911 DANCE OF DEATH

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The winners of the 9/11 trifecta can't sleep at night for there is always the fear that their victims will figure out that this conspiracy, hatched in the bosom of the bin Laden clan, nurtured by the Saudi royal family, grown in Florida near the Bush Jupiter Island compound, seemingly invisible yet obvious enough for the CIA to give a written warning to Bush a month before the attacks, the Attorney General not flying on commercial planes all that summer, the Pentagon playing war games with the premise that hijackers would fly a civilian aircraft into it....on and on it goes.

The 9/11 commissions and investigations were all fake. From conception onwards, since the only people allowed to interact with it were fellow conspiritors, it is no wonder, they decided that everyone was culpable, no one was capable and no one was responsible for anything that led up to 9/11/1 or afterwards, everyone was no one and now here we are again, frustrated people leaking more tormenting information showing very clearly that either we have 100% incompetence from the lowest levels to the very top or....we are the victims of the biggest betrayal of America since Ronald Reagan pretended to be negotiating with the Japanese.

From the Guardian in England:

Congressman: Defense Knew 9/11 Hijackers
The Sept. 11 commission will investigate a claim that U.S. defense intelligence officials identified ringleader Mohammed Atta and three other hijackers as a likely part of an al-Qaida cell more than a year before the hijackings but didn't forward the information to law enforcement.

Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa. and vice chairman of the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees, said Tuesday the men were identified in 1999 by a classified military intelligence unit known as ``Able Danger.'' If true, that's an earlier link to al-Qaida than any previously disclosed intelligence about Atta.

Sept. 11 commission co-chairman Lee Hamilton said Tuesday that Weldon's information, which the congressman said came from multiple intelligence sources, warrants a review. He said he hoped the panel could issue a statement on its findings by the end of the week.

``The 9/11 commission did not learn of any U.S. government knowledge prior to 9/11 of surveillance of Mohammed Atta or of his cell,'' said Hamilton, a former Democratic congressman from Indiana. ``Had we learned of it obviously it would've been a major focus of our investigation.''

The Sept. 11 commission's final report, issued last year, recounted numerous government mistakes that allowed the hijackers to succeed. Among them was a failure to share intelligence within and among agencies.

According to Weldon, Able Danger identified Atta, Marwan al-Shehhi, Khalid al-Mihdar and Nawaf al-Hazmi as members of a cell the unit code-named ``Brooklyn'' because of some loose connections to New York City.

My ex husband worked once on the very floor of the building that was directly hit by Atta's jet. Everyone in his former office died.

I will say it now as loudly as possible: the attacks didn't "slip through the cracks." Unless we are talking about the Cracks of Doom in Mordor. Lords in Hell!

I really should just cuss non stop at this point. When I saw the pictures of the Pentagon that showed a model of the building with generals and others standing around, with a model plane smack dab in the middle, them discussing how to deal with the possiblity of such an attack and then recall how, with solemn faces, on 9/11 and for several years afterwards, these same FUCKS claimed that no one ever concieved of such an attack! Well.

Meet the co-conspiritors!

One of the stewardesses on Flight 11 talked to company headquarters and the people directing plane traffic in Boston, that a man stood up and instantly killed his neighbor sitting right hard by him, a man who happened to be a high ranking Israeli undercover agent...just this act alone opens so many ugly doors, all of them leading into this dusty, dead chamber under the rocks of Jerusalem, the Chamber of Horrors, the womb of the Beast.

All I can say is, what ails everyone? This is now reaching the level of screaming dissonance. Why did Atta choose to train right next door to the Bush compound? The place crawls with Secret Service agents and retired CIA agents and the FBI investigating drug runners and a host of obvious things to watch and that is where he toiled day and night to hatch his plans?

Two of the hijackers lived with an FBI informant in San Diego?

It is much worse. No one has yet been able to explain why Bush was so delighted when Andrew Card whispered in his ear that a second jet hit the WTC. His obvious glee that day and later was hard to ignore. The time of national mourning was bizarre, to say the least. "This reeks of Skull and Bones magic numbers," I complained back then. To my horror, the period of mourning was exactly 11 days long.

11+11=22. 9/22 is the Autumn Equinox, a magic day of great antiquity.

Weldon said that in September 2000 Able Danger recommended that its information on the hijackers be given to the FBI ``so they could bring that cell in and take out the terrorists.'' However, Weldon said Pentagon lawyers rejected the recommendation because they said Atta and the others were in the country legally so information on them could not be shared with law enforcement.

You know, the FBI and CIA have a nice fat file of my activities. They never seemed unable or blanched at spying on me or my friends or people I knew. They poke around all over the place.

A lot.

And the authorities kill people. I once had a boyfriend who was a Black Panther. He was shot in bed in Chicago by the authorities. Heck, President Kennedy was terminated by a highly trained American military sharp shooter who had lived in Communist Russia and had connections with Castro and a host of spooky, weird people. And supposedly no one could track or stop him but they could, a few years later, trail all over the planet, following a teenager around.

Gads. This is so pathetic. My mother once made a speech to a small group of women and the contents of it leaked across the planet and deep into the government spy systems. Spies spy on spies.

However, because of concerns about pursuing information on ``U.S. persons'' - a legal term that includes U.S. citizens as well as foreigners admitted to the country for permanent residence - Special Operations Command did not provide the Army information to the FBI. It is unclear whether the Army provided the information to anyone else.

When Bush wanted Hatfield, the author of "Fortunate Son" destroyed, the FBI spent many man hours chasing down every possible lead to delve into his life and then destroy him. They then visited him in a hotel room, told him he was going to be arrested one day so he committed suicide. This was a month before 9/11.

Ahem. Clearing my throat.

What the hell.

Think no one could "visit" Atta and corner him? Eh? Huh? Oh, he was visited! Unfortunately for all those poor, dead people, the visits were probably very congenial.

Weldon, considered something of a maverick on Capitol Hill, initially made his allegations about Atta and the others in a floor speech in June that garnered little attention. His talk came at the end of a legislative day during a period described under House rules as ``special orders'' - a time slot for lawmakers to get up and speak on issues of their choosing.

The issue resurfaced Monday in a story by the bimonthly Government Security News, which covers national security matters.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he was unaware of the intelligence until the latest reports surfaced.

But Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said the 9/11 Commission looked into the matter during its investigation into government missteps leading to the attacks and chose not to include it in the final report.

Hamilton said 9/11 Commission staff members learned of Able Danger during a meeting with military personnel in October 2003 in Afghanistan, but the staff members do not recall learning of a connection between Able Danger and any of the four terrorists Weldon mentioned.

On 9/11, I was screaming. I grabbed the phone eight minutes before the second jet hit the WTC buildings. I was desperately trying to call the FBI. I knew this was an attack and a big attack (hate to say this, but I was expecting a terror attack because the NYT/WP/WSJ vote counting of the Florida ballots was done and it clearly showed that Gore had won by nearly 20,000 votes! So Bush desperately needed to change the news flow). My husband told me to stop.

"There is no point. They already know," he said, sadly.

Grimly, we watched that day unfold. When I learned that Rumsfeld, after hearing of not one but two attacks from hijacked jets, calmly went to a meeting about an unrelated matter. He then went back to his desk, I presume to play twiddly winks, and was startled by the explosion near by.

He then wandered over to see what blew up.

This was the actions of the head of our military. No one has tried to explain this. Why was he so unconcerned? He wasn't even bothering to watch TV much less organize a defense!

He didn't need to. His job was to sit tight and shut up.

Did Bush rush off to rally America?

No.

He flew to a nuclear base which just happened to have many of America's corporate elite at a private breakfast (!!!) that morning in that god forsaken place. You would think they would be meeting in Manhattan, no? Or Aruba. But Nebraska?

Even the Devil that is Death wouldn't go there for breakfast or lunch.

Bush then had an off the record chat. I can guess what he said since he said it to them all very openly three times: "I won the trifecta!"

The 911 Dance of Death continues.

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NAKED EMPEROR IN TEXAS

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Usually, it takes the NYT and other major media outlets two to five days or several years to report stuff. So this story is from two days ago.

Bush went to a Texas town to make a speech and get an award. What was interesting about this jaunt of his was what happened to the poor former citizens of America thanks to his need for "security." From the Daily Texan:

GRAPEVINE - Roads were shut down Wednesday and residents living in nearby apartments between Dooley and Ruth Wall Roads were warned not to look out of their windows Wednesday. School busses from Grapevine-Colleyville ISD formed a perimeter around the site where President George W. Bush was scheduled to land. No one was going to get a glance of the president on his way to the Gaylord Texan Resort and Convention Center.

Leave no school bus behind!

What gives? I would think, in what used to be our country, that the citizens would be really ticked off if someone ordered them to cower inside behind closed curtains or else. This is how Hitler entered Paris. There is something distinctly unamerican about all this stuff.

This isn't due to 9/11, either. Early on, Bush went to Africa to play at being concerned about things there. He toured a former slave market. Before doing this, he had the neighboring villages cleaned out of all humans. They were rounded up and locked under armed guards in a stadium. Then he had "plants" accompany him on his little tour. Otherwise, all normal people were kept far away. I remember writing about this at the time and right wingers assured me that this would never happen here in America.

Well, not only has it happened, it is out of control. Where ever this champion coward goes, he scurries along like a cockroach, slithering under the rug and avoiding the light. He not only keeps far away from hecklers, mothers of dead soldiers, Congresspeople, the press, horses, prosecutor Fitzgerald, he keeps everyone away because he basically can't argue his way with anyone asking sharp questions. You can bet, he would move heaven and earth to avoid me!

There is zero chance of us ever meeting.

What ails Texans? They make a lot of noise about hating government intrusions yet whenever their chimp runs out of his ranch, they meekly and mildly lock themselves indoors without protest. They yell about how free and brave they are and then show less resistance to authority than the average Iraqi child. They allow themselves to be buffaloed and ballyhooed. I have raised sheep with more gumption and self respect.

Is Bush so terrifed of Texans that he thinks they will Oswald him? Does he trust the one state that wholeheartedly voted for him without manipulating the voting machines? Did the people of Texas really vote for him? He should be able to walk the streets there, shouldn't he?

If not, why? Why didn't poeple pour out of their prison homes, shouting and shaking their fists? Why didn't they spontaneously march upon the Texas Convention Center, demanding that Bush act like a citizen and not like Stalin? You would think, the rage and hurt dignity would rouse them out of their Texas stupor.

Bush nearly never comes to New York. He can't shut down NYC like he loves to shut down Texas. If he went down the street and the Secret Service demanded everyone shut the curtains, people will throw eggs from the rooftops except they would be murdered by the many troops that "secure" the President by acting like it is WWII and we are the Parisians who oppose Hitler.

And in a nutshell, that is where we stand today. Our emperor has no clothes but plenty of guards.

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SKULLDUGGERY

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Tonight it is very dark. No moon, no star. Alone at my laptop, I contemplate Fate.

From Newsweek:

The departure this week of Deputy Attorney General James Comey, who has accepted the post of general counsel at Lockheed Martin, leaves a question mark in the probe into who leaked the identity of CIA operative Valerie Plame. Comey was the only official overseeing special counsel Patrick Fitzgerald's leak investigation.

With Attorney General Alberto Gonzales recused, department officials say they are still trying to resolve whom Fitzgerald will now report to. Associate Attorney General Robert McCallum is "likely" to be named as acting deputy A.G., a DOJ official who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the matter tells NEWSWEEK.

But McCallum may be seen as having his own conflicts: he is an old friend of President Bush's and a member of his Skull and Bones class at Yale. One question: how much authority Comey's successor will have over Fitzgerald. When Comey appointed Fitzgerald in 2003, the deputy granted him extraordinary powers to act however he saw fit—but noted he still had the right to revoke Fitzgerald's authority. The questions are pertinent because lawyers close to the case believe the probe is in its final stages.

Fitzgerald recently called White House aide Karl Rove's secretary and his former top aide to testify before the grand jury. They were asked why there was no record of a phone call from Time reporter Matt Cooper, with whom Rove discussed the CIA agent, says a source close to Rove who requested anonymity because the FBI asked participants not to comment. The source says the call went through the White House switchboard, not directly to Rove.

A small problem, no? The man who is tracking down the nest of traitors who betrayed America so they could punish a whistle blower now must report all his efforts to one of Bush's coffin laying, the Devil is death buddies.

So much for the Plame investigations.

As we go wailing off the cliff, we should celebrate the fact that this organization, the Yale Skull and Bones, did a great job of destroying America. Whoopee.

I feel rather rotten about all this. You see, one of my ancestors is one of the earliest members of the Skull and Bones and he brought in a great deal of the really dark black magic. Sigh. The fool.

I hold the world record for being struck by lightning directly while indoors. Not only that, but my illustrious family on the Steele side have rather a few deaths from lightning bolts, odd, no? Our history and the history of America intertwine in ways that are rather charming for we came here fleeing religious persecution and the last place we wanted to be was anywhere near Boston.

They kill witches.

Today my whole family spends a great deal of energy trying to be good Christians. I don't bother. I can't hide. I know too much.

One thing I do know is that the Skull and Bones isn't a mere fraternity that plays pranks like using a crypt for a meeting hall or kissing skulls they steal from graves of prominent people like Geronimo and chant to devils. They are a religion. And like all religions, they believe things about their god and themselves.

Since their god is the Devil that is Death, this pretty much sums up what they are and where they will take us all if we are dumb enough to follow them. It matters little to myself, I have no pet beliefs in any one god so I can deal with them in my own way.

But their followers, the easily duped Christian community, they are in woefull trouble. When I was a child, I pestered the pastor over dumb things like, "Why would the Christians follow the antichrist? Wouldn't they be able to see he is the exact opposite, an executioner rather then one executed, just for example?" He would assure me that no one would be so foolish.

Well, the Fool rules.

And this really worries me because it is so painfully obvious that the Skull and Bones are conspiring with each other and pulling us hither and yon, playing tricks on us, laughing at our dupery, grasping and stealing us blind, all while assuring us with a straight face that they are all Christians.

But then, the Pope is a former Nazi who coddles child molesters. Gack.

What does the Skull and Bones plan to do to us all? They, held on a short leash by their master, the Devil that is Death, rush to war and rush to foolish actions that will kill many humans. Will they realize this and stop?

When I was a child, I assumed people would stop. But now, a cynical adult, I know they will not only not stop but, sneering at me, plunge off the top of the building without a parachute.

Anyone who thinks the Devil that is Death doesn't enjoy the sight of Americans dying for His minions needs to visit Hell and take a good, hard look.

He is laughing. To death.

I ain't.

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LOST IN A MAZE, LOSING STEAM

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Like the miners trapped underground in China, our soldiers are trapped in the cul de sac of Iraq and all attempts to rescue them seem futile. It looks like the Chinese leadership is finally figuring out that they have a responsibility for protecting mine workers but the soldiers in Iraq are not so lucky.

It seems the leaders in Washington remain clueless and deluded.

From Associated Press:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says the insurgency in Iraq is losing steam as a political force, even as Democratic congressmen warned Sunday that violence jeopardizes plans for withdrawing some troops.

The 30,000 troop withdrawl keeps popping up in the news every few months. Thanks for all the Ohio troopers who died trapped down a dark mine shaft trapped in Iraq, once again, the mythical troop withdrawl is resurrected.

The Pentagon, PNAC and Bush have gone from "the generals don't want more troops" to "the troops will come home when hell freezes over--- Bush gets impeached--- when demonstrators burn down the White House--- Iraq is stabilized."

Iraq can't be stabilized. We are trying to impose Saddam 2.0 there but we won't put in this person because Saddam is still alive and no one wants to surplant him if there is even a faint possibility of him surplanting them. The lunatic kangaroo trial we plan for Saddam recedes as quickly as the mirage of Iraqi stability thanks to the fact that there is precious little difference between Saddam and us. Our war crimes are now so great, so various, so complete that we look like fools, trying him for killing villagers.

Just yesterday, our jets were straffing peasants and bombing their hovels in Vietnam style raids on the countryside. We have leveled whole cities and put the population to the sword, so to speak, such as Fallujah. We have allowed the civil rights of women to seriously degrade to the point of despair over there. From Kurdmedia:

Thousands of Kurdish women marched in northern Iraq on Wednesday against an interim Governing Council decision to repeal long-standing secular family laws, once the most advanced in the Arab world.

The alarm in Iraq rises. Like Afghanistan, American triumphalism coupled with deals with really horrible people=loss of significant civil rights for women and minority religions. In other words, our policies extend the power of fundamentalist Muslims. Back to the AP article about Clueless Condi:

"It's a lot easier to see the violence and suicide bombing than to see the rather quiet political progress that's going on in parallel," Rice said.

"If you think about how to defeat an insurgency, you defeat it not just militarily but politically," she said, adding that she believes the insurgents are "losing steam" politically.

I bet poor Powell, living in GOP obscurity, is glad he let her take over. Imagine him being forced to mouth such insanities.

All the pandering to the reactionary Muslim men continues to backfire. From the BBC:

The United States has closed its embassy and two consulates in Saudi Arabia for two days in response to a terror threat, the embassy has said.
US citizens in the country have been urged to keep a low profile, in the embassy's second warning in a month.

Australia and Britain have also revised their travel advice because of "credible reports" of terror attacks.

But the Saudi authorities say they have no information of an imminent attack in the oil-rich kingdom.

The warnings, in what is the world's largest oil exporter, have helped push crude oil prices to a new high.

We will all feel this in our wallets. This is probably why it makes nearly no major headlines in America.

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BUSH IS A MORON

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I was leafing through pictures of Bush and the President of Columbia, Uribe. As usual, the diplomatic photos of Bush are a gold mine for goofy, horrible, stupid poses and pictures. He never lets us down. What is disturbing is how he mangles the simplest tasks like shaking hands or keeping his pants zippered up. Or running over a Bobby.


This one-man diplomatic disaster is destroying our country as surly as if the Chinese had replaced our President with a Manchurian candidate or in this case, Moronian candidate.
It is all too easy to do a cartoon, I could have picked a dozen others. Why do our rulers want to inflict upon us, this utter jerk? He can barely mangle his way through our common tongue, he is clumsy and crass and cusses and eats like a slob and walks like a lost Neanderthal man seeking Darwin to complain about how he isn't a monkey?

From Associated Press:

President Bush, facing a grim and growing death toll in Iraq, said Thursday that threats of more violence by al-Qaida's second-in-command would not intimidate the United States into retreat.

At the same time, the U.S. military said in Iraq that four more service members had been killed in action but also insisted American troops were making progress against insurgents.

An AP-Ipsos poll taken early this week showed public support of Bush's handling of the war had dropped to 38 percent, the lowest so far.

"We will stay the course, we will complete the job in Iraq," Bush said in Texas as a videotape by Ayman al-Zawahri, al-Qaida's No.2, was broadcast around the world.

More troops dead today? My god. Elsewhere in the news, I read a crummy article about how the deaths aren't all that many, just more Iraqis are dying but I remember last year even when we seldom got more than 28 dead a month and more than that have died the last three days! Geeze.

Before the war, they took this poll and asked how many people must die before anyone would reconsider this invasion and the number was between 2,000 and 2,500. Well, as we reach 2,000 ( we passed it, if you include Afghanistan), Bush's numbers are collapsing.

Note that we had this dumb election just a short while ago. Now he is already whittled down to his bare core supporters.

The Yellow Elephant Chickenhawk brigade.

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MEET OUR REAL RULERS

Meet our real rulers, #4: Ambassador to the UN for China, Mr. Wang Guangya.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

As usual, as I scan the news, a single line jumps out at me and makes an impression. The official news services of the communist Chinese are like an orchard, the branches hang low with juicy fresh fruit. From Xihuanet:

The United States and China have agreed to work together to block a plan tabled by Japan, Germany, India and Brazil, to expand the powerful United Nations Security Council, China's U.N. ambassador said Wednesday.

The Associated Press quoted Chinese Ambassador Wang Guangya as saying he reached the agreement with John Bolton during a meeting Tuesday, which was the new U.S. ambassador's first full day in his new post, because both believe the proposal by Brazil, Germany, India and Japan would divide the U.N.'s 191 member states.

Washington and Beijing are already on record as opposing the so-called Group of Four resolution for different reasons, but the agreement would mark a new joint effort to prevent its approval by the U.N. General Assembly, which requires a two-thirds "yes" vote.

Now, I have been tracking this obscure topic for quite a while. Just recently, the USA lured Japan into thinking they could be put on the Security Council then China suggested Germany should and then it was pulled to and fro while all the diplomats pretended to be doing things when they were really positioning themselves for quite different things.

The only way to track them is to keep your eye on the individuals involved. Who are they and what are their plans?

Wang and Bolton, who have known each other for about 15 years, met again Wednesday outside the office of General Assembly President Jean Ping, part of a round of courtesy calls the U.S. envoy is making to Security Council members and senior U.N. officials.

"There's a lot of important work," Bolton said. "It's a very busy schedule in the first couple of days, and I think it's been productive and I'm certainly enjoying myself."

He wouldn't discuss his meetings with Ping or council members.

Haha. You can bet your bottle caps Mr. Bolton isn't going to tell us anything about his private discussions with his Chinese masters! Gads, they are so open about it...in China. This does amuse the Chinese, I suppose, letting us know just how far they own our own leaders and negotiators. Thanks.

The Chinese know who to cultivate. When they watched with amused astonishment as Reagan openly collected bribe money from the Japanese and was cheered for this crime, they knew who to target.

When Clinton unexpectedly (no Diebold machines!) won the Presidency, they tried to buy him but do note, they snarled at him, a lot. The Chinese people were very charmed by old Bill Clinton which caused the Chinese communist leaders to scowl and frown.

But now, all is well. The purchases are finished.

Of course, China and America and Russia do not want to dilute their power over the Security Council. Nothing will change. But the movement for change allowed them to have excuses for secret meetings. The triangulation of power between these three giant empires is now going ferociously forwards. The USA is now led by a group that is more interested in making money for themselves despite how bad this is for their home base.

Here is Wang's biography.He studied in Britain during the Cultural Revolution years (none of the present crew running China have fond memories of that time!). He went to the London School of Economics. You can bet, since this isn't a legacy venue, he is extremely smart and understands the fundamentals of economics better than most of us and certainly, more then those negotiating with him at the top levels.

He then went as a translator to the UN and then to John Hopkins University (at government expense). He then bounced back to the UN. I gave him a lot of grief when I was helping the Chinese students demonstrating in front of the UN. He was not at all pleased with us.

The chummy relationship of our negotiators with the people we are in a very grave economic/political struggle with, should frighten and concern everyone, absolutely everyone. Even as our Pentagon plans for WWIII possibilities with China as our opponent, we see our rulers glad handing and goofing around, in private with these very same people.

Let me explain something about the Chinese: every conversation, every visit, every encounter is carefully recorded and examined. They do this with an open mind, studying the mannerisms, the tics, the language, the emotions of those they want to "bag". Like lions studying zebras.

The Chinese prefer private meetings and they smile and offer drinks and smile more, all very friendly. But trust me, not a word passes their lips that isn't vetted carefully. The intelligence level of Mr. Wang is extremely high. Look at his face. It shows great intelligence.

Bolton is out of control. The Chinese do not admire him, they probably trade stories about him and laugh. They desperately wanted him to sit at the other side of the negotiating table. They will play him like a fiddle.

Here is a slightly unrelated story but revealing in its own way: From Xinhuanet:

sco Systems' China chief will leave his current post but continue to work for the firm, the world's biggest computer networking equipment manufacturer, a company source said yesterday.

Duh was the first president of Microsoft China before joining Cisco China as the country president in 1998. Prior to that, he also worked at Hewlett Packard for more than ten years.
Duh, born in Taiwan, is said to be one of the most successful Chinese executives working for the China operations of major global technology giants. With a keen understanding of western corporate management as well as Chinese culture, Duh has helped turn China into the fifth largest market for Cisco.

In June Duh said he hoped for a double-digit growth of Cisco China for this year, and expected to move 40 per cent of Cisco's outsourced manufacturing to China by 2006.

But Cisco's global operations later backed away from the estimate, saying in a statement that it will maintain "geographically balanced" production.

He almost sucked into China all of Cisco who backed down, but only for the time being, and the result was, this guy jumps ship and leaves...to continue elsewhere. Note how he hits on one vital sector after another.

And note how jobs here in America dry up.

There is a connection, you know. You got to admire them all, they certainly are slick. And smart. But then, America wants to admire blunt stupidity.

What a mess.

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BUSH FLIP FLOPS AGAIN

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Just the other day, we struggled to keep up with the many changes the White House announced about all our wars on whatevers. Just as soon as we were getting used to mocking the clumsy "global struggle against violent extremism" Bush junks the whole thing for his old, tired and useless "War on Terriers." Woof.

Well, that war is being lost, big time.

From the New York Times:

President Bush publicly overruled some of his top advisers on Wednesday in a debate about what to call the conflict with Islamic extremists, saying, "Make no mistake about it, we are at war."

In a speech here, Mr. Bush used the phrase "war on terror" no less than five times. Not once did he refer to the "global struggle against violent extremism," the wording consciously adopted by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and other officials in recent weeks after internal deliberations about the best way to communicate how the United States views the challenge it is facing.

As usual, the entire GOP and our military operatives will swing back to the old chant. Since Bush is so helpful in pointing out that we are "at war," will he now point out that we are again, as I expected, running over $500 billion in the red this year?

Remember all the hooting and hollering over the news that our budget deficit was going to be only $333 billion? Then Congress swung the fiscal bat and blew it over the fence and out of the ball park, didn't they? And note that Bush vetoed nothing.

Time to raise taxes, dudes!

But then, this war isn't a war, it is a Potemkin phantom.

"Some ask, are we still engaged in a war on terror?" Mr. Rumsfeld said. "Let there be no mistake about it. It's a war. The president properly termed it that after Sept. 11. The only way to defend against terrorism is to go on the attack."

Rumsfeld is obviously insane. The only way to stop terror is to do what the British are doing: police work at home, making deals abroad. They didn't retaliate by bombing other nations in turn. Note the greater success in their little enterprise.

This idee fixee that we have to go abroad on murderous rampages in retaliation to pokes in the eye is exactly why we are losing the war on terror. And speaking of terror, Bush just announced he is going to continue to push for destroying Social Security.

Be afraid, be very afraid.

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THIS IS A WAR CRIME

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

It never ends, does it? Saddam, the other day, claimed he was physically attacked in court when he had a hearing. The long awaited trial seems to be crawling along. I can't see anyone convicting him of anything at this point. "Killing his own people" is particularily ridiculous since everyone is killing Iraqis these days.

Now comes more shattering news: From the Washington Post:

Iraqi Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush was being stubborn with his American captors, and a series of intense beatings and creative interrogation tactics were not enough to break his will. On the morning of Nov. 26, 2003, a U.S. Army interrogator and a military guard grabbed a green sleeping bag, stuffed Mowhoush inside, wrapped him in an electrical cord, laid him on the floor and began to go to work. Again.

It was inside the sleeping bag that the 56-year-old detainee took his last breath through broken ribs, lying on the floor beneath a U.S. soldier in Interrogation Room 6 in the western Iraqi desert. Two days before, a secret CIA-sponsored group of Iraqi paramilitaries, working with Army interrogators, had beaten Mowhoush nearly senseless, using fists, a club and a rubber hose, according to classified documents.

OK, everyone. Listen carefully.

General Mowhoush was in uniform. He surrendered. Was captured. He has a legal right to try to free himself, you know. I.e., escape. He also only has to give his name, rank and serial number. The excuse we use for running a gulag system with no Human Rights controls can't be used in this case. He certainly comes under all the statutes of the Geneva Conventions not to mention older stuff like the Code of Chivalry, just for one example.

The Mongols were famous for wrapping people, especially those defending Babylon, in rugs and smothering them to death. Isn't this interesting? Before our invasion, Saddam compared us, accurately it now appears, with the terrifying Mongols who piled pyramids of skulls.

Aren't we charming.

Two Army soldiers with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Fort Carson, Colo., are charged with killing Mowhoush with the sleeping-bag technique, and his death has been the subject of partially open court proceedings at the base in Colorado Springs. Two other soldiers alleged to have participated face potential nonjudicial punishment. Some details of the incident have been released and were previously reported. But an examination of numerous classified documents gathered during the criminal investigation into Mowhoush's death, and interviews with Defense Department officials and current and former intelligence officials, present a fuller picture of what happened and outline the role played in his interrogation by the CIA, its Iraqi paramilitaries and Special Forces soldiers.

Over and over again, the lowest levels of our military gulag apparatus are blamed for the crimes they were heartily enouraged to commit. Over and over and over again, the people supposedly in charge claim they had no idea of what was going on below themselves in the chain of command which seems more like a stew of command, no one in charge of anyone.

Just rogue soldiers running wild.

Yeah. Like in a rat's ass. This "out of the loop" loopiness has infected our entire government all the way to Mr. Out of the Loop and Out of the Solar System President Bush. This perpetual "hands off" while beating and torturing people to death in every prison we run cannot be accidental.

The Nazis tried this at Nuremburg. They pretended the whole apparatus of death was accidental. We still executed them.

Here is a true story about my relatives in Germany:Moosberg Online:

"... Eines Tages kam ein Befehl, der dahin ging, daß durch Aussonderungskommandos der Gestapo in den Kriegsgefangenenlagern und auch in den Arbeitskommandos, die draußen auf dem Lande waren, die russischen Kriegsgefangenen auf sogenannte untragbare Elemente zu durchsuchen seien. Die Aussonderung der untragbaren Elemente war dabei angeordnet. Was mit den Ausgesonderten geschehen sollte, war mir damals zunächst nicht bekannt. Was den Zeitpunkt anlangt, in dem dieser Befehl an meine Dienststelle kam, so wird es wohl Herbst 1941 gewesen sein, wenn ich mich auch heute nicht mehr genau erinnere. Ich erinnere mich aber, daß schon vor Eingang dieses Befehls einmal ca. 400 russische Kriegsgefangene aus den Beständen des Stalags Moosburg und der zugehörigen Arbeitskommandos ausgesondert und nach Dachau gebracht wurden. Ich kam damals zu der Vermutung, daß auch diese Kriegsgefangenen in Dachau schon vernichtet wurden. Zu dieser Vermutung kam ich deshalb, weil bei einer späteren Auseinandersetzung zwischen mir und dem Reg.Rat Schimmel - dem seinerzeitigen Leiter der Gestapo München - [ 18 ] dieser letztere erklärt hat, seine Leute seien am seelischen Zusammenbruch wegen der zahlreichen Erschießungen. Ich habe daraus gefolgert, daß schon seit längerer Zeit Erschießungen vorgenommen wurden, und habe weiter gefolgert, daß die ca. 400 schon früher ausgesonderten russ. Kriegsgefangenen dieses Los gehabt hätten.

Unfortunately, this is all in German but it is the testimony of a relative of mine who was the General in charge of this notorious camp. He balked at sending Russian soldiers over to be used as human research subjects especially when he learned they were brutally killed.

He told his superiors (one Herr Hitler) that this was not allowed by the Geneva Conventions.

