Paul's rants

So what else is new?

2006-10-13T14:32:00.000-07:00

Bush Is Said To Have No Plan If GOP Loses

Thus blares the Headline from US News and World Report. Ah, yeh. After 6 years of having no plans for anything else why did you think that this would be different?

And it seems as if some of the GOP is finally starting to trickle back from their extended trip away from the reality based community.

There is also considerable criticism of Bush for making little or no news in his 63-minute encounter with the press.
"He had nothing to say at the press conference," says a prominent GOP insider. "My question is, why call it?"

Some of us have been saying that for a very long time folks. Welcome back.

PAULS RANTS EXCLUSIVE!

2006-10-13T10:05:00.000-07:00

This blog has uncovered the secret Demo Party plan by undercover liberal gays to infiltrate the GOP -- Right Here

GOOD NEWS FOR THE DEMOCRATS

2006-10-09T07:40:00.000-07:00

The New York Daily News today reports that:

Bush remains defiantly resolute. He will campaign relentlessly in the next month and has told friends he's determined to prove his Democratic and media enemies wrong on Election Day.

Looking at the President's track record since taking office, on everything from Social Security to Katrina, the obvious outcome is that the Democrats will take control of both The Senate and The House.

Nothing wrong with overly friendly emails

2006-10-08T10:04:00.000-07:00

Dear Neighbor,

I saw your 16 year old son and one of his hot friends playing basketball in your driveway the other day.

Could you please send me his email address? I would love to strike up a friendship with him. I think that it would be to his advantage to have a 52 year old friend.

thanks in advance,
Paul

ps: Do you have any photos of him that I could have?

2006-10-06T01:24:00.000-07:00

Dance Brigade at A.N.S.W.E.R

Take a break from Foleygate for a minute. Krissy Keefer has a right on message.

AT LEAST THAT'S CLEARED UP

2006-10-05T20:45:00.000-07:00

Some of the brightest, sharpest minds in the conservative movement have been working non-stop since the Foley story broke, trying to find out just whose fault it is that a sexual predator has been allowed the stalk the halls of Congress for the past several years. The hard work has paid off. The blame rests entirely on the shoulders of this individual:

Nancy Pelosi (per Pat Buchanan)
Bill Clinton (per Dennis Hastert)
The Pages (per Drudge)
Tom Reynolds (per Dennis Hastert)
Dennis Hastert (per Tom Reynolds)
John Boehner (per Dennis Hastert)
Dennis Hastert (per John Boehner)
The "sleaze ball, greedy, aggressive" Page (per Michael Savage)
Democrats and/or liberals and/or the media (per Rush Limbaugh)
The Democrats (per Sean Hannity)
Florida voters (per Bill Kristol)
"tolerance and diversity" (per FRC's Tony Perkins)
liberals tolerant of the "gay lifestyle" (per the Wall Street Journal)
gays who would be offended at criticism of Foley (per Newt Gingrich)
"a network of gay staffers and gay members" of Congress (per unnamed sources on Capitol Hill)
Low level staff members in Hastert's office (per Rep. Ray LaHood)
Nancy Pelosi (per Rush Limbaugh)
Brian Ross of ABC (per Rush Limbaugh)

This list is based almost entirely on an excellent piece of reporting by Media Matters.

Catholic League's Head blames boys for being molested.

2006-10-04T16:06:00.000-07:00

Catholic League president Bill Donohue today took time to blame the victims of pedophile priests for being sexually abused.

"After all, most 15-year-old teenage boys wouldn’t allow themselves to be molested. So why did you?” He asked. "Why didn't you just slap the clergyman in the face?"

Donohue also went on to proclaim that in the year 2005 "only" 840 priests were sexually abusing children. I'm not sure that's something to brag about, Bill.

I guess he probably believes that women who get raped are "asking for it" as well.

COMPUTER TECHS DESPERATELY NEEDED

2006-10-03T01:40:00.000-07:00

Due to changing circumstances we, one of the nation's major equipment providers, face the challenge of reprogramming several hundred thousand computers throughout the United States before November 7 of this year. We are looking for self starting individuals who can work with a minimum of supervision and who have the personal motivation to help us meet the critical deadline. Applicant MUST be willing to sign and abide by a confidentiality agreement.

We offer excellent wages, full benefits and, if you should happen to be questioned by local authorities, we cover all the costs for attorneys and bail bond services.

Time is of the essence. Call Today!

2006-10-02T11:29:00.000-07:00

From Talking Points Memo

"TPM Reader JM gets it ...

Once ABC got hold of the e-mails, it took them one day to flush out the IMs. That's what an actual investigation looks like. The Republican leadership simply didn't want to know how bad the Foley situation was. That's just as morally negligent as if they had started digging and found the IMs."

The House Republican leadership claim that last year they investigated the original emails. They say that they dropped that investigation after Representative Foley falsely told them that the emails were innocent.

What kind of investigation is it, where the suspect's word is enough to end the probe?

That would be like, say, holding a hearing to grill oil company executives over rapidly rising fuel prices but skipping the whole bit about making them swear to tell the truth.

Oh. Nevermind.

2006-10-01T00:46:00.000-07:00

No one could have anticipated ~~the levees would break~~ that a sexual predator would lie.

It's time to order up another batch of Freedom medals.

The Instant Messages are painfully familiar. Millions of us have heard the words or similar ones repeatedly as Chris Hansen reads them back to pedophile after pedophile in his ongoing series "To Catch A Predator".

In Mr. Hansen's show we watch as he confronts men who have shown up expecting to have sex with an underage boy or girl only to find themselves looking into the cameras of a TV News team, with a squad of police waiting in the wings.

"You are a 52 year old man" he might say, "Here you are asking this 16 year old boy to measure his erect penis for you. Doesn't that sound like more than just 'mentoring?'."

"You asked that same boy to describe to you how he masturbated, and even pressed him for details," He might go on, "Do you really expect us to believe that you just wanted to 'hang out' with him?"

Of course the difference here is that instead of being a plumber or a truck driver the perp was a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and the setting wasn't an apartment in Long Beach, but was the very halls of our nation's capitol.

What makes this case particularly egregious is that the predator wasn't stalking a teen chat room to find his victims. He was targeting some of this country's sharpest and brightest kids. These are 16 year old high school juniors chosen for their high academic standing to fill a limited number of positions serving the House and the Senate. It is one of the highest honors a student can receive.

These young people are our responsibility. During their service they are paid by, fed by, educated by, and housed by us, the American people. Their parents send them off expecting that we will keep them safe.

The truth which has now been revealed is the stuff of a parent's worst nightmare. The predator in daily contact with their child was not only a person of authority, but one who was allowed to operate openly without fear of consequence, one who was so tolerated and whose behavior was so well known that the burden of avoiding him was put onto the shoulders of his young targets by "warnings" about him given them at their school.

This predator has not been operating very far under the radar. Besides the rumors or worse over the years that triggered the need for those warnings, a former page filed a report nearly a year ago of inappropriate and unwanted interest by that suspect Representative.

Word of that report made its way up through the highest levels of the Republican leadership of the House, where it was apparently treated as a political problem, rather than as a threat to the vulnerable who needed to be protected. The offender was not punished, censored or removed from the vicinity of his victims, but was warned, in effect, to lower his profile.

Now those same politicians who so proudly put their signatures to laws which they trumpeted would protect the nation's youth from sexual predators are scrambling to avoid any responsibility for the mess in their own house.

They are about to face a painful reality. The parents of America believed the rhetoric. They believed that their elected officials were mouthing truths, not platitudes when they promised to track down and punish those who were targeting their children.

Those parents will not be amused to find that they wasted their trust on a bunch of men who are acting more like diocese officials who saw nothing wrong with hiding pedophile priests than some of the highest elected officials of the land.

No matter how much twisting, avoiding or spin is generated, the one thing that those in position of leadership can't change is that every parent who hears this story is going to look over at their own kid and ask themselves, "What if it was him or her?"

And yes. Someone has already said it. A spokesman for Representative John Shimkus, the Illinois Republican who is the chairman of the House Page Board told reporters Saturday "Obviously Foley lied...”

Who could have ever anticipated that?

2006-09-30T08:18:00.000-07:00

Congressman Foley sure likes boys.
He treats them like his personal toys.
He saw the towheaded page.
Thought "Ah, the perfect age."

The suspicions he cinches
by asking "How many inches?"
One boy thought it sick
that the old guy wanted his dick.

GOP leadership can overlook the sin
as long as Foley brings them a win.
"Just so long as you help us win in November
we don't care what you do with your 'congressional member'."

A gift to the Demos, served on a platter,
is all his talk of seminal splatter.
The results of this Fall's election
are sure to ride on Mark Foley's erection.

CANDIDATE FACING "N-WORD" ACCUSATIONS

2006-09-28T20:29:00.001-07:00

Another Congressional hopeful is floundering as reports of his past usage of "the N-word" continue to surface. Today several former neighbors and co-workers came forward to add their voices to those already accusing Republican House candidate Vernon Robinson of using the word "nigger".

"He wouldn't care who heard" said one. "He would walk right into a room full of Black folk and use that word right at the top of his voice." The speaker, a man who claims to have worked with Robinson for several months, asked that his name not be printed, as he is fearful of retaliation. A former neighbor, who lived across the street from Robinson in the early 90's said that the congressional candidate habitually used the term when addressing his own children.

Robinson is also facing increasing scepticism over his claim that he only learned of his Negro heritage within the last month. His campaign spokesman explained that the candidate was prompted to ask his parents about the matter a few weeks ago when the question was raised by a reporter. "He had no idea", said the press aide. "His parents had hid the fact from him, hoping to shield him from taunting and other cruelty that children so often inflict on those they perceive to be different."

Voters in the predominately African-American thirteenth district of North Carolina reacted with some trepidation to a statement by the candidate last week that voters should not worry, "I still haven't developed an overwhelming urge for chitlins or watermelon", Robinson was reported as telling the dwindling crowd at a campaign stop.

FOR SHAMES SAKE

2006-09-28T13:49:00.000-07:00

Some people just go too far. For example there is a joke making its way around the Internet which is as unAmerican as could be. Here it is.

A driver is stuck in a traffic jam on the interstate. Suddenly a man knocks on his window. The driver rolls down his window and asks, "What's going on?"

"Terrorists down the road have kidnapped George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. They're asking $100 million ransom. Otherwise they're going to douse them with gasoline and set them on fire. We're going from car to car, taking up a collection."

The driver asks, "How much is everyone giving, on average?"

"Most people are giving about a gallon."

It's shameful. The joke is advocating violence against the President. It reflects badly on those of us who don't agree with Mr. Bush's policies. It also creates an opportunity for those who don't share our political beliefs to accuse us of being prone to violence. It opens the door for them to claim that we, Democrats and progressives, want to kill the President. That of course is totally false. We do not want to see Mr. Bush killed.

We want to see him tarred and feathered and run out of town on a friggin' rail!

CONSERVATIVES CARE!

2006-09-26T08:46:00.000-07:00

Say what you will about conservatives, I have to give credit where credit is due. In some ways the conservative movement is ahead of their liberal neighbors. One indicator of that is their concern for the less fortunate, specifically the mentally retarded.

Recently the administration put into place a plan to give jobs to those less gifted souls, making room for them in the U.S. Military.

Last week noted conservative Dr. Patricia Doyle, realizing that not all the mentally retarded would be able or willing to serve in uniform proposed a bold new plan to employ even more. In her own words:

"How about using people that are mildly retarded, who people do not wish to hire, and who are really just sitting in workshops stuffing cotton into bottles and the other group's taking cotton out of bottles?" She added, "Let's put them to work picking. They would love that."

Do people care? People do.

MAKING AMERICA SAFER

2006-09-26T08:22:00.000-07:00

The George Bush administration - those are the folks who went hunting this guy...

And ended up arresting this one instead...

Trust Us?

2006-09-25T09:56:00.000-07:00

If there is still any doubt that the political future of this country should not be left in the hands of electronic voting machines which lack even the most basic of protections, such as a paper trail which would allow for a manual recount if needed, the following story from Wired News should be enough to convince even the most stubborn.

It seems that the maker of one of the most popular ATM machines is having to make changes to overcome the problem of machine technitions who overlook the critical step of changing the machines service pass code from the factory setting. At least one thief has taken advantage of this security lapse by using the code at various machines to make changes which allow him to empty all the cash.

If this is the level of expertise displayed by those safeguarding money, just what kind of protection can we expect for our votes? I shudder to think.

Aleta Fenceroy 12/27/1948 - 9/23/2006

2006-09-25T08:35:00.000-07:00

From Jean Mayberry

As most, if not all of you know, Aleta has been battling cancer since she
was diagnosed on June 15th of this year.
I was blessed to be with Aleta at the end of her life. She died at home, in
a hospital bed that I had set up in the dining room next to a big window so
that she could look out at the garden. She lived just over 3 months after
she was diagnosed with cancer, but she had many good days. Aleta died
peacefully in the company of friends and family who loved her.

She had wonderful visits with her two children, Michelle and J.J., who flew
in from Phoenix and Africa respectively. She was able to read to her
granddaughters, Chloe and Ella, and hold the newest addition, little
Teaghan.

And even though this was a terrible situation, we were able to take so many
good things from it. The incredible support and love we felt from friends
close by and far away really sustained us. We grew closer to each other and
to our families. We found humor and learned lessons of courage and
compassion from fellow cancer patients and their families. We learned to
enjoy the little moments that make our days and our lives so precious.

