Mr. David Corn,

Just did the blogger head thing - It was good!

I hope Fitzgerald is on top of the case.

I doubt Libby's counsel is blowing smoke. They will make the prosecution pull teeth every step of the way. A few million buys that much.

Thank for the update!

Kirk

The bloggerhead thing was blogversational!

What about a rolling transcript - it could have items linked like the Texas legal code David mentioned.

I wonder if any of the people with dail-ups tried it and did it work?

capt

I think and hope Fitzgerald has Libby cornered(he will get pardoned anyway). I still have my fingers crossed that Cheney is the "target".

#224 Hajji...from the King Dick post....
DEATH SQUADS IN IRAQ.

It is amazing and depressing to see how long it takes people to respond over in Iraq. As I have shared before the Christian Peace Maker Team has been reporting this to U.S. military officials since the summer of 2005.

The CPT folks had a similar response to the written reports that they were handing into U.s. military long before Abu Gharib hit the news. This is where Seymour Hersh came in and talked with CPT'rs and others about the abuses.

Here is one of Peggy's emails from last summer. I have 50 or so emails from her if anyone is interested. She is still in Iraq.

July 22, 2005

?

Dear Family and Friends,

? I haven?t written for a while because I just spent a week in Amman, Jordan studying Arabic and writing while waiting to be able to get into Iraq. First the Baghdad Airport was closed because of a combination of a sandstorm and heavy pollution. Then the U.S. military put tighter restrictions on the mode of landing. The small subsidized airline for international NGO?s we were flying in on decided it was too dangerous to fly in under those restrictions, so canceled flights indefinitely. So?Wednesday, July 20,?I flew in with Iraqi Airways, a little more expensive option, but the team did not want me to attempt coming in overland.

??????????? Coming back to our apartment in Central Baghdad feels like coming home. My arrival makes our team 5, and next week another team member returning will make 6. I have been spending most of my time so far getting reoriented to the changes that have taken place here and with the work of the team, and greeting long time-friends.

??????????? The team is still giving support to various Iraqi organizations, including the Muslim Peace Team in Kerbala. They have sponsored several work days in Fallujah and are still hope to conduct nonviolent trainings with other Iraqi groups in the future. Because the two main leaders of this organization have been traveling and working to build up the organization, it is not been as active in these projects.

??????????? Although our work with prisoners of the U.S. military system has been less, the team has been accompanying Iraqis to try to find avenues for getting information and help concerning abuse of Iraqis by Iraqi soldiers and police in their arrest and prison system. Reports of extensive abuse in this system have been disturbing.

??????????? The team has been continuing its work of ?truth-telling? in Iraq, has been visiting Sadr City and is planning for another trip to Fallujah soon.

??????????? At times the team has been a bridge between international groups and Iraqi people or institutions seeing information about medical needs or between Iraqis and UN human rights workers or US officials.

??????????? It was good to be able to go to the orphanage again and see children I have known for two and a half years as well as some new children who have come more recently. I hope to be able to go there frequently and in a small way share in their life.

??????????? Yesterday, while visiting a family, the mother told the story of her father who had a high position in the transportation and construction ministries under Saddam. In the early ?80?s he was deposed, sent to prison and the family?s home was confiscated. Now her sister?s husband has been imprisoned under the US. She says it was horrible under Saddam for prisoners and their families and life in general, but now it is even worse under the US. She said that every family in Iraq has had members killed, injured, missing or imprisoned. Everywhere we see a lot of pain and discouragement as well as people working peacefully to deal with the problems around them. We pray that we can be channels of hope and peace in this situation.

??????????? Thank you for your love and prayers,? Peggy

Palestine Solidarity Movement to Hold its Fifth Annual Divestment Conference at Georgetown University, February 17-19, 2006

Washington, DC, February 1, 2006 – Quickly approaching the February 17 – 19 date of its Fifth Annual Student Conference at Georgetown University (GU), the Palestine Solidarity Movement (PSM) announced today that its 2006 convergence will focus primarily upon skills-training for emerging divestment activists and campaign development for existing Palestine solidarity organizations. The PSM is the largest North American coalition of students, professionals, as well as religious and community groups advocating the implementation of boycott and divestment strategies in order to peacefully oppose Israeli human rights violations of the Palestinian people. MORE , SPEAKERS, SCHEDULE

CONFERENCE UPDATES

Notice: There have been considerable false charges and incorrect information circulating on the internet about the Palestine Solidarity Movement’s (PSM) forthcoming conference and its organizers. Using both quotations pulled from context, as well as outright fabrications, many individuals and organizations are flagrantly engaging in smear campaigns targeting both conference organizers and the movement as a whole. One organization falsely claims that it has intercepted PSM emails stating that Dyab Abou Jahjah, a fervent anti-Semite, has been invited to take part in our upcoming conference. He has not. MORE

When is the MSM going expose the fact that Plame was secretly working on nuclear proliferation in Iran?
With this administration's covert plans with Israel to attack Iran, and considering how vital such information could be, is there ANY justification for blowing Plame's cover?
It seems that Cheney feels payback is more important than national security.
This is purely and simply TREASON.

When will the MSM ever expose anything of consequence? Is shotgungate history already? I gave it at least a week. I think it has become obvious by now that national security is not an issue, didn't bushco just allow a Saudi co. to have 6 contracts for port security here in the states, or something like that? If that isn't a slap in the face I don't know what is. As for libby, I predict this will all blow over as soon as we nuke Iran, until then it's just a distracting soap opera. If anyone can give me a rational reason to believe otherwise, please do. And please Kathleen, don't suggest that Phase II will solve the problem, it must seem obvious to even you what a joke that has become regardless of how important it may be to we the truthseekers. I'm sorry if that sounds negative but I have all but given up hope of seeing any justice where these thugs are concerned. From illegal wars that slaughter hundreds of thousands to outing CIA agents to males hookers posing as reporters given free rein at the WH to shooting your hunting partner in the face with a shotgun, where's the justice?

The MSM would have to run the story non-stop 24/7 for about a week or two to get it through some of those not paying attention.

They will not for fear of provoking the silent masses.

capt

Secrecy over security

Libby revelation puts things in perspective

When it comes to keeping secrets, the Bush administration has what might be called a two-handed approach.

On one hand, the administration will do and has done all kinds of gymnastics to avoid giving Congress information about intelligence programs. On the other, the administration is willing to reveal classified information selectively when doing so suits its political aims.

Actions here speak louder than words.

Just in case you have forgotten: Last year, a grand jury led by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald indicted Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, on one count of obstruction of justice, two counts of making false statements and two counts of perjury related to the leaking of the identity of an undercover officer working for the CIA. Libby's trial, originally scheduled to begin Feb. 3, has been postponed until January 2007, after the November elections.

Last week, the National Journal reported that court papers in the case reveal that Libby testified before a federal grand jury that he was "authorized to disclose" - that is, to leak - highly classified intelligence information to the press "by his superiors." The evidence is a Jan. 23 letter from the prosecutor responding to Libby's lawyers, who asked what information the government will make available to the defense.

Congress, which has the duty under our system of government to watch and check the government, gets information in dribs and drabs - or not at all - at the whim of the president. The administration sends people up to Congress who wax eloquently about "inherent" presidential authority. In short, Americans are simply expected to have faith that the president is exercising powers constitutionally, legally and appropriately without accountability to Congress and the courts. Just to make sure of that faith, administration officials also try to scare people by saying that oversight would somehow harm efforts to combat terrorism.

You might think the president would want Congress as a partner in the worldwide struggle against terrorism. Yet this president acts as if he and the executive branch are the only ones who care about protecting Americans - that they alone decide what is in the national interest and that Congress somehow is an impediment. The Libby testimony underlines that. It also reveals in stark terms an administration more concerned with gaining and maintaining power than building common cause to protect national security.

*****end of clip*****

A re-post but a good piece is worth reading again!

capt

corky
If it was not for the fact that invading Iraq has made the effort against violent religious extremist's WORSE not better, your statement might actually make sense.

So I guess you are saying that the American homeland has been hit again, just like 911. I hadn't heard about any of the new attacks on American soil.

I didn't think America had been hit again. If I am right and we haven't been hit, that must mean you are lying about terrorism getting worse, and you are lying to mislead on purpose. Maybe not, Maybe you are just stupid

Cheers Greet Cheney at Appearance in Wyo.

