HOW TO IDENTIFY MISINFORMATION

Cartoon by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This is not a joke (hahahaha) but real. The State Department has issued a warning for us about people lying about things like...9/11 or the reasons for us invading Iraq or the anthrax attacker who only attacked people Bush wanted to terrorize or people wondering how many minutes (more than twenty) Bush sat reading "My Pet Goat" and other "misinformation and urban legends."

From the State Department:

Consider the source

Oh my god, I am really going to die laughing!

Certain websites, publications, and individuals are known for spreading false stories, including:

&spades Aljazeera.com, a deceptive, look-alike website that has sought to fool people into thinking it is run by the Qatari satellite television station Al Jazeera

Yeah, like as if we want the REAL Aljazeera broadcasting--- in between murdering their reporters and photographers and deliberately targetting them and then lying about it all...can't trust them to report stuff, yeah. Gods. Of course, they were on certain neo-con hit lists, literally. I got all my news during the illegal attack on Iraq from al Jazeera! Now the official station is muzzled by the Americans.

&spades Jihad Unspun, a website run by a Canadian woman who converted to Islam after the September 11 attacks when she became convinced that Osama bin Laden was right.

Another group the Israelis want to shut down somehow. They can't lob bombs at her home in Canada...

&spades Islam Memo (Mafkarat-al-Islam), which spreads a great deal of disinformation about Iraq.

Can't have us reading those pesky Iraqis! That is a no-no. We are supposed to read and believe those many State Department statements about WMD and other do-dads.

(More details on Islam Memo and Jihad Unspun in English and Arabic.)

There are many conspiracy theory websites, which contain a great deal of unreliable information. Examples include:

&spades Rense.com

He started out years ago with mild examinations about Israel's Mossad/anti Palestinian activities and now is totally anti Zionist to a startling degree. He is way out there but is also way out in general. I find a lot of interesting weird stuff at his site. I plow through lots of dross looking for gold all over the place including at the New York Times, for example (heh, everyone is a mess these days!).

&spades Australian “private investigator” Joe Vialls, who died in 2005

Dead investigator alert. Gads, I have personally known more than one...

&spades Conspiracy Planet

Yeah! My buddies! Luv ya all! Keep it up!

&spades Extremist groups, such as splinter communist parties, often publish disinformation. This can be especially difficult to identify if the false allegations are published by front groups. Front groups purport to be independent, non-partisan organizations but actually controlled by political parties or groups. Some examples of front groups are:

&spades The International Action Center, which is a front group for a splinter communist party called the Workers World Party
&spades The Free Arab Voice, a website that serves as a front for Arab communist Muhammad Abu Nasr and his colleagues.
(More details on Muhammad Abu Nasr in English or Arabic.)

I am so pissed off. I am not on this list! I will have to break the bad news to Mad Cow, too, that he is also off the list. And the wonderful people running the Memory Hole!

Who are the stupid slackers in the State Department dissing us? Seriously. I grew up inside the govenment, where the CIA and State Department cross wires! They know me! They have many files on me!

And I didn't make the list. (Hanging head in shame) Rats. I have to try harder. All you must help me make this list!

For a bunch of lying, thieving war mongers, if the truth ever crosses their lips, they get the Golden Scapegoat award and are hounded out of office or run over by stray cars or murdered or something. Certainly, ask Ambassador Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame!

The list also looks like it was drawn up by my old nemisis, Horowitz. I knew him in Berkeley and we used to correspond over at Salon.com for a while until he ended up screaming at me.

Well. I see my efforts have failed yet again.

Of course, this is a State Department site so they have to start in with the rank lies. This sub section really pisses me off on a million levels:

There are many exaggerated fears about depleted uranium because people associate it with weapons-grade uranium or fuel-grade uranium, which are much more dangerous substances. When most people hear the word uranium, a number of strongly held associations spring to mind, including the atomic bomb, Hiroshima, nuclear reactors, radiation illness, cancer, and birth defects.

Depleted uranium is what is left over when natural uranium is enriched to make weapons-grade or fuel-grade uranium. In the process, the uranium loses, or is depleted, of almost half its radioactivity, which is how depleted uranium gets its name. But facts like this are less important in peoples’ minds than the deeply ingrained associations they have with the world “uranium.” For this reason, most people believe that depleted uranium is much more dangerous than it actually is. (More details on depleted uranium in English and Arabic.)

Another highly controversial issue is that of forbidden weapons, such as chemical or biological weapons. The United States is regularly, and falsely, accused of using these weapons. (More details on this in English and Arabic.)

Read carefully this pot pourie of lies. They say there is only half of the uranium so they can poo poo obvious evidence about how this kills and maims? Huh?

Like saying this cup of poison is only half full so it won't kill you?

We have lots of information clearly showing how people who worked with and used these blasted bullets produce deformed babies. And many are suffering health problems, themselves! Like Agent Orange, we knew it was toxic and bad and caused deformities and brain damage and etc since 1972! But getting the State Dept and Pentagon to admit this...nada! Even today, we recently turned down Vietnam's request for us to pay for poisoning them and we pretended there was no case, sort of like the Japanese are doing to their victims of WWII atrocities.

I want to be on that list. Now.
Oh, and about those pesky lies: From CNN

A former top aide to Colin Powell says his involvement in the former secretary of state's presentation to the United Nations on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was "the lowest point" in his life.

To return to homepage click here

BUSH KILLING FEMA

Cartoon by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Via Atrios: Now we get more fun information about Homeland Security (sic). Anyone who remembers 9/11 and didn't pay attention to all the lies and propaganda spewed out on 9/12 onwards knows that literally all those people charged with protecting America were not only asleep at the wheel or goofing off but were promoted or rewarded for this. And all those people who sounded alarms or blew whistles were punished and driven away.

So, we had the stupid "9/11 Decommission Commission" which was supposed to not punish anyone (except for the whistle blowers, natch) but to suggest changes so the incompetent fools running America thanks to red voters, could function half way decently.

So, what did they do?

From the Washington Post:

In the days to come, as the nation and the people along the Gulf Coast work to cope with the disastrous aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, we will be reminded anew, how important it is to have a federal agency capable of dealing with natural catastrophes of this sort. This is an immense human tragedy, one that will work hardship on millions of people. It is beyond the capabilities of state and local government to deal with. It requires a national response.

Which makes it all the more difficult to understand why, at this moment, the country's premier agency for dealing with such events -- FEMA -- is being, in effect, systematically downgraded and all but dismantled by the Department of Homeland Security.

Apparently homeland security now consists almost entirely of protection against terrorist acts. How else to explain why the Federal Emergency Management Agency will no longer be responsible for disaster preparedness? Given our country's long record of natural disasters, how much sense does this make?

What follows is an obituary for what was once considered the preeminent example of a federal agency doing good for the American public in times of trouble, such as the present.

FEMA was born in 1979, the offspring of a number of federal agencies that had been functioning in an independent and uncoordinated manner to protect the country against natural disasters and nuclear holocaust. In its early years FEMA grew and matured, with formal programs being developed to respond to large-scale disasters and with extensive planning for what is called "continuity of government."

OK, now can we impeach Bush? Read on! According to the article, Bush put his ever faithful incompetent drinking buddies in charge of keeping us safe and saving us from danger. Sort of like putting Elmer Fudd in charge of hunting rabbits.

These country club clowns barely interrupt their golf games and reading "My Pet Hurricane" to pay attention to their jobs. Remember the article I talked about concerning DC administrators with "nothing to do"? Including of course bubble boy? They sit and twiddle their dinkies all day, demoralized because no one is paying attention to them? This is why Bush must be impeached for he is their boss who chose them and elevated them and rendered them inoperative!

Well, now the death toll is climbing into the thousands. Not one of them should have died for the vast majority of New Orleans deaths are the very poor, the very elderly, the very young! May god spare us.

Homeland Security is killing FEMA and replaced it with nothing. Or rather, a reproduction of the stupid slack jawed response to 9/11: to sit there, blank stare, the ultimate slacker.

BREAKING NEWS: Bush on TV today to talk about how he is going to have the Army Corp of Engineers that he has slated for severe cuts this year in the upcoming budget....to fix the messes! What a clown.

And a bunch of corrupt corporatists who pushed Bush through two very cheesy "elections" to a hair thin "victory" so they could have huge tax cuts will each give a million dollars to this effort which will cost us over $20 billion, yes, billion to fix up. Each of these executives take home bonuses and goodies to the tune of $20+ million a year. Why not donate a year's worth of bonuses?

Yeah, and pigs will fly on a breezeless day, too.

All this reeks of too little, too late. We knew for four days this hurricane was going to be a great one and a mass killer and paralyzed, the authorities on every level did nearly nothing at all. Even as the storm raged, they patted themselves on the back saying, "We dodged the bullet."

Well, maybe we did. But then we got smacked with the missile.

To return to homepage click here

ASTRODOME REPLACES SUPER DOME

Home Sweet Home in Houston for hurricane victims?

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The Govenor or Louisiana just announced they will remove everyone from the city starting with the shelters like the now infamous Super Dome. Living conditions are deteriorating so rapidly, they must remove all 30,000 victims of the hurricane as fast as possible, she said within 48 hours.

The interm plan is to move them to the Astrodome in Texas, of all places. Bush's backyard! This isn't a home or a hotel and it has no hope to hold people for more than a few days since there are no real rooms or beds or whatever people need, privacy, for crying out loud.

What are they going to do? Lock everyone inside? Or let them go where they will? Into Texas? This is going to be a real test, you know. The Govenor said people will not be allowed back for...get this: 16 weeks! This is the optimistic numbers! Namely, around New Years!

Like the other Great Mississippi Flood, it takes months to recover, actually years and years. It isn't an overnight thing like earthquakes where you shovel the rubble into the new foundations and immediately begin rebuilding. This is much messier and the underlying problem remains the basic unihabitability of the entire set-up for New Orleans. It is an illogical city with the same problems of Venice due to global warming only much worse since global warming is creating one massive hurricane after another aiming themselves at this fragile city. This wasn't even a direct hit. If it were, there would have been quadruple or more deaths.

We can't keep 30,000+ people in the Astrodome in Houston forever. During the Great Mississippi Flood, Hoover organized the food and shelter for everyone but for blacks, it became yet another punitive prison where they were put to work doing the dirty work under armed guards on horses with orders to shoot to kill.

But then, Hoover ordered those vets camping outside his house shot, too. Hmmm....Bush and Hoover have a lot in common, don't they? Yikes.

I don't see the Texans allowing all the minority males to run around Houston unattended with no jobs and no hope of jobs. This is going to get nastier and nastier. Displaced populations don't created happy outcomes.

To return to homepage click here

RIOTS AND INSURRECTIONS

From Heaven and Hell in Western Art..Traini, 1349

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

While Bush runs around yapping about changing SS and laughing when talking about his utter refusal to stop oil price gouging, Cosmic Rays sends me this information: From ABC News:

Official: Prisoners Riot, Take Hostages in New Orleans
Children Reportedly Among Those Held Captive

Aug. 30, 2005 — Inmates at a prison in hurricane-ravaged New Orleans have rioted, attempted to escape and are now holding hostages, a prison commissioner told ABC News affiliate WBRZ in Baton Rouge, La.

Orleans Parish Prison Commissioner Oliver Thomas reported the incident to WBRZ.
A deputy at Orleans Parish Prison, his wife and their four children have been taken hostage by rioting prisoners after riding out Hurricane Katrina inside the jail building, according to WBRZ.

Officials are expected to hold a press conference regarding the riots at 9 p.m. ET.

A woman interviewed by WBRZ said her son, a deputy at the prison whose family is among the hostages, told her that many of the prisoners have fashioned homemade weapons. Her son had brought his family there hoping they would be safe during the storm.

Reason # 6488 why it is totally demented to send nearly the entire National Guard to Iraq. Gads. And this week was all about more base closings! Emptying out our empire to the furthest corners of the earth and then attacking Cindy Sheehan for suggesting they come home.

LASSIE, COME HOME!

Lord in heaven, what will it take? Bush wants to compare this to WWII?

Well, at the end of WWII, Germany lay in fucking ruins, you moron which is what we will be dwelling in at this pace. In ancient China, if bad things happened via the Gods, the Emperor was sacrificed to placate the deities. We don't do that but in this case, impeaching the idiot who plunged us all into a costly,wasteful war is most appropriate.

I am going to the Peace Pagoda at dawn to pray for the many dead and those who will be beset by Death's cold hands. I really wish I could save them all.

But I am not President of the USA. Nope. Nor are any of my readers.

Sigh.

To return to homepage click here

AND NOW FOR WORDS FROM THE CHIMP:

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

And now, hold on to your hat and canoe and paddle---the Washington Post talks to our very own bizarre chimpanzee at the golf resort he is swinging from the trees pretending to play golf: Bush babbles:

"In August 1992, after Hurricane Andrew flattened parts of South Florida, President George H.W. Bush swiftly visited the scene. But his gesture seemed hollow to many when it took several days for emergency supplies to arrive. . . ."

Flash forward to last summer, when four hurricanes ripped through Florida.

"The president responded with a massive outpouring of federal aid. The response by the Federal Emergency Management Agency initially was seen as robust and aggressive. Only later would FEMA be criticized for writing taxpayer-backed checks to those with dubious claims of damage."

Jennifer Loven writes for the Associated Press: "President Bush, urging prayer for Gulf Coast communities 'hit hard' Monday by Hurricane Katrina, weighed whether to release oil from petroleum reserves to help refiners, administration officials said. . . .
"Administration officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said Bush seemed likely to authorize a loan of some oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. But details remained in flux and no decision was imminent, they said.

"The expected move would be designed to give refineries in the area a temporary supply of crude oil to take the place of interrupted shipments from tankers or offshore oil platforms affected by the storm. It would not be intended to keep a lid on soaring gasoline prices."

OK, the chimp used the usual unnamed semi nude pool party dudes to do the off the record junk. Obviously, this asshole thinks reaming us all out is business as usual. Why do po' white folk vote for this clown? Poverty rates have gone up every year he has swung from the chandeliers. The uninsured have gone up, too. 50% of the people who will be sick or hurt down South this summer can't go to a doctor!