Aleta raised two children on her own, a single mom on welfare, working
part-time and going to college to earn a Master of Music Degree. She
graduated from Morningside College in Sioux City, IA and received her
Masters at the University Of Minnisota, in Minneapolis. She was a church
organist for 30 years, 4 of which were spent in Norway. She worked for the
State of Iowa Department of Corrections for over 15 years before going back
to school to earn an Associates Degree in computer programming in 1998. She
then took a job in Omaha, Nebraska with First Data Resources as an
analyst/programmer and software writer. She LOVED her job. She loved
solving puzzles, following trails and picking up clues and that was her
favorite part of being a programmer.

She was dogged in her pursuit of answers at work and that is how she was in
most aspects of her life. When she sunk her teeth into something, she
didn't let go. Hence, 8 years of "Fenceberry Articles." Hour upon hour
and day upon day were spent on the home computer. Aleta was determined to
hunt down the story; to get the news out; to defend her community; and to
right the wrongs to the best of her ability. And she did it with love, wit,
dignity and charm. That is the way she lived her life and that is the way
she died.

She will be terribly missed. She is terribly missed.

A memorial celebration of her life has been planned and arrangements will be
finalized when her son knows on which dates he will be in Omaha. There will
be no funeral. Aleta requested there be no flowers. Anyone wishing to make
a donation should write a check to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Congratulations America!

2006-09-25T07:48:00.000-07:00

Isn't it wonderful that our Congress and the White House has thrown out all those quaint ideals that this country was founded on, so as to make it easier to bring freedom and democracy to a twenty first centrury world?

From The L.A. Times:

Both men told The Times that while held overnight in Gardez, they were forced to kneel and press their foreheads against a wall. Every time they sat back, they said, they were kicked in the small of the back and the chest.

"At first they didn't ask us any questions," Mohammed said. "Everyone who was there took turns kicking me, and when I fell on the ground from the blows they started to stomp on me. We were forced to stay on our knees, and my knees were injured from the stones on the ground. I felt really bad pain in my chest."

He said the Americans eventually asked him about his brother, but he couldn't concentrate. "I kept seeing my brother's face and the gunshot in his mouth," he said.

Dawood Khan said his interrogators asked whether Mohammed was one of Pacha Khan's commanders. "I told them, 'No, he has no connection,' " he said.

He said that after being beaten he was twice dunked in a tub of icy water and submerged to the verge of drowning. He said he and Mohammed were forced to stay awake through a cold night.

The two villagers were released the next day with clean sets of clothing. A report to headquarters described them as cooperative.
------------------------------------------------------
Parre said he believed his brother, Jamal, was subjected to the harshest interrogation because, at only 18, he was perceived to be the most vulnerable. When he first saw Jamal a few days after their capture, his brother's body was already black and blue and swollen, Parre said.

He said Jamal told him the Americans had forced him to stand with arms and legs outstretched as they took turns beating him. He was moaning about the pain in his kidneys and back, Parre said.
--------------------------------------------------------
The team was advised that the Afghan had died of a sex-related infection that shut down his kidneys, the soldier said. The point of the meeting, he said, was "to make sure everybody's on the same sheet of paper — this is what happened to the man," in case there was an investigation.
---------------------------------------------------------
A hospital worker who prepared the body for burial said in an interview that "it was completely black." Hajji Abdul Qayum said Jamal's face was "dark and looked like it was burned." He said it was "completely swollen, as were his palms, and the soles of his feet were swollen double in size."
----------------------------------------------------------
local physician Aziz Ulrahman examined the prisoners and described them as battered and bruised, with seeping, unbandaged wounds. He said Parre's feet were black. "We have no terminology for that," he said. "It was caused by blunt-force trauma."

To a friend who is leaving us too soon...

2006-09-22T08:20:00.000-07:00

Jean Mayberry (left) and Aleta Fenceroy comprise the team behind Fenceberry, an informal news source that gay civil rights advocates and members of the media turned to for information during the past eight years. Fenceberry stopped operating on July 31, (2004) primarily because it consumed so much of the couple’s time. - The Washington Blade

One of the hardest working members of the modern glbt equal rights movement is leaving us soon. Aleta Fenceroy, who along with her life partner Jean Mayberry for eight years spent hours every day before and after their "real" jobs in a pre-Google world gathering and distributing news about the glbt community in the form of their Fenceberry Articles is about to leave us. Jean tells us:

Aleta (Fenceberry) is under hospice care now. There will be no more treatments or visits to the doctor. The chemotherapy that she underwent for 9 weeks did not work. Now the hospice team of nurses will come to us, but only to make sure she is comfortable and pain free.

The hospice nurse from Visiting Nurse Association told me yesterday (June 20) that it is a matter of weeks now, maybe less if Aleta's liver can't hold out. Aleta sleeps most of the time, but still enjoys visits and calls, although she has some difficulty following conversations some times. It is extremely difficult for her to walk now, she sleeps a lot and can't really stay focused. Her body is shutting down.

Hey Aleta,

Jean tells me that you are moving on to bigger and better things soon. I just wanted to drop you this note and wish you a great trip.

Hate to see you run off a little ahead of the rest of us, but you know that we will all be catching up with you real soon. In the meantime its good to know that you are going to be the advance party. I bet that by the time I get there you will have heaven better organized and more lgbt friendly than anyone could have ever imagined!

Before you take off be sure to have Jean get a photo of you grinning and flipping the bird. She can have it enlarged into a big poster in case Phred and his clan show up at your funeral.

Best of wishes on this next step in your journey. Until we meet up again you have my...

Love and Hugs,

Paul

Is there a doctor in the house?

2006-09-19T11:24:00.000-07:00

Chinese doctors have announced that they successfully transplanted a penis on a man who had lost his. (I wonder how hard he looked before giving up and ordering a new one?). Now this is China, so the procedure involved micro-surgery. Hmmm. If I ever find myself in that situation I'm going to order one that doesn't need anything "micro".

The bad news is that the man returned and asked that his new member be removed. Seems he and his wife couldn't get used to it. One of the problems is that it was swollen all the time. I can relate. I remember well my teenage years.

The report didn't say what was done with the now twice used penis. eBay maybe?

2006-09-19T11:13:00.000-07:00

Bind Moggling

2006-08-30T09:13:00.000-07:00

After reading the news this morning I can't even think straight (as if I can at other times). First this gem from The Olympian, in an article reporting on the use of fingerprint scanners to keep track of student charges in a school cafeteria, one parent piped up with a hitherto unaddressed fear - "Our fingerprints are just like our Social Security numbers," she said, before seeing a demonstration of the service. "That's how people steal identities."

Yep. I saw that movie too. The bad guy lops off someone's finger and uses the detached digit to activate the fingerprint scanner. I can't help thinking of news stories which pop up on a regular basis in which police report finding this or that ID thief with hundreds of pieces of stolen ID. So now it's going to be hundreds of detached fingers? Ehew!

Kudos goes to the California State Legislature for enacting yet another law which has been so watered down to meet the demands of special interest groups that it ends up doing nothing. I am talking about the new law which will ban the use of handheld cell phones while driving. The law continues to allow the use of hands-free models. The problem, of course, being the studies which show that there is no difference at all between using handheld or handsfree phones while driving. Either way your chances of getting into an accident are quadrupled over those times when you concentrate on your driving. Hang up and drive, dammit!

Sudan has identified a new security threat and is taking drastic measures to protect their citizens. All travelers to that country are now required to turn over that laptop computers to security forces who then send the machines off to be scanned - for pornography. Way to go, Sudan.

Linux is just so gay

2006-08-29T20:12:00.000-07:00

I was setting up a laptop that someone gave me the other day, replacing the old Microsoft Windows OS with Linux. As I was working it occured to me that using Linux is a lot like being gay. Linux machines comprise less than 5% of the computer population, they are misunderstood by the vast majority. Their needs and even existance are ignored by the 95% who don't share their "orientation", and last but not least they are smarter, cooler and more versatile than their counterparts.

I have to admit though, that unlike sexual orientation, using Linux is a choice. One that I made a year and a half or so ago after spending way too much time and money working to keep one step behind those who unleash viruses, malware, worms and all the other threats looking for victims.

I read a comment the other day from a Windows fan who declared "The only thing that keeps Linux from coming under the same kind of daily attacks as Windows is that so few people use it!" Well, maybe he's right. So? As long as I don't have to run anti-virus programs, spyware programs or worry about my machine being turned into a "bot", I'm quite happy, thank you. Then there is the whole thing about saving money, both on the OS, and on the programs. You know that most of the programs that Windows users pay extra for are available for free for Linux?

So go ahead and say it - Linux is just so gay.

Action Alert - State helping homos recruit children

2006-08-14T07:02:00.000-07:00

It is time to rise up in arms to protest this targeting of some of our most vulnerable children by the homosexuals. The homosexuals say that they want to help these kids. The God fearing among us know that they really want to recruit these troubled youths into that deadly lifestyle that is anything but "gay".

In the Houston area, an estimated 1,700 children under 21 received homeless services, according to a 1999 survey by the Coalition for the Homeless of Houston/Harris County. The counseling center estimates that about 30 percent of these youths are gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender.

Even at a young age these confused youths are heading for a lifestyle of hedonism and selfishness. Comprising only 2% of the population these spoiled children are siphoning away 30% of the precious funds allocated to caring for society's needy young. Rather than remain in the bosoms of their caring families, these headstrong, rebellious teenagers refuse the loving care of their parents and rush off in search of the illicit sexual pleasures promised them by the insidious anti-family messages beamed out 24/7 by the anti-God, Jewish controlled TV and movie industries. (Yes, Mel Gibson IS right. He is a hero for having the courage to call a spade a spade).

The well funded homosexual lobby would have us believe that these innocents would be better off placed in the homes of feces eating sexual perverts than they are in their current situation, where they are productive members of society, learning street survival skills and discovering their hitherto undiscovered ability to make money by marketing their bodies for cash.

We need help in our battle to save society. Please donate today. You know that your generosity will be remembered by "The Big Guy" up there.

Operation Iraqi Liberation - update

2006-08-05T08:25:00.000-07:00

President's Message to the Iraqi People (April 10, 2003)

President's Remarks
view

view

listen

Message in Arabic

PRESIDENT BUSH: This is George W Bush, the President of the United States. At this moment, the regime of Saddam Hussein is being removed from power, and a long era of fear and cruelty is ending.

American and coalition forces are now operating inside Baghdad – and we will not stop until Saddam’s corrupt gang is gone. The government of Iraq, and the future of your country, will soon belong to you.

Saddam Captured 'Like a Rat' in Raid
Sunday , December 14, 2003

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Without firing a single shot, U.S. forces captured Saddam Hussein (search) as he hid in the bottom of a hole at a farmhouse near Tikrit on Saturday.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we got him," L. Paul Bremer (search), the U.S. administrator in Iraq, announced.

"The tyrant is a prisoner," Bremer said.

The goals of our coalition are clear and limited. We will end a brutal regime, whose aggression and weapons of mass destruction make it a unique threat to the world. Coalition forces will help maintain law and order, so that Iraqis can live in security.

Saturday, August 05, 2006

Summer of Goodbyes...

Residents of Baghdad are systematically being pushed out of the city. Some families are waking up to find a Klashnikov bullet and a letter in an envelope with the words “Leave your area or else.” The culprits behind these attacks and threats are Sadr’s followers- Mahdi Army. It’s general knowledge, although no one dares say it out loud. In the last month we’ve had two different families staying with us in our house, after having to leave their neighborhoods due to death threats and attacks. It’s not just Sunnis- it’s Shia, Arabs, Kurds- most of the middle-class areas are being targeted by militias.

We will respect your great religious traditions, whose principles of equality and compassion are essential to Iraq’s future. We will help you build a peaceful and representative government that protects the rights of all citizens. And then our military forces will leave.

Wednesday 24 May 2006
U.S builds world's biggest embassy in Iraq
by Leila Fadel
Source: MercuryNews.com

http://www.thestate.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/14638635.htm
Don't ask about the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. Officially, it's a secret.
But it's hard to hide a 104-acre complex rising on the banks of the Tigris River. Anyone who cares to know can easily see four giant construction cranes towering over the river at the largest such project ever undertaken by the United States -- a symbol of American presence that will last well into the future.
When the complex is completed by June 2007 -- this one apparently is on schedule, unlike most construction projects in Iraq -- it will be an American oasis in the heavily fortified ``green zone,'' away from the fear and lack of services that permeate the rest of Baghdad. Among the 21 buildings will be a recreation center to rival any in the United States with, among other amenities, a pool, a gym, a food court, a beauty salon and, of course, a recreational area that will be called the American Club.
Baghdad may have little potable water and only a few hours of electricity a day, but the embassy complex will have its own water-treatment facilities and electricity generator, according to Andy Fisher, a press officer for Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., the chair of the House Foreign Relations Committee.
First Kuwaiti General Trading and Contracting, a subcontractor of Halliburton's Kellogg, Brown and Root, was granted the $592 million construction contract. By December it had already been paid about $483 million.

Iraq will go forward as a unified, independent and sovereign nation that has regained a respected place in the world.

Posted on Fri, Aug. 04, 2006

Iraqi civil war has already begun, U.S. troops say

By Tom Lasseter
McClatchy Newspapers

BAGHDAD, Iraq - While American politicians and generals in Washington debate the possibility of civil war in Iraq, many U.S. officers and enlisted men who patrol Baghdad say it has already begun.

