the jacket, Luther blasted out of the cove. If he noticed I was smashed into the seat; if he heard the snap of my neck -- the castanet rattle of my spine -- he gave no indication. I still get grim satisfaction out of knowing that there are irreparable "chin gouges" in the back of the padded seat in Luther's flat-out racing bass boat.

I could tell right off that "fun tournament" was beyond Luther's comprehension as he tried to get the jump on the rest of the club members who were beginning to show up. He held full throttle; we were aboard a devil craft, rocketing into the eerie pre-dawn fog. Whimpering, I clung to the side of the boat, where I'd fallen upon take-off. Luther ignored my groans when my thermos of steaming coffee went spinning into the lake. He glared at me menacingly when my plastic worm slipped from stiff fingers -- and warned me wickedly that bass fishin' was serious business.

Each time the wind shifted, we were off again; the tip of the boat standing at haughty attention. There's nothing more invigorating on a Christmas morn than icy spray rattling on teeth set against lips frozen into a permanent snarl...

I tried to get Luther's attention, but I didn't have a gun. I prayed for deliverance. I prayed for Luther to get snagged by one of the dead, witch-like trees that grasped and clawed as we soared by. Then -- I just prayed.

Finally, mercifully, it was 5:30 and time to head back to shore and "rev up" for the fun tourney. From my position in the bottom of the boat, I could hear light "men only" banter as the rest of the gang jockeyed for position.

I struggled to give good ol' Luther a scathing look, but my eyes were frozen shut. "HELP!" I whispered as we nosed against the dock.

They all pitched in to get me out of the boat, and it didn't take but a few minutes to chip away the two inches of ice around my feet. They didn't even break anything when they folded my stiff body into the seat of my car.

"Be back out here tomorrow at the same time for the final phase of your initiation," Luther said, patting me on the head ever so gently so as not to break my hair. "That's the fun part -- going after the big ones. All you gotta do is catch yourself a bass, and then you'll be one of us."

ME? One of THEM? I stared at Luther with wild eyes -- now frozen open. "When donkeys fly!" I attempted to shriek, but my frozen lips could only muster a plaintive, "Aaaaarrrhhh..."

So, here I am, still shivering and nursing a cold, and coming to grips with the fact the ERA isn't all it's cracked up to be. But on the other hand, why would I want to be out there with Luther, baitin' bass -- when I can be here with you, bashin' Bush?

Happy New Year!

Culling the Herd

2007-12-17T06:46:00.001-08:00

"Everything you can imagine is real"~~ Pablo Picasso

In 1974, a year after orchestrating a mass terror bombing of Cambodia -- after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize -- Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and his National Security Council completed “National Security Study Memo 200: Implications of Worldwide Population Growth for U.S. Security and Overseas Interests.” This document, whose sharp edges are dulled by page after leaden page of how to reduce over-population in the Third World through birth control and "other" population-reduction programs, was classified until 1989, but was almost immediately accepted as US policy, and remains the US blueprint for ethnic cleansing today.

It is difficult to imagine the staggering number of innocent humans who have perished through war or famine as a direct result of Kissinger's half-century obsession with, and lust for, genocide. It's even more difficult to imagine the cruel indifference with which Kissinger, and those like him in positions of political and corporate power -- the elite -- continue to plan the elimination of millions, even billions. All under the guise of national security, or to spread freedom...democracy...

Kissinger targeted a number of "key countries" whose populations, he said, must be curtailed and controlled lest they gain economic, political and military strength, and thus threaten US strategic interests. "Depopulation should be the highest priority of foreign policy towards the third world," Kissinger said, "because the US economy will require large and increasing amounts of minerals from abroad, especially from less developed countries.”

Then, as now, any nation refusing to surrender its natural resources was an ominous threat to our national security and was dealt with initially through birth control and other population-reduction programs such as food rationing. But that was too slow for Kissinger, for Brent Scowcroft who replaced Kissinger as national security adviser and was put in charge of thinning out the Third World population, and for his eager enabler, CIA Director George Bush who trotted like a love-starved puppy at Kissinger's heels for decades.

At first, they used food as "an instrument of national power" to coerce the dumb masses to stop copulating and populating, and then as a deadly weapon because widespread famine not only dealt death quicker, but it was cost-effective. And it made more sense. Like Kissinger said, "To give food aid to a country just because they (sic) are starving is a pretty weak reason."

If we could imagine the suffering endured by victims of such perverse inhumanity, we might feel a twinge of outrage or, as George Washington so succinctly put it -- a "little spark of celestial fire called conscience." Or not. Perhaps we are so far removed from reality because our minds cannot grasp the horror of that reality. Those who seek to destroy the denizens of this planet are totally without compassion or remorse. They are grotesque mutants who kill indiscriminately in their relentless drive for world conquest and domination.

It's naive to think the carnage will stop once predators such as Kissinger, Alexander Haig, Robert McNamara, George H.W. Bush, and other One World advocates, many of whom are in their 80s or 90s, are no longer in our midst. With the release of thousands of tons of Depleted Uranium in both Bush Gulf Wars and Afghanistan, they have poisoned food, water and air, and turned the entire region into massive radioactive death camps. Without fear of accountability, they have ensured the slow, agonizing extermination of entire populations, to include the American military, whom Kissinger views as "dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns for foreign policy" -- and their families -- that will continue for many generations.

We're like herds of cattle, grazing placidly, unable or unwilling to imagine that we might share the same fate as the millions throughout the Third World targeted by the elite as "bottom feeders," contributing nothing -- eating into their profit -- gluttons who must be dispensed with. Any rancher or farmer will tell you that it's good business to cull the herd for a variety of reasons, such as market outlook, cash flow, or just to maintain a healthier, more easily controlled mass of cattle. It makes no sense to keep problem cows, the elderly, the ill or non-productive around. There comes a time when you must cut your losses -- and cull the herd.

There are those who, unlike Kissinger and his co-conspirators, are not interested in profit or power, but believe fervently that human population is destroying the planet. Perhaps the most outspoken is University of Texas evolutionary scientist Dr. Eric R. Pianka, who gave a speech in March 2006 advocating the elimination of 90 percent of Earth's population.

According to Forrest M. Mims III, Chairman of the Environmental Science Section of the Texas Academy of Science, and the editor of The Citizen Scientist, Pianka shrugged aside war and famine -- too slow -- and said "the most efficient and fastest way to kill the billions that must soon die" is disease. Pianka advocates airborne Ebola because, he explained, "it is highly lethal, and it kills in days, instead of years."

Pianka drew rounds of enthusiastic applause throughout his speech, and a standing ovation when he threw in the Bird Flu for good measure, and quipped gleefully, "We need to sterilize everybody on the Earth." Five hours later, the University presented Pianka with a plaque, not for winning hands down as "Mad Scientist of the Year," but in recognition of his being named 2006 Distinguished Texas Scientist.

It doesn't take a wild imagination to know that genocide is real, and it's underway in America. The most blatant example is the barbaric response to Hurricane Katrina victims -- withholding food, blocking aid, ignoring those clinging to rooftops while crying out in vain for help, leaving corpses to float in the flooded streets or to rot in the Superdome.

If you start with the poor, minorities, elderly, the ill or non-productive, the culling becomes much easier the next time around. Those who wait become inured to the inhumanity and, rather than rise up against it, breathe sighs of relief that it's others and not them who are rounded up and herded to the slaughterhouse.

Imagine what life would be like if the Food and Drug Administration did not ensure the safety of our food chain...if our creeks and rivers were polluted by sewage and industrial waste...if vaccines forced on our children caused mental deficiencies, even death...if mothers were afraid to breast-feed their babies because the environmental toxin perchlorate present in our food and water supply accumulates in mother's milk...if our air was contaminated...if we had a government cold-hearted enough to withhold food and aid from the needy and health care from poor children...if we were spied upon and incarcerated, tortured, disappeared without charges...

Oh yeah. I forgot. That is what our life is like. All that, and more, is grinding relentlessly away at our safety, our health and our lives.

We have the power to remove these madmen. They are criminals under Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide, and they must pay for their crimes. One more year wherein millions more throughout the world are slaughtered is, as they say, not an option.

The culling must stop, even if we are forced to stampede. They must be impeached. Go here, here, and here and take action.

Straight Talk -- From Cal 45

2007-12-08T12:06:00.000-08:00

I do not care about the votes of gays, straights, jews, gentiles, rich, poor, christians, aethists, vegans, meat-eaters, recyclers, liberals, conseratives or flat-worlders.

The purpose of government is to:

1. Keep the playing field level -- socially and economically for the sake of what reasonable people would define as a "civilized" society

2. Represent the majority and protect the minority

3. Enforce the common laws

4. Protect the democracy from internal and external threats.

Period.

Those who vote on a "single issue" alone deserve what they get -- which is an entire nation whose citizens have their heads up their asses, voting against each other instead of for good government. This naturally results in bad government, which made their issue an "issue" to begin with...and on it goes.

President Theodore Roosevelt said...

"We freely extend the hand of welcome and of good fellowship to every man, no matter what his creed or birthplace, who comes here honestly intent on
becoming a good United States citizen like the rest of us . . . Americanism is a question of spirit, conviction and purpose, not of creed or birthplace. The politician who bids for the Irish or German vote, or the Irishman or German who votes as an Irishman or German, is despicable, for all citizens of this commonwealth should vote solely as Americans."

If I could be dictator for a day, I would have these words tattooed on every citizen's forehead....heh,heh,heh.

Cal 45

The Last Founder Standing

2007-11-17T13:03:00.000-08:00

By Sheila Samples

"If you want to go quickly, go alone.
If you want to go far, go together.
We need to go far -- quickly." ~~ Al Gore

No entity in this once-proud nation is more corrupt than its shallow, hubris-infested media. Any pricks of conscience the media may have felt for covering up the treasonous seizure of the 2000 election were swept away in the swirl of terror following the attack on 9-11. The "big story" to confront George Bush when he returned from his month-long vacation in September 2001, his approval numbers tanking, was that Al Gore got more votes than any Democrat in US history -- nearly a half-million more than Bush. It was that five conservative Supreme Court judges stopped the vote count that would prove Gore won because, in their unsigned decision, they wrote such a democratic win would cause "public acceptance," which would "cast a cloud over Bush's legitimacy" and thus harm "democratic stability."

Into the Abyss

The election coup was a shot across the bow of democracy, a power seizure orchestrated by the ever-present, hands-on man who leaves no fingerprints, James Baker III, and carried out by mob leader John Bolton. Luckily for Bush, he blundered into 9-11 and managed to hit the trifecta before the papers managed to hit the newsstands. And, thanks to the media and its burgeoning power to manipulate citizen opinion and form legislative attitudes, Bush demanded -- and was given -- a license to kill.

The beast was loosed.

The last seven years have been a hell of a ride for Bush, Dick Cheney and their toady media -- continuous, absurd politicking for the next election, blood-gushing adventure abroad and a Constitution-shredding free-for-all at home. Power is a heady thing, and they grow more powerful and immoral with each lie they tell, each freedom they destroy, each crime they cover up.

For the rest of us, those years have just been hell. Like our fellow Americans in New Orleans caught up in the despair of waiting for help that will never come, we remain mired in a Samuel Beckett wasteland, waiting for our own "Godot" to return and claim what is rightfully his. Rightfully ours. Our rights, our freedoms, our civil liberties -- our government.

Gore tested the water in 2004, and the media met him head-on, fangs bared, in a concerted effort to ridicule and destroy him and to keep their corporate benefactors and war profiteers in office. From the New York Times to the Washington Times to the Los Angeles Times the message to Gore was the same -- get lost.

Over at CNN, Paula Zahn and Judy Woodruff each did an "exclusive" interview with Gore. Each pointed out how popular and wonderful Bush is; each asked Gore virtually the same question -- "Do you really think YOU can win?" Each looked at Gore in stunned amazement, and Woodruff even added in her intensely oh-so-blonde bewildered way (eyes wide, hands spread) -- "People are saying that nobody out there likes you, even the leaders of your own party. Given that (you're such a ridiculously low lying slimeball) -- what makes you think you can win...?"

People are saying. Should anyone doubt who those "people" are, during the same period, CNN's Suzanne Malvoux opined to then morning anchor Soledad O'Brien, "There's a connection between Bush 43 and the public -- it's a comfort level...Bush has a glow about him." O'Brien announced a bit later, as if noticing it herself, "Bush seems to have a glow about him." Later, Woodruff credited Malvoux with reporting earlier that "Bush is so relaxed, he has a glow about him." Later in the day, Wolf Blitzer commented, "Some people are saying that Bush has a glow about him..."

Gore was determined that the election be more than some "media" people saying he is boring, he is fat, he is a liar. He knew that Bush, if forced to address the issues facing this country, if forced to explain the disconnect between his words and actions, explain to Americans why their civil rights were being desecrated in the name of freedom, explain how a "man of God" could morph so effortlessly into an "Angel of Death," he could not -- and should not -- survive. So Gore withdrew, hoping to set the stage if not for Bush's defeat, at least for him having to answer some critical questions about this nation's economy, its domestic chaos, and the pathological lies that took this nation into a bloody, senseless war.