What does Bush have to say about gas prices?

Here's a preview, from his Arizona speech: "I wish I could just snap my fingers and lower the price of gasoline for you. The markets don't work that way. I'd be snapping if I could do it. (Laughter.) But we've got a strategy and a plan to help you."

So, as people can't go to work or can but can't afford to put food on their families as gas soars past $3 a gallon, Bush won't snap his fingers but will...laugh...yes. Mr. Compassion thinks this is funny. All the fixed income people who will freeze to death next winter and the Farmer's Almanac says it will be very cold this winter!---are humor to him.

Florida was special but the WP won't point this out. Bush threw tons of money at the state because he was making a purchase: he got the votes for the election and helped his stupid brother out and we, the tax payers, foot the bill which was given to the Chinese.

Also from the WP:

China is willing to buy more U.S. goods to reduce its trade surplus and is eyeing energy deals despite Congressional opposition to state-run CNOOC's bid for U.S. oil firm Unocal, officials said on Tuesday, days before President Hu Jintao's U.S. visit.

But Chinese Foreign Ministry officials urged the United States to stop selling advanced weapons to China's rival, Taiwan, and not to play politics with its human rights record.

President George W. Bush will host Hu on September 5-8, a visit that caps months of rising trade friction as well as growing cooperation on stopping North Korea's nuclear arms ambitions.

China revalued its currency by 2.1 percent last month, but U.S. lawmakers have said they want more of a revaluation to address a trade deficit with China that is on track to surpass last year's record $162 billion.

"We are willing to import more U.S. goods," He Yafei, director-general of the ministry's Department of North American Affairs, told a news conference.

"We hope the United States will ease curbs on exports to China, especially curbs on high-tech goods," He said. The restrictions were imposed after the Chinese army crushed the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests on June 4, 1989.

He described the U.S. trade deficit as "complementary," saying cheap Chinese goods saved American consumers $20 billion each year and rein in U.S. inflation.

Time to learn Mandarin (ahem). They want weapon systems and oil. And we will be forced to sell both to them, won't we, gang? After all, who owns our President?

Ain't us!

Richard Morin writes on washingtonpost.com: "Slightly more than half of the country says President Bush should meet with Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a soldier killed last year in Iraq, who is leading a protest against the war outside Bush's ranch in Crawford, Tex., according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

"The survey found that 52 percent of the public says Bush should talk to Sheehan, who has repeatedly asked for a meeting with the president, while 46 percent said he should not. Fifty-three percent support what she is doing while 42 percent oppose her actions, according to the poll."

I am betting in one year that the only people who will want to meet with Bush will be his lawyers.

Schwarzenegger's poll numbers are lower than his buddy. Isn't this funny.

One last note about our chimp in chief: remember his press pool pool party? They pretended to have fun with this rotted beast. The pretend nondrinker? Well, it seems he wanted everyone but himself to be dressed in suits and ties! Some "pool party!"

In his pool report to colleagues yesterday, The Washington Post's Peter Baker noted the following: "Karl Rove was with POTUS and evidently unimpressed with your pooler's wardrobe, obtained at the all-night Wal-Mart in Waco last night thanks to American Airlines' impeccable talent for losing luggage. 'Wear a tie or at least a coat!' the deputy chief of staff admonished from his van as the pool ran by. No time to ask if he had an extra to spare."

Now, did the reporter spit in Rove's fat face and tell him he is a fat pig? Go to hell? What pool parties have this sort of poop running them?

Eh? What ails these people? If I went to a pool party and was told it was a formal with stiff manners I would think the person is Idi Amin or Baby Doc of Haiti! Or Saddam forcing one into a pool filled with shit which is what Bush does with these dumb cows called "reporters." I better warn Cindy that she doesn't want to hang out with this clown.

He is obviously deranged.

To return to homepage click here

NO REAL HOMELAND SECURITY

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The great hurricane is past but far from done. As flooding and general mayhem continues, the parts already hit wake up in a daze. There was a similar event back in the 1920s: the Great Flood. The Mississippi overflowed its banks and many people were stranded on high ground without food or water. And the Republican controlled government at first, sat idle....sounds familiar?

From Wikipedia:

The Great Mississippi Flood in 1927 was the most destructive flood in United States history.
In the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 the Mississippi River broke out of its levee system in 145 places and flooded 27,000 square miles or about 16,570,627 acres (70,000 km²). The area was inundated up to a depth of 30 feet (10 m). The flood caused over $400 million in damages and killed 246 people in seven states.

Started in hurricane season. You know, a terrible drought followed this period of extreme wetness...both made the Great Depression much worse. The flood displaced farm workers decreasing the labor pool, for example, just before the stock market tanked.

As the flood approached New Orleans, Louisiana 30 tons of dynamite were set off on the levee at Caernarvon, Louisiana and sent 250,000 ft³/s (7,000 m³/s) of water pouring through. This prevented New Orleans from experiencing serious damage but destroyed much of the marsh below the city. As it turned out, the destruction of the Caernarvon levee was unnecessary; several major levee breaks well upstream of New Orleans, including one the day after the dynamiting, made it impossible for flood waters to seriously threaten the city.

By August 1927 the flood subsided. During the disaster 700,000 people were displaced, including 330,000 African-Americans who were moved to 154 relief camps. Many African-Americans were detained and forced to labor at gunpoint during flood relief efforts. The aftermath of the flood was one factor in the Great Migration of African-Americans to northern cities.

Relief efforts required a lot of manual labor. As we can see now, flood and hurricane messes are worse than earthquakes because the water rots the standing housing base as well as the mud fills the remaining houses and is very difficult to move and you can't just bulldoze the houses down if there is lots of mud in them, for example, and shoveling them out is all hand labor.

This is why we had the National Guard. Already, people are nervously wondering what happened to them. So far, about 5,000 of them have appeared in three states to deal with this mess. To clean up just the roadbeds of debrie in about 500 costal communities and one major city, this is what? Ten guards per town? Eh? Cleaning up New Orleans which should take only two weeks if enough Guards were available would require about 15,000 National Guards minimum!

From MSNBC:

WASHINGTON - Despite a heavy deployment of National Guardsmen to Iraq and Afghanistan, more than enough troops are on hand to assist with safety, security and relief efforts in areas impacted by Hurricane Katrina, a National Guard spokesman said Monday.

More than 5,000 National Guard troops across four states have already been activated; 3,500 of those in Louisiana alone, said Lt. Col. Mike Milord.

“The troops are available, they’re responding as we speak,” he said.

Four states! Gack! This comes down to 1,250 per STATE! In a blackout, this is how many you need for traffic direction only if you concentrate on the biggest intersections!

The la-de-dah about all this is infuriating. Perhaps, Americans who are well to do have successfully fled and think, let those darker people or useless elderly die? Huh?

This happened during the Great Flood. People were quite content to let the blacks stranded in the flood, die. Some photographers took pictures of these poor souls and they were reluctantly saved or the death toll would have been many thousands.

So it is now. The NG is handing out food right now but note that before the storm, they did NOT go door to door to seek out the old, the infirm, to firmly remove others who foolishly wanted to stay. They used to do this! I remember them doing this. As the storm lashes a city, you could see pictures of NG huge trucks rumbling through the rising waters rescuing people. One friend of mine, they had to use a ladder to save her as the ocean rose and was slamming into the front of her house and the only exit was the window out back!

There should be thousands of NG in boats and amphibians going all over, scouring for victims! Where are they? Soon, people will be very thirsty and hungry. There is no electricity. Many poor people will have to be removed from the area and fed and housed! In the twenties, they opened camps and then forced the residents to do the clean up for cleaning up will be a huge chore. But in this case, we are acting as if this were a minor inconvenience.

Yellow Dog:

According to Defense Department documents that show “a cumulative roster of all National Guard and Reserve personnel, who are currently mobilized,” a total of 4,109 Louisiana Reserve and Guard troops are currently serving in Iraq.

I'm sure their families and the people in New Orleans would give anything to have them home right now.

I feel the pain, brother! From Global Security (using our military as a private army):

Twelve 20th Logistics Readiness Squadron vehicle operators here are preparing to leave in early September to support convoy operations in Southwest Asia.

These predominantly first-term Airmen will undergo rigorous training at Camp Bullis, Texas, before immediately deploying for six to eight months with an Army truck company in Southwest Asia, said Capt. Whitney Sherrill, 20th LRS vehicle management flight commander.

Since 2003 when the Army chief of staff requested base operating support augmentation, Airmen have been supporting convoy operations in the war on terrorism.

Since that time, more than 500 vehicle operators and maintainers per air and space expeditionary force rotation have assisted with daily convoy and security operations, mainly in Iraq.

"These Airmen are truly at the tip of the spear, performing a critical function in support of coalition forces," Captain Sherrill said. "The bottom line is, without their support, supplies don't get where they need to go."

So, next WEEK Bush is shipping out even more of the NG units in Louisiana! Amazing.

As we close bases at home, we pour personnel and equipment and money into Iraq and other distant places. Leaving Americans to fend for themselves. This is total insanity. Our tax money, the $2.5 trillion debt we are accumulating, all this is going down that sandy sinkhole!

Homeland security? More like Homewrecker insecurity! (I am betting, morosely, there will be lots of developing stories about people unable to get simple aid...already, there are such stories from Florida from this same, damned hurricane!)

To return to homepage click here

THE GOLDEN SCAPEGOAT AWARD

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Bush has handed out the Medal of Freedom and other top awards and pay bonuses and promotions to anyone and all who fuck up. He is single minded in this. Mess up an invasion? Use too few troops? Spend a fortune of taxpayer money?

Get promoted and awards! Or let bin Laden attack America and kill many people? Become Secretary of State! Fall on your sword to prevent public anger at Bush? Get more awards!

There are those who serve America. They get attacked and pay cuts, are driven out of service. Today's Golden Scapegoat awardee is the woman who exposed Cheney's chums as rip off artists. From Wimpling Wings:

The Army finally got around to firing Bunnatine Greenhouse, the principal civilian responsible for awarding contracts on behalf of the Corps of Engineers. She raised a lot of dust by questionning why Halliburton, the Vice President's former employer, was awarded - over her objections - billions without competitive bidding. This generally is the fate of whistleblowers: unemployment. Here is someone who was responsible for spending our tax dollars, and she took her responsibilities very seriously, too seriously, of course, for the inbred, old-boy, back-slapping parasites who view the U.S. Treasury as a rewards programs for political pals.

My guess is that the boys in charge consider her inflexible. That's the term they always use when someone insists on following the rules the old boys themselves put in place. She could be said to be lacking in vision, because that's how the crooks rationalize their thievery: they have vision. She'd also be derided as a bureaucrat, which translated means anyone who isn't in on the superliner gravy train.

One previous recipient of this award, FBI agent Coleen Rowley, is now running for office after she was shoved out the door for writing reports complaining about the FBI supressing her investigation of one of the potential 9/11 hijackers. From Outside the Beltway:

"I'm concerned about the direction of the country," Rowley said in a telephone interview Tuesday. "We have done things that have made us less safe, among them the Iraq invasion and the loss of our allies and the moral high ground in international affairs."

Rowley, 50, was named one of Time magazine's Persons of the Year for 2002 after writing a critical memo on FBI intelligence failures.

She had sought a seat this year on the new Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, designed to ensure that government actions in the war on terror do not infringe on people's rights. But when President Bush appointed members of the board earlier this month, Rowley's name was not on the list. She said that was a factor in deciding to run for Congress.

Rowley will face an uphill campaign in a conservative district that Kline won by 16 percentage points last year. Also, Kline's opponent in that race, Teresa Daly, might run again. Daly did not return phone messages Tuesday, but her 2004 campaign manager, Darin Broton, said, "If I was betting, I'd say she will run."

At least, unlike the FBI top investigator of bin Laden, O'Neill, she wasn't killed on 9/11 (possible oversight, this!).

It strikes me more and more that the Golden Scapegoat awards are nearly exclusively for women! One after another. Of all the pro-torture people running our gulags for Muslims, the only top official punished was a woman general! And of course, good old Lynndie English. A dual award, for sure.

Greenhouse irritates the Bush/Cheney crime duo the most because she is interfering with their looting the Treasury. Maybe we should alert old Skull and Bones Greenspan about this! Heh. He yapped about budget deficits just last Saturday! He wants fiscal responsibility. Time for him to attack these free spending free booters.

Eh? Do I hear the sounds of complicit silence? Yooohoo. Greenspannie! Hellllo?

I am very angry about Halliburton. I believe this stupid war was launched to save Halliburton's ass because they were going bankrupt right before 9/11 due to asbestos lawsuits. Note that Cheney and Bush want to limit class action lawsuits against companies!

Then there is Ken Lay. Here is an obvious criminal. And he isn't being swatted around by the press, is he? He is nearly as invisible as good old buddy boy, bin Laden, friend of the Bush clan. Hi ho. Where do they park all these men?

In the YMCA?

To return to homepage click here

DARK MEMORIES

Storyville, New Orleans, 1900, Lady of the Night

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

GALVESTON
(Words and Music by Jimmy Webb)
Glen Campbell - peak Billboard position # 4 in 1969


Galveston, oh Galveston, I still hear your sea winds blowin'
I still see her dark eyes glowin'
She was 21 when I left Galveston

Galveston, oh Galveston, I still hear your sea waves crashing
While I watch the cannons flashing
I clean my gun and dream of Galveston

I still see her standing by the water
Standing there lookin' out to sea
And is she waiting there for me?
On the beach where we used to run

Galveston, oh Galveston, I am so afraid of dying
Before I dry the tears she's crying
Before I watch your sea birds flying in the sun
At Galveston, at Galveston

The worst hurricane disaster to ever take down a city. The buildings that still stood saved no one for those inside often drowned in the tidal surge.

Up until tonight, no catagory 5 hurricane has made a direct hit on any major city. Florida was not heavily populated when the great hurricane of the late twenties destroyed much of lower Florida. Story of the hurricane:

For locals, any reference to "the storm" is obvious. If someone says a house survived the storm, there is no doubt it predates Sept. 8, 1900.