Well, my relative wasn't hung by the neck after the Nuremburg Trials ended. He chose correctly when it was very dangerous to choose at all.

The main thing is, he was in charge. And so he felt he was responsible even though Himmler himself ordered him to not be in charge, he stated that the Geneva Conventions made him in charge once he enrolled a prisoner in his Stalag, that was that. Himmler could not come in and remove any prisoners. Period.

The lesson here is: someone above is always in charge. If soldiers "run riot" and murder and kill, they can't simply be punished mildly over and over again. The leadership is responsible and we see no sign of anyone above the lowest classifications being put on trial, properly.

Ie: at the Hague. This is an international violation of international laws. We can't try ourselves. It has to be done properly by international authorities or the UN.

Fat chance of that happening. Gott hilfe uns alles.

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MAURITANI-WHO?

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The CIA Gidget clones: Saddam and Taya. Both become, via coups, dictators of oil pumping countries we want to control or influence. Both ruled over restive Muslim populations. Both ruled despotically. What amuses me is that they look like they were cloned in Scotland along with the famous sheep.

Well, our puppet in Mauritania is now looking for a tax haven to camp out and live off the funds he squirreled away in Aruba.

From the BBC:

President Taya took power in a bloodless coup in December 1984 and has been re-elected three times since.

Correspondents say he later made enemies among Islamists in the country, which is an Islamic Republic.

Critics accuse the government of using the US-led war on terror to crackdown on Islamic opponents.

Mr Taya has also prompted widespread opposition by establishing links with Israel.

Earlier this year, nearly 200 people, including former President Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallah, were put on trial for a series of alleged coup plots.

Ah, see our own future! The only way we will change governments will be via this method. Unless we clean up our own acts. As bin Laden foresaw, the American/Israeli hegemony efforts worked like magic to alienate and infuriate Muslims and created conditions for vast wars. This country is another key in the Chinese plans to be the powerful alternative to American hamfisted hegemony.

If this coup can hang on, and it appears they are very popular with the people there, then expect either Hu or Wen or before them, the ever busy, good buddy of Bush, Tang, will be hopping a flight to Mauritania to glad hand and make offers of protection and mutual friendship and of course, the oil.

We snapped at China when they followed the rules and made Unocal an sweet offer. Instead, the shareholders will take a $1,000,000,000 hit in the wallet and the Chinese won't bother doing this anymore but go about the planet picking up the shattered remains of our little world girdling empire.

Now for a true story: many years ago, my parents were flying across Africa with a head of state. They were coming back from America after the head of state visited the White House. When they landed at the airport, they were greeted by tanks and machinegun nests. For two days, my father negotiated with the coup members through proxies until my mother got sick from the heat. So dad strode out to the door of the plane, called over to the gunners to fetch the French ambassador.

He then explained about my mother needing help so they took her out to the embassy. Then my dad arranged for the President to fly to Paris, too. As they flew away, the gunners shot at the plane and bullets "went right through the wings! But none through us!" my father exclaimed.

I always worried when they went overseas.

From an amusingly demented right wing site:

June 11, 2005

2,000 US Troops Dispatched to Mauritania
So far, I've only seen this AKI report which claims the US has dispatched 2,000 troops to the small Western Sahara nation of Mauritania. Last week, members of the Salafite Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), an al Qaeda linked group which has been fighting secularists in Algeria for some time, killed 17 Mauratian troops.

I know I've said it a dozen times, but if you want to find the hot bed of Islamic radicalism look to Africa. Also, the 2,000 US troops might also want to keep an eye out for Osama bin Laden while they are there. If I had to make a bet on where he is, I'd place it on Africa.

Via Open Source Intelligence this AKI story:

Following the recent slaying of 17 government soldiers in a terrorist attack on a military base in northern Mauritania, the United States has sent a contingent of 2,000 soldiers, as well as helicopters, to the area, the United Arab Emirates daily 'Al-Kalheej' reported on Friday. The US troops will use military bases set up in the desert in Mauritania and Mali three years ago as part of the war on terror.
The US battalion's mission is to help Mauritanian troops patrol the country's northern border with Algeria, where militants from the Algerian extremist formation, the Salafite Group for Preaching and Combat (GSPC), have been entering the country. The GSPC claimed responsibility for last Saturday's deadly attack on the remote military base, although the Mauritanian authorities maintain the attack, in which 17 soldiers were killed, was the work of Mauritanian and Mali extremists, linked to a few GSPC and smugglers operating along the borders between Algeria, Mali and Mauritania.

Posted by Dr. Rusty Shackleford at June 11, 2005 12:47 PM | TrackBack | Blogroll mypetjawa

Yes, we have troops there. After interacting with our troops, the Mauritanian troops want to get rid of us as fast as possible. Once again, waving flags and screaming, "USA, USA" doesn't make friends with anyone. The right wing is steadfastedly anti-internationalist while wanting to meddle in all and sundry nations and people no matter how hostile.

From Afrol News:

23 September - While abandoning much of its Cold War-era bases in Europe and Asia, the US military is relocating to Africa and the Middle East to "fight terrorism" and "protect oil" resources. In Africa, US bases are to focus on Uganda, Djibouti, Senegal and São Tomé and Príncipe, where flexible, small-scale "jumping off points" exist or are to be built.

The US Pentagon is in a period of major restructuring, in particular regarding American military bases abroad. While enormous bases in Germany and South Korea are abandoned or detracted, new and more flexible bases are constructed or planned all over the world, in particular in the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe.

The concept is creating strategically placed "jumping off points" with very few permanently stationed troops but with the infrastructure in place to rapidly launch major regional operations, according to a report published today by the US new agency Associated Press (AP). Bases are to cover all the world's regions where the US government is concerned over potential instability or terrorism, or simply wants to protect key resources such as oil.

Forget the jumping off stuff, we are being jumped on. The geniuses running our foreign affairs like Bolton or Condi think a good punch in the nose will make everyone love us. All experiments in this form of diplomacy have blown up in our faces which is probably why they are so determined to continue.

Obviously, someone wants another 9/11 on 9/11. Looks better and better for this "winning trifecta" to come along and make Bush wildly popular.

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IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Everywhere my ancestors settled as they moved across the continent, they named either Peru or Lima in memory of the Pettit progenitor who was a pirate. Once again, the Marines based in Lima, Ohio, make the news. It used to be, if over five soldiers died and many more were badly injured, this made headline news. Now the stories sink lower and lower in regard and it has reached "ho hum" status.

Ohio is in the news today also because thanks to the GOP's running dogs, a war hero has been repudiated in the polls in favor of a person who thinks we fight at home rather than in Iraq because the real enemy is birth control and gay men kissing.

I can see why our rulers want us to pop out more baby boys for them. But even this woman looks like she would have to turn off all the lights first, in order to achieve this goal. No wonder they are so dissatisfied.

From Newsday:

Six Marine reservists attached to the same suburban Cleveland unit were killed while on sniper duty in Iraq, a military official said on Tuesday.

"Every single one of them is a hero," said Lt. Col. Kevin Rush of the Headquarters and Service Co. 3rd Battalion, 25th Marines based in Brook Park, a suburb of about 21,000 people southwest of Cleveland.
All six were killed on Monday in northwest Iraq. All were from northeast Ohio.

Rush did not have specific details about how they were killed and said unit members in Iraq were under a military imposed communications blackout to make sure none of the names were disclosed until the Pentagon was satisfied that the victims' families were notified.

The mother of Sgt. Nathaniel Rock, 26, of Toronto, about 90 miles southeast of Cleveland, said military officials told her Monday that her son had been killed.

Rock spent six years in the Marines after graduating from high school in 1997 and then joined the reserves, Adriana Rock said. At home in Ohio, he worked as a part-time police officer in Martins Ferry.

"He was very proud to be a Marine," she said.

The battalion was activated in January and went to Iraq in March. The unit's Web site lists 25 of its Marines who have been killed this year.

Lima Company, a unit of the battalion based in Columbus, has lost 11 servicemen since the beginning of the war, an official with the company said Friday. It suffered four deaths during one operation in May.

It is interesting that the civilians running our military have insisted that the bodies be brought home at night only. In the utter darkeness before dawn, in strictest security, the coffins are disgourged and whisked away as fast as possible. Meanwhile, the civilians running this disgusting charade insist they are patriotic and they honor the dead. Of course, the dead don't run for office.

Then they are called "staff pukes" and other ugly names.

The mood was somber but businesslike at the nondescript, one-story brick Marine training center, located on a residential block near a local fire station. The unit's few Marines not serving in Iraq shuttled media around the headquarters but would not speak with reporters because of the gag order.

"The six Marines killed in action yesterday in Iraq represent the best of the best of this nation," said Rep. Dennis Kucinich, an outspoken critic of the war whose district includes the headquarters. "These brave and courageous soldiers will forever be remembered as heroes."

Reporters show up since this unit has been hard hit several times. No one is allowed to talk about the dead because of the gag order. Well, I wonder what turtle crawls from house to house to inform the families? I know they want "formalities" and such, the awful van drawing up to the home of the bereaved who have been waiting in anxious fear since seeing the back page news stories.

The group of sombre men walking up to the front door. The ritualistic ringing of the bell. The wails and cries of pain inside the house before the door opens. Face drained of all blood, the bereaved let the grim men inside. Then the news breaks officially.

Well, once this process of pain is done, then they can talk about the dead.

Unfortunately, the press has moved on to other, more "interesting" stories so there won't be a tribe of reporters prowling the base, asking for information. This process plays into the hands of the rulers who don't want us to know the names and faces of the fallen. Note how enraged they were when one TV network decided to just read the names and show the faces, 1,000 dead people ago. They acted like this was some sort of crime.

From Truthout.org

Haban, Iraq - The explosion enveloped the armored vehicle in flames, sending orange balls of fire bubbling above the trees along the Euphrates River near the Syrian border.

Marines in surrounding vehicles threw open their hatches and took off running across the plowed fields, toward the already blackening metal of the destroyed vehicle. Shouting, they pulled to safety those they could, as the flames ignited the bullets, mortar rounds, flares and grenades inside, rocketing them into the sky and across pastures.

Gunnery Sgt. Chuck Hurley emerged from the smoke and turmoil around the vehicle, circling toward the spot where helicopters would later land to pick up casualties. As he passed one group of Marines, he uttered one sentence: "That was the same squad."

Among the four Marines killed and 10 wounded when an explosive device erupted under their Amtrac on Wednesday were the last battle-ready members of a squad that four days earlier had battled foreign fighters holed up in a house in the town of Ubaydi. In that fight, two squad members were killed and five were wounded.

In 96 hours of fighting and ambushes in far western Iraq, the squad had ceased to be.

Every member of the squad - one of three that make up the 1st Platoon of Lima Company, 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment - had been killed or wounded, Marines here said. All told, the 1st Platoon - which Hurley commands - had sustained 60 percent casualties, demolishing it as a fighting force.

"They used to call it Lucky Lima," said Maj. Steve Lawson, commander of the company. "That turned around and bit us."

The Pentagon sent this unhappy group right back into Iraq just a mere month after it was badly decimated. Now they got decimated yet some more.

"That's the last of the squad," said another, Cpl. Craig Miller, whose reassignment last month had taken him out of the unit. "Three weeks ago, that would have been me."

Late Wednesday, helicopters flew out Hurley and the remaining members of 1st Platoon for time off. They are to return after the platoon is remade, Marines said.

Some break, no? What? A week?

As we watch our military get ground down, Russia and China flex their muscles. In two weeks, they will conduct war games. Uzbekistan is kicking us out of a key province we tagged as our own. The surrender talks in Korea continue as we twist and turn, trying desperately to not make it look like a surrender to a member of the Axis of Evil and a strong hardliner is taking over Iran this week and he has every intention of being a good friend of Russia and China while extending his power over southern Iraq.

About southern Iraq: it seems quiet only because it is now a fortress of power for the Shi'ite radicals who pretty much run the place and don't let anyone meddle in their affairs. From Yahoo news:

An American freelance journalist was found dead in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, the U.S. Embassy said Wednesday.

Police said Steven Vincent had been shot multiple times after he and his Iraqi translator were abducted at gunpoint hours earlier.

The British aren't being killed simply because they aren't running anything in that place. They hide out in their various spider holes and hope no one notices they are lurking about the place.

Vincent and the translator were seized Tuesday afternoon by five gunmen in a police car as they left a currency exchange shop, police Lt. Col. Karim al-Zaidi said.

Vincent's body was discovered on the side of the highway south of Basra later. He had been shot in the head and multiple times in the body, al-Zaidi said.

Police said Vincent, a writer who had been living in New York, had been staying in Basra for several months working on a book about the history of the city.

In an opinion column published July 31 in The New York Times, Vincent wrote that Basra's police force had been heavily infiltrated by members of Shiite political groups, including those loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Vincent quoted an unidentified Iraqi police lieutenant as saying that some police were behind many of the assassinations of former Baath Party members that have taken place in Basra.

"He told me that there is even a sort of "death car" — a white Toyota Mark II that glides through the city streets, carrying off-duty police officers in the pay of extremist religious groups to their next assignment," he wrote.

Vincent was also critical of the British military, which is responsible for security in Basra, for turning a blind eye to abuses of power by Shiite extremists in the city.

Bet more than one entity wanted this pesky reporter dead. Just as our rulers want us to get only good news from this mess, the residents in southern Iraq want to work in the dark. I remember the campaign to destroy al Sadr. There were tons of news stories and lots of talk about him. Then we threw away a Marine division, going after him. We then declared victory and let him be installed into the government of Iraq.

Way to go. This is how we are fighting the War on Terror War on Violent Extremism: by surrendering abjectly.

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BREAKING NEWS: Even as I clicked to post this story, my husband, on the other computer, said, "Look! 14 Marines just got killed in the same city!" Sure enough. From the BBC:

It is one of the deadliest attacks on US forces since the 2003 invasion.

It happened near the city of Haditha, in the same area as an incident on Monday in which six US marines were killed by hostile gunfire.

The city is near the Syrian border in an area that has seen frequent insurgent assaults against US troops.

The bomb is reported to have exploded near an amphibious assault vehicle travelling south of Haditha. One other marine was wounded.

At least 37 US military personnel have been killed in Iraq in the last 10 days during in a period of intense violence, but the latest Haditha attack ranks among the biggest US losses.

Good grief. Right on the heels of the GOP loudmouths mouthing off about a real Marine from Ohio which seems to be taking it on the chin.

And thank you, BBC, for the death tally. I certainly couldn't get it from the American media. Geeze. This is far spookier than the Vietnam war. I remember that time. Every day, the casualty list was put on the news. Not now.

I hope Ohio is happy with the harpy they just elected.

WIN AT ANY COST

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Atrios put up a posting from Devtob at the Daily Kos:

by devtob

Tue Aug 2nd, 2005 at 12:09:14 PDT

Limbaugh went all out against Hackett today, including calling him a "staff puke" because he served as a civil affairs officer.

Midway in the third hour, Limbaugh was talking to an active duty Navy officer from Houston and asked what "civilian" affairs officers do. The Navy guy said they are liaison with the local authorities.

"So he wasn't in combat," the anal-pimple chickenhawk asked.

The Navy guy said yes, then Limbaugh said Hackett was just a "staff puke," several times.

Made me want to puke all over the steering wheel.

BTW, Limbaugh was probably following the Rove plan for a last-day slime of Hackett because it is SO CLOSE. Update [2005-8-2 18:44:14 by devtob]: The transcript from Limbaugh's Web site is now below the jump.

As the online money poured into Ohio to help long shot Democratic contender, Paul Hackett, the GOP was forced to unload every weapon they had.

And this is what they unloaded.

Readers of this blog know I consider the entire leadership and the mass media operators working for them to be a singular class of traitors. Back when they laughed off Reagan running off to Japan to collect a huge amount of money after mindlessly waving to people who could barely understand a few English phrases...I knew that the game was up and it was only a matter of time before everything would fall apart for no empire lasts long when the emperors and their hanger-ons tirelessly destroy all patriotism and good things.

Right now, these same criminals want you and me and my son to sign up to support the stupid war in Iraq. They won't sign up, they want you and me to sign up. They are too cowardly to fight even mice but they want us to fight. Then they openly insult us.

They insulted a Democrat who was a parapeligic. They insulted one that was awarded purple hearts. They insulted one that flew many missions over Nazi Germany! They insulted a captain of a nuclear sub who was sent undersea to watch on the Russians, a very dangerous mission.

There is no Democrat they won't smear in particular, if they went into tremendous danger. Nixon, who fought WWII behind the lines like Reagan, smeared McGovern who was the hero who survived more than fifty missions flying over the deadliest parts of Germany. Nixon and his crew mocked Kennedy who was nearly killed in the Pacific. They smeared Gore who went to Vietnam, like Kerry, as a volunteer. They made every excuse in the book for AWOL Bush and deferment Cheney.

The demon who is death that these men worship whispers sweet nothings in their ears. Rush, a notorious coward, gets all bloated with glee at the thought of tearing down and smearing real heroes. He hates them.

He wants them all destroyed for their very existence is a slap in his fat, cowardly face and he can't stand it anymore than the entire leadership of the GOP.

The fact that he was compelled to commit this outrageous act of treason, for it is treason to attack our hard fighting troops, at least, this is what the media screamed at Durbin when he accurately pointed out that our Gitmo based gulag system is an outrage, they yelled that he was demoralizing the troops and they made him apologize over and over.

You can bet, we will see no yapping pundits screaming at Rush. Not one. Not even their weasels they keep in their back pockets will make a sound.

Dead silence. As more than 25 soldiers got blown up in the last 7 days, the dead more than 1800, the wounded countless since they won't give traditional casualty figures, who knows? 50,000? And the suicides? And the many dead in Afghanistan which is collapsing?

I can't get our rich people to fire these clowns running their goofy party. All I can say is, may the gods dish out the deserved desserts for Rush and all his buddies.

http://culturelifenewsii.blogspot.com/

BOLTON'S CRASH LANDING

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Once again, Bush rules without consulting the Senate. This reminds me of the Roman Empire. Luckily, or from Sparky, my horse's view, unluckily, Bush won't make his favorite horse a Senator. Actually, appointing my proud and now bereaved gelding to the UN might be a smarter thing than putting this ugly, irritable, hostile and to my eyes, demented man in the international spotlight.

But then, this is how America wants to be seen. The Ugly American 2.0.

From the Voice of America:

President Bush is putting John Bolton in the job of United Nations ambassador without a Senate confirmation vote. The move came at a time when the Bolton nomination stalled on Capitol Hill.

Under the U.S. Constitution, the president has the right to install nominees without a confirmation vote during a congressional recess.

Shortly after lawmakers left town for their month-long August break, President Bush did just that. He said, because of partisan bickering, John Bolton was denied the vote he deserves.

"As a result, America has now gone more than six months without a permanent ambassador to the United Nations," he said. "This post is too important to leave vacant any longer."

The Bolton nomination proved extremely controversial in the Senate. A favorite of conservatives, he was seen by critics as too brash for the crucial diplomatic post. They alleged that during his tenure as head of the State Department's arms control office, he intimidated subordinates, manipulated information, and voiced disdain for the United Nations.

The White House denied those charges, calling Mr. Bolton a tough talker who speaks his mind.

Go to any insane asylum and you will meet lots of people who speak their minds, too. Ever play poker with a Foghorn Leghorn guy? Heh.

Diplomats who blurt out whatever is popping into their vastly underfunctioning brains are easy prey for real diplomats who weigh their words and carefully craft their sentiments and who are cold fish like, say, Mr. Tang who learned to be cautious while cleaning pig stalls during the Cultural Revolution. He hides his mind behind a very carefully built mask. Just look at his eyes.

And he can afford to smile these days. If the Chinese put in a puppet at the head of the USA so that the puppet would ruin this great country, this is exactly how it would unfold. Even alarmed people within the government can't stop this Manchurian Idiot, Bush will do what he will do when he will do it and he was told by Mr. Tang and his daddy that spitting in the world's eye is good. It will teach them all a lesson and they will cower in awe and fear.

Like the Iraqis.

And the Afghani peasants. Shivvering with terror at the tread of this Infant Terrible.

Hail, Caligula!

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SUPREME INJUSTICE

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The sewage flowing from Gitmo never ceases. Frantically, now, the very people running this doggie show are leaking vital information detailing our spiral down the gulag drain. The lastest to smack into the web is this. From ABC news:

Leaked emails from two former prosecutors claim the military commissions set up to try detainees at Guantanamo Bay are rigged, fraudulent, and thin on evidence against the accused.

Two emails, which have been obtained by the ABC, were sent to supervisors in the Office of Military Commissions in March of last year - three months before Australian detainee David Hicks was charged and five months before his trial began.

The first email is from prosecutor Major Robert Preston to his supervisor.

Maj Preston writes that the process is perpetrating a fraud on the American people, and that the cases being pursued are marginal.

"I consider the insistence on pressing ahead with cases that would be marginal even if properly prepared to be a severe threat to the reputation of the military justice system and even a fraud on the American people," Maj Preston wrote.

"Surely they don't expect that this fairly half-arsed effort is all that we have been able to put together after all this time."

Maj Preston says he cannot continue to work on a process he considers morally, ethically and professionally intolerable.

"I lie awake worrying about this every night," he wrote.

"I find it almost impossible to focus on my part of mission.

"After all, writing a motion saying that the process will be full and fair when you don't really believe it is kind of hard, particularly when you want to call yourself an officer and lawyer."

Maj Preston was transferred out of the Office of Military Commissions less than a month later.

I recall the Nuremburg Trials, my dad was there for the prosecution, I do recall that some of the people put on trial there were top Nazi judges and lawyers. The Nazis thought, if they wrote laws and passed them, this made everything they did legal! We squelched that notion hard at the Nuremburg trials. This is why we have the whole thing of "crimes against humanity" which we now denounce and refuse to acknowledge.

Here is another lawyer decrying our legal collapse: From Time magazine:

moved to Washington in the weeks after Pearl Harbor — remember, this was a war that everyone wanted to fight in — and worked as an attorney for a member of the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel. One Sunday afternoon in June I was called and asked to report to the Justice Department, where for three months I worked as the youngest of 10 lawyers who tried the saboteurs. In the days after Hoover's announcement, I helped draft a proclamation for Roosevelt that created a military commission to try foreign spies and saboteurs, and denied them the right to judicial review and the right to trial in nonmilitary U.S. courts. They would, instead, be tried by a military tribunal of seven generals, none a trained lawyer, in a conference room in the FBI headquarters, on the fifth floor of the Justice Department, away from the press, a civilian jury and civilian judges.

The appointment of a Justice Department attorney this week to flesh out Bush's order is welcome, because the current document seems incomplete in at least three respects: it does not define "terrorism," rules of evidence for a military trial are not specified and it makes what in most cases may be a vain attempt to ban an outside nonmilitary judicial review of any American military trial in the U.S. or abroad. For example, if a suspected terrorist were apprehended in France, it seems unlikely that the French judiciary would turn the suspect over for military trial in France or the U.S. without reviewing the case. In general, most countries, including France, refuse to extradite their own nationals. Even in the wartime fervor of 1942, the U.S. Supreme Court ignored Roosevelt's order denying the German saboteurs access to the civilian court. The Court reached the merits of the saboteurs' appeal and upheld the convictions and the penalties — death by electrocution for all but the two defectors — to proceed.

In July 1942, when the first witness took the stand and was asked the first question, Kenneth Royall, the appointed counsel for the defendants, stood up and made a valid objection to the form of the question. The tribunal recessed for 45 minutes, roughly the amount of time it takes to smoke a good cigar, and returned with their response. Objection overruled. The question was answered and another asked. Royall stood up and made a second sound objection, but after another cigar break, the panel again overruled him. At this rate the trial would have lasted three years, but Royall took the generals' hint and sat virtually mum for the remainder of the month-long trial.

You see, this article, written at the beginning of our Gitmo gulag adventure, accurately points out several dangerous flaws in the Bush "justice" system, flaws that were quite deliberate and are very ongoing and which lie at the root of all the unfolding scandals that are destroying our international image as well as our collective souls.

The WWII trials were turned into a farce via the mechanism of not allowing the lawyers for the defendants any say in the matter. They allowed the trials to become Nazified. Namely, the end was a foregone conclusion and anyone interfering with it was to be shamed or ignored or silenced in some fashion.

The full Nuremburg Trials grow more and more tawdry as the years pass thanks to our own Nazification. As we become the beacon of torture and murder, we don more and more the judicial robes the Nazi judges wore. Anyone not doing this retires or resigns or is entangled in sudden scandals and offenses.

From Ohio.com:

A Guantanamo detainee who once was Osama bin Laden's driver can be tried by military tribunal, a federal appeals court ruled Friday, apparently clearing the way for the Pentagon to resume trials suspended when a lower court ruled the procedures unlawful.

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled unanimously against Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni.

More broadly it said that the 1949 Geneva Convention governing prisoners of war does not apply to al-Qaida and its members. That supports a key assertion of the Bush administration, which has faced international criticism for holding hundreds of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay without full POW protections.

"I think pretty much the entire opinion would be welcomed by the administration. I think there's nothing in there that is adverse to the administration's positions," Carl Tobias, a professor of law at the University of Richmond, said in a telephone interview. "It's a very pro-administration decision."

You know, this is sort of like trying Hitler's cleaning lady. Or Eisenhower's driver, who was a woman, by the way, and his mistress.

This is ridiculous on a thousand levels. I can see us interrogating, without torture, the driver for information. But putting him on trial? What was his crime? Running stoplights in Afghanistan?

Seriously, this is at the core of what is destroying us. Our lust for revenge which soured the Nuremburg Trials, has exposed us to being utter fools and criminals in our lust to punish bystanders. It runs an awful lot like the attitude the Japanese had towards prisoners. They were to be used, abused and killed because it was possible and convenient and felt good. We executed their leaders for this. Did we execute Hirohito's chauffuer?

Finally, From the Pentagon:

Intelligence analysts observe interrogations remotely from this room in Camp 5, the new state-of-the-art detention and intelligence facility at Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Photo by Kathleen T. Rhem (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.
He is sitting on a black, padded folding chair, calmly doing stretching exercises within the limits of his restraints. Handcuffs are attached to a chain belt around his waist, and his leg irons are attached to an iron ring in the gray cement floor.

The small room is brightly lit and appears spotlessly clean. A table in the corner is empty, except for a few bottles of water.

This scene played out in mid-February in an interrogation room in Camp 5, the state-of-the-art detention and interrogation facility completed here in 2004. After agreeing to strict ground rules, reporters were allowed to view the interrogation via a video feed from a remote location and with the sound turned off.

A few minutes earlier, three Army military police officers with the names on their uniforms covered with tape had escorted the man into the room. They appeared to exchange polite niceties, and the detainee seemed to be familiar with the process. He even assisted the MPs in correctly fastening the shackles through the chair and into the ring on the floor.

After the detainee sat alone for about five minutes, stretching, examining his fingernails and gazing around the room, the MPs came in again, removed the shackles and handcuffs, and left. One individual, wearing black combat boots, green camouflage pants and a brown T-shirt, stayed in the room and pulled up another chair directly in front of the detainee.

For at least 20 minutes the two men appeared to speak casually. The reporters were escorted out before the session was finished, but during the observed period, neither man appeared irritated or angry at any time. The detainee sat with his legs comfortably crossed, and once he stood and rested a leg on the seat of the chair. At times he gestured animatedly. The two men smiled at each other occasionally and even appeared to chuckle once.

Our detainees seem to be having a happy time, now. Lots of good food and good chat. And this is all hunky dory. The torture which raged on for three years is now over. Thanks to the news leaks and cameras that photographed our crimes. Everyone is now at ease. According to the Pentagon, we are getting tons of great information even today! So it all came out well.

Well.

Talk about stupid. First, the information is utterly useless. Al Qaeda has morphed all over the planet and it has, like any virus, mutated totally and is working its cancerous wonders as bin Laden wished. We lost in Iraq and Afghanistan and are bleeding like crazy in both places and one of the key of bin Laden's triumph is the torture. Without it, he would have one less weapon for fighting us.

The Pentagon childishly believes that the informtion we glean today is going to make us big and strong tomorrow.

This must be why we are celebrating the rise in power of Abdullah, the new ruler of Saudi Arabia. Oh, we do pray he keeps his corrupt and evil talons buried deep in that oil nation! We will literally do anything to keep him in power.

Bin Laden knows this and he uses this against us. Leverage. It is all about leverage and public perception.

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INEXCUSABLE TORTURE

It never seems to end. When Congressman Durbin stood in the House and denounced our gulag system for being evil, the right wingers and the media attacked him and pretended he was attacking the troops and not Federal policies put in place by the Bush team under the guise of the ill named Patriot Act.

He was cowed into retracting these words. And Newsweek had to retract the Koran desecration story even as Bush had to confirm it just one week after the media/right wing storm over what turned out to be the truth.

Now the story breaks open like a puss filled wound, yet again, on several fronts. The inner gangrene is now totally rotting our limbs and there probably will be an amputation some day. I know what to amputate!

From Newsweek

An FBI agent warned superiors in a memo three years ago that U.S. officials who discussed plans to ship terror suspects to foreign nations that practice torture could be prosecuted for conspiring to violate U.S. law, according to a copy of the memo obtained by NEWSWEEK. The strongly worded memo, written by an FBI supervisor then assigned to Guantanamo, is the latest in a series of documents that have recently surfaced reflecting unease among some government lawyers and FBI agents over tactics being used in the war on terror. This memo appears to be the first that directly questions the legal premises of the Bush administration policy of "extraordinary rendition"—a secret program under which terror suspects are transferred to foreign countries that have been widely criticized for practicing torture.

It never ends. The CIA agents who went into Italy to kidnap a man without warrant nor any legal controls, flew him to an undisclosed location to be tortured. This has cause a serious rift in relations with Italy. Whatever information the guy had, it didn't do us any good if it alienated a good ally.

In a memo forwarded to a senior FBI lawyer on Nov. 27, 2002, a supervisory special agent from the bureau's behavioral analysis unit offered a legal analysis of interrogation techniques that had been approved by Pentagon officials for use against a high-value Qaeda detainee. After objecting to techniques such as exploiting "phobias" like "the fear of dogs" or dripping water "to induce the misperception of drowning," the agent discussed a plan to send the detainee to Jordan, Egypt or an unspecified third country for interrogation. "In as much as the intent of this category is to utilize, outside the U.S., interrogation techniques which would violate [U.S. law] if committed in the U.S., it is a per se violation of the U.S. Torture Statute," the agent wrote. "Discussing any plan which includes this category could be seen as a con-spiracy to violate [the Torture Statute]" and "would inculpate" everyone involved.

The dogs again. Over and over, the dogs. Now the pretense that the soldiers at the very bottom were out of control, having fun, disobeying orders, collapses when the dogs come into the story for not one of the soldiers had their own dogs.

All the dogs came from Gitmo. And so did their handlers. And so did their boss, the Generals in charge.

The con artists running America would rather blame the pooches rather than admit they are the criminals here. Oh, and yes, we are criminals. And just today, the Washington Post celebrated Condi for being so clever as to write UN stuff about war crimes but not signing it because she doesn't want us to be put on trial for obvious war crimes!