Army troops in and around the capital interviewed in the last week cite a long list of evidence that the center of the nation is coming undone: Villages have been abandoned by Sunni and Shiite Muslims; Sunni insurgents have killed thousands of Shiites in car bombings and assassinations; Shiite militia death squads have tortured and killed hundreds, if not thousands, of Sunnis; and when night falls, neighborhoods become open battlegrounds.

"There's one street that's the dividing line. They shoot mortars across the line and abduct people back and forth," said 1st Lt. Brian Johnson, a 4th Infantry Division platoon leader from Houston. Johnson, 24, was describing the nightly violence that pits Sunni gunmen from Baghdad's Ghazaliyah neighborhood against Shiite gunmen from the nearby Shula district.

As he spoke, the sights and sounds of battle grew: first, the rat-a-tat-tat of fire from AK-47 assault rifles, then the heavier bursts of PKC machine guns, and finally the booms of mortar rounds crisscrossing the night sky and crashing down onto houses and roads.

The bodies of captured Sunni and Shiite fighters will turn up in the morning, dropped in canals and left on the side of the road.

"We've seen some that have been executed on site, with bullet holes in the ground; the rest were tortured and executed somewhere else and dumped," Johnson said.

The recent assertion by U.S. soldiers here that Iraq is in a civil war is a stunning indication that American efforts to bring peace and democracy to Iraq are failing, more than three years after the toppling of dictator Saddam Hussein's regime.

Some Iraqi troops, too, share that assessment.

"This is a civil war," said a senior adviser to the commander of the Iraqi Army's 6th Division, which oversees much of Baghdad.

"The problem between Sunnis and Shiites is a religious one, and it gets worse every time they attack each other's mosques," said the adviser, who gave only his rank and first name, Col. Ahmed, because of security concerns. "Iraq is now caught in hell."

The United States and its coalition partners respect the people of Iraq. We are taking unprecedented measures to spare the lives of innocent Iraqi citizens,

Evidence is mounting that America's war in Iraq has killed tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians, and perhaps well over 100,000. Yet this carnage is systematically ignored in the United States, where the media and government portray a war in which there are no civilian deaths, because there are no Iraqi civilians, only insurgents. "The Daily Star"

and are beginning to deliver food, water and medicine to those in need.

U.S. Plan to Build Iraq Clinics Falters
Contractor Will Try to Finish 20 of 142 Sites

By Ellen Knickmeyer
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, April 3, 2006; A01

BAGHDAD -- A reconstruction contract for the building of 142 primary health centers across Iraq is running out of money, after two years and roughly $200 million, with no more than 20 clinics now expected to be completed, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says.

The contract, awarded to U.S. construction giant Parsons Inc. in the flush, early days of reconstruction in Iraq, was expected to lay the foundation of a modern health care system for the country, putting quality medical care within reach of all Iraqis.

Parsons, according to the Corps, will walk away from more than 120 clinics that on average are two-thirds finished. Auditors say the project serves as a warning for other U.S. reconstruction efforts due to be completed this year.

Our only enemy is Saddam’s brutal regime – and that regime is your enemy as well.

In the new era that is coming to Iraq, your country will no longer be held captive to the will of a cruel dictator. You will be free to build a better life, instead of building more palaces for Saddam and his sons, free to pursue economic prosperity without the hardship of economic sanctions, free to travel and speak your mind, free to join in the political affairs of Iraq. And all the people who make up your country – Kurds, Shi’a, Turkomans, Sunnis, and others – will be free of the terrible persecution that so many have endured.

Bush's Other Iraq Invasion

By Antonia Juhasz, AlterNet
Posted on August 22, 2005, Printed on August 5, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/24307/

If Iraq's National Assembly meets its deadline, it will release a draft constitution to be voted on by the people in two months. Since February, vital issues have been debated and discussed by the drafting committee: the role of Islamic law, the rights of women, the autonomy of the Kurds and the participation of the minority Sunnis.

But what hasn't been on the table is at least as important to the formation of a new Iraq: the country's economic structure. The Bush administration has succeeded in maintaining a stranglehold on issues such as public versus private ownership of resources, foreign access to Iraqi oil and U.S. control of the reconstruction effort -- all of which are still governed by administration policies put into place immediately after the invasion. The Bush economic agenda favors foreign interests -- American interests -- over Iraqi self-determination.

The nightmare that Saddam Hussein has brought to your nation will soon be over. You are a good and gifted people – the heirs of a great civilisation that contributes to all humanity. You deserve better than tyranny and corruption and torture chambers. You deserve to live as free people. And I assure every citizen of Iraq: your nation will soon be free.

WASHINGTON -- President Bush suggested yesterday that US troops might stay in Iraq beyond his presidency, which ends in 2009, saying at a press conference that the issue of removing troops from the country ''will be decided by future presidents and future governments of Iraq."

Thank you.

2006-06-15T12:48:00.000-07:00

AFA ANNOUNCES NEW BOYCOTT CADILLAC MOTOR COMPANY

Dear Fellow Christians,

Our boycott of Ford Motor Company has been so successful that we are going to expand our God given reach and include yet another automobile company that has been a threat to the family for many years.

We are talking, of course, about Cadillac Motors. This company, as many of you well know was the first automobile maker to extend credit to the so called "African-Americans". This policy in effect since the 1940's has resulted in the negro being able to buy cars, even as they ignore the family duties. As Time Magazine puts it "A flashy car becomes their living room, the only one they've got."

It is a proven fact that negroes conceive out of wedlock much more often than we do. Studies show that those who embrace the "black" lifestyle breed like rabbits, with no regard for the need to provide their offspring with the blessings of a nuclear family, with a mother and father taking up their God given duties to shephard the young as they grow.

So we urge you all to make your displeasure known to the Cadillac Motor Company and to their parent corporation General Motors.

If you think our efforts are worthy, would you please support us with a small gift? Thank you for caring enough to get involved.

Sincerely,

Donald E. Wildmon, Founder and Chairman
American Family Association

P.S. Please print this and share with others.

Home Depot Rules!

2006-06-15T10:28:00.000-07:00

Home Depot has just come out with an awesome marketing strategy.

(CNN) -- Large quantities of drugs were found inside merchandise from at least two Home Depot stores in Massachusetts, and authorities are investigating, police said Wednesday.
A contractor late last week discovered two 50-pound "bricks" of marijuana wrapped in plastic bags inside a bathroom vanity he had purchased at a Home Depot store in Tewksbury, said Chief of Detectives Lt. Dennis Peterson.
The estimated street value of the marijuana is around $145,000, Peterson said. (Watch as do-it-yourself goes to pot -- 1:30)

I'm out of here. Gotta borrow a truck and get myself one of those bathroom vanities.

The Final Solution

2006-06-08T22:46:00.000-07:00

In a bold public-private enterprise the State of Texas has come to the rescue of a small business which has been devastated by hastily passed laws which ban hunting done remotely through the Internet. Live-Shot.com has seen it's profits plummet as the anti-gun forces steamrolled across the 2nd amendment. When Live-Shot heard of Texas Governor Rich Perry's proposal to allow citizens to use the Internet to remotely control and view cameras guarding the US/Mexican border a ready made solution presented itself. The final solution.

And We Accomplished Exactly What?

2006-06-05T10:20:00.000-07:00

"The U.S.-Vietnam war killed more than 58,000 Americans and 3 million Vietnamese soldiers and civilians."

US boosts military ties with Vietnam
Mon Jun 5, 2006 9:13 AM ET

By Paul Eckert, Asia Correspondent

HANOI (Reuters) - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld said on Monday that U.S.-Vietnamese ties had reached a "new level" and that the former battlefield enemies would boost military exchanges and training.

Have We No Shame?

2006-06-05T07:44:00.000-07:00

The Baltimore Sun

U.S. to drop Geneva rule, officials say
Clause bars humiliation, degradation of detainees
By Julian E. Barnes
Originally published June 5, 2006
WASHINGTON // The Pentagon has decided to omit from new detainee policies a key tenet of the Geneva Conventions that explicitly bans "humiliating and degrading treatment," according to knowledgeable military officials, a step that would mark a further shift away from strict adherence to international human rights standards.

Food For Thought

2006-06-02T10:27:00.000-07:00

Maybe Americans should take another look at our diet.

This is a straight out copy and paste of a comment found over on Americablog. Thanks to the original writer, who kindly gave me permission to repost it.

Same planet?

BBC Headlines:

Iran nuclear bomb 'in 10 years'
Iraqi PM angry at 'US violence'
US probes new Iraq massacre claim
Haditha: Massacre and cover-up?
Iraqi viewpoint: Fear of US troops
No jail for US army dog handler
US jobs growth tails off in May
Guantanamo hunger strike grows
Army 'to blame' for Katrina flood
US sniper gets life for killings

CNN Headlines:

Anna Nicole Smith: 'Yes, I am pregnant'
FDA: Restaurants on front lines in obesity fight
Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie at it again
Man prepares for double marathon ... in a freezer
Kelsey Grammer 's new, blue role
Couric hopes 'pretentious' news era over

oh, and . . .
Bush to promote gay marriage amendment

Those damn Brits, have they no idea about real journalism?

--
AmbroseBierce | 06.02.06 - 11:46 am | #

A "Must Watch" Video

2006-05-30T07:55:00.000-07:00

I was blown away when I sat down in front of the computer last night and watched the British documentary "Iraq, The Hidden War".

The film looks at the difference between the war coverage shown in the US and the much more complete (and graphic) coverage shown to the rest of the world. In examining this subject the film also gives us the first realistic picture that I have seen in years of the current conditions inside Iraq, both for the fighters, the news crews and the ordinary Iraqis.

Watch it. It runs about 50 minutes, but you can pause it and come back to it as you need/want.

No S--t, Sherlock

2006-05-21T16:11:00.000-07:00

I just saw this headline over at Raw Story: "Snow: Fox not official channel at WH". Well, duh. Of course it isn't. This is, obviously.

Time To Pay The Piper

2006-05-19T07:22:00.000-07:00

In George Orwell's "Animal Farm", all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.

In the world of Howard Dean, and many of our other "friends", All people are equal but some are more equal than others, and that's how it is supposed to be, apparently.

I am tired of being manipulated. I am sick of having fear shoved at me as a motivator.

No, Mr. Bush. I am not going to silently stand by and watch the constitution being torn to shreds because "The smoking gun may turn out to be a mushroom cloud." That's fear mongering and Homie don't play that game.

And no, Mr. Dean. I am not going to be satisfied with being kinda equal. I am not going to give up my principles because you tell me that standing up for my self and my community may doom the Democratic Party and allow the Republicans to stay in power. Can't have that, you say, because the GOP doesn't believe in gay equality.

Well, that's fear mongering too, my friend. I ain't gonna play that game for you, either.

Let's see just what kind of equality the Democrats would have us believe we should accept.

The kind of equality where we don't get to decide who to marry and spend the rest of our life with?

The kind of equality where we aren't equal enough to don a uniform and lay down our life for our country?

The kind of equality where we aren't equal enough to be mentioned in the history books or even worthy enough to have our very existance acknowledged in most schools?

The kind of equality where a dying police officer had to crawl out of her death bed to plead with the city council to award her death benefits to her wife? (oooh, don't use the "W" word, you say, it freaks the straights out - Fuck you!)

We are not stupid, Mr. Dean. We have watched the Bush administration pass law after law allowing big business to screw the ordinary citizen. But we have also noticed, in an awful lot of those cases, that a bunch of Democrats voted with the Republicans. Frankly you guys aren't all that better.

I want a Democratic Party that stands up for the regular folks, not the rich. A party that will protect me from the avarice and greed of multi-billion dollar corporations.

I want a party that believes in the sanctity of the ballot box, and will do every thing in its power to see that every vote counts. (and that there is a way to verify it).

I want a party that believes in true equality for every citizen of this great country, no matter skin color, ethnic background, gender, sexual orientation, age or economic status.

I want a party that finds the practice of throwing the mentally ill, the infirm, the aged and the poor into the streets and forcing them to eat out of garbage cans as abhorant as I do.

I want a party that will stand up to the insanity of "intelligent design", the insanity of agreeing that creationism and other kooky ideas are equal to scientific fact.

I want a party that will stand up, with no equivication, for a woman's right to decide.

I want a party of principle. A party that will state what it believes, and then stand up for those beliefs. Appeasment and bending your stance to follow the polls quite frankly sucks or blows or whatever the current word is.

If you can't be that, why the hell should I support you?

You know, I hear that the religious right is giving the same message to the GOP right about now.

I guess the time has come to pay the piper.

I Could Tell You, But Then I Would Have To Kill You

2006-05-18T23:05:00.000-07:00

Judge dismissed prisoner's lawsuit on national security grounds

ROCKVILLE, Md. A federal judge in Maryland says a prisoner's private interests have to "give way to the national interest in preserving state secrets."

U-S District Judge T.S. Ellis is dismissing a lawsuit by a German man who said he was illegally detained and tortured in overseas prisons run by the C-I-A.Ellis says a secret written briefing from the director of central intelligence convinced him that letting Khaled al-Masri (kha-LED' ahl MAHZ'-ree) sue the C-I-A would harm national security.The ruling makes no determination on the validity of al-Masri's case. Al-Masri claims he was kidnapped, brutally beaten and drugged over five months before he was dumped on an abandoned road in Albania.

Copyright 2006 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed by order of The Department Of Homeland Security. Violation of this order may result in fines or imprisonment and torture in secret overseas prisons.