If people say they had family who died or survived the storm, there is no doubt that they are referring to a family history that goes back more than 100 years.

For in Galveston, "the storm" always refers to the hurricane that tore across Galveston on Sept. 8, 1900, and left the city in ruins.

Those who managed, either by sheer luck or the grace of God, to survive the storm faced the challenge of moving forward.

In his memoirs, meteorologist Isaac Cline referred to the morning after the storm as "a most beautiful day."

It was indeed a sunny, warm day, the kind of day people came to Galveston for at the turn of the century. But few visitors would walk the sandy shores for months after the infamous hurricane.

Instead, bodies of the dead that were improperly buried at sea washed ashore on those beaches, leaving even more treacherous work for the cleanup crews.

The storm left behind a legacy that extends across the country. As families moved from the island, they carried with them the story of that night.

I lived in Texas for a while, as a child. A hurricane in 1955 blew in from the Gulf and lashed the McDonald observatory complex. I remember how beautiful the skies were before it hit and how the low, billious grey/green clouds hung heavy as they crowded in and the howling winds when they hit.

People were still alive who lived through the Galveston blow. They were listened to respectfully for they went through the Gates of Death that terrible day. Like the survivors of nuclear bombs, they knew intimately what happens when things suddenly fall apart.

A picture from 1900, Storyville, New Orleans.

Note the fragility of the houses. Much of New Orlean's charm is its extreme fragility. It is no surprise that "A Streetcar Named Desire" takes place in the old part of New Orleans. I fix old houses for a living. I know what they are like. Loose bricks, wood that looks sound but when I plunge a screwdriver into it, it gives way like butter. I have literally put my hands right through 8"x 8" beams in 200 year old houses! I get many calls after storms when the Old Ladies sigh and faint dead away. New Orleans is worse than New York City buildings. They were invaded the last 40 years by sturdy termites from Asian jungles that are eating the fabric of the city. Oak trees are desperately weak, walls that look solid due to plaster and other indigestibles are held up by the paint. Far from solid, the buildings are often extraordinarily weak due to the geography of the place, hot and humid and in a bowl. Perfect for cooking insect dinners.

Unlike many Gulf communities, New Orleans has dodged the bullet many times and so it has a great excess of very old buildings and it is by far and away, the oldest community on the entire Gulf for it was founded extremely early on by the French when they came down the Mississippi River thanks to La Salle.

So it is one of the very oldest cities in America and one of the most fragile, like Venice, only worse, for the entire contents of any rain up the continent runs through New Orleans so this hurricane is going to hit very hard for as it slogs up the Mississippi, all the tons of rain will fall, run downhill and end up in New Orleans.

The shameful foot dragging by the government will go down in our history as yet another crime. For there was time to clear out the city and they didn't exploit this at all at first. Only when the hurricane swelled up drinking the warm bathtub waters of the Gulf which has been killing all living things steadily all summer as the extreme heat killed off many creatures and red algae blooms sucked out all the oxygen in the water, it was inevitable that any tropical depression straying into these waters will be horrific.

This one is gigantic. Just three days ago, the papers were all screaming that the price of oil is plunging (one whole dollar a barrel...great, yeah) because no hurricanes were going to destroy the pumping/refining stations. Then it happened. Now we wonder if anything will be left!

Price of oil shoot up, of course.

Last hurricane, they hid the pictures of the collapsed oil rigs, the largest in the world. It was saved but there was virtually zero news about it, I saw pictures only after stumbling across some rig guys debating what was going to happen next! The media covers things while not covering them.

Tonight, I will extend my heart out to all those unfortunate people who were not evacuated because they can't go. But read this! From New Orleans TV

The bands were blaring on Bourbon Street, the bar tables were packed and the drinks were flowing.
"The only dangerous hurricanes so far are the ones we've been drinking," said Fred Wilson of San Francisco, as he sipped on the famous drink at Pat O'Brien's Bar. "We can't get out, so we might as well have fun."

As Hurricane Katrina whipped its way through the Gulf of Mexico toward New Orleans, some tourists were forced to stay put because flights and rental cars were booked up. Others were lucky enough to change reservations early and get out of town.
Mayor C. Ray Nagin called for a voluntary evacuation of the city at 5 p.m. Saturday. He said he would most likely be more forceful about making people leave Sunday. For the tourists stuck in town, he had some different advice.

"The only thing I can say to them is I hope they have a hotel room, and it's a hotel room that's at least on the third floor and up," Nagin said. "Unfortunately, unless they can rent a car to get out of town, which I doubt they can at this point, they're probably in the position of riding the storm out." In the French Quarter, the revelers, street musicians, tarot card readers and fortune tellers carried on like it was any other Saturday.

"I'll be here tomorrow, I'm not leaving," said trombonist Eddie "Doc" Lewis. "I've been through typhoons, monsoons, tornadoes, hurricanes and every other phoon, soon or storm. I'm not worried."

Down the street, psychic Jackie Wilson waited for customers at a card table, advertising "Free sample readings."

Sample readings? I can just imagine...

This is the Fin de Siecle aire. Remember, the end of the Victorian era wasn't 1900 but was a 15 year period ending with the beginning of WWI. The destruction of the similar vacation heaven, the sinking of the Titanic, the San Francisco Earthquake...all were like tremblors before the great blow out.

Speaking of great blow outs: From the Independent:

There are crackles on the tape but the message is clear. President John F Kennedy and his advisers considered using nuclear weapons against China if the Communist nation attacked India a second time.

The date was May 1963 and the year before China had attacked India along its 2,000-mile Himalayan border, overpowering and defeating the poorly trained and badly equipped Indian troops. At dispute were two areas under Indian control, Aksai Chin in Ladakh and another area on the north-east frontier.

Gads, that makes my hair stand on end! My mom and dad were in the Himalayan mountains when this border war broke out. The Chinese cornered her and asked her, "Are you a CIA spy?" and she said, "Why would the CIA send a six foot tall woman here to spy on you?" And they laughed and let her go.

I know their report influenced what happened concerning this, namely, they could plainly see the Chinese had no intention of pouring across into Nepal. They even went to Bhutan to insure that place was going to side with India and Nepal and the rest is history. No wonder Chou EnLai asked Nixon to send my parents to Beijing.

I feel for the people who lie in the path of the dragon. All of them, past and future. I will pray for them all.

To return to homepage click here

BUBBLE BOY'S BRIGADES

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Well, baby bubble boy couldn't meet the bereaved mothers besieging his swimminghole/trike track but he summons his buddies to save him! So some actually show up, showing clearly that there is always some people you can fool all the time.

So, using my semi-magical pretend reporters, here is the story today, of the huuuuge pro-war demonstration! By the way, the laconic press claims thousands, yes, thousands showed up to demand more war. But my bean counting reporters who are magical saw that every photograph of this great crowd, seldom is there more than three people in a picture and the people stand one person deep! Excuse me, but the arithmetic for crowds is, for every ten anti war people, the press counts one and for pro war crowds it is the reverse.

So the "thousands" are more likely to be a few hundred, if that. If you count the town drunk and the preacher looking for some ass.

The press and the pro war types are certainly happy campers in their new digs!

Energetic young man who can't find his own socks, much less a military recruiting station.

He won the hog calling contest but lost the egg laying one.

Bubble Boy's double shows up at last. Took no questions and gave no answers.

From Yahoo news:

A few Bush supporters went to the edge of the anti-war camp on Saturday, trying to remove some of the hundreds of white crosses bearing fallen soldiers' names. They had a list from families who did not want their sons' or daughters' names associated with Sheehan's group.

Sheriff's deputies said they could remove the name tags but not the crosses, so the group removed a few tags and left without incident.

There also were some heated moments at the pro-Bush rally when Bush supporters mistakenly identified two people as war protesters. The two walked in with a sign that read "Say No to War — Unless a Democrat is President."

Many Bush supporters only saw the top of the sign and believed the men were war protesters, so they began shouting and chasing the pair out. One man tore up their signs.

When Will Marean of Minneapolis kept repeating that he was on the Bush side, one Bush supporter shook his hand and apologized.

Another brainiac proving there is no Intelligent Designer for no designer even drunk out of his gourd, would be proud of creating this sort of animal. If He did, He certainly won't own up to in the next morning.

From a Texas "news" paper

An estimated 3,000 to 4,000 people attended a pro-Bush rally in Crawford, waving flags and pledging their allegiance to U.S. troops. At times, they accused Cindy Sheehan of dishonoring the war death of her own son, Casey, who was in the Army.

Now all the non-Texan sources say less than 1,500 and trust me when I say, it is easy to tell a crowd of over 3,000 vs less than 1,500. It is dramatically different and all the photos, all are very sparse with people. You could spit down Crawford and are more likely to hit a cow than these bovines.

Seriously, if they are so gung-ho, why aren't they all marching to the recruiting offices?

Here is one student who tried to get the Young Republicans to sign up: From Neat Things (via Atrios.blogspot.com)

I finally decided to participate in Operation Yellow Elephant, and I think I successfully ticked off the republicans a bit. I went to their callout and spent a few minutes trying to recruit soldiers for Iraq after the meeting; unfortunately, they had a BOUNCER at their callout, who decided to shut me down. I was called insensitive, Michael Moore, and other nasty names.

Go and watch the video. It is rather funny. Certainly, some youngish Repubs need military training to reign in some pretty awesome potbellies.

Oh, and more soldiers died today. They die every day. And the Sunni promise uprisings against the dumbest Constitution to float up in a toilet.

To return to homepage click here

BUSH CIRCLING THE DRAIN

Cartoon by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

From Political Affairs:

Congressman Jim Leach (R, Iowa) has informed Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D, California) that he will co-sponsor her Resolution of Inquiry into Bush Administration communications with the U.K. about Iraq at the time of the Downing Street Memos. Leach is the first Republican member of Congress to publicly support a demand for an inquiry into the Bush Administration's pre-war claims. The 131 congress members who have signed Congressman John Conyers' letter to the President about the Downing Street Memo are all Democrats. The 11 Senators who have asked the Senate Intelligence Committee to do the investigation it committed to in February 2004 but never did are all Democrats.

The Resolution, H. Res. 375, is a privileged resolution which must be brought to a vote in the House International Relations Committee by September 16th, or Lee is permitted to demand a vote of the full House. Fifty-two Democrats, including Lee, have co-sponsored the Resolution. Leach is the first Republican to join them, and he is a member of the International Relations Committee..

The International Relations Committee has 27 Republican members and 23 Democratic members. Thus far 10 of the Democrats have co-sponsored the Resolution. If the other 13 vote for it as well, then along with Leach, one more Republican vote will be needed for a tie, or two more for passage.

Leach has questioned Bush's war policies for years and was one of five Republicans in May to vote for Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey's amendment requiring an exit strategy. Another of those five, Congressman Ron Paul of Texas, also serves on the International Relations Committee.

Another crack in the dam! Looks like the Downing Street Memos are going to take down both Blair and Bush. Both will park their carcasses at Carlyle and work for their real masters: the Saudi Rulers.

Meanwhile, things get worse and worse for both men.

Bush evidently is falling apart, hard to believe, isn't it, that he has any parts left to fall? From Capitol Hill Blue:

While President George W. Bush travels around the country in a last-ditch effort to sell his Iraq war, White House aides scramble frantically behind the scenes to hide the dark mood of an increasingly angry leader who unleashes obscenity-filled outbursts at anyone who dares disagree with him.

“I’m not meeting again with that goddamned bitch,” Bush screamed at aides who suggested he meet again with Cindy Sheehan, the war-protesting mother whose son died in Iraq. “She can go to hell as far as I’m concerned!”

Bush, administration aides confide, frequently explodes into tirades over those who protest the war, calling them “motherfucking traitors.” He reportedly was so upset over Veterans of Foreign Wars members who wore “bullshit protectors” over their ears during his speech to their annual convention that he told aides to “tell those VFW assholes that I’ll never speak to them again is they can’t keep their members under control.”

If this story is true and it sounds reasonable, Bubble Boy will have only one place where he can be himself: in a Saudi Sereglio.

There, no one will ask questions or look at him except for the Sultan who enjoys his caresses and kisses. They can roll in piles of American dollars and laugh at how Americans were fooled into supporting the oil barons and sheiks of Araby. Kissing and fondling each other, yes, that is what pleases Bush.

Instead, he runs from pillar to post, trying to pretend he and his fellow yellow bellies are real men and not nubile females in the Saudi stable, waiting to be kissed again.

Ah, the kisses of the Sultan on that hot, sultry, Texas afternoon! Bush sent his "wife" away so he could smooch his beloved Sultan without female interference.

Like a Valentino movie, Bush sighs and wonders how he can get rid of Cindy Sheehan. She can talk to the press for hours! Without a radio promptor! She can write without a ghost writer! She can read, too! Rats.

And worst of all, she can think and she has put 2+2 together and her numbers aren't fuzzy.

“Who gives a flying fuck what the polls say,” he screamed at a recent strategy meeting. “I’m the President and I’ll do whatever I goddamned please. They don’t know shit.”

Well, polls don't matter, do they, thanks to Diebold. But Bush's numbers have collapsed and he doesn't understand, he is in deep doo-doo now.

To return to homepage click here

ALL THE BRAVE TEXAS BOYS RUN FROM CINDY

Cartoon by Elaine Meinel Supkis

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Bush has slipped out of town when the lady with the umbrella showed up to give him a jaw chewin' over the death of her son. AWOL knows how to run away from any dangers. He runs.

So the eagle eyed lady with the proverbial umbrella turns to a close gang member of the Bush Oil Rustlers and she nails him with this threat: From Altertnet:

Iraq war protester Cindy Sheehan, whose vigil near President George W. Bush's Texas ranch has become a symbol for the anti-war movement, said on Friday she plans to focus on Congress, starting with Bush close ally and fellow Texan House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.

Like Bush, DeLay is well known for shirking his duties. He ran away from war when he could. This is why he loves to send people overseas to be blown up. Must float his weinie or something.

A spokeswoman for DeLay said his schedule was already set and did not plan to change it to meet with Sheehan.