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) -- His face marked with tiny birdshot wounds, the lawyer shot by Vice President Dick Cheney while quail hunting left a hospital Friday, saying "accidents do and will happen" and apologizing for the trouble the incident had caused the vice president.

"My family and I are deeply sorry for everything Vice President Cheney and his family have had to deal with," Harry Whittington said, his voice a bit raspy but strong in his first comments since being shot on a South Texas ranch six days earlier.

The Austin attorney spoke less than 20 minutes before Cheney made his first public appearance since the shooting, receiving a rousing ovation from legislators in his home state of Wyoming.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

These people are nuts! Who cheers a guy for shooting a 78 year old friend in the face? Some sick SOB's!

capt

"The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.": Aldous Huxley -(1894-1963) Author

=
"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise" : Adolf Hitler - German Chancellor, leader of the Nazi party

=
"See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."-" : George W. Bush - 43rd US President

=
Laws just or unjust may govern men's actions. Tyrannies may restrain or regulate their words. The machinery of propaganda may pack their minds with falsehood and deny them truth for many generations of time. But the soul of man thus held in trance or frozen in a long night can be awakened by a spark coming from God knows where and in a moment the whole structure of lies and oppression is on trial for its life.: Sir Winston Churchill

===
Thanks ICH Newsletter!

Current Administration Seems to Relish Media's Anger

"McClellan is a brick wall disguised as a government official. He wins any time the press bangs its head against the wall," NYU's Rosen said. "Part of the White House strategy is essentially cultural, that resentment against the press is itself converted into a political asset."

Thus Cheney found a ready audience when he suggested that the White House press corps was angry only because he'd left them out of the loop.

"I had a bit of the feeling that the press corps was upset because, to some extent, it was about them," he said. "They didn't like the idea that we called the Corpus Christi Caller-Times instead of The New York Times."

Conservative bloggers echoed that line of attack, despite firm statements from loyal Republicans such as former Defense Department spokeswoman Torie Clarke and former White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater, who both said that Cheney had acted irresponsibly by not immediately disclosing to the nation that he'd shot someone.

Live TV broadcasts of news briefings also help the White House manipulate the media. Pundits, bloggers and talk-show hosts often spend more time criticizing reporters' questions than the issues they're raising. And reporters probing aggressively for information from polite but unresponsive officials can look like snarling jackals.

"Ideally, televising the briefings should add to the transparency of the White House. But it's become less. It's how the White House can use the event to its advantage," said Ferrel Guillory, director of the Program on Southern Politics, Media and Public Life at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.

"It's another staged event. And the journalists in the briefing room are playing the role the White House wants them to play, as adversaries."

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

The recent lack of honest reporting from all sides of the MSM and the 1600 press corps does help the liars pull this kind of thing.

capt

Connecting the Dots of Cheney's Crimes

Ultimately, however, it was "Daily Show" correspondent Rob Corddry who hit the bullseye, when he reported that: "The Vice President is standing by his decision to shoot Harry Whittington. Now, according to the best intelligence available, there were quail hidden in the brush. Everyone believed at the time there were quail in the brush. And while the quail turned out to be a 78- year-old man, even knowing that today, Mr. Cheney insists he still would have shot Mr. Whittington in the face. He believes the world is a better place for his spreading buckshot throughout the entire region of Mr. Wittington's face."

All seriousness aside, there is a good deal of humor to be found in the fact that members of the White House press corps have finally been roused to mount the journalistic barricades by a hunting accident. While they cannot be counted on to go after the big stories, they are unrelenting in their determination to get to the bottom of every tale of celebrity folly -- be it Britney Spears failure to place her baby in a carseat or Dick Cheney's inability to shoot straight after he's downed a cold one.

But, as in the days when Pravda and Tass could not be relied upon to go after the big stories of Soviet shenanigans, Americans now know that, for the full story about this administration, they must turn to the comedians and the satirists who understand that Cheney's abuse of beer and guns cannot compair with his abuse of the most powerful vice presidency in American history.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

How sad is it when "The Daily Show" is more on point than the MSM.

capt

From the previous thread from th

Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore

While digesting Reader's Digest
In the back of a dirty book store,
A plastic flag, with gum on the back,
Fell out on the floor.
Well, I picked it up and I ran outside
Slapped on my window shield,
And if I could see old Betsy Ross
I tell her how good I feel.

Chorus:
But your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
They're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more.

Well, I went to the bank this morning
And the cashier he said to me,
"If you join the Christmas club
We'll give you ten of them flags for free."
Well, I didn't mess around a bit
I took her up on what he said.
And I stuck them stickers all over my car
And one on my wife's forehead.

Repeat Chorus:

Well, I got my window shield so filled
With flags I couldn't see.
So, I ran the car upside a curb
And right into a tree.
By the time they got a doctor down
I was already dead.
And I'll never understand why the man
Standing in the Pearly Gates said...

But your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more.
We're already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don't like killin'
No matter what the reason's for,
And your flag decal won't get you
Into Heaven any more.

For the best lyrics site visit sing 365

This is for the lying propaganidist Pandemoniac, who said I LIED when I made the claim that the countries of Egypt, Jordan, Australia, Britain ALSO had intelligence indicating Iraq had WMDs.

I also put Russia into the same category, since Russain president Vladimir Putin said he had intelligence that indicated that Saddam Hussein's intelligence services were planning an attack on the U.S. after 9/11.

Australian intelligence about Iraq's WMDs:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/australia/story/0,,1266766,00.html

British intelligence about Iraq's WMDs:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/europe/july-dec04/intelligence_7-14.html

Egyptian & Jordanian intelligence about Iraq's WMDs:
http://capitolhillcoffeehouse.com/chch_news_157.htm

In an article for Parade magazine, published on Aug 1 2004, Retired General Tommy Franks discussed the possibility of WMD’s in Iraq, He mentioned that he had spoken to both the President of Egypt (Hosni Mubarak) and the King of Jordan (King Abdullah), about two months before the invasion of Iraq. Both told him that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. In fact, King Abdullah informed him that “Saddam has WMD - biologicals, actually - and he will use them on your troops. ” Within the hour, he had relayed that information to Washington.

Russian intelligence indicating Iraqi intelligence services were planning an attack on the U.S. after 9/11:
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/06/18/russia.warning/index.html

So it looks like the Propagandist and liar, Pandemoniac, owes me an apology and explanation.

But then again, I'm not holding my breath. This is the same guy who called Phase 1 of the Senate Intelligence Committee a "whitewash" after he found out that Phase 1 exonerated George W. Bush. He says Phase 1 didn't exonerate Bush, but yet he still calls it a "whitewash" because it DID exonerate Bush!

This is the same guy who says there was no link between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, even though the Clinton administration made the SAME claim in 1998, even though both the Senate Intelligence Committe and both the Chairman and Democratic Vice Chairman of the 9/11 comission said that there was a link between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

Yeah, but Pande here says Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda HATED each other, but yet they offered each other safe haven!?!? LOL It must suck to be a progressive, all fantasy, no reality!

capt, #13

I know what you mean. It seems more often nowdays the ones who do parodies of the news of the day are often more revealing and being more truthful than the supposed news sources themselves.

"My family and I are deeply sorry for everything Vice President Cheney and his family have had to deal with," Harry Whittington said.

The victim apologized to the vice president and his family for what THEY had to deal with! Amazing. What era are we living in anyway? If there was any doubt that we have a king and his court right out of the 1500's in place, it's gone now. At least in MY eyes.

Lots of people went to the block under Henry VIII. Most of them apologized to the king just before they lost their heads. That was because they were worried about their family's welfare when they were gone. We're back to that kind of country. The lawyer's words reminded me of English history. So many parallels in this government to the old king's of England's courts. Our King George went on a "progress" today. He flew, on our buck, to Michigan just to visit some factory. Imagine all the people that had to go with him, and all the accoutrements his progress required. Imagine what the people he visited, the cities he entered, had to go through to accommodate the king.

I've been a rabid Anglophile my whole life. It was great to read about it, but I sure don't like living it.

Just watched the show. I enjoyed it. Will watch it again. I like listening to two people hash things out even when they have too much in common. Ideas get generated. Opinions get thought through and I get to listen to it happen.
That cartoon thing. There's a million dollar bounty on the guy who created it now. That's a big temptation for somebody who wants to make the fanatics happy, he'd be the hero, or for someone who likes money. There was a discussion on the subject one day on Democracy Now. It was from the perspective of the Muslim population.