Undermining Security Over There So That We Won't Have To Undermine It At Home

"Siga El Dinero" (Deepthroat)

2006-05-18T10:09:00.000-07:00

Bush solicita $1.9B para alentar las fronteras - Por SUZANNE GAMBOA, Escritor Asociado Jueves, De Mayo El 18 De 2006 De la Prensa (05-18) 09:08 PDT WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Presidente Bush envió congreso $1.9 mil millones una petición jueves de aumentar seguridad de la frontera como partidarios del control reafirmado arrebatador de la legislación de inmigración en el discusión del senado. La casa blanca dijo que el dinero pagaría los "primeros 1.000 de 6.000 agentes nuevos de la patrulla de frontera que serán desplegados en los dos años próximos," así como el despliegue temporal de hasta 6.000 tropas del protector nacional a los estados a lo largo de la frontera mexicana. La petición incluye los fondos para las nuevas barreras que cercan y otras así como dos aviones sin tripulación nuevos de la vigilancia y cinco helicópteros para contener la inmigración ilegal. La casa blanca envió la petición al congreso mientras que el presidente viajó a Yuma, Ariz. dramatizar su comisión para confinar control y el senado trabajó sobre el reacondicionamiento más arrebatador de la ley de la inmigración en dos décadas. Después de votar estrecho y en gran parte a lo largo de las líneas de partido noche de miércoles para barrar a trabajadores de huésped de solicitar en sus el propios para la personalidad jurídica, el senado reconsideró. En un voto de dos partidos políticos de 56-43, la prohibición fue diluida para decir que los trabajadores de huésped puede buscar generalmente personalidad jurídica en sus el propios si el gobierno no determina a ningún trabajador americano está disponible para llenar el trabajo. Sensor. Juan Cornyn, R-Tejas, dijo que la oferta que despejó el la noche de miércoles fue diseñado proteger a trabajadores americanos, y el reemplazo los "trabajadores americanos puestos en el asiento trasero y los trabajadores extranjeros... en el asiento delantero." Sensor. El espectro de Arlen, R-Pa., presidente del comité judicial, dicho, "pienso que hay un valor más alto en no tener el inmigrante conforme al control del patrón donde allí puede ser coerción y ejercer presión sobre..." Los líderes del senado han dicho que esperan el paso de la legislación polémica por la semana próxima. Incluye medidas de apretar control sobre las fronteras, de crear un nuevo programa del trabajador de huésped y de ofrecer una trayectoria a la ciudadanía para millones de inmigrantes ilegales ya en el país. Las perspectivas del paso del congreso final este año son altamente inciertas, dado la oposición fuerte entre republicanos a las ofertas de Bush referentes a ciudadanía. La petición de financiamiento de Bush vino con un compromiso que no conduciría a un aumento a corto plazo en el déficit. La casa blanca dijo que compensaría el gasto por "ciertos esfuerzos militares menos-urgentes delaying de la consecución" a las cuentas futuras del gasto. Los progresos vinieron un día después de que una serie de choques que hicieron que el discusión nacional sobre la inmigración se parece como una pelea de la familia, estilo republicano. "sin importar lo que dice el presidente, qué él está proponiendo es amnistía," dijo a Representante James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., el legislador que conduciría a negociadores de la casa en cualquier tentativa de bosquejar una cuenta de la inmigración del compromiso más adelante este año. Es amnistía, "porque permite a gente que ha roto la ley para permanecer en el país," Sensenbrenner dicho de las posiciones Bush estacado hacia fuera en su discurso anterior en la semana. Bush estaba parada su tierra. "el partido republicano necesita conducir en la aplicación la inmigración," él dijo a audiencia de los donantes de GOP, "... América puede ser una sociedad legal y una sociedad que da la bienvenida y nosotros no tenemos que elegir entre los dos." Contenga la legislación que la oposición democrática vigorosa el año pasado excesiva pasada haría a todos los inmigrantes ilegales conforme al procesamiento como criminales. En una llamada de conferencia con los reporteros, Sensenbrenner dijo que Bush tenía "básicamente dio vuelta el suyo trasero" en una cuenta resistente de la seguridad de la frontera después de solicitar que ciertas provisiones sean incluidas antes de paso de la casa el año pasado. El miércoles, el senado siguió el plomo de la casa y votó 83-16 para construir 370 millas de la cerca en las áreas "usadas lo más a menudo posible por los contrabandistas y los extranjeros ilegales" según lo determinado por los funcionarios federales. La casa aprobó dos veces tanto cercar en su cuenta. El senado también aprobó 500 millas de barreras del vehículo. Los partidarios dijeron que el cercar y las barreras podrían ayudar a mejorar economías en las comunidades donde se localizan y a reducir crimen. Pero los opositores dijeron que las barreras cambiarían de puesto tráfico ilegal del inmigrante y del contrabando a las áreas de la frontera sin cercar. La cuenta subyacente del senado preve una cerca "virtual" a lo largo de la frontera usando las cámaras fotográficas, los sensores y la otra tecnología para supervisar la frontera. Sensor. Las sesiones de Jeff, R-Ala., estimaban el coste en áspero $3.2 millones por milla, más de $900 millones para 300 millas. Él dijo que la cerca enviaría "una señal que los días de la abrir-frontera encima." Pero Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., dijo el coste sería mucho más alto, mientras que Sen. Dick Durbin, eneldo, predijo que el cercar sería una "señal" en una cerca que estira la longitud de la frontera. Todos los republicanos y más que la mitad de los demócratas del senado apoyaron la oferta. ___ La cuenta es S. 2611. ___ En la red: Senado: www.senate.gov URL: Prensa Asociada ©2006 De http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2006/05/18/national/w090834D07.DTL

And How's Your Day?

2006-05-15T00:21:00.000-07:00

It's a good thing that President Bush doesn't read newspapers. If he did he wouldn't be in a good mood today.

From The Daytona Beach News-Journal:

"U.S. lawbreaker-in-chief - President Bush stokes constitutional crisis"

The NSA continues to spy on Americans. The president continues to lie to Americans about the extent of the spying, or its purpose, since tens of millions of Americans couldn't possibly be terrorist suspects or "bad guys," and call patterns can be analyzed as much for their connections to whistle-blowers and reporters who reveal what an out-of-control operation the Bush administration has become as to connections to fanatics in Kandahar. How does the president get away with it?

How else: By breaking the very laws he signs through the same kind of self-serving legalese that he's used to justify arbitrary imprisonment, torture, secret prisons, domestic spying and who knows what else?
[...]
To Bush, it's a matter of interpreting presidential authority. To anyone else with a middle-school understanding of the Constitution and the balance of powers, it's lawbreaking.

----------

From The New York Times

Conservative Christians Warn Republicans Against Inaction

Some of President Bush's most influential conservative Christian allies are becoming openly critical of the White House and Republicans in Congress, warning that they will withhold their support in the midterm elections unless Congress does more to oppose same-sex marriage, obscenity and abortion.

"There is a growing feeling among conservatives that the only way to cure the problem is for Republicans to lose the Congressional elections this fall," said Richard Viguerie, a conservative direct-mail pioneer.
[...]
"I can't tell you how much anger there is at the Republican leadership," Mr. Viguerie said. "I have never seen anything like it."

----------
From The Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Bad judgment in the wilderness of mirrors
By Joseph Galloway
Knight Ridder Newspapers

WASHINGTON - It was entirely predictable that the Bush administration's attempts to reform U.S. intelligence in the middle of a war and an endless series of political firestorms would come to no good end.
[...]
At this juncture in our history, it would be better if the president had the best intelligence that money and knowledge and experience in the ways of infiltrating hard target states and bad guy groups can buy. But he doesn't, and he won't for months or even years -- in part because his administration and especially his vice president value political loyalty more than competence.

All of it is reminiscent of that famous line in the cartoon strip Pogo in which the possum declares: "We has met the enemy, and it is us."

It's Baaack!

2006-05-12T00:04:00.000-07:00

"TIA may have died on paper, But it got parceled out to various other agencies, including the NSA."

The San Francisco Chronicle is offering a good argument that the phone call data that the NSA is gathering almost surely is being used for "Data Mining" as originally envisioned by the now supposedly defunct Total Information Awareness program

Government interest in data mining increased sharply after the Sept. 11 attacks. Unlike the private sector, intelligence officials began exploring ways to use the technique to identify and track individuals suspected of terrorist links. In 2002, the Department of Defense, through the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) launched the "Total Information Awareness" project -- later changed to "Terrorism Information Awareness" (TIA) to counter the impression that the program would spy on U.S. citizens.

The goal of TIA, its now defunct Web site explained, was to link certain transactions -- applications for passports, visas, work permits, driver's licenses, automotive rentals, airline ticket purchases, receipts for chemical purchases -- to arrests or suspicious activities.

The program, the brainchild of President Ronald Reagan's national security adviser John Poindexter, collapsed under public and political criticism in 2003. But the idea lived on, said Forno, who lectured on information warfare at the National Defense University from 2001 to 2003 and participated in the 2000 White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Information Security Education Research Project.

"TIA may have died on paper," he said. "But it got parceled out to various other agencies, including the NSA."

A January 2006 report (pdf) prepared by the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress pointed out that funding for the TIA was prohibited by Congress in 2003. However unspecified parts of the TIA inititive were allowed to be "funded as part of DOD's classified budget, subject to the provisions of the National Foreign Intelligence Program, which restricts the processing and analysis of Information on US citizens."

What The Fuck, Fox?

2006-05-11T21:59:00.000-07:00

We learned today that every telephone call made by the vast majority of Americans for the past four and a half years (Quest customers are the lucky exceptions) has been logged into government computers. The government now knows who we called or were called by, when we called and how long we talked. If we talked on a cell phone they probably have a record of our travels as we talked.

We are told that the call tracking doesn't really impact our privacy because our names aren't in the records only our phone numbers are. As if matching a phone number to a name isn't child's play in this Googlized world.

Civil libertarians, constitutional scholars and many others are in meltdown over this revelation.

Newspapers across the land are predicting that the nomination of General Hayden, who headed the NSA as this program was implimented and who gave what turned out to be extremely inaccurate testimony to Congress on the subject earlier, could very well be upset by this latest disclosure.

So imagine my suprise when I found that Fox News was bucking the trend

(From Fox News)

Hayden Nomination Unlikely to Be Sidelined by NSA Reports

According to Fox, the whole thing is being blown out of proportion. They say that it is just a bunch of computer geeks doing some outrageous far out thing with phone numbers that none of us regular people would be able to make heads or tails from.

(A) key congressional aide familiar with algorithmic programming told FOX News that the NSA program sounds like a lot of mathematical analyses.

"It's your number-crunching geeks that put this together," the aide said.

While the aide said he had no knowledge of this particular NSA program, based on the reporting, the NSA plan allows phone number groups to be connected to other phone number groups to create a web of numbers.

Over top of that web, analysts can lay known information on Al Qaeda and other terror organizations and quickly find relationships among number groups.

Law enforcement agencies use similar types of activities, he said, adding that something similar to the NSA program is currently being used to ferret out conspiracies in the drug trade.

The aide pointed out that based on the reports, it is not a data-mining program because no content comes out of the phone numbers. He added that phone numbers are not inherently private.

"There's no constitutional protection to your phone number," he said.

Yes, But there are laws protecting the privacy of our phone records.

Fox claims that even key Democrats aren't upset:

As one lawmaker who has previously been briefed on the various NSA programs, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said she the program does not sound intrusive.

"I think it's fair to say that what was in the newspaper this morning is not content collection," she said.

That sounded pretty lame, coming from DiFi, so I checked Google News to see what she really had said:

"Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat and member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had praised Hayden earlier in the week. But she said Thursday that the new disclosures of a more expansive NSA role under his command could harm his nomination.

"I believe we are on our way to a major constitutional confrontation on Fourth Amendment guarantees of unreasonable search and seizure," Feinstein said. "I think this is also going to present a growing impediment to the confirmation of General Hayden. And that is very regretted."

More Good News Being Ignored By Liberal MSM!

2006-05-11T09:11:00.000-07:00

Yes, once again the liberal mainstream media is ignoring good news in the War On Terror.

We ARE being greeted with flowers, just as our great leaders said we would be!

The Danger Is On The OTHER Border!

2006-05-11T07:08:00.000-07:00

I just read about a bunch of anti-illegal immigration hotshots who are surrounding and threatening drivers who attempt to pick up day laborers in a Vista, CA. parking lot. Gotta give 'em a pat on the back. These guys are so tough that they refuse to affiliate with that wussey Minuteman group.

"The Minutemen are so squeaky clean," he said. "Some of us choose to be (only) loosely affiliated with the Minutemen, so that maybe we have the option of not being that squeaky clean if we so desire."

The problem, of course, is that like most Americans they are worried about the wrong border. Now I have to admit that I snickered at the lone Minuteman, featured on Tuesday's edition of The Daily Show, sitting on his lawn chair protecting America's border with Canada. But by God, today I have to admit that he is right.

You see, we are being threatened by a hitherto unknown species of, hold on to your seats, a new species of bear.

And do you what the really scary part is? That hybrid bear was discovered to be carrying a piece of paper with Stephen Colbert's home address. (The strange thing is, the handwriting on the paper looks a lot like that of President Bush.)

Bless You, Steve

2006-04-30T07:16:00.000-07:00

I heart Steve Colbert.

Damn It. Why Can't People Just Stay In Their Pigeon Holes?

2006-04-29T08:38:00.000-07:00

There was a spectacular crash in the center of the Castro district the other night.

News reports on the accident and resulting fire on Castro Street
leaves me examining my own behavior and lack of compassion.

You see, I know Dane, the homeless man who according to reports was
the first on the scene to help pull the victim from the burning car.