Way to go.

From Watching the Watchers:

By Lee Russ, Section News
Posted on Fri Jul 29, 2005 at 05:02:56 PM EST

It looks like even more U.S. authority figures are being nailed as liars. The Washington Post today includes a story with the headline The Truth About Abu Ghraib, detailing the evidence that Major General Geoffrey D. Miller lied when he testified to Congress last year that he did not recommend the use of dogs for interrogation at Abu Ghraib, and that dogs had not been used at Guantanamo (where he was formerly the commander).

Evidence form hearings at Fort Meade are described as strongly suggesting that Gen. Miller lied about his actions, and as meriting further investigation by prosecutors and Congress. The Post also reports that there is evidence that the Guantanamo commander was not acting on his own, but was initially acting under rules approved by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Dec. 2, 2002. After strong protests from military lawyers, the Rumsfeld standards -- which explicitly allowed nudity, the use of dogs and shackling -- were revised in April 2003. Yet the same practices were later adopted at Abu Ghraib, at least in part at the direct instigation of Gen. Miller.

Again, the dogs that doth bark at the moon.

General Miller is a war criminal. We hung Nazis and Japanese Generals who ran the notorious prison camps, you know. We were very stern about this matter. And here we are, pretending that the fighters we have trapped in this hell hole gulag system are not fighters so we can capriciously hold them and torture them until they die.

Amazing.

This is America today. Well, the Chinese are happy. We can't finger point at their gulag system, can we?

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IOKIYAR--IMPERSONATING THE SS

Secret Service tracks dangerous antiwar peaceniks.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Some time ago, as per usual, when Bush appears in public, being a coward, he had his audience scrubbed of all possible opponents or even people who might not clap loudly enough for Tinkerbell.


The three scary people that Bush is hiding from.

Ooooh. (OK, the real question is, are they single? Heh.)

From the Rocky Mountain News:

Federal prosecutors have declined to press charges of impersonating a Secret Service agent against a White House volunteer who ousted three people from a speech by President Bush in Denver on March 21.

The announcement was made Friday in a letter to Colorado Sen. Ken Salazar and Reps. Mark Udall and Diana DeGette, all Democrats, who had asked for a Secret Service investigation into the incident.

Evidently, even though this clown breaking Federal laws dressed like a SS agent and acted like an SS agent, didn't quack like an SS agent. So long as he didn't say Valerie Plame's name, it's OK to fool people into believing one is a fake SS agent. Note how our rulers parse everything! The intent of the law, making it very dangerous for people to impersonate any officers, is suddenly heaved off the cliff if the criminal is working for our rulers. Then, the law is fine tuned to death.

The three, Alex Young, 26; Karen Bauer, 38; and Leslie Weise, 39, said they were told by the Secret Service that the man admitted ejecting them because they arrived at the event in a car with a "No more blood for oil" bumper sticker.

U.S. Attorney William Leone said the investigation was "thorough and complete."

"I am certain that the Secret Service would demand, and our office would aggressively prosecute, any person who was found to be impersonating a Secret Service agent if the facts warranted such a prosecution," Leone said in a statement. "This is not such a case."

He added, "Criminal law is not an appropriate tool to resolve this dispute. The normal give and take of the political system is the appropriate venue for a resolution."

What? We are supposed to have a revolution or coup and overthrow the criminals? Is this what he is suggesting? Or maybe take back our government? So it is OK to be a criminal and to fix this, all one has to do is take over the entire government and then arrest them?

OK. Aux la Barricades!

This was a public forum and we enlarged the offending bumper sticker that tagged our three enterprising citizens. Offensive as hell! Talking about oil and all that. Don't look at that listing oil rig!

Ah, but there is much more about this. From the Rocky Mountain News:

Here's the press release the Young Republicans put out last Wednesday, April 27.
-----Original Message-----
From: Dan Kopelman [mailto:dkopelman@technologist.com]On Behalf Of press@dmyr.org
Sent: Wednesday, April 27, 2005 4:18 PM
To: dkopelman@technologist.com
Subject: FOR IMMEDIATE Release - Denver Metro Young Republicans


FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
"Denver Three" Member Harasses Young Republican Chair

Karen Bauer, one of three people removed from President Bush's Social Security meeting posed as a Rocky Mountain News journalist while grilling Jay Bob Klinkerman at a regular meeting of the Denver Metro Young Republicans. Klinkerman is chair of the Colorado Young Republicans, a group unaffiliated with the Denver Metro Young Republicans.

Ann Imse, staff writer for the Rocky Mountain News and photographer Evan Semon, escorted Bauer into the meeting.

"They were waiting in the restaurant area until our meeting began. They then joined our meeting in progress in a private room. They declined signing our guest form or to introduce themselves which is standard at our meetings," said Jude Sandvall, President of the Denver Metro Young Republicans.

It was only discovered after the harsh questioning of Klinkerman that Bauer was not a reporter and that she had shown up with Imse to intentionally confront the Young Republican chair.

"The sad thing is that we have enjoyed a great relationship with the press media in the past. Ann Imse's behavior is beyond our worst expectations in her attempt at deception. I'm truly disappointed with the Rocky Mountain News," concluded Sandvall.

The Denver Metro Young Republicans have been meeting at On the Border Cantina for more than 7 years on the 4th Tuesday every month at 6:30pm. They are independent from any State or National Young Republican organization and have been in continuous existence for more than 40 years in the Denver Metropolitan region.

Please direct all inquiries to press@dmyr.org

Seems our dear little yellow elephants met one of the reporters for the newspaper who was along with one of the victims of the fake SS officer and she was there to ID the man the reporter suspected was the law breaker in question.

When the Young Chickenhawks began to argue with the reporter, they argued with her, too. Then, being weasels, they tried to pretend she was doing what they do all the time: fake it. Pretend to be what she isn't.

This has fallen flat because a real reporter was there and witnessed the whole thing. It is an interesting read.

Here is the letter from Senator Salazar of Colorado asking for an investigation:

U.S. Senator Ken Salazar
Member of the Agriculture, Energy and Veterans Affairs Committees
2300 15th Street, Suite 450 Denver, CO 80202 | 702 Hart Senate Building, Washington, D.C. 20510

For Immediate Release
April 6, 2005
CONTACT: Cody Wertz – Press Secretary
202-228-3630
Jen Clanahan – Deputy Press Secretary
303-455-7600

April 5, 2005

Mr. Dennis S. Schindel
Office of Inspector General
U.S. Department of the Treasury
1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20220

Honorable Mitch Morrissey
District Attorney
2nd Judicial District
201 West Colfax Avenue
Denver, CO 80202

Dear Mr. Schindel and District Attorney Morrissey:

I am writing to request that you investigate a matter related to the alleged impersonation of a Secret Service agent by a political operative at a recent town hall forum hosted by the President.

I understand three Colorado residents were allegedly forcibly removed from a town hall forum on Social Security in Denver at the Wings Over the Rockies Museum on March 2, 2005 – one in a series of such forums hosted by President Bush – by an individual who may have been falsely posing as an agent of the U.S. Secret Service. The three also allege they were threatened with arrest if they did not leave.

I am extremely troubled by these allegations. Both Colorado state and federal laws make it a crime to impersonate a law enforcement officer. Specifically, Colorado law makes it clear that the impersonation of a law enforcement officer or public servant is a crime, §18-8-112 and §18-8-113, C.R.S. Moreover, under federal law, a crime is committed by a person impersonating a federal officer or employee and that crime is punishable by up to three years in prison, 18 U.S.C. §912. Other state or federal laws may apply.

The three Coloradans, Karen Bauer, Alex Young, and Leslie Weise have contacted me regarding their removal from the event. I accordingly ask you to undertake an investigation into this matter and, if the facts so warrant, to prosecute those who have violated either state or federal law.


Thank you in advance for your consideration of this request.

Sincerely,

Ken Salazar
United States Senator

You know, the Republican pretending to be an SS officer threatened the three young people with arrest as well as using some minor force to get them to leave the stadium. This is clearly illegal as the Senator notes.

Here is an example of how the law works: From the Secret Service Government site:

Marcos D. Jiménez, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, William Sims, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Secret Service, Miami Field Office, Michael S. Clemens, Special Agent in Charge of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Miami Field Office, and Jon Sall, Special Agent in Charge, Coast Guard Investigative Service, Department of Homeland Security, announce that ROBERTO MARTIN was sentenced today by United States District Court Judge Ursula Ungaro on five counts of fraud. Martin previously had pleaded guilty to charges that he falsely impersonated federal agents in connection with a billion dollar fraud scheme. Following a four hour sentencing hearing, Martin was immediately remanded to serve a nine (9) year prison term. In addition, he was ordered to pay $774,625 in restitution to various victims, and a $500 special assessment.

As set forth in the Indictment, ROBERTO MARTIN was charged with participating in a scheme in which he sought to unjustly enrich himself by falsely representing to certain individuals that he worked with the Central Intelligence Agency on an alleged “secret operation” that involved obtaining money that had been stolen from Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, and that those individuals could receive a share of the money if they provided the defendants with money to finance the “secret operation.” As part of the scheme, MARTIN claimed that he was a former Cuban intelligence officer who had defected from Cuba, and falsely represented that he was then working for the CIA on an alleged “secret operation” to recover money that he had helped steal from Castro. Previously, Martin’s co-defendant, Christopher Johnson, pleaded guilty to similar charges that he falsely represented to others that he was “Special Agent Chris McClenic” of the United States Secret Service, and that he assisted MARTIN with the alleged “secret operation.” At meetings with participants in the alleged “secret operation,” MARTIN carried a firearm and a law enforcement-style badge case, and Johnson carried a firearm, wore an ear-piece style radio and used a business card from the USSS in the name of Chris McClenic.

He got eight years in the clink for this! It sounds identical to the law breaking of the Young Republican renegade, doesn't it?

Here is another, spooky story about real/fake Secret Service agents harrassing people. From Essential Liberties.com:

The whole strange thing began nearly two years ago, when an acquaintance e-mailed me, wondering why the Secret Service had contacted him to ask if he thought I was a threat to George W. Bush. Me? A pretzel is more of a threat to Bush than I am. At the time, I was writing an unauthorized biography of Microsoft's C.E.O., Steve Ballmer. I fully expected the Beast from Redmond to keep tabs on me -- which, of course, it did and which, of course, Ballmer publicly denied -- but the Secret Service?

Private investigators have been known to intimate that they're with the government, so I called the Secret Service's Seattle office to report that someone might be impersonating one of their agents. No, the officer responded, they had wanted to contact me for the past eight months but couldn't find me. Weird -- my name and number were in the Seattle phone book. I went to their office to find out what was going on.

After a couple of pat-down searches, I sat in a small room with the good cop, Steve, and the bad cop, whom I'll call Cruella. Steve said they had received a report that, on Oct. 12, 2000, I was overheard in a D.C. bar saying, ''I have friends in the C.I.A. who will make sure Bush doesn't enter the White House.'' I responded that except for the facts that I don't have any friends in the C.I.A. (that I know of) and that I've never thought, let alone said, something like that, I was in Philadelphia that day. Unfazed, Cruella opened an inch-thick file. Everything I've ever done wrong in my life flashed before me. (Took about a nanosecond.) She then said, firmly, ''You've been arrested for trespassing on federal property in Washington.''

The jig was up. Brilliant police work. As was widely reported, in 1986 this son of a librarian was convicted of a petty misdemeanor, having been caught red-handed studying after hours in the Library of Congress. Seriously. I helped lead a successful civil disobedience action protesting evening-hours reductions by not leaving when the new hours went into effect.

I know if I dig hard, a number of such stories especially the "fake SS" stories will pop up because the GOP has been doing this for four long years. And will continue doing it. Why the SS wants to reduce their authority and purity in this fashion is obvious.

They are tools of the GOP, too. Unlike the CIA which demanded Rove be investigated, for they knew it was him from day one, the Secret Service will remain silent because they don't work for us, the citizens.

They work for the dictator, Bush.

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CHINA'S SHADOW, CONDI

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The propaganda machine in America whirls on. From the Washington Post:

Now six months on the job, Rice has clearly wrested control of U.S. foreign policy. The once heavy-handed Defense Department still weighs in, but Rice wins most battles -- in strong contrast to her predecessor, Colin L. Powell. White House staff is consulted, but Rice designed the distinctive framework for the administration's second-term foreign policy.

In short order, she has demonstrated a willingness to bend on tactics to accommodate the concerns of allies without ceding on broad principles, what she calls "practical idealism." She also conducts a more aggressive personal diplomacy, breaking State Department records for foreign travel and setting up diplomatic tag teams with top staff on urgent issues.

U.S. foreign policy has always had "a streak of idealism, which means that we care about values, we care about principle," Rice said in an interview last week. "The responsibility, then, of all of us is to take policies that are rooted in those values and make them work on a day-to-day basis so that you're always moving forward toward a goal."

Our "streak of idealism" seems to be pretty bloody, no? And the "goal"? What is this goal?

To any outsider, it looks like the diplomatic/domestic political goal is to put America deeply into hock vis a vis Japan and China and to bankrupt the government so they can no longer provide any social services to Americans, thus reducing them to serfhood?

On North Korea, Rice got the prickly Pyongyang government back to six-nation talks last week on nuclear disarmament by publicly recognizing it as a "sovereign state," then empowering her top aide on East Asia to repeatedly meet privately with the North Koreans -- extended contact forbidden during Powell's era.

OK. I will explain: Powell wanted to continue the Clinton NK iniatives. Bush didn't let him. Now Condi is doing this and it is OK. OK? Geeze.

What a victory for the lady. I wonder how she did this? Since she called him her "husband" not too long ago, I suppose it was the post cloital pillow talk.

But much worse, as I detailed last night, Mr. Tang of the Chinese Central Committee, did all the real work here, getting NK set up, going of to give Bush Sr. his marching orders, then going to Condi and explaining to her what she must do next, then running back to Beijing to alert the other committee members and then back to NK to draw up the treaty of surrender so that it is worded carefully to look as if the USA itself surrendered because we really wanted to surrender. Isn't raw diplomacy fun?

On Iran, Rice agreed to offer incentives -- allowing the Islamic republic to apply for eventual membership in the World Trade Organization and buy badly needed spare parts for aging passenger aircraft -- in exchange for a European pledge to support U.N. Security Council action if talks fail. Powell had trouble just getting the White House to drop language including Iran in an "axis of evil," which implied eventual confrontation.

Powell couldn't get Bush to change his language but a few sessions at night from Condi and voila! Bush drops the Axis of Evil and even the entire War on Terror! What a magician she is! How very amazing. She sure is talented and skilled!

Hahahaha.

My cats have greater skills at manipulating minds.

With India, she brokered a deal to sell peaceful nuclear technology that will cement U.S.-India relations, but which may also risk undermining the treaty to halt nuclear weapons proliferation.

An absolute genius. India makes a nuke and shows it off, we then punish India, India runs off to....China and signs a series of important treaties. Then we go to India and...surrender! Wow.

Surrendering is very easy to do. You sign the dotted line and give up. This is what Condi means by "ideals". The ideal diplomacy is to OK everything and obey one's masters, the Chinese, in this case.

On Sudan, Rice found middle ground between the administration's rejection of the International Criminal Court and U.N. efforts to launch a war crimes investigation into violence in the Darfur region. The State Department helped draft a U.N. resolution supporting an international probe that would pass -- but on which Washington could abstain.

Gads. This is part of the "make them laugh to death" scheme. The ever clever Condi helps draft a UN resolution for war trials and then doesn't vote for it. Oh, how amazed the world's diplomats were at this awful, hypocritical act. Great follow up for Gitmo!

In the interview, Rice said she discovered on her first European trip that, particularly on the Iran issue, "somehow we'd gotten into a position where it was the United States that was the problem . . . that was not a good place to be." So she formulated action that put the onus back on Iran and, later, North Korea.

If Condi doesn't understand how the war criminal President managed to alienate all our allies, then she is a lot dumber than even I thought. What were her actions that "put the onus back on Iran and, later, North Korea"? Well.

She twisted arms in Europe. Every time the Europeans tried to do business with Iran, she interfered. So they went back to jawboning Iran who went to the Chinese and got everything they wanted from the Chinese. The Chinese wanted Iran to go to them and this little scheme worked.

Remember, Mr. Tang is a very busy man and his visits to the Bush clan and with Condi are very important to him and they all listen very carefully to him!

The Chinese are worried about the political climate in America. They have been exposed by various media operations and are worried that American workers will get restive. They will try to assauge this as much as possible while not changing the great plans. This is why we see our rules snapping and snarling at the Chinese, then going off quietly to a restaraunt to eat a hearty meal and toast each other merrily.

Rice has worked hard -- at a pace that sometimes seems like a campaign -- to overcome her image during Bush's first term as a weak national security adviser who struggled to mediate among the strong-willed personalities vying to shape foreign policy. As secretary of state, she has surprised allies with her blunt use of diplomatic tools to make a point.

Rice cancelled a visit to Egypt and temporarily suspended $200 million in aid to signal displeasure with the arrest of a pro-reform politician. She also scrubbed a visit to Canada when it nixed participation in U.S. missile defense, a trip still not rescheduled. During a stop in Saudi Arabia, she publicly told the desert kingdom to enfranchise women. And after a trip through the rocky hills of the West Bank, where she noted new Jewish settlement construction, she cautioned Israel that more building might violate an agreement it made with Bush a year earlier.

Rice is blunt. Hahaha. Great thing for a diplomat. To be blunt. She cautioned Israel. Note how that flew. Note that Sharon continued to not only build but demanded a couple billion more from American taxpayers. Boy, was he impressed! Like the Chinese.

She did and continues to snub Canada. Not that takes great bravery. We all know how belligerent the Canadians are! They have to be kept at bay or they might clock us with a hockey puck or attack us with French only signs!

She also cut funds temporarily that support one of our Middle Eastern dictators. Great. Didn't last long, this obviously half-hearted propaganda gesture. And Saudi Arabia: oh, the women got civil rights there? Huh? Must have slipped under my "civil rights radar." More: in Iraq, women are losing their civil rights that Saddam granted them! And in Afghanistan, they had many more rights under the Soviet Russians than they do under the Americans who really don't like women's rights.

Colleagues have dubbed Rice the "velvet hammer." Philip Zelikow, State Department counselor and a close adviser, said that "one of her gifts is that she knows how to say very direct things to foreign governments in a way that is not confrontational. She is very assertive, very firm, but doesn't leave them feeling sullen and resentful."

Oh, that is why we are so very unpopular. She doesn't make "them" feel sullen and resentful? Who is "them"?

Our puppets? Our nominal allies who greatly resent the way things are being run but are too diplomatic and polite to say so in public? Is this why our popularity in the world is about the same level as North Korea?

The gist of this article is that the world's peoples are once again following America happily and the diplomacy of Rice is responsible for all this. This childish view can be reassuring if one never reads other people's papers or news media and if one ignores tons if existing information. The world has seriously realighned itself and not in our favor at all. At any level. The borders of the USA are so insecure, we had to close our consulate there. From the Associated Press

The United States will close its consulate for one week to assess the security of its employees and consulate visitors in this Mexican border town after a shootout between drug gangs using machine guns, grenades and a rocket launcher.
In a statement from Mexico City late Friday, U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza said "in light of this alarming incident and continued violence along the border, I have decided to suspend all operations except for emergency services for American citizens,'' for one week, beginning Aug. 1.
While the consulate is closed, "we will be gauging what should be a swift and certain response from the government of Mexico, to bring this situation under control,'' Garza said.

We can't secure our own borders. The Mexican government, which is firmly under our thumb, won't secure their own border with us for political reasons. American corporations don't want secure borders any more than they want unionized workers.

Why isn't Condi Rice in Mexico City?

She is too busy going back and forth for the Chinese. She has hard work to do for the Saudis. She knows perfectly well who her real bosses are.

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THE WAR ON ERROR

Bush declares the War on Terriers is finished.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I just knew this would happen. Bush said, one day, "I will make our allies hostile," and sure enough, he succeeded. He also said he would "fight the war on terriers and bariffs" and he did exactly that, too. He also admitted that he, like the family friend, Mr. bin Laden, woke up every day thinking what he could do to attack America.

He is our President. Now for a moment of shocked silence.

Today, Karen Hughes proves her worth as she changes the course of history with just a few well chosen words. From the New York Times:

The Bush administration is retooling its slogan for the fight against Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, pushing the idea that the long-term struggle is as much an ideological battle as a military mission, senior administration and military officials said Monday.

In recent speeches and news conferences, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the nation's senior military officer have spoken of "a global struggle against violent extremism" rather than "the global war on terror," which had been the catchphrase of choice. Administration officials say that phrase may have outlived its usefulness, because it focused attention solely, and incorrectly, on the military campaign.

Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the National Press Club on Monday that he had "objected to the use of the term 'war on terrorism' before, because if you call it a war, then you think of people in uniform as being the solution." He said the threat instead should be defined as violent extremists, with the recognition that "terror is the method they use."

Although the military is heavily engaged in the mission now, he said, future efforts require "all instruments of our national power, all instruments of the international communities' national power." The solution is "more diplomatic, more economic, more political than it is military," he concluded.

Is this like the Monty Python episode about WWI whereby the British intelligence services tell the soldiers to memorize a really dumb (Ein Hund, ja?) joke that causes the German soldiers to laugh to death but won't hurt the British because they speak no German and thus, can't see the humor. Well, shall we all now laugh to death?

You can bet, I will fight this battle!

Extremists such as the American right wing! They are running around this planet, killing people. They harrass and harrangue us here in America. They make threats on our lives, our homes, they..terrorize us ruthlessly. So, their leader is calling for us to struggle to stop them!

So, here it is: STOP IT! STOP IT, GODDAM IT!

Whew. This war is going to be very hard. Alas, we can't vote these extremists out of office because they wrecked our fair voting system. We can use other means to push them out and defeat these extremists. Of course, we have to storm the Vatican, too. But then, that can be arranged, too.

These anti humanist extremists are a hazard to the entire planet for they want to pollute our air and water and raise the world temperatures to an intolerable degree. They want to cut down all our forests and ship all our jobs overseas and in general, destroy us. This is a war we must fight to the bitter end. To stop fascistic, right wing extremists. We must take this fight to the Supreme Court hearings concerning the extreme right wing religious fanatic, Roberts.

He must be removed from the bench!

We must get rid of DeLay, a very notorious extremist. Orrin Hatch...down the booby hatch! This is going to be fun! We should draw up a list of all American extremists and post it on a "Most Unwanted" site. Fight! Fight the good battle.

Down with all right wing extremists!

Down with Fox TV!

Down with them all.

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CORRUPT POLITICIANS EXECUTED

Reagan's true nature

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The USA would dearly love to penetrate deep into the Chinese leadership and like they did in Iraq before our misbegotten war, bribe people to betray their own countries. We, of course, supposedly frown on others doing this to us.

The Chinese remain pretty untouchable. There is a reason for this. From Xinhuanet:

Ma De, former secretary of the municipal committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in Suihua City, Heilongjiang Province, was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve for accepting bribes on Thursday.

The Beijing No.2 Intermediate People's Court on Thursday made the first-instance trial.

According to the court verdict, from October 1993 to February 2002, the defendant Ma took advantage of his posts as deputy mayor of Mudanjiang City, northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, prefectural commissioner of Suihua area, Heilongjiang Province and secretary of the municipal committee of the CPC in Suihua City to seek gains for others after accepting bribes.

They aren't kidding, either. They have famously shot officials accused of betraying the communist party in public, in stadiums.

Ma, himself or together with his wife Tian Yazhi who will be handled in a separate case, accepted and extorted bribes worth of 6.03 million yuan (about 743,500 US dollars), including 5.586 million yuan and 55,000 US dollars. By now, all the illicit money has been recovered.

The court verdict said Ma committed the crime of bribery. The sum of bribery was big and the misdeed was very serious. But considering that Ma has confessed some bribery facts which the prosecuting bodies had not discovered and exposed the clues of other official's bribery behaviors, Ma was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve and was deprived political rights all his life with the confiscation of all his personal assets.

Wang Shenyi, former deputy secretary of the municipal committee of the CPC in Suihua City, was sentenced on Thursday 15 years in prison for taking bribe at the first-instance trial by the Beijing No.2 Intermediate People's Court.

The court verdict showed that from May 2000 to August 2002, the accused Wang took advantage of the posts as the deputy secretary of the municipal committee of the CPC in Suihua City andthe Mayor of Suihua City to reduce or exempt tax and fees for others, and allocate public funds to others, after accepting bribes totally worth 1.889 million yuan (about 232,900 US dollars).

Just look at the darn energy bill! It is a potpourie of corruption. Lobbyists poured money into all sorts of creepy politicians especially the Texas gang and got tax cuts and subsidies. Geeze, sounds similar, doesn't it?

The slush funds of the lobbyists in America surge back and forth. The politicians give them huge benefits and a percentage of this returns to the politicians in the form of "campaign donations" which can be pocketed, by the way, if not spent on cheesy attack commercials.

If we had the death penalty for this, we would need to bring in the guillotine and a host of trumbrels to haul the many thousands of politicians and lobbyists and industrialists who have brought our system down into the gutter and are rapidly bankrupting our country, spending wildly while giving each other goodies at our collective expense.

But it is much more dangerous than this!

From the Weekender:

n 1989 (September of 1989 — some dates I do remember) we returned from Santa Barbara where we had helped our daughter get settled at the University of California. Ronald Reagan’s ranch was up the hill from the campus, but I decided not to drop in on him.

Three or four days later, we were at a reception hosted by Ambassador Mike Armacost at the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, and who do you suppose was there? You guessed it. And he was still tall, tan and handsome.

Ex-president Ronald Reagan and his wife Nancy were in Japan. Reagan made a series of speeches here for more money than he earned in eight years at the White House. Good for him.

OK. I didn't find a zillion Google hits for this speech that earned Reagan an absolute fortune. It is as if it fell into a black hole but I did glean this entry. Note the comment of the author. Upon noting that the President of the fricking USA went to Japan and was paid more than his entire eight year's salary! This is greeted with a hearty "Good for him!"

Well, it certainly was good for...him. But not you and I. You see, Reagan was negotiating with the Japanese over currency issues and trade issues and military issues all of which were vital to our survival...and he was double dealing the USA from under the table!

Worse, this was greeted as good news! I will assure you that if any retired Chinese politician runs off to America to collect a huge fee, he would stay because he would be shot as a traitor if he came back to China. They feel very strongly about this matter. Very strongly.

Reagan's betrayal was successful. Next to China, Japan has run the biggest trade deficits vis a vis the USA for umpteen years. They purchase our leaders who don't worry about the money since it is given to them after leaving office. Ask Bush Sr.

The la-de-dah attitude of Americans, "Oh, look, they are getting rich!" is most peculiar but not surprising. When we learned Bush Sr's dad made a fortune helping Hitler even after he invaded Poland and began to bomb England, we thought the nation would recoil from this man.

But it didn't happen. Even the Jewish organizations shut up. Why?

Well, ask Israel. Bush Sr opened the spigots for them and they now suck down a huge amount of money from America. This bribe keeps the peace. And then back to Iraq: the people fighting us there are angry because the guys "running" the place are rank quislings willing to sell their services to a foreign government. I know that these people will all be shot, in the end. This is what happens in most places when one betrays one's people.

Just not here, that is all.

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CRAFTY CAFTA POLITICS

The Texas mob continues to steal from all Americans.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

From Atrios comes this important story:

From Think Progress.org

Tom DeLay thinks the federal treasury is his personal piggy bank. DeLay slipped “a $1.5 billion giveaway to the oil industry, Halliburton, and Sugar Land, Texas” into the energy bill.

But this isn’t a normal case of government pork. DeLay has completely dispensed with the democratic process. From a letter Rep. Henry Waxman just sent Speaker Dennis Hastert:

The provision was inserted into the energy legislation after the conference was closed, so members of the conference committee had no opportunity to consider or reject this measure.

The $1.5 billion won’t be administered by the government by a private consortium in DeLay’s district:

The subtitle appears to steer the administration of 75% of the $1.5 billion fund to a private consortium located in the district of Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Ordinarily, a large fund like this would be administered directly by the government.

Hastert and DeLay need to explain themselves immediately. No member of Congress who takes taxpayer dollars seriously should vote for the energy bill until this matter is resolved.

Not content to make oodles of money on the dead and dying soldiers and civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, not content to make oodles of money with the high and higher and even higher energy costs, these thieves conspired with Bush to simply pack their stachels with loot as they ravage the remains of the public purse.

We ran up over $2 trillion in debts during this Bush time. This is literally bankrupting America. But the buddies of our rulers aren't going belly up. They are bellying up to the bar to order more drinks on the White House.

Couple this news with the news about CAFTA, another knife in the worker's backs: From the New York Times:

House Republican leaders declared on Wednesday that they had lined up enough votes to secure approval of the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or Cafta, the most significant treaty to knock down trade barriers in more than 10 years.

President Bush made a rare trip to Capitol Hill yesterday morning.

After one of the hardest-fought legislative battles of the year, Republican leaders were able to cut enough political deals to overcome fears among many of their own members about foreign competition and push ahead despite opposition from most Democrats, labor unions and the sugar industry's powerful lobby.

"We will pass Cafta tonight," said Representative Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, said Wednesday. "It will be a tough vote," he added, but "we will honor our commitment to our neighbors to the south. We will protect our national security, and we will do it all with very few Democrats on board."

You can bet your booties the booty in the previous bill addressed here is directly connected with industrialists wanting the CAFTA bill. Tit for tits.

But the political effect is likely to loom much larger. To supporters and opponents alike, the pact became a political symbol over how to respond to globalization, competition from low-wage countries and the loss of manufacturing jobs in the United States.

The treaty has also been the focus of a power struggle between Mr. Bush, who championed the pact as a model for expanding free trade, and Democratic lawmakers, who had been hoping to hand him a high-profile defeat and to brand him as an ally of powerful corporations with global interests at the expense of American workers.

I bet Friedman is peeing in his pants over this. As for branding our banana republican, Bush, as an ally of powerful corporations: well, duh.

All fascists are. Roberts wants to be a Supreme Court Justice and he is a fascist. Cheney is a fascist. He wants secret meetings so he and the oil overlords can carve out spheres of influence and charge us an arm and a leg for energy.

And we wonder why all empires collapse.

Geeze.

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MURDER MOST FOUL

King Fahd (took over after relative murdered King Faisal) King Gyanendra (mysterious mass murder of brother's entire family) and King Richard III (murdered his nephews who were to be crowned before he).

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I vividly remember when the Nepal Royal family was machinegunned down while dining. It was on the BBC news. I immediately said, "Did they kill the evil uncle? If not, he did it." When the details came out, it confirmed my fears. Seems all the family members of the evil uncle suddenly had to either leave the room or had urgent business elsewhere and only the king, queen and their children and attendants were in the hall when all were gunned down.

From the BBC news:

The king and queen of Nepal have been killed in a massacre of royal family members by the heir to the throne.