Going Quickly, Alone

That didn't happen. So Gore set out to continue his lifelong quest of awakening the world's population to the reality of global warming. In spite of the media's vicious efforts to discredit him, Gore soared to new heights of credibility with his book, "An Inconvenient Truth," published concurrently in May 2006 with the documentary film of the same title. The film, by far the most popular at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, was mocked at home but received well-deserved acclaim in foreign media and captured not one, but two Academy Awards. It went on to become the fourth-highest-grossing documentary in US history.

The New York Times' Michiko Kakutani did review Gore's book, pointing out that it was "largely free of the New Age psychobabble and A-student grandiosity that rumbled through" his 1992 book, "Earth in the Balance." Kakutani reminded readers that Poppy Bush had earlier dismissed Gore as "Ozone Man," but conceded that Gore's "passionate warnings about climate change seem increasingly prescient," and that his "wonky fascination with policy minutiae has been tamed in these pages..." Finally, while noting that Gore wrote the Introduction for (1994 reprint) Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring," Kakutani wrapped it up by sneering that Gore "isn't a scientist like Carson and doesn't possess her literary gifts," and accused Gore of writing "as a popularizer of other people's research and ideas."

Perhaps if Kakutani had known that, just 18 months later, Gore and the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) would be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about manmade climate change, and to lay the foundations ... to counteract such change," she might have mentioned that the premise of Gore's book was clearly that global warming is not just about science nor is it just a political issue. It is a moral issue and we -- all of us -- have a responsibility to do something about it. Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" is, as Kafka wrote, "the axe for the frozen sea inside us."

Al Gore is a "larger than party" guy, and stands head and shoulders above the hypocritical Bush clones in both parties who are flip-flopping all over the campaign trail. Since 2000, he has wielded that axe again and again via op-eds, speeches and face-to-face interaction with the people -- a wake-up call to resist the imposition of tyranny by the powerful. As early as 2003 Gore was ahead of the pack, warning Americans about the loss of civil liberties, unwarranted searches and seizures, and illegal surveillance.

In a September 2005 speech in San Francisco, a heartbroken Gore spoke of the morality -- or lack of it -- in the Bush administration's belated response to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Don't point fingers -- don't hold us accountable -- appeared to be the only plan in place to deal with catastrophe.

However, "When the corpses of American citizens are floating in toxic floodwaters five days after a hurricane strikes," Gore said, "it is time not only to repond directly to the victims...but to hold the processes of our nation accountable, and the leaders of our nation accountable..."

Gore had personally responded to the tragedy by arranging to have 270 evacuees airlifted on two separate flights from New Orleans to Tennessee. He agreed to pay $50,000 for each flight, recruited doctors and cut through government red tape to allow the planes to land in New Orleans. The media did not mention this act of courage and compassion, perhaps because Bush had not yet arrived for his belated flyover and cathedral photo-op where spotlights cast a glow about him.

Going Far Together -- Quickly

For millions of us who wait for Gore, each day begins anew, with hope that he will return -- yet each night ends in despair because he did not. We have hope because we know that each step Gore has taken in his entire career -- representative, senator, vice president and, yes, president -- has been forward. The grassroots movement to draft Gore is spreading across the nation, and will continue unless Gore himself says "Stop!" To date, he has not done so. Perhaps that is because he knows -- as do we -- that both the earth and our democracy are teetering on the brink of disaster, and their restoration depends entirely upon the person occupying the Oval Office.

We have hope because we read his explosive new book, "The Assault on Reason," wherein he exposes the Bush administration for what it is -- traitorous. Gore wrote more than once in his book, "Where there is no vision, the people perish." Gore shares the vision of the Founders that we are a government of laws, not of men. He warns that a "president who breaks the law is a threat to the very structure of our government."

Gore is a Tom Paine, a Paul Revere, who tells us -- "It is time now for us to recover our moral health in America and stand again for freedom, demand accountability for poor decisions, missed judgments, lack of planning, lack of preparation, and willful denial of the obvious truth about serious and imminent threats that are facing the American people."

Al Gore is for the people who are rising to the challenge of restoring democracy. He is of the people who long to "rekindle the true spirit of America." And Gore will be re-elected by the people -- because he is the last Founder standing.

In The Kingdom of Fear

2007-10-15T18:44:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

"You're A Whole Different Person When You're Scared"
~~Warren Zevon, Hunter S. Thompson

My friend Bernie says since Democrats won the Congress, George Bush reminds him of a cartoon where this destructive Texas jackrabbit was careening headlong down a path, his eyes riveted on a rabbit hole in the distance. A tortoise, sunning himself at the side of the path, looked behind the rabbit where a baying pack of dogs, in hot pursuit, was gaining on him. The tortoise smiled. The poor bunny was in a race for his life. As he shot by, the tortoise called out lazily, "Think you'll make it?" The rabbit, looking neither to the right nor left, shot back desperately -- "I gotta make it..."

Bernie says Bush is running scared. So scared he's "pantin' like a lizard..."

Pantin' like a lizard? Hah. Having been raised in New Mexico with me, Bernie should know that Bush is panting because, well, that's what lizards do...Especially the venomous gila monsters, who are fun to chase, but only a fool would try to catch one. That's why the few Democrats out there who appear to be chasing Bush are, in reality, just trotting along in his wake. I suspect they fear the holocaust he is capable of inflicting if they catch him.

For six long years, Bush has "water-boarded" all who oppose him -- especially those in Congress -- with a steady stream of 9-11. Each speech is laced with visions of 9-11 -- 9-11 horror just over the horizon, 9-11 around each corner, 9-11 behind each tree. "Fear Itself" is the only option on the Bush-Cheney table, and they have used it relentlessly, not only to wage genocidal war in order to gain control of the world's resources, but to seize dictatorial power and to control the quivering masses. Constant and repetitive warnings and false-flag alerts, evidence of plotters and planners skulking among us, hateful ideologies swirling above us like mushroom clouds -- is it any wonder our elected representatives, once inside the Kingdom of Fear, lose all sense of direction, the ability to reason?

In his new book, "The Assault on Reason," former vice president Al Gore shines the light of truth upon this Orwellian prison of fear in which we are held captive. In fact, Gore says more in his Introduction than most people can manage to get across in an entire book. He says there is a "connection between the withdrawal of reason from the public sphere and the resulting vacuum that is filled by fear, superstition, ideology, deception, intolerance, and obsessive secrecy as a means of tightening control over the information that a free society needs to govern itself according to reason-based democracy."

Bernie says that sounds good, but as far as he's concerned, they're all just a bunch of spineless hypocritical weasels. "Something ain't right here," Bernie said. "These Democrats are different from the ones we sent up there. We elected them to do the two things they promised to do -- stop the massacre in Iraq and impeach the shallow, warmongering fool who lied us into his greedy war. They've been there nearly 11 months and they refuse to hold Bush and Cheney accountable for their treasonous lies or the massive destruction that gets worse every day. Blood keeps gushing from the sands of Iraq. Bodies keep piling up."

Bernie glared at me as he headed for the door. "Are they really scared, or are they just playing politics?" he asked. "Either way -- how do they sleep at night -- how in the hell do they sleep at night?"

If I knew the answer to that question, I'd know why my hero, Sen. Russ Feingold, gave a speech on the floor of the Senate in early October wherein he urged his peers to take a stand and insist the $150 billion war-funding bill include a timeline for beginning to withdraw troops because, he said, "There have been more than 3,600 killed in Iraq..."

I was aghast. Perhaps Feingold overslept that morning. Had he bothered to check, he would have discovered that, as he spoke, more than 3,800 of our soldiers and marines had been killed. He might even have mentioned the more than 37,000 injured and more than 21,000 suffering from disease and other medical problems. No matter how you stack them, that's a lot of bodies piling up...

I'd know why another of my heroes, Rep. John Conyers, who had been out there hugging the peerless David Swanson and the courageous Cindy Sheehan -- holding meetings in basements, whipping up articles of impeachment -- suddenly shut up, backed off, and dove under his desk when the polls closed. Freaked out -- after 21 terms in Congress!

I don't know if House droid Nancy Pelosi experiences fear; if she sleeps, or even blinks, but her strident insistence that she alone is the Decider on impeachment is a power grab indicating either her ignorance of, or contempt for, the U.S. Constitution. Article II, Section 4 leaves no wiggle room, but is a mandate -- "The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."

Pelosi's mantra that "impeachment is off the table" mirrors Bush's 9-11 broadside, and is clear evidence that she is far more concerned with politics than with the faceless, invisible bodies that keep piling up because of her inaction. In a recent interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer, Pelosi said she is determined that Bush will not escape his legacy. "This war is Bush's war and it's Cheney's war. And now," she said, smacking her lips in delight -- "this war is the Republican's war..."

So there you have it. When Pelosi and other members of Congress were sworn in after the 2006 election, 2,761 American uniformed military had been slain. In the ensuing 11 months, while Democrats were caving in, kissing ass, and giving Bush everything he demanded to expand his war, an additional 1,072 of our young men and women have perished. With 13 months remaining for this administration, one must wonder how many more innocent Iraqi citizens and American military must die in order for Pelosi to write Bush's legacy with their blood...

If Democrats in Congress actually read that document which they swore to "support and defend against all enemies foreign and domestic," they would know that any member of the House can start impeachment proceedings by (are you listening, Rep. Dennis Kucinich?) merely tossing a resolution in the hopper for referral to the appropriate committee.

There is good reason for Americans to be scared, for as George Orwell said, "It does not matter if the war is not real, or when it is, victory is not possible. The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continous...The war is waged by the ruling group against its subjects." It's them against us -- a greedy corporate cabal protected by a cruel and sinister Dick Cheney and Bush, a vicious, brainless jackass who endowed himself with "wonder-working" masturbatory power to torture and kill at will.

I once read that the Constitution is our birth certificate. If we are to remain a legitimate republic and escape this Kingdom of Fear, we must impeach both of these illegitimate warmongers. We must resist being fatigued into compliance with murder and into relinquishing our freedoms.

As Hunter S. Thompson wrote so succinctly just prior to the 2004 elections, "We are down to nut-cutting time," and, again, with Warren Zevron, Thompson admonished -- "If you can't run, walk...If you can't walk, crawl...But don't look down...It's a long, long fall."

Let us begin.

*Painting by Brooke Neal

Gonzo Boogie -- As Easy as ABC

2007-09-09T14:58:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

Speculation is swirling about who will replace Attorney General Alberto Gonzales -- everyone from Utah's Senator Orrin Hatch to former Solicitor General and Clinton stalker Theodore Olsen. Until last week, the name most bandied about was Secretary of Homeland Security and USAPATRIOT Act co-author Michael Chertoff. You'd think selecting Chertoff in light of the New Orleans debacle would be a stupid thing to do since Chertoff's continued ideological mishandling of the Katrina disaster borders on the criminally insane.

Oh. Yeah. I forgot. Stupid bungling and destructive, criminal assaults on the less fortunate seem to be the criteria for serving at the pleasure of this president. Who can forget Chertoff's bewildered insistence that nobody could "predict such a disaster ever could occur"? Or that he refused hundreds of aid personnel and dozens of vehicles offered by Chicago's Mayor Daley...refused to let the Red Cross deliver food...refused the Navy's offer of a ship with a 600-bed hospital...refused Amtrak's offer to assist in evacuations...turned away WalMart supply trucks...prevented the Coast Guard from delivering diesel fuel...blocked a 500-boat citizen flotilla from delivering aid...turned back a German government plane loaded with 15 tons of food...put on FEMA's website that first responders were "not to respond" unless dispatched...and then tried to cover his ass by asking the media not to take pictures of the dead?

The response to Katrina was an evil, genocidal racist disaster, a contractors' wet dream, a dry-run for mercenary troops to impose martial law. Its PR was orchestrated by Karl Rove, who also controlled the money, and by Michael Chertoff who apparently was in charge of ridding the Big Easy of its bottom feeders, you know, the ill, the elderly, the poverty stricken and tens of thousands of its Black population. They did a heckuva a job...

The Democrats seem to think doing the Gonzo Boogie is as easy as ABC -- Anybody But Chertoff. They're getting nervous, begging Bush to consult with them and to come up with a candidate that suits both sides of the aisle. Bush's response thus far has been to extend the middle fingers of both hands while accusing Democrats of dragging Gonzales' "good name" through the mud for political reasons.

According to the Washington Post, who long ago quit even pretending to identify its sources, administration officials are warning that Bush will nominate an attorney general who agrees with his policies. "It is the president's prerogative to appoint someone who shares his views," a senior administration official told the Post.

Well, that lets former acting attorney general James Comey, the one man who could perhaps bring some sanity back into our justice system, off the hook. Comey is a Republican whose attention is riveted on the views of the U.S. Constitution rather than those of the president. Comey appointed Patrick Fitzgerald as special prosecutor to investigate the CIA leak case, which resulted in Cheney chief of staff Scooter Libby taking the perjury perp walk. It was Comey who thwarted Gonzales' smarmy effort to get the survelliance program reauthorized in his midnight raid on the hospital room of a critically ill John Ashcroft. And it was Comey, the only Justice official not to lose his memory when facing questions from Congress, who told the truth about the filthy, behind-the-scenes activities of the Bush administration.