A year or so ago I had carried on a couple of conversations with Dane, and during those conversations I found him to be articulate with a wicked sense of humor. But the third time I attempted to speak with him, he freaked out, acting extremely irrational. I subsequently saw him acting "crazy" on several occassions. He would wander up and down the streets of the Castro yelling and intimidating visitors to the neighborhood.

My reaction to his behavior was to start acting as if he was invisible. Whenever I saw him in my frequent visits to the neighborhood I would look away, or look through him as if he wasn't there. We eventually came to an unspoken truce. I would pretend I didn't see him, and he wouldn't try to engage me in conversation or as the target of one of his rants.

Now I read that he rushed to the aid of a stranger, one that just as likely would treat him with the same lack of respect that I am guilty of doing.

Makes me feel like a real asshole. You know?

In Unity With Our Young

2006-04-26T09:13:00.000-07:00

This blog will be dark today in honor of those students who are participating in the day of silence, and in support of those whose situations are so unsafe that they are unable to participate.

"The Decider" determined to take on oil companies

2006-04-25T22:25:00.000-07:00

Americans will be comforted to know, as this L.A.Times headline tells us:

Bush Pledges Action to Root Out Gas Price Gouging

In other news, O.J. Simpson says that even though 12 years have passed since the murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, he is as determined as ever to find the real killer.

Who Woulda Thought?

2006-04-25T10:43:00.000-07:00

Who could have imagined that in 2006 it is heterosexual activists who want to stress to 7 year olds that falling in love is all about S-E-X, while in San Francisco's Castro District, Homosexual "ground zero" in America, gay parents are banding together to shield their children's eyes from the same subject?

Courageous Long Island county takes action to protect health workers

2006-04-25T10:11:00.000-07:00

Nassau County (NY) commissioners took a courageous stand today to protect hospital workers from being forced to view homosexuals holding hands and other obscene displays when visiting their "long time partners" in county hospitals.

Homosexual activists had argued for a "domestic partnership" registry which would have, among other things, given society's stamp of approval on the notion that just because two people have been in a relationship for years, they are somehow entitled to have a say in each other's health decisions or have the right to be at the bedside of their dying partner.

Way to go, Nassau County!

President Bush finds cause of skyrocketing gas prices - Enviormental protection regulations

2006-04-25T09:54:00.000-07:00

Displaying once again his uncanny knack for cutting to the heart of complicated problems, President G.W. Bush today identified and put into place a cure for the cause of rapidly rising gasoline prices.

Debunking theories that the price increases where somehow tied to his military threats aimed at Iran, the worsening situation in Iraq and obscene profit taking by the oil industry, the president solved the problem this morning by suspending regulations put into place by liberals to "protect the earth".

Thank you, Mr.President.

Treehuggers Lies Debunked

2006-04-24T07:40:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I wrote about the fear mongering tree lovers in Vermont who are throwing around wild claims that somehow "global warming" is affecting the way sap runs in trees. We know who the saps are here.

Thank God for the GOP. Their Earthday website brings the truth to the American people. The Earth is not in worse shape, but is in better shape thanks to American know how and the support of the business community.

Unpatriotic Tree-Huggers Sign On To Demo's "Global Warming" Myth

2006-04-23T09:18:00.000-07:00

In yet another act of sedition a group of maple syrup producers have fallen victim to the anti-American agenda of the Democratic party.

Citing totally unscientific indicators such as personal memories and handwritten "family journals" a bunch of liberal farmers in Vermont claim that the effects of "global warming" are affecting their business.

Of course, God does not believe in "global warming". End of discussion, thank you.

Why Does The Press Hate Freedom Of Speech?

2006-04-20T10:06:00.000-07:00

I was reading a story about G.W. Bush and President Hu of China meeting up this morning and was suprised to find out that when a protester who somehow gained access to a platform filled with photographers shouted out protests about the treatment of the Falun Gong in China she was physically silenced by a photographer. As the AP reports:

A photographer who was standing next to the protester tried momentarily to quiet her by putting his hand in front of her mouth.

Its bad enough when the press engages in self censorship. To physically restrain someone else from engaging in the constitutionally guaranteed right of free speech is unforgivable. That photographer should be fired.

Iraqi March To Democracy Ahead Of Schedule, Rummy and Bush Vindicated

2006-04-17T06:39:00.000-07:00

In what has to be a relief to the embattled Secretary Of Defense and to the White House, the fledging government of Iraq has reached a major milestone. Managing to do in three years what it took the American people fifteen years, Iraq has rushed into civil war.

The liberal press will no doubt try to put a negative spin on the situation, but there is no denying the fact that the Iraqi people have reached this important milestone in just 1/5th of the time it took us here and the Bush administration deserves every bit of credit.

The American Taliban's Foot Soldiers?

2006-04-16T21:42:00.000-07:00

I will be the first to admit that two does not make a trend, but still I find myself concerned by two recent double murders, in which registered sex offenders were tracked down and killed, in at least one and possibly both cases by the use of "Megan's Law" sex offender registry web sites.

The first case took place in Bellingham, WA in September of last year. 36 year old Michael Mullen called police to tell them that he had killed 2 sex offenders. He said that he had found the name of one of the victims on an Internet "Hit list". The other victim, also a registered sex offender, was a roommate of the first. Mullen told police that he had used the "Megan's Law" website to ascertain the location of the victims' home.

The second case happened yesterday, Sunday, in Maine. 20 year old Stephen Marshall killed two sex offenders in their homes and then shot himself in the head when police closed in. It was unknown if that state's "Megan Law" site was used by the killer, but authorities are concerned enough by the possiblity that they took the site down.

As I say, two does not a trend make, but as I have exactly zero trust in the ability of these kinds of self righteous zealots to differentiate between convicted sex offenders and ordinary queer folk, especially considering the onslaught of slander and lies aimed at us by so many political and religious leaders in this country, I do feel concerned.

There Should Be A Special Place In Hell For People Like This

2006-04-16T10:39:00.000-07:00

9:00 AM this morning it was raining like mad in San Francisco. I was leaning out my apartment window having a cigarette when I noticed a strange sight. It was a man on a horse, carrying some sort of large homemade flag and leading a heavily laden burro. Even for San Francisco this was a bit of an oddity in a city that prides itself on the odd being commonplace.

It was with disbelief that I watched this small procession leave the city streets and take the freeway on ramp. The rider brought the animals up to the top of the ramp and then proceeded to cross three lanes of traffic where he took up his ride in the fast lane.

Apparently oblivious to the fact that cars were approaching at 70 mph the fellow set off in the direction of the Bay Bridge.

I quickly grabbed my cell phone and called the Highway Patrol. I've got nothing against demonstrators, but I do have a whole bunch of problems with people who put animals and children into harms way.

As far as I am concerned there should be a special spot in hell reserved to idots such as this guy, and for those parents who I see far too often jaywalking against the traffic lights with their children. Folks, if you are an adult and want to do something really stupid that puts your life in danger, that is one thing. To involve animals or children in your hare brained schemes is quite anothor. Stop it. Now.

Things worked out well, as you can see from the CHP log which I've copied below, the rider was taken into custody and the horse and burro were given over to Animal Control.

Incident: 0605 Type: Pedestrian on the Roadway Location: SB S VAN NESS AV ONR TO SB US101 Zoom Map: 667 1J info as of: 4/16/2006 10:19:56 AM
ADDITIONAL DETAILS
10:16AM AC BROUGHT HORSE AND BURRO BACK TO CONTAINMENT
9:37AM 1 SUSP IN CUST - THE PTY RIDING THE HORSE
9:25AM SF PD 1097
9:24AM TAKING 7TH OFR NOW
9:23AM PER PSBY , EB 80 JWO 4TH HEADING TOWARDS BRG IN THE #1 LN
9:16AM 1039 BRG
9:16AM ALSO GIVEN AS MISSION ONR TO SB 101
9:14AM DONKEY IS BEHIND THE HORSE
9:12AM MAN RIDING HORSE #1 LN

White House Breathes Sigh of Relief

2006-04-15T17:40:00.000-07:00

(Satire)

According to an unnamed White House official, President and Mrs. Bush are quite relieved that the idea of attending the White House Easter Egg Hunt this weekend as a political statement hasn't spread beyond the gay community.

The biggest fear, according to our source, was that illegal immigrants would bring their plight and children to the event. "The worst case scenerio would be the sight of half a million grubby brown skinned families lining up to enjoy a celebration which should be reserved for only those who are legally here and who deserve the honor. Mrs. Bush had told reporters earlier that the event was open to all, but of course she didn't mean just anybody."

The White House official told this reporter that the President and First Lady were actually planning on greeting the gay families during the opening ceremonies until it was learned that the homosexuals had decided to be fashionably late. "To heck with them then!" snorted the President. He reportedly uttered a Cheneyism as he stalked away.

Press gets it wrong - again

2006-04-14T16:16:00.000-07:00

I was reading
a story on the SF Chronicle website about the gay families who will be taking their children to the Easter Egg hunt at the White house this year when I was stopped in my tracks by this quote:

Despite the criticism from some quarters, the Christian Coalition, a leading conservative group, said it does not object to gay and lesbian families participating in the White House event.

'If it's an open event, it's an open event,' said Michele Combs, a spokeswoman for the Christian Coalition. 'If they are protesting, I think that's wrong. ... If they are just going with their kids, I don't see where there's a problem with that.'

Now two things immediately popped to mind when I read that. First off, that has to be one of the most sane statements ever attributed to the Christian Coalition. The second thing is, of course, the description of that organization as "a leading conservative group".

According to an article this week in The Washington Post:

The once-mighty Christian Coalition, founded 17 years ago by the Rev. Pat Robertson as the political fundraising and lobbying engine of the Christian right, is more than $2 million in debt, beset by creditors' lawsuits and struggling to hold on to some of its state chapters.

In March, one of its most effective chapters, the Christian Coalition of Iowa, cut ties with the national organization and reincorporated itself as the Iowa Christian Alliance, saying it "found it impossible to continue to carry a name that in any way associated us with this national organization."

"The credibility is just not there like it once was," said Stephen L. Scheffler, president of the Iowa affiliate since 2000. "The budget has shrunk from $26 million to $1 million. There's a trail of debt. . . . We believe, our board believes, any Christian organization has an obligation to pay its debts in a timely fashion."

At its peak a decade ago, the Christian Coalition deployed a dozen lobbyists on Capitol Hill. Today, it has a single Washington employee who works out of his home. Its phone number with a 202 area code is automatically forwarded to a small office in Charleston, S.C.

Now if the press still has to go find a quote from some anti-gay organization every time our community makes the news, perhaps they would do well to make sure that the anti-gay organizations they turn to are actually legitimate. Could it be a sign of the times that Americans have become so accepting to their gay neighbors and relatives that its getting pretty darn hard to sustain an organization on heterosexism and bigotry? It appears so.

The Prez is right

2006-03-28T14:04:00.000-08:00

President Bush said, a few days ago, that the news media is not conveying a true story of the situation in Iraq. He suggested that readers go beyond the mainstream media and read blogs to find out what is really happening in that country.

I did. President Bush is right. While the media is telling us that things in Iraq are bad, they are not telling us the entire truth. The truth is that things in Iraq are really, really bad.

Go read it yourself. Start with Riverbend. If you have the time I would suggest that you go back in the blog archives and start at the very beginning of her postings. Follow the history of her family as it experieces hope, as Suddam is unseated and then apprehention and now despair.

If Riverbend isn't your cup of tea, then go here and choose your reading from other Iraqi bloggers.

Oh My God, They're Going To Kill Kenny!

2006-03-10T22:21:00.000-08:00

Great Leader is looking like a fool over the ports deal - The Democrats are gaining points in the area of national security. Do something, quick!

OK. Here it is.


Danger, Danger! Alert Status Orange!

"FBI warns of threat to college basketball tournament
Fri Mar 10, 2006 7:04 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The FBI warned U.S. law enforcement officials on Friday that an extremist message board suggested carrying out suicide bombings at U.S. college basketball tournament sites but emphasized there was no evidence of a specific threat."

Fool me once, Mr. President, shame on you. Fool me twice? Shame on me.

The Long War

2006-03-10T11:37:00.000-08:00

A great big heartfelt thanks to Crooks and Liars. They have posted "The Long War", a bit done by The Colbert Report (it follows The Daily Show on Comedy Central every night).

"The Long War" has to be one of the most right on pieces done by Colbert. I most highly recommend it. Watch it here.

Sheiks Royally Pissed At Port Delay - Threaten Retaliation

2006-03-09T09:18:00.000-08:00

UPDATE: Rawstory is reporting that Dubai is withdrawing from the ports deal in the face of overwhelming opposition from the American people. More details as they become available...

Now back to my original posting:

From The Hill

"Dubai is threatening retaliation against American strategic and commercial interests if Washington blocks its $6.8 billion takeover of operations at several U.S. ports."

"(T)he emirate let it be known that it is preparing to hit back hard if necessary.
A source close to the deal said members of Dubai’s royal family are furious at the hostility both Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill have shown toward the deal.

“They’re saying, ‘All we’ve done for you guys, all our purchases, we’ll stop it, we’ll just yank it,’” the source said."

Welcome To South Dakota

2006-03-08T19:07:00.000-08:00

All Your Ports Are Belong To Us

2006-03-07T18:20:00.000-08:00

(with two updates)
From an article in the Washington Post:

"DP World officials suggested yesterday that within days, Peninsular & Oriental's operations will belong to them, no matter what Congress does."