As Muslim Outcry Grows, Questions of Rights vs. Responsibilities Come To the Fold

JUAN GONZALEZ: Rahul Mahajan, let¹s ask you, these cartoons actually were published in September. This is months later that these protests have erupted around the world. Your reaction, one to the publication here in the United States of a Wyoming newspaper, and also to the protests themselves?

RAHUL MAHAJAN: Well, I think the question of publication now and the question of the original publication are two different things. The problem with the first one was that some of the cartoons, in particular with the one with the Prophet's turban as a bomb, with allah jdssdjf written on it were not just blasphemous if you're a Muslim, which shouldn't be of concern to those who are not Muslims, but also are racists in essentially saying that all Muslims are terrorists. Now if you reprint it, it kind of depends on what your point is.

At this point it is a huge story and it is news and people should be seeing it just to see what the controversy is about. Some people are re-printing just to say it is another step in the culture wars, and I think that¹s silly. But certainly even the original publication knows there is freedom of the press and they had the right to do that it was just a really bad idea and really racist thing that should be opposed.

The reason it's taken so long for the protest to come to a head is that that's how things always happen. Political processes do not happen overnight. First of all, as was said already, there were many attempts to peacefully address the problem, most of them were rebuffed in Denmark. Then it got out to the attention of all the Muslim countries. Some governments and some groups in those countries decided to stir up protest. And then I think what really started this auto-catalytic chain was the cascade of reprinting of the stories all over the place. So I think that people say, you know, it's taken so many months, to suggest there is something manufactured about the crisis but no, that's just how things work politically.

AMY GOODMAN: Behzad Yaghmaian, your response?

BEHZAD YAGHMAIAN: I agree with most of what he said. What I like to add to this is the way the western media has portrayed the Muslim population, especially those living in the west has been very problematic. The reprinting of these cartoons in my opinion, has been a political act; a political act with an intention of demonizing the Muslim population.

That is, it was quite well calculated, it was anticipated that the most fundamentalist section of the Muslin population in the West would react. And then using that reaction as a way of the politics of exclusion to excluding the Muslim migrants. There are fifteen million Muslims living in the west, in Europe now. The Europeans are not happy with that. The aesthetics of the cities have changed. From the beginning they were upset with having that many Muslims in the communities. The way the Muslims, some of them, dress, the way they go out, the way they eat, the way their cultures, all of them, have been troubling to a lot of the Europeans. This has now been used as a way of further excluding the Muslims. And also it's important to note that those who protested this in Europe are a very small fraction of the fifteen million Muslims who live in Europe.

The majority of the Muslims are not against ideas of western democracy; they embrace that, that is why they are there. But the media actually blames and victimizes the majority because of the action of the minority. So that's one problem. In the end it's going to lead to further marginalization of the large section of the Muslim population that wants to be a part of the European community and live there.
------------------------
The thing that really scares me about this kind of turbulence is that the wick keeps shrinking and getting closer to the dynamite keg. Where's is this all leading?

Here is the article from Mother Jones regarding the Hackett snub

Backroom Battles

This administration is soooo disfunctional. I want this. I want that. You need to give me this. Look at how much trouble this whole thing has caused me. Libby needs to take it like a man. He did the crime.
And the Cheney shooting...man I just can't see myself feeling sorry for the guy who shot me. I'd be too busy feeling sorry for me.

TRH,
Thanks for posting that. That is really gross. Yeah, let's support the military. What a joke.

Jeanne,

I'm no Democrat but I don't understand why they would take out an obviously popular candidate who has energized a new generation of voters in Ohio. There was no truth to any allegation being made yet they chose and I think Hackett was absolutely right in his response, "If you don't want to see a Marine doing their job, don't send them off to war!"

February Friday 17th 2006
House of Representative votes to support Bush's lies on Iran

H. Con. Res. 341: condemning the Government of Iran for violating its international nuclear nonproliferation obligations and expressing support for efforts to report Iran to the United Nations Security Council

Nays: Kucinich, Paul, Stark, Mcdermott

Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich (D-OH), Ranking Member of the House Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations, issued the following statement today on H. Con. Res. 341:

This bill undermines efforts towards a peaceful resolution of Iran's nuclear ambitions, and puts the United States on a dangerous path that could lead to war. This bill, and the debate in the House, have an eerie resemblance to similar debate and resolutions that led to the misguided and ill advised war in Iraq.

This bill scuttles the only possibility for a peaceful resolution of this crisis. Namely, the offer, by Russia, to enrich uranium for Iran to use in its nuclear power plants. Iran would not operate any enrichment processing facilities of its own, and therefore would not have the ability to make isotopes of uranium suitable for weapons. This is the essence of a resolution offered by Russia to avert the crisis. This is the only diplomatic option available to us today.

Moreover, there is no imminent threat of Iran building a nuclear weapon. This past summer, a National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear capabilities was released showing that Iran was 10 years away from building a nuclear weapon. This estimate represents a consensus among the U.S. intelligence agencies.

The Security Council option, favored heavily by the bill, thinly veils the route to a military confrontation with Iran.

The Administration, covered by this bill, is leading this country to take military action against Iran. Make no mistake, that is the US program at the UN, just as it was prior to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

If you think Muslim reaction to a political cartoon is bad, what do you think reaction will be when the US is to attack Iran while it occupies Iraq?

This is a dangerous and deadly course the United States should not embark upon. http://kucinich.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=39584
------------
I just can't believe this is happening AGAIN!!! What law are they violating? What law says they can't have nuclear powered plants for energy? 4 nays? My God we are SO screwed.

#5 Astroboy...It may be true that Plame was working on gathering intelligence about Iran. Although a few months ago there were articles written about Plame being outed because both Feith , Perle and Woolsey had connection with illegal arms trade with Turkey. That Plame had uncovered their illegal activities etc, etc.

I really think Larisa over at Raw Story is an incredible reporter. She seems to really dig deep and be one of the true investigative journalist writing these days.

Although I can not help question all of the references to "high level officials" confirming this or that about Iran or about Plame. After we have seen the use of anonymous sources overused, abused and the public seems to lose when reporters can not validate their sources.

I can see the theory of Valerie Plame being outed because she was investigating WMD movement into Iran being conveniently used as another excuse for sanctions or military action against Iran. "WELL NOW THAT PLAME IS NO LONGER COLLECTING INTELLIGENCE ABOUT IRAN..NOW WE REALLY NEED TO SET UP SANCTIONS OR CONDUCT A MILITARY STRIKE.

Until I hear Valerie Plame or Joe Wilson say that this is what she was doing I question the validity of "high level officials" these days who come out anonymously.

If several of these "officials" that Larisa quotes in her article about why Plame was outed would come out before the public and stand by their claims, then Larisa would have me believing that this is why Plame was outed.

When Iaea Mr. El Baradei comes out with his report at the beginning of March we should all be listening closely. Since his March 7th 2003 statements discounting the Niger documents, when he told the world they were fakes, and the american media barely touched his statements.

Hopefully our representatives and the rest of the world will be listening to what Mr. El Baradei has to report about Iran instead of listening to the neo-cons.

.

Saladin,

I'll join you in your support for Iran having nuclear powered plants for energy if you join me in support of having nuclear powered plants for energy in the U.S. I think Billy Joel said it best in his song "It's a matter of trust"
Nuclear power in the U.S. would put OPEC virtually out of business.

Our leaders have gone completely insane. They are so 'in the box' that they can't look at reality and figure out another plan. They need to be thrown out of office. Everyone of them.

#6 Saladin...I know that Phase 2 is not the answer to the level of corruption that this administration is guilty of.

Although I believe it is the only chance that is left to see some of these criminals held accoutable for their crimes against humanity.

I know it is highly unlikely...I am just hanging onto some hope...and I will keep pushing.

TRH,
My neighbor is an engineer. He says nuclear power is the way to go. The more modern nuclear power results in very little nuclear waste.

#26 Jeanne(above) ...what a wonderful program you described. It is too bad the parents could not recognize the value in it. Your youngest daughter being involved with the ACLU is inspiring...wonder where she gets her inspiration?...Good Job !

#230 Corky (back at the King Dick thread.... I
really like the idea.