If Bush had any integrity or appreciation for the rule of law, he would consider Solicitor General Paul Clement, a 31-year-old legal whiz kid who is not only brilliant, but honest. Clement is a true conservative, a former clerk for Justice Antonin Scalia, and a deputy to Ted Olson when he was solicitor general. However, that doesn't necessarily mean he would meet Bush's criteria of an attorney general who agrees with his policies or shares his dangerous views. In a January article in Legal Times, Tony Mauro wrote, "Clement defends liberal legislation with as much zeal as he does Republican policies. His litigating skills and reputation for straight shooting have won him plaudits from across the ideological spectrum."

Does it matter whose names remain on Bush's "short list" for attorney general? Nah...Bush is The Decider. Under pressure to fire Gonzales, he declared, "I decide who serves in my government." He decided long ago the U.S. Constitution is nothing but a G**damn piece of paper, and his obsession with exercising empirical control over every facet of government, over the people -- over the entire sphere -- borders on vampire lust. Bush is Caesar, his visions put Plato to shame, and when he weeps, his head is on God's own shoulder.

Removing Chertoff from consideration without a fight is uncharacteristic of Bush, and is designed to force the Democrats to cave yet again; to give Bush what he wants while weakly claiming victory. And what Bush wants is unparalled, unmitigated power such as that proposed by former Ashcroft deputy assistant John Yoo -- the power to wiretap US citizens, the freedom to torture not only terrorist suspects, but their children as well, and to declare war anytime, anywhere, on anyone.

Fortunately, Yoo, currently a professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, is radioactive, but we can look for former solicitor general Theodore (Ted) Olson to be at the top of Bush's list. Olson was part of the Paula Jones legal team in her case against President Bill Clinton, and was deeply involved in Kenneth Starr's Richard Mellon Scaife-funded Swiftboat investigation of Whitewater. Olson also personally represented Bush in the 2000 election coup in Florida.

Olson almost makes Gonzales look good. He is campaigning for Rudy Giuliani in 2008, and is the chairman of Giuliani’s Justice Advisory Committee. In a recent National Review article entitled, "Two for the Price of One: The presidency and the judiciary," Olson openly admitted his goal is to stack the courts with "jurists in the mold of Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito and Chief Justices Rehnquist and Roberts," and Giuliani is the guy who will do just that.

And then there's Judge Laurence (Scary Larry) Silberman. Should his name pop up for confirmation, I'll wager the Democrats won't remember, or will hope we don't remember that Silberman is the Reagan campaign operative who worked behind the scenes with Iran's Khomeini regime to successfully delay release of American hostages until after the 1980 election.

Silberman's reward was a seat on the powerful right-wing U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, where he was instrumental in changing the course of history by intervening in the Iran-Contra scandal. Investigative journalist Martin McLaughlin writes that Silberman's "most important decision on the Court of Appeals came in the case of Lt. Col. Oliver North, the principal figure in the Iran-Contra affair. Silberman and fellow justice David Sentelle, a former aide to arch-right-wing Republican Senator Jesse Helms, voided the convictions of both North and Admiral John Poindexter in 1990. Their intervention played a key role in sabotaging the investigation by Iran-Contra special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh."

The Democrats may discover that confirming a new attorney general is not as easy as ABC. We could go on through the alphabet and find other candidates, such as Poppy's Deputy Attorney General George Terwilliger, the leader of the Bush-Cheney coup team during the Florida recount, or former Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson, who left government service shortly after the Iraq invasion for a saner position at the helm of PepsiCo.

It's likely Bush won't be able to resist ramming a political firecracker in the mouths of Democrats just to see their heads explode by nominating Connecticut donkey Sen. Joe Lieberman, who has spent the last six years selling his soul to prove to Bush he's a team player who really really wants to be attorney general. Democrats would be forced to reject the totally unacceptable Lieberman, or accept him and split the Senate down the middle while Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell appoints a Republican to replace him.

Nothing will change with Gonzales' departure, because each candidate on Bush's attorney general list is Gonzo "squared" -- each one committed to do the Gonzo Boogie from now until January 2009. Until then, the Democrats will continue to struggle with their attention-deficit disorder (ADD), and the American people will sink deeper into the morass of national post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

And Bush? It's been a hell of a ride. So exciting that Bush has decided to keep "surging" and "kicking ass" until his job is done, and then he says the next president can clean up the body parts 'cause he's gonna go out and give speeches and make lots of money like Poppy and Bubba...

Ah, Democracy, We Hardly Knew Ye...

2007-08-22T13:56:00.001-07:00

"For in a democracy, every citizen, regardless of his interest in politics, 'hold office'; everyone of us is in a position of responsibility; and, in the final analysis, the kind of government we get depends upon how we fulfill those responsibilities. We, the people, are the boss, and we will get the kind of political leadership, be it good or bad, that we demand and deserve."~~ John F. Kennedy, Profiles in Courage [p. 265]

My friend Bernie says he's not only tired of making excuses for Democrats, he's sick and tired of it. "We've worked our backsides off since 9-11 getting people in office with the courage to derail Bush and Cheney's Constitutional death train," Bernie wailed. "We had our feet on the ground, our eyes on the prize, our noses to the grindstone, our backs to the wall, our shoulders to the wheel --" he paused, mentally clicking off body parts.

"Your head in the clouds?" I suggested helpfully.

"Yeah. That too," Bernie said. "We believed them when they said they wanted to end the war. They promised to stop the torture, the slaughter of innocents, the killing and maiming of our own citizens. Just give us the power, they said, and we'll put a stop to Bush and Cheney's killing spree -- we'll jerk a knot in Gonzales' tail, stop the illegal spying on Americans -- restore our battered Constitution. They promised to impeach the treasonous warmongers, and we believed them. Well," Bernie said, "we were wrong. We gave them the power -- and they betrayed us."

Bernie's right. They betrayed us. Scarcely had the polls closed in November before the victorious Democrats were out in force, backing down, caving in, reassuring George Bush and Dick Cheney they had nothing to worry about. Incoming House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi held an immediate news conference, then hit the airwaves, to include CBS 60 Minutes and Tim Russert's Meet the Press, with a single announcement -- impeachment is no longer in the Constitution. Oversight...accountability...checks and balances...all gone.

Senator Chuck Schumer candidly admitted that getting elected and getting along were his top priorities regardless of what the people expected. He told the Wall Street Journal that "75% of this election was about the people's opinion of the president," but added, "...If we are seen as just blocking the president, it will not serve us well in 2008."

Others, like Rep. Charlie Rangel can't see the point in challenging Bush since he threatens to veto anything that is not what he wants. Rangel said, "We don't want really a fight with the president. What we want to do is to prove we can govern for the next two years..." And Rep. John Dingell, who's been around longer than anybody, agrees, saying the Democrats will "do what makes good sense, while not getting into any extreme positions on any matter."

What is it about 75% -- three-fourths -- of the votes that these craven gerbils don't understand? The 2006 election was an indictment of a president who is ruthlessly destroying our republic, our democratic freedoms, our way of life -- simply because he can. And he can because we let him. Apparently, Democrats are so brain dead they think the "voice of the people" they heard was permission to show they can manage a treasonous genocidal war better than Bush. Whereas, if like Bernie, they'd put their ears to the ground, they'd know that each vote was a primal scream erupting from the masses -- a mandate to stop the madness. Now.

The corrupt political cabal before whom Democrats and Republicans grovel is evil, disgusting, and dangerous. But even more so are their lame excuses for allowing Bush to strip the other two branches of government of their powers and to rule via signing statements and Executive Orders. We believed his lies, they say. We don't want to be blamed for opposing him if there's another attack on the "homeland." We can't speak out...we can't take a stand for democracy lest we be accused of aiding the enemy...please don't hurt us...

I can only hope that Dante was right when he said, "The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis." The silence of the Democratic lambs has been deafening since Constitutional traitors on the Supreme Court intervened in the 2000 election to strike the first blow against democracy. Since that time, the erosion of personal privacy and the alarming increase in citizen-control laws has been achieved by this administration under cover of fighting a senseless, baseless, illegal "war on terrorism."

And Bush grows bolder with each victory. He's determined to have no restraints placed upon him in any area. Immediately upon ramming through the USA Patriot Act just six weeks after 9-11, the administration went on a spree of sweeping up and detaining thousands of citizens without charges and no access to counsel. This act was, and continues to be, the greatest threat to American liberties in our history. It is buoyed by Bush's Military Commissions Act of 2006, or "no consequences torture bill," giving himself the empirical right to torture anyone he views as a "terror suspect."

Perhaps this act is one reason Democrats remain so subservient. Right up front, in Section 948a(2), Bush has the empirical right to decide who is a "lawful enemy combatant." If you are a "member of the regular forces of a State party engaged in hostilities against the United States," or even a "member of a volunteer corps or organized resistance movement and you wear a fixed distinctive sign recognizable at a distance," Bush has the power to decide you are not only hostile but are an enemy combatant.

Bush IS the United States -- a government of Bush, by Bush and for Bush. He has seized the power to "grant" or "take away" basic inalienable rights of American citizens. "I will decide who serves in my government," Bush recently told a member of the media questioning him about calls for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to resign. Does it not follow, then, that those coming out against the war, those not supporting the troops by insisting they come home, or those calling for impeachment would be engaged in hostilities against the United States? Isn't that right, Mrs. Pelosi -- Mr. Conyers?

Is it any wonder that legislators on both sides of the aisle recoil and beat a fast retreat when they look up and see Bush, caught up in the wild influences of his own idiotic imagination, running at them with a lighted firecracker in each hand? Is anyone surprised that Bush so easily got them to agree to his Protect America Act of 2007, which allows the continued secret collection of Americans' phone calls and e-mails with no oversight...no checks...no balances?

It is madness to stand upon the precipice of a Constitutional crisis and even consider for one moment plunging into the abyss by giving Bush additional time to spy on Americans, to torture and kill innocents abroad, and to abandon an exhausted and ill-equipped military on the killing fields of a nation embroiled in the spiraling violence of civil war.

When party loyalty gets so screwed up it is based on a commitment to -- obsession with -- opposing ideologies neither of which, in all its twisted glory, concerns itself with doing what is right for the people in this nation, it's time to take a break from that loyalty. John F. Kennedy was right when he said, "Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer, but the right answer."

We still have a Constitution. And we have a choice, perhaps the last one we are free to make. We can either use it -- or lose it.

Bush's Booming Economy -- For The Rich

2007-08-12T21:28:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

Sometimes I'm amazed at how much I know about the financial markets and the economy. I don't understand any of it, but I know a lot of stuff, thanks to my friend and mentor, Richard Walrath, who's been to the market more than once. He says when George Bush brags that the economy is booming, he's probably right. The economy is exploding with a big boom, and Walrath says now we are engaged in a great battle to see how long this country can endure.

According to Walrath, the Fed has been manipulating the market for years, especially during the Bush years. "There was great fear the United States was going to follow Japan into a period of deflation and recession -- maybe even a depression. Interest rates were cut close to zero while hundreds of billions of dollars were added to the National Debt through tax-cuts for the rich and 'Big Bidness.' And it gets worse just at the time the National Debt limit has to be raised again," he said.

With things as bad as they are, Walrath says it's going to be interesting to see how this will be handled. Congress may have to return early to pass legislation to raise the National Debt. But it makes more sense to me -- since the bulk of our lawmakers were so eager to get out of school for recess, Bush could decide to handle the whole thing like he does everything else to avoid partisan jawboning -- via Executive Order.

But the National Debt is just one of many problems battering our economy. Walrath points out a major problem is "all those margin accounts out there with people getting calls to come up with some real money because their stock is down. As you might expect, this led to speculation in housing -- let's flip it -- and millions of people who couldn't afford to pay their rent bought houses."

Wait a minute...Let's flip it? What does that mean? Nothing comes to mind -- okay one thing does -- but Walrath never takes such a cavalier attitude about economics. Let's flip it, Walrath says is when "--you buy the house with no intention of ever living in it. You add a kitchen, spruce up a bathroom, and "flip" it, or put it back on the market, hoping to make a profit.

This goes on all the time, Walrath says, but there were more flippers than buyers this time around because "it cost almost nothing to own a house while you were waiting to sell it. That's sub-prime credit. You could buy a house with no money down, no income, no job, no assets."

Of course! Now I understand. If you buy a house with no money down, you have little or nothing invested. Just walk away. Let the banks worry about selling them. But to whom will banks sell them? What are the banks going to do? "That's why houses for sale are now piling up all over the country," Walrath said. "It's a terrible situation."

Donald Trump begs to differ. When you're in a hole, keep digging as hard and as fast as you can. Trump's advice, according to Walrath is to "just go back and make another deal with whoever holds the mortgage. Trump says you'll get a better deal this time than the one you had before. Don't walk away from it -- go make another deal. The last thing the bank wants is your house. What are they going to do with it? They can't find anybody to buy it."

So, who's flipping whom in this credit seizure?

According to an unsigned editorial in Saturday's Wall Street Journal, the root cause of this credit correction was the Federal Reserve's willingness to keep money too easy for too long. An "emergency rate cut, as some in the market seem to be anticipating or hoping for -- carries the risk of introducing even greater moral hazard into the financial system," the Journal warns.