Eleven people - including several members of the royal family - were shot dead late on Friday evening, apparently after a dinner table dispute about a bride for the heir to the throne.

King Birendra's 29-year-old son, Crown Prince Dipendra, opened fire on his parents and other family members before turning his sub-machine gun on himself. Some reports say he is on life support in hospital.

The evil uncle put out a story that the eldest son did it in retaliation for not being able to marry the woman he loved. Oh, how romantic. Yeah, right.

My family happened to know the king and queen and the others My parents spent many years going in and out of Nepal. They talked science and technology with the young king when he ascended the throne many years ago. They talked about opening schools, building universities, creating observatories! Dreams, oh so many dreams. What passed for roads when my parents came bouncing into Katmandu in a WWII jeep looks like the pictures of the same sort of jeep we used to ride up the "old road" at Kitt Peak: steep and nearly impassable with cliffs and ruts and many a flat tire.

This family was very charming. I was so upset about this, I went off to the nearest Buddhist temple to chant and pray all day. The nuns and priests were already in full white and yellow cloth mourning, incense burning. Everyone suspected the evil uncle did the bloody deed.

When the king of Bhutan married an American woman, Hope, my parents were at that wedding. The possibility of a son marrying outside the old clans wasn't really a problem for the royals in the Himalayan kingdoms for the sons ruled and so long as they became Buddhists, which is easy, then all was well. In this day and age, I could not imagine the dotting king and queen of Nepal being excessively cruel to their beloved son. And he certainly, just look at his face!--look like a murderer.

Look at my gallery of faces here. The foul deed marks their faces with deep grooves, every crime etched deeply, the frightened, cold eyes. The same mouth, turned down in disgust, one can see the invisible claws of the Furies not far off. These men fear death for they know they will be judged and judged harshly!

From the BBC news:

Former US Senator Tom Daschle has launched a scathing attack on Nepal's king, who seized power in February.
Speaking in Kathmandu after talks with King Gyanendra, Mr Daschle called for the release of ousted former PM Sher Bahadur Deuba, jailed for corruption.

Mr Daschle said all political prisoners must be freed and urged the king to scrap a controversial corruption body.

As he made his statement, security forces re-arrested a prominent student leader, Gagan Thapa.

Bush and Cheney and our Shadow Government were elated when the prince murdered his family who were liberals and were in intense talks with the Maoist rebels and with the Chinese, dealing with their country's status, and they happily applauded the new king. The bizarre details of all this, like committing suicide with a sub machine gun? Huh? Killing his siblings too? Eh? His mom? No.

The fake story impressed few Nepalese. The king, who promptly attacked the rebels and started heavy handed military operations against the peasants, is wildly unpopular. Demonstrations against his rule only caused him to conspire with Americans to overthrow the tattered remains of the monarchal democracy which my parents worked so hard to help into life.

Now he is the Mussolini of the Himalayas. The Sheik of Mount Everest.

The Fool on the Hill.

Na Nu Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo (drumming)

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WE NEED DICTATORS

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I can remember all the way back to last month. As I recall, America's scolding diplomats were running around the planet telling all and sundry that dictators were evil and it was wrong to oppress people and China and North Korea are evil and so is Russia and everyone should imitate us.

We then praised "revolutions" like the Tulip Revolution in Kyzgystan. This revolution was started by demands of the people for better economic conditions. They held an election and what a surprise.

The President was forced to flee the country to Russia and was replaced by a vote of nearly 90% support for the former Prime Minister, Bakiyev. Sort of like Bush fleeing to Beijiing and Cheney taking over, no? From Greenleft.org:

Bakiyev had served as prime minister under Akayev in 2000-02, but had resigned after police fired on opposition protesters. He then moved over to the opposition, leading protests in March that culminated in an opposition takeover of government buildings in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, and Akayev's flight to Moscow. Bakiyev took over as interim prime minister, pending the new presidential elections.

At a July 18, news conference, his first after winning the election, Bakiyev told reporters: “This election can be called a convincing victory of the popular revolution.” He then went on to say that Kyrgyzstan intended to review the presence of US troops on its soil. He made no mention of the presence of Russian troops.

This revolution was no revolution but merely a changing of the guard and the old "new" leader knew Americn troops fighting their fellow Muslims are very unpopular so he had to promise them he would remove them.

Alas, they didn't get their wish. Overriding the desires of his own voters, today, he betrays them.

“The game the Americans are playing has some of the highest stakes going. What they are attempting is nothing less than the biggest carve-out of a new US sphere of influence since the US became engaged in the Mideast 50 years ago.
“The result could be a commitment of decades that exposes America to the threat of countless wars and dangers. But this huge venture — call it an Accidental Empire — could also stabilise the fault line between the West and the Muslim world and reap fabulous energy wealth for the companies rich enough and determined enough to get it.”

“From incidental sums fewer than five years ago”, the report added, “the amount of US investment in the region has jumped to $20 billion... Major investors include ChevronTexaco Corp, Exxon Mobil Corp., BP PLC, and Halliburton.”

The BusinessWeek article explained that key to these companies exploiting the oil and gas wealth of Central Asia is the construction of pipelines that lead south to the Persian Gulf or the Indian Ocean, where it can be shipped by tanks to the energy-hungry Japan and China. However, Washington wants pipelines “that will help its friends in the region and freeze out its enemies — especially the Iranians”.

Just before 9/11, Cheney had a series of secret meetings which he refuses to divulge even today despite many attempts of others to make him cough it up, concerning this region and how we can militarily occupy it and run it for our own profit, or rather, the profit of a clique of powerful men (the Queen of England benefits, too, but she doesn't run it).

From the Chicago Tribune:

Facing pressure from Russia and China to end America's military presence in two Central Asian states, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld won assurances Tuesday from Kyrgyzstan's new leaders that they would not shut down a U.S. base on Kyrgyz soil used for combat and humanitarian missions in Afghanistan.

The U.S. air base at Manas in Kyrgyzstan and its air base at Karshi-Khanabad in southern Uzbekistan have become vital cogs in American anti-terrorism operations in Central Asia.

Serving as important conduits for humanitarian aid and military equipment sent to Afghanistan, they also are seen as part of a shift in Pentagon strategy that establishes within the world's hot spots small, rapid response outposts that can be quickly ramped up during crises. Central Asia, home to numerous Islamic extremist and terrorist groups, is one of those hot spots.

The continued use of those bases was put in doubt by a declaration July 5 by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a security coalition made up of Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. The group called on the United States to fix a date for its pullout from its Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan bases.

What humanitarian stuff? Huh? I suppose blowing up peasants has been elevated into one of the seven virtues now? Let us be frank: our empire isn't "humanitarianing" anyone. Indeed, since my own childhood, if you want to rile a right winger or neo-con or old-con, just say, "humanitarian". They go bananas!

I put out a leaflet in highschool back in 1967 mocking this. The John Birch Society was deriding "creeping humanism in our schools" so my leaflet urged fellow students to seek out and report anyone seen creeping along the school halls. And to call the authorities if they spotted any creepy people. We took rather a great joy spotting the creepy people starting with my right wing Principal.

Well, the old new ruler of Kyzgystan has been bribed to keep our troops in his country. We will up the millions we pay him for this privilage. We intend to collect a profit by collecting money for oil. Of course, this profit is strictly for Halliburton and other oil soaked entities that are buddies of Bush.

We won't see a penny. Indeed, the great profits they will collect will be coming from us!

Note that once again, world oil prices have gone up. Note how the Texan and Saudi oil barons are weeping for us.

As a footnote---From Xinhuanet:

S Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld urged Iraqis to finish drafting a new constitution without delay as he arrived in Baghdad on a surprise visit on Wednesday.

"We don't want any delays," Rumsfeld told reporters on the flight to Iraq from Tajikistan. "Now's the time to get on with it."

The constitution drafters can call a six month extension on Aug.1 if they can not complete the charter before an Aug. 15 deadline.

OK. After a secret bribing session with a man who you can bet will become an unpopular dictator since he was part of a dictatorial duo just four months ago, now Rumsfeld has to secretly sneak into our province that is in full revolt to snap orders to the Quislings running the place for us, sort of, when we let them which is about as often as we let Karzai run things in Afghanistan.

Imagine the French going to our own Constitutional Convention and at gun point, ordering our Founding Fathers to "finish is quickly or else".

We are so amazingly f*cked.

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KISSY KISSY WITH NORTH KOREA

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Interesting diplomatic news today. Aside from the twin disasters in Asia Minor, the steady beat of death and doom there ever ongoing, never ending. Bolton just might be appointed to represent us at the UN despite Congress not passing him. Way to go, diplomatically. This is a real winner, yes?

Bush, the illiterate, still refuses to hand over important Bolton papers. I suppose he wants our Senators to be equally unread. Then there is the Supreme Court nominee, the inverterate liar, Roberts. Bush won't release many of his papers, either. Unread is unknown! Best to keep that paper trail shredded or burned.

Now we are in the midst of a diplomatic push to legitimisize North Korea and cement their place in the political pantheon.


Here is the picture proof! Note the jolly faces. Note how the North Koreans look like all the others! You can't tell them apart anymore! Note the grinning American on the end, no longer snarling and calling everyone names and barking orders. Note that Condi Rice isn't there at all! Truly a tipsy-doodle photo!

What? Is this me joking? Alas, no. Since the Chinese won this round vis a vis the American Empire, I will go to their news site for how they see all of this. From Xinhuanet:

The six-party talks on the Korean Peninsula nuclear issue restarted Tuesday in Beijing after a 13-month-long impasse, with the United States promising not to attack the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK).

US chief negotiator Christopher Hill said at the opening session of the fourth round of the talks that the United States regards the DPRK as a sovereign state and has no intention to send troops to or attack it.

The US statement was of particular concern to the DPRK, who over the past years has repeatedly asked the United States to respect its sovereignty and normalize political and economic relations with it, while offering "definite assurance" of non-aggression against it.

The six nations, China, the DPRK, the United States, the Republic of Korea (ROK), Russia and Japan, have agreed to realize the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, but are yet to decide on the approach to the goal.

To find a solution to disputes, the six nations held three rounds of talks in Beijing from 2003 to 2004, but failed to achieve substantial results. The fourth round was originally planned in September last year.

Early this year, the new Bush administration called the DPRK an "outpost of tyranny." In return, the DPRK announced on Feb. 10 it was suspending its participation in the six-party talks on the nuclear issue for an "indefinite period."

The DPRK also declared that it already had self-defensive nuclear weapons.

Guess who was brought to heel here? It wasn't North Korea. Nor was it China. When Bush took the WH in the fake election in 2000, he immediately tried to tweek the Chinese who slapped him silly over the spy plane mess, then he tried to poke at the North Korean rattler and got bit.

Every time Bush and Blair shouted about Saddam having WMD, North Korea would announce they had nuclear weapons. This was deliberate. They played their poor hand and bet their tiny stakes at the table that we would be unable to counter their moves because we wanted to steal oil from Iraq and they were a diversion. This proved to be a correct analysis and the pay off is impressive: we are basically finally surrendering to them, long after the brutal Korean war stalemated. We are finally being dragged to the table to sign treaties with the North Koreans. This is most impressive.

In the past year when the six-party talks were suspended, the US side had bilateral contact with the DPRK for six times under the framework of the six-party talks.

Hill said the US side had made clear its key stance and opinions to the DPRK through those contacts and the United States was ready for "serious" talks under the same framework.

Meanwhile, DPRK's delegation head Kim Kye-gwan said political will and strategic resolution are needed to wipe out the threats of a nuclear war on the Korean Peninsula and to realize a nuclear-weapon-free Korean Peninsula.

The DPRK is ready for that, he said, adding that the DPRK side would work together with the other five parties to prevent the meeting from going fruitless.

As the host country, Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing urged negotiators to take a "flexible and pragmatic" attitude to seek "positive" progress in the new round of negotiation.

A nuclear-weapon-free Korean Peninsula and long-term peace and stability in the region would serve the interests of all parties concerned, Li said.

Noting there might be various difficulties during the talks, he said, so long as all sides worked together there would be success.

"Nothing in the world is difficult for one who sets his mind on it," he quoted a Chinese saying. "China will continue to work with all sides for realizing denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula and regional peace and stability."

I recall all the hysterical pleas from Bush and his gang, begging China to fix things up with North Korea. The smug Chinese are smiling broadly as they issue this press release. Like our begging over the value of the yuan, we, the mighty so called empire of freedom, must plead for help from the Chinese. We then slap at them, note that today, Congress is definitely interfering with business. The Unocal offer has utterly unnerved us and we show naked fear, clutching at straws, trying to wrest victory without making a better offer.

The New York Times has a rather disjointed, long article, almost as unreadable as Pravda in the good ole days. From the NYT:

Early this year, American spy satellites detected a spike in suspicious tunneling activity at a highly secretive military site in the mountains of North Korea.

It alarmed some of the government's top nuclear analysts, who saw it as a sign that North Korea might be preparing to make good on threats to conduct its first test of a nuclear weapon. There was even tantalizing talk among some officials in Washington that the North Koreans were so far along in preparing for an underground detonation that they had built a reviewing stand for dignitaries to witness the earth tremble.

Potemkin nuke tests! A cheap way to get attention and saber rattle without either a sword or a baby's shake toy. The North Koreans are no dumber than anyone else. Indeed, it would be hardly possible to be dumber than our own dear neo-cons running foreign policy these days. They knew their quarry well and stalked the USA's neo-cons and bagged them.

Our Pravda press will trumpet this sad six country negotiations as a great victory for our dear ruler and his squadrons of goons. They will prance all over, yelling, "We got peace at last!" and will thump themselves on the back for ending the Korean war at last.

Sort of like Nixon trumpetting his kow tow embassy to Mao as a great victory, too. Note how that turned out in the long run. Heck, our victory in WWII which was total is now reversed.

North Korea's true intentions on testing - whether the activity in the mountainous Kilju region was genuine or an attempt to deceive the world - may never be known. But a review of this spring's divergent assessments, based on interviews with officials from Congress, the administration, American intelligence agencies and foreign governments, reveals how the process of assessing North Korea's weapons is vulnerable to politics and to the imprecision of intelligence. Most of the officials and analysts spoke on the condition of anonymity because the subject concerned classified information and issues of political sensitivity.

Seems like everyone except for former Ambassador Wilson has to use the hoary old, "sources say" these days. DC is filled to the gills with a goofy chorus of shady shadowy non people all babbling away like Hamlet's father's ghost. We can't understand North Korea but they certainly don't need to spy on us with all these motormouthed anonymous tipsters in DC.

The question of whether North Korea would conduct a test had great significance because, many experts and officials fear, such a step could ignite a nuclear arms race in Asia.

If the more urgent view of the test preparations was circulated by the Bush administration as it sought to restart the six-nation talks, the more benign version was promoted by the C.I.A., which is struggling to overcome criticism for overestimating Iraq's unconventional weapons. Although the government overhauled its sprawling intelligence structure in the wake of 9/11 and the Iraq war, the North Korea episode highlights a lingering lack of coordination in assessing even the most serious threats.

This is pure hogwash. The arms race began in earnest in January, 2001, with the installation of Bush in the WH. He then jacked up the foolish "Star Wars" programs and the insane Missile Defense Shield and reanimated nuclear bomb research and began a nuclear shelter building program so Bush and the neo-cons can hide deep in the earth while we all fry.

Declaring war on North Korea, Iraq and Iran is the cause of all this arms building. What on earth did we expect? When we invaded Iraq after the UN certified that Saddam was in compliance with all UN protocols, China and North Korea decided to work in concert to clip our wings as well as pull our fangs.

This worked perfectly.

Now for the real interesting news from China: From Xinhuanet:

The ancient Chinese regarded sexual satisfaction as crucial for both men and women, revealed a Japanese researcher here Tuesday.

In ancient China, men played a dominant role in social issues, politics, families, and sexual affairs. Women were regarded as passive service providers in sex and their role was to satisfy men.

However, for more than 1,000 years, "The Art of the Bedchamber" underlined the pleasure, sensitivity and desires of both men and women, said Sumiyo Umekawa, a professor with the Otsuma Women's College.

Manuals starting from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) noted that females should receive as much pleasure from sexual intercourse as she gave to the man, and introduced practical skills to achieve mutual satisfaction, said Sumiyo, at the 22nd International Congress of History of Science.

In other words, if you are going to be f*cked, at least it should feel good.

Sensitive, no?

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AFGHANISTAN IMPLODING

Bin Laden's eternal message to the USA.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I parked the backhoe and finally got free of the poison ivy and flies only to come inside the nice cool house to read more ridiculous news. From the BBC:

At least 1,000 protesters have staged a demonstration outside the main US base of Bagram in Afghanistan.
The demonstrators, chanting "Die America", were angry at the arrest of a number of villagers on Monday night. Some threw stones at military vehicles.

Piles of tyres were burned on the main road near the base, sending clouds of black smoke billowing over the area.

Eyewitness say US troops fired warning shots at the demonstrators. The US military are denying this. Crowds dispersed after being told the Americans would hand the detainees to Afghan authorities.

OK. Just a month ago, old Karzai came to America to beg for us to do as he says, not as we want. He warned us to let him do the chase for bin Laden and the Taliban and to not bother the opium war lords or hold prisoners so we can torture them and mock the Koran.

Bush brushed off everything and sent him home, gloomy and empty handed. Since then, all hell has broken lose. We lost many top troops now in the fierce fighting. Peasants vs the Empire. Sounds like the Wookies against you know who. Why are we playing the bad guys all the time? Why have we lost not only their hearts and minds but lost our own minds?

The Empire pumping gas into a SUV.

"Afghan and US forces attempted to contact local leaders to involve them in the operation but were unable to do so," a statement said.

Afghan troops used batons to beat back the protesters as they tried to push down the base's outer gate.

It was not immediately clear if there were any casualties. The protesters said that the Americans should have consulted local authorities first before arresting the villagers.

"We have supported the Americans for years. We should be treated with dignity," local resident Shah Aghar told the Associated Press news agency.

"They are arresting our people without the permission of the government. They are breaking into our houses and offending the people. We are very angry," he said. Later on Tuesday the US military said the men would be handed over to the Afghan authorities.

"We met with local leaders and we agreed to release the individuals we detained last night into the custody of the local governor," US military spokesman Lt Col Jerry O' Hara told the AFP news agency.

Remember, the people in this part of Afghanistan wanted us to invade. They are our supporters. Our opponents simply shoot to kill now. The fact that they stormed the gates screaming, "Death to America" is a very bad sign. In Iraq, when we gave the natives problems, like when we occupied a school the first month we were there, we shot a number of them dead even when they were unarmed demonstrations.

This is the definition of a powderkeg. These aren't people who will turn and go home. They can't. We are in their homes so they have to confront us and they are confronting us and Congress is debating the appointment of the monumentally stupid Texan, Karen Hughes, to fix all of this with magic PR. I really do pray she is sent over to Iraq and Afghanistan. Put a beard on her and she can pretend to be bin Laden and give "Love America, give them opium and oil!" speeches.

Heck, forget the beard. Just give her a turban.

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LIAR LIAR ROBE ON FIRE

Roberts does silent photo op.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

For a whole week we had to endure the stupidest, most craven chorus of right wing Mainstream Media pap about Roberts, rank right winger candidate for the Supreme Court. With nearly no information, they declared that there was nothing bad about this jerk and that there was no way we could fillibuster him or oppose him in any way.

Well, now we have a good reason. Remember Clinton? He was supposed to be impeached for lying. Yes, lying. Lying was very very bad, the Republicans assured us of this. Of course, today, lying is not only OK, it is de rigure.

From Associated Press:

Supreme Court nominee John Roberts declined Monday to explain why he was listed in a Federalist Society leadership directory when the White House says he doesn't recall being a member of the conservative legal organization.

Roberts, nominated by President Bush last week to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, was asked by a reporter about the discrepancy during a morning get-acquainted meeting with Sen. Dianne Feinstein (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif.

He smiled but didn't reply.

"I don't think he wants to take any questions," Feinstein interjected during the session with photographers and reporters that was part of the meeting in her office with the Supreme Court nominee.

"No, no, no thanks," Roberts added.

Several news organizations, including The Associated Press, reported immediately after his nomination that Roberts had been a member of the Federalist Society. The AP and others printed corrections after the White House said later that Roberts doesn't recall ever belonging to the group.

Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, you get hired by the media bosses.

I am happy AP isn't owned by the Moonies or isn't owned by Murdoch. They overlooked this one last refuge for some news. Frankly, I get more news about America from my Commie Chinese source, Xinhua. Heh. Anyway, the real news here is that either Roberts is more brain dead than Terri or he is a liar. Or both.

He was the head of the Federalist's steering committee in DC! And this was a mere seven years ago! And he can't recall? Bwahahaha. Perhaps he suffers from too much drinking and was their drunk driver? He steered them into the guardrails because he passed out behind the wheel? The way they act, they certainly could pass for drunks.

If I sat on a steering committee, I sure as heck would remember that fact for more than a week.

Already, like with the Bolton hearings and the Cheney Oil War meeting notes, the dictator called Bush is trying to prevent any paperwork from leaking out and revealing the true nature of this brain dead idiot. Obviously, if he can't remember a thing, we ought to dig around to refresh his pathetic brain and jolt him into recalling stuff he would rather hide.

This reminds me that this fight is over not only economic issues but my civil rights which, frankly, I hold very dear. I hope my Senators are diligent and hard headed as they tear into this brainless idiot.

We have enough brain dead people in the Supreme Court as it is.

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PENN STATION CLEARED

Penn Station before demolition
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Interesting what doesn't make the news these days. I was reading Chinese financial news for a story that will appear soon when I saw this in Xinhuanews. From Xinhuanews:

Pennsylvania Station, a major train station in New York city, was evacuated and train service disrupted for about an hour on Sunday.

The busy commuter hub was evacuated after someone threw a backpack at an Amtrak agent and said it was a bomb, said Marissa Baldeo, a spokeswoman for New York City Transit. The threat was a false alarm, and service on all lines was restored about an hour later.

The incident came days after a second bombing attack in London,which prompted New York police to start random inspections of subway riders' bags.

After evacuating Penn Station, police sealed the Eighth Avenue entrance with yellow tape and moved everyone across the avenue to the west side.

The service disruption affected Amtrak, the Long Island Rail Road, New Jersey Transit and the Seventh and Eighth Avenue subway lines.

The incident was over as quickly as it began. One minute, camouflage-clad soldiers were shouting, "Penn Station is closed indefinitely," and the next minute they got the all clear and started letting people into the station.

Looks like a traveler got irritable and lost control and is now in jail. Shuffling through long, tedius lines can set some people off. This is similar to the Brazilian being tackled and shot in the head. Namely, people are on edge and so are the security forces and this is heading towards unpleasant waters.

But what interests me tonight is this story is no where obvious. I looked and looked. I live in NY so I always focus on NY news and yet, it is obscure indeed. Very obscure. Like it is not of any importance or what?

My analysis of this whole stuff is, we don't really want to know, we want to be brave but only via a foolish naivity. Perhaps if we close our eyes very tight and clap our hands over our ears, the boogey man won't blow us up.

More died in Iraq, blown up. Bombs are now going off all over the planet and Mother Earth is still moving, another fairly great earthquake tears at the Nicobar Islands right on the heels of the one hitting Japan. Something we should attend to closely because it will reverberate in California eventually.

Back to Penn Station: it was already destroyed in ths sixties by reckless developers who destroyed a great architectual work of art. Now we tremble at the possibility of further destruction.

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MY CIVIL RIGHTS MATTER

From the British gay rights blog, Outrage!
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This picture is a real hanging. These two boys, for they are still teens...were killed in Iran this last week for the crime of being gay. Take a good look at them. They are dead now. A court of mullahs condemned them to death.

I sigh with despair.

A blogger I have long admired, Prof. Kunstler, had his usual bimonthly rant up and I read it with agreement until the very end, the last sentence enraged me. From Clusterfuck Nation:

What I believe will happen: the Jihadi violence will continue, the American public will lose patience with the attrition in Iraq, other flash points (North Korea, Pakistan, Venezuela, Mexico) will make it clear that the US Army is not capable of conducting land operations elsewhere, events will evolve to choke off oil imports to the US as our hegemony slips away, terror events in Europe will continue and provoke a backlash against Islamic imigrants, which will only inflame the Islamic world further, the US will revert to a naval strategy of attempting to protect our interests -- namely access to oil -- which will not be effective, and America will be plagued at home by political recrimation, blaming, scapegoating, and a futile campaign to keep the car-dependent utopia going.

Ultimately, the world will enter The Long Emergency, a horizonless era of conflict, withering global economic relations, and energy starvation -- with plummeting standards of living.

Meanwhile, we are doing nothing at home to prepare for this future, for instance a crash program to restore the American railroad system, or to restore true fiscal discipline to the mortgage industry in order to stem the insane spread of even more car-dependent suburban sprawl (a.k.a. the housing bubble). Where is the Democratic party (my party) on this? Lost in the raptures of sexual and racial pandering.

So, my civil rights and my gay friend's need for civil rights is pandering? Eh? Did I hear right?

My life and death issues like birth control and being able to make a living and to terminate a bad marriage is pandering? My gay friend's struggle to not be beaten to death by strangers or fired from jobs or preserving their home if one is hospitalized and a hostile family then cuts off all contact, is pandering? The right to bear, keep or adopt children? The right to vote? The right to not be blackmailed or raped?

If saving American means enslaving me and my dear friends, well, a big fuck you all. This is not the first time, either, that liberal (white) males have attacked us. Kos has periodically made it pretty clear our petty civil rights problems are a drag and he would prefer we stop yammering about them and knuckle under so white hetero males can associate with us politically!

You know, I really am steamed about that. Why can't we eliminate the rights of white hetero males? Then they can meekly accompany us on our great fight to save ourselves from our economic and cultural follies. Eh? Do I hear moans of "no"?

Welcome to my party, dudes.

I was almost tempted to never go back to some economic blogs I used to enjoy when periodically, the white hetero males running them sigh about us pesky non white or non male or non heteroes who are so demanding. These guys just want me to shut up and go away and this will save the Democratic Party and America.

Well, why can't you all sacrifice yourselves instead of me? "Women and children first" means we get thrown to the sharks first? Huh? What?

Let's look at the progress of women's rights under the untender teachings of "freedom and democracy" America: when the Soviet Union collapsed, starting with Afghanistan and breaking up until a whole bunch of "stans" were created, did this recession of communism free women?

Let's take a look. From Muslim Uzbekistan:

Since beginning of June protest actions of Muslim women whose relatives were imprisoned on religious charges have been gathering momentums in Tashkent, Andijon and Marghilon cities of Uzbekistan, according to reports.

The website of "Birlik" opposition movement informed that the protests in Andijon went off more calmly. However, a little later human tights group "Ezgulik" spread information that although protests supposedly were off calmly from the outside the law enforcement authorities committed brutalities against some of protester Muslim women.

According to "Ezgulik" about 80 women gathered in Navoi square in Andijon on June 1 demanding putting an end to tortures against Muslim prisoners. Reportedly women were beaten up by Andijon police.

Doesn't sound very free. We know there is an insurrection running there now but this won't help the women, the insurgents want to eliminate the tattered remains of former Soviet civil rights!

Let's look at another place: From the BBC news:

You would never know that this beautiful, educated woman, in her traditional voluminous velvet, ankle-length dress of green and gold, was struggling to hold it all together.

Bichalicha smiled warmly and added: "I just try to keep going for the children's sake." I did not dare ask what she would do if her husband did not return. Bichalicha is lucky to find any employment.

After independence, Russian-backed factories and aluminium treatment plants ground to a halt. Those with professional qualifications are not faring well either.

Of the husbands who do return from Russia, plenty bring a suitcase packed full of roubles, but an increasing number of men are also carrying HIV. We met (women) doctors and teachers selling fruit and vegetables in the bazaar because their state salaries are so low.

One of them told me: "I make $40 a month as a doctor but I can't feed my family from that. I'm forced to leave a job I love and trained hard for."

In the Soviet days, many women were trained to be doctors and professors and dancers and all sorts of things. Now they are being forcibly repatriated to a past condition worse than the one of my great grandmother's day!

It only gets much worse! From the PBS Frontline special:

FRONTLINE/WORLD correspondent Petr Lom -- a professor at Central European University in Budapest -- first traveled to Kyrgyzstan to investigate Islamic extremism. But he stumbled across a strange local custom, which he decided to explore.

With his translator and friend Fatima Sartbaeva, a young Kyrgyz woman, as his guide, Lom sets out on a journey of discovery, driving deep into the countryside to a small village just outside the ancient city of Osh.

Petr and Fatima arrive as a wedding is about to begin. Women are busy making traditional Kyrgyz bread for the occasion, and men sit in chairs outside, talking and sipping tea. The groom confesses he has had some difficulty finding a bride, but he is hopeful that "this one will stay."

When the bride does arrive, she is dragged into the groom's house, struggling and crying. Her name is Norkuz, and it turns out she has been kidnapped from her home about a mile away.

Fatima had prepared Petr for this scene, telling him that the custom of bride kidnapping is shocking, but he is still stunned by what he is seeing.

As the women of the groom's family surround Norkuz and hold down both of her hands, they are at once forceful and comforting, informing her that they, too, were kidnapped. The kidnappers insist that they negotiated the abduction with Norkuz's brother, but her sister, a lawyer from Osh, arrives to protest that her sister is being forced to marry a stranger. Ideally in Kyrgyz circles, a bride's family gets a price for their daughter, but Norkuz is 25 -- considered late to marry -- and the women remind her she is lucky she was kidnapped at all.

If the woman refuses, she is murdered and her body dumped in the town square or a river! Is this what American freedom is spreading? We have military bases in all these countries plus Afghanistan.

In Afghanistan, under the Soviets, the women had not only civil rights but economic equality! Now they live in fear and squalor and have virtually no rights at all and we don't give a fig. We pretend we are "uplifting" them when we are not! We never have.

Iraq: same rotten story. Under the "evil" Saddam, women were lawyers and doctors and professor and had civil rights nearly equal to ours here. Now these are being removed, one by one, rapidly. The "constitution" being passed is a horror. It makes thing worse for minorities, for women, for gays, for everyone except the ascendant hetero males of power.

My grandmother fought for her rights. She was one of the first women to get a high degree from a men's university, the University of Chicago. She was a scientist like Madame Curie. She was a suffragette. My mother didn't have the opportunites or the goodies showered upon my father, luckily, he shared everything with her very openly and championed her activities and promoted her.

He was still quite dismayed at my lawsuits, my battles, my physical fighting, my challenging authority, my defiance. He thought, giving my mom privilages would please me.

I wanted all women to have privilages, period. This was a shared thing, not mine alone.

With sexual freedom, control of our bodies, control of our destinies, came great economic activity as well as political activity. This has been squandered by the American people, collectively, because we decided to be an empire that exploits people who are not American. Now we are falling into bankruptcy due to excessive military bills and this is killing us and we are lost little lambies.

Tossing me to the wolves won't save our empire. Tossing all the women on this planet to the wolves won't stop al Qaeda. Nor will it save all those unhappy and uncooperative white hetero males who can't work with me or a gay person because they are too petty and what?