Waaaaal...I hate to do this, heh, but here is another news story from today...From the Houston Chronicle

Tom DeLay at a senior citizens' sock hop that featured a DJ dressed as Elvis? You betcha.

And he wasn't roped into attending, either.

His office called the Sugar Land Parks & Recreation Department and said the House majority leader wanted to attend the event at the Sugar Land Community Center earlier this month.

"I was a little shocked," said officer Todd Zettlemoyer of the Sugar Land Police Department, which helped organize the dance as part of a neighborhood crime-awareness program.

"This was the first year that we had the congressman there," he said. "He no sooner walked in the door than he had a crowd around him."

Boy, this child was soooo busy, he had to call around for playdates so he could diss the mad mommy with an excuse!

These children destroying America should be potty trained and then put in a proper nursery school so they can learn their ABCs and some Sunday School so they learn the 10 Commandments!

From Reuters:

The top U.S. military officer faulted U.S. political leaders on Friday for failing to get across what he portrayed as the huge stakes in Iraq and elsewhere in the U.S.-declared global war on terrorism.

"The most important thing we have ... right now in this kind of conflict is our will and our resolve," Gen. Richard Myers, outgoing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at the Pentagon, adding the U.S. public does not get the stakes.

Well, since Bubble Boy and his gang of cookie stealers can't tell Ms Cindy why we should fight and if the war is even legal, maybe the General can explain this illegal war.

If this general is so resolved, why didn't HE fight in Iraq? Pushing paper in the Pentagon instead, he presided over this disaster, he signed off on sending men over without armor, he sat at his desk while they got blown up and did virtually nothing, yeah, right.

He wants us to fight harder. Why?

He certainly did not. I don't recall him punching Bush in the nose when Bush demanded soldiers go without armor.

Some fighter. Some leader. Pfffft.

To return to homepage click here

THE 35% SOLUTION

From100 Years of Bicycle Posters by Darien House books

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Bush's popularity is down to the hard core right wing End of the World fantasists and a handful of rich people who are destroying our economy. NPR noted today that he is as popular as Nixon was on the eve of resigning.

Time to impeach the chimp, no?

Today, the Pentagon said they will send 1,500 more troops to help with the latest corner being turned in the Iraq Labyrinth. More soldiers were blown up today along with so many other people. The Israelis removed the illegal settlers in Gaza only to openly steal even more Palestinian lands around Jerusalem. Jerusalem's name had to be a source of irony for the gods that inhabit that place. It is probably one of the least peaceful places on earth.

Robertson's call to send out crazed assassins to murder democratically elected Presidents caused a bit of a flame out for him and the very last person to suggest this was a naughty thing for the leader of a large group of Republicans to do, was Mr. Bush himself.

Mr. Bubble Boy who is more terrified of assassins than anything but Cindy Sheehan who has this to say to him today:From Buzzflash.com

"President Bush charged Tuesday that anti-war protesters like Cindy Sheehan who want troops brought home immediately do not represent the views of most U.S. military families and are 'advocating a policy that would weaken the United States.'"

Bringing our troops home from the quagmire that he has gotten us into will be weakening the United States? George: even if you pretend you didn't know that Saddam did not have weapons of mass destruction and Iraq was not threat to the USA before you invaded -- Americans know differently. We have read the reports and the Downing Street Memos. We know you had to "fit the intelligence around the policy" of invading Iraq. I want to know what your real reasons were.

"In brief remarks outside the resort where he is vacationing, Bush gave no indication that he would change his mind and meet with Sheehan after he returns to his Texas ranch Wednesday evening. Sheehan lost a son in Iraq and has emerged as a harsh critic of the war."

I will be back in Crawford George: Even closer to you now in Camp Casey II. Why don't you channel some courage from my son and come down and face me. Face the truth. Your house of cards built on smoke and mirrors is crumbling and you know it.

Go read the whole letter. My, she is good. She hits so many nails on the head, she built a house. Bush builds a house of cards by reciting "9/11" and "Iraq" over and over again, like a child telling the same lie so many times he no longer has to even pause before blurting it out. If he had Pinnochio's nose, it would be poking all the way across America.

Being a creep, he crept off to visit far right wing co-conspiritors who infest the American Legion, odd how nearly all of them at the conventions are whites when so many blacks fought Vietnam for us!--and here, thanks to Atrios via Billmon

"The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples," Thomas Cadmus, national commander, told delegates at the group's national convention in Honolulu" . . . "We had hoped that the lessons learned from the Vietnam War would be clear to our fellow citizens. Public protests against the war here at home while our young men and women are in harm's way on the other side of the globe only provide aid and comfort to our enemies."
Editor & Publisher
American Legion Declares War on Protestors
August 24, 2005

(via Atrios)

______________________
Dear Mr. President:
The American Legion, a wartime veterans organization of nearly three-million members, urges the immediate withdrawal of American troops participating in "Operation Allied Force.''

The National Executive Committee of The American Legion, meeting in Indianapolis today, adopted Resolution 44, titled "The American Legion's Statement on Yugoslavia.'' This resolution was debated and adopted unanimously.

Mr. President, the United States Armed Forces should never be committed to wartime operations unless the following conditions are fulfilled:

That there be a clear statement by the President of why it is in our vital national interests to be engaged in hostilities;
Guidelines be established for the mission, including a clear exit strategy;
That there be support of the mission by the U.S. Congress and the American people; and
That it be made clear that U.S. Forces will be commanded only by U.S. officers whom we acknowledge are superior military leaders.
It is the opinion of The American Legion, which I am sure is shared by the majority of Americans, that three of the above listed conditions have not been met in the current joint operation with NATO ("Operation Allied Force'').

In no case should America commit its Armed Forces in the absence of clearly defined objectives agreed upon by the U.S. Congress in accordance with Article I, Section 8, of the Constitution of the United States.

Sincerely,
Harold L. "Butch'' Miller,
National Commander

American Legion

Stunning, isn't it? I remember vividly how the howls on the right rang out like the shrieks of shrikes shredding mice back then! The cries of grief over the Blackhawk Down drowned out everything but Monica which was a screamaton to end all screamation!

They yelled that to support the troops, one had to attack the President. And they attacked. Many an assassin tried, too, flying planes into the White House for example which reminds me. The Republicans pretended that no one ever thought of anyone using planes to attack the White House before 9/11.

Shows us how brain dead people operate. They need memory pills. And a spanking with a brush and no dessert, either.

From the Sunday Mirror, England:

TONY Blair is expected to join one of the most exclusive groups of businessmen in the world after he leaves Downing Street.

The PM is being lined up for a highly lucrative position with the Carlyle Group - an American-based investment giant with strong links to the White House and the defence industry.

The firm has been nicknamed "The Ex-Presidents Club" because it has had a host of former world leaders on its books including George Bush Senior, his former secretary of state James Baker and former British PM John Major. There a also a large number of former US Army top brass.

Mr Blair has been keeping quiet about his plans after his departure from Number 10 - which could be as early as 2007 according to some Labour insiders.

But sources in the City have revealed that he is "seriously considering" a high-profile role with Carlyle - which manages $30billion (£20million) of investments worldwide.

The job could net Mr Blair up to £500,000 a year for only a few days work a month giving speeches and making "networking" trips on behalf of the company.

The move comes after it emerged that the premier's financial affairs are in an increasingly perilous state His dream home has crashed in value by £700,000 in just seven months and he and Cherie have to find £13,000 a month for the mortgage.

Hahaha. I predicted this five years ago! And as always, was right on the nose. The Japanese purchased Reagan, the Chineses and Saudis own the Bushes and the American elite own the British Prime Ministers. This is why Blair was Bush's poodle. He went to visit in the beginning and Bush showed him how Major betrayed England and got away with it.

So Blair betrayed the English people! See? Everyone owns everyone elses' leaders. This is called "globalization" and this is why, even if Diebold has no machines, no matter who anyone elects, they will be bribed or coerced or murdered. Like Robertson said about Chavez.

Remember: the big demonstration is in Sept in DC on the 24th. Be there. Impeach Bush! Arrest the traitors of America!

To return to homepage click here

NO FREE PASSES

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

They had a fair sized protest in the reddest of the red states and now the chimp chump show is up in super right wing White Powerland, Idaho, and guess what?

The Cindy Sheehan effect is still a powerful pull even up there! From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

As the names of the nearly 1,900 American soldiers who have died in Iraq were read over a microphone, Melanie House hushed her 8-month-old son.

"Nothing is going to justify my husband's death," said House, whose husband, U.S. Navy medic John Daniel House, was killed in a January helicopter crash. "Why are we there? What is President Bush trying to get out of this? Why must my son be fatherless?"

House was among more than 100 protesters who gathered at a park across from the Idaho Statehouse on Tuesday, on the eve of President Bush's speech in nearby Nampa.

The protesters want the soldiers to come home from Iraq. Bush's address is expected to focus on why the administration wants them to stay.

And how often did he mention Israel and oil? Not once? Heh. Cindy wants to chat with him and since she went on line and learned from the non mass media masses of bloggers and researchers here, she can chat about Halliburton and the Saudi/bin Laden/Bush crime family connections and all sorts of PNAC goodies the media goes to great lengths to hide. But of course, according to Bush, we are fighting for a constitution in Iraq, one that apes...Iran! So. And who was part of the Triple Entant? Or was it the Evil Trifecta? Or was it the Triad of Terror? Anyway, Iran, Iraq and North Korea. Seems they are all doing pretty well, kicking our political asses, aren't they?

The Terrible Enfant, Bush, feels that if we just stay the course and curse the dark and light our asses on fire, we will prevail. Of course, he and his toadies still aren't volunteering anything to this war. Their children are still goofing off. I wrote a fine fettle lady, Kathleen Parker the barking bat lady of Florida who attacks Cindy Sheehan, saying,

On Saturday, a caravan of military families who support the war in Iraq is scheduled to arrive in Crawford. The backlash battalion, which is calling itself the "You Don't Speak For Me, Cindy" tour, started in San Francisco Monday and is composed of parents whose sons and daughters are in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Among those leading the caravan is Deborah Johns of Northern California Marine Moms, whose son, William, is a Marine in Iraq. Her sentiments are typical of other military families who sympathize with Sheehan but feel she's hurting others.

"I am deeply sorry for Ms. Sheehan's loss," said Johns, who also is starring in a commercial she is producing. "However, Ms. Sheehan's actions are only causing pain to those of us who have loved ones serving in the war against terrorism."

Ah, the calvary of outraged pro warriors! They already are being bogged down in California, ambushed by outraged Gold Star Mothers and Fathers as well as bereaved widows and orphans. What commercial is this right wingloon mother going to film?

"My only son is dead and buried forever and he was blown up by unknown people in Iraq and I think you should go there too, and join him in being blown up!"

Or how about this: "My son came home in a casket and I got a pretty flag to hug. You can do this too! Sign here and get a free funeral, at night, of course."

Or this: "My son is dead. Why is yours alive. Tell him to haul ass out here now! Sign up to fight."

I can see the recruiting stations filling with eager responders.

In practice, of course, it means that people lost in their emotions get a pass from the usual standards of debate and fair play, as Sheehan has. That's about to change. As others arrive in Crawford who share Sheehan's grief and her moral authority — but not her politics — her free pass expires.

Oh, that emotional mother, ticked off over a monkey mad war! Her free pass, honey buns, was bought at the most precious of prices: her beloved son is gone forever. I wrote to the newspaper whore begging her to join up and fight, she is, after all, ten years younger than the mother that was blown up last month at the age of 48 years old. Of course, she won't fight. Her free pass stays at $0.00.

To return to homepage click here

BUSH SPEAKS! TELLS LIES!

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The biggest, fattest, ugliest lie of this young century has got to be the American excuses for invading a helpless country the UN disarmed. Right on the hells of the UN team certifying that there were no WMD, Bush and Blair conned their people into allowing them an invasion. They claimed there were hidden WMD and we would find them.

There were none.

This grave crime was buried under the fiction that we were freeing the people of Iraq. Well, we reopened and reoccupied Saddam's prisons and we replicated every one of his odious tortures. So much for that. We also claimed he was killing Iraqi civilians.

Well. Welcome to the "Kill and Iraqi Child" sweepstakes!

Then we pretended we were freeing Muslim women from hardliner religious bigots. Scratch that.

So here is Bush, today, trying to answer Cindy Sheehan and the other Gold Star Mothers Against the War. According to today's message, "We went into Iraq to make America safe." Yup. Before we went into Iraq, the number of Americans killed by Iraqis of any shape, color or size, for the previous 12 years was zero. The number of attacks on Americans abroad and at home by Iraqis of any sort was also zero. They didn't kill anyone, anywhere, that was American. The number of Iraqis participating in or around or about the 9/11 attacks were also exactly zero.

Today, they kill a dozen Americans a week. Week after week, they fight us. Of course, we attacked their homes! But the VFW guys don't care about that! They still think this is WWII and we are saving people from foreign invaders. Only we aren't. We are the foreign invaders!

Wherever we went in WWII, everyone cheered because we were expelling hated foreign invaders. Now wherever we go, everyone wants to get rid of us except for the prostitutes, pimps and our puppets. They love us. Everyone else thinks we are a blight. Unless they are making money off of us like Eastern Europe. We pay them and plenty of other despots, money so we can park our armies over in their countries.

Bush won't explain why closing a great number of bases here in America is going to make us safer. I still remember the fumblebums laying about, open mouthed with flies inside, glazed eyed as the Saudis successfully attacked us right at home without Bush even pausing in his book reading with kids or Rummy's solitaire game on his computer. It doesn't astonish me that Bush went after the wrong guy after 9/11.

From the NYT:

Defeating the "hateful ideology" of terror-mongers in Iraq will not only make Iraq and the Middle East safer, Mr. Bush said, but it will make the United States more secure - if not yet safe - in a world whose new dangers were brought home to America on Sept. 11, 2001.

"Terrorists in foreign lands still hope to attack our country," he said. "The lesson of Sept. 11, 2001, is that we must confront threats before they fully materialize."

The hateful ideology of terror is what the USA is all about. We even boasted about how "shock and awe" from our bombs and depleted uranium bullets would dismay and break the will of the Iraqi people and force them to bow to the Christians!