We can't have immorality in our financial system, now can we? Oh, the horror!

While chiding Democrats such as Senator Hillary Clinton for proposing a $1 billion federal bailout fund for homeowners at risk of default and foreclosure, the Journal goes on to channel Barbara Bush's flash of morality when speaking of homeless Katrina victims -- "No one wants to see someone lose his home to foreclosure. But many of those most at risk bought their homes with little or no money down, and so have very little at stake economically. Bringing in the feds to bail them out would send precisely the wrong message -- that risky or overly aggressive borrowing will be rewarded by the government rather than punished in the marketplace. To the extent that bad loans were made, the market needs to clear, not be propped up by federal-aid programs."

Unfortunately, despite what the Journal and the endlessly bleating "Money Heads" on TV would have you believe, millions of Americans are in deep trouble. CNBC's Jim Cramer "flipped out" last week in a torrent of truth about the current economic situation.

Walrath agrees, and says if we continue in the direction we're headed, Bush's "boom" will make the Savings and Loan bail-out look like a Girl Scout Cookie Sale.

According to Walrath, there are four sets of losers in this housing meltdown...

~~Those caught with the homes they bought for flipping purposes are not going to be able to find buyers. They are going to lose whatever they have invested, plus whatever mortgage payments they make. It may be cheaper for them just to walk away.

~~Those who own homes will see the value of their houses go down because of the current oversupply due to overbuilding when interest rates were lower and people were buying homes with little or nothing down with the idea of flipping the houses as soon as possible.

~~Those who bought homes with variable-rate mortgages are having trouble making payments because those payments keep going up, and there's nothing they can do about it. Many did not even realize they had such a mortgage. Millions are going to lose their homes.

~~And then, there's the murky many -- the banks and the hedge funds which ended up with mortgages which were used as collateral for junk bonds which ended up as holdings by French and German and English banks, not to mention those in this country.

"This is the dog that worried the cat that killed the rat that ate the malt that lay in the house that Jack built, and we ain't seen nothing yet," Walrath says.

"When it comes to saving the rich from losing money, no expense will be spared. Actually," Walrath mused, "the economy is good -- if you're rich. For the rest of us, there's not much to write home about."

Something Happened on 9-11

2007-07-28T13:26:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

Painting by Brooke Neal

Strange how something happens and you're unaware that it "registers" with you. Later, perhaps, something will trigger that buried memory and things begin to fall into place.

Something happened on 9-11.

The day began with CNN's Wolf Blitzer frantically reporting that planes had smashed into Buildings 1 and 2 of the World Trade Center. They stood there, so tall that the smoke billowing from their upper floors could be seen for 20 miles. The scene was shocking, grisly, and the horror was broken only by the further news that a plane had rammed into the Pentagon. Death and destruction everywhere. Happening now -- right before our eyes.

In an amazing "Breaking News" alert, CNN Pentagon reporter Jamie McEntyre shot down Blitzer's "plane hit the Pentagon" report. McEntyre said flatly, "Although it may appear that way, from my close-up inspection, there is NO evidence of a plane having crashed anywhere near the Pentagon. The only pieces left are small enough you can pick them up in your hand. There are no pieces lying around that would indicate a plane crashed into the side of the Pentagon."

Whoop! Happening now...Quick! Back to Ground Zero...Just in time to see WTC 2, then WTC 1, sink eerily into their own footprints -- tons and tons of cement blasting instantly into a fine powder, rolling majestically through the streets like an Iraqi sandstorm. Anyone who had ever seen one -- even one -- controlled demolition knew without a doubt what he had just witnessed. But no time for that -- yet another plane had rammed into a Pennsylvania field with such force there was just a smoking pit at the site with the debris scattered over an eight-mile area...

But wait! Don't ask! Still happening now! We're treated to yet another controlled demolition display when WTC 7, struck by no plane, inexplicably collapsed in exactly the same fashion as the first two buildings.

Within hours, CNN had pinned this four-pronged attack on our "homeland" on Saudi billionnaire and former CIA operative Osama Bin Laden, and was parading the photographs of 19 terrorists -- 15 from Saudi Arabia -- non-stop across our TV screens. Never mind that in the ensuing weeks, most of them were found alive and well and minding their own business in various parts of the world. For now, they are vicious killers, four of them wannabe pilots who flunked out of flight school, and conveniently left their flight manuals in their cars at the airport. Then, according to Blitzer, these amazing Boeing stunt pilots, armed with deadly box cutters, evaded multiple layers of airport security, outsmarted the entire intercept and identification operations of the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), and destroyed 2,974 innocent human beings.

It wasn't long until McEntyre, his feet back on the ground and marching orders in hand, responded to Blitzer's question about his earlier comments -- "Web sites often take statements out of context, such as the exchange from CNN, in which I, myself appear to be questioning whether a plane really hit the building. In fact, Wolf," McEntyre continued, while rapidly pulling my trigger, "I was answering a question about an eyewitness account that a plane had crashed short of the Pentagon, and I was making the point that, no, not near the Pentagon. The only plane that crashed was at the Pentagon."

That's what happened on 9-11. Throughout the day, Blitzer narrated each step over and over again -- a grisly, staccato date-rape drug seared into our national consciousness...unimaginable heartbreak...horror like none we've ever seen before...devastating grief...incredible force of crashing airplanes...unbelievable horror...people running for their lives in desperation through massive debris...Stay tuned -- dramatic new pictures of people being swallowed by the smoke and flames...happening now...

By the time the sun set, our absentee president concluded his day-long zig-zag dash from one hidey-hole to another, and was back at the helm of this shaken nation whose citizens, thanks in large part to CNN, were in the throes of universal post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). That evening, in his address to a paralyzed world, Bush, leaving no doubt he was answering the call of the Almighty, declared war on the terrorists. That evening, Bush, and those like Dick Cheney who control him, began waging war on the terrified.

With the enthusiastic support of CNN, Bush has relentlessly used the singed flesh of the people slaughtered on 9-11 to justify the monstrous lies that took us into war, and the lies that keep us there. Since that day he has ruled through signing statements and Executive Orders, setting himself above the US Constitution, the Justice System, the entire government. He IS the law -- the Decider, the Priveleged Executive, the Tyrant.

Some say one branch of our corporate mainstream media is neither better nor worse than the other branches. I disagree. Perhaps it's because CNN is the Ministry of Truth's chief operative, panting for war, death, and profit, lying -- "catapaulting Bush's propatanda," -- while portraying itself as "The Most Trusted Name in News." Or maybe it's just when the Mockingbirds come home to roost, they all seem to light on the CNN branch.

CNN is very adept at transmitting fear and lies, fradulent polls, and false-flag alarms over and over and over again to cover up the crimes, treason and mass murder committed by the Bush administration. Blitzer rigidly controls what is aired -- spun -- on CNN as news in his "Situation Room" in the late afternoon and evening. The rest of the 24-hour cycle is spent in news-team giggling, vacuous coverage of Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, and sex predators on the MySpace website. Did you know that yesterday there was an explosion in Dallas, a truck turned over in North Carolina, peanuts can kill you, obesity is contagious, and a cat roaming the halls of a nursing home points out who is next to die?

But this absurd little Machiavellian fool and the servile CNN courtiers who obediently spin his stupid slogans fail to realize that our freedom is not theirs to destroy. Our children are not Bush's, as political philosopher Etienne de la Boetie so eloquently wrote in 1552-1553, "to be led into his battles, to be delivered to butchery, to be made the servants of his greed and the instruments of his vengeance."

Something happened on 9-11 -- something so horrible that the American people acquiesced for a time in their own subjection. They will not succumb to their own destruction. Enough is enough.

No Blood on the Blue Dress

2007-07-14T20:22:00.000-07:00

Here are the 25 Republican Senators -- all still in the Senate -- who voted for both counts of impeachment against President Bill Clinton. Anybody heard a peep out of any of them lately?

Me neither.

I guess taking an unwilling nation into a bloody war based on a pack of lies, slaughtering more than a million innocent people, sending brigades of our military to their deaths (3,615 as of today), and totally bankrupting the country can't be compared with the horror of getting a knob job in the oval office and staining a young woman's dress...

Many thanks to Bob Geiger bobgeiger.blogspot.com for pointing out the sheer hypocrisy of these "patriotic" creeps.

* Wayne Allard (R-CO)
*Robert Bennett (R-UT)
*Kit Bond (R-MO)
*Sam Brownback (R-KS)
*Jim Bunning (R-KY)
*Thad Cochran (R-MS)
*Larry Craig (R-ID)
*Mike Crapo (R-ID)
*Pete Domenici (R-NM)
*Mike Enzi (R-WY)
*Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
*Judd Gregg (R-NH)
*Chuck Hagel (R-NE)
*Orrin Hatch (R-UT)
*Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX)
*Jim Inhofe (R-OK)
*Jon Kyl (R-AZ)
*Trent Lott (R-MS)
*Dick Lugar (R-IN)
*John McCain (R-AZ)
*Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
*Pat Roberts (R-KS)
*Jeff Sessions (R-AL)
*Gordon Smith (R-OR)
*George Voinovich (R-OH)

STRIKE THE ROOT!

2007-07-04T21:16:00.000-07:00

By Sheila Samples

"We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men"~~George Orwell

Recently, Nova M Radio's Mike Malloy suggested the lethargy that appears to have descended on the American people is more "rage fatigue" than a lack of knowledge or comprehension of the damage wrought by this administration. I agree, although for many of us, rather than fatigue, it's more an inability to "focus" on any single atrocity about which to be enraged. There are just too many incoming horrors at any one time. We are in the throes of a national paralysis.

It's not that we don't know enough to be enraged. We know too much. About too many things. Our rage is splintered, spread too thin to be effective. For the past five years, people in this country and around the world have protested against Bush and Cheney's genocidal assault on two helpless nations. As they prepare openly for yet another bloody attack on yet another nation, we continue to sign petitions, hold meetings, march against the corporate machine -- all to no avail.

The issues catapaulting citizens into the streets are outrageous -- each one deserving of a "million man march" on its own merits. However, because we are frustrated by a relentless media blackout and by the deepening corruption, loss of freedoms and the tightening noose of tyranny, our cries are little more than a cacophony of discord -- an impotent racket.

Both Democrats and Republicans are branches of the same tree of corruption. When hacked off, a branch is instantly replaced by another, and another, each one stronger than the last. George Bush is but a snarled twig, waving at us with a frog in one hand and a firecracker in the other. As bodies of American citizens pile up in funeral homes and cemetaries across the nation; as more and more bodies of innocent men, women and children are strewn across the Middle East, it is becoming increasingly obvious the madness will not stop until we fell this tree -- dig into the darkness and strike the root. We must expose -- and impeach -- Dick Cheney.

There have been Cheneys throughout the annals of time who wreak their destruction from the shadows. Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC) warned, "For the traitor appears no traitor -- he speaks in the accents familiar to his victims and he wears their face and their garments and he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of a city. He infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist."

Dick Cheney must be impeached -- now -- before he lashes out from the dark side, and Iran is aflame; its terrified citizens displaced, dying -- dead. Whether to impeach is not up to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, no matter how many "arrows" she claims to have in her quiver. We've moved way beyond playing Cowboys and Indians with this gang.

Pelosi's statement on July 2 that Bush's commutation of Scooter Libby's prison sentence "does not serve justice, condones criminal conduct, and is a betrayal of trust of the American people" is rather ironic, considering her steadfast refusal to hold Bush and Cheney accountable for their acts of treason after being elected to do just that.

Nor is impeachment up to the presidential wannabes flip-flopping in disgraceful political one-upmanship as they vie for money to pour into the ravenous media machine. Any American who would hesitate to impeach a destructive, treasonous, power-mad dictator does not deserve to be president of this United States -- now or ever.

Other than Ohio's courageous congressman Dennis Kucinich, whose co-sponsor list to impeach Cheney has grown to 14, no other candidate dares to take a stand. No other candidate deserves a single vote.

Whether to impeach Cheney is not even up to us. We have no choice. The U.S. Constitution is very explicit about this matter. In just 31 words, Article II, Section 4, tells us, "The President, Vice President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors."

I can cite 3,588 reasons to impeach this man who lied -- is still lying -- so relentlessly to rush this nation into genocidal war. Kucinich's Articles of Impeachment barely scratch the surface of Cheney's treason and crimes against the state, but are more than enough to not only impeach, but to indict and convict him. A more detailed account can be found here.

The U.S. Constitution is the greatest perception of Liberty ever conceived. It was hammered out by men determined to prevent imperial presidencies, shadow governments and seizures of power by any one branch. It was conceived precisely to thwart efforts to destroy the republic by those whose only allegiance is to power and money. We must rid ourselves of the traitors in our midst, starting with Dick Cheney, the one man responsible for the corruption threatening our downfall.

If we are to survive, we must strike the root.

All They Have Is Each Other...