What ails them? And the white hetero women who are their companions? The ones who hate gays, too? What on earth are they afraid of? Will they doom themselves, financially, just so they can hurt us? Huh? If this is the plan, well.

Don't come crying to me!

I will be busy fighting for our sexual civil rights. See you on the streets, everyone!

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BACKSTABBER BUSH

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The CIA-Plame investigation continues even as the psychopaths running America blow smoke trying to persuade everyone that taking illegal drugs and breaking Federal laws is not only OK but good for America. This battle is rather funny to me for I believe the CIA and all the other black bag ops stuff should be stopped because they cause way more harm than good. Thinking clearly, getting to know one's opponents really well, intelligent questioning, an open mind works wonders.

But we want to behave like cannibals and so we slog along as the world blows up in our faces.

Meanwhile, we do have to uphold the pitiful few laws we have. Bad as they might be. To silence a CIA critic who revealed a lot of the dirty laundry, our government passed laws forbidding anyone from revealing agent's sources and work. I assure you, people doing work for the CIA keep it secret from absolutely everyone including pesky, spy prone kids like myself. I had to be very good at my self chosen calling to find out any information at all.

Today, yet another CIA agent is emerging from the Shadows to talk to America about Valerie. The DNC chose him to address the nation this weekend. The Republicans will claim, this negates the message even though the CIA agent, like 99% of them, is a Republican (and you wonder why they are so rotten at finding out information! Heh).

From Atrios, the entire message:

"Good morning. I'm Larry Johnson, an American, a registered Republican, a former intelligence official at the CIA, and a friend of Valerie Plame.

I entered on duty at the CIA in September 1985 with Valerie. We were members of the Career Trainee Program. Senator Orin Hatch wrote the letter of recommendation for me which I believe that helped open the doors to me at the CIA.

From the first day we walked into the building, all members of my training class were undercover, including Valerie. In other words, we had to lie to our family and friends about where we worked. We could only tell those who had an absolute need to know where we worked. In my case, I told my wife.

I knew the wife of Ambassador Wilson, Valerie, as Valerie P. Even though all of us in the training class held Top Secret Clearances, we were asked to limit our knowledge of our other classmates to the first initial of their last name.

So, Larry J. knew Val P. rather than Valerie Plame. I really didn't realize what her last name was until her cover was betrayed by the Government officials who gave columnist Robert Novak her true name.

I am stunned that government officials at the highest level have such ignorance about a matter so basic to the national security structure of this nation.

Robert Novak's compromise of Valerie led to scrutiny of CIA officers that worked with her. This not only compromised her "cover" company but potentially every individual overseas who had been in contact with that company or with her.

We must put to bed the lie that she was not undercover. For starters, if she had not been undercover then the CIA would not have referred the matter to the Justice Department.

Val only told those with a need to know about her status in order to safeguard her cover, not compromise it. She was content with being known as an energy consultant married to Ambassador Joe Wilson and the mother of twins.

I voted for George Bush in November of 2000 because I was promised a President who would bring a new tone and a new ethical standard to Washington.

So where are we? The President has flip-flopped on his promise to fire anyone at the White House implicated in a leak. We now know from press reports that at least Karl Rove and "Scooter" Libby are implicated in these leaks and may have lied during the investigation.

Instead of a President concerned first and foremost with protecting this country and the intelligence officers who serve it, we are confronted with a President who is willing to sit by while political operatives savage the reputations of good Americans like Valerie and Joe Wilson.

This is wrong and this is shameful.

We deserve people who work in the White House who are committed to protecting classified information, telling the truth to the American people, and living by example the idea that a country at war with Islamic extremists cannot focus its efforts on attacking other American citizens who simply tried to tell the truth.

I am Larry Johnson.

Thank you for listening.

Naturally, he is a retired agent. Ones at work can't talk. This story is a quicksand pit for the GOP. From the Boston Globe:

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's lack of action against a top aide involved in the disclosure of a covert CIA operative's identity sends ''the wrong message" overseas, former US intelligence officials said yesterday.

At an unofficial congressional hearing sponsored by House and Senate Democrats, the retired agents said US intelligence gathering had been damaged by the leak of Valerie Plame's name two years ago after her husband, former ambassador Joseph Wilson, criticized the White House's justification for going to war in Iraq.

Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper testified to a federal grand jury that presidential adviser Karl Rove told him that Wilson's wife worked for the CIA, but did not disclose her name.

Cooper has also said he discussed the couple with Lewis ''Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff.
''What has suffered irreversible damage is the credibility of our case officers when they try to convince an overseas contact that their safety is of primary importance to us," said Jim Marcinkowski, a former CIA case officer.

The many downsides of the Bush backstabbing are painfully obvious to any observer. The GOP wants to pretend that everything is OK despite the many times they betray their friends, co-workers and allies. The betrayal of vital information last year to dim Kerry's acceptance speech is why we see so many bombs going off today all over the place. Al Qaeda slipped the British-Pakistan noose and is on the loose.

(Mr.Marcinkowski) criticized Republican efforts to minimize the damage caused by the leak.
''Each time the political machine made up of prime-time patriots and partisan ninnies display their ignorance by deriding Valerie Plame as a mere paper-pusher, or belittling the varying degrees of cover used to protect our officers, or continuing to play partisan politics with our national security, it's a disservice to this country," he added.

Bush can call off the media attack dogs. They work for his buddies. He and his buddies sit around, yukking it up as their trained poodles attack anyone and everyone, heroes and fellow Skull and Bonesmen like Kerry or personal aides like Powell. These craven men and women gleefully attack just like the anthrax letter sender only sent letters to people Bush personally wanted to either kill or intimidate.

Bush could have stopped the Swift Boat Liars. He could have stopped the anthrax letters, too, I bet. He can stop all the members of the party he dominates and leads. He could order them to sign the lynching apology. He could do many things.

But he doesn't because he is the author of all this. He is the vengeful psychopath who used to blow up frogs and laugh as they died.

White House officials have sought to put the controversy behind them pending the outcome of a federal investigation.

If they want to stop talking about this, they can. It is called "Shut the F. up." But they won't and they can't.

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FREEDOM TOWER/BARADUR CLONE

From a great site all should visit frequently: Professor Kunstler's Eyesore of the Month
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

It is official. The new, redesigned Freedom Tower (sic) has been unveiled to the shrinking eye. Even Oopaloompas would go on strike if they were ordered to work in such a thing. Hobbits would climb volcanoes and toss in rings just to make it go away. It has so many close relations!



This structure is very close in design. Unlike the Freedom Tower (sic), this has these close set red glaring windows that look remarkably like the Eye of Mordor. Where ever you creep, it glares balefully down upon us tiny mortals. It really gives me the creeps when I go to DC to lobby or argue or plot changing the status quo by fixing voting mechanisms.


Here is Mordor's Baradur tower as seen in the recent movie. Note the black surface. According to Tolkien, Saruman's tower was white and shaped pretty much like the Freedom Tower (sic).


This is the Tower of Babel. It didn't get finished. In this case, the God that many humans worship played the roll of Atta and company and knocked it down himself without using aircraft.


And here is the very famous Rider Tarot card deck made over 100 years ago. Note the white tower. Note all the awful other stuff. Sigh. This looks an awful lot like the new tower. This is depressing to look at. Many people jumped to their deaths at this unhappy place.

This reminds me. It is a place of massive death. The pulverized remains of the people who died that day are still there, maybe not in big heaps, but like other horrible places like Auswitz, it is there, if only in the cosmic sense.

I have been, since day one, against building a tower in this place.

I have stood there and looked upon it. Let it be. Let it be. Like the song says, just...Let it be.

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BIN LADEN KEEPS HIS WORD

Four star hotel-casino, the front was blown away and many injured/killed there
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Just before the last, really awful, badly run election when not a soul mentioned bin Laden's name until the man himself reinserted his face into the news very forcibly, we all were told by the mass media mavens that Bush was strong against terror and his policies of going to war with all and sundry in Asia Minor was making the world safer.

Bin Laden assured us that this was completely stupid. After all, if anyone knows about future terrorist plots, "he be da man."

He laughed at us and dared us to reselect Bush and allow Bush to fight for us. He mocked Bush's reading of "My Pet Goat" and gloated over how foolish and infantile we all are and how easy it is to shove us into doing things that further his plans.

In retaliation, we not only did what he hoped, Bush even expanded the war in Iraq, attacking Fallujah.

Well, blast back is here with a vengence. There are many, many more people interested in fighting us and capable of hitting us at will where ever they desire. To hit an expensive tourist resort deep inside the Egyptian protectorate was a stunning move, coupled with the amazing series of attacks in the heart of the British satrapy.

From the BBC:

At least 43 people have been killed and more than 130 wounded in a string of explosions in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, police said. The first explosion took place in the Old Market area, popular with tourists.

Other blasts followed in the nearby area of Naama Bay, which is packed with hotels. Witnesses said a four-star hotel was heavily damaged.

Police sources said initial reports suggested there had been at least four and possibly seven car bombs.

The first blast, which took place shortly after 0100 local time (2200 GMT), shook windows some distance away, and smoke was seen rising over the area, residents said.

This is bad. Like all the other times, there is no one to interrogate or torture or shoot in the head six times. Torturing or shooting or interrogating a bunch of people has not made the slightest dent in these attacks.

Just a few days ago, the stunning news that Bush and his Homeland Security puppet spilled the name of the only al Qaeda mole who was being held in Pakistan and who was talking with his confederates so the ISI and M15 could track them, to ruin Kerry's acceptance speech with an arrest story plus raising the color alert--this alerted bin Laden and shut down everything and everyone scrambled with some of the operatives showing up on 7/7.

I assumed England would be outraged with this news but I am wrong. The same mindless stupidity is enveloping them like a toxic fog and they are clinging to the architects of this disaster, Bush and Blair.

All the stories of the London bomb suspects having been "suicided" turned out to be wishful thinking and now a very alarmed Scotland Yard is back to trying to catch people who, like all "revolutionaries" in the past, will elude them for a critical time.


Where is this BBC picture from? Oh my. It is from a place very near where the bombs went off a few hours ago. Of course, we won't notice all this, will we?

From the BBC again:

At least 36 people have been killed in two days of violent clashes between protesters and police across Yemen, police and witnesses say.
Tanks have been deployed on the streets of the capital, Saana.

Deaths were also reported in a string of other towns. The unrest began after fuel subsidies were lifted on Tuesday, leading to dramatic price rises.

The government says it needs to reduce the budget deficit, but opponents say the rises hit poor people the hardest.

Yemen is not only next door to one of the richest countries on earth, it is also the one with the largest oil reserves on this planet. And Yemen is important to the USA for a significant number of the hijackers who attacked us on 9/11 hailed from Yemen and there was one Egyptian, Atta, the ring leader.

From Al Jazeera:

Twelve people have been wounded in a bomb blast on a busy Beirut street known for its nightclubs, cafeterias and restaurants, officials and witnesses said.


The blast came late on Friday, hours after US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice left Beirut after a surprise visit in support of Lebanon's new government.

Seems the bombs going off in Lebanon are going off even more. No wonder Condi kept her visit secret. Visits to Iraq, the breeding ground and nest for many terrorists today, have to be supert top secret triple secret visits. Our politicians and generals sneak in and out of that place under hyper secrecy. They hide from Fitzgerald the same degree.

Super duper secret.

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LONDON TIMES

by Elaine Meinel Supkis

I had to work this morning so I stuck the headline story, "London Mayor critisizes western Middle East policy for bombings" and lo and behold, I come home after all that backhoe work to see another spate of bombs going off in, you guessed it, London.

Like with the doleful IRA bombings, these will continue until something is done to fix it and fixing never means going after the people that are fighting a guerilla war but making things work out sensibly so there is no reason to have a war in the first place. Invading, of course, and then oppressing someone, leads to all sorts of side effects.

When fighting stone age people, they tend to be fairly easy to disarm and destroy but when one goes after other former empires then there is a problem since we are dealing with often very sophisticated people who are also educated and motivated. And know our weak points.

When Blair and Bush conspired to attack a nearly totally innocent third party after 9/11, Iraq. They had to forge about with fake data and fake paper work and fake photos but in the end, they convinced a bare majority of Americans and not even that many Brits, to do this despicable deed.

We citizens of Planet Earth held huge demonstrations warning the two war conspiritors that they were making a huge mistake. We warned them that Iraq was a dangerous cul de sac and that this could start the proverbial dominoes falling and it would fuel further war and besides, the history of starting wars has a very dark side, namely, many such wars ended up causing massive wars that killed millions of people but they didn't listen to us.

Now we are reaping the whirlwind we sowed.

This isn't over yet, it is just beginning. I have detailed here how China has secured not only all its borders but has formed some pretty dangerous alliances. When Condi went off to Japan six months ago after the Japanese Finance minister blurted out that China talked about the looming American bankruptcy and he wondered if Japan ought to sell off its dollars soon, Japan has sided with America in drawing some lines in very dangerous quick sand.

Yesterday, I didn't have a chance to post this, but China signed yet more treaties with Vietnam, to wit, a mutual resource exploration treaty that includes the Philippines. Triangulating, they are securing the back side of Taiwan as well as their own lower flank.

The knife in the chest, Taiwan, is still a knife but it is much blunted now. If we were playing the ancient war board game of Asia, "Go", I would say that our white stone, Taiwan, is now nearly surrounded by black stones. It is now pretty much out of play. It can sit there for however long until the Chinese 9 dan Go masters decide to pluck it up and drop it onto the lid of their stone jar. Japan remains a power but it is a very vulnerable power. Any Asian nation with nukes can polish off Japan in a literal flash.

Here is yet another example: as Britain and American thrash about in extreme fear and pain, bellowing, China is a busy little bee, building yet more alliances, a daily parade of alliances and deals! From Xinhuanet:
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao (L) holds a ceremony to welcome Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing July 21, 2005. Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero arrived in Beijing Thursday morning for a three-day official visit to China. (Xinhua Photo)

China and Spain here Thursday inked a dozen agreements to cement their cooperation in justice, industry, tourism, finance, seismological study, railway and civil aviation.

Visiting Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who arrived in Beijing Thursday on a three-day official visit to China, and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao witnessed the signing of the agreements following their hour-long meeting. The two sides will strengthen political dialogue through a mechanism between foreign ministries of the two countries, according to an agreement. The two sides will each establish a cultural center in the other country. China will buy 20 Airbus A330 jetliners, according to a framework agreement signed by the two sides.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said the two sides reached wide-range consensus on developing bilateral relations between China and Spain as well as on regional and international issues of mutual concern.

Wen Jiabao highly praised the Spanish government's plan to strengthen relationship with China and other Asian-Pacific nations, adding that China attaches equal importance to its relationship with Spain.

The Chinese premier proposed that the two countries should step up their cooperation in areas of politics, economy, science and technology as well as culture.

Spain is an interesting country. The Maine blew up in the harbor of Havana, Cuba, and we used that as our belligerent excuse to invade Spain's last colonies and take them for our own. We then proceeded to kill lots of natives, securing our new colonies. Spain was once a world girdling empire that rivaled all previous empires that merely spanned acres on land, the Spanish empire was the first global, sea faring one.

It went bankrupt after too many disasterous wars and industry died in Spain as loot and gold and easy living took over. A familiar story, no?

Notice how China deftly uses civil aviation as a diplomatic tool. Everyone peddling aircraft should realize by now that the contracts for planes are being carefully spread out in strategic ways. The one with Boeing is really funny because the Chinese are already positioning themselves to tell Boeing to relocate their factories in China to take advantage of cheap labor and other thingies.

Now for the other big breaking news: the Chinese leadership have decided it is time to start moving their currency around. Why today?

Heh. Well, read the diplomatic bulletins! They are pretty nearly done with the preparations for the beginning of the new struggle: tanking America's currency. You see, they made a bid for Unocal and it was rebuffed just yesterday so today they said, we won't add more money (instead we will make business more expensive for Americans here in China). The amount change won't give us any advantages in trade vis a vis China. But it will change their currency value vis a vis all other currencies as they begin to dominate our currency just as they now dominate our trade.


From the BBC:

In talks marred by scuffles between US and Sudanese staff, she told Mr Bashir he must end the crisis in Darfur.

Ms Rice later flew to Israel, where she is due to hold talks on its planned withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

In her meeting with Mr Bashir, Ms Rice stressed that the US would hold him to account if he failed to act, particularly in stopping violence to women.

Ms Rice told reporters: "I said to the Sudanese government that they had a credibility problem with the international community... I have said, 'actions not words'."

Instead of making big deals with other nations, Condi went to a dry well in Africa to do a photo-op in Dafur where the government officials jostled her and intimidated the reporters and caused her to stamp her feet and bark orders in a way that probably had the Chinese laughing like crazy at home. Why did she do this? Most of the world has spent many hours ignoring Dafur despite all the media attempts to make us interested.

I will note that one article today noted that many "refugees" there are not refugees at all but have come into the area in great numbers for the free food and free schooling. I can't blame them. It is just a big mess, as always in many dessicated third world countries.

Meanwhile, our futile and useless gulag in Cuba continues to fester and ooze puss onto the public stage of the rest of the world even if our Supreme Court nominee, Roberts, thinks this prison is just handy dandy fine and constitutionally correct. From the BBC news:

Fifty-two detainees at the US prison camp at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba are staging a hunger strike, US military officials say.
So far, the men have refused nine meals over three days, the US military said in a statement.

The detainees are being monitored by medical professionals and their vital signs are being checked daily.

More than 500 inmates are currently being held at Guantanamo. Only four have been charged.

"Indications are that this is a temporary effort by some detainees to protest their continued detention," the statement said.

On Wednesday, an Afghan man released from the camp after three years said that more than 100 prisoners had been on hunger strike for two weeks.The former Taleban soldier said the protest was aimed at highlighting "inhuman" conditions at the camp.

This is how we will stop the subway bombers who will most likely hit here too, soon enough: set up prisons that make them into martyrs and abuse them in interesting ways guaranteed to rouse more bombers into attacking us.

Oh, and to make this article come back full circle: two top Algerian diplomats were kidnapped in Iraq today and are being held hostage. It just keeps on blowing up in everyone's faces, doesn't it? This is going to end badly.

Time for America to go to China and ask for more loans!

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CHINESE PEASANTS SHOW US HOW

by Elaine Meinel Supkis

I have detailed before how the dictators of China try to run the place as if there is no opposition but we all know there is fierce opposition. Unlike Americans, the Chinese peasants aren't meekly trailing after the ruling elite, obedient and stupified. Instead, they stand up for their rights, their land, themselves.

They riot. They get killed but they fight on. They don't give up.

From the BBC:

Chinese farmers have won a dispute over land rights which culminated in a bloody riot last month in the northern province of Hebei, state media says.

Farmers in Shengyou village, northern Hebei province, were angry they had not been compensated for land proposed for a power plant's ash storage yard.

Now, the yard will be built in a place where it will take less arable land.

"[Because] Shengyou village, the originally proposed site of the power plant's ash storage yard, has a big population but relatively little land, the Hebei provincial government... has now made a decision not to requisition land from that village," Xinhua state news agency reported.

Dramatic footage handed to The Washington Post in June showed local farmers fighting a pitched battle with dozens of unidentified men wearing camouflage gear and construction helmets wielding hunting rifles and clubs.

Police have since arrested 31 people and detained another 131 involved in the incident, Xinhua said.

The peasants are paying a high price. Some are now in jail, facing prison, facing terrible times. But they are also heroes. And prison makes them stronger, not weaker.

Relative strength lies in one's will and one's refusal to be defeated even when the rulers apply great force.

We see this in Iraq. America has thrown all it can at the people of Iraq and failed. The greatest power: corruption, bribes, has failed the most there.

From Xinhuanews:

Not long ago, Tian Guirong, a well-known environmentalist in Henan Province, central China, beat her rival, a local factory owner, in the elections of Fanling Village committee.

The villagers hailed it as "the victory of the ordinary," and hoped that Tian would help drive out polluting factories run by local people.

Fanling villagers used to enjoy a comfortable, pastoral life, with clean water from two sources -- the Communist Canal and the Weihe River. But their pleasant life came to an end a few years ago, when chemical factories began appearing in the village and the surrounding area.

Since being elected village head, Tian has been busy scrutinizing the behavior of the factories and resisting attempts to build new factories that may create pollution for the village.

Tian's plight is common in China's rural areas today. Environmental protection has become one of the top concerns of Chinese farmers.

"Environmental pollution is threatening the life of villagers in many parts of the country," says Zhang Yulin, a scholar from Nanjing University.

It is interesting that even the official news is gingerly covering this developing story. Like in all previous industrializing nations, pollution is a big problem. In Mexico, since the factories were nearly owned by Americans who didn't want environmental controls, the factories polluted like crazy. Even though this pollution ran into rivers bordering the USA, both countries shrugged this off. The fact that water pollution flows into the Gulf of Mexico, this didn't deter them. One supposes they think the Gulf is an infinite body of water.

So the pollution became utterly horrible. Just last month, I saw a story about two Mexican refugees pulled out of the muck in the Rio Grande because they couldn't go any further, they wore white disguises to look like the towering piles of soapy sudsy looking crap. Incredible. This ferocious level of pollution hasn't helped the Mexican peasants much. But they can't fight back because they are overruled by America's rulers who keep the lid very tight on these poor people.

Which is why I can't get even slightly angry over the stuff about "Mexicans are invading America." We invade them, with armies and navies and with laws and our factories and whatever. I consider them to be ex-cathedra Americans with no say, no vote in who really rules them so why even have a border? It certainly doesn't keep American powers out.

Chen Yingxu, deputy dean of the Environment and Resources Institute of Zhejiang University, says the authorities should attach great importance to environmental problems in the countryside. "Farmer's health rights must be put on top the agenda," he says.

In some areas, local environmental departments have been blamedfor their failure to tackle environmental problems and protect villagers' health rights.

"Localism is one of the major obstacles to anti-pollution efforts," says Tian.

There are accusations that in Xinxiang, where Fanling Village is located, local environmental officials have tried hard to cover up the serious environmental degradation.

But some officials argue that environmental problems are exaggerated.

Fan Ziding, secretary of the village's Party committee, doubts Tian's credibility, saying Tian has a low educational background (she only graduated from elementary school), and a lack of experience in rural matters.

"Environmental protection should be only a small part of the work for a village head, but Tian always talks about it regardless of the overall situation," he says.

The peasants amaze me. One of the leaders is a woman with scant education but wisdom and sense. This irritates those in power. Tian is my hero for today. I love her. She sensibly understands pollution is never local, it is global. I hope she is invited to be the keynote speaker at the next Kyoto Accord meetings. I hope she can lecture Bush.

I am rather ticked that Americans can't or won't lecture him. This is our great failing. We complain, we talk, but we won't rip apart the Machine itself.

History is written by those who fight back.

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SCOTTY ALWAYS BEAMED BIG SMILE

by Elaine Meinel Supkis
I loved Scotty, from far away. When I was a teen, I wanted to be Spock but I wanted to play around with Scotty, he had access to the guts of the Enterprise. And he was tons of fun. Well, a girl could dream!

Scotty has been beamed to another time and another place. We don't have a way of contacting him now. So we must all say, farewell, we loved ya, hope to meet again. He lived here with us terrestrials for 85 years and had a very exciting and amazing time. Some of the news stories cover this pretty well, so let's cut to them. From the BBC:

James Montgomery Doohan (he shared a name with his most famous character) was not, in fact, a Scot but a Canadian. Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1920, his early life, like that of his contemporaries, was dominated by World War II.

Doohan's wartime experiences were every bit as hair-raising as his fictional fights with the Klingons. As a captain in the Royal Canadian Artillery Regiment, he lost a finger on the first morning of the D-Day landings in Normandy.

He then saw a tank, which was carrying his substantial winnings from a cross-Channel card school, blown to pieces before his eyes.

Besides this, his aerobatic exploits, which included nearly crashing his aircraft in Holland while taking "a look" at a German U-boat, earned him the title of "the craziest pilot in the Royal Canadian Air Force".

Um, I see movie material here! His life was pretty exciting.

From the Associated Press:

He was among the Canadian forces that landed on Juno Beach on D-Day. "The sea was rough," he recalled. "We were more afraid of drowning than the Germans."

The Canadians crossed a minefield laid for tanks; the soldiers weren't heavy enough to detonate the bombs. At 11:30 that night, he was machine-gunned, taking six hits: one that took off his middle right finger (he managed to hide the missing finger on screen), four in his leg and one in the chest. Fortunately the chest bullet was stopped by his silver cigarette case.

His life wasn't only exciting, it was positively charmed! They say there are no atheists in fox holes. Well, the one most people pray to probably is Lady Luck: "Please, don't let that bomb fall on me!"

I am particularily charmed by the fact that after winning a lot of money on the ride to his fate-filled battle in Normandy, Lady Luck did an exchange: she took his winnings but let him beat the odds in the most important crap shoot of them all.

The powerfully built Doohan, a veteran of D-Day in Normandy, spoke frankly in 1998 about his employer and his TV commander.

"I started out in the series at basic minimum_ plus 10 percent for my agent. That was added a little bit in the second year. When we finally got to our third year, Paramount told us we'd get second-year pay! That's how much they loved us."

He accused Shatner of hogging the camera, adding: "I like Captain Kirk, but I sure don't like Bill. He's so insecure that all he can think about is himself."

The Pigs in Space charater of the captain, Link Hogthrob, was a wicked take on Shatner. Miss Piggy, in her tell-all interview gave him a good black eye.

Scotty talked about the "Beam me up," jokes. He never tired of them. He had the patience of a saint.



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BIG TYPHOON

by Elaine Meinel Supkis

Been a while, except for the pigs in space news. The East has been busy, though, do not doubt this.

Just the other day, I breezed by the usual economic forums I sometimes haunt and as usual, everyone was speculating when the Chinese will raise the value of the yen---ooops, I mean the yuan. As usual, the Chinese have the last laugh: From Xinhuanews:

China's central bank said Tuesday it will continue to keep the exchange rate of Renminbi, China's currency, basically stable at a reasonable and balanced level in the second half of this year.

In a press release issued after a meeting by heads of the bank and its provincial branches, the bank said it is one of its major tasks in the six months to deepen the reform of its foreign exchange administrative system, and push forward the reform of RMB exchange rate mechanism and keep the RMB exchange rate basically stable at a reasonable and balanced level.

China must uphold the principles of independent initiative, controllability and gradual progress in pursuing RMB exchange rate.

This must be their main source of amusement these days. Like when I drag a string across the floor and the cats go nuts. Watching news about that is a waste of time. Watch Hu and Wen and who they meet with and when they meet and what treaties they sign for they are busy little bees.
Today's treaty: From Xinhuanews:

President Hu Jintao (R) gestures while welcoming visiting Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong during a ceremony in Beijing yesterday outside the Great Hall of the People. [Xinhua]
The leaders vowed to speed up the survey and setting of the land boundary, and reaffirmed their desire to see results from joint exploration of disputed areas in the South China Sea.

Hu and Luong also agreed to maintain normal fisheries co-operation in the Beibu Bay in an effort to build the China-Viet Nam border into one of peace, friendship and long-lasting stability.

Hu said the land border issue between China and Viet Nam and demarcation in the Beibu Bay, were issues left over from history that were gradually being resolved, adding that he looks forward to the completion of the matter and a mere stone monument on the land border.

After an hour-and-a-half meeting, the leaders of the two countries witnessed the signing of three agreements, one of which pledges China's support for Viet Nam's accession to the World Trade Organization.

Hu suggested furthering the Sino-Vietnamese comprehensive co-operative relationship by enhancing high-ranking exchanges, expanding trade and economic co-operation and strengthening communication between the countries' people, especially the youth.

I have kept track. They have secured all borders, rear and front. They are just about ready to confront Japan. Japan piggy backed on the USA when Bush handed over our nuclear secrets to India today so he could get a treaty. Now Pakistan, home to bin Laden, is pissed. We keep fetching up against many rocks, knapping our shins. From the Washington Post:

President Bush agreed yesterday to share civilian nuclear technology with India, reversing decades of U.S. policies designed to discourage countries from developing nuclear weapons.

The agreement between Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, which must win the approval of Congress, would create a major exception to the U.S. prohibition of nuclear assistance to any country that doesn't accept international monitoring of all of its nuclear facilities. India has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which requires such oversight, and conducted its first nuclear detonation in 1974.

Participants in the discussions said there had been debate within the administration about whether the deal with India -- which built its atomic arsenal in secret -- would undercut U.S. efforts to confront Iran and North Korea over their nuclear programs. There were also concerns about how the agreement would be accepted in Pakistan, India's regional rival and an ally in the U.S. campaign against al Qaeda.

This is pathetic. We have no borders with either country. We have secured Canada's and Mexico's borders long ago which freed us up for running around the planet playing imperial Rome but we are now having increasing problems with the Mexican border. We seem to be plugging holes in dams all over the place.

Japan, as always, kicks China in the shins. They may think this is funny but it isn't.

The Chinese leadership don't mind, these Japanese moves make them highly unpopular. From Xinhuanews:

The Tokyo High Court on Tuesday dismissed an appeal by a group of 180 Chinese nationals seeking compensation from the Japanese government for injuries and deaths stemming from a germ warfare campaign during Japan's aggression war on China, upholding a lower court ruling.

In handing down the ruling, Presiding Judge Yukio Ota acknowledged the fact that the Imperial Japanese Army waged germ warfare, carried out by Unit 731 in China before and during the war, resulting in the deaths of many Chinese people from pest and cholera.

Referring to an international treaty that banned germ warfare at that time, Ota said, "Japan is held responsible for using germ weapons in violation of a treaty."

The judge, however, rejected the compensation demand saying that there were "no rules that allow individuals to directly demand damages from perpetrating countries."

Um, word of the wise: the government of Japan should step in and do the right thing. But then, the USA should, too, vis a vis Vietnam and Agent Orange.

But we lost that war...all over again today, didn't we?

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CONGRESSIONAL ELECTION IN OHIO

Paul Hackett with his family at home.

Paul Hackett, all business.
by Elaine Meinel Supkis

Just in from Atrios! Seems there is a snap election in Ohio for a seat in Congress! We have a good chance of nibbling away at the edges of the Republican machine. The Democratic candidate is Paul Hackett and he needs all our help! Already, money is coming in from the web. Yeah!

He is a Marine who just came back home a bare few months ago. He was in Fallujah and other hot spots. He is committed and he knows what goes, he is no chicken hawk or even a hawk but is, like in the long line of patriotic men and women who fought but also understood war is hell, he knows what he is doing and will do the right thing! From his campaign website

By 1992 Paul had met and married Suzi, become a part of the Select Marine Corps Reserve and founded his own law firm, Hackett Law Offices.

As an active member of his neighborhood, a husband, and a small business owner, Paul became acutely aware of his community. He was disgusted by many of the things he saw in his own city council meetings and, feeling the need to do his part serving his community, chose to take a more active role by running for, and becoming a member of the Milford City Council, taking charge, and restoring order.