Well, that was one fat dud.

How our continuing to kill them will impress them into not fighting us, Bush refuses to explain. Nor will he offer his charming, drunk daughters to participate in this slaughter, either. Stubbornly, he and his hausfrau keep the wayward twins at home. They gad about, doing as they please, sticking their pink little tongues out at the rest of us.

Cindy Sheehan's son didn't stay home and lollygag about, drinking and laughing at others. He went to war and died. The continuing refusal of all the GOP children of draft age including the Congresspeople and others, to sign up and fight, is a victory for the "terrorists" because there is nothing less terrifying than a childish, weak kneed right wing kids trembling with fear because he or she might be blown up by someone they antagonized.

Bad news for Bushie: even in far rightwingland, Utah, about a thousand protestors showed up and some of them were the greatly feared Gold Star Mothers. The mayor of Salt Lake City joined the protest. It is growing, it is real, and it is terrifying Bush. He quakes with fear at the sight of the demonstrators which is why they are kept far, far away.

The distance grows smaller each week. Join us on Sept. 24 for the great demonstration in DC!

To return to homepage click here

FIGHTING TO END WOMEN'S RIGHTS IN IRAQ

Editorial by Elaine Meinel Supkis

Like everything our Bankrupt Midas, Bush, touches, Iraq has devolved into the opposite of what we claim we are doing there. Like Afghanistan, when we "freed" them they immediately enslaved the women there. Iraq was the most liberal, free Muslim country for women under Saddam but now, thanks to USA interventions, they are eliminating women's rights ruthlessly.

This reminds me of our own Supreme Court: Bush is replacing the first woman judge with a far right wing ass who hates women's rights up and down and all around. He is a Mulberry Mullah. He wants to come in under the radar but note, this anti women's rights monster is replacing the only other woman on the Supreme Court.

Another reason to impeach Bush. This backward bubble boy is very destructive for us. Maybe he really hates his mom? Gack. Whatever psychology this pathological pyromaniac thinks, it is obvious that he, the man who kisses Saudi men and holds their hands and gooses them on the rear is a danger to all women all across the planet.

Not only has he cut birth control funding, internationally as well as at home, he reduces our influence and powers except for Condi, his mistress, who gets to mess up the world with her lover.

The Iraqi constitution which we are trying to ram down the throats of the city dwelling Sunni women is a regressive document that unlike our own which clearly states the church and state must be utterly seperate, they want to mimic Israel's way of doing things where one religion is favored above all others and the others can be dispossessed or removed or killed with impunity.

This model, the "Our clan is better than your clan" is followed in many places on earth and always is a catastrophe over the years. India struggles mightily with this, the religious/clan clashes burning down whole cities sometimes. China has dealt with this matter by becoming "modern", ie, merit and effort can get anyone ahead. They brutally suppress religious activity in order to maintain this modernism. But here in America, many want to kill modernism and replace it with glorified gang wars, namely, the women are either sluts or old ladies and outsiders can be killed or robbed and everyone sticks to their buddies on Harleys and kill all opposition.

What a mess.

This is gravely weakening America. Texas, the heart of the "gang/clan" rule ethos, just tipped the scales and there are more minorities there than gang/clan members of the ruling junta. The "white" people in Texas are already reacting to this news in unpleasant ways which is why they are forming crews to patrol the borders and keep "those people" out.

To make the war for oil popular, the anti-women right wingers had Laura Bush visit Afghanistan and Iraq and proclaim the victory of women's modernarity. But she was lying just like she lies every night in bed, letting her husband sleep wherever he wants, saying nothing so long as she has her booze, her servants and her drunken wild daughters nearby. She doesn't need modern civil rights because she can literally run over whoever she wants and drink whatever she wishes and no one is allowed to interfere, stop her or even note that she is a lush who has killed in the past.

Like the rulers of old, the women had many rights and could bugger whoever they wanted and live however they wished, the fight for women's rights is alongside the fight for worker's rights or civil rights for dispossessed clans/religions. Namely, everyone becomes a Queen. This is what equality is all about.

Roberts is a disaster and he should be filibustered out. He is bad for America, bad for the world, bad for women, bad--bad---BAD. Our attempts at foisting a fake constitution on Iraq is bad--bad--BAD too. And Afghanistan, like Iraq, is burning down because we are imposing on them, too. We don't want to fight to save women, we are there to kill people and they irritate us as they contend with our masculine military might.

When we go to DC in September, and I will post the bus information as it develops next week--one of the things we will be demonstrating for is for our feminine civil rights.

DOWN WITH ROBERTS. IMPEACH BUSH.

To return to homepage click here

VOLUNTEER TO BE BLOWN UP!

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

The media storm around Cindy Sheehan rages onwards. Now "counter demonstrators" have set up a camp which is an exact mirror showing the same reflection of the antiwar camp: parents weeping over their dead children.

Of course, the parents in the mirror camp are happy to see their children dead and want to send off the remaining children to die. Whatever floats your boat. I would call this either child abuse since the very vocal dad, from CBS news:

In Crawford, Gary Qualls, the father of a slain soldier, explained his reasons for supporting the pro-war camp. "If I have to sacrifice my whole family for the sake of our country and world, other countries that want freedom, I'll do that," said Qualls, who is friends with the local business owner who started the camp. He said his 16-year-old son now wants to enlist, and he supports that decision.

his only other son is still a juvenile and obviously, dad is pushing him into a known death trap. If he doesn't care if he has any descendants, fine.

But I see neither mother or son backing him up themselves.

Indeed, his rain of tears, instead of inspiring more people to rush into that grinding mill, it is causing even more to get cold feet! Neither he nor the media understand this. His "brave patriot" display satisfies them all, especially those who want to watch this parade while sitting at home, drinking beer and shouting about how manly they all are.

Just like during Nam. I wonder why the Marines don't set up a booth next to the weeping father and start recruiting. All those people in Crawford, irritated about peace marchers, can sign up!

The anti-war ad began airing on other Salt Lake City-area stations Saturday, two days before Bush was scheduled to speak in Salt Lake City to the national convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

However, a national sales representative for KTVX, a local ABC affiliate, rejected the ad in an e-mail to media buyers, writing that it was an "inappropriate commercial advertisement for Salt Lake City."

In the ad, Sheehan pleads with Bush for a meeting and accuses him of lying to the American people about Iraq's development of weapons of mass destruction and its connection to al Qaeda.

Virtually no station turned away those idiot "Swift Boat" ads. I wonder why (hahaha). Cindy is lucky she didn't have gays holding hands in her ad or they would have gone ballistic.

Which reminds me of the news not covering Bush hand holding and cheek kissing the Saudis who happen to be the ones who attacked us on 9/11 but then this Sunday, Bush on the radio, again tried to tie Saddam into 9/11 by association and this reminds us that Cindy wants to ask him about exactly that! What did Saddam have to do with 9/11, anyway?

Four soldiers blown up in Afghanistan. They are learning from the Iraqis how to terrorize our brigades sent over there to replace the Russians. One wonders why the Russians left (hahaha).

Another heart deficient right wingloon reporter lines up to attack Cindy: From the Sun Times:

Really? Well, what about those other parents who've buried children killed in Iraq? There are, sadly, hundreds of them: They honor their loved ones' service to the nation, and so they don't make the news. There's one Cindy Sheehan, and she's on TV 'round the clock. Because, if you're as heavily invested as Dowd in the notion that those "killed in Iraq" are "children," then Sheehan's status as grieving matriarch is a bonanza.

They're not children in Iraq; they're grown-ups who made their own decision to join the military. That seems to be difficult for the left to grasp. Ever since America's all-adult, all-volunteer army went into Iraq, the anti-war crowd have made a sustained effort to characterize them as "children." If a 13-year-old wants to have an abortion, that's her decision and her parents shouldn't get a look-in. If a 21-year-old wants to drop to the broadloom in Bill Clinton's Oval Office, she's a grown woman and free to do what she wants. But, if a 22- or 25- or 37-year-old is serving his country overseas, he's a wee "child" who isn't really old enough to know what he's doing.

So, the mother of the missing teen got a bonanza? She was on the news 24/7 for weeks and weeks! Want to be on TV? Just sacrifice your eldest child to die horribly and you, too, will win Bush's trifecta! Be famous.

I happen to remember the right wingers during the Clinton years. Over and over again, we had to explain that Monica wasn't a child, she was a 24+ year old adult when she met Clinton. Nope. To the right wing, she was a child. Then there is the brain dead woman in Florida. A child! Her husband had no say in her life, she was a mother's child! Yup.

Also, this young reporter, I looked him up, he can fight!---claims volunteers are fighting this war so we shouldn't give a hoot if they die. They asked for it! Amazing. Obviously, he ain't volunteering! And if you are put in jail if you don't cycle through Iraqi Hell, this is volunteerism, isn't it? At gun point!

The infantilization of the military promoted by the left is deeply insulting to America's warriors but it suits the anti-war crowd's purposes. It enables them to drone ceaselessly that "of course" they "support our troops," because they want to stop these poor confused moppets from being exploited by the Bush war machine.

I resisted writing about "Mother Sheehan" (as one leftie has proposed designating her), as it seemed obvious that she was at best a little unhinged by grief and at worst mentally ill. It's one thing to mourn a son's death and even to question the cause for which he died, but quite another to roar that he was "murdered by the Bush crime family."

I want this clown to go to Iraq and announce, "I am here to replace anyone who wants to go home."

I dare him. This fool needs to taste the sting of the lash. Why does this monster want this war to drag on? He ain't joining.

None of his cohort is joining. The professional whores who do the dirty work like this hit piece won't fight. They only fight orphans and widows and only from far away because if they talk like this in person, they will be slugged or in Cindy's case, hugged, for she is very generous. She will even hug Bush if he pulls out the troops.

Ah, well, they're not immediate family, so they lack Cindy's "moral authority." But how about Casey's father, Pat Sheehan? Last Friday, in Solano County Court, Casey's father Pat Sheehan filed for divorce. As the New York Times explained Cindy's "separation," "Although she and her estranged husband are both Democrats, she said she is more liberal than he is, and now, more radicalized."

Isn't it odd that someone becomes more radical when one loses one's son in a very illegal and destructive and useless war!

One reason why all the military families aren't besieging Bush is because he upped the death benefits rapidly to keep a lid on discontent. So you get a nifty packet of money if your loved one is dead. If injured, you get to nurse them along as they suffer horribly.

Now remember Nam? Everyone got weepy and tearful over the Memorial Wall but during that long, grinding mess, most people refused to sign up and fight. Half of that war's dead+ were draftees! And we had many antidraft marches and even riots and when draftees began to mutiny in Nam, the Pentagon begged for volunteers. But even Westpoint graduates refused to sign up in the end, only one did the last year of the ground war! They all wanted to be generals, not corpses.

And they died for what? So people can get all teary eyed and sing songs and wave flags, right? This is what it is all about?

The snarling jackals on the right, like during Nam, don't have the stomach to fight. Pwtuoi on them.

To return to homepage click here

CLUELESS IN CRAWFORD

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Bubble Boy's cleaning crew are desperately trying to explain why they can't ever meet with angry mothers of dead soldiers:From the Washington Post:

Some of Bush's aides acknowledge now that they did not anticipate the reaction to turning Sheehan away, but they also are not expressing any regrets about it. These aides maintain that one of the strengths of this White House is a willingness to resist "what appears to be the easy PR route," as one aide put it, and to have the discipline to stick to long-laid plans.

Yo, long range plan according to the Pentagon is for at least 4000 more troops blown up as we try to occupy Iraq for at least four more years! That will make over 6000 possible angry moms of dead soldiers banging at Bush's front door! He will show strength by telling them to shove it, he is fit and healthy and wants to get on with his life unlilke them.

A former White House official said the Sheehan decision reflected a policy that Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. has enforced for five years on everyone from donors to governors to top aides. "If you want a meeting with the president, you will never get it," the official said. "If you need a meeting with the president, you will get it 100 percent of the time. Otherwise, he'd have a thousand meetings a day."

Earth to anonymous official: Cindy not only needs a meeting, she deserves one! She has paid the dearest price for a meeting with the man who recklessly and foolishly and illegally sent her son to his early grave! I can't imagine anyone having more pressing need to meet with this booby than she.

Bush could bike with a bikerider who refuses to sign up to fight in this war. Bush ate dinner with money baggers who bagged him with money. So what was their needs?

Oh, yes, tax cuts!

Former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said Bush's focus on the long term rather than the immediate is "part of what, to his supporters, is steadfastness and, to his critics, is stubbornness."

"If you allow those who are the most vocal and most antagonistic to get a meeting with the president for fear that publicity will hurt you if you don't, you're creating incentives for your critics to become even more antagonistic and more vocal," Fleischer said. "Then, you're forever stuck in: Will you or won't you meet? You'll no longer lead. You'll just wrestle with meetings."

The Fuehrer who leads has no time to meet with people who object to the direction he is leading us in...how quaint. Straight out of the Hitler playbook.

So, booby bubble boy thinks that if he acknowledges there is opposition, it will only grow, but if he spits in our collective eyes and makes funny faces and laughs at us behind a screen of armed assassins, then he is a leader? The Washington Post wanted to host the 9/11 Run for Rummy celebration and they support the war even now so I suspect they genuinely, in this stupid article, think they are persuading people that bothering the Fuehrer von Booby Boy is uncalled for and just plain wrong. One shouldn't petition to talk to der Fuehrer. They should only follow orders they read in the Washington Post!

This is probably why the WP hasn't done a poll lately. Heh.

To return to homepage click here

NEWS FROM ACROSS THE POND

The body of Jean Charles de Menezes of Brazil lies in a London Underground train after he was shot dead by police on July 22, 2005, in this photograph obtained by ITV News on August 16, 2005. (REUTERS/ITV News)
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

America isn't the only place experimenting with drastic police actions that kill people like all those taser deaths of even youths or tasering children and elderly, not to mention shooting the toddler hostage a zillion times when the hostage taker nipped one policeman on the shoulder. This trigger happy problem is well neigh universal.

From Richard in England, we hear an earful about the evolving mess of the shooting of the supposed terrorist in London.