#270 Alan...back at the "King Dick" thread...thanks for reminding us to call Roberts, and others about the NSA bailout

TRH, I read a very interesting book called "Fire and Ice" that addressed the nuclear power issues and what to do with the waste. I agree that nuclear power is the best option now, but we have to figure out what to do with the leftovers, this is no small problem. But the uproar over Iran is purely manufactured propaganda just like it was for Iraq, and for the same reason, petrodollar hedgemony, it really is that simple. Even if Iran did intend to build a nuke, which there is absolutely no evidence to support, who would they launch it at? US? And do they not know what the consequence of that would be? Is this even remotely possible? Aside from the wildly paranoid fantasies of the bushbots, any sensible person knows better. Even Israel, who has 2-400 nuclear bombs, knows better than to start launching them in panic. Once that evil genie is out of the bottle, there's no stuffing it back in. If a nuke is launced it will be the US that does the launching, just as it was before. We have some 10,000 of them, somehow that doesn't make me feel safer.

US 'losing media war to al-Qaeda'

The US is losing the propaganda war against al-Qaeda and other enemies, defence chief Donald Rumsfeld has said.

It must modernise its methods to win the minds of Muslims in the "war on terror", as "enemies had skilfully adapted" to the media age, he said.

Washington and the army must respond faster to events and learn to exploit the internet and satellite TV, he said.

...In a speech to the Council of Foreign Relations, Mr Rumsfeld said some of the US' most critical battles were now in the "newsrooms".

"Our enemies have skilfully adapted to fighting wars in today's media age, but... our country has not," he said.

Mr Rumsfeld said al-Qaeda and other Islamic extremists were bombarding Muslims with negative images of the West, which had poisoned the public view of the US.

The US must fight back by operating a more effective, 24-hour propaganda machine, or risk a "dangerous deficiency," he said.

Government communications planning must be "a central component of every aspect of this struggle", he added.

"The longer it takes to put a strategic communications framework into place, the more we can be certain that the vacuum will be filled by the enemy."
-------------------------
Or we could try not using torture. Or we could try not having our soldiers using illegal weapons. Or we could try not starting illegal wars, destroying the country and then stealing reconstruction funds.

The easy way is to think of propaganda we can used against the enemy. It's also a big waste of time.

Jeanne,

I hope Saladin doesn't think I was disagreeing with her. Nuclear power should be a viable option for all countries. The nuclear incident here in the United States at Three Mile Island caused such a major uproar from the environmentalists that those in the know got scared and backed away from the evolution of nuclear power in the U.S. There has been more death in this country by pollution from auto's, factories, etc than any nuclear incident, yet we ban one and not the others. All are potential dangers and there are risks involved. But to ban one in favor of others with just as great a risk is absurd.

Iraq: What Cheney Truly Has to Answer For
Tom Lasseter, intrepid war correspondent for Knight Ridder, has an appointment in Samarra. In this city, "re-taken" by the U.S., death, devastation and cries of "Why? Why?" come from both Iraqis and Americans.

By Greg Mitchell

(February 16, 2006) -- We’§ like to give Vice President Cheney a break from the wall-the-wall coverage of the face-shooting incident of this past week, so let’≥ turn to his war in the Middle East, which continues maiming (and creating more terrorists) every day. Over there, the warriors on each side are not using birdshot.

My favorite editorial cartoon of the week comes from my local paper here in the Hudson Valley, The Journal News, which happens to employ recent Pulitzer winner, Matt Davies. He pictured a barren landscape, looking much like Iraq, with buckshot-riddled bodies strewn across the field, Cheney with his shotgun still smoking, and flying harmlessly overhead a duck labled җMDs.ӠCheney looks up at the honking duck, says, ҄amn. Missed.ӊ

Well, that pretty much says it all. Yet one of the top American correspondents in Iraq, Tom Lasseter of Knight Ridder, still manages to say quite a bit more, in a gripping, and depressing, article distributed today and posted at the www.krwashington.com site.

E&P has profiled Lasseter and his work numerous times in the past two years, and last we heard he was supposed to be back home in the USA, but there he is, still risking life, limb and, no doubt, sanity in Iraq.

Based in Baghdad, Lasseter often gets embedded with U.S. or Iraqi troops out in the hellish beyond. Inevitably he gets ordinary grunts to speak honest truths. His latest piece focuses strictly on Samarra, a city that has lost half of its population of 200,000 since the U.S. supposedly pacified the area more than a year ago. Lasseter reveals the true costs—°nd the real chance that the death and destruction will go for naught.

Lasseter opens by observing that more than a year after some 5,000 Iraqi and U.S. soldiers re-took the city from the enemy, “Åmerican troops still are battling insurgents in Samarra. Bloodshed is destroying the city and driving a wedge between the Iraqis who live there and the U.S. troops who are trying to keep order.

“ñiolence, police corruption and the blurry lines of guerrilla warfare are clouding any hopes of victory. ‘ât's apocalyptic out there. Life has definitely gotten worse for’†Iraqis, said Maj. Curtis Strange, 36, of Mobile, Ala., who works with Iraqi troops in Samarra. ‘ôou see Samarra and you almost want to build a new city and move all these people there.’†

“ìoldiers such as Sgt. Powell desperately want to reach out to the community, but they're mired in daily skirmishes. Residents have fled, and a 7-mile-long, 5-foot-high earthen wall that U.S. soldiers built around the city last August has failed to keep out the insurgents.

“çany of the American troops who patrol the city say they don't see much hope for Samarra. Some officers privately worry that the city will fall to insurgents as American troops withdraw." Already, roadside bomb attacks are increasing, with at least 15 going off in January.

And it’≥ hard to tell who is in the enemy. U.S. military officials suspect that many of the Iraqi soldiers, including a company commander, are on the insurgents' payroll, possibly in league with terror master Zargawi. Yet the 101st Airborne plans to hand over the town to the Iraqi police and army by July 1.

One recent day, which Lasseter describes in vivid detail, a .50-caliber machine gun, on the roof of a schoolhouse, manned by a 21-year-old Texan name Michael Pena blasted an unarmed man on the street into oblivion. Horrified soldiers rushed to the Iraqi, or what was left of himѨis organs were now slithering outѡnd watched him die, as he praised god and muttered, җhy? Why?Ӡ

҈aji, I donմ know,Ӡan American soldier replied.

A few days later, Lasseter finds the gunner, Pena, still manning the machine gun on the same roof. Pena doesn’¥ say a word about the man he killed but he is boiling with frustration.

"No one told me why I'm putting my life on the line in Samarra, and you know why they didn't?" Pena asks. "Because there is no f------ reason."

Perhaps Vice President Cheney, or his new press secretary, Katharine Armstrong, can explain that to him.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Greg Mitchell (gmitchell@editorandpublisher.com) i

TRH, I admit I thought you were being a bit facetious. I think Iran is looking to the future of a petroleum based energy economy and seeing the pitfalls, something the people of this country prefer to keep on the back burner, a sort of see no evil, hear no evil kind of attitude. The US needs to stop thinking in terms of selfish gain and try to look more towards the future of the entire planet. We can't live in a bubble forever. What we do will bring problems that will have to be dealt with eventually.

Saladin,

Posting my last before seeing your #30. Nuclear waste is a problem but no different from smokestacks & autos spewing into the atmosphere or factories dumping into rivers or oceans. As far as Iran gaining a nuclear weapon. I agree, no threat to the U.S. But I don't need to remind you of one main reason for the U.S. to be involved. We have NATO allies in the region, oil interests, and Israel. If there is a threat to one, there is a threat to all. Cold War mentality, but that is where it comes from. I think that is the only reason we let Europe take the lead in atempting to negotiate a deal with Iran in the first place.

There was a report on NPR dealing with Iran. They were talking about nuclear power. They understand the needs of their population and are looking realistically at those needs. Nuclear power is a need. Controlling the growth in population was a need. They are being very practical. We may not like their fanatical mentality but they do understand what is best in a practical way for their people.

Now, I would not say they are rational when it comes to how they treat gays, how they treat women...but I think we have to look at the issue in the most realistic way possible and the Bush administration isn't doing that. Surprise, surprise.

Conservatives Endorse the Fuhrer Principle

02/17/06 "ICH" -- -- Last week's annual Conservative Political Action Conference signaled the transformation of American conservatism into brownshirtism. A former Justice Department official named Viet Dinh got a standing ovation when he told the CPAC audience that the rule of law mustn't get in the way of President Bush protecting Americans from Osama bin Laden.

Former Republican congressman Bob Barr, who led the House impeachment of President Bill Clinton, reminded the CPAC audience that our first loyalty is to the U.S. Constitution, not to a leader. The question, Barr said, is not one of disloyalty to Bush, but whether America "will remain a nation subject to, and governed by, the rule of law or the whim of men."