With all due respect folks, you might have been wise to consider a different choice of words there. What's the future hold? Lemmee see. (holding hands up to forehead) It's coming to me, yes, it's coming to me, I can see -- I can very clearly see a bunch of really pissed Americans kicking your sorry butts all the way back to Dubai.

And another thing. You DP World folks might just want to consider using a spokesperson named Jim Smith or something. Anything but Sultan Bin Sulayem. Somehow I think that name doesn't do much to reassure us that our ports are going to be in good hands.

Update #1: One of the questions that has been constantly asked is why Bush is pushing so hard for this deal.

From Dissident Voice (I highly recommend clicking on and reading the entire article)

United Arab Emirates is located at the center of an oil-dependent world. This tiny state forms the promontory that juts out into the famed Straits of Hormuz through which 40% of the world’s oil passes every day. Across the narrow straights sits Iran, the next victim on the list of “axis of evil” nations. Any attack on Iran will require that military forces quickly deploy to Dubai to forestall the closing of the straits and the subsequent devastation that would occur to world oil supplies and financial markets.

This is the critical point that is being intentionally concealed by America’s diversionary media. This is the reason that President Bush continues to force the Dubai port plan even though 70% of the American people and Congress resoundingly oppose it.

The importance of UAE as a staging area for future hostilities cannot be overstated. No military strategy can hope to succeed without first establishing a beachhead across the straits in Iran so that the danger of blowing up oil tankers and blocking passage is removed. This tells us that plans for an attack may be on track for late March as originally threatened by Israel.

Tip of the hat to commenter EnoughAlready at AmericaBLOG

Update #2

Last night while discussing this issue with others on AmericaBLOG , I made this observation:

" It's only resonating with "voters" in polls because of pure racism - plain and simple."

I don't think that's it, Rich. My gut feeling is that this ports deal is the first time that most of us in this country have had to face the fact that while we were busy watching American Idol or worrying about whether Tom and Dick or Ann and Sue could get married, the whole damn country has been sold out from under us.

There is racism to the point that it is much easier to imagine Arabs being "foreigners" than the English or other folks who dress and talk more like we do. But it's not really racism that we hearing. It's a primal scream of frustration. We thought that we owned our country and have just discovered that we were really just leasing it, and our lease is up.
Paul in SF | Homepage | 03.08.06 - 2:21 am | #

This morning I discovered that conservative columnist Cinnamon Stillwell had made the same point in this morning's San Francisco Chronicle. She said, in part:

"But the fact that such acquisitions are even being considered points to the larger problem of increasing foreign ownership. As it stands, China, Denmark, Japan, South Korea and Singapore have control over terminals in 36 American port cities. And now we're going to add the United Arab Emirates to that list? The strong reaction to the ports deal speaks to a growing dissatisfaction among Americans at the level of foreign ownership, outsourcing and illegal immigration in our country..."

She also laid the blame where it belongs, not only on Bush, but also on those before him

"Much like previous administrations, the president is simply making the world safe for transnational corporations. It's no coincidence that former presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter are out pushing the Dubai deal. Administration after administration has brought America to the point it's at today, where everything is for sale to the highest bidder. When President George H.W. Bush introduced the concept of a "new world order," it was a harbinger of things to come.

We have entered the era of transnationalism, otherwise known as globalism, and it is sweeping away national identity in favor of an international marketplace. America is becoming nothing more than a hub for the exchange of money, goods and cheap workers. Concern over this issue spans the political spectrum, including the anti-globalization forces on the left and the protectionists on the right. Each faction is opposed to the outcome, for different reasons.

Many of Bush's constituents have awakened to this reality, and the rumblings of discontent have greatly increased. Adding to a series of disappointments since Bush's re-election in 2004, the ports deal may turn out to be the last straw.

The honeymoon is definitely over."

Bite Me

2006-03-03T12:38:00.000-08:00

Source: justinsomnia.org/2005/09/question-intolerance

Lawyers for ex-gay group issue cease and desist letter over this parody. Go read the details here at Pam's House Blend.

Democrats Face New Threat

2006-03-03T08:14:00.000-08:00

The Democrat Party learned today that they face a new, far reaching threat. According to a Gallup/CNN/USA Today poll due to be released today of those polled, when asked who they would likely vote for in November, 53% picked Democrats, 39% Republicans.

The poll has caused a flurry of activity among Democratic leaders. None would respond on record for this article, but several privately told this reporter that those in charge of the party would be meeting today to develop a stratagy to insure the party would not gain any votes as a result of Bush's waning popularity. One leader, speaking off the record said that "We are fully committed to remain as the opposition party. Nothing will keep us from our goal of being #2."

The truth behind the truthiness

2006-03-03T05:58:00.000-08:00

HYDERABAD, India Mar 3, 2006 (AP)— With U.S.-India relations at their highest mark in six decades, President Bush said Friday Americans should see the rapidly growing nation as a land of opportunity instead of a threat.

"There's all sorts of brush here that needs to be cleared!" The U.S. president declared joyfully.

Iraq: Worst Case Scenerio Now Has It's Own Worst Case Scenerio

2006-03-03T04:49:00.000-08:00

Remember just a few short months ago when a halfway realistic forcast of the Iraq situtation somehow got released to the American public? The one, quickly dismissed by the White House, that listed the worst case scenerio as Iraq sinking into civil war?

A Reuters article this morning examines what may lay ahead for the U.S. military if the current slide toward civil war in that country continues.

"If full-scale civil war erupts -- and Iraq appears to be awfully close to that at this point -- even 134,000 troops could be in a highly vulnerable position, especially when you consider how many true combat troops we have there," said Ted Carpenter, defence analyst with the Cato Institute in Washington.

Many U.S. troops in Iraq are supply and logistics personnel. British and Australian combat troops are not expected to make much difference should a bloody free-for-all erupt.

The military could try to stiffen the resolve of Iraqi forces to maintain government authority, by shipping in another U.S. division of about 20,000 troops or by inserting special forces.

But that scenario assumes U.S.-trained Iraqi troops and police would remain loyal in a crisis to the national government, rather than to religious leaders or the sectarian or ethnic militias to which many of them once belonged.

In the worst case, U.S. troops could be forced to withdraw, leaving Shi'ite and Sunni Arab Iraqis at each others' throats and other conflicts possibly ripping the country apart. "You could be confronting situations where there would be full-scale firefights between rival factions," Carpenter said.

"If those divisions explode into massive violence, the U.S. is in a hopeless situation."

Drink The Kool Aid And Repeat After Me: The World Is Safer Now That We Have Toppled Suddam. The World ...

2006-03-01T08:32:00.000-08:00

From the AP:

"A civil war in Iraq could lead to a broader conflict in the Middle East, pitting the region's rival Islamic sects against each other, National Intelligence Director John Negroponte said in an unusually frank assessment Tuesday.
"If chaos were to descend upon Iraq or the forces of democracy were to be defeated in that country ... this would have implications for the rest of the Middle East region and, indeed, the world," Negroponte said at a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on global threats."

And:

"At the Senate hearing, Lt. Gen. Michael Maples, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, painted a similarly stark picture of Afghanistan.

While the government has made progress in disarming private militias, Maples said, his agency estimates that violence from the Taliban and other anti-coalition groups in Afghanistan increased 20 percent last year.

"Insurgents now represent a greater threat to the expansion of Afghan government authority than at any point since late 2001, and will be active this spring," Maples said in his written statement.

Afghan insurgents increased their suicide attacks almost fourfold and more than doubled their use of improvised explosive devices, he said."

And it has cost us just how many billions of dollars and how many lives and broken bodies to get to this point?

"Bush Confident Bin Laden Will Be Captured"

2006-03-01T07:09:00.000-08:00

Really. That was the headline that greeted me this morning. After spewing my coffee (Pam's House Blend, of course) halfway across the room, I scrolled down. Has Vice President Cheney been sent off, trusty shotgun in hand, to bag the elusive bearded bad one? Have we finally turned the corner on incompetence? Naw. Bush has just found a bunch of uneducated folks in one of the poorest regions of the world and figured that they just might fall for his bull. As for the actual progress on the hunt for Bin Laden - hey, we can't comment on an ongoing investigation.

First Amendment - Few Know Or Care About Outdated, Obsolete Document

2006-03-01T05:50:00.000-08:00

A recent study, reported on by the AP, found that Americans know little about the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The First Amendment, of course, was written in 1789 and remained in effect until November 2001 when President Bush, under the authority granted to him by himself, cancelled its provisions.

Of the 1,000 people surveyed only one could name the five freedoms protected by the amendment. 20% of those surveyed thought that the right to own a pet was included.

I would go on about this, but then again, who really gives a shit about the Bill Of Rights anyway?

Military Disputes Troop Poll - Claims Their Poll Shows 98% Support Bush Policies

2006-03-01T05:49:00.000-08:00

Well, actually they haven't come out with it yet. But you and I both know they will soon. It's just kind of difficult for the Green Zone Command to get their spin up to speed right now as the hallway between the copywriter's room and the press room is impassible due to heavy insurgent and sectarian fighting.

Blind Justice

2006-03-01T05:48:00.000-08:00

Early Sunday morning Oakland, CA police were called to investigate reports of shots fired in an industrial area of that city. Police claim that officers were dispatched and could find nothing.

Monday morning, over 30 hours later, workers at neighborhood businesses, returning from their weekends, got curious about the bullet riddled car parked on the street. When they looked inside they found a woman, suffering gun shots in the face and the leg, clinging to life.

Oops. No donuts for a week for those cops.

Oh How Sweet It Is

2006-03-01T05:47:00.000-08:00

From The Washington Post

"Yet at the White House, aides were decidedly downbeat, making dark jokes about the latest political trajectory and the Murphy's Law quality of life in the West Wing these days -- what can go wrong will go wrong. At least, some consoled themselves, Bush (at a 34% approval rating) beat out Vice President Cheney, who was viewed favorably by just 18 percent in the CBS survey."

Can People Be This Stupid? People Can.

2006-02-25T00:00:00.000-08:00

Microwaved Penis Turns Out To Be Fake

By JOE MANDAK, Associated Press Writer

Friday, February 24, 2006

Now I have to admit that the above headline got my attention. The story in a nutshell is that a couple go into a convenience store and ask to warm something up in the microwave there. The clerk notices that the item that they place in the microwave is apparently a severed penis and calls the cops.

Now here is where an admittedly already strange story starts to get seriously weird. It turns out that the woman is due to take a pre-employment drug piss test and she is trying to find a way to beat it. These morons get hold of one of those fake dicks with a pee reservoir , you know, the thing designed for GUYS to hang out of their pants in front of the drug inspector, which they fill with the boyfriend's clean pee.

She and her boyfriend were warming up the device in the microwave so that the pee it dispensed would be body temperature as it streamed out in front of the inspector. That's all fine and good, but didn't she ever stop to think that the drug inspector just might get kinda suspicious when this woman pulls out her dick to pee in the jar? Hello?

I don't know what kind of job she was applying for, but my guess is that unless it was one where the cash register has pictures of food items on the buttons instead of numbers, she probably isn't qualified. I just hope that the mastermind of this plot was the drug addled woman and not her substance free boyfriend.

Party time!

2006-02-24T08:40:00.000-08:00

Stuff you just can't make up...

From The Houston Chronicle:

Military interrogators posing as FBI agents at the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, wrapped terrorism suspects in an Israeli flag and forced them to watch homosexual pornography under strobe lights during interrogation sessions that lasted as long as 18 hours, according to one of a batch of FBI memos released Thursday.

(Sounds like some of the nights I spent under the influence of Chrystal Meth back in my wild days...)

Seems like the real FBI agents complained, saying that the actions would make any information gained not admittable in court, but they were overruled by Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller, who was in charge of the prison at the time.

Now the kicker. The last sentence of the story:

"Miller later left Guantanamo and was sent to Iraq under orders to find better ways of extracting intelligence."

No comment needed...

2006-02-23T07:58:00.000-08:00

The American Association of Port Authorities estimates that ports need $5.4 billion over 10 years to upgrade security, but the Bush administration has budgeted $708 million. (Kansas City Star, 2/23/2006)

and...

The federal government is on the verge of one of the biggest giveaways of oil and gas in American history, worth an estimated $7 billion over five years. (NYTimes via the Lakeland Florida Ledger 2/13/2006)

I won! I won!

2006-02-12T09:54:00.000-08:00

The funny thing is, I don't even remember entering this lottery...

FROM: THE DESK OF THE PROMOTIONS MANAGER
INTERNATIONAL PROMOTIONS/PRIZE AWARD DEPARTMENT
UK,CAMELOT EMAIL LOTTERY WINNINGS
THE NATIONAL LOTTERY
P.O BOX 1010
LIVERPOOL
L70 1NL
REF NO: MELI-T/ 17-F044262312
BATCH: 901/00319/HLP

(AWARD NOTIFICATION (JAVA POWERED ONLINE EMAIL SELECTION 8TH FEB)

We are pleased to inform you of the announcement today of
winners of the CAMELOT JACKPOT LOTTO WINNINGS, PROGRAMS held on 8th
feb 2006.Your company or your personal e-mail address, is attached to
ticket number 901-0148-790-691, with serial number 66109-17 drew the
lucky numbers 990-11-815-37-10-83, and consequently won the
lottery in the 2nd category.

You have therefore been approved for a lump sum pay out of
US$300,000.00 in cash credited to file REF NO: MELI-T/
17-F044262312. This is from total prize money of US$9,000,000.00 shared
among the Thirty (30) international winners in this category.