It has now emerged that Mr de Menezes:

* was never properly identified because a police officer was relieving himself at the very moment he was leaving his home;

* was unaware he was being followed;

* was not wearing a heavy padded jacket or belt as reports at the time suggested;

* never ran from the police;

* and did not jump the ticket barrier.

** But the revelation that will prove most uncomfortable for Scotland Yard was that the 27-year-old electrician had already been restrained by a surveillance officer before being shot seven times in the head and once in the shoulder.

Indeed, as information sloughs off the shedding beast, it gets only worse and worse. From the Guardian:

Britain's top police officer, the Scotland Yard commissioner Sir Ian Blair, attempted to stop an independent external investigation into the shooting of a young Brazilian mistaken for a suicide bomber, it emerged yesterday.

Sir Ian wrote to John Gieve, the permanent secretary at the Home Office, on July 22, the morning Jean Charles de Menezes was shot at short range on the London tube. The commissioner argued for an internal inquiry into the killing on the grounds that the ongoing anti-terrorist investigation took precedence over any independent look into his death.

Most internal investigations are usually white washes, note how DC handled the 9/11 mess. It should be obvious now that one can't investigate one's self. There is a conflict of interest here. This is why all things must be outsourced. If we let the Chinese investigate 9/11, for example, or the Germans, even better, maybe we would have seen some hard hitting truths.

Of course, the Chinese would conclude shooting the top officials who allowed this attack to succeed would be the solution. Obviously, our leaders wouldn't want that!

Back to Britain, from This Old Brit's self:

(Refering to the breaking news that the policeman watching the terrorist house went off to take a piss and mixed up who left the building) Within the last few minutes - from UK's ITN NEWS.

The guy who was "relieving himself" -- while filming the premises - was "A SOLDIER, ON LOAN TO THE POLICE"

I rest my case. A Soldier? Yeah. But they don't say which regiment. They don't bloody well need too. Some of us have known all along - S. A. S.

And incidentally, the poster who commented on my original piece[ when I claimed within hours of the killing that the SAS were responsible] telling me that although I was a good writer ----- I had started to sound like a loony.

An apology would be nice, if you're still around and read this.

Usually, Richard is right on the nose, analyzing things going on in his own country. Heck, here, too.

It is understandable that the police and military after any terrorist attacks, will be edgy. But their sole job is to protect innocent civilians and and any failure in this matter is serious. We don't need to be terrorized by our protectors when terrorists are doing it too. This is why our mission failed in Iraq. Every time terrorists attack our troops, they retaliate by butchering all and sundry in the neighborhood. We then invade all the nearby homes and take away any young men and torture and sexually humiliate them and then we wonder why four more soldiers were blown up and killed today!

This downward spiral was fed by the fact that no one in charge in Iraq has been held responsible for the misdeeds and murders. Even the soldiers who threw two innocent young men into the river and drowned one of them just for sport were let off with a slap on the wrist. Not to mention all the torture generals getting off scot free!

From the No Spin Zone:

Document 1: State Department cable, Future of Iraq Expert Working Groups, July 8, 2002

State Department officials held planning meetings with "free Iraqis"-described as "Iraqis who live outside Iraq or in northern Iraq"-as early as April 2002, according to this document. Directed to embassy posts in several allied countries, the State Department cable announces the establishment of 15 "Future of Iraq Project" working groups to prepare for the transition to a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, adding that priority subjects had been identified at a "planning meeting with Iraqis on April 9-10."

Seems the "planning" was for us to investigate human rights violations after a "regime change" and then punish the guilty. Well, we now know who is guilty and of course, we won't see any of these people punished. This is why the charade of the Saddam trials can't go forwards. In a country falling into chaos, you can't exactly try someone for being nasty if everyone is being very nasty indeed right now.

There is no authority left since authority comes with a moral charge and we don't want to be moral, we just want everyone to obey us.

The British ruled this way for centuries which was what we were supposed to be rebelling against back in 1776. The deal always is, with empires, let the rulers run amock in distant places, they just can't do it at home. Well, the chickens always come home to roost and the fighting always ends up in the captitals of the empires. This is part of the dynamic of all empires and is why they don't last forever.

To return to homepage click here

CHATHAM, NY 8/17 VIGIL

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Today was a lovely, balmy summer day and the evening came softly and cool with pink clouds decorating the sky as if it were a birthday cake. I ventured off my mountain to join the "Support Cindy" vigil. It started at 7:30 EDST and ended at 9. When I arrived at the start, the candles were already lit even though the sky was still bright but the darkness fell as we stood about, chatting and sharing.

The village is very small and is set in farm country. It is pratically where the famous Rt 66 begins. This intersection is where the two main roads cross the train tracks. Even as we were there, freight trains rumbled ponderously past us.

Navy vets against the wars.

Quite a few mothers and grandmothers, all very concerned about the draft happening again, all in great sympathy with the loss of children other mothers have suffered in these wars.

A mother gives directions. There were a number of children at this vigil. They were joyful and pleasant.

We had nearly 100 people show up. At the Moveon.com site, only 45 had signed up so nearly twice as many came via other means. Many said, their friends emailed or called them.


As we cleaned up at the end, even the children pitched in.

What amused me the most was the fact that I met two men tonight who had crossed my path many years ago at Berkeley, in the sixties. While throwing out names and addresses and places we hung out, we hashed out where we met back then. It was rather funny for despite our collective ages, we still could recognize each other. The police stayed away from our demonstration and only ticketed a speeding car that drove near by.

One person handed out homemade bread. He was rather amusing, reminded me very much of the Diggers in SF. He belonged to one of the several communes that still exist out here. One man told me he was building a house in one of the communal lands that are run by the Quakers. We talked about energy and it turned out, he used to work for Shell oil!

My, the world is small.

I really recommend attending these events. The people are nice, the feeling of being part of something is worth it and the entry fee is free so where can you lose? A win/win for us all. Do log on to MOVE ON.ORG and get their emails.

Peace.

MORE VIGIL VISUALS: Pictures Noel Adamson took last night

Pictures taken by Scout Prime (who is often at Atrios)

To return to homepage click here

VIGILS FOR PEACE

Painting by Carlos Schwabe, painted at end of WWI.

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

I just got the email from Moveon.org.

Dear MoveOn member,

Late last night, a pick-up truck dragging chains ran over the rows of white crosses on the side of the road near Cindy Sheehan's vigil. Each cross commemorated a dead soldier; this morning, many of them were broken or gone.1 But Cindy and the other moms in Crawford have vowed to stay, and now a neighboring rancher, who is a veteran, has offered them some of his nearby land if they have to move from the roadside.

The spirit of that rancher standing up in his own pro-Bush community is the sort of public support for Cindy Sheehan and her cause that is growing across America. Tomorrow's vigils for Cindy Sheehan will be the most visible measure of the size and strength of public concern about the war in a long time. It is critical to have as many vigils as possible and as many attendees as possible to demonstrate the wave of public support for Cindy.

Can you join us? You can find a vigil near you by clicking this link:

Vigils for Cindy Sheehan
7:30 PM :: Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Homepage for vigils here

You can find the vigil closest to you by typing your zip code and clicking search. There are more than 900 vigils already planned across America. From Anchorage to Miami, and hundreds of towns in between, people are gathering tomorrow. There is a vigil in Cindy's hometown of Vacaville, California and more than a dozen in New York City.

Most of them are organized by single individuals. Some are organized by groups of people working together. Just like the folks in Crawford, Texas we can all do our part.

Attending a vigil is really easy. All you have to do is grab some candles and show up. If you're an Iraq veteran, or a family member of a soldier, it'd be especially meaningful for you to join us. Bring a photo of your loved one to remind all of us what is at stake. We've also made some downloadable placards you can use. Click below to download them.

Vigil information click here!

These vigils aren't rallies or places to give long-winded speeches. They are moments to solemnly come together and mark the sacrifice of Cindy and other families.

Please find the vigil nearest you today and RSVP.

Thanks for all you do.

–Tom, Nita and MoveOn moms Carrie, Marika and Joan
Tuesday, August 16, 2005

I will try to cover the events near where I live. One vigil, a small one, will be held in the village of Chatham, NY. I may have time to go to photograph the much bigger one in Albany, too. If anyone reading my blog lives in this area, give me a big hello. I will be chanting a Buddhist peace chant, Na Mu Myo Ho Ren Ge Kyo. I hope to see a lot of people there.

For we can't just feel sorry for our very well armed soldiers dying, for every one of their deaths, hundreds, thousands of poorly or unarmed civilians die. The toll from WWII, the worst war to wrack this planet, was 54 million deaths, about 80% of them, civilian. Millions of babies, millions of small children, butcherd, burned, starved and tortured to death.

We must remember that the scythe of war takes down the tenderest of sprouts and it leaves ashes in its wake.

We must pray that America stop killing.

To return to homepage click here

ZELDA DELAY!

From AC Paradise cosplayers
By Elaine Meinel Supkis

This is because I am a loving mother. From National Post, Canada:

New Zelda game delayed, Nintendo cuts price of portable DS system

Neil Davidson
Canadian Press

Tuesday, August 16, 2005
(CP) - Some bad news for Zelda fans from Nintendo. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, which had been expected out later this year for the GameCube, has been delayed until 2006.

Zelda developers need more time to finish the game, said Ron Bertram, vice-president and general manager of Nintendo Canada.

The title was expected to be Nintendo's cornerstone this year. The Canadian arm of the company planned to spend 30 per cent of its 2005 marketing budget on the Zelda game for GameCube, with Bertram hoping to sell more than 250,000 copies in Nintendo's fiscal year (through March 31, 2006). That would have likely made it the bestselling game of the year in Canada.

"It's not good news short-term for everyone who was expecting it," Bertram acknowledged Tuesday from Vancouver.

"So short-term obviously, our software sales will go down a little bit. But the beauty of a game like that is whenever you launch it, it sells a lot . . . When we launch it in 2006, it will sell great guns. But (game producer Eiji) Aonuma needs more time. So they're giving it to him."

An announcement on the exact release date is expected later this year.

Good about the Nintendo prices but bad about the game. Guess we will have to figure out what else to get you for Christmas, eh?

The offical site: They need the Triforce! Or at least, more programmers (heh). Of the early Nintendo games, aside from Mario and friends, Zelda was a great game. It was one of the earlier games to have a story line and wonderful characters that pulled one in. They even made a cartoon show and comix books which were suddenly cancelled to the despair of some people in my household. Heck.

I read the comix, too, and watched along and was not happy.

So we all give our wishes for godspeed and good times to the programmers, we can't wait! And let's hope it isn't like the time they delayed the release of the game month after month, right? That was fun...(yer mom!)

To return to homepage click here

CROSS COUNTRY

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

From Atrios:

From San Antonio News:
CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - A pickup truck tore through rows of white crosses last night near President Bush's ranch, where a woman has been protesting the Iraq war.

The crosses stretched along the road at the Crawford, Texas, camp, bore the names of fallen U-S soldiers. No one was hurt.

Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq last year, vows to remain in Texas through Bush's August vacation unless he meets with her.

Meanwhile, court documents reveal that Sheehan's husband has filed for divorce in California. The couple were high school sweethearts. But Cindy Sheehan says they separated because of the stress caused by their son's death.

Sheehan's husband's family evidently is all right wingers. They didn't carry Casey in any of their bodies, only Cindy did this, her husband didn't scream in pain as the baby was born nor did he nurse the baby. I bet neither he nor his family changed the baby's diapers or nursed him when he was sick, either. So they don't have the emotional investment in the boy that the mother has. The gloss of patriotism heals the wound his death created.

But in Cindy's heart, it yawns.

To disrespect this is typical of right wingers whose idea of compassion is "me, myself and I" and begins with themselves and ends there. They can't overturn their own apple carts if it means saving even close family members. My own family operates this way. Death to siblings or relatives if they dare to not ape whatever political mush that has been carefully poured into their brains. Why do you think the rulers spend billions of dollars programming people's minds?

They would dearly love to do it cheaply like implanting some electronics and then simply pressing buttons but right now, they have to do it via tons of entertaining propaganda designed to get people to love the wrong people. Loving Bush and hating Cindy is a stupid move by these people but then....they don't care. Like those obnoxious idiots shouting at her, "We don't care," they sit there, ugly and unmoved and unloving.

Christians, all. Boy, won't Jesus have fun in heaven with this crew!

Yesterday, I explained how, in a sane world, the drunken, violent creep who moved next door to Bush the same year Bush bought his ranch (I bet there is a connection here!) shot a gun while bellowing about shooting doves, he wasn't arrested or put in an insane asylum. He was treated with kid gloves and allowed to bloviate about how much he wished he could be an abusive husband type towards Cindy.

Cindy's husband is a bird of this feather, obviously. Snark.

Like whenever OJ beat Nichole, the police would shake his hand and laugh. She was frantic about this. Now she is dead.

Bush could stop all this. He could meet with Cindy and be a man and take her ire. She has every reason to be angry with him. I am angry with him. I would love to meet him, too, but Cindy is way ahead in the line here, her problem is much more pressing. Bush could scold his followers for shooting guns near people in prayer. "This is Prairie Chapel Road, not a shooting gallery," he could have said. He could say the protestors are not hurting anyone and anyone destroying the crosses of those brave people who died for America is unamerican and should be ashamed. But no.

He wants this to happen. He would love to see Cindy abused. He would love to see the police laugh as people beat her up, heck, have the cops beat her up for being uppity. Not to mention here the zillions of screaming Christians and their wealthy leaders. Shouldn't they be horrified that someone desecrated these crosses? Shouldn't they be yelling? Praying to Jesus to save the soul of the sinner who did this? Like, when hell freezes over.

MORE NEWS: From Daily KOS:

From Truthout.org
t r u t h o u t | One Mother's Stand
By Scott Galindez
Monday 15 August 2005
9:50 PM

Reality Hits Camp Casey

The last 10 minutes have been very difficult here. I am at the Peace House editing video. First came a phone call that someone drove their vehicle over the Arlington West Crosses at the camp. I will head out to the camp now to get more details.