2007-06-03T17:29:00.000-07:00

"The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."~~Dante

Okay. Let's talk about troops. Everybody's doing it. We're bombarded round-the-clock with "support the troops...fund the troops...bring the troops home...surge the troops...use the troops for Commander Guy photo opps..." Congress is embroiled in a ghoulish "troop" food fight that has gone on far too long. Democrats say Republicans demoralize and dishonor the troops by sending them into an unwinnable war built on lies. Republicans counter that, by suggesting the war is lost, Democrats demoralize and dishonor the troops by calling them "losers."

Losers? Oh, yes. Big time. The men and women who wear this nation's uniform are losers every day, in every way. They are not only demoralized and dishonored, but are dehumanized by a diabolical den of dimwits whose eyes never waver from the 2008 prize, and who view "troops" as a faceless mass of political capital to be spent toward winning that prize. Their deserter commander-in-chief and his chickenhawk minions are very careful to call military personnel "troops," lest they assume human form and enter the slumbering masses' consciousness -- a vacuous pit otherwise known as the "dead zone."

Killing the Troops

On Armed Forces Day, May 19, eight soldiers were blown to bits by roadside bombs in Iraq -- a total of 15 for the weekend, which brought the casualty toll since the March 2003 invasion to 3,419. As the troops lay dead and dying, body parts scattered amidst the explosive ruin in a foreign land, their president took to the airwaves to somberly discuss...how to make life easier for illegal immigrants here at home. Less than a week later, as Bush and the press were bobbing and weaving in the Rose Garden, the number of dead troops rose to 3,432, a day later to 3,444 and, finally, on May 26 -- two days before Memorial day -- to 3,455.

That's 36 American men and women, most under the age of 30, lost in one week. Lost forever. On Memorial Day, as Bush yet again disgraced the hallowed ground of Arlington National Cemetery with more babbling about how his will cannot be broken and the only way to honor the dead troops is to complete his "mish-shun," eight American troops were slain in a Baghdad roadside explosion, another in an explosion near Tahir, two perished in a helicopter crash, and five British troops were kidnapped. It's difficult to keep up, but the total now stands at 3,467. No, 3,471. No, 3,474. No, 3,480. No, 3,495.

God, I can't keep up with the numbers. It's impossible to do the math -- to stay abreast of the burgeoning number of precious human beings who were lied into a death trap and who return to orphans, widows, and parents physically maimed, psychologically deranged or as neatly folded US Flags. There is no evidence that Bush knows, or cares, that 633 soldiers and marines have been brutally wiped off the face of the earth since he was given the Iraq Study Group report, then strutted off like a college kid on Christmas break to "decide" whether to pull the troops out of the trap or to keep using them as bait. We knew, and Congress knew, what his decision would be -- and what it was -- more troops.

Betraying the Troops

The surge has been quietly ongoing since then, in spite of angry shouts from the American people -- shouts that fell on deaf ears not only in the Oval Office, but throughout the Congress. House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid caved to Bush's demands, while vowing to come back in September and "hold the president to account." Reid announced with bowed head, "We will never, ever, ever, ever give in to this president." Then he gave in.

Sad. There is no honor in a nation whose leaders are given the power to choose life or death for their fellow citizens held captive in an illegal, treasonous, bloody occupation -- and choose death. What do you do after betraying those who elected you -- trusted you -- to stem the needless flow of American blood? Do you dash off to Greenland to check on the climate, or do you stand in the well of the Senate, eyes downcast, with your tail between your legs?

It doesn't matter. They knew what they were doing -- extending tours of duty from 12 months to 15 months, sending other troops back for second and third tours -- weary, wounded and disheartened. They had the purse strings, the Constitutional power, and the mandate of the American people to bring Bush's madness to a screeching halt -- to save the lives of those citizens he daily condemns to death.

They chose, instead, to back down. They chose to allow Bush -- as Texas commentator Jim Hightower said -- to stick the troops in another country's vicious civil war. "They're under attack from every direction by every faction, every hour of every day," Hightower wrote, "hit by car bombs, roadside bombs, chlorine bombs, IEDs, suicide bombs, rocket fire, mortar rounds, snipers, and assassins. There is no safety in Iraq."

The legislators who voted to fund Bush's folly until September were casting votes of betrayal. Nothing will change in September. A second surge, sans the initial fanfare, is underway that could double the number of troops in Iraq by December, bringing the total to more than 200,000. We can disregard December if we are to believe CNN Pentagon correspondent Jamie McIntyre, who reported on Memorial Day that "no major troop reductions are planned until at least January 2009."

We can also disregard January 2009. Accordng to Gen. Peter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, there is no plan to even plan withdrawal of troops. "We do have ongoing replacements of forces, and we do change the size of the force over time so that that system is available to either plus-up or draw down," Pace told the Senate in early May, "but we have published no orders saying come up with a complete plan for total drawdown." However, Pace did say they planned to maintain a series of military installations for a long period of time -- maybe a few decades...

You'd think as a minimum, the top military brass and the troops' commander-in-chief would know at any given moment exactly how many lives were lost in their war. However, the only thing Bush knows is that he "grieves 'n mourns" for the heroes who "give their lives" for his mission. Numbers aren't important. What's important to Bush is that he "pre-shates" their sacrifice. And Pace, who monitors the number of gays wearing the hetro-military uniform, commented last week that we lost "nearly 3,000 Americans on 9-11," and then warned we are "getting close" to losing that many troops in Iraq.

Actually, Pete, we are losing three or more American men and women every single day. It's six months -- 180 days -- 540 dead troops until December. It's 18 months -- 545 days --1,635 dead troops until January 2009. How many days -- how many dead troops -- are there in a "few decades"? You do the math.

Supporting the Troops

George Bush and the corporate war profiteers have blanketed the landscape of the entire country with yellow ribbon. "Support the Troops" is non-sequitural double think -- a psyops tool cleverly used by both Republicans and Democrats to desensitize and control the slobbering masses. It means you are anti-American if you scream in pain each time a soldier or marine is killed -- innocent Iraqis are massacred. It means shut the hell up and support whatever deranged blather comes out of Bush's mouth, even if we must sacrifice our sons and daughters on his killing fields.

So many of them died in vain.

In Feb. 2005, the Marines sent a "priority 1 urgent" request for more than 1,000 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles. In spite of the MRAP's proven ability to withstand blasts from IEDs and to save lives, it was 21 months (Nov. 2006) before this urgent plea was acted upon. After a few MRAPs trickled into the area and their life-saving value was recognized, both the Army and Marines requested as many as 18,000 to replace the totally inadequate humvees. Although Defense Secretary Robert Gates "talked the talk" that the MRAP is the Pentagon's "highest priority" new gear buy, until the Pentagon "walks the walk," Americans will continue to be slaughtered by the ever-present IEDs.

Supporting the troops is ensuring they have sufficient equipment and materiel in order to survive, and providing the proper care for the wounded and maimed when they return. This type of support is not a high priority with the Bush administration. In addition to forcing soldiers to dig through scrap piles for metal to reinforce vehicles, injured troops are billed for damaged or lost body armor, charged for food while in the hospital and routinely have their pension benefits cut. Because of Bush's brand of support, troops are faced not only with having to deal with the traumatic reality of their injuries, but most of them face financial ruin as well.

Bush has relentlessly fought supporting the troops from the outset. He not only opposes, but "strongly opposes" any pay raise for his troops. He threatened to veto the 2008 defense authorization bill if it included a paltry 3.5-percent raise for the military, a $40 monthly increase for widows and survivors, or any attempt to curb prices for prescription drugs the troops are forced to buy under TRICARE. Current pay and benefits are "sufficient," he said, echoing the refrain of Barbara Bush, his mother, as she looked out over the Katrina refugees penned up in the Houston Astrodome -- "...so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this -- this (she chuckled slightly) is working very well for them."

And, on Mar. 18, 2003, the day before Bush's bloody invasion of Iraq, the former first lady appeared on ABC's "Good Morning America" to shrug aside the death sentences he was imposing upon an entire generation of Americans. “Why should we hear about body bags and deaths? Oh, I mean, it’s not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?”

Bush is truly his mother's son -- shallow, unfeeling, incapable of compassion. In a recent meeting with five families of slain soldiers, one mother, Elaine Johnson, asked him why we were in Iraq. Bush could not answer that, nor could he explain what we were fighting for. But he did toss each of them a presidential coin and quipped, "Don’t go sell it on eBay.”

To Bush, body bags and deaths are simply an inconvenience and, with the help of the corporate media, he is very adept at hiding them from prying eyes. Bush is on a righteous mission -- he is the President, the Decider, the Commander-in-chief and God has chosen him to lead this country to its destiny.

And the troops? They have learned when it comes to support, all they have is each other. All they have is each other.

Wouldn't It Be Funny, If...

2007-05-16T12:46:00.000-07:00

NAH...even they wouldn't let Rummy continue to run things from the shadows -- the dark side, if you will...

Just because the Rumster still has an office in the Pentagon...Just because they can't find Rummy's "resignation letter"...Just because Rumbo and Cheney are locked at the hip and are this nation's most infamous tag-team...Just because one day after Stinky W. announced HE was The Decider, Rummy was doing a heckuva job and wasn't going anywhere, Rummy was gone...Just because Cheney never uttered one word of objection but brought in Iran-Contra bullet-dodger Robert Gates to put a fresh mask on the face of the Pentagon -- there's no reason to believe Rummy is still in charge.

No reason at all. Pay no attention to the "shadow government" created under the auspices of the Pentagon -- Black Ops, covert operations, Total Info Awareness (TIA, which, when ordered to cease and desist, Rummy shrugged, said, "Okay, you can have the name. I'll give you the corpse, but I'm going to keep the program...") Disregard the $2 trillion (yes, "Trillion") Rummy said with a shrug was "lost," but is used to fund/arm the 140, 000-plus corporate mercenaries stirring up chaos in Iraq.

Pay no attention to me. I'm a certified conspiracy theorist. You can go back to sleep, or you can pull back the mask. If you do; if you peer into the shadows, you will see Cheney still driving this killing machine -- and Rummy still riding shotgun.

Then, like me -- you'll never sleep again.

When We Forget to Remember...

2007-05-07T20:04:00.000-07:00

The gutters are clogged with the dead
The ones who couldn't join in
The others refusing to sing
The ones who are losing their voice
The ones who've forgotten the tune.
Excerpt "God Bless America," Harold Pinter, January 2003

Preceeding generations had every reason to believe those following them would step into the breach and continue the vigil over this nation's Constitutional freedoms and, if necessary, fight to preserve them. They believed, like George Washington warned -- "Government is a "force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master. Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action." And they remembered, from generation to generation. Unfortunately, those following our generation will have no such luxury.

We blew it.

We forgot to remember when history goes around, it inevitably comes back around. We forgot to remember that the U.S. Constitution is the beating heart of the United States and, from its inception, was designed to protect the freedoms and liberties of "we the people."

However, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia maintains that the Constitution is a "dead" document, and says he "cringes" when it is referred to as "living." Vice President Dick Cheney, the duck-hunting buddy Scalia unconstitutionally installed in the White House in the 2000 election coup must agree, since he refuses to abide by even one of its strictures.

Nobody is more adept at forgetting to remember than Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, or “Fredo,” as Bush calls him. Remember Fredo -- Michael Corleone's dumb-as-dirt, totally controlled brother in the “Godfather” series? The nickname is a perfect fit for Gonzales, who cannot recall what he had for breakfast this morning. The one thing he knows for certain -- the Constitution is "an outdated document" -- quaint and old-fashioned, but of no use in Fredo's world of abuse and torture and trickle-down fascism.

And President George Bush, who flies into a rage when he feels his will -- his God-given right to rule -- is being tested, holds this living document of American liberty in utmost contempt. In Dec. 2005, when Bush was determined to renew and expand the destructive USA Patriot Act, an aide reminded him that invasion into citizens' private lives underminded the Constitution. Bush immediately exploded -- "Stop throwing the Constitution in my face," he screamed, "It's just a goddamned piece of paper."

Right then. At that moment, Bush should have been removed from office. Can anyone make the case that Bush deserved to remain at the helm of this nation for even 10 seconds after spewing such treasonous hate and filth? Lest we forget, not once, but twice, Bush stood before the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, his hand on the Bible, and parroted, "I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Lest we forget, that 35-word oath is required of all elected presidents,and can be found in Article II, Section I, Clause 8 of the U.S. Constitution.

The Constitution is so vital for keeping this republic on track that those who work for the government -- all three branches -- to include the vice president, each member of both houses of Congress, unelected Supreme Court justices, and military personnel must take similar oaths. Supporting the Constitution -- defending it against all enemies, both foreign and domestic -- is literally their job description. All else is political folly.

Surely Americans must know that a crisis without precedent is underway in this country. The first target in the Straussian neocon's war of terror was the Constitution and, by extension, the American people. We are hurtling headlong into tyranny and, as Harold Pinter so aptly put it -- those whom we elected to protect both us and the Constitution have either lost their voices or seem to have forgotten the tune.

It's all politics all the time. Those on the right champion the suppression of free speech and assembly. Those on the left are equally to blame; complicit in their silence, although they know Bush's war is but another "option on the table" to keep the populace cowering in irrational fear for political gain. Neither side seems willing to admit there's a big difference, both legal and ethical, between asking citizens to die for their country -- and demanding they "kill" for their country...