The CPAC audience answered that they preferred to be governed by Bush. According to Dana Milbank, a member of the CPAC audience named Richard Sorcinelli loudly booed Barr, declaring: "I can't believe I'm in a conservative hall listening to him say Bush is off course trying to defend the United States." A woman in the audience told Barr that the Constitution placed Bush above the law and above non-elected federal judges.

These statements gallop beyond the merely partisan. They express the sentiments of brownshirtism. Our leader über alles.

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

Another good piece from Paul Craig Roberts~!

capt

#33
Kathleen,
Can you imagine that soldier having to deal with the death of that Iraqi. It's so easy to be in the US and read articles like the one you posted and shrug. But that 21 year old kid killed a human being and he has to live with it.

Cheney sits on Fox news and talks about how terrible he felt shooting his friend. Get a clue guy. You have sent young men over to do the same thing not by accident but as part of the plan. How do you think they feel when they say there is no f**king reason for being there?

#37
We live in interesting times.

TRH,

I know the song. Glad you figured it out and tried to sing along. But, don't give up your day job, ok?

By the way, I play it in the key G, but I capo on A. I put a slight back beat to it. And I spice it up a bit with a dominant 7th on the turn around.

Music really does make the world a better place.

Here is a good song--"Cheney's Got A Gun".

Later,
th

PS
Capt. I hope you get some precipitation from this system we have to your north. Near Gunnison, there is a winter storm warning and moisture is reported down to Farmington.

My satelite hook up is sporatic so I have to sign off til manana

What, us count?

Earlier this week the Montana GOP circulated a letter to the editor that had already appeared in the Helena Independent Record, authored by Chuck Baraby, of Helena, claiming that "Most Senate Democrats, 90 percent, took Abramoff-related cash." The idea was that the media has falsely cast the Abramoff scandal as a Republican affair, while Democrats were taking the felon’s money as well.

Chuck Denowh, executive director of the Montana Republican Party forwarded Baraby’s letter to newspapers across the state Monday urging editors to reprint it. The letter lists 40 Senate Democrats along with the supposed amounts of "Abramoff-related" monies they received.

The problem is, the letter’s numbers don’t seem to jibe with published reports. For instance, John Kerry is identified as the recipient of $98,550 in "Abramoff-related" booty; the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics puts the Kerry total at $500. The Center also puts Conrad Burns at $55,000, not the widely reported—by us, among other— $150,000.

Denowh told the Independent he made no effort to verify the facts laid out in Baraby’s letter before circulating it.

"I assumed that if the Helena Independent Record had printed it, that was good enough for me," Denowh said Tuesday.

Baraby says he got his information from a Jan. 6 article on NewsMax.com, a conservative news website. That article cited the Republican National Committee as the source of the information.

Various Internet blogs, meanwhile, cite a website run by Dwight L. Morris & Associates, a consulting firm specializing in campaign finance research, as the source. But when contacted, Morris refused to stand behind the widely-circulating report. Morris said his firm makes campaign finance data available, and the firm’s clients use it to "grind their own axes."

In this case, he said, the client was the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

"I have no idea if the numbers are 100 percent accurate or not," Morris said from his Virginia office. "I don’t know what ‘Abramoff-linked’ means."

Morris said it’s impossible to know if the report’s authors are including legitimate donations made by the clients of the 300 or so lawyers who work at Greenberg Traurig, Abramoff’s former law firm.

"The fact is, [Abramoff’s clients] gave $2 to Republicans for every $1 they gave to Democrats," Morris said.

The Republicans’ tactics don’t appear to be paying off in Montana.

Last month the GOP urged party faithful to "vote early and vote often" in two online newspaper polls in an effort to sway public opinion in favor of Burns, but a new scientific poll released this week shows State Auditor John Morrison now leads Burns in the 2006 Senate race, and state Senate President Jon Tester is in a dead heat with the incumbent.

*****end of clip*****

The truth does not matter to the moron-bats. Say anything do anything bunch of liars.

capt

PS - th I sure hope for any rain, water, anything wet!

th,

Just noticed you mentioned the song, found the lyrics and posted them. If there is a mistake in the lyrics, don't fault me, it came from the source.

Folks should be targeting Roberts..The Young Turks should go after him. He was so slimy so slippery last week on "Meet the Press".

Doing the President's Dirty WorkArticle Tools Sponsored By
Published: February 17, 2006

Is there any aspect of President Bush's miserable record on intelligence that Senator Pat Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, is not willing to excuse and help to cover up?

For more than a year, Mr. Roberts has been dragging out an investigation into why Mr. Bush presented old, dubious and just plain wrong intelligence on Iraq as solid new proof that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and was in league with Al Qaeda. It was supposed to start after the 2004 election, but Mr. Roberts was letting it die of neglect until the Democrats protested by forcing the Senate into an unusual closed session last November.

Now Mr. Roberts is trying to stop an investigation into Mr. Bush's decision to allow the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on Americans without getting the warrants required by a 27-year-old federal law enacted to stop that sort of abuse.

Mr. Roberts had promised to hold a committee vote yesterday on whether to investigate. But he canceled the vote, and then made two astonishing announcements. He said he was working with the White House on amending the 1978 law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, to permit warrantless spying. And then he suggested that such a change would eliminate the need for an inquiry.

Stifling his own committee without even bothering to get the facts is outrageous. As the vice chairman of the panel, Senator John Rockefeller IV, pointed out, supervising intelligence gathering is in fact the purpose of the intelligence committee.

Mr. Rockefeller said the White House had not offered enough information to make an informed judgment on the program possible. It is withholding, for instance, such minor details as how the program works, how it is reviewed, how much and what kind of information is collected, and how the information is stored and used.

Mr. Roberts said the White House had agreed to provide more briefings to the Senate Intelligence Committee —†hardly an enormous concession since it is already required to do so. And he said he and the White House were working out "a fix" for the law. That is the worst news. FISA was written to prevent the president from violating Americans' constitutional rights. It was amended after 9/11 to make it even easier for the administration to do legally what it is now doing.

FISA does not in any way prevent Mr. Bush from spying on Qaeda members or other terrorists. The last thing the nation needs is to amend the law to institutionalize the imperial powers Mr. Bush seized after 9/11.
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Iran calls on UK troops to pull out of Basra

02/17/06 -- -BEIRUT (Reuters) - Iran's foreign minister called on Britain on Friday to pull its troops out of the southern Iraqi city of Basra, saying their presence was destabilising the city.

"The Islamic Republic of Iran demands the immediate withdrawal of British forces from Basra," Manouchehr Mottaki told reporters through an interpreter during a visit to Lebanon.

"We believe that the presence of the British military forces in Basra has led to the destabilisation of the security situation in the city," he said.

Prime Minister Tony Blair swiftly rebuffed Tehran, saying British soldiers were in Iraq under a United Nations mandate and warned Iran not to try to divert attention from international concern over its nuclear programme.

Mottaki also said the British presence had also negatively affected the security situation in southern Iran itself.

He was apparently referring to a spate of recent bomb attacks in southern Iran.

Iran last month accused the British military in Iraq of cooperating with Arab bombers who attacked targets in the Iranian oil city of Ahvaz, killing eight people. Britain has denied the allegation and condemned the attack.

The minister also denounced what he said were human rights violations by the British forces in Basra.

But Blair, speaking at a news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin, said it was up to the U.N. and the Iraqi government to decide how long the troops stayed.

"British troops are in Iraq today under a United Nations mandate and with the consent of the Iraqi government. They stay as long as the U.N. mandate is in place and the Iraqi government wishes us to stay," he said.

"What I would say to the Iranians is that there's no point in trying to divert attention from the issues to do with Iran by calling into question the British presence in Iraq which is there, as I say, with a U.N. mandate and Iraqi support."

I promise I will not post any more long ones. This is one of the best articles I have read so far about Iran. It is worth the time.

February 17, 2006

The Mad is Not Out of the Question
Stopping the War on Iran, Before It Starts
By GARY LEUPP

I have thought for a long time now that the U.S. would attack Iran. I know that the experts have said this simply isn't possible so long as the U.S. is bogged down in Iraq, and that Jack Straw has stated pretty clearly that Britain won't be on board if the U.S. decides to use its "military option." U.S. domestic opposition to the war on Iraq has slowly risen to about 55%, and there is no groundswell for a third war in Southwest Asia. But the U.S. has for several years called openly for "regime change" in Tehran, and while early on during the Bush administration Colin Powell's State Department opted to court reformers in the Iranian government, the neocons in power have long since put their bets of the underground opposition. They don't negotiate with evil, as they like to say; they plan to defeat it.