Within minutes one of the volunteers logged on to a website and learned that her friend was killed in Iraq. She burst into tears, Cindy was sitting across the room and immediately moved over to comfort her. What a reality check.

Uppity women are bad. Fascists hate them, Kirchen, Kuchen, Kinder. Jawohl, like the Pope likes to say.
More news:
Angry man blocking road, demanding peaceful protestors be removed. Note how he isn't arrested for blocking the road. It seems they can do anything they want. Unlike the protestors who have to be hyper careful.

UPDATE:

Seems the cops got the man who did this crime: From Crawford Update:To return to homepage click here(note the fact the driver drove over the American flags. He is lucky his GOP buddies haven't passed the flag desecration amendment!)

About an hour ago, wegot a phone call from our friends up at Camp Casey saying that the line of gravemarkers along the road (Arlington West) had been run over. People there said that as they were talking to a few members of the press, a pick-up truck came down the road and stopped at the fork by the edge of the tents. The driver then jumped out and attached a pipe to the undercarriage with a chain and began to "swerve into the line of crosses," said Tammara Rosenleaf from Montana. "Then we heard the pipe being dragged over the gravemarkers and the pick-up's wheels crushing them."

Out of the 800 crosses, 500 were knocked down and 100 are irreperable. However, the driver was arrested by the local authorities. This is a prime example of how the Crawford sheriff's department has helped to protect us and our freedom of speech over the past week and a half. A big thank you to them!

I do hope the Sheriff protects the protestors. It is his job, you know. No one was allowed to attack the protestors making life miserable at the hospice, for example. And they were very obnoxious.

IT'S OK TO SHOOT AT CINDY

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

When I protested against the war during Nam, I was taking my life into severe danger, the possibility of being beaten or shot was fairly high before 1969. We were relentlessly attacked and I used my considerable fighting skills (training helps) to keep alive.

One thing, though. The police and the courts were our enemies. They did nothing to protect us, they joined in the attacks.

From Yahoo:

A man fired a shotgun into the air as about 60 anti-war protesters held a religious service on the road to President Bush's ranch.

Sheriff's deputies and Secret Service agents in the area of the demonstration site Sunday rushed to the home of Larry Mattlage after the shots were fired but did not arrest him.

"I ain't threatening nobody, and I ain't pointing a gun at nobody," Mattlage said. "This is Texas.

Yeah, this is Texas, all right. OK to lynch blacks or drag them behind trucks. OK to terrorize and harass liberals. OK to shoot at people praying if they aren't praying for money and power.

Excuse me, but this is fake. If I were to go to Texas and shoot guns over the heads of people praying in those mega churches, I would be arrested if not shot. One of our readers was visited by three SS agents because he wrote about how he would like to see Bush put on trial and executed. But right next door to a whole nest of SS agents, a man can threaten people praying in the road and they show zero interest in arresting him.

This attitude that it is OK to shoot guns at people praying is bizarre as well as insane. The peaceful protestors anger cowards like this Texan white male because they are a challenge to his private delusions which are carefully cultivated by the rulers who need creeps like him to protect them from protestors who want to stop the death machine they are building.

The fact that he wasn't arrested really riles me because it is illegal to discharge a gun on a public road for any reason. If a hunter shoots over a road, he is arrested. Period. It is totally illegal. If this man didn't shoot his gun on his property, he shot it on a public road. Even if he shot over the people there, he could have shot anyone near by. His violence is like that of an abusive husband who doesn't hit his wife but terrorizes her by breaking the furniture right next to her.

His goal was to shut down a legal demonstration. He should be arrested. The fact that he isn't is a crime. I want the sheriff arrested for not keeping the peace. Peaceful demonstrations are just that: peaceful. They aren't stopping traffic. They aren't blocking abortion clinic doors.

They are on the side of the road, protesting, protected by the Constitution. That thingie the right hates so much. The thingie we are supposed to be encouraging the Iraqis to write. I hope the authorities reconsider. This criminal claimed he was preparing for "dove hunting" which is code for shooting antiwar demonstrators.

NEW INFORMATION: Here is the transcript and pictures of the incident. From the Lone Star Iconoclast Pictures show the man had been drinking. And it is obvious he was being very hostile. The Sheriff was hostile to questions about how they coddled this obviously deranged man.

To return to homepage click here

CONSTITUTIONAL CONSTIPATION

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Archeologists have recently dug up this original painting done right after the British surrender to General Washington. The artist thoughfully recorded what was said that memorable day.

Because our Constititution was written at bayonet point by William Pitt and signed by King George, we now understand why we don't have a real democracy and never really had one, right? After all, putting people in prison without trial or going on imperial war adventures without voting for war, dispossessing people of their homes so favored courtiers can build marinas for their pleasure craft, we now understand our true status vis a vis the Throne.

After surrendering to the King (God save the Queen! Long live the Queen, yadda yadda) we are now working as mercenaries, forcing other people to sign constitutions against their will.
From the BBC:

The militants have also warned they will kill any Sunni Muslims working on the new constitution - a threat apparently carried out during Tuesday's attack in Baghdad.

In the firestorm of what used to be Iraq, the effort to ram through a constitution continues. We don't have enough robots or long range missiles to work on corralling these pesky people into writing what we dictate. But we will grimly go forwards with this effort. More soldiers of ours were blown up today. A heap of corpses, American Redcoats and Iraqi Whigs, pile up all around Baghdad. But we will get that document out or else.

Our ruler, King George the Dimwit, threw a temper tantrum yesterday, demanding the Iraqis finish the stenography. But do they?

Noooo. Instead, they complain! From Yahoo:

"The Americans say they don't intervene, but they have intervened deep," Mahmoud Othman, a Kurdish member of the constitution committee, told the paper.

"They gave us a detailed proposal, almost a full version of a constitution. They try to compromise the different opinions of all the political blocs," Othman said.

"The US officials are more interested in the Iraqi constitution than the Iraqis themselves, because they promised their people that it will be done August 15."

It has to be done while the King is in Waco so he can trot outside his castle and wave it in front of the bereaved mothers besieging his home. He wants to dismiss these pesky people who dare to remind him about those he has killed.Via Antiwar.com

From the NYT:

For the second time since the Iraq war began, the Pentagon is struggling to replace body armor that is failing to protect American troops from the most lethal attacks by insurgents.

And how many armored plated ships did we churn out during WWII each month? 30? 50? Of course, the Pentagon hopes to have six robot killer Humvees in a couple of years. 50 dead soldiers a month times 36 months=1800 more dead. So, the real question is, will 3,800 angry mothers be able to change King George the Insane's mind?

A King George mind is a terrible thing and is wasted, too.

To return to homepage click here

INHUMAN ROBOTS

From Science Fiction Art by Brian Aldiss

By Eaine Meinel Supkis

With over 30,000 casualties, over 2,000 dead soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, untold mayhem, the Pentagon goes onwards with the quest for a totally ruthless, utterly undefeatable, inhuman war machine. Of course, this means creating killer robots. The Gladitor is the latest entry in the Evil Empire Sweepstakes. I am sure that the technicians working on these various projects all know Star Wars by heart and have grown up on science fiction books and movies. 100% of them. Yet they make money doing the obviously wrong thing for the government.From the Post Gazette via CNet:

The "Gladiator," an unmanned remote-controlled vehicle, makes its way over a dirt obstacle yesterday as a crowd observes. Carnegie Mellon and BAE Systems held a public demonstration of the robot, developed for the Marine Corps..... military-green robot resembling a large all-terrain vehicle climbed and tumbled over makeshift stacks of wood planks and piles of stone-filled dirt, preening before a crowd uttering "ohs" and "ahs".

Known as the Gladiator Tactical Unmanned Ground Vehicle (TUGV), the six-wheeled combat robot spun around in circles displaying its strength and durability at what could have been its coming-out party-- the first public demonstration of the prototype designed and developed at Carnegie Mellon University and set to be built and manufactured at BAE Systems' Ground Vehicle Unit plant in Fayette County.

In February, CMU beat out defense giant Lockheed Martin for a $26.4 million Defense Department contract to produce a line of six Gladiator TUGV prototypes.

This is driving us into bankruptcy. Six Humvees with National Guards inside cost one tenth that. As the people fighting us know, humans are actually cheap resources. The reason why we want robots is because we can't stomach the close up fighting that running a ruthless empire entails. We want to reap the riches and wreck the wretches but not get hurt in the process.

So the temptation to spend oodles of money making robots which will do all the dirty killing for us is a severe temptation.

Eventually, the military hopes to arm the remote-controlled TUGVs with machine guns and other weapons, giving them the capacity to destroy enemy targets.

Rep. John Murtha checks out the launchers on the "Gladiator" yesterday.
Click photo for larger image.

Marine Corps Col. Terry Griffin, the project manager for the Department of Defense Robotic Systems Joint Project Office, called the Gladiator "the future of war-fighting.

"Remote combat task is to accomplish the mission and save friendly lives," Griffen told a crowd of BAE employees, politicians, CMU researchers, staff and reporters on hand for yesterday's demonstration. "We're going to do that with the Gladiator."

Yes, this killing machine will spit out bullets and "destroy enemy targets" just like the nukes dropped on cities filled with women and children destroyed enemy targets.

Right now, as is usual, our enemy targets are nearly exclusively pesky peasants in distant lands who interfer with our New World Robot Rule.

Designed to fit into a military Humvee for transport, the Gladiator will be driven remotely by a soldier using a Sony PlayStation-like joystick. The soldier will wear a special helmet fitted with an eyepiece that serves as a camera, allowing the soldier to see what the robot sees, even though it could be miles away.

The latest Gladiator prototype has containers for hand grenades that can be used for clearing obstacles and creating a footpath on difficult terrain for soldiers following behind. It also features what looks like organ pipes to produce smoke, and it has a mount on top for a medium-size machine gun or multipurpose assault weapon.

Ender's Game, anyone?

To return to homepage click here

NORTHCOM NUCLEAR GAMES

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

On 7/7, in London, the authorities were playing "war games" in the subways to see if they could deal with a terrorist attack. The same morning the attacks really happened. Lady Luck, at work. The Pentagon was running "war game" on 9/11, pretending airplanes were hijacked just as real hijackers did the exact same thing.

We lost both of those fake wars, didn't we?

Well, hold onto your knees and put your head between them: From NORTHCOM headquarters:

Exercise to focus on nuclear terror scenario
Posted Jun 29, 2005 at 1:00:PM MDT

FORT MONROE, Va. -- Here’s the scenario…A seafaring vessel transporting a 10-kiloton nuclear warhead makes its way into a port off the coast of Charleston, S.C. Terrorists aboard the ship attempt to smuggle the warhead off the ship to detonate it. Is this really a possibility?

Joint Task Force Civil Support (JTF-CS) here is planning its next exercise on the premise that this crisis is indeed plausible.

Sudden Response 05 will take place this August on Fort Monroe and will be carried out as an internal command post exercise. The exercise is intended to train the JTF-CS staff to plan and execute Consequence Management operations in support of Federal Emergency Management Agency Region IV’s response to a nuclear detonation.

Some of this year’s objectives for SR05 are to refine nuclear incident Concept of Operations, produce a CM Operation Order, refine command post set-up procedures and maintain situational awareness of multiple CM incidents.

The Sudden Response exercise has been held at Quantico, Va., in the past, but has been moved to Fort Monroe to maximize command post training time. The senior leadership felt that it was more important to accomplish training instead of losing up to a day and a half in travel time, said Paul Deflueri, J7 Lead Exercise Planner. “This will allow us to still meet our training objectives,” he said.

Some external participants may work with JTF-CS during the exercise.

“We’re trying to get representatives from FEMA Region IV as well as representatives from South Carolina Emergency Management Division and active duty soldiers from the (Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and Explosive) Consequence Management Response Force to play the role of task force units,” Defluri said.

“Each time we do one of these internal exercises, we try to make it more robust and try to add in fidelity,” Defluri said. “That’s what we’re trying to do for SR05: create a good scenario and be able to replicate the effects as best we can. That way we can give the command a really good CM exercise.”

More real? What is it with terrorist attacks happening the same time as the exercises, anyway? Is this creepy or is this suspicious or do the gods hate us or all three?

This is the scariest one of all. I was talking to a neighbor about this and he volunteered that the time is ripe for Bush to scare everyone again. So obviously, even ordinary people are getting suspicious and fed up.

Nuclear war is in the air. Bush scuttled the treaty talks with North Korea, infuriating the Chinese who arranged the whole thing very carefully. Hu and Wen do not like to walk away from a negotiation with no signiatures on documents. They pushed very hard on our behalf and we not only shafted them in NK but with the Unocal oil deal. So they are not in a good humor today. Neither are the Germans or the Russians. From the BBC:

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has warned the US to back away from the possibility of military action against Iran over its nuclear programme.
His comments come a day after President Bush reiterated that force remained an option but only as a last resort.

Iran has resumed what it says is a civilian nuclear research programme but which the West fears could be used to develop nuclear arms.

note the timing here, right on the heels of America screwing up the nuclear negotiations in Asia, Iran kicks us in the nuts. They aren't doing this blindly, either.

They have oil to sell. And since we are sucking up massive amounts of oil, filling our oil reserves and driving up the price of oil across the planet, oh, did you know that Bush is filling caves in the ground with oil? Heh. Squirrelling it away in hidden stashes, at taxpayer expense.

Mr Bush's comments about the military option came in an interview on Israeli TV.

Note that our so-called President goes off to a foreign nation to talk about WWIII and nuking enemies of this nation....and not telling us, directly. This is how little we control our own government. It is owned by the Saudis, by the Zionists, by the very rich, the Queen of England, by the Chinese and Japanese who squabble over who gets which officials as private pets.

They certainly don't serve us.

From Al Jazeera:

Credit card-sized reactors that pump out potent toxins could render international chemical weapons bans impotent, a US military weapons expert has said.

Efficient "micro-reactors" make it easy for stockpiles of chemical weapons to be secretly produced, according to Tuan Nguyen of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Centre for Global Security Research.

"The inherently small physical size of the equipment and small space required make it attractive for clandestine operations," Nguyen wrote in a paper to be published in the 12 August edition of the journal Science.