Bush's "reign" since 9-11 has been one bad-tempered tantrum after another. Bush has executed the office of the president every single day over the past six years, just as he promised -- faithfully, relentlessly. As we stare dazedly over the blood-sodden landscapes of two continents, we remember -- too late -- the only thing Bush ever did in his entire life with any enthusiasm was "execute."

It's time for Americans to actually read the "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA Patriot Act) Act of 2001 (preceeding generations recognize this as the "Enabling Act"), and the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which completes the loop of oppression, revokes the right to habeas corpus not only for detainees, but for anyone Bush or Fredo labels an “enemy combatant,” including legal US citizens. This destructive act places the "Commander Guy" at the helm of the executive panthean where he is bound only by his imagination when it comes to detaining, torturing and murdering other human beings.

Continued compliance with such venal madness is no longer an option on the people's table. Elected officials must do more than jerk the Constitution out of their pockets and wave it in the faces of their opponents as they rip off some really neat sound bytes and posture for the media. Perhaps if they actually read the Constitution, they would discover what they forgot to remember -- they have no choice but to impeach the entire cabal for their absolute despotism, illegal actions, lies, and filthy war crimes.

It's in their job description.

And then we should revive the Declaration of Independence so we can get on with restoring this once great republic to its former grandeur -- an ethical and political entity that derives its powers from the consent of the governed.

WHY...

2007-04-26T08:56:00.000-07:00

They will steal our elections...
They will steal our children's future...
They will steal our jobs, our health, our sanity...
They will ultimately destroy us.

Watch it here and die laughing.

CNN -- The Most Twisted Name in News

2007-04-18T09:14:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the complete nervous breakdown of the US media, it's been a long, hard six years for those of us who believe that journalism exists for one reason only -- to hold those in power to account, and to speak truth to that power.

Today, Paul Wolfowitz is embroiled in a really slimy, immoral sex scandal at the World Bank ... Rove/Bush/Cheney "ordered" the RNC not to release to the House Judiciary Committee any emails related to their involvement in the attorney firings that have not been cleared by the White House ... little Alberto Gonzales has painted himself into a corner and "can't recall" how he got there ... and the White House has admitted our flag-wavin', foot-stompin' commander-in-chief was "unaware of defense plans to immediately extend Army combat tours when he criticized Democrats’ budget plans as potentially forcing troops to spend more time in Iraq."

But, perhaps the most explosive news not covered this week is the announcement of Ohio Democratic Rep Dennis Kucinich that he would file articles of impeachment against Dick Cheney. Here is a copy of his letter to members of Congress that was leaked to the Washington Post's "Slueth," Mary Ann Akers...

April 17, 2007

Dear Colleague:

This week I intend to
introduce Articles of Impeachment with respect to the conduct of Vice President
Cheney. Please have your staff contact my office . . . if you would like to
receive a confidential copy of the document prior to its introduction in the
House.

Sincerely,
/s/
Dennis J.
Kucinich
Member of Congress

However, Kucinich's action appears to have been quickly shot down, as Akers reported that, "Sources tell the Sleuth that in light of the mass killings at Virginia Tech Monday, Kucinich's impeachment plans have been put on hold. There will be no action this week, they say."

Akers writes that Kucinich shouldn't hold his breath on getting anywhere with his impeachment plan because a Democratic aide quipped, "We'll see a Kucinich Administration before we'll see a Cheney impeachment."

Looks like Cheney has low friends in high places, doesn't it? Kucinich's office had no comment...

ALL media, print and electronic, are obscenely obsessed with the shooting at Virginia Tech -- none more so than CNN, the most "twisted" name in news. CNN anchors are on the scene in full investigation mode, mercilessly interrogating university officials, police officials and friends of those murdered -- "how did it feel?...how will this affect your life?...should someone have seen Cho Seung-Hui's "break" coming?...Who's responsible?...tell us -- tell us how you feel...What is it like -- to see your friends in the hospital?...What are you going to do next? How are you going to move on?

CNN then went on to go down a list of victims, giving their names and airing interviews with family members who were asked how it felt to lose their children...

Meanwhile, the 40 faceless, nameless, family-less American soldiers and marines killed last week -- the 10 killed on Monday of this week -- were not important enough to get CNN's attention. The 157 (reported briefly by the NYT -- or 127 reported just as briefly by the WaPo) human beings killed in Bathdad today as a result of four car bombings weren't even a blip on CNN's TV screen. There were also at least 150 injured in those blasts.

Maybe CNN should ask them how they "feel..."

DARE TO LOOK BACK

2007-04-16T10:01:00.000-07:00

"...the high office of the President has been used to forment a plot to destroy the American's freedom, and before I leave office, I must inform the citizens of this plight." John F. Kennedy (November 12, 1963, Columbia U, 10 days before his assassination)

I cannot recall a single day since Vulcans' Godfather James Baker sent his thuggish henchman John Bolton to Florida's Palm Beach County to screw up the vote count that has not been filled with horror, anger, shame -- despair. On Dec. 9, 2000 -- three days before the Florida deadline -- the US Republic shuddered on its axis when Bolton crashed through the doors of a Tallahassee library where Miami-Dade ballots were being recounted and shouted triumphantly -- "I'm with the Bush-Cheney team, and I'm here to stop the count!"

In that instant we lost most of what had taken more than two centuries to build. In one fell swoop, Americans were thrust into the mire of an Orwellian World spinning out of control on the other side of the Looking Glass. What a tragedy -- not that so many failed to realize their government had just been seized in a coup de'etat -- but that the few who did refused to acknowledge it.

The sudden unconstitutional decision by five unelected right-wing activist Supreme Court justices to blatantly steal an election for one of their own -- to stop the vote count so Bush would not be "embarassed" by losing -- was a frightening assault upon the separation of powers, the American people, and upon democracy itself.

Having upset the national equilibrium, George Bush and Dick Cheney hit the deck at a dead run, trashing everything in their path. Like a couple of deranged Benny Hills with "Yakety Sax" blaring in the background, they trashed treaties, insulted other world leaders, and undermined Constitutional restraints on everything that stood between them and their goal of worldwide corporate pillage and total executive power.

Those who dare to look back will be struck by the speed at which they resurrected the zombies of the Iran-Contra era, the tyrannical neo-Straussians, and the godless right-wing evangelical warmongers, Talk about an Axis! The stage was set for their long-planned crusade to gain control of not only the world and its resources but of space and cyberspace as well. The only thing lacking was an incident to catapault them into the war for which they lusted -- an incident of such magnitude that cries of dissent would be lost in the roar for war.

Their vision of global dominance supplied them with moral justification for the filthy lies that took us into two wars and is threatening a third. "It is ironic," writes Canadian author and professor Shadia Drury, "that American neoconservatives have decided to conquer the world in the name of liberty and democracy, when they have so little regard for either." Drury has written two books on the philosophy of Leo Strauss, and she writes that Strauss believed "religion and war -- perpetual war -- would lift the masses from the animality of bourgeois consumption and the pre-occupation with 'creature comforts'. Instead of personal happiness, they would live their lives in perpetual sacrifice to God and the nation."

Neoconservatives such as Paul Wolfowitz, Irving and Bill Kristol, Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, David Wurmser, John Negroponte, and many others, took from Strauss a doctrine of "all politics all the time" -- nasty, deceptive and repressive -- whatever it takes for the elite to exercise control over the vulgar unwashed. That would be you and me, fellow Americans, and Strauss said we could be inspired to rise above our "brutish existence only by fear of impending death or catastrophe." The lies they told, and continue to tell, according to Drury, are "noble lies for the consumption of the masses."

We are in the clutches of an evil, evil group of psychopaths -- warmongering moral cowards whose faux leader, George W. Bush, is a shallow, self-destructive little bully who deserted his military post during a time of war. Perhaps the most frightening of all is Michael Ledeen. Looking back, some might remember that Ledeen was Secretary of State Alexander Haig's advisor, a member of the National Security Council and a consultant for Ronald Reagan's Department of Defense. He played a central role in the Iran-Contra scandal. It was Ledeen who made the initial contact with Iranian arms dealers, which launched the arms-for-hostages affair and could have -- should have -- brought down the Reagan presidency.

Anyone reading Ledeen's book, Machiavelli on Modern Leadership, will recognize the Bush doctrine and know that the horror of 9-11 was a foregone conclusion -- a "done deal" -- the minute they seized the 2000 election. Ledeen wrote, "To be an effective leader, the most prudent method is to ensure that your people are afraid of you. To instill that fear, you must demonstrate that those who attack you will not survive."

On the evening of 9-11, Bush went before a paralyzed nation and, after a brief comment about praying, grieving and mourning for the 3,000 victims of that terrible day, he announced, "Thousands of lives were suddenly ended by evil." Then, warming to his subject, Bush rammed home what would become his mantra for the next six years -- "These acts shattered steel, but they cannot dent the steel of American resolve." He then assured the masses that he would make no distinction between the "terrorists" and the regimes that harbored them. Bush's vision for revenge was to chase them all over the world and kill them all...

But a vision is not a plan. Looking back, it appears that Bush's plan for perpetual war is sending Americans to their deaths, unequipped and untrained, while bellowing, "Support the Troops!" Bush's plan is destroying an entire nation, its culture, its infrastructure -- raping, torturing and slaughtering its people for no reason other than he can. It is creating a humanitarian crisis of mind-boggling proportions -- more than 3.9 million Iraqis have fled their homes to safer areas in Iraq and in neighboring countries.

For Americans, it is more than a momentary inconvenience that 3,302 of their sons and daughters have needlessly been killed, 40 just last week, and that more than 26,000 have been wounded, broken, maimed -- their lives and those of their loved ones utterly destroyed. Stretching our military with its proud and honorable tradition of protecting this country until it breaks and then outsourcing legions of mercenaries to do our dirty work of preemptive attacks and occupation of other countries is not a plan that Americans will support.

Bush reminds us on a daily basis that our world changed on "September the 11th." That is true. But we must dare to look back even further to that dark December day when five Supreme Court judges made the ghastly decision that spawned the horrors of not only 9-11, but of the carnage in which we are embroiled today.

Before that bleak day, I had never used the f-word nor uttered the Lord's name in vain. However, as this nation teeters on the cusp of spiritual, physical and political death, I can only pray that God will damn them. Every last fucking one of them. Please God. Damn them all.

SURVIVING AT THE PLEASURE OF THE PRESIDENT

2007-03-25T22:18:00.000-07:00

"You is feeling like you was lost in the bush, boy? You says: It is a puling sample jungle of woods. You most shouts out: Bethicket me for a stump of beech if I have the poultriest notions what the farest he all means."~~James Joyce, Finnegans Wake (1939)

My friend Bernie says ever since the Bush gang stormed the White House in 2000, then stormed the World Trade Center in 2001, we've done nothing but run in circles like a bunch of terrified chickens with our heads chopped off. "We have no sense of direction," Bernie said, "we're staggering around in a jungle of lies, deceit, and scandal with no way out -- and that's the way they planned it."

"You're kidding!" I exclaimed, astonished. "You mean they planned this mess? It's nothing but bloody chaos out there --"

Bernie nodded. "You got that right. Bloody chaos is the best -- the only -- way to get what they're after. Don't be fooled by those little American flags stuck in the lapels of this bunch," Bernie continued. "The people in this nation, the hungry and homeless, the ill, the elderly, displaced Katrina victims, and especially those returning from war's inferno either in body bags or maimed physically, psychologically, and spiritually aren't even blips on their New World Order radar screen. They suffer at the pleasure of the president."

Bernie reminded me that shortly before the 2000 presidential campaign, when Dick Cheney was CEO of Halliburton, he made a speech to the Institute of Petroleum in London where he complained that oil producers "had to deal with the pesky problem that once you find oil and pump it out of the ground you've got to turn around and find more or go out of business."

Cheney went on to say, "That means by 2010 we will need on the order of an additional fifty million barrels a day. So where is the oil going to come from? Governments and the national oil companies are obviously in control of about ninety per cent of the assets. Oil remains fundamentally a government business...the Middle East with two thirds of the world's oil and the lowest cost, is still where the prize ultimately lies..."

Bernie grinned. "If that didn't set off alarms, especially in Iraq, you gotta know they started going off when, a year later, with his eyes on the prize, Cheney appointed himself vice president, put himself in charge of the nation's energy policy, based that policy on the location of oil fields -- not only in Iraq and Iran but throughout the Persian Gulf -- then mounted up and headed out to solve big oil's 'pesky' problem."

I have to agree with Bernie. Cheney and his bumbling bunch of neo-conservative henchmen are obsessed with this really crazy "vision" that they can control the world. Flip through their chilling masterpiece and you'll see that they believe the world is theirs -- everything, including space and cyberspace -- all theirs. And, it'll hit you right between the eyes that every one of these suckers is a flaming psycho. If it takes lies, they'll lie. If it takes imprisonment, torture, mass murder, either at home or abroad -- they'll do that too.

Bernie says folks in this country have no idea what they're up against. In spite of the draconian USA Patriot Act, they still hang onto the illusion that their freedoms are protected by the US Constitution; yet they emerge from each succeeding crisis with fewer and fewer freedoms. "If Americans were willing -- or capable -- of reading and thinking," Bernie said, "they'd know that the war being waged throughout the world began here at home, and the US Constitution and Bill of Rights were its first victims."