Condi Rice has once again denounced the Iranian regime as bent on "political subversion, terrorism, and support for violent Islamist extremism," and (as the neocons always do) depicted Iran as "a strategic challenge" not just to the Bush administration but to "the world," "the international community." U.S. arm-twisting of the IAEA has paid off to the extent that the agency has found Iran "in non-compliance" with the Non-Proliferation Treaty and seems poised to "report" or "refer" Iran to the UN Security Council for some sort of action next month. To the chagrin of many (including myself) the Indians, Russians and Chinese caved in to the tendentious, selective statement on Iran earlier this month, joining forces with the U.S. and lending credence to the Bushites' depiction of Iran as a lawless loner defying the whole of respectable humanity. Whatever happens in March, Bush will be able to use as political capital the September and February IAEA statements as he goes to the American people seeking support for some further action.

Just as it built the case against Iraq, the administration has tirelessly prepared its brief against Iran, discarding no exile's report nor putative terror link as implausible, no assessment of nuclear capability as alarmist. It's rushed to make bold charges (about traces of enriched uranium on centrifuges purchased from Pakistan) that it has had to quietly drop. Washington obviously wants to find reasons to attack Iran, and would be delighted to discover a full-fledged illegal nuclear weapons program buried in the bowels of the Islamic Republic. That's why the Iranian nuclear program is all over the front pages, and why the embedded press has taken to alluding matter-of-factly to "Iran's nuclear weapons program." (As though it, in its journalistic objectivity, knows there is such a thing, and that that the journalist's job is to encourage anxiety about it!)

There's surely enough material to fill up another hour of the UN's time should Rice decide to follow Colin Powell's act in February 2003 and ask the "international community" to validate another criminal assault on a sovereign state. All of this vilification of Iran has to be leading to something. But to what? A Security Council debate producing sanctions against Iran? That's apparently John Bolton's optimal scenario. It seems unlikely, given Russian and Chinese veto threats, but the representatives of both these countries caved in unexpectedly at the last IAEA vote. The Security Council may well deliberate, keeping the Iranian "threat" in the news, but deadlock over any action, allowing Bush to declare, "We tried to get the UN to act rationally, to confront the clear danger from Iran, but some nations putting narrow selfish interests first have proved unhelpful. Therefore we must again act with a coalition of our friends to do what needs to be done to meet this terrorist threat."

Were there nothing to gain from this procedure, the U.S. wouldn't be working overtime to bring Iran before the Security Council. There must be some game plan to activate once the UN ritual's done. Perhaps a couple game plans whose advocates quietly tussle behind the scenes in the highly secretive Bush White House and Pentagon. Scott Ritter suggested last June that the U.S. would use air and land forces based in Azerbaijan and "the coastal highway running along the Caspian Sea from Azerbaijan to Tehran" in an attack on Iran. Another script involves the seizure of the ethnically Arab and oil-rich province of Khuzestan. A "shock & awe" hit on Iran's dispersed nuclear facilities is apparently part of any plan, although some plans leave this mission up to the Israelis and their U.S.-supplied bunker-busters. In any U.S. operation the Mujahadeen Khalq would be deployed to engage in what Washington would in other contexts surely describe as "terrorist" actions.

All these possibilities seem so stupid from the vantage point of the imperialists' own interests that one is tempted to dismiss them. How can they afford to provoke Shiite outrage in occupied Iraq, where their troops are both hated and overextended as it is? How can they risk the massive expansion of hostilities on Israel's northern border? How can they imagine that an attack would meet with popular enthusiasm, and produce from out of nowhere a pro-U.S. regime---rather than unite civil society behind the Ahmadinejad and the mullahs? It just wouldn't make sense.

But is all the administration's rhetoric, growing shriller by the month, so much sound and fury, signifying nothing? That wouldn't make sense either. My best bet is that failing to force through a resolution imposing sanctions on Iran, Washington will bully its allies, who a year ago traded grudging U.S. support for the "E3"-Iran talks for the European promise to support punitive sanctions should Tehran continue to insist on its right to enrich uranium, into applying such sanctions. Iran will then settle comfortably enough into an axis of convenience involving China, the number one customer for its oil, and Russia, its key partner in nuclear technology.

Why would Europe comply with a scheme that would raise its petroleum prices and threaten its considerable investments in Iran? Perhaps it sees such sacrifices as the price for healing the rift that opened as the U.S. prepared its aggression against Iraq. Perhaps it surmises that the U.S. is in decline, and that the dollar will weaken and the euro strengthen as Iran sets up its euro-based petroleum exchange. Perhaps it is responding to quiet threats from the notorious Ambassador Bolton. In any case, if the goal is to cap these many months of bluster with some concrete bullying achievement paving the way for further action down the line, a sanctions regime imposed not by the "international community" but merely by the U.S. and its allies might be the best the neocons can do for the time being.

Failing, for a second time, to validate Washington's regime change plans in the region, the UN will draw the administration's fire. The neocons will accomplish one of their central goals by effectively crippling the international body, while continuing to posture as the tribune of the "international community." These thugs care nothing, of course, about global public opinion. But they are keenly interested in shaping U.S. opinion and acquiring the freedom to move forward with whatever strategy for empire opportunity might afford them down the road. If an Iraq-style invasion isn't yet in the cards, at least a UNSC debate would as reported through the corporate press show the American people who "their" friends are and make a future attack seem more palatable. If discussion results, as expected, in one or more "no" votes, the administration will say that its friends are on one side (Good), Iran and its friends on the other (Evil), and the UN unwilling to take sides "irrelevant." Posing as chiefs of the camp of the Good, the unilateralist neocons having shuffled off the coil of international accountability will do whatever they think necessary to control the Middle East.

Meantime, as the UN showdown approaches, and as the rumors of war proliferate, the antiwar movement ought not assume that the mad is entirely out of the question. Cheney asked Stratfor last summer to draw up a plan for a large-scale air assault on Iran, employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons, to be immediately implemented in the wake of a terrorist attack (of any origin) on the U.S. If he is imagining the unimaginable, so must we if we want to prevent it.

Belatedly, an organization specifically formed to oppose war on Iran has been announcing itself through mass emails soliciting endorsements. StopWaronIran.com, noting that "Just as in the case of Iraq, none of the claims made by the U.S. government stand up to unbiased scrutiny," and urges "an immediate end to Washington's campaign of sanctions, hostility, and falsehood against the people of Iran." It opposes "any new U.S. aggression against Iran." The group is international, its statement initially endorsed by Ramsey Clark, Howard Zinn, George Galloway, Tony Benn, Harold Pinter, and Margarita Papandreou among others. While all paying attention puzzle about the possible outcomes of the U.S.'s anti-Iran campaign, I urge everyone with a conscience to sign this statement. http://stopwaroniran.org/

Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and Adjunct Professor of Comparative Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900. He is also a contributor to CounterPunch's merciless chronicle of the wars on Iraq, Afghanistan and Yugoslavia, Imperial Crusades.

He can be reached at: gleupp@granite.tufts.edu

Now I think I figured out why Hume asked Cheney about the declassification of secret material in that interview. This might be an attempt to provide cover for Libby. No matter; Fitzgerald is on the ball and he's going after Libby for what he can prove, i.e. perjury or obstruction of justice.

The idea that the VP, a job that has been compared to a bucket of spit by others who have held the office in the past, could have the power to classify and declassify information as secret is unprecedented.

This is all part and parcel of the Bush administration's attempt to make the executive branch all-powerful and cripple our system of checks and balances. True patriots, regardless where they line up on the political spectrum, will recognize the threat these thugs represent to our republic.

CHENEY GOES AHEAD WITH FOLSOM PRISON CONCERT

Vice President Dick "Buckshot" Cheney kept his word to the inmates at California's maximum security Folsom State Prison. He played a one hour set with his band "Dickie and The Trigger Happy Birdie Killers". The set received a luke warm reception until Cheney launched into his new, as yet unreleased, single "Go Fuck Yourself". During the guitar solo the Vice President thrilled the assembled audience by producing a rifle and opening fire. "He seems angry. Very angry" one inmate said "I mean, I always thought that the American people didn't like to vote for angry people but...Man, that dude is angry!" I managed to obtain a tape of the performance and am proud to present it here....