All participants were selected through a computer ballot system drawn
form 25,000 names from Australia, New Zealand,America, Europe, North
America and Asia, as part of International Promotions Program, which is
conducted annually.

Your fund has been deposited in an escrow account and insured in your
name.Due to the mix up of some numbers and names, we ask that you keep
this award strictly from public notice until your claim has been
processed and your money remitted to your account.

This is part of our security protocol to avoid double claiming or
unscrupulous acts by participants of this program. We hope with a part
will participate in our year high stakes US$100. Million International, you must first contact the claims department by email:
Mr. DUKE ANDREWS claimsprocessonline@yahoo.com
"For processing and remittance of your prize money to a designated account of your choice.Remember, all prize money must be claimed not later than the 15th feb, 2006.All funds not claimed on or before the fixed date will be returned as unclaimed. NOTE: In order to avoid unnecessary delays and complications, please remember to quote your reference and batch numbers in all correspondences with this office. Furthermore, should there be any change of your address, do inform us as soon as possible.

Congratulations again from all our staff for being part of our promotions program.

Sincerely,

Mrs Jane wesley For ukCamelot lotto

Any breach of confidentiality on the part of the winners will result in disqualification and any winner below the age of 18years is automatically disqualified. For processing and remittance of your prize money to a designated account of your choice.Remember, all prize money must be claimed not later than the 15th feb, 2006.

All funds not claimed on or before the fixed
date will be returned as unclaimed. NOTE: In order to avoid unnecessary
delays and complications, please remember to quote your reference and
batch numbers in all correspondences with this office.
Furthermore, should there be any change of your address, do inform us
as soon as possible.

Congratulations again from all our staff for being part of
our promotions program.
Sincerely,
Mrs Jane wesley
For ukCamelot lotto ;

N.B. Any breach of confidentiality on the part of the winners will
result in disqualification and any winner below the age of 18years is
automatically disqualified.

Oh hell, I wasn't supposed to tell anyone? I guess I don't get the money now, huh?

Freedom Of Speech

2006-02-08T05:36:00.000-08:00

Moving in the right direction

2006-01-08T09:03:00.000-08:00

You gotta know some things are moving in the right direction when the crusty old New York Times, in an article about Enron bad boy Michael J. Kopper, nonchalantly mentions the "$1.5 million dream house with its glass stairways and its contemporary Japanese motif that he had designed with his longtime partner, William D. Dodson." and later in the story "Mr. Kopper had begun dating Mr. Dodson, who worked in the finance department at Continental Airlines and also wanted to become an investor."

How pleasing it is to note that the article's writer saw no need to include the words, "admitted", "practicing" or even "homosexual".

Two Turkish Children Die From Bird Flu

2006-01-05T07:30:00.000-08:00

Well, duh. Turkey = Bird doesn't it?

Worst Parents Award Goes to...

2006-01-05T07:28:00.000-08:00

From The San Jose Mercury News:

The oldest of two San Ramon boys left home alone over New Year's weekend was angry Wednesday that he was forced to care for his autistic brother by himself.

``I'm mad they left,'' Joshua Calero, 10, said. ``I'm mad they didn't take us with them.''

Meanwhile, his father and stepmother, Jacob Calero, 39, and Michelle De La Vega, 32, who had been vacationing in Las Vegas, were escorted off their return flight to Oakland on Wednesday and held on suspicion of felony child endangerment, police Sgt. Brian Kalinowski said. The couple, who allegedly had hired a sitter for their puppies while they were away, both declined media interview requests.

Police, alerted by the boys' maternal grandmother, discovered Joshua and his 5-year-old brother, Jason, home alone Saturday night with cereal and frozen meals to eat and a cell phone number to call for emergencies. (Read the rest here)

Thursday's news clips

2006-01-05T06:17:00.000-08:00

Enough about the mine disaster. Where were the tears, TV cameras and reporters when 123 Chinese miners were killed last month? When 161 were killed in November, 65 in July, another 65 in March and 203 in February? Oh. Those 617 folks don't look like our lilly white asses do, so they don't count, eh? Just keep buying those Chinese goods streaming into our Wal-Marts folks.
--------------------

The US military is moving right along in their investigation of war crimes. They announced today that they are charging 65 year old Jerry Texiero with desertion and theft. Texiero committed his "crime" when he was a 24 year old Marine who split rather than go to Vietnam. While Texiero's compatriates who fled to Canada to avoid the draft have since been pardoned, and others who enrolled in the National Guard but skipped out on their duties now hold high government posts, officials seem intent on prosecuting Texiero. Let's see. At this rate the police ought to get around to catching the killer of Tupac Shakur, oh, in the year 2033 or so.

---------------------------

It's alway heartening to watch struggling countries follow the example of the USA. For example, Afghanistan. Taking a page from our playbook, that emerging democracy noted the need for a strong economic base. Here in America that base was cotton. In Afghanistan the cash crop is opium poppies, and this year brings a record crop.

Following again in America's footsteps Afghan leaders took a long hard look at the history of eduction in America. Unable to follow exactly our example, Afghan women have been recruited to fill the vital role once filled by slaves here. Specifically those who teach women to read or write are being killed.

---------------------------------------

Linux and Apple users urge others to stick with Windows even in face of huge new threat

2006-01-02T13:03:00.000-08:00

Updated Jan 4, 2006

A flaw in Microsoft's Windows Meta File has spawned dozens of attacks since its discovery last week, security experts warned Tuesday.

"Right now, the situation is bad, but it could be much worse. The potential for problems is bigger than we have ever seen," (A computer security expert) said. "We estimate 99 percent of computers worldwide are vulnerable to this attack."

Many of the computer users who have switched from Microsoft's Windows operating system are urging current Windows users not to give up on the Microsoft product, even in the face of the huge new threat, which affects all Windows products made in the last 15 years.

"Just do as Microsoft advises, and don't go to any websites, don't use your e-mail and don't log onto any instant messaging system and you should be fine." Said one computer user who switched to Linux last year.

The ex-Windows users are urging the 95% of computer owners who do use Windows to stick with that system. They point out that there would be severe reprocussions if there were a widespread migration away from Windows.

"Can you imagine the havoc that would be wreaked on the economy if the billions of dollars which are being spent by consumers to buy virus protections, anti-spam programs, spyware blockers and the like were to dry up?" asked one. "Not to mention the impact on consumer spending if the spam publishers were suddenly denied the millions of infected computers they use to secretly email their ads. It would be devestating to computing as we know it."

That 5% of computer users also owe a big debt to the other 95% who still utilize Windows. "If all those folks weren't standing out there with a virtual sign on their back saying 'Attack Me', the bad guys might start targeting us. The way it is now, though, it doesn't make any sense to go after 5% of the total, when the same effort will allow you to crack into and steal from 95% - So please, stick with Windows", he said.

Want a good laugh?

2006-01-02T12:40:00.000-08:00

Check out Dave Barry's column "The Year In Horror"

January

... when President George W. Bush is sworn in for a second term, pledging in his inauguration speech that, over the next four years, he will continue, to the best of his ability, trying to pronounce big words. In a strongly worded rebuttal, the Democratic leadership points out that, when you get right down to it, there is no Democratic leadership.

Bush's nominee to be U.S. attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, undergoes a grueling Senate hearing in which Democrats probe him repeatedly about his views on torture. At one point the Democrats threaten that, if Gonzales does not give them the information they want, they will force him to listen, without ear protection, to a question from Sen. Joe Biden. "No!" screams Gonzales. "Anything but that!"

But the mood is more upbeat in ...

February

... when Bush, seeking to patch up the troubled relationship between the United States and its European allies, embarks on a four-nation tour. When critics note that two of the nations are not actually in Europe, the White House responds that the president was "acting on the best intelligence available at the time."

A study by researchers at the University of Utah proves what many people have long suspected: Everybody talking on a cellphone, except you, is a moron.

Meanwhile, in ...

March

... the economy gets a boost when the jobless rate plummets, as hundreds of thousands of unemployed cable-TV legal experts are hired to comment on the trial of Michael Jackson. Jackson is charged with 10 counts of being a space-alien freakadelic weirdo. Everybody agrees this will be very difficult to prove in California.

A California jury finds that actor Robert Blake did not kill his wife. The jury also rules that John Wilkes Booth had nothing to do with the Lincoln assassination, and that bears do not poop in the woods.

Read the rest of the column

Miracle In Spokane, WA. Church leaders rejoice

2006-01-02T12:21:00.000-08:00

Just days after a court ruling threatened to bankrupt the diocese of Spokane, Church leaders say that their prayers were answered. "God told us to look at our figures again and we discovered that the diocese may have $57.5 million available without selling any church property" said one church leader. That’s double the initial estimate.

Last week's court decision, in response to the Diocese's claim that it didn't have enough money to pay jury awards to victims of priestly child sex abuse, ruled that the church property wasn't owned by the individual parishes, as church leaders claimed, but by the Diocese. The court ordered the properties onto the auction block to make up the shortfall.

Bush-Cheney Energy Policy Meets Goals Ahead Of Schedule

2006-01-02T11:51:00.000-08:00

The White House was gleeful today on receiving word that Iraq's oil exports have hit their lowest levels ever. Bush and Cheney reportedly were seen giving each other a "high five" and chortling over the fact that the anti-war crowd has been completely hoodwinked.

"We fooled them from the beginning" smirked the President. "They thought that the point was to capture the oil for America's use. Why the hell would we want a glut of oil on the market? The fools were going around chanting 'No War For Oil', they should have chanted 'No War For Oil Shortages'."

Vice President Cheney was heard to murmer "War on terror all right. We were 'terror'fied that oil prices might go down." The war, of course has played a large factor in the worldwide shortage of oil, leading to high prices at the pump, and obscene profits for the oil companies.

Cat Calls 911 to help his human

2005-12-31T13:30:00.000-08:00

Police aren't sure how else to explain it. Apparently when the cat's human fell from his wheelchair and couldn't get up or reach the phone, the cat dialed 9-1-1. When emergency dispatchers at the other end of the line couldn't get anyone to talk to them, they sent the cops to investigate. The victim told police that he had tried to teach the cat to dial 9-1-1 when the had gotten the animal a couple of years ago, but wasn't ever sure if the training had stuck. Obviously it had.

CHENEY WAS RIGHT - DAMN!

2005-12-31T07:20:00.000-08:00

Our Dear Leaders are seriously pissed that word has leaked about the double super secret doings of the Bush administration, particularly their programs of rendition, including a network of clandestine prisons where US officials are "disappearing" those they deem a threat, and, most recently, the leaking of the details of a domestic communications spying program which runs counter to provisions of the US Constitution and a federal law specifically put in place to guard against such abuses.

Vice President Cheney has said the leaks are a threat to our security. Damn right they are.

I can't tell you how insecure I feel knowing that our President believes that he can invoke his powers as commander in chief over something as nebulous as the "war on terror". What excuse will we hear the next time he wants to make an end run around the Constitution? Maybe it's necessary to help us win the "war on poverty" or "the war on drugs"? How about that friggin' "war on Christmas"?

And as far as "disappearing" people and hiding them in prisons in countries that condone and support the use of torture, Mr. Bush should remember that this is not an original idea.

From: The Vanished Gallery

Desaparecidos is the Spanish word for "The Disappeared." For thousands of Argentine families, this word has become a symbol of a long harrowing nightmare.
In a coup on March 24, 1976, a military junta seized power in Argentina and went on a campaign to wipe out left-wing terrorism with terror far worse than the one they were combating. Between 1976 and 1983 - under military rule - thousands of people, most of them dissidents and innocent civilians unconnected with terrorism, were arrested and then vanished without a trace.

In 1983, after democracy was restored, a national commission was appointed to investigate the fate of the disappeared. Its report revealed the systematic abductions of men women and children, the existence of about 340 well organized secret detention centers, and the methodic use of torture and murder. According to former president, Carlos Menem, records of the atrocities were destroyed by the military, following the 1982 Falklands War. The disappeared have not been heard of to this day.

These pages are a humble attempt to bring the voices of the desaparecidos and their loved ones to the world. The vanishing was swift, a burst into a home at night, a few minutes and they were gone - not enough time to be heard. We owe it to them.

Make Them Eat Their Friggin' Words

2005-12-30T06:59:00.000-08:00

"(T)his nation sits at a crossroads. One direction points to the higher road of the rule of law. Sometimes hard, sometimes unpleasant, this path relies on truth, justice and the rigorous application of the principle that no man is above the law. Now, the other road is the path of least resistance. This is where we start making exceptions to our laws based on poll numbers and spin control. This is when we pitch the law completely overboard when the mood fits us, when we ignore the facts in order to cover up the truth. ...

No man is above the law, and no man is below the law. That's the principle that we all hold very dear in this country." - Representative Tom DeLay, 1998

The House of Representatives must step up and do its part to hold this Administration accountable for its actions and demand answers by conducting thorough and dignified hearings concerning spying on Americans. So, if you have not signed Representative Louise Slaughter's petition yet, please sign it today and pass it on: click here.

Gee, George. I kinda liked The Constitution, and this document, too.

2005-12-29T23:37:00.000-08:00

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, having its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient suffrance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their acts of pretended legislation.

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offenses:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighboring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally, the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever:

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizen taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connection and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The Original Thirteen Colonies:
- Carolina (Later divided into North and South Carolina)
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Georgia
- Maryland
- Massachusetts
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- New York
- Pennsylvania
- Rhode Island
- Virginia

Non-union "scab" workers' mistake blows hole in plane during flight

2005-12-28T10:44:00.000-08:00

Yet once again big business has decided that the war against organized labor is more important that the safety of the consumer.