Can't argue with that. The truth's been out there for years. In December 2002, before the Washington Post drank the Stepford Kool-Aid, it published a riveting piece, "In Terror War, 2nd Track for Suspects," in which writer Charles Lane exposed Bush's executive power grab to strip courts of all oversight or authority. Lane sounded the alarm on the "parallel legal system in which terrorism suspects -- U.S. citizens and noncitizens alike -- may be investigated, jailed, interrogated, tried and punished without legal protections guaranteed by the ordinary system."

Lane went on to say the administration, with approval of the "special" Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, could "order a clandestine search of a U.S. citizen's home and, based on the information gathered, secretly declare the citizen an enemy combatant, to be held indefinitely at a U.S. military base." If the courts were aware of this activity at all, they would have "very limited authority to second-guess the detention." .

Lane's article is no longer available on the WaPo site (surprise!), but can be found on Common Dreams.org, as can Jonathan Turley's August 2002 article,"Camps for Citizens: Ashcroft's Hellish Vision," originally published in the LA Times, but alas, is also no longer there.

Turley, a straight-talking professor of constitutional law at George Washington University, exposed then Attorney General John Ashcroft's "hellish vision" to incarcerate citizens he decided were "enemy combatants," i.e., all who were disloyal to Bush or dared to resist his "smoke-em-out" war on terror. According to Turley, in Ashcroft's America, "security precedes liberty." Liberty is nothing more than a "rhetorical justification for increased security," and citizens have a choice -- accept autocratic rule and surrender their rights peacefully, or be labeled enemy combatants and be held indefinitely by the government, without charges, a hearing, or access to a lawyer.

The camps are there, fully staffed and ready. In the absence of the US Constitution, Bush's Executive Orders are in place. Everything needed to keep this country running has been contracted out. Halliburton has left the building. Those in our society still having bragging rights to civil liberties are illegal aliens, whose growing numbers give new meaning to the word, "surge." One swipe of Bush's pen will inflict martial law and we will discover, too late, that we live in a police state patrolled by jackbooted Blackwater USA mercenaries who will, indeed, serve at the pleasure of the president..

Blackwater is in place to become this nation's shadow police force and is its current shadow army. Go back to the "dry run" of Katrina and take a look at the heavily armed force that laid seige to New Orleans, that sped through the streets rounding up hurricane victims, packing them into a "detention" arena where they were forced to stay for days without food or water or assistance. Go back even further -- the bodies hanging from the bridge in Fallujah were not US soldiers, but Blackwater mercenaries -- death squad troops 100,000 strong who roam the Iraqi streets at will and stir up violence and hatred against the uniformed US military.

We are awakening to find ourselves in a dark evil tangle, a "puling sample jungle of woods." Reminds me of the helplessness I felt on that bright, sunshiny day when I pulled over at a roadside park near Atlanta to take a short nap. When I awoke two hours later, it was pitch dark -- and it was only noon! Then, I realized with horror that I was covered with Kudzu -- I could hear it relentlessly growing, munching, crunching around me!

I was faced with a choice. I could hunker down in fear and hope someone else would save me, or I could at least make the effort to get out of the mess I had gotten myself into. Armed with only a dull pocket knife, I managed to slice my way out of the jungle by cutting frantically for a few minutes and then "inching" the car forward. Finally, after a three-hour battle with the stuff, I was free! I sped toward the state line with the carniverous vines hot on my tail. I have never been back to Georgia. Only the Devil goes down there...

It doesn't matter if that actually happened. The important thing is that we are now faced with a choice. We can hunker down and hope for the best, or we can rise up and take our country back. Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul says we must act before it is too late and we find ourselves being herded into camps. Paul says we must contact every single member of congress and demand "a repeal of freedom-crushing legislation such as the Patriot act and the Military Commissions Act and the Defense Authorization Act which essentially wipes out Habeas Corpus."

They must be forcibly stopped. We must impeach this unholy gang of war criminals because they have no intention of leaving office in 2008, or ever, if they are left unchecked. We must not allow ourselves and our children to be forced to live in a Kudzu World -- to survive only at the pleasure of the president.

PROUD TO BE FROM MISSOURI

2007-03-10T08:06:00.000-08:00

In the following March 7 editorial entitled, "Spartacus B. Cheney," the St. Louis Post Dispatch separates the wheat from the chaff in the Scooter Libby fiasco. Tells it like it is. Exposes the pundits on Fox and CNN for what they really are -- Bush's bitches. I may live in the vast wasteland of Little Jimmy Inhofe Country, but I was born in Missouri. Today -- I'm damned proud of it.

Spartacus B. Cheney

If Dick Cheney had a shred of honor, he'd resign the vice presidency and offer to take the rap for his former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who's looking at 18 months to three years in a federal prison after being convicted Tuesday for lying about his part in a scheme that his old boss clearly engineered.

What an opportunity for Mr. Cheney. With one grand, magnanimous gesture, he could erase his image as Washington's Darth Vader, the Dark Lord of Halliburton, the scheming Rasputin to George W. Bush's Czar Nicholas II. History might even record Mr. Cheney as a principled man of honor, who, when his men were threatened with annihilation, stood tall and proclaimed, "I am Spartacus!"

We shall not hold our breaths. If the long and tortuous four-year saga over how 16 false and misleading words came to be in Mr. Bush's 2003 State of the Union speech proves anything, it's that the concept of personal sacrifice is foreign to this White House. Sacrifice is for other people — for the soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines sent to war on false premises; for reporters willing to go to jail to protect sources who didn't want protecting; for underlings sent out, either knowingly (like Mr. Libby) or unknowingly (like former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan), to tell lies.

It was a four-year journey from yellow cake to yellow streak. It seems long ago, but the original idea was to see if laws were broken by the cad or cads who leaked the information that Valerie Plame, the wife of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, was a CIA operative.

It was in the fall of 2003, some six months after the U.S. invaded Iraq looking for weapons of mass destruction, including some that might have been produced with uranium yellowcake purchased in Africa, as suggested by Mr. Bush in those famous 16 words in Jan. 28 of that year.

This wasn't true, of course, and Mr. Wilson's trip to Niger on behalf of the CIA had indicated as much. But the truth was inconvenient to the effort to gin up a war on Iraq. Instead, as testimony in the trial revealed, Mr. Cheney led a full-bore assault on Mr. Wilson's credibility, including the disclosure of Ms. Plame's identity to selected reporters. Mr. Libby was part of the effort, as was Karl Rove, the president's political guru. As to the president's involvement, the kindest interpretation is that he was clueless. Mr. Cheney let him go before the press and promise to fire anyone on his staff who was involved.

The nation owes a debt of thanks to Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for Northern Illinois, whose relentless pursuit of the truth in this case was less about what Mr. Libby said or didn't say, but about lifting the curtain of self-righteousness from the White House. What was revealed was not the great and powerful Oz, but a craven band of bunco artists.

As a prosecutor, both in the Plame affair and in his ongoing investigation of Democratic and Republican political scandals in Illinois, Mr. Fitzgerald has proved to be patient, careful, leak-proof and nonpartisan. He found insufficient evidence to seek indictments under the difficult terms of the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act, but plenty of evidence for what he believed he could prove: five counts of perjury and obstruction of justice against one defendant. The jury returned convictions on four of the five.

Alas, Mr. Fitzgerald also drove hobnailed boots into the First Amendment, jailing one reporter for 85 days and threatening to jail others unless they outed sources. This overzealous behavior by the prosecutor was mitigated by two facts: One, the sources, including Mr. Libby, released the reporters from their pledges of confidentiality; and two, some of the biggest names in Washington journalism allowed themselves to be spun like rotisserie chickens.

L'affaire Plame was not a proud moment for either American government or American journalism — or, for that matter, for American justice. If there were real justice, Scooter Libby wouldn't be the only guy headed for prison.

Lost in the Lust of Werewolves

2007-03-06T10:58:00.000-08:00

By Sheila Samples

"A lost infant in the ashes, lost faces in the dust, a lost finger in the garbage dumps, a lost mother in the debris, a nation lost in the fire, a country lost in the greed...and eyes lost in that endless tunnel of helplessness, anguish and despair...lost in the total emptiness, in the void of the living dead."~~Layla Anwar, "Ashes & Dust"

Sometimes I wonder if Americans are unaware of the malicious devastation the Bush administrtion is wreaking upon this good earth and its inhabitants, or if they just don't give a damn. I wonder if they ever put a "face" on even one of the hundreds of thousands of innocent men, women and children who are lost forever -- victims of arrogance, lust for power, insatiable greed. And lies .. all lost because of evil, deliberate lies.

I wonder why so many denizens of this Christian nation seem unable or unwilling to wrap their minds around the reality that Iraqi people are human beings just as they, themselves, are -- not rabid dogs to be hunted down and slaughtered. Perhaps it's because, in order to remain sane or to avoid being targeted by the Bush administration, they traded their Christianity for Religion, their Love for Hate -- their Life for Death. For protection from the Butcher of Baghdad, far too many Americans far too easily traded their souls to the Werewolf of Washington.

They don't want to know what it's like for families to cower in terror as their doors are kicked in, mothers and daughters raped, fathers and sons dragged off, never to be seen again. They don't want to know about prisoners being humiliated and tortured, secretly "rendered" to countries for more torture, held captive for endless years without charges, without hope, without life. They don't want to know about Iraq's rich culture, its secular society, its formidable institutiions of learning. According to the late Columbia University professor Edward Said, all of this, along with Iraq's "long-suffering people were made invisible, the better to smash the country as if it were only a den of thieves and murderers." (Al-Ahram Weekly, 24 - 30 April 2003)

Even if it were possible to know how many innocent civilians have been needlessly murdered, it wouldn't matter. Because America's leaders don't know and they don't care. As General Colin Powell, then Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, retorted to an April 1991 question about Iraqi casualties -- "That's not really a number I'm terribly interested in." And, following the assault on Afghanistan, General Tommy Franks, CENTCOM commander and architect of both the Afghanistan and Iraqi killing sprees, quipped at a March 2002 news conference at Bagram Air Base -- "We don't do body counts."

Even President George Bush, the commander-in-chief -- the Energizer Bunny Decider -- pleaded ignorance and apathy when asked on Dec. 12, 2005 about the number of iraqi civilians slain since the March 2003 invasion. "How many Iraqi civilians have died...in this war?" he asked. "Um...I would say about 30,000 -- more or less..."

Reporters in the room knew that more than a year before, the British medical journal, The Lancet, had reported for the period March 2003 - Sept. 2004, an excess mortality of nearly 100,000 civilian deaths. Yet none dared challenge Bush then nor in October 2006 when the journal released an indepth study that an estimated 655,000 Iraqis had died since the invasion, with more than 600,000 due to violence.

Is Politics really more important than life? Of course, when you consider the gandy-dancing, moon-walking and flip-flopping that's gone on within the political axis -- the administration, the Congress and the media -- since the November elections. If there were doubts that this axis considers the nation's military anything more than "dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns for foreign policy," the spectacle that has unfolded since Bush was backed into a corner with the release of the James Baker/Les Hamilton Iraq Study Group (ISG) report put them to rest. Its 84 pages boiled down to one sentence in the Executive Summary - "The United States has long-term relationships and interests at stake in the Middle East, and needs to stay engaged," which was another way of telling Bush not to cut and run until the oil law was passed which will legalize US corporate plunder of Iraq's oil fields via 35-year contracts.

The ISG was nine months in the making, March through October 2006, during which time 556 coalition "troops" were killed -- 515 of them American. For political reasons, Baker and Hamilton waited until after the election to release it, hardly noticing that 77 servicemen and women were killed in November. On Dec. 13, when Bush tossed the report on the table with the rest of the options and announced he'd make his decision after Christmas, US casualties stood at 2,937. On Christmas Day, when he bowed his head to thank God for making him The Decider, 2,975 Americans would never open another present.

The overwhelming vote in November 2006 was a national demand to stop the war. Bush responded in January 2007 by announcing not only that he was staying the course, but that he was "surging" an additional 21,500 military in a "New Way Forward" plan. Since that time, with the surge underway, Democrats and Republicans have sparred in a shameful display of shadow-boxing oratory and endless debates on debates, resulting in a single limp, non-binding resolution designed to do little more than give political cover to those voting for it. With the surge nearly complete, House Democrats now say they're working on a plan to restrict Bush's ability to wage war, with the stipulation, of course, that he can continue to kill if he "publicly justifies" his position.

With cruel indifference this pack of werewolves, led by a creature who deserted his post in a time of war, continue to fund a surge they claim they are against while shouting, "Support the troops!" They neither know nor care that, above all things, support means full force protection -- sufficient training, proper equipment -- and medical care for those who return broken in body, mind and spirit.

Like their more than 650,000 Iraqi counterparts, the 3,185 US victims of the Iraqi inferno have no individual form or substance in the minds of the general public -- certainly not in those of the media or the Congress. One is merely "collateral damage," the other a heap of body bags labeled "troops." Senators John McCain and Barack Obama were exactly right when they said that so many lives in this illegal war have been "wasted," rather than sacrificed. Victims of this war -- Iraqi and American -- are little more than debris scattered in the wake of the werewolves' lust to dominate the world and control its resources.