"The ability to produce chemicals of interest in a safer and more feasible manner, with little signature produced, could encourage their application for malicious intent," he explained on Thursday.

Reactors ranging in size from a notebook to a credit card produce inexpensive, high-grade toxins, according to Nguyen.

Whoopee. This reminds me, the anthrax killer got the anthrax from an American military top secret lab that only a tiny handful of people had access to...and no one has been arrested. You can bet, they will improve their underhanded attack abilities. The anthrax attacks were very successful and the media cover up of the miserable, amazingly inept and obviously thwarted investigation was a ringing success--most Americans don't even remember there were any attacks in the first place and if they do, they think it was Saddam who did it, in between launching those WMD and playing gin rummy with bin Laden, his dire enemy.

From Xinhuanet:

US Department of Homeland Security announced Friday that it will lower the terrorism threat level after evening rush hour Friday for mass transit systems, which had been placed under extra security since the July 7 bombing attacks in London.

The color-coded threat level will be lowered from orange, or high risk, to yellow, or elevated risk, at 8 pm local time for transit systems, according to a statement issued by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff.

Chertoff is a neocon serving two masters only one of which is nominally American. He wants us to relax and enjoy the NORTHCOM nuclear war games.

But, lo, what light in window yonder? From Xinhuanet:(the Chinese are laughing at us, you know)

Terrorists could attack New York, Los Angeles and Chicago around Sept. 11, using fuel tanker trucks to cause mass casualties, Federal Bureau Investigation (FBI) experts warned.

The warning grew out of intelligence developed from an overseas source indicating that terrorists might seek to stage an anniversary attack by stealing fuel tanker trucks to explode gas stations, The New York Times on Friday quoted the experts as saying.

Although it is unclear whether the attacks will occur simultaneously or be spread out over a certain period of time, the goal of the attack is very clear -- to collapse the US economy, according to the experts.

Rummy is planning a "Freedom Walk" this very same day. To show we love our wars and we love our neocons and we want more wars! Either he wants us to be flypaper for terrorists or the possibility of attacks are nil.

Want to know how coyotes hunt dogs, their favorite dinner item? They look enough like dogs to fool them and the domestic dogs follow the female coyote down the river until they are away from humans then the pack, for they now run in packs, attacks. This happened this morning down by the river here. My dogs and I heard the dog barking excitedly as it followed the female coyote upstream and then...shrieks and the war whoops of the coyote pack. My dogs went bezerk, barking and growling but they stayed home.

The coyotes are hunting us. They pretend to be friendly.

They aren't.

To return to homepage click here

BUBBLE BOY

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

We had those stupid pictures of Bush driving around Putin's estate, waving his arms out the windows as if he were a five year old driving daddy's car for an indulgent grandpa. We had more driving pictures whenever anyone visits this infant, out trots the drive around and off they go, in circles.

Then, when bubble boy has to leave and go into the real world, he ain't driving anymore. He goes into his armor plated car and with his dark windows cranked all the way up, he roars off, avoiding all human contacts.

From the Houston Chronicle;

President Bush and his motorcade passed the growing camp of war protesters outside his ranch today without incident.

As Bush passed on his way to and from a political fundraiser, law enforcement blocked two intersecting roads where the demonstrators have camped out all week. Officers required the group to stand behind yellow tape, but no one was asked to leave.

The motorcade didn't stop.

You know, bubble head could have rolled down his window and waved. He loves to wave at photographers when he drives his toys around on various estates. He knows how to use the window electric open button. Press and presto! It opens.

But he drove by, hidden in Mommy Condi's lap.

Today, Bush arrived before noon at a neighbor's ranch for a barbecue that was expected to raise at least $2 million for the Republican National Committee.

About 230 people were attending the fundraiser at Stan and Kathy Hickey's Broken Spoke Ranch, a 478-acre spread next to Bush's ranch. All have contributed at least $25,000 to the RNC, and many are "rangers," an honorary campaign title bestowed on those who raised $200,000 or more for Bush, or "pioneers," those who have raised $100,000 or more.

All those oil people! They are happy. Very, very happy. The world price of oil shot up even more today. Happy, they are. Broken Spoke Ranch. How appropriate. Broken promises, broken speeches, broken brain. As America breaks down, just remember this: Bush can drive in circles if he is supervised.

To return to homepage click here

NEW WOODSTOCK

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Looks like Viggo Mortensen, aka, Aragorn, visited Cindy Sheehan. I'll tell you what, I would happily camp in front of Viggo's home for a month to meet him! Except my husband won't let me.

Indeed, the meeting with Bush is just a front. Except for a chance to humilate him, the last person Cindy wants to see is Bush. On the other hand, meeting Viggo....va voom! Lucky! We have the really cool guys on our side! We got the power! Ah.

I must say, Cindy is doing really well. According to the news, some stay at home tough guys are beginning to harrass her, honking horns continuously and speeding by, raising dust. As if that will stop this brave Hobbit woman! She isn't big but like Gandalf used to say, "tough as tree roots" not to mention, incredibly brave, going to the Gates of Mordor itself to protest!

By the way, where is Gandalf? Hmm...must contact him.

Today, the sheriff of Nothingham told our fair Maid Marion that she needs proper toilets in her camp. So of course, people like Viggo show up to assist her in the quest for port-a-potties.

This is serious business. I remember when the Chinese students, protesting the student massacre in Beijing, were camping in front of the UN. I had my own private toilets and the Organization for African States let us use their indoor facilities during business hours. But thousands of Chinese showed up to protest and I was on the phone on the corner, arguing about getting enough toilets and the city wasn't helping me, they wanted the police to clear the square. A man tapped me on th shoulder and said, "Can I help you?" and I turned around and yelled, "I need fifty port-a-potties!" and then dropped the phone because it was Gov. Mario Cuomo, laughing. He got on the phone and got me my toilets. The protests rolled on.

Gads. Now there is a man. Unlike Bush.

Bush isn't Sauron. He is Gollum. Jappering in odd turns of the tongue, hiding from everyone, wailing about his ring of power, he took over Mordor somehow, with the help of Rove/Cheney as Saruman the Fat. Anyway, they all are evildoers.

We are supposed to be at war to end the reign of terror of evildoers. Go, Cindy!

To return to homepage click here

SARAGOSSO 911 COMMISSION

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Becalmed in placid seas, the silence enfolding them, the 911 Commission steadly tries to deal with all the flipped out, insane, infuriating information that is leaking out of the USS Cover Up. As reported here earlier, we now know that Atta was being closely watched and rather a few people knew about him and knew he was attached to al Qaeda and their excuse for letting him literally run amock is that they can't share information with anyone in the USA so any terrorists traveling inside our country are untouchable.

Geeze. Yeah. Right. Their hands were tied. Uh-huh.

No one is inquiring about how the CIA was able to write up that memo about bin Laden planning an attack. You would think that Condi Rice and her paramour, Bush, would have said, "Who are these people? Tell us! We will foil the attack!" Why, they could have gone to work to track down Atta, a laughably simple thing to do since Mossad had him under a magnifying glass as well as some American spies.

Here is how the panel is reacting to all this information:From the NYT:

The Sept. 11 commission knew military intelligence officials had identified lead hijacker Mohamed Atta as a member of al-Qaida who might be part of U.S.-based terror cell more than a year before the terror attacks but decided not to include that in its final report, a spokesman acknowledged Thursday.

Well, it is nice to know they knew. So why did they not say anything about all this? I was amazed that nearly immediately on 9/11, the government knew exactly who did the hijacking. It was obvious that the terrorists were not total strangers to our "protectors." The hard thing to explain is why Bush and Card and Rumsfeld and everyone was so unsurpized on 9-11 as events unfolded.

Al Felzenberg, who had been the commission's chief spokesman, said Tuesday the panel was unaware of intelligence specifically naming Atta. But he said subsequent information provided Wednesday confirmed that the commission had been aware of the intelligence.

In other words, he played dumb until embarrassing questions forced him to admit the truth. They all knew this very important, very dangerous information, and kept mum.

It did not make it into the final report because the information was not consistent with what the commission knew about Atta's whereabouts before the attacks, Felzenberg said. The commission has gone out of existence, although a follow-up organization called the 9/11 Public Discourse Project continues to follow closely the Bush administration's progress in implementing their recommendations.

The "information" about Atta that wasn't "consistent" turned out to be all lies or misrepresentations. Atta traveled about the world, doing whatever he wanted, but 90% of the time he was hanging out in Southern Florida, openly talking about his plans right in the lap of where more CIA and FBI agents retire or maintain second homes not to mention the Bush clan, who run the state, by the way.

The intelligence about Atta recently was disclosed by Rep. Curt Weldon, vice chairman of the House Armed Services and Homeland Security committees. The Pennsylvania Republican is angry that the intelligence never was forwarded by the military establishment to the FBI.

According to Weldon, a classified military intelligence unit called ''Able Danger'' identified Atta and three other hijackers in 1999 as potential members of a terrorist cell in Brooklyn, N.Y. Weldon said Pentagon lawyers rejected the unit's recommendation that the information be turned over to the FBI in 2000.

According to Pentagon documents, the information was not shared because of concerns about pursuing information on ''U.S. persons,'' a legal term that includes U.S. citizens as well as foreigners legally admitted to the country.

Attention, this is a smoke screen. I know how one can "drop a dime" to the FBI, it is very simple. Do you really think the FBI doesn't watch legal aliens? Huh?

Well, we know they didn't watch Oswald, a sharp shooter military man that defected to Russia and then returned on a mission. Geeze, the delicacy the FBI and Pentagon show towards people they have zero interest in stopping is most amazing. I am complaining loudly because I know for a fact, no one escapes scrutiny if you want them watched. No one. Especially Clinton. Remember, during this time period of squeamishness about watching possible terrorists, 100 FBI agents were combing America seeking information about Clinton's sex life.

Felzenberg said an unidentified person working with Weldon came forward Wednesday and described a meeting 10 days before the panel's report was issued last July. During it, a military official urged commission staffers to include a reference to the intelligence on Atta in the final report.

So a military offical wanted to let us know about this little matter? Why, in the name of all the evilest gods on earth, weren't all the hearings on 9-11 open? Like when Bush and Cheney did their puppet show? So much was hidden from us and so much is still hidden, isn't it? Some way to defend freedom and democracy!

We might as well be in the Soviet Union.

Felzenberg said checks were made and the details of the July 12, 2004, meeting were confirmed. Previous to that, Felzenberg said it was believed commission staffers knew about Able Danger from a meeting with military officials in Afghanistan during which no mention was made of Atta or the other three hijackers.

Staff members now are searching documents in the National Archives to look for notes from the meeting in Afghanistan and any other possible references to Atta and Able Danger, Felzenberg said.

He sought to minimize the significance of the new information.

Open mouthed, as flies buzz about his head, he rouses himself out of the hammock to tell us this isn't important information. They fixed things now. The military and all the goofy agencies that refused to defend us in the past are now united under our Fuehrer who isn't told anything even if they evacuate DC, and now they will protect us so long as we ask no questions, don't look too hard, and go about as if nothing is wrong.

We don't need to know anything.

Arg. You know, they tortured sheep herders for three years at Gitmo seeking useless information and they couldn't even have someone tail Atta? I cannot believe this. I was spied upon for a long time, as a fricking teenager, for crying out loud. No one did anything, they just watched all the time.

Very simple. You don't need any legal excuses, certainly Mossad didn't apply for anything when they were spying on Atta.

But then, like Bush, 9-11 was also their trifecta!

To return to homepage click here

DEAD SENATE WALKING

By Elaine Meinel Supkis

Over and over again, despite Bush's party running the White House, the Senate and the House of Representatives, he can't pass his far right wing picks so he resorts again and again to putting people in during vacations. This refusal to cooperate with the rules that ran our nation is a clear sign the Presidency has become a dictatorship.

If the rule was split, one could understand trying to keep the government running but this isn't the case at all.

From Bloomberg News:

President George W. Bush today named Eric S. Edelman undersecretary of defense for policy, using his power to make temporary appointments while Congress is in recess to overcome potential Democrat opposition to the nomination.

Edelman replaces Douglas Feith in the No. 3 position at the Pentagon. Feith helped plan the war in Iraq and the postwar occupation, and those roles made him the target of criticism from opponents of the March 2003 invasion.

Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee led by Carl Levin of Michigan, their ranking member, stalled Edelman's nomination to force the release of documents related to a specialized intelligence unit Feith set up before the conflict. Levin said the unit produced assessments alleging still unproven links of Iraq to terrorist groups to justify the invasion.

The committee sent Edelman's nomination to the full Senate July 29. Republican John Warner of Virginia, the panel chairman, was unable to organize a floor vote and asked Bush Aug. 1 to make Edelman a recess appointment, said Warner spokesman John Ullyot.

Bush's appointment puts Edelman in the job until January 2007, when a new Congress convenes. A recess appointment, one of the executive powers in the Constitution, is typically used when a president believes a nominee can't get a fair hearing or a vote in the Senate.

The nominees got fair hearings. The deaf people here are the Bush people. The Republicans. They won't allow the Senate to "consult" but rather, want it to rubber stamp all choices of the dictator without question.

This is why they won't turn over any Roberts papers. They want to control access to all information so they can lie when appearing at the rubber stamp hearings. Roberts' paper trail as well as Bolton's and Edelman's, is what is at issue here and the three of them don't want us to see the information.

The previous choices by Bush for these positions were all disasters...except for the Supreme Court, this is his first chance to wreck that institution. The free flow of information is vital to all democracies and this is what is in full collapse here. When the GOP shut down the government fighting with Clinton, they did that for ideological reasons, not because Clinton was refusing to follow our ancient customs and rules.

These violent reactionaries want to turn by the social and political clock to pre-civil war times. The anti-ante-bellums.

Edelman, like Boulton, will be allowed to rule the roost until 2007. This is not some stop-gap appointment. After reading about all those do nothing goof-offs in today's Washington Post, it makes me wonder.

How long will it take for all those "drown the government in the bathtub" to drown so they can leave us alone? Eh?

To return to homepage click here

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.

To read more click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To read more click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here

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!

To return to homepage click here

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.

To return to homepage click here