Then and now, Paul is a strong proponent for using our tax dollars responsibly, most notably to provide affordable healthcare, ensuring that our children are delivered a better America. That includes spending less on corporate welfare, and more support for small businesses that are primed to take the next step up the ladder.

Last year, Paul heard the call to service again. As his Marine Corps brothers fought a half world away, Paul could not sit in the comfort of his home and let others do the work he was prepared to do. After a serious discussion with his wife and children, Paul re-upped and joined his marines for a seven month tour with the 1st Marine Division and served as a Civil Affairs officer in Ramadi, took part in the Fallujah campaign and subsequent reconstruction.

When Paul returned only a few weeks ago, he learned of Rob Portman's decision to vacate his congressional seat. Paul Hackett is continuing his service to his country by running for the United State Congress.

As a candidate for the United States Congress, Paul Hackett is fighting for the people of Southern Ohio. Not for the red. Not for the blue. For the red, white and blue.

He seems to be just the sort of candidate we dream about. Energetic, smart, thoughtful and a man who one can trust for he is good for his word, not an empty promise front for someone else!

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He is up against the "let's invest in rare coins and then lose all the pocket change" GOP of Ohio. These are the "I own Diebold and I will make sure Bush wins" GOP of Ohio. These people need to be replaced and this will directly affect all of us, even on my far away mountain which is nearly half way across the country, his victory will make my day, too.

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REBUILDING THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY

Fleeing from minorities, uppity women, gays and the French looks like this.
by Elaine Meinel Supkis

Then LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act, a huge body of American voters who just couldn't stand the idea of minorities having the right to vote, to go to school, to buy homes or run businesses as equals, they picked up and moved out of the Democratic party and moved next door to the New World Order White Republican party.

To triangulate, the Bushes have pushed forwards individual minorities, these servants of theirs are always carefully detached from their own people and will betray them at every turn. But they make a great false front! This bothers the lower levels of the New World Order who put up with this because they are allowed to make fun of the top Bush minority aids. Note how much of the Iraq war mess was dumped onto Powell and when he was dismissed, he went off silent, his reputation in tatters, the laughing stock of the left and the right, both.

The Democratic party gropes for a base. Progressives and liberals desperately want the party to appeal to us all. We would really like to be loved and held dear. We want to be petted, too. We want people to fight on our behalf. This is why we love Dean, we love Clarke, now that he has had time to court us in all seriousness. He is doing a splendid job of courting us and I respect him for this and will talk more about him in the future.

Minorities, gays, uppity women who want to protect their right to their own bodies, retired people, unions, immigrants, there are many people we can build as a base. If white voters in the south would rather have no health care, bad schools, crummy infrastructure, no public transportation, pollution, etc. well, god bless them! Let them suffer. Even if they can gang up on us all and force us to live in their puny, ugly, dank, stinking world, we can band together to fight them off. Even if we lose every fight, we must fight them for their vision of the world resembles my vision of what hell looks like!

Let's take pollution. These people, because they hate and fear their fellow humans, their fellow Americans, gleefully spew toxic chemicals into the environment and despite years of us all fighting to pass pollution laws, they are gleefully undoing all this hard work and this ticks me off.

Look at this news! From the Scotsman

Seriously hazardous chemicals can be found in the tissue of nearly every person alive. It is a frightening thought, but exposure to such toxic substances has been linked to a higher incidence in several cancers, reproductive complications, a continuing decline in fertility rates and birth defects.

Like the majority of people, I was unaware of the levels of these chemicals circulating in my bloodstream, so when the opportunity to find out about them came along, I seized it.

Along with 150 others, from politicians and journalists to leaders of environmental NGOs and lobby groups, I volunteered to have my blood tested for three groups of dangerous chemicals, including PCBs, organochlorine pesticides and PBDEs, or flame-retardants.

The biomonitoring survey, which is the largest exercise the UK has seen in biomonitoring in over two decades, is part of a chemicals and health campaign set up by the environmental organization WWF.

I shudder to see what soup my children swam in when I was innocently carrying them!

My test results came back last week, detailing my exposure to 77 chemicals, along with the collective minimum, maximum and median of the other volunteers.

When the full results are published in full later this month, they will reveal that not one of the 150 participants had clean blood.

Pollution kills. Air pollution kills. We know this. It is detailed over and over again by zillions of health studies. So what happens?

The right wing in America spits in the eye of the world, going from forum to forum like Bush did just last month and telling everyone, we don't give a rat's ass about the environment. Mo Udall cared. I care. We should all care. This is literally life and death. As the fine lady in this study says, "I ate carefully all my life and lived carefully and I had an astonishing number of industrial chemicals in my blood!"

This is what I call a "transendental issue". All those white women and men love fetuses?

Well, we must go to them and talk about pollution. Pollution destroys fetuses, destroys babies, destroys adults, destroys our planet! If they don't care, we tell them loudly to shut up, you are all fakers. You all don't really love fetuses, you hate them. Fetus abusers! Fie!

Corporate America has no need for controlling the messes they make, it interfers with them stuffing their pockets with loot and then carefully keeping family and home far from the maddening crowds. Despite the bad news of these studies showing there is no safe haven anymore, they figure, any messes can be fixed by doctors so pollute away! Whoooeee!

The GOP had a hammerlock on a subset of the Hispanic vote: Cubans. But that is fading fast as Hispanics from all over the place emigrate to America. They work hard and have a very fun culture, I grew up around Hispanics and I love the music, the lilt of the language, many good things there. And the food!

Heh. I adore it. As much as I adore Chinese and Japanese food.

The Democratic party has a perfectly fine base sitting right here, we can take this party all the way back to the Liberal Oasis which is what our Founding Fathers wanted America to be! They wanted a place of intelligence, philosophy, science, freedom of thought and great deeds! They were Revolutionaries, not mice. They knew that leadership strides forth, not dilly dallies at the rear!

We got to buck up and buck back! Viva the Democratic Party!

Hooray for Liberals! We are coming and coming fast!

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HILLARY CLINTON CAN WOW THEM

A very YOUTHFUL looking great Lady and my Senator!

I don't agree with a great deal of the votes and such that my Senator makes. She and I are not the same. But then, I don't have her responibilities and I don't have to build a base of support before taking a position, free as a bird, I can do whatever.

Her vote for war ticked me off. But then, many Democrats were rushed into voting for war and let us not forget, they didn't vote for declaring war but for pressuring Saddam. Bush and Bush alone wanted a war itself and pushed hard for it, even lying to the UN to get what he wanted and when he didn't get that, without consulting with Congress even, he just invaded anyway.

Rash, he is!

But in general, compared to the others in the Senate (yoiks!) even though Hillary can't hold a candle to my beloved Mo Udall, at least she is on my side, in general. And I do say, I admire her moxie, I really admire her steadfastness...she really did stand by her man. I admire her skill at handling the garbage she must wade through. Few humans could tolerate what she had to tolerate daily!

When her husband was under fire because Starr leaked the information of the blue dress, the firestorm around her husband was huge and her anger at him, very great and understandably great. I wrote a small editorial the NY Times published and she sent me a personal letter, thanking me for explaining what to do and why, namely, the nobility of standing by her man.

I was stunned when the letter arrived. I fell in love with her because of that. When the firemen and police at the 9/11 ceremony booed her and drunkenly acted like louts (have the conservatives no sense of shame? No dignity?) she took it "like a man" unlike Bush who is a tremulous mouse if anyone is indisposed with him.

From the Washington Post:

Speaking on the grandest stage of the nation's largest Hispanic civil rights organization yesterday in Philadelphia, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) made no mention of presidential ambitions, but many said her message and delivery had the aura of a campaign speech.

Clinton touched on nearly every issue that was important to Hispanics, the nation's largest ethnic group and a crucial voting bloc. She said she wanted to make sure Hispanic children got a fair education, and that families had medical insurance to ward off health problems such as asthma and lead poisoning that affect kids. She also talked of supporting legislation that would make it easier for immigrants to send money back home, which Hispanics do at a rate of about $200 per month.

It is really pathetic that southern white women are terrified of Hillary. They hate her. They want her punished because she "stood by her man" which puzzles me since this is what they supposedly admire. Every time a GOP jerk is caught with his toy misbehaving, the GOP Stepford wife dutifully backs him up and forgives him.

But Hillary!

Oh, the bitch. How dare she!

This bizarre double standard annoys me more than pratically anything. It should annoy anyone. But then, the GOP has a double standard for nearly everything, don't they?

A thunderous ovation followed, the first of many rounds of applause.

"To me it sounded like a campaign speech," said Nellie Moreno of Phoenix, who said she was surprised that Clinton did not talk about immigration, temporary-worker programs and the border with Mexico. "I was hoping to hear something," she said. America Jones of El Paso said she heard what she wanted. "I hope that she will run, whether it sounded like a campaign speech or not," she said.

Clinton's remarks followed those of Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, who also pitched to Hispanic parents, doing her part in the tug of war between the Republican and Democratic parties for Hispanic hearts and minds.

A hint to politicians in Texas: there are a lot of Hispanics there. They have borne the brunt of the casualties in our misbegotten war. They now are beginning to organize and vote. They won the mayorship of Los Angeles recently. Anyone in the Democratic Party of Texas should be absolutely delighted to invite my Senator, the Honorable Hillary Clinton to come to Texas and the entire Democratic delegation, the top people and all candidates should STAND SHOULDER TO SHOULDER WITH HILLARY CLINTON.

Spit in the eye of the demented right wingers of Texas. Seriously. The good people who are American citizens who live in weird places like New York will really appreciate this greatly. We will even admire you guys down in the even weirder state of Texas if only you guys do this for us, for America, for you own good, your own souls. Forget the angry, frightened, irritable, annoying voters who support Senators who refuse to apologize for lynchings, who are corrupt as corrupt can be, who don't give a fig about America or whatever.

If you lead, they will follow, if you take them to a better place. But the Hispanics need a leader and they seem to approve of Hillary Clinton!

This action will fix many things. It will please the Northern states greatly to see that the Democratic Party of Texas ain't going to be a Party of One. It will reassure us after our Democratic President Kennedy was murdered in Texas that we can go to that state and be a liberal and a NYer and not be attacked physically.

And it will heal the rift that is growing ever wider here in what is supposed to be One Nation. The Lone Star state is going to be very lonely if we NYers and others take a hike.

Viva, Hillary!

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REAL LIBERAL SENATORS

Tonight, I want to go down memory lane. The subject of electing progressive Democrats to the Senate has crossed my desk in a rather forceful manner. Seeing the naked fear of being called "liberal" or being compared to anyone even faintly "liberal" really depressed and annoyed me.

So let's salute one of the greatest liberal Senators, ever, friend of my family, a man I adored and admired all my life, my former Senator from the former great state of Arizona, the man whose political base was my home town of Tucson, the liberal oasis in the desert!

From the Morris K. Udall web page:

Morris King Udall was born in St. Johns, Arizona, June 15, 1922, to a Mormon family with six children. At age seven, he lost his right eye in an accident, but this loss didn't stop him from becoming co-captain of his high school basketball team, quarterback for the football team, trumpet player in the school band, student body president and valedictorian. After graduation he entered The University of Arizona. His college career was interrupted from 1942 to 1945 when he served in the U.S. Army Air Corps in the Pacific, entering as a private and honorably discharged as captain.
In 1946, Udall returned to The University of Arizona and earned a law degree. He obtained an airplane pilot license, played professional basketball for the Denver Nuggets and, after scoring highest on the state bar exam, was admitted to the Arizona Bar and began practicing law with his brother Stewart.

He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1961 in a special election to replace his brother Stewart who left the position to become President John F. Kennedy's Secretary of the Interior.

Petitioned by many of his colleagues in the House of Representatives, Udall campaigned for the 1976 Democratic Party Presidential nomination. He finished second to Jimmy Carter, who was elected president. In 1977, Udall was named chairman of the House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs (now Committee on Resources) until 1991.

Udall was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, a neurological disorder impairing movement and speech, in 1979. In May 1991, he resigned from Congress for health reasons, and he died on 12 December 1998. He left six children, one stepson, and his wife, the former Norma Gilbert.


Udall was one of the most productive members of Congress in the latter part of this century. Chief among his accomplishments was the Alaska Lands Act of 1980, which doubled the size of the national park system, and tripled the size of the national wilderness system.

Other significant legislation includes: The Central Arizona Project, Postal Reform Act, Bill to Reform Congressional Franking Privileges, Strip Mining Reclamation Act, Indian Child Welfare Act, Civil Service Reforms, Archaeological Research Protection Act, Southern Arizona Water Rights Settlement Act, Nuclear Waste Management Policy Act, Arizona Wilderness Act, Amendment to the Price-Anderson provision of the Atomic Energy Act, Indian Gaming Act, Arizona Desert Wilderness Act, Tongass Timber Reform Act.

As well as serving in the House of Representatives for three decades, Udall ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1976. He became one of the most creative and productive legislators of the century. His concern for Native Americans and love of the environment resulted in numerous pieces of legislation moving through Congress. He also authored important legislation on campaign reform, congressional ethics and was the first major Democrat to oppose President Johnson on the Vietnam War.

Udall's sense of humor, civility and a strong bipartisan spirit led him to distinguish between political opponents and enemies. One of Udall's closest longtime friends was the rock of Republican conservatism, Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater. To honor his family's contributions to public service, The Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy, The Morris K. Udall Foundation, and the U.S. Institute for Environmental Conflict Resolution, all continue the Udall's legacy to improve the American experiment.

He was Mr. Clean. He lived a fairly spartan life. He didn't ask for much at all. He, like my parents, lived within the splendors of Nature and surrounded by the Inca Dove and the Vulture, the Mule Deer and the Mountain Lion, the delicate and harsh beauty of the desert and lightning and saguaros was the cultural treasure he cared so carefully for and doted on.

Sigh.

Here is a famous speech about government ethics by this great Senator: Politics and Morality

Charles Dickens begins his "Tale of Two Cities" with a paradoxical statement that "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times." Dickens wrote of the 1770's and the French Revolution, but his description might well be applied to our own time and to our collective experience in the 1960's. For in many ways, this last decade was both the best and the worst of times. It was a time when we put a man on the moon, an event as much a symbol of our astounding technological progress as it was a result of that progress. It was the best of times in other ways, too, for the 1960's saw the culmination of social reform efforts begun more than 30 years earlier.
But it was also a decade when mobs put the torch to some of America's sick and deteriorating cities; when three of our most promising leaders fell in senseless assassinations; when we became embroiled in a hopeless war that has done incalculable damage to us and to the people of a far off land.

As a result of the worst aspects of the times, it seems to me we are on the verge of losing a typical American quality -- optimism. One of America's unique strengths and most obvious national characteristics has always been optimism. We have believed -- and our history has tended to support this view -- that America would be bigger and better and more prosperous for each generation. A man could hope and dream that his children would surpass his own achievements. We believe that when crises arose, leaders, somehow, would appear to match the times.

All of this stuff really takes me back to my earlier memories in my life which are intimately tied to the famous mountain of Kitt Peak. Both Stewart Udall who became Sec. of the Interior in 1961 and Mo Udall, who became the Senator that same year, were instrumental in helping Kitt Peak get off the ground.

Here is my father at the treaty signing.

My dad is the handsome tall man leaning against the building. Dr. Carpenter is sitting at the table. I remember this house, by the way. The lady who lived there made awesome tortillas by hand.

Kitt Peak is a sacred mountain. My father told me, he flew over it and fell instantly in love with the mountain and prayed hard that it would pass muster. I remember my first day there. We drove on this narrow road in the desert that went up and down through each arroyo. We came to the tribal leader's home and my dad chatted and then we went to the mountain itself. I looked up the complex mountain soaring so near yet so high. It sang to me. I fell in love. This place was to become utterly intertwined with my dream world as well as waking world. I ended up exploring every inch of Kitt Peak over the years.

My father and Dr. Carpenter talk about Kitt Peak and their first visit to the mountain.


Here is a picture of the old South Face road. I remember the jeep! We used to ride on the sideboards and hang on as it banged along in the deep ruts. Riding the cat tractor was even more fun. The back road ran through desert that was scattered with thousands of shards of broken pottery and discarded corn grinder stones and the rivers had treasure troves of sand rubies which I used to sift for, squatting with the children of the tribe, searching for the shiny red stones.

The Udalls had an interest in all this and much, much more. As I grew older, I could see how their love of the desert, their respect for the natives, their careful care of the planet, this was the true spirit of the West! This is why Muir, when he passed through the Tucson valley, declared a century earlier that this was a most beautiful place!

Mo was taller than my dad who is tall. When I was really small, I thought he was like Old Man Saguaro. Old Man was ancient as well as very tall. Unlike Mo, multiarmed.



Kitt Peak is famous for the lightning photos. I got struck there, too. But then, this happens to me rather a lot.

Well, to continue after going way off course....who would have imagined Arizona would produce the Udall family? All of them, wonderful people. Much of what we take for granted to day were things they decided to save for us to enjoy. Yet they also developed the resources of the desert and the tribes. In addition, they worked with Presidents and Congress to change the mining laws, for example, so lovely places like the Appalacian mountains wouldn't end up a moonscape. Oh, did I tell you the GOP has gutted those laws recently? No?

They did.

The tension in the West can be summed up thusly: some come to rip the place apart, yank out whatever they can grab and then leave. Some come to live and love. Preservation and death intertwine. The rocket launching grounds of China Lake or White Sands, I know them well, too. The stark, hot beauty and deadly fear. Then there is the atom bomb's birthplace. Death. Shin.

The entire West is perched on the edge of a very serious environmental cliff. Water is being used extravegantly and wastefully. People are abusing themselves and the lands. The stresses are growing, not diminishing. People are pouring in from all over. The West is terribly fragile, and in addition, awfully geologically active.

The Udalls understood all of this. Not all at once. This family reached out to learn about Nature and to understand how Nature responds and how it all fits neatly together. This took time which they devoted to using. I learned just as they did, we all learned together.

But learning means nothing without love. And I loved Mo and Stewart Udall and I loved the Desert. (And the Dark Side: his wife committed suicide. The Desert is a Harsh Mistress)

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TEXAS AGAIN

At Eschaton, aka, Atrios: via Desi of Great Scat: comes this delightful picture of a cute Texan lass who is unafraid of picketing the private home of a quiet, unobtrusive gay couple. Oh, the tremendous bravery of this woman!

Will politicians arise and go forth and protect this gay couple who have to have this terribly rude and rather vicious in a petty way, female who is making a spectacle of herself? Think about how terrible it is to live in your own home with this floozy hanging about the entrance, mocking you, laughing at you, bullying you?

According to Desi's great blog, she belongs to a Baptist Church.

I always wonder about these sorts of people. Has it ever occured to them that what they are doing is terribly rude, crude, low class, stupid and whatever other negative things I can think of? Why do these sorts want to interfer with people's private lives? Who made it their business? Do you think she would be smiling if I stood in front of her and made fun of her poor choice of clothing and crude hat? Her silly face? Her sex choices? If her boyfriend comes up, should I laugh at him and tell him his pants are hanging down too low and he looks like a lout?

Of course, seeing that I am a woman, she and her buddies would become violent...unless I come armed, for example. For they are bullies and boy, there seems no end to these in Texas. I know from my own life that when people stand up to bullies, they collapse.

Of course, the bullies won't picket the homes of minorities who belong to gangs, that you can bet. Bet also, they roll up the windows and slither past such neighborhoods, shaking in their cowboy boots. Or they hire armed people to go in and fight real battles with people who shoot back.

Certainly, no chick would stand in front of the homes of dangerous people with signs telling them they will burn in hell.

After the last "election" we were all solemnly told that the Christians are in the driving seat and we should court them and respect them and...well...I will quote from this fine specimen of Southern Ladyhood: "God hates you."

Until some church drives up to this home and protects this couple, until a church rallys their people to get them to be civilized rather than vicious savages, I say, to heck with them all.

I remember once trying to get some churches to rally together to stop a local bully who happened to have some power, the family owning a nearby big business. They all chickened out. They thought it was OK for the kids to bully other children in school.

You get what you pay for in this world. And bullies love to think they are great. And alas, they get away with this. Too bad this chick ain't fighting a real war. Several Marine women were blown up the other day. Two of them were about her age.

Heh. Like in a rat's *ss.

backtrack

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BUSH/DELAY AND TEXAS

As the deranged Texan duo imitate Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, leaping off the cliff to avoid the cops, I wonder why there isn't a chorus of Democrats in the South calling for their scalps. Now's the time! I remember Clinton. A pretty innocent blow job from a star struck young lady got him impeached, for crying out loud, and I noted at that time there was a Greek chorus of politicians lining up in the Democratic and Republican parties screaming for his blood and demanding he disappear, pronto.

Well, don't times change. From Associated Press

President Bush said Monday that if anyone in his administration committed a crime in connection with the public leak of the identity of an undercover CIA operative, that person will "no longer work in my administration." At the same time, Bush again sidestepped a question on the role of his top political adviser, Karl Rove, in the matter.

"We have a serious ongoing investigation here and it's being played out in the press," Bush said at an East Room news conference.

Bush, appearing with visiting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India, spoke a day after Time magazine's Matthew Cooper said that a 2003 phone call with Rove was the first he heard about the wife of Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson apparently working for the CIA.

Bush said in June 2004 that he would fire anyone in his administration shown to have leaked information that exposed the identity of Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame. On Monday, however, he added the qualifier that it would have be shown that a crime was committed.

Asked at a June 10, 2004, news conference if he stood by his pledge to fire anyone found to have leaked Plame's name, Bush answered, "Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts."

A tempest has swirled around the leak of the CIA agent's name, apparently by Bush administration officials, in July 2003.

This is getting pretty funny. The reporter has spilled the beans, dudes. Guess what? We know the leakers are both Libby and Rove and by extention, Bush and Cheney. We can't fire Bush and Cheney...yet....but they are sworn and bound to fire Libby and Rove. There is no more excuses. No games. This is it, bubs. Ya gambled and ya lost. Don't play Texas Hold 'Em with me. Time to fold your cards and pass the kitty over to me, thank you.

It is done.

Of course, we need a chorus of stab in the back Republicans to yell at Mr. Dimwit President and get him to do what he keeps saying he will do: fire anyone who leaked Plame's name to a reporter.

Sen. Charles Schumer (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y., said Bush shouldn't wait for charges to be filed to take action.

"The standard for holding a high position in the White House should not simply be that you didn't break the law," he said. "It should be a lot higher and if Mr. Rove or anyone else aided and abetted the leaking of the name of an agent, even if they don't meet the narrow criminal standard, the president should ask for their resignation."

We got other Democrats who can call for the resignation. Where are they? Under what tables and beds do they cower?

Come out, come out, where ever you are!

When Durbin accurately compared our gulags to Russian gulags, the Democratic party had no shortage of back stabbers happy to attack him. I really liked the silly line, "We must support the troops," used as a general blanket excuse for not being outraged by gross violations of the Geneva Conventions as well as really close similarities to Nazi torture that we claimed allowed us to hang them at the Nuremburg Trials.

Talking about trials, here is a laugh riot. We want to try Saddam for "killing Iraqis". Thud. Amazing, no? Gads.

From Associated Press

A lawyer for Saddam Hussein said Monday that Iraq's insurgency has made Baghdad far too dangerous a venue for the former leader's trial, and that the proceedings should be moved to another country.

Giovanni di Stefano said Saddam's defense team has contacted the Swedish government about the possibility of holding a trial there. But Swedish Justice Ministry spokesman Alexander Valentin said Monday that he was not aware of any official request.

"Do you fancy spending a year or more in Baghdad, going to court five days a week? Would you feel safe there?" di Stefano said in an interview with The Associated Press.

"Baghdad couldn't even prevent the recent kidnapping and killing of the Egyptian ambassador. There are also many Iraqis who want to see Saddam executed and many others who want to see him freed. That means the defense and prosecution would both be in danger there," di Stefano said.

Di Stefano criticized Iraq's handling of Saddam, saying the fact that he has been held in custody for 548 days without being formally charged is a violation of international law.

548 days in jail with no trail. Um, look up the Nuremburg Trials. They were all done in half that time.

What with the chaos in Iraq, the Americans should be overjoyed to have him tried in a court in Sweden! I cannot see how a trial can be run anywhere in Iraq without Saddam being sprung out jail! Certainly, blowing up the courthouse isn't that unlikely. Or maybe they can do a Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid shoot 'em out. Quite likely.

Talking about unrepentant criminals brings up another story in today's news: From Associated Press

An unrepentant Eric Rudolph declared Monday that abortion must be fought with "deadly force" as a judge sentenced him to life in prison for setting off a remote-controlled bomb at an abortion clinic that killed an off-duty police officer and maimed a nurse.

"Children are disposed of at will," the 38-year-old Rudolph said, jabbing the air in a speech that echoed a rambling manifesto he issued in April when he pleaded guilty to four bombings in all, including the blast at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. "The state is no longer the protector of the innocents."

Rudolph's fiery statement came as his victims confronted him court, branding the anti-abortion extremist a cowardly "monster" and recalling how their lives were devastated by the 1998 clinic bombing in Birmingham.

Saddam isn't the only one killing fellow citizens, no? I hope the entire GOP denounce this guy. And denounce anyone who supports him. And while they are at it, they could sign the Lynching Apology, too. Every bit helps.

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FEAR

I have been running around the political hustings for a very long time. In Brooklyn, I earned the sobriquet "The Housewife From Hell" from the Daily News because I was a political attack dog. Anyone who crossed my path regretted it.

Even before that, I did real as well as virtual hand to hand combat over political matters. No namby pamby "I am against the war but too scared to demonstrate" stuff for me! Indeed, in Europe, the place I took my Desert Fighting skills and used it in real battles, I had the stirring joy and cold sweat fear of standing on a barricade and hearing the clank-clank-clank of a French army tank and seeing the gun turrent peek around the corner and then the tank hove into view.

We weren't as suicidal as the Iraqis fighting Americans, we ran.

The main thing is, I stand up for something and I am who I am and like Popeye, that's all that I am. Eat ya spinach!

Bush isn't a man. He is a coward. He hides behind an army of courtiers and operatives and the Secret Service and the GOP machine and they carefully remove any and all opposition when he appears "in public". He is scared of his own shadow.

The Deep South is full of scared people, alas. Even as they wave flags and act brave and proud, they really are scared. Scared of immigrants, scared of uppity women, scared of foreigners, scared of the descendants of slaves, scared of their own children, husbands, whatever. This pervasive fear causes them to cut themselves off at every turn. What will someone say if they notice...whatever?

When I lived in the deep South briefly as a child, I saw this fear first hand. As a student radical, I noted how scared the people there were of hippies. Hippies! About as harmless a folk one can imagine! They seem to be absolutely terrified of gay men. Indeed, the fear needle goes off the chart if the gay man is also kind and gentle. Then the fear totally unmans and unwomans the average Southerner.

Why? What makes for all this fear? Why are they addicted to it? Why is this fear destroying America?

For it is.

The right wingers in the Republican party and quite a few Democrats, too, want to ban the burning of the American flag. Like, when has this been going on? I ain't seen no such anywhere, no? So why warp the Constitution to deal with it? Fear. They just might hate the concept of a Federal Government and a nation undivided, indivisible, etc. They don't really love the flag all that much, they want to have a very divided America. Look at how all of the leaders in the deep south work hard to alienate us! The country is totally and nearly unrepairably divided!

So, the Democrats ride to the rescue?

Hahahaha. Nope. Fear eats them, too. In the south, and I assure you of this, this editorial is thanks to a conversation with a very nice but very fearful politician from the Deep South, the strategy is to run away from the Democrats up North! Why? Well, the voters won't vote if one belongs to a national party that has other members from other states like the terrifying place called "New York"! Repudiate Kerry! Repudiate and attack Edwards! Not to mention Al Gore! If a Democrat wants to be popular in the Deep South, all they have to do is attack these people. Join the howling right wing and attack within the party! Then you "win elections". Great.

Like winning a war by bombing your own cities.

The other thing is to pretend to not be progressive and indeed, attack brave progressives in the South. Repudiate them and even sneer at them. Depict them as out of step with "regular" Americans. Sow the hate.

The Republicans feed their base and the Democrats attack their base. And then wonder why the party is over.

For it is drawing to a close. The GOP can still pretend to be a national party only because they still have their grip on the American credit card and can charge everything to our children's bill. The big wigs in the North like this because they are raking in the dough thanks to this. But this is ending...very soon.

American Progressives and Liberals are getting pretty fed up with all this. Don't talk about Hillary! Don't talk about single payer plan! Huh? Eh? Don't talk about pulling out of the disaster in Iraq!

Why? You can't have dreams because you are afraid someone will say, "No"? Ask for the world, you might get it. Ask for a penny, you might get that, too. But why? The skinflints running the GOP want a single party system in the South so they can loot the North. They won't even give a penny so why worry about asking for that?

It is much worse. The hatred of our nation is rife there. Being told that one doesn't talk about "national" stuff when running in the Deep South pisses me off more than anything right now. Well, they don't want a nation?

Good. Let's get a divorce. I said this after the last election fiasco. Let them go. They don't want to be part of us, ditto in spades from me! They can live without my tax dollars! We pay for them even as the oil barons down there are reaming me out financially up here, they are rolling in dough and got their toadies to pass more tax breaks for themselves. I have to pay for all this.

Anyone running as a Democrat has to talk about these things. If a Democrat in the south is going to be a near clone of the Republicans, why have them? If they are progressive, they should stand proud and be happy being one and tell everyone, "The water is fine! Jump in and swim! We can do it!"

But that might be scary.

Hiding one's progressive desires while appearing in a false light never works for the GOP will turn the spotlight glare upon anyone challenging them and then blast away. It is far better to be open and proud so when they start yelling at you, you can say, "Yes, I am!" and laugh at them.

If Americans are not ready for progressive ideas then one has to slog along like I do here, educating and patiently building a case. Like health care. I comb the web for stories that contain data concerning this and I show how the American unions who wanted our present, unfair system, are losing it and will lose it and they have to start yelling, top of lungs, for single payer plans! And students and workers with no insurance, they must be organized to yell for this. They want something, give them what will work! Don't worry about the stupid insurance companies! They will absolutely hate anything we come up with. Look at the campaign against Hillary Clinton!

Hillary Clinton is an outlying icon. Any candidate in the Deep South should invite her down, stand next to her and say, at the top of the lungs "We are in the same party and want to work together for AMERICA! Let's give Hill a loud CHEER!"

Make sure the press has many pictures of this. Smile big and hard and even laugh! The GOP will go insane, screaming. "Yes, we want America to be safe, strong and happy. This is what the Democratic party has always fought hard for! We are proud of our record!"

But if one is scared? Run and hide. Hope no one notices that the terrifying Hillary is a Democrat. I have a suggestion for all politicians in the Deep South scared of my Senator: rename your party, please. I can think of several. "The Jackrabbit Party" for one. Or "Ostrich Party". "We keep our heads in the sand!" Way to go. Strut your stuff!

In the very early 80's I helped a politician who was gay. She thought she hid it well but I sat her down and forced her to listen to all the inside gossip I had collected on her. "I thought you were on my side," she wailed. I grabbed her and said, "You must make some choices now. What do you plan to do when this makes the news?"