They are, as described so eloquently by Iraq's Layla Anwar -- "lost faces in the dust."

CHIMPS IN A ZOO CAGE

2007-02-12T09:29:00.000-08:00

Journalism is not a profession or a trade. It is a cheap catch-all for fuckoffs and misfits - a false doorway to the backside of life, a filthy piss-ridden little hole nailed off by the building inspector, but just deep enough for a wino to curl up from the sidewalk and masturbate like a chimp in a zoo-cage."~~Hunter Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

If the Bush administration and the US mainstream media are united on any one issue, it's an absolute refusal to rock the political boat as they sail mercilessly through the seas of corporate profit on the good ship Terrorbush. For the most part, each group is an incurious lot -- undead creatures who neither care, nor dare, to glance over the side of the ship at the bloated, swirling bodies in the blood-red water below. From the beginning, their mission has been to perform so fantastically against a backdrop of such violent, explosive madness on so many fronts that we watch hypnotically but do not see -- listen intently but do not hear.

They are very good at what they do.

In the last 10 days, as 36 Americans were killed in Iraq, we were inundated with a variety of devastating news -- all of which literally beg for broad, investigative reporting from those whom the late, great Molly Ivins laughingly referred to as "alert guardian watchdogs of democracy." For example...

~~A bleak National Intelligence Estimate was released, which stated flatly that what is going on in Iraq is much worse than a civil war and there is little chance that Bush's escalation of 20,000-50,000 troops will do anything but fuel the fire. The media's initial interest quickly faded when Vice President Dick Cheney called the report "hogwash," and announced that he and Bush had the power to do whatever they wanted, and neither the Congress nor the people could stop them.

~~Bush appointed Adm. William Fallon to head Central Command (CENTCOM) -- a Navy man to run the ground wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Formerly with NATO as Assistant Chief of Staff, Plans and Policy for Supreme Allied Commander, Atlantic, Fallon has a history of high-tech war game tomfoolery that provokes the enemy to attack. With US carrier attack groups bumping into each other in the Persian Gulf off the coast of Iran, who you gonna call?

~~Nat Hentoff writes in the Village Voice that the giant aerospace Boeing is "supplying the CIA with the planes to transport the shackled, blindfolded, drugged passengers for interrogation in foreign torture chambers." Hentoff credits The New Yorker's Jane Meyer with breaking the Boeing story in October, wherein she quoted a former Jeppesen (Boeing subsidary) employee who was told by a top official, "We do all of the extraordinary rendition flights --you know, the torture flights...It certainly pays well. They” -- the C.I.A -- “spare no expense. They have absolutely no worry about costs. What they have to get done, they get done.”

~~The Pentagon's Inspector General (IG) Report confirms what we have known for nearly five years -- we were catapaulted into war with Iraq on a pack of malicious, treasonous lies dreamed up by Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, who were obviously following Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's order on 9-11 to "sweep it all up -- things related or not" to justify an attack on Iraq.

. . .In testimony last week before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Acting IG Thomas Gimble acknowledged, albeit in bewildering doublespeak, that Feith's office had indeed "developed, produced and then disseminated alternative intelligence assessments on the Iraq and Al-Qaeda relationship, which included some conclusions that were inconsistent with the consensus of the intelligence community, to senior decision-makers." Gimble plowed on with an admission that Feith "was inappropriately performing intelligence activities of developing, producing and disseminating that should be performed by the intelligence community."

. . .Given that more than 600,000 Iraqi civilians have been slaughtered, more than 2 million families are broken and displaced, and 3,379 coalition troops (3,123 of them Americans) have been blown to bits, Gimble's limp concession that what these creatures did in manipulating intelligence to go to war was neither "illegal or unauthorized" is almost as bizarre as the media refusing to investigate such criminal activity. Almost as bizarre as Wolfowitz' grinning admission in Vanity Fair two months after the attack, "We settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on." Almost as bizarre as the American Enterprise Institute's Michael Ledeen, who boasted in 2002, "We do not want stability in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and even Saudi Arabia. . . The real issue is not whether, but how to destabilize."

~~Attorney General Alberto Gonzales suddenly fired seven US attorneys and replaced them with Republican insiders. One of them, Tomothy Griffin, who previously worked for Karl Rove and for the Republican National Committee, will head to Arkansas -- just as the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign heats up. San Diego prosecuror Carol Lam was bounced for bringing California Republican Randy "Duke" Cunningham to justice for taking $2.4 million in bribes. According to Salon's Joe Conason, Lam "is still pursuing important leads in that historic case. Cunningham is supposed to be cooperating," Conason says, "but if Bush replaces her (Lam) with a partisan stooge, he may be able to keep his secrets." In his usual Cheshire manner, Gonzales admitted the resignations were forced, but "declined to comment on details of the cases."

~~The old news surfaced briefly of the Pentagon loading 363 tons of $100 bills onto pallets and flying them aboard military planes to Iraq where they were handed over to the Iraqi government with no accountability. That's $4 billion, or 726,000 pounds of stash -- with an additional $8.8 billion that also disappeared about the time US "Viceroy" Paul Bremer mounted up and headed for the border.

~~Then, there's the Scooter Libby Blame Plame Game trial wherein Libby and a gaggle of journalists are wildly pointing fingers at each other in a hiliarious effort to cover their treasonous asses about who told whom what and when -- while the noose tightens slowly around Dick Cheney's neck. Great entertainment, but of course no in-depth research and investigation into matters of consequence, such as what "dark side" activity was going on at the highest levels in order to take us to war. Personally, I never believe anything anybody called "Scooter" tells me -- unless his last name is Rizzuto.

You'd think that the mainstream media would bump into each other in their haste to cover one or all of the above. But no. While C-Span alone carried the interminably long Senate debate-about-the-debate on at least three toothless, nonbinding resolutions addressing Bush's ongoing ejaculation in Iraq -- while six US helicopters were brought down by enemy fire -- while the Bush neocons were back at their old game of manipulating intelligence to justify a war on Iran -- the silly, somnolent scriveners chose instead to overdose on the "Air Pelosi" scandal.

Reporters clambered aboard the Swift Boat with their Republican "unnamed sources," and went full throttle at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for daring to request a plane large enough to fly from Washington to California without refueling. The story quickly went from "Air Pelosi" to "Pelosi One." It went from, "The new Speaker of the House is apparently asking for a big travel upgrade" to "the San Francisco Democrat is abusing the perks of power by attempting to commandeer a fancy jumbo-size military jet with a 'distinguished visitor compartment with sleep accommodations.'"

The reporters-cum-repeaters rounded out the jam-packed 10-day news period either shouting that all destructive weapons in Iraq come from Iran -- or curled up on the nation's sidewalks shrieking in ecstasy about Anna Nicole Smith.

The U.S. media is beneath contempt, and can never redeem itself for the damage it has wrought on this republic by its fawning allegience to a band of crooked, war-mongering fools. By sinking to reading scrubbed-clean White House press releases, by relinquishing all pretences of honesty, values and integrity in order to ingratiate itself to the ravenous corporate beast, its members are little more than "enablers" who cannot remember why they became journalists in the first place.

W.C. Fields once said, "There comes a time in the affairs of man when he must take the bull by the tail and face the situation." That time is now. Molly Ivins was right -- it's time we hit the streets, beating on pots and pans and take our country back. Our first stop should be at the source of our country's problems -- the shallow and destructive corporate media.

2007-02-06T22:30:00.000-08:00

The empire of the Romans filled the world, and when that empire fell into the hands of a single person, the world became a safe and dreary prison for his enemies. The slave of Imperial despotism, whether he was condemned to drag out his gilded chain in Rome and the Senate, or to wear out a life of exile on the barren rock of Seriphus, or the frozen banks of the Danube, expected his fate in silent despair. To resist was fatal, and it was impossible to fly. On every side he was encompassed with a vast extent of sea and land, which he could never hope to traverse without being discovered, seized, and restored to his irritated master.

Beyond the frontiers, his anxious view could discover nothing, except the ocean, inhospitable deserts, hostile tribes of barbarians, of fierce manners and unknown language, or dependent kings, who would gladly purchase the emperor's protection by the sacrifice of an obnoxious fugitive. "Wherever you are," said Cicero to the exiled Marcellus, "remember that you are equally within the power of the conqueror." ~~Historian Edward Gibbon

NO WAY IN -- NO WAY OUT...

2007-01-22T16:01:00.000-08:00

"We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission; which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force." -- Ayn Rand, The Nature of Government

I have no desire to get embroiled in the current tangled debate on immigration, either legal or illegal. However, I have watched with interest the intense campaign for President Bush first to intervene in the trial of two border patrol agents accused of shooting a suspected Mexican drug dealer as he fled, and then to pardon the agents for the crime after they were convicted.

CNN's Lou Dobbs has led the crusade against illegal immigration for the past several years, and seems to be in the camp that believes if you're an immigrant and you're illegal, the gloves come off. You deserve what you get. I agree with Dobbs that our borders must be secured and that Mexicans entering our country legally should be welcomed as they have been throughout our history. However, those like Osvaldo Aldrete Davila who slip across the border illegally should be stopped and sent back home -- not shot as they are trying to escape.

The agents, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean, entered prison last week amid shrieks of injustice, to begin serving sentences of 11 and 12 years. They were convicted not only of shooting Davila, who was unarmed and running away, but of destroying evidence, covering up a crime scene and filing false reports concerning the circumstances.

Right-wing pundits and politicians on both sides of the aisle seeking political gain are clamoring for Bush to pardon Ramos and Compean for their "act of courage" and to ignore the laws they broke and the crimes they committed.. Although Congress has never bestowed a pardon on anyone convicted of a crime, in a ploy to get attention last week, presidential hopeful Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) introduced a bill demanding that Congress, rather than Bush, pardon them.

That's not likely to happen, so the pressure remains on Bush. In an interview in El Paso last Thursday, Bush was asked if he would consider pardoning the two agents. In classic Bush bumblespeech, he non-replied, “There are standards that need to be met in law enforcement, and according to a jury of their peers, these officers violated some standards.”

Bush then stammered, “On this case, people need to take a hard look at the facts, at the evidence that the jury looked at, as well as a judge. And that’s -- I will do the same thing. Now, there’s a process for pardons,” he continued. “I mean, it’s got to work its way through a system here in government. But I just want people to take a sober look at the reality. It’s a case, as you said, it’s got a lot of emotions.”

Upon hearing this, news sites such as NewsMax.com, jumped out with, "Bush Eyes Pardon for Border Patrolmen," and announced, "President Bush on Thursday said a pardon was possible for two Border Patrol agents serving prison sentences for shooting a Mexican drug dealer as he fled and then covering up the crime..."

For NewsMax to reach such a conclusion from Bush's twisted rhetoric is not only a stretch of the imagination, it's a classic example of wishful thinking. The "standards" that the two agents "violated" were laws they broke, for which they were convicted by a jury of their peers. Ramos and Compean are criminals. According to the Justice Department, the "process for pardons" that Bush says has to "work its way through a system here in government" is that once convicted, a criminal is not even eligible for consideration to be pardoned for a period of at least five years.

The bad news is that even if Bush, who is determined to work not above the law but outside the law, decides to "eye" pardons for the two agents, he will rely on the recommendation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Given the Bush-Gonzales history of compassion for their fellow human beings, it's a slam-dunk that Ramos and Compean will remain incarcerated. The good news is they were not sentenced to death...

The only coherent statement Bush made is that the border patrol case has "got a lot of emotions." I don't pretend to understand all I know about illegal immigration, but it seems likely those emotions will get uglier and more intense if this administration continues to nod and wink at securing the border between the United States and Mexico. If there is a policy other than to give no-bid contracts to Halliburton to build a network of detention camps where immigrants will be held indefinitely, I'm not aware of it. I find it difficult to believe that these camps are cheaper -- more humane -- than simply closing the border to illegal entry.

Those who cry that the border between Mexico and the United States stretches for 2,000 miles and is all but impossible to control apparently are unaware of the new passport requirements that go into effect on January 23. Air travelers going to or from the US, Canada, Mexico, the Carribbean and Bermuda must have passports.

Those who have no problem with them coming for air travelers should know that as early as January 2008, they're coming back for the rest of us. According to just the basics, "All persons -- including U.S. citizens -- traveling between the U.S. and Canada, Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and Bermuda by land or sea (including ferries), may be required to present a valid passport or other documents as determined by the Department of Homeland Security."

Americans who cherish freedom would do well to stop stumbling around in the trees and forests of the illegal immigration debate and see that the Bush administration is well on its way to closing the borders of the entire nation, not only to people trying to get in, but to citizens trying to get out. For the millions who don't travel, it's probably no big deal -- they long for the tranquility of servitude and do not recognize shouts coming from the rest of us as a desperate rattling of chains.

Unfortunately, securing the homeland is a two-edged sword that the Bush administration and military establishment profiteers are holding firmly over our heads. It's time Americans realized that we are in danger of being herded into a national detention camp in which there are no pardons, and from which there is no escape.