*****end of clip*****

An automatic sound file.

capt

And thanks for the Mother Jones link, TRH.

I'm still depressed about Hackett leaving the race, even though I'm from Michigan and I can't vote for him anyway. He's my kind of candidate. I love the guy...in a very heterosexual, manly way, of course.

This is one reason why I don't belong to any political parties.

Everything you post is long even if people beg you not to. Can't you find the time to learn how to use HTML? It's really simple. You just need the formula and someone posted a link to the formulas the other day. If you would learn to link it would save scads of space here. I e-mailed you the formula a couple weeks ago, but I guess that's not your real address. God knows who got my letter.

That was to Kathleen. A couple posts slipped in before I posted. I know that happens and should have put her name in at the beginning of the post.

The link to an easy-to-use html cheat sheet:

http://cedesign.net/help2j.htm

Yes! That's the site someone posted. I bookmarked it. Thanks B.Toest for reposting it.

Dem. Sen. 'fact checks' President Bush's speech

Filed by RAW STORY

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid hits back at President Bush's speech earlier today with a list of "fact checks" that range from the pre-war claims of WMD in Iraq, Congressional briefings about NSA wiretapping, and Vice President Cheney's involvement in putting together Colin Powell Speech to the UN in 2003, RAW STORY has learned.

Senator Reid's press release:

REID: BUSH PREACHES TO THE CHOIR IN TAMPA

"In his latest appearance before handpicked supporters, the president today called on the American people to just trust him with our nation’≥ security. Trust him on Iraq. Trust him on domestic spying. And trust him on preparing and protecting America for terrorist attacks and natural disasters. Unfortunately, more than five years of incompetence have failed to protect the American people and have eroded the president’≥ credibility. We need more than tough talk and rhetoric. We need real leadership that will make 2006 a year of significant transition in Iraq, will finally take the necessary actions to protect Americans from terrorism here at home, and will speak honestly about the challenges we face."

More HERE

*****end of clip*****

You have to read the rest, a good point by point.

capt

Carol I am a numb skull with computers. I will try it again. Thanks for the link.

Did you read the article about Iran that Leupp wrote at Counterpunch that I posted, it is worth reading.

And it is not true that everything that I post is long.

Link TV Special: Abu Ghraib - The Sequel

You can view the Abu Ghraid Dateline show from Link TV.

Why the Bush administration has not been held accountable for these crimes is a clear indication of how worthless the congress is. Worse than that, they are witnesses to a crime and are doing nothing.

#48 Don..I also like Hackett. But when he came here to speak a couple of weeks ago. I asked him a question about the middle east.

Specifically about the way the Bush administration is building up the case for sanctions or a military strike. I asked if he thought this was a good idea and he answered "we should let Israel take a shot at Iran". I am not kidding you there were 120 people in the room to hear his answer.

I asked Congressman Sherrod Brown the same question when he was here just four days after Hackett. His response to this same question was to avoid it and begin talking about some book. Everyone I talked with after his visit noticed that he dropped the ball on this question.

I had some serious questions about Hackett on the middle east issues.

Another very easy way to link is put the URL (address) just under your email address. Where is says URL Remember me? Yes no.

Then ask the readers to just click on your name/handle.

Here click on my name below

Two points

1. The Cheney shooting thing is so overblown and should not be conflated (Don?) with many other nefarious schemes of this lame administration.
2. The uproar in the Islamic countries regarding the Danish cartoons makes me think (and want to share) this simplistic thought - (Old) Europe are the parents, America is the adolescent and the Islamic countries are the kids.

15

"Tim L - second cousin of LBH "the moron"

"This is the same guy who says there was no link between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda, even though the Clinton administration made the SAME claim in 1998, even though both the Senate Intelligence Committe and both the Chairman and Democratic Vice Chairman of the 9/11 comission said that there was a link between Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda."

1. I don't what rock you've been living under for the last three years. Saddam and Al Queda were on opposite ideological *and* political ends of the spectrum. The relationship that was, accoring to Cheney, "pretty well established" was based on an alledged meeting between Atta and Iraqi intellegence in Prague. There is no evidence it ever happened.

2. Now? you decide to use the Clinton admin as an authoritative source? The Clinton administration may have thought Iraq had WMDs but they didn't committ $271 BILLION dollar and invade. Clinton isolated and sanctioned Iraq. He didn not invade.

3. The 9/11 Commision Report said unequivocally there was no relationship between Iraq and Al Queda.

Tim L, There's a job for you locating nuclear weapons in Iraq. You can get a lucrative contract from your friends in the WH and move out of your parent's basement.

Media bury video of Bush's domestic spying lie

Fox's strange decision not to broadcast Cheney's drinking admission isn't the only recent example of a television news organization deciding not to broadcast video that could be embarrassing for the Bush administration.

A Media Matters review found that television news outlets, cable and broadcast alike, have virtually ignored video of Bush lying about domestic spying.

In April 2004, Bush said, "any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires ... a court order." That statement, as we now know, is demonstrably false: Bush himself has now admitted that he has ordered domestic wiretaps without court orders. Yet in the 66 days between the time White House press secretary Scott McClellan was first asked to explain Bush's 2004 remarks in light of current evidence that he was lying and February 13, CNN, Fox News, ABC, NBC, and CBS aired video of Bush's 2004 statement only 16 times.

By comparison, those same news outlets aired video of President Clinton's January 1998 statement denying a relationship with Monica Lewinsky 73 times in the 66 days after his August 1998 acknowledgement that, in fact, such a relationship had occurred.

Video of Clinton's lie about sex was broadcast nearly five times as often as video of Bush's lie about warrantless domestic spying.

*******

The SCLM are really the propaganda arm of this WH.

capt

#57
Capt,
I never knew that. You probably posted that 20 times and it didn't sink in. This time it did. Thanks.

#58
Truthseeker,
The middle east is the birthplace of civilization. I see what you are trying to say but it is making the assumption that the people of the middle east don't have the capabilities to rule themselves and that they are children. That's wrong. Iraq is one of the most educated countries in the middle east and look what we've done to it.

I agree with you, Truthseeker. That was an apt way to put it. I've said for years "it's like teenagers are running this country." With the way the Arab countries are acting, they are DEFINITELY the kids.

Truthseeker #58,

1. The Cheney shooting thing is so overblown and should not be conflated (Don?) with many other nefarious schemes of this lame administration.

I didn't mean to imply that Cheney shooting an old man in the face had anything to do with his other crimes. I was suggesting that Cheney might have used the interview to publicly float the idea that the VP has the power to classify and declassify secret information. Both TRH and myself have linked to other sites showing executive orders that may be used to justify such an interpretation. Not too many people actually know about these orders, of course. But if you get the idea out there, and repeat it over and over again, well, we've seen the results, haven't we?

#63
Carol,
I can't agree. How are the Arab countries acting like kids? That's your perspective. A middle eastern country has been invaded. They are being threatened by a superpower. Their culture is being insulted constantly. Their religion is being made to look as if it has no consequence. Everything we are doing is very threatening to the middle east.
Not only that but Israel has become very violent in it's demands. It is racist in it's actions toward the Palastinians. It is also very threatening to the middle east.

Just watched the latest Maher. Some very funny stuff, and an interview with Feingold as well.

He started his new season at the perfect time, didn't he? The show started with a trailer for the new Dick Cheney "gangsta" film, "Get Quail or Die Tryin'"

At one point, the panel was discussing the discrepancies in the stories regarding the use of alcohol. Maher said, (and I'm paraphrasing), "C'mon! Who isn't drunk at 5:30 in the afternoon on a Saturday! Especially after a hard week of trying to destroy the world!"

Oh man, the house is cracking tonight. It's going to get down to -18. Ick.

Jeanne, they're acting like kids every time they fly off the handle over imagined slights, like the ridiculous cartoons. "I'll get you back," they're saying. Just like children.

Secrecy inquiry OK'd by panel

WASHINGTON - Leaders of the House intelligence committee said Thursday that they had agreed to open a congressional inquiry related to the Bush administration's domestic surveillance program. But a dispute immediately broke out among committee Republicans over the scope of the inquiry.

Rep. Heather A. Wilson, R-N.M., the committee member who called for the investigation last week, said the review "will have multiple avenues, because we want to completely understand the program and move forward."