She realized she had to start dealing with this, not by hiding it but by carefully bringing it out, step by step. She won. She did well. She is still doing well. No one in NY notices her sex life. It doesn't matter.

If she hid it, it does matter.

I would think it would be very easy to wrap the flag around oneself and say, "I love America!" Look at my icon image here! I wear this flag because my family fought for it in the Revolution, both the one in England with Cromwell and the one here! We lost our ancestral home in England, fled to Holland and then took a chance in the New World which was really dangerous back in the 1600s! Out of the frying pan and into the fire!

Elections are mere bribery sessions. "What are you going to give me," isn't the question. "What will make America better and stronger" is a pressing question. Fighting a deadly war with the civilians in Asia Minor isn't making us one whit safer, it has greatly increased our danger. We have to talk about this! Both parties! Both plunged into this war out of greed and fear.

The many trillions in debts we owe other nations is going to destroy America. There are no more goodies to hand out! Everyone wants whatever! But we can't! No more. No longer must we "balance the budget," it was nearly too late 3 trillion dollars ago. Now we are in "emergency alert" territory.

Ross Perot took almost one third of the vote talking about all this once. His party was butchered bit by bit until it died utterly. There was no way the Republicans or Democrats would allow a real third party.

I go forth and talk about stuff. If people want to follow, this makes me happy. If they don't it is a free world. Even lemmings make choices!

I don't have to join them.

Leaders have to stand out. This is why one is noticed. "Outstanding" means to stand on some sort of pinnacle and be noticed! Duh, no?

In NYC politics, I tracked who was my enemy and why and was quite happy to collect quite a few scary people. Meade Esposito was one. "The Mafia Boss of Brooklyn." When I was through with him, he was in prison. When I deposed the head of the City Council, he called me in tears, "Why did you do this?" he wailed.

I laughed. "You told ME to go to hell. Hot, isn't it?"

Politics isn't a tea party. It is warfare carried on without weapons except when the shooting starts. This didn't stop Martin Luther King. Bullets didn't stop me. Anyone who isn't willing to literally die for their beliefs isn't worth following. Get that, all you Republicans who are refusing to fight Bush's wars? Get going. Your duty calls! Bush is an AWOL coward and few Texans even in the Democratic Party dares say that outloud.

This is why the Southern Democrats are going down in flames. You can't fight if you give up. Someone tell that to Kerry, too. Rrrruf. Snarl. Snap.

This is also why I always used my real name on the web. No hiding behind clouds of smoke. You can see me as clearly as I see the world on my mountain. I see storm clouds. There is no Santa Claus waiting to give us goodies. All our progressive dreams will mean ought if the Chinese and Russians nuke our cities because we are moving in, at the orders of the Japanese, into disputed territory in Asia!

Riots and revolutions and civil war as well as world wars can rain down upon our heads. This doesn't happen because people are strong but because they are fearful.

As the great President, Roosevelt, said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." This should be engraved and posted in every office, every room of every Democratic politician. Speak up, be proud of a great party, be American. Be for all America. Get some spine, will ya?

Thank you in advance (sword fighting lessons at 5).

CUE THE HITCHCOCK TORTOISE THEME!

The older readers here probably fondly remember the Saint Saens' theme music for the Hitchcock TV mystery show. He was so droll, he would step into his own picture in profile and he had some trenchant comments about crime at the end of each show, complete with props.

Well, Rove is learning the hard way, you can't outrun the Long Arm of the Law especially the Law of Unintended Consequences!

From the NYT:

When revelations surfaced last week that Karl Rove had secretly talked to reporters about a C.I.A. operative, some critics demanded the senior adviser be swiftly swept from the corridors of power.

But Mr. Rove is not just any staff member. He is, by most accounts, the definition of an indispensable aide - at once "the architect" of Republican gains, as Mr. Bush dubbed him after the 2004 elections, as well as a nexus of politics and policy within the West Wing, his office constantly abuzz with communications from Congress, grassroots groups, other branches of the administration and Republican operatives nationwide.

Geeze. Rove is nothing more than a courtier to the Bush family. No more, no less. Far from being some genius, he is an old fashioned pol: he spends our money bribing people who should be put in jail but can't because they own us. All the support Bush garnered was due entirely and only to bribes he handed out like there was no tomorrow.

It isn't accidental that we racked up a cool $2.5 trillion in new debt in less than five years!

One former Republican official who retains close ties to the White House said there could be a political cost for keeping Mr. Rove on board even if he is found to have done nothing illegal. "If Karl survives, he does so at the president's political expense," said the former official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he did not want to be seen as disloyal to Mr. Rove.

"George W. Bush came into office promising two tenets that are in competition now: straight talk, non-parsing - and loyalty," the former official said. "He's either got to choose loyalty or straight talk. He can't do both."

But there are few historical models for the ousting of a figure like Mr. Rove. There is the save-the-sinking ship model. When the Nixon administration began to unravel, because of Watergate, three of Richard Nixon's most trusted aides - H.R. Haldeman, the chief of staff; Richard Kleindienst, the attorney general; and John Ehrlichman, the domestic policy adviser - had to go, in order to try to save the president himself. No presidency before or since has seen such upheaval at its highest echelons.

The CIA was investigated, too! All sorts of dirty garbage saw the light of day for a mere eyeblink then the media whores and the ruling elite cracked down on us and put us back into harness and started shovelling debt on top of us starting with Reagan's wild budgets.

From the Washington Post:

In public, he was masterminding President Bush's reelection and brushing off suggestions he had played any part in an unfolding drama: the unmasking of CIA operative Valerie Plame. In private, the senior White House adviser was meeting, on five occasions, with federal prosecutors to tell what he knew about the matter.

The story he would tell prosecutors did not seem to square with the White House's denial that it had played any role in one of the most famous leaks since Watergate. Rove told prosecutors he had discussed Plame in passing with at least two reporters, including the columnist who eventually revealed her name and role in a secret mission that would raise questions about Bush's case for war against Iraq. At the same time, other White House officials were whispering about Plame, too.

It is now clear: There has been an element of pretense to the White House strategy of dealing with the Plame case since the earliest days of the saga. Revelations emerging slowly at first, and in a rapid cascade over the past several days, have made plain that many important pieces of the puzzle were not so mysterious to Rove and others inside the Bush administration. White House officials were aware of Plame and her husband's potentially damaging charge that Bush was "twisting" intelligence about Iraq's nuclear ambitions well before the episode evolved into Washington's latest scandal.

This is much stronger than the mealy mouthed NYT! The entire article hits much harder. Must be because the NYT has to pretend their media whorette, Miller, is a sweet innocent bitch, no?

But as the story hurtles toward a conclusion sometime this year, there are several elements that remain uncertain. The most important -- did anyone commit a crime?

To paraphrase others wittier than I, "this is worse than a crime, it is a mistake." (note: It was the Napoleon's Minister of the Police, Fouche, who quipped this!)

Attacking a mother of young twins because Bush wanted to punish her husband was a cowardly, dasterdly thing. Period. For that alone, the Executioner who is Bush should resign in disgrace. Period.

Thank you, end of story.

Using lies to invade an innocent nation and then allowing it to devolve into a charnel house, that is for the Hague to try and sentence him. War crimes used to be a hanging matter.

And the anthrax killer. Isn't it a very odd thing for this unknown person to reach out and right after 9/11, sends a letter to a very obscure man in Florida who happened to be the person who OKed the Jenna drunk photos in the Sun? Normally, if I were Hitchcock or Sherlock Holmes, the first thing I would look at is the connection between this nobody and the President. Seeing it, and seeing that the anthrax was military grade and thus only could have come from the military that the President controls...see? Follow the dots!

Rove is a sideshow to the real circus.

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UNDERCOVER CIA MOMS

My mom and dad being SPIEIs awards for their great work

During WWII, my father became one of the youngest OSS/ONI officers. He went deep into Germany looking for the secret rocket factories. He had a most exciting time of it. After the war, the OSS was disbanded and he became a civilian again, a respected astronomer.

My father's activities during WWII were so classified, he reported only to Gen. Eisenhower himself or the President of the United States. Because it was so classified, after the war, all information of it was kept hidden from view only to be partially declassified in the late 1980's. When I was tracing my father's activities in Europe in 1968, I met a number of Germans who told me many astonishing stories. To them, my father was a dashing figure. I was rather annoyed at his quiet image at home. Geeze. Like living with Tarzan only he is wearing a business suit and glasses to hide himself!

When the CIA was launched, they reached out to my father and mother. Since my father was deep cover ops already, they kept him that way. He was the perfect person for this sort of thing for he is very good at what he does in the open: astronomy. He traveled around the planet organizing observatories and conducting classes in physics and his constant companion was my mother.

My mother is a great woman who keeps a low profile at home. I could spend days telling you funny or amazing stories of her. She was the real intelligence gatherer for no one paid any attention to her as she travelled about, poking her nose into everything, talking to everyone. She rummaged about the planet, quite literally.

When I was a child, she went off on these long journeys to India or Africa or Europe and we were cared for by Rosie. She couldn't call us on the phone during the early years because after WWII, there was very spotty phone service in many countries. Even from Europe, I remember the calls. You had to yell to be heard. The calls from Asia had to be passed hand by hand via various operators who didn't do very good English so my mother's speech to us fledglings often came across in hilarious forms.

In the sixties, I would call their secretary and ask her, "What part of the planet are they at now?" Sometimes she didn't know, herself. Once they turned me loose in Europe, they were the ones demanding to know what country I was in! Turned the tables, yah.

I became suspicious of my parents when young because they knew too much. They would talk to each other and forget some of us have very big ears. The mysterious helicopters that would suddenly appear dropping into the horse pasture whenever there was a crisis certainly wasn't normal. The bizarre flights on supersonic jets my father took when there were really bad stuff happening impressed me. Like the Cuban Missile Crisis! He gave us the helmet and parachute from that ride. All our friends laughed at us when we showed them as proof our dad did weird things. I also riffled through my parent's office when they were overseas. I pieced together a great deal this way. I used to wait until they changed their IBM typewriter ribbons and then fish it out and reconstruct letters. I felt like a real spy.

What I was doing was dangerous, of course. Finally, my father noticed my activities, I suspect he was warned to stop me because I talked to Statsi agents in Germany so he ordered me to not tell anyone anything anymore.

My own affairs became tangled with my parent's CIA activities. I was active on the world stage while they were increasingly upset with me interfering with them.

"We are trying to protect America," my father would say, his face in pain.

"You are not protecting America, you are protecting the rulers of America," I countered. "And they are evil."

One thing, though. I will protect my parents. Up until four years ago, I never wrote a word about them nor did I talk to any reporters. But now this is all over because they have retired for more than a decade. I promised them at least this.

When my mother was overseas, she could have been killed. Back then, most governments assumed she was out of the loop instead of deep inside it. If the top advisor to any President were to tell the DC top reporters, "Professor Meinel's wife is a undercover CIA operative who works in China and Saudi Arabia," for example, my mother could have been killed! Luckily for me, this never happened.

But Bush and Rove did this to another mother in the CIA! And this ticks me off, a great deal.

Jesse Walker of Reason Magazine makes fun of the outing of Plame. From Reason Magazine

Before Neil Bush had some trouble with a failed savings and loan and before Jeb and W. entered politics, George H.W. Bush's most famous child was the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, passed with much fanfare in 1982. Under that law, an official who deliberately reveals a covert agent's identity faces 10 years' imprisonment and a $50,000 fine; it was passed to stop the activities of former CIA case officer Philip Agee and the magazines Counterspy and Covert Action Information Bulletin, which between them had exposed over 2,000 alleged agents of the company. For former CIA chief Bush, such revelations were an outrage: They had led, he argued, to the death of one agency employee—Athens station chief Richard Welch, assassinated by Greek leftists on December 23, 1975—and they had to be stopped before they killed anyone else.

Now the law is back in the news, thanks to Robert Novak's 2003 column revealing that Valerie Plame, wife of Iraq war whistleblower Joe Wilson, did undercover work for the CIA. Newsweek has fingered Karl Rove, the president's chief political adviser, as the man who leaked Plame's other identity to the press; he soon may be in trouble under the act aimed at Agee. One reporter has been jailed for refusing to cooperate with the investigation, and another barely missed imprisonment. All for an edict that shouldn't have been passed in the first place and ought to be junked today.

I am going to tell you something: every time my mother was cornered, she would put on her most innocent face and say, "Why would the CIA send a mother of seven children overseas to spy?"

I can't tell you how many times my parents were facing armed people who were on the verge of killing them and how they talked their way out of it all, time and time again. Especially my mother. They were in constant danger and sometimes, so were we, the children. When others in the CIA reported that Statsi agents were tracking me, he told me to come home and go into hiding.

Of course, I didn't. I said, "The CIA is more worried that I will spill the beans on them in the European press." He couldn't refute this.

The passage of the CIA laws was done by Bush to stop whistle blowers within the CIA. It is immensely funny that this law is biting off the head of Bush's childish son, Bush Jr. A fitting end to all of this.

One more thing: actually, the Russians and Chinese know who our spies are. In the beginning, when Nixon opened China so he could withdraw from Vietnam in one piece, the Chinese assumed all Americans interacting with them were CIA spies. And guess what!

They were right!

They told me this. I laughed with them, they laughed nervously. While spying on me, they quickly discovered that I was a person non grata with the government and the CIA and with my own parents so they relaxed and sometimes would even blurt out the truth which is why, when I tell you what they are thinking, I am not making stuff up.

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DRACONIAN RULE

We used to have a Constitution. Every once and a while, it is misplaced or burned by our rulers. Then they dust it off, actually, we force them to return it to us, we add on more stuff protecting ourselves and life goes on. The rulers have once again torn up the Constitution. The misnamed Patriot Act and the Gore vs the Ruling Elite in 2000 has rendered the Constitution moot.

From the Washington Post

A man convicted for what he said -- words that prosecutors said incited his followers to train for violent jihad against the United States -- had a few more things to say yesterday in a federal courtroom in Alexandria before he was sentenced to life in prison.

Ali Al-Timimi, a prominent Muslim spiritual leader, delivered an impassioned statement in which he asserted his innocence, read the preamble to the U.S. Constitution and said his religious beliefs do not recognize "secular law." He then compared himself to the Greek philosopher Socrates, who was sentenced to death for corrupting the young and dishonoring the gods of Athens.

OK, let's review some history here! Way back in the old days, before Bizarro world took over, it was early April, 18, 1995. I was moving timber and was driving my pickup truck across the property, bouncing along, when my hand hit the radio by accident and it turned onto an AM station I never heard of before.

"I ask all real patriots to pick up a gun and punish the ATF officers who killed all those little children at Waco last year," yelled the man. He lived at that time in Idaho, he was a white power racist. I wrote down the station ID and called them after looking them up. After being called names by them, I hung up and then called Washington, DC and talked to my contacts in the FBI, this was back when the FBI still chatted with me periodically (since 1970, heh). I told them to watch out for the FBI and BATF offices in Oklahoma City and Dallas, Texas. They said, "Don't worry. These guys are just talking big."

The next morning, I was washing dishes. The birds were singing. The tiny battery operated TV was on. 9:02 (terrorists LOVE that time slot!) OKC time, the TV show was interrupted by the breaking news about the explosion which just happened. The smoke from it was still rising. I dropped the dish and broke it. I wailed, "NO!" and the phone behind me rang.

It was the BATF in DC calling. They were screaming at me. I told them I overheard the white power racists talking about assassinating them. They sent an agent over from Albany.

We went over my information very carefully. On TV, they had the usual people talking about Muslim terrorists. I told them, "Look for a thin, blonde haired man, check out your data from infiltrating the Idaho groups. There is a connection". They sent out the bulletin and caught McVeigh.

For years and years, the FBI considered me to be a good source of information. Today, they won't dare talk to me.

The point here is...the people on the radio calling for terrorist attacks on Federal agents and Federal buildings were not even arrested. They didn't go to trial. They aren't "life in prison". This garbage today is pure rank racism.

"The first amendment protects him," they told me. Well, obviously, we no longer have a first amendment. The cleric sent unjustly to prison today didn't call on people to kill Federal agents or blow up DC, he told them to fight in a holy war...far away from America.

We now have troops all over the planet. This means no people can talk about fighting our military which is stationed in 75% of the world's countries. This hyper imperial reach collapses at home when white so called Christian males and females want to sound off.

Anne Coulter: like the cleric, no one was shot, no one did anything violent, they only talked about terrorizing people. She famously called for the NYT building to be bombed by the same clowns who I called the FBI on. From Media Matters:

* October 2004: Two days after the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, Coulter wrote about Muslims: "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity." She was fired from the right-wing National Review Online in late 2001 for this comment. Since then, she has not changed her position: In her new book, How to Talk to a Liberal, she wrote: "I am often asked if I still think we should invade their [Muslim] countries, kill their leaders, and convert them to Christianity. The answer is: Now more than ever!"

* August 26, 2002: On Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh: "My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building."

She isn't alone in egging violent people to commit grave crimes.

From David Neiwart of Orcinus:

This bumper sticker was spotted by Left in SF over the weekend -- disturbingly, on an SUV parked among a crowd of cars out for a gay-pride rally.



These "permits" have been around for awhile now, mostly circulating on the fringes of the far right, but they've been increasingly making their way into broader circulation. One of the Minutemen described in Andy Isaacson's mash letter to that extremist phenomenon sported just such a sticker on his rig.

The people sporting such stickers, no doubt, will contend that it's just a joke -- as though such a fig leaf could disguise the violent attitudes and beliefs required to find it humorous. Next they'll argue that stickers saying "Hitler Needed to Finish the Job" are just meant to be funny.

This is, of course, just another permutation of the rising tide of eliminationist rhetoric directed at liberals. It's everywhere -- including now, thanks to Karl Rove, the highest echelons of the Bush administration.

Quite. I notice this all over the place. Famously, a certain Senator from the south told President Clinton to not visit his state because he would be assassinated and he let it be known, he thought this would be a good thing, too. The Senator wasn't brought up on charges. He wasn't run out of office. Nothing happened to him. It supposedly was illegal for anyone to threaten the President but since this was Clintona and the terrorist was a Republican, it was OK.

From the NYT:

In a significant victory for the Bush administration's antiterrorism policy, a federal appeals court ruled today that military commissions could resume war crimes trials of detainees at the American naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled unanimously for the administration and against Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a former driver for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan, who is facing terrorism charges.

The panel emphatically overturned a decision on Nov. 8 by a federal district judge in Washington, James Robertson, who had ruled that in setting up military commissions to try the detainees President Bush overstepped his constitutional authority and improperly brushed aside Geneva Convention provisions on the handling prisoners of war.

These are mostly Muslims who aren't part of the Treaty of Westphalia concert of civilized nations that lined up toops to shoot politely at each other! They were fighters so they should be treated as such whatever they were wearing! We have quite a few soldiers "out of uniform" all over Asia Minor, by the way, and you can bet, we will howl like banshees if they were put on trial and then shot for being out of uniform!

Administration lawyers had argued that Judge Robertson, in conferring Geneva Convention protections on Mr. Hamdan and by extension others like him, had "put terrorism on the same legal footing as legitimate methods of waging war."

Those "legitimate methods," as described in the Convention, include wearing uniforms to distinguish fighters from civilians and prohibitions against making civilians targets. The administration argued that Al Qaeda fighters had openly defied the Convention.

The head reels.

In one month is the 60th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.

Gads, during WWII, 50% of the targets, 100% at the end of the war, were civilian only. We and the others in that hideous, ugly war, killed literally tens of millions of humans. And we executed the losers accusing them of torturing out of uniform people and civilians etc. Geeze, can't we look in a mirror here for a minute?

The appeals court said Congress had given the president all the authority he needed in a resolution passed just after Sept. 11, 2001. "It is impossible to see any basis for Hamdan's claim that Congress has not authorized military commission," the court ruled.

Nor does it matter at all, the court said, that Congress did not formally declare war on Al Qaeda after Sept. 11. The battle against Al Qaeda is as much a conflict as many other undeclared but still deadly wars in the nation's history, the court reasoned.

Um, and what exactly were these "undeclared but still deadly wars"? Hmmm....reviewing my own family history. We killed quite a few natives when we came here. They were in the way. They resented us shooting all the deer and beaver and taking rich farmland and plowing it for ourselves and cutting them out of their old camp grounds. They had no uniforms, heck, few weapons that weren't made of stone!

So we killed nearly all of them.

We didn't even bother putting on uniforms to do this, though often, we did. Blow them up, massacre the women and children. Teach them to mess around with our appropriations! And the slaves! Well. Even in uniform, they had precious few rights.

Yup. No blood on our hands. We are pure as driven snow.

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WWIII WILL LAST ONE DAY

Hiroshima, August, 1945

Will I get to bed tonight? As I was riffling through the dim, dark past, remembering things, I ran across this headline that just came over the wires.

This is an important story.

From Reuters:

A senior Chinese general has warned that China was ready to use nuclear weapons against the United States if Washington attacked his country over Taiwan, the Financial Times newspaper reported on Friday.

Zhu Chenghu, a major general in the People's Liberation Army who said he was expressing his own views and did not anticipate a conflict with Washington, nevertheless said China would have no option but to go nuclear in the event of an attack.

"If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons," he told an official briefing for foreign journalists.

Zhu said the reason was the inability of China to wage a conventional war against Washington.

"If the Americans are determined to interfere ... we will be determined to respond," he said.

"We Chinese will prepare ourselves for the destruction of all of the cities east of Xian. Of course the Americans will have to be prepared that hundreds ... of cities will be destroyed by the Chinese," he added.

The newspaper observed that it was unclear what prompted the remarks, but noted that they were the most specific by a senior Chinese official in nearly a decade.

During a visit to Beijing earlier this month Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said there should be no unilateral change in the status quo over the disputed island of Taiwan.

"That means that we don't support unilateral moves toward independence by Taiwan. It also means that we are concerned about the military balance, and we'll say to China that they should do nothing militarily to provoke Taiwan," she added.

Condi is probably, after Bolton and Bush, the worst diplomat on this entire planet. She can't juggle snakes and certainly our opponents can be real rattlers. Handle with extreme care!

The Japanese today gave an oil drilling contract to a Japanese company in the area claimed by China and this is a cause for war unless the Japanese back down. And so suddenly (this article can't connect dots, it is written by the mainstream press) today the Chinese talk about nuking America! YIKES.

We are Japan's army and navy, you know. They own us. They own a lot of us. They own us in a million overt and hidden ways. They buy our government bonds. They don't buy them, our taxes will double.

So they own us. They won WWII. They are now reasserting their ownership of Asia. With us as their military forces.

Gods spare us! I have warned people a thousand times, the Chinese are willing to lose 1/2 their population! They have been through this before and before! Like the Mongol invasions. They rebuild. But we lose 1/2 our population, the main cities, we are toast, you know. Not just that, we have never really been hit by war. We can't imagine the destruction.

Of course, this is also a warning to Japan that they can't use the USA as a cat's paw to attack China. The sotto voce here is the fact that 100% of Japan will be glowing in the dark and not even cockroaches will be alive. I don't know if the demented people running our planet right now understand we always are on the brink of WWIII. This is why we have to have sane leaders who are smart and don't want war. Why we need a very strong UN and disarmament. Why we need to be nice and get others to be nice. Why launching our stupid war in Asia Minor can cause the annihilation of most Americans in the long run.

Wars are easy to start.

They never end except in a pool of blood.

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RED ALERT!

A cartoon from last year. Haunting, no?

Even as the British desperately try to dig out the last bodies from the collapsed tunnel in London, the crimes of the Bush people pile up. Every time they wanted something political, they would assist terrorists.

The latest example now emerging from the smoke and taking shape concerns last year's election. Kerry was going to make his acceptance speech. Callowly, Bush connived with the head of Homeland Scardycats to up the terrorist alert to yellow. So just before Kerry spoke, the spooky people in this administration (sic) held a press conference designed to give everyone the willies.

They announced that an al Qaeda chief was in custody and was planning to blow up several cities in America!

From the always great Americablog:

ABC News just reported that the British authorities say they have evidence that the London attacks last week were an operation planned by Al Qaeda for the last two years. This was an operation the Brits thought they caught and stopped in time, but they were wrong. The piece of the puzzle ABC missed is that this is an operation the Bush administration helped botch last year.

1. The London bombers, per ABC, are connected to an Al Qaeda plot planned two years ago in Lahore, Pakistan.

2. Pakistani authorities recovered the laptop of a captured Al Qaeda leader, Mohammed Naeem Noor Khan, on July 13, 2004. On that laptop, they found plans for a coordinated series of attacks on the London subway. According to an expert interviewed by ABC, "there is absolutely no doubt that Khan was part of a worldwide Al Qaeda operation, not just in the United States but also in Great Britain and throughout the west."

3. ABC reports that names in the computer matched a suspected cell of Britain's of Pakistani decent, many of who lived near the town of Luton, England. According to ABC, authorities thought they had stopped the subway plot with the arrest of more than a dozen people last year. Obviously, they hadn't.

4. Those arrests were the arrests that the Bush administration botched by announcing a heightened security alert the week of the Democratic Convention. Because the US let the cat out of the bag, the media got a hold of Khan's name, his Al Qaeda contacts found out he was co-opted, and they fled. The Brits had to have a high speed chase to catch some of them as they fled, and, according to press reports, the Brits and Pakistanis both fear that some slipped away.

I was listening to the news the night the Bushies let the cat out of the bag. I had written about this matter the same day and scanned the news for the inevitable "arrest" or "alert" since we all decided, Bush will announce one. As he did.

We even talked with each other at TAPA how the arrest happened much earlier, maybe weeks earlier, and was kept quiet so they could pull it out of their hat just before the Kerry speech. As it happened. Our cynicism was fully justified and now today, the British have revealed that the fifth bomber on their tapes was one suspect who made a get away last July, nearly exactly a year ago.

That was important because Khan was remaining in touch with his Al Qaeda contacts AFTER his arrest - he was our mole - and the authorities were thus tracking INSIDE Al Qaeda. Once the American official made the info about Khan's arrest public, our mole inside the cell was blown, and the British police, caught off guard, had to make a high speed chase, literally, to catch Khan's contacts before they fled. THAT'S the raid that ABC is talking about. And it's that raid that - guess what? - didn't catch everybody who was plotting to blow up London last week. That's the raid that got botched.

And I quote from the Associated Press, August 10, 2004:
The disclosure to reporters of the arrest of an al-Qaida computer expert jeopardized Pakistani efforts to capture more members of Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, government and security officials said Tuesday.

Two senior Pakistani officials said initial reports in "Western media" last week of the capture of Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan had enabled other al-Qaida suspects to get away, but declined to say whether U.S. officials were to blame for the leak.

"Let me say that this intelligence leak jeopardized our plan and some al-Qaida suspects ran away," one of the officials said on condition of anonymity....

But the Pakistani officials said that after Khan's arrest, other al-Qaida suspects had abruptly changed their hide-outs and moved to unknown places.

The first official described the initial publication of the news of Khan's arrest as "very disturbing."

"We have checked. No Pakistani official made this intelligence leak," he said.

Someone in Whitehall has been releasing secret papers, the famous Downing Street memos, that detail Bush and Blair's conspiracy to create an illegal war based on false information and Wilson spilled the beans concerning the fake charges, destroying much of their conspiratorial fabrications, and now America writhes with screaming right wingers pretending the outing of Wilson's wife isn't treason or even illegal, but the story is the same.

Bush, and by extention, Blair, chose political expedience and protecting their own power over doing the right thing. They both bluntly would lie about nearly anything and reveal any information no matter how much it destroys our security so long as the results are more power for them both.

This is a dual treason. Like Hitler and Mussolini. The Axis of Evil is obvious now.

Bush allowed 9/11 to happen. He allowed 7/7 to happen. He is an accomplice to bin Laden. Going back to square one, the Bush clan and the bin Laden clan have a long history together, they interacted with each other, protect each other and assist each other. They have joint financial projects which were terminated only after 9/11 exposed both clans to charges of treason. Nonetheless, Bush actively assisted in helping them leave America the day after 9/11 and he prevented the FBI from talking to them except for very briefly despite the fact they were the number one suspects to detain and interrogate.

At every possible turn, Bush undermines our war on terror. Just today, his party that controls the entire government nearly passed a law, right after the London subway bombings, to strip NYC and other cities with subways, the money they need for security! Good sense finally forced a tiny handful of Republicans to vote no. By the skin of our teeth!

Last month, they tried this trick in another bill. It, too, was caught before they could sneak it past. They try everything they can think of to assist bin Laden in his attacks. He reads the news and tracks this stuff. He always takes two years to make his moves. Like a patient chess player, waiting, moving the pawns into position, then bang.

I, personally, feel Bush is a traitor. I feel he has bribed the media owners into supporting him by giving them ruinous tax cuts and permission to form cartels and monopolies. They, in turn, massage him and cover up his crimes. The other big wigs do the same for the same reason. They are immensely richer thanks to Bush and his wars have made them even richer. They love their puppet and think it is funny how he manipulates terrorists so they attack us and force us to give them more tax cuts, more power.

Bush is too powerful to arrest tonight. He should be arrested. Now. The shameful 9/11 commission that allowed him to testify in secret and with Cheney and with no cross examination should be put in prison too, for treason. They are his accomplices.

So is Powell and Condi, the two faithful house servants. They are material witnesses who lied to the American people.

And all those neo cons. Into the slammer with them all.

After all, we executed rather a few Nazis at the end of WWII. Thank goodness for our present crew of criminals, international law doesn't go for the executions that the Chinese and Americans seem to love so much. On the other hand, Bush is the Executioner who is Death, as the Skull and Bones chant goes.

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BARK LIKE A DOG

From Dachau web page

My sense of outrage is being tested today. I do not like living in a place that mimics the Third Reich. Yet here it is, more ugly news about our gulag prison system where people languish without the succor of laws or covenants, for years, while being viciously abused.

From Bloomberg News:

U.S. military investigators told senators today that forcing a top male detainee to wear lingerie and perform dog tricks was ``no evidence of inhumane treatment'' at the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, prison for terror suspects.

The techniques were used to extract information from Mohamed al-Khatani, whom U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last month described as the would-be ``20th hijacker'' in the Sept. 11 attacks.

``He was forced to dance with a male interrogator, was subject to strip searches for control measures, not for security, and he was forced to perform dog tricks -- all this to lower his personal sense of worth,'' said U.S. Air Force Lieutenant General Randall M. Schmidt, senior investigating officer, according to a transcript of the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.

This "dog act" is old stuff. I could distinctly remember reading about it before and it took me less than five minutes to find other sources on the web, just think "neo Nazi".