As you might remember, in the year 2000 Ford and the Firestone tire company came under fire due to a large number of fatal and injury accidents involving Explorer SUVs equipped with Firestone tires. Investigators learned that many of the tires which failed were made by non-union scabs brought in by Firestone to replace union workers who were involved in a labor dispute. Studies showed that the tires made by the non-union strike breakers failed 15 times as often as those made by the union employees that those scabs had replaced.

In the latest incident, scab workers at Sea-Tac airport in Seattle have been blamed for an incident which placed an airliner and all its passengers and crew at risk. According to NTSB investigators, the non-union replacement workers, who were responsible for " an increase in ground-damage incidents at Sea-Tac after (the airline) replaced 472 unionized workers in May" struck and creased the skin of the airliner with a piece of baggage handling equipment.

Twenty minutes into the flight the damage blew open, creating a 1 foot by half a foot hole, which depressurized the cabin of the aircraft. The pilot immediately took the plane into a steep dive, while passengers and crew scrambled to don oxygen masks.

From The Seattle Times

"Absolutely terrifying" flight after ground-crew mistake

By Jennifer Sullivan and Melissa Allison
Seattle Times staff reporters

Alaska Airlines Flight 536 was 20 minutes out of Seattle and heading for Burbank, Calif., Monday afternoon when a thunderous blast rocked the plane.

Passengers gasped for air and grabbed their oxygen masks as the plane dropped from about 26,000 feet, passenger Jeremy Hermanns said by phone Tuesday.

"This was absolutely terrifying for a few moments," said Hermanns, 28, of Los Angeles. "Basically your ears popped, there's a really loud bang and there was a lot of white noise. It was like somebody turned on a leaf blower in your ear."

Though the MD-80 plane was quickly stabilized, he said, passengers spent the next 25 minutes tearful and anxious. An "acrid" odor of burning plastic overwhelmed the cabin, Hermanns said.

"A lot of people were very stunned," said Hermanns, who had been visiting Seattle with his fiancée for Christmas. "It was surreal."

But hey, we saved a few bucks on labor costs.

Coalition Of The Unwilling Grows

2005-12-28T10:14:00.000-08:00

From The L.A. Times December 28

Poland Adds to Coalition Troop Cuts
The U.S. ally says it will pull out 40% of its force. The news comes as Bulgaria and Ukraine complete their exits, dismaying Washington.
By Paul Richter
Times Staff Writer

December 28, 2005

WASHINGTON — The U.S.-led international military coalition in Iraq shrank further Tuesday after Bulgaria and Ukraine completed troop withdrawals and Poland announced it was reducing its contingent 40% while switching to a noncombat role.

Responding to appeals by U.S. officials, the Polish government reversed an earlier plan to remove all of its troops by the end of this year. But officials of the East European nation said the 900 remaining soldiers of its previous 1,500-strong force would focus almost exclusively on training Iraqis as they wind down their mission over the next year.

Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz said in Warsaw that the government would like to complete the drawdown of its forces "not in an abrupt way, but gradually."

In a previously announced departure, Ukraine removed a final 876 troops. Bulgaria withdrew 380.

America's partners in the "coalition of the willing," as the Bush administration had dubbed it, have dwindled from a peak of 38 nations and 50,000 troops in mid-2003 to 27 countries and about 22,000 troops, according to a recent State Department tally. Most of the remaining countries have announced that they will end their participation in 2006.

Because only the 8,000-member British force plays a substantial combat role, the disappearance of the international contingent would not be a major military setback for the United States. But the departures represent a political setback for the administration, because foreign troops help lend international legitimacy to the effort to build a new Iraq.

Read the entire article here.

Blair again convinces Bush not to bomb "anti-democracy" media outlet

2005-12-28T09:48:00.000-08:00

Word out of London is that once again Prime Minister Tony Blair used his calming influence to talk US President George W. Bush from bombing a media outlet which the American leader accused of lending support and comfort to the enemy. The target of Bush's ire was the British paper The Globe and Mail which published this.

Post-Gazette Takes On King George

2005-12-28T09:15:00.000-08:00

Columnist Reg Henry blasts Bush:

Its Good To Be King George

As I was saying to a fellow peasant just the other day, it is ironic that this country should rebel against one King George only to bow down before another monarch of the same name more than 200 years later...

Henceforth, throughout the land, let him be proclaimed as His Royal Texas-ship, Defender of the Faith, Interpreter of the Constitution, Protector of the SUVs, Guardian of the Malls, Warrior King, Scourge of the Liberals, Bane of the Activist Judges, His Most High Majesty and Most Excellent King George W. the First of Many.

Read the whole thing here

DUH!

2005-12-26T08:57:00.000-08:00

From The Seattle P.I.

WASHINGTON -- In an unusually candid admission, the federal chief of AIDS research says he believes drug companies don't have an incentive to create a vaccine for HIV and are likely to wait to profit from it after the government develops one.

And that means the government has had to spend more time focusing on the processes that drug companies ordinarily follow in developing new medicines and bringing them to market.

"We had to spend some time and energy paying attention to those aspects of development because the private side isn't picking it up," Dr. Edmund Tramont testified in a deposition in a recent employment lawsuit obtained by The Associated Press.

Tramont is head of the AIDS research division of the National Institutes of Health, and he predicted in his testimony that the government will eventually create a vaccine. He testified in July in the whistle-blower case of Dr. Jonathan Fishbein.

"If we look at the vaccine, HIV vaccine, we're going to have an HIV vaccine. It's not going to be made by a company," Tramont said. "They're dropping out like flies because there's no real incentive for them to do it. We have to do it."

2005-12-21T23:18:00.000-08:00

From The New York Times, Dec. 25, 2005

U.S., Citing Abuse in Iraqi Prisons, Holds Detainees
By ERIC SCHMITT and THOM SHANKER
The military will not turn over detainees to Iraq until officials are satisfied that Iraqis are meeting U.S. standards.

Oh, I guess they mean these standards:

News Snips

2005-12-13T08:03:00.000-08:00

Torturous Path To Democracy

Troops find more tortured prisoners in Iraq

American and Iraqi troops have found hundreds of prisoners packed so tightly into a Baghdad detention centre that they had trouble lying down, it was announced yesterday. Some had been tortured.

Of the 625 men, 13 were taken to hospital to be treated for broken bones or the effects of electric shocks. Others had fingernails pulled out or cigarette burns on their necks and backs.
*****
Council of Europe probe backs claims of CIA prison flights

PARIS (AFX) - The CIA appears to have abducted suspects in Europe and illegally transferred them to other countries, according to the preliminary results of a Council of Europe investigation released today.

'Legal proceedings under way in certain countries appear to show that individuals were abducted and transferred to other countries without respect for any legal assistance procedures,' the Swiss senator who leads the inquiry, Dick Marty, said as he presented his findings to date.

(For an interesting article on how the US got caught, go here)
*****

Backstory: 1,000 days in Iraq
Tuesday marks the 1,000th day of the war in Iraq. Apart from the debate over its purpose and progress, here are some basic facts about the conflict.
Check out these figures from the Christian Science Monitor.
*****

Our Tax Dollars At Work? Not!

2005-12-12T19:50:00.000-08:00

How do multinational corporations rip off the poor? Here's one I hadn't been aware of. From an interview on Australia's ABC Network with Raymond Baker, guest scholar and the Brookings Institute in Washington DC and author of Capitalism's Achilles Heel: dirty money and how to renew the free-market system.

RAYMOND BAKER: (A) thousand billion dollars a year of dirty money crosses borders.

Half of that, in my estimate, comes out of the poor countries of the world, developing and transitional economies, and those are the countries that are tremendously hurt by these flows, because that is for the most part, a one-way flow out of those countries into western accounts.

MARK COLVIN: And so there you're talking about corrupt, say, African dictators just shovelling what's often aid money into Swiss bank accounts for instance?

RAYMOND BAKER: That's part of it. I'm also including in that calculation transfer pricing, that multinational corporations use to move money that is tax evading out of developing countries.

MARK COLVIN: How do they do that?

RAYMOND BAKER: They price transactions in such a way as to reduce taxes in one place and shift profits, for example, into a tax haven. If you vary prices of what you're selling, the same thing can be sold at different prices to different countries for the purpose of moving money out of those countries, and particularly lodging it in tax havens.

MARK COLVIN: So it must be keeping the world's accountants very busy, all of this stuff?

RAYMOND BAKER: It certainly does. In fact, the larger accounting companies typically maintain transfer pricing departments that advise their clients, advise corporations on the efficacy of transfer pricing and in effect, how to get away with it.

MARK COLVIN: Is that done mainly in the developing world, or would that be affecting all countries, countries like Australia and the United States?

RAYMOND BAKER: All countries, including Australia, the United States. The United States has a great deal of money flowing into tax havens through transfer pricing. The same thing is true out of European countries. It's done by virtually all multinational corporations.

MARK COLVIN: Is it illegal or is it just to difficult to police?

RAYMOND BAKER: It is illegal. It breaks laws against mail fraud, wire fraud and normally, it would break laws against filing false customs documents. However, because these laws are so seldom enforced in the United States, in Europe and Australia and elsewhere, it's done with a great deal of frequency.

Thursday's News

2005-12-08T08:52:00.000-08:00

Snippets From The Internets:

US "Isolated" At Climate Talks

href="http://news.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=us/1-0&fp=4398351be8d4b91f&ei=1lWYQ5S_FJPcaMi18ZcO&url=http%3A//www.news24.com/News24/Technology/News/0%2C%2C2-13-1443_1847335%2C00.html&cid=1102613215">Montreal - The United States found itself isolated on Wednesday as other countries, including ally Australia, backed the early start of negotiations for deeper cuts in greenhouse gases, the fossil-fuel pollution blamed for global warming.

*****

UK Nobel literature laureate brands Iraq war a "US crime"

LONDON, Dec. 8 -- Ailing British Nobel literature laureate Harold Pinter fiercely attacked the Anglo-American decision to go to war in Iraq in a pre-recorded speech aired at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm on Wednesday.

The British playwright said the Iraq war was one of a number of"US crimes" and mocked Tony Blair's Britain as "pathetic and supine", according to The Independent on Thursday.

The invasion of Iraq was "a bandit act", "an act of blatant state terrorism, demonstrating absolute contempt for the concept of international law ... an arbitrary military action inspired by a series of lies upon lies and gross manipulation of the media andtherefore of the public." he said.

Pinter, who has been treated for cancer in recent years, was supposed to have delivered the traditional Nobel lecture in person,but was forced to cancel his trip to Sweden because of poor health.

Pinter began his speech by explaining that most of his plays had been born from a single line, word or image that came into hishead. But the Nobel Prize winner interrupted his literary meanderings with an impassioned tirade against the Iraq war.

He continued: "We have brought torture, cluster bombs, depleteduranium, innumerable acts of random murder, misery, degradation and death to the Iraqi people and call it 'bringing freedom and democracy to the Middle East'... the justification for the invasion of Iraq was that Saddam Hussein possessed a highly dangerous body of weapons of mass destruction, some of which couldbe fired in 45 minutes, bringing about appalling devastation. We were assured that was true. It was not true."

*****

Lords ban "torture evidence"

LONDON (Reuters) - The Law Lords ruled on Thursday that information gleaned from torture anywhere in the world was unacceptable as evidence in British courts.

Rights groups immediately said the ruling sent a clear signal to governments around the world who are wrestling with accusations that they participated in, provided facilities for, or used evidence in court extracted from people detained as part of a CIA programme known as "rendition".

*****<

Woman convicted of AOL Schiavo death threat

San Francisco. A federal jury convicted a San Francisco woman Tuesday for posting a threat on an online message board to kill the husband of Terri Schiavo, the brain-damaged Florida woman who died in March after the removal of her feeding tube.

According to FBI Special Agent Christopher Sadlowski, defendant Dera Marie Jones wrote on March 23: "If she dies I will kill Michael Schiavo and the judge. This for real!" on an America Online message board that dealt with the Schiavo case.

Jones, 32, told FBI agents that she was "just kidding" when she posted it and that she had to change her screen name because of threats she received because of her message, Sadlowski wrote in a court affidavit.

*****

Army To Spend $1.35 Billion In Next 5 Years To Attract Cannon Fodder

From staff and wire reports

December 8, 2005

The creator of the U.S. Army's "Army of One" advertising slogan just got discharged.

Chicago-based advertising giant Leo Burnett USA was dismissed Wednesday as the Army's advertising agency in favor of McCann Erickson New York after a formal review of the account.

The U.S. Army estimates the new contract to be worth $1.35 billion over five years.

The advertising agency shake-up comes as the Army missed its recruiting target for the budget year ended Sept. 30 for the first time since 1999.

*****

Straight Men Are Strange

The Olympian:

A Lacey man was arraigned Wednesday on charges that he allegedly locked his wife and 1-month-old son in their motor home before leaving for work each day.

Two Lacey police officers found a padlock on the motor home after they were dispatched to the 8900 block of Martin Way about 3:30 p.m. Tuesday.

They were able to talk with the 33-year-old woman through an open window. She said her husband, Donald T. Carlson, 38, locked them in for the past week before going to work, according to a police report.

The officers gained entry into the motor home after a lieutenant brought bolt cutters to the scene. Inside, they found the wife had telephone access.

They then visited Carlson at a job site in Hawks Prairie. He acknowledged locking the two inside the motor home.

He said his wife had “attention deficient disorder” and forgets his requests to not talk to some of the “drunks and drug users” living nearby, the