However, an aide to Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., who leads the committee, said the inquiry would be much more limited in scope, focusing on whether federal surveillance laws need to be changed and not on the eavesdropping program itself.

The decision came as the Senate Intelligence Committee put off a vote on conducting its own investigation after the White House, reversing course, agreed to open discussions about changing federal surveillance law. Senate Democrats accused Republicans of bowing to White House pressure.

For weeks, the Bush administration has been aggressively resisting calls from Democrats and some Republicans for a full review into the National Security Agency's surveillance program, saying such inquiries were unnecessary and risked disclosing sensitive national security information that could help al-Qaida.

Elsewhere on Thursday, a federal judge ordered the administration to begin turning over internal documents on the surveillance program, the Justice Department balked at having former Attorney General John Ashcroft and other former department officials testify about it before Congress, and lawyers for a Kentucky man prepared to bring a federal civil-rights lawsuit today against President George W. Bush to have the surveillance declared illegal and unconstitutional.

*****end of clip*****

Heather Wilson is my representative here in District 1 NM. She votes with Bunnypants 90% of the time (last stats I read) and I think this is a total set-up. She gets to act like she wants a broad investigation but the outcome was calculated. The illegal wire taps are very unpopular here. We have Los Alamos, Sandia Labs, Honeywell, Phillips, Intel, etc. a bunch of companies that compete for military and scientific contracts.

This is how they give each other political cover.

capt

Carol,
So you're saying that when they make a cartoon of Jesus as a terrorist Pat Robertson is just going to smile and turn the other cheek?

Don @ 64

I didn't really mean anything by invoking your name other than to credit you with a good word (conflate). The question mark indicated that I wasn't sure it was you. But I'm using up bandwidth with no point - so I'm outta here.

capt,

Wilson is supposed to be on Maher next week. Maher is ALL OVER the NSA scandal. Hopefully, he'll pin her down. I know you've written her in the past, and now might be a good time to do it again. Perhaps you might suggest that she should let her constituents know how she feels about this while she's on the program.

They ("they" being wingnut Bush cult fascists operating under Rove directives) are playing as if we're ("we" being any patriots against dictatorship) weak on terrorism. But the American people are starting to see through it. They say the president's got every right to do what he is doing, yet they are doing everything possible to kill this issue. Is there any more obvious evidence of their fear?

It ain't over 'til it's over.

TS #71 -

No problem. I know you weren't being hostile; I was just trying to clarify if there was any misunderstanding.

Jeanne, Robertson can get as bent out of shape as he wants but the people won't start rioting over any cartoon. We're adolescents here. A notch above the fray.

Carol,
I have a hard time with this because I don't think we are a notch above the fray. Maybe we won't riot but we have committed torture. We are taking innocent men and placing them in prison for what? No one knows.
I just don't like the kid analogy. It's demeaning. It gives a reader the impression that our domination over them is warranted.

You put humans in the right conditions riots occur. It isn't an Arab phenomenon.

Earlier on this thread or the one before, we were talking about songs. This is much better listened to but here are the lyrics. I'm off to bed.

Brothers in Arms

These mist covered mountains
Are a home now for me
But my home is the lowlands
And always will be
Some day you'll return to
Your valleys and your farms
And you'll no longer burn
To be brothers in arm

Through these fields of destruction
Baptism of fire
I've watched all your suffering
As the battles raged higher
And though they did hurt me so bad
In the fear and alarm
You did not desert me
My brothers in arms

There's so many different worlds
So many different suns
And we have just one world
But we live in different ones

Now the sun's gone to hell
And the moon's riding high
Let me bid you farewell
Every man has to die
But it's written in the starlight
And every line on your palm
We're fools to make war
On our brothers in arms

#72

Received four replies from the four emails I sent yesterday. I cleaned them out of my inbox but will post her reply next time I get one.

I called and left her a message at her office.

We almost booted her in the last election.

The oddest reply from her included the statement: "I know you hate the president but blah blah blah "

She probably has my name on her hit list.

capt

#75

I think we are nearly infantile. War is such a sandbox game a three year old type of tantrum taken to the extreme.

capt

Give Hamas Election a Chance

How in the world can any democratic election succeed unless you give it a chance. We are suppose to be spreading democracy and not puppet governments or dictatorships. What in the hell are our men and women dying for? Unless spoiled brat Hitler Bush has his way, he is taking his bat and ball home with him. Hitler Bush grow! All you are is a spoiled brat!!!!!

Hitler Bush grow up!!! Horseshit reigns in the WH!!!

Ah, yes . . . pardon me while I throw myself on the floor and scream.

#14

Hey Doofus TRH,
Get a Clue!

"Your Flag Decal Won't Get You Into Heaven Anymore" is a John Prine song that makes fun of ignorant fucks like you that go around waving your flag and at the same time are to stupid to realize how fucked up things really are.

I don't know what is worse? You worthless liberal hippies or you nazi loving freaks letting it all happen.

Bogus degree,

You get a clue. I was only posting the words to a song th mentioned. As for waving my flag, have you ever seen me do it? Why not try something like getting a real degree, a degree of sense.

awwwwww, how cuuuuute!

Some of ya know about my friend Jen from my email(she calls me Dad). She's an online friend originally, but an IRL (in real life) friend too. Known her 'bout 8 yrs now. So anyway, I wanna share wif you guyz the slide show she sent while I was out. Jess is her daughter...

Jes-uh-cah... aww, dontcha wanna hug her

Good one Alan,

Just got the 8 month old back to sleep by playing on the NOGGIN website. He likes Moose A. Moose. Now stretched out beside me in the recliner. Nice touch of Eve so early in the morning!

LOL Capt, your #47 cracked my azz up! Dammit man, where do you find this stuff?! hahaha I'ma send it to my friends.

awesome dude, keep 'em coming

Just got the 8 month old back to sleep...

I remember that stuff! haha My girls are 24 and 20, so it's been awhile. I miss it tho, so no matter how much trouble it seems like at the time, soak it all in Tim. No doubt about it, my girls are the bestest thing I've done or will ever do. Rich don't always mean money, ya know?
*props to ya Dad*

Alan,

You got that right! Now back to bed. My 7 year old has a basketball game in the morning. These old bones need some rest.

These old bones need some rest.

yeah, I hear ya... but I'm an hour behind you guyz in the east. Think I'll catch up on a few more posts. I'm only like, 40 behind...

Resist

I've linked you guyz to my other pictures b4, but since I bragged 'bout it earlier, lemme show ya what I'm yappin' about.

one of my favs
This one's a couple years old. Early morning on my birfday, they came over 'n woke me up.

fk it, here's the rest of 'em

Alanz page

Alan,

Great pics! Thanks for sharing.

The sobering news yesterday is that Greenland is losing its snow much faster than previously thought. As ski fans know, when the snow is gone, it is much more difficult to replace it. Bear in mind that most of the world's largest cities and many of its people are at sea level. So it may produce a tragedy thousands of times more economically destructive than the New Orleans affair. The irony here is those who have the most to lose in a personal sense are the least worried about it.

On the way in to work this friday day, I listen to civil war tapes:

Grand Gulf, Raymond, Jackson
Champion Hill, Big Black
and the siege of Vicksburg has begun in earnest after the first repulse,
I cant wait for trip back home
Grant was so cool

Im here, Just to balance out you pussies.
You know, its pretty tuff to turn the other cheek when you're head has been cut off.
Bush has it right. Blessed is the long term peace maker
After 9/11 in NY, what would you do? Offer them LA? How many more 9/11 would it take before you get a righteous hard on? 3? 6?
Please do tell. No thank you.
Glory Glory Halleuya, his truth is marching on

Cornnuts: A bunch of pussies, with your heads stuck in ground. You all may want to bet your family's lives, but not me, no thank you.

Any president who liberate 50,000,000 souls from tyranny and oppression, deserves your praise.

You may now bow down, and worship our beloved president. Permission granted.

What no response?
You whimpy pussies. War Monger, ha!

Just like lincoln butchering 650,000
Or Rosesavelt butchering 250,000, etc etc
God knows what you would call G. Washington.

Cornnuts: A bunch of lame ass pussies.

DMR

Go back to bed. It's Saturday.

Nice...

Gambling with OTHER families' lives is SOOOOO MACHO!

-T

Hajji,

By the saneness of his argument, maybe I was mistaken. I shouldn't have told him to go back to bed, just go to bed.

erp!

from: The WAR PRAYER
____________

"You have heard y