From Third World Traveler, the Argentina coup

Despite the fact that Jews constitute only one percent of the population of Argentina, an estimated ten percent of the victims of the dirty war were Jews. That this war had an anti-Semitic side is attested to by CONADEP, which devoted a section to illustrate this point. It is illustrated, to quote the report, by the "particular brutality in the treatment of prisoners of Jewish origin .1117 Jews were not only tortured, but the torture often took on an anti-Semitic form. The torturers painted swastikas on one Jewish prisoner's back with a sharp pointed marker. Another torturer who called himself the "great fuehrer" made Jewish prisoners shout "Hell Hitler." A Jewish woman on her way to an excursion in Israel was called by her abductors "a Yid," and subjected to the cattle prod. They wanted information from her and from her files on Jews. She was told that the Jewish problem was second only to the problem of subversion. Later, they told her that her abduction was a mistake and to forget it. In one torture center Jews were made to raise one hand and to shout "I love Hitler." One prisoner remembered the ordeal of another prisoner, a Jew nicknamed "Chango," at the hands of his torturer called "Julian the Turk." Julian always carried a key ring with a swastika and wore a crucifix around his neck. He made Chango bark like a dog, wag as though he were a dog wagging his tail, and lick his boots. Chango did very well at this. If he didn't, Julian would beat him. CONADEP concluded that:

All kinds of torture would be applied to Jews, especially one which was extremely sadistic and cruel: "the rectoscope," which consisted of inserting a tube into the victim's anus, or into a woman's vagina, then letting a rat into the tube. The rodent would try to get out by gnawing at the victim's internal organs.

Most of the people murdered or tortured were innocent. Intellectuals, writers, union organizers, beautiful women, Jews, all were picked up at whim by the Argentinian military that gained power thanks to help from the CIA and School of the Americas.

From Justin Raimondo at Antiwar.com:

One wonders if they ever sent those photos back home – or if they were taken for other purposes. In any case, the mistreatment of prisoners, and the American penchant for recording their own brutality on film, is nothing new. Nor is the element of sexual perversion.

The Taguba report lists rape and abuse of imprisoned children among the other crimes committed by the MPs and their enablers, but this is old news. Child abuse as a key aspect of the "liberation" was revealed by Kelly on Antiwar.com back in December:

"'There were 13 year old kids in with us,' Fadi said. 'Sometimes they would throw candies from their humvees, shouting 'Bark like a dog, and I'll throw you the candy'..Some of the small children were crying in the night, asking to go home to their families. We were trying to get them quiet.'

"'Some of the prisoners were criminals, thieves. They put the children with them. Some of them tried to abuse children. We told the guards, they started laughing. One prisoner tried to rape a kid and he refused, so they made a cut on his face."

Excuse me while I go out and barf.

Gack.

Geezus, America! Here we are, trying to be outraged about some British kids who felt badly enough to blow themselves and their neighbors up and yet we are...monsters ourselves! There is no excuse for any of this. This is not how you do police work. This is what Nazis did to people! They were very fond of doing these things. The sole purpose was to humilate before murdering people. We aren't dropping people from helicopters except I bet we are!

Now for some horror on the right wing of the blogsphere: From Daly Thoughts:

On the heel’s of yesterday’s Gallup survey showing a majority of Americans approve of the way prisoners at Guantanamo Bay are being treated comes this survey from Scott Rasmussen:

Rasmussen Reports survey found that 20% of Americans believe prisoners at Guantanomo Bay have been treated unfairly. Seven-out-of-ten adults believe the prisoners are being treated “better than they deserve” (36%) or “about right” (34%).

The survey also found that just 14% agree with people who say that prisoner treatment at Guantanomo Bay is similar to Nazi tactics. Sixty-nine percent disagree with that comparison. This helps explain why Illinois Senator Dick Durbin apologized for making such a comparison.

Partisan differences concerning prisoner treatment are huge. Only 7% of Republicans believe Guantanomo prisoners are treated unfairly. Thirty percent (30%) of Democrats hold that view along with 22% of those not affiliated with either major party.

Forty-five percent (45%) of Republicans say the prisoners are treated better than they deserve. That view is shared by 28% of Democrats.

I disagree with Rasmussen’s characterization of the partisan differences being huge. When there are only 17 to 23 points separating the parties, it is a much smaller difference than is found on most issues. We do not have unanimity, but we do have consensus.

Well, I know that if we polled Germans in 1945, the numbers would be about the same. Even as American soldiers were literally shaking the Germans and yelling, "What is going on here?" at Dachau, the good citizens who lived a literal stone's throw blinked in astonishment because they couldn't understand that anything was wrong at all.

It is the nature of people indulging in the gross horror of fascism to actively approve, nay, it is often very popular. The streets are safe, all is well, a certain amount of loot is brought home and passed around, goodies abound and enemies suffer. What is there to be against?

The people holding the latest hearings about our gross violations of the Human Rights treaties know very well that we transgressed deep into "Nuremberg Trial" territory and if there were real justice in the world, we would be in the dock right this minute facing the death penalty.

But the trials in Germany were a farce. We had no intention of fixing anything, we just were doing the old fashioned "kill the losers" garbage. We dearly want to torture and kill Saddam but it is too late for that so we hold him illegally in prison, too, without charges and without trial. We dare not charge him with torturing or killing Iraqis. That would be laughed out of any court.

Nope.

I also read today somewhere, we interrogated a prisoner for 18 to 20 hours a day for 54 days. This is on the level of "Spanish Inquisition" style torture. This is very much a violation of the Human Rights Treaties not to mention our very own Constitution which the courts conspired to violate if not utterly trash by allowing Bush to hold many prisoners all over the planet as well as American territories so we can torture them. This is totally Unamerican. This is what our Founding Fathers fought. Precisely this very thing. This was, for they all faced such horrors themselves, a top issue with them and they carefully framed the new Constitution to prevent such a system from being created here!

It is the very basis of our country. It is what the 4th of July is supposedly all about! Not the flag but the Declaration of Independence which also mentions imprisonment without trials! Geeze.

I am very pissed about all this. You or I or anyone can, like the Argentinians, find themselve barking like a dog while some ridiculous, vicious, neo Nazi jerk laughs.

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CHILDREN USED AS HUMAN SHIELDS

Just this week there was a big flap in LA because cops shot dead a toddler who was being used as a human shield. Her mother was screaming at the cops to not shoot but when the tot's dad shot at them, they riddled him and his hostage with bullets, killing both.

Well, back in our own hostage standoff, our little adventure to steal us some oil, in Iraq from the BBC:

Children die in Baghdad car bomb

At least 26 Iraqis, almost all of them children, have been killed by a car bomb in south-eastern Baghdad.
A US soldier is also said to have died in the blast. Another three US soldiers are reported to have been injured.

A car laden with explosives drove past a US army vehicle and blew up as troops handed out sweets, a witness said.

Sorry, I literally screamed when this came across my computer screen as I was finishing up the story about Strauss and how he and his buddies have sold America to the real rulers of our planet, ie, people with tons of money. This story infuriates me on many levels.

&spades Iraq is a fricking war zone

&spades Past photo ops of soldiers handing out candy have ended in hideous carnage

&spades During WWII, soldiers would give away their chocolate rations to starving children because they were filled with pity and love. This happy icon is being cynically used by Pentagon propagandists who want to paper over our neo-fascist invasion. Using children in this fashion is a war crime. They set them into danger knowing it is dangerous and still they do it so they can generate propaganda.

Sigh.

Why don't we just tie these tots onto our vehicles? Seriously. The mess in Afghanistan, I wrote about how the military sent in helicopters to pass out medicine and candy to the natives and then try to gather information so they can win their war against the peasants there. This backfired badly as I predicted and many Americans died. These dead soldiers all thought they were fighting for something.

What, I cannot guess. But in their own minds, they must have believed in something. Maybe the vision of a flag flapping from some SUV, who knows? Maybe they just wanted a paycheck and ended up in Afghanistan.

Oh, American soldiers died in this blast today. These seemingly disposable units don't even make the headlines. I have noticed this for months. "Fifty Iraqis blown up today" will be the daily headline. Scanning the article, one finds the number of American dead buried deep inside just as they will be sneakily buried in the ground when their pitiful, blasted, burned remains are boxed and shipped in the dead of night to America.

Mr. Strauss is a very rich man. He has a great deal of seeming power as he hobnobs with the communist Chinese and the Saudi Royals and the Queen of England. He schemes with others so he can run things in Asia Minor. He is a very happy man right now for everyone is clamoring for his services. He needs photo ops of smiling children eating candy handed out by GIs pretending this is WWII.

He got his photo op. The Pentagon, splattered with blood, got yet another propaganda piece: "Oh my, these Muslim rebels are inhuman! Let's murder the whole lot and be finished!"

Then we can do what we did to Japan at the bitter end of WWII: blow up a whole boatload of babies and small children and mothers and elderly in on nuclear holocaust.

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TOADIES CROAKING LOUDLY

The press gaggle is no longer gagged. They have begun to pester the Petulant Childe in the White House. During a photo-op, they pestered him so much he phased out the photos and phlipped them the phinger and phlung them out.

While working in the garden outside today, in between thunderstorms, I moved a rock and saw a nice, fat little toad with pert bulbous eyes. We photographed him and stuck him here on this page for all to admire. This set me to thinking, a dangerous thing to do, thinking.

From the Girl Scouts of America, no less!

(to the tune of "Oh, Christmas Tree)

Oh, KARL the toad, Oh, KARL the toad,
Why are you lying on the road?
Oh, KARL the toad, Oh, KARL the toad,
Why are you lying on the road?
You did not see the car ahead;
Now you're all marked with tire tread.
Oh, KARL the toad, Oh, KARL the toad,
Why are you lying on the road?

The picture of McClelland looking like he smells a dead skunk on said road, was in Reuters today so he got the top billing here. But the subject is Karl the Toad. He hopped into the middle of the Yellow Cake controversy and now is being run over by the Sheriff.

Earlier today, Bush decided the Nixonian "hang tough" method. He said nothing and did nothing. This comes natural to him, of course. From the NYT:

President Bush offered only a stony silence today when he was asked if he planned to fire Karl Rove, a senior aide at the center of an investigation over the unmasking of an undercover C.I.A. officer.

Stephen Crowley/The New York Times
Karl Rove, center, and other officials in the Rose Garden on July 1 for remarks by President Bush.
But the war of words over Mr. Rove went on for a second straight day, with Mr. Bush's spokesman declaring that the president has confidence in Mr. Rove, the Republican national chairman joining in the defense - and a prominent Democrat saying that Mr. Rove should be fired. "Are you going to fire him?" the president was asked twice in a brief Oval Office appearance with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong of Singapore. Both times, the president ignored the questions.

Then a White House aide signaled that the session was over. "Out those doors, please," the aide told journalists. "Thank you very much."

Uppity servants. Demanding the master fire his top flunky! How dare they!

Alas, poor Rovick! He and his boss told the press a year ago that if the leaks were traced to whoever, that person would be summarily fired! Pronto! Now that we know it is Rove, this is so yesterday. What promise? "We don't make promises," says Bush. So instead, Bush and Rove play Frogger to see how many reporter's questions they can dodge without being turned into an "x".

From Reuters tonight:

The White House broke its silence and said on Tuesday that President Bush continued to have confidence in his top political adviser, Karl Rove, despite his involvement in a scandal over the leak of the identity of a CIA agent.

But Bush and White House spokesman Scott McClellan balked at answering key questions about the case, as some Democrats stepped up calls for Rove to be fired.

McClellan said the White House was asked to remain silent by prosecutors investigating who leaked the identity of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame, an act Plame's husband said was meant to discredit him for criticizing Bush's Iraq policy in 2003.

"Any individual who works here at the White House has the president's confidence. They wouldn't be working here if they didn't have the president's confidence," McClellan told reporters in answer to a question.

Limited hangout modified plan. Bush pretends our interests are his interests. That we are worried Bush doesn't trust Karl with the silver spoons in Bush's mouth. So he assures us, he has full faith in this criminal who breaks the law.

I do say, Rove hasn't been arrested as many times as Bush, and this is the scrubbed records. The stuff Daddy hid...heaven only knows.

All I know is...Karl the toad was in the road...

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RID ME OF THIS TROUBLESOME DIPLOMAT...

A thousand years ago, give or take a few, an angry king, down in his cups, cried the famous words, "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" From Eyewitness to history:

The king's exact words have been lost to history but his outrage inspired four knights to sail to England to rid the realm of this annoying prelate. They arrived at Canterbury during the afternoon of December 29 and immediately searched for the Archbishop. Becket fled to the Cathedral where a service was in progress. The knights found him at the altar, drew their swords and began hacking at their victim finally splitting his skull.

The death of Becket unnerved the king. The knights who did the deed to curry the king's favor, fell into disgrace. Several miracles were said to occur at the tomb of the martyr and he was soon canonized. Hordes of pilgrims transformed Canterbury Cathedral into a shrine. Four years later, in an act of penance, the king donned a sack-cloth walking barefoot through the streets of Canterbury while eighty monks flogged him with branches. Henry capped his atonement by spending the night in the martyr's crypt. St. Thomas continued as a popular cultist figure for the remainder of the Middle Ages.

Rove is a good servant. Like all the Bush courtiers, he guides his stumblebum dumb master like a good Jeeves and leads the drunken twat around, in between running over the soldiers guarding him.

When Bush, in his usual drunken state, said, "Remember the anthrax attacks? Hehehehe. They worked. Shut up that Wilson guy, he is messing with my war!" This was just before the disasterous siege of Bagdad that irks us even today. Rubbing his fat hands, Rove must have said, "Can I attack anyone in this too, master?" and Bush waved him out of the room with a "Whatever." Backing out, he turned and ran to the phone.

"Find whatever on Wilson," he said to...Cheney, the head of the knights of the bar shaped table. Cheney hunched his way over to the Spies Nest and made inquiries. It seemed, Maid Plame hung out in Sherwood forest. True, she worked for Lackland Bush himself. But this was a hard business so Rove decided to tell all the terrorists haunting the kingdom that the fair lady was not one of them but in the King's employ!

True, her job was to stop assassins from attacking DC Town! But that didn't matter to king Bush!

So Rove told the scribes to post her name and picture about the city streets so the Burgesses doth chatter about her but they all swore an oath to not reveal to the Sheriff who did this. Of course, the king saw what was happening and did nothing.

King Henry II paid dearly for killing Beckett. He had to do absolutions. His protests that he didn't sign an authorization for this murder didn't go far with medieval thinkers who still blamed him.

Unlike today with our freckless king. The scribes ran around literally for nearly three years, pretending they couldn't reveal the fat courtier who betrayed the kingdom. Nor did the king show the slightest interest in ridding himself of this troublesome courtier.

Why?

HAHAHAHA.

Rove knows a great deal. His silence must be total or many schemes and plots and plans for world domination and criminal acts will be open to examination, no?

Sir Fitzgerald sharpens his sword and urges his hounds onwards in the hunt.

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RID ME OF THIS TROUBLESOME DIPLOMAT...

A thousand years ago, give or take a few, an angry king, down in his cups, cried the famous words, "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" From Eyewitness to history:

The king's exact words have been lost to history but his outrage inspired four knights to sail to England to rid the realm of this annoying prelate. They arrived at Canterbury during the afternoon of December 29 and immediately searched for the Archbishop. Becket fled to the Cathedral where a service was in progress. The knights found him at the altar, drew their swords and began hacking at their victim finally splitting his skull.

The death of Becket unnerved the king. The knights who did the deed to curry the king's favor, fell into disgrace. Several miracles were said to occur at the tomb of the martyr and he was soon canonized. Hordes of pilgrims transformed Canterbury Cathedral into a shrine. Four years later, in an act of penance, the king donned a sack-cloth walking barefoot through the streets of Canterbury while eighty monks flogged him with branches. Henry capped his atonement by spending the night in the martyr's crypt. St. Thomas continued as a popular cultist figure for the remainder of the Middle Ages.

Rove is a good servant. Like all the Bush courtiers, he guides his stumblebum dumb master like a good Jeeves and leads the drunken twat around, in between running over the soldiers guarding him.

When Bush, in his usual drunken state, said, "Remember the anthrax attacks? Hehehehe. They worked. Shut up that Wilson guy, he is messing with my war!" This was just before the disasterous siege of Bagdad that irks us even today. Rubbing his fat hands, Rove must have said, "Can I attack anyone in this too, master?" and Bush waved him out of the room with a "Whatever." Backing out, he turned and ran to the phone.

"Find whatever on Wilson," he said to...Cheney, the head of the knights of the bar shaped table. Cheney hunched his way over to the Spies Nest and made inquiries. It seemed, Maid Plame hung out in Sherwood forest. True, she worked for Lackland Bush himself. But this was a hard business so Rove decided to tell all the terrorists haunting the kingdom that the fair lady was not one of them but in the King's employ!

True, her job was to stop assassins from attacking DC Town! But that didn't matter to king Bush!

So Rove told the scribes to post her name and picture about the city streets so the Burgesses doth chatter about her but they all swore an oath to not reveal to the Sheriff who did this. Of course, the king saw what was happening and did nothing.

King Henry II paid dearly for killing Beckett. He had to do absolutions. His protests that he didn't sign an authorization for this murder didn't go far with medieval thinkers who still blamed him.

Unlike today with our freckless king. The scribes ran around literally for nearly three years, pretending they couldn't reveal the fat courtier who betrayed the kingdom. Nor did the king show the slightest interest in ridding himself of this troublesome courtier.

Why?

HAHAHAHA.

Rove knows a great deal. His silence must be total or many schemes and plots and plans for world domination and criminal acts will be open to examination, no?

Sir Fitzgerald sharpens his sword and urges his hounds onwards in the hunt.

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LIGHT SABERS

The Holy Grail of the military is some system of controlling or killing humans while keeping the loot intact. Since our empire seldom if ever battles other armies, most of our action is against lightly armed and armored civilians or totally helpless civilians blocking our troop carriers or demonstrating against our rule.

And those pesky citizens at home. Have to have some way to disperse or drive off them, too. Keep they away and scared but not too bloody or one will be accused of being an American ally like in Uzbekistan.

From Yahoo:

For years, the U.S. military has explored a new kind of firepower that is instantaneous, precise and virtually inexhaustible: beams of electromagnetic energy. "Directed-energy" pulses can be throttled up or down depending on the situation, much like the phasers on "Star Trek" could be set to kill or merely stun.

Stun means only slight brain/organ damage. You come to, are in miserable shape, if you are carrying a baby, tough luck, even on stun, babies will die. Just think of the movie, "Potemkin" and the famous baby carriage bouncing down the steps.

Such weapons are now nearing fruition. But logistical issues have delayed their battlefield debut — even as soldiers in Iraq encounter tense urban situations in which the nonlethal capabilities of directed energy could be put to the test.

"It's a great technology with enormous potential, but I think the environment's not strong for it," said James Jay Carafano, a senior fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation who blames the military and Congress for not spending enough on getting directed energy to the front. "The tragedy is that I think it's exactly the right time for this."

What a charming man. Wants to rush this into Iraq so we can fine tune the settings using it against all those civilians there. Just recently the "government" of Iraq shot up some demonstrators and killed a few of them, a la Uzbekistan. Since day one, we have shot and killed quite a few demonstrators there. No point in keeping back!

Before this war, and this story is NOT on the net, it was censored and removed and only I caught it and parked it at another site which is gone now, at the Georgia training base called "Pinelands" they had pretend Muslim anti American riots, this was in April, 2001, before 9/11! They had Bush on a platform watching and he laughed as the military came into the pretend square and pretended to kill all the demonstrators who were also soldiers, acting the part.

I was appalled at the time and wondered why they pretended to be Muslims from another country and why the game plan was to kill all of them. The government's answer was to get the media to scrub this story.

The hallmark of all directed-energy weapons is that the target — whether a human or a mechanical object — has no chance to avoid the shot because it moves at the speed of light. At some frequencies, it can penetrate walls.

Since the ammunition is merely light or radio waves, directed-energy weapons are limited only by the supply of electricity. And they don't involve chemicals or projectiles that can be inaccurate, accidentally cause injury or violate international treaties.

"When you're dealing with people whose full intent is to die, you can't give people a choice of whether to comply," said George Gibbs, a systems engineer for the Marine Expeditionary Rifle Squad Program who oversees directed-energy projects. "What I'm looking for is a way to shoot everybody, and they're all OK."

Frightened families, huddled in their mud homes, hit by this. Killing the babies, of course, not to mention fetuses. The issue here isn't preserving our troops no matter what. It never is. Nor is it under international laws. The issue is why troops are where they are and why people fight them and what this means. Since we invaded someone we are under the obligation to control ourselves. Obviously, the population isn't very happy with our occupation. At this level of ferocity which is way above that shown by Europeans invaded by Hitler, clearly shows we are lousy occupiers. Killing or zapping or silencing the population isn't the solution.

The problem faced by all colonial powers was this: proving they were civilized and the benefits exceeded the butchery. Even as recently as 100 years ago, butchery was the whole point. We killed the natives and stole their lands. Then it became embarassing so we pretended to teach them English while keeping them penned up in forbidding ecological niches.

The problem with the civilizing storyline is, when empires invade ancient civilizations like China or Iraq, this is all mush. There is no stone age tribes to subdue, these are former great civilizations. So thus the need to pretend we are police coming in to prevent problems.

Other radio-frequency weapons in development can sabotage the electronics of land mines, shoulder-fired missiles or automobiles — a prospect that interests police departments in addition to the military.

A separate branch of directed-energy research involves bigger, badder beams: lasers that could obliterate targets tens of miles away from ships or planes. Such a strike would be so surgical that, as some designers put it at a recent conference here, the military could plausibly deny responsibility.

OK. What is a terrorist?

A sneak attacker who uses various sneaky tools to sneakily destroy someone's defences while not declaring war or showing who is responsible.

Sneaky sneaks. What a fine tool! What a great opportunity....to start WWIII. If we could be Hitlerian enough to launch sudden attacks from nowhere on anyone we want this means the world must be on hairtrigger alert to annihilate America for the only thing to stop our obviously utterly deranged Pentagon Dr. Strangeloves is to be ready on multiple levels to level America.

This means we can be destroyed before we get a chance to use sneaky weapons. Since our advesaries watch us very closely you can bet, they will be ready to kill all of us in an eyeblink and this means they could mistake some of our thrashing around and bellowing as a possible strike and hit us immediately.

This is why such fun toys are dangerous to have. The word "destabilizing" comes to mind. Worse, the Chinese have very good facilities and researchers in laser technology. They have been very big on this since 1978. They are formidable challengers on this level. We should be working on treaties to prevent this sort of goofy Star Wars junk because they will apply it to us in spades.

They are not disarmed civilians. They have a military apparatus and many powerful allies.

Bitar heads Indiana-based Xtreme Alternative Defense Systems Ltd., which makes small blinding lasers used in Iraq. But his real project is a nonlethal energy device called the StunStrike.

Basically, it fires a bolt of lightning. It can be tuned to blow up explosives, possibly to stop vehicles and certainly to buzz people. The strike can be made to feel as gentle as "broom bristles" or cranked up to deliver a paralyzing jolt that "takes a few minutes to wear off."

Bitar, who is of Arab descent, believes StunStrike would be particularly intimidating in the Middle East because, he contends, people there are especially afraid of lightning.

At present, StunStrike is a 20-foot tower that can zap things up to 28 feet away. The next step is to shrink it so it could be wielded by troops and used in civilian locales like airplane cabins or building entrance.

Geeze. Talk about Baradur! The Dark Lord and his tower! The Evil Eye will fighten Muslims into surrendering. Yup. Great. They think we are the Great Satan so why not be it? This is how you win hearts and minds. You become the Lightning Lord and terrorize humans while laughing demonically, I am assuming.

Smug Americans hiding in huge armored tanks clanking along, zapping people with lightning bolts. This will make them bow to us as gods and I can picture young Americans grinning with joy as they see people collapse and cry and roll around in agony. Hahaha. We are the champions, they will sing.

Yes. Orcs rule.

AL QAEDA TAR PIT

The great empires are like trumpeting mastodons, struggling to pull free of a deep tar pit. The saber tooth tigers occasionally fling themselves upon the thrashing giant, tearing at the thick hide and the imperial mastodon swings its huge head, slashing with the great tusks, black oily muck splattering all over the nearby brush.

Thousands of years from now, scientists will disinter the bones and wonder how such a large creature could have gotten into such a fix. Tar pits, you see, look like shiny ponds of clear, clean water. Just stomp right through!

Just before the 7/7/5 attacks...isn't it odd, ahem, that the bombs went off at roughly the same times as the WTC and Pentagon attacks on 9/11? ...Britain, stuck up to the belly in the Iraq tar pits, was desperately trumpeting to former prison colony, Australia, to hoist them out and go into the pit for them. Australia made some sympathetic noises and then watched.

From the London Times:

BRITAIN is negotiating with Australia to hand over military command of southern Iraq to free up British troops for redeployment to the front line in Afghanistan.
An announcement is expected within weeks that several thousand British soldiers are to be sent to Afghanistan.

The prospect of Australia taking command at the Basra headquarters will be a key item in talks that John Howard, the Australian prime minister, will be holding next weekend with Tony Blair and President George W Bush.

Howard, who is also considering sending a few hundred troops to Afghanistan, insisted last week that Australia would remain in Iraq “until the job is finished”.

The crusaders have to somehow make things work. For two years, they have insisted that Afghanistan was a shining star and victory was won there and who cares about all that tar covering us! Victory slipped away even as we sink deeper. When Karzai came to America to warn us and to talk us into doing things his way, he was sharply rebuffed by his owner, Bush, and slunk home to nurse his new grudges.

Since Bush's great diplomatic success, things in Afghanistan have slid utterly out of control. From Yahoo:

Suspected Taliban gunmen ambushed an Afghani government border patrol in the desert near the frontier with Pakistan, killing 10 soldiers and beheading their bodies, a provincial governor said Sunday.

The victims served on a 25-member patrol in southern Helmand province that was attacked late Saturday by militants driving four pickup trucks, said provincial Gov. Sher Mohammed Aghunzada. The remaining 15 soldiers escaped.

"The Taliban cut the heads off all the soldiers who were killed," he said. Aghunzada said the dead soldiers' bodies had been recovered.

The news comes a day after a purported Taliban spokesman, Mullah Latif Hakimi, claimed that the rebels had beheaded a U.S. Navy SEAL commando missing since June 28 in mountains in eastern Kunar province, also near the border with Pakistan.

As always, we misunderstand the society we invade and thus, we fail. When we recruit people to fight for a puppet government, they are nearly always outcasts or disconnected people, the riff raff. The tribal people, the real fighters, the ones who are proud and would die if you put them in a uniform and yell orders at them...they give orders!...are our opponents. Our recruits fear death the insurrectionists love death as a Great Mistress, she who is embraced.

The Taliban are now on the warpath and they are winning their war.

From the NYT:

The Taliban said Saturday that they had beheaded a Navy Seal commando whom it had claimed to be holding for several days. The United States military said it could not confirm the claim and said the search continued for the missing commando.
A Taliban spokesman, Abdul Latif Hakimi, said by telephone that the commando, had been taken prisoner nine days ago in Kunar Province, where a four-man Navy Seal team was reported missing in a firefight with Taliban guerrillas on June 28. One of the commandos was rescued on July 2, a spokeswoman for the United States Command in Afghanistan said. Two others were confirmed dead, and the fourth remained missing.

These fighters, armed with antique weapons, carrying only a cloak for a blanket, wearing sandals, bested our best, heavily armed, scientifically trained, technology empowered SEALS. This should give us all pause. In this war, intelligence must be applied. This means, figuring out what to do and why do it and where to do it and if it is wise to do anything, frankly. Also note the ancient Mongol practice: using swords to behead those they capture, letting some flee so they can spread the story about the tough, brutal methods. This isn't modern warfare.
Delusional plans abound. From Xinhaunews:

Britain, which heads a foreign force in south Iraq, wants to hand over to Iraqi control of Al-Muthanna and Maysan provinces in October 2005 and the other two provinces, Dhi Qar and Basra, in April 2006, the memo was reported to have said.

"This should lead to a reduction in the total level of UK commitment in Iraq to around 3,000 personnel," the document said. It said the planned withdrawal of British troops would save about 1 billion pounds (1.74 billion US dollars) a year.

The memo also said Washington plans to hand over control of security to Iraqi forces in 14 out of 18 Iraqi provinces by early 2006. This means that US troops in the country will be slashed to 66,000 from about 140,000.

But a British Defense Ministry spokeswoman said Sunday that the two countries' military withdrawal from Iraq is only under consideration as one of many options and that no decision has been made.

Reid, in response to the Mail on Sunday report, said in a statement, "We have made it absolutely plain we will stay in Iraq for as long as is needed. No decision on the future force posture of UK forces has been taken."

Seems just a few weeks ago, the Brits were hoping to yank themselves out of the tar pit and save money. They just promised more aid to Africa and know the natives at home are restive about this expensive colonial expedition gone mad but now they will simply lurch out of the tar pit into a much worse pit, Afghanistan, the land that professionally eats imperial pretensions.

The natural human reaction to being struck by yet anothesaberre toothed terrorist is causing the British people to rally around their leader who got them stuck in the tar pit. But as they thrash about, swinging the tusks, more than one is thinking that it is really insane to be in this place in the first place. Alas, there is no leader out. All political parties are filled with the lusts of empire and the Queen herself lives in the glory of luxury thanks to imperialism and she is most eager to ride the American elephant as far as she can, glorying in hedisintegratingng situation as her own wretched, spoiled clan falls apart under their own amoracontradictionsns.

Like any leech, bleeding the host dry, they are challenged with the task of pretending to be normal. They dearly want to go utterly insane like so many previous despots, pretending to be a normal, middle class family is collapsing yet again.

The Bush twins have gone insane just like many of their own family members including their besotted father.

Our opponent is resolute and considers these people to be fitting opponents in this moral battle of wills. They know nearly all of their opponents are brave only in the most cowardly way, fearful for themselves, willing to cast their populations into hell so long as they, themselves, remain untouched.

Now for the scary stuff: do note that never, ever do our "attackers" at home attack our rulers. They wait until they are out of town. Blair is in Scotland when London is hit. Bush was in Florida when DC was hit and none of the attacks were aimed at the White House, anyway.

No government office in Britain was attacked.

Like in Russia, only bizarre civilian targets are chosen. One wonders about this. Certainly, this permits the rulers to pause in their drunken, besotted games and put various controls upon their own populations. The tactics of the terrorists certainly coincide with the desires of our rulers who take great glee in these attacks.

"I won the trifecta!" Bush announced several times, to the roar of laughter of his friends and allies. When he stood on the smoking ruins of the WTC, he was laughing. His sheer joy at this wonderful opportunity to enchain the free people of America is obvious on his face. He knew people would run to him and give him power if only they were attacked. This is why he asked the GOP to cut funds to protect NYC last month. He needed another event and needed NYC vulnerable.

He and his people still haven't explained why they sat idle after getting the Aug. 6, 2001 memo about the impending attacks. Nor has he explained why Ashcroft was warned to not fly domestic flights before 9/11. Or a host of other things. Or the oddity of the anthrax attacks which were aimed directly at only people on his enemy list.

The average imperial resident wants all of this to end. Just kill everyone in the tar pit and then stomp off, with the oil, of course. The itch to do this grows as the knowledge that we blew this war on terror utterly sets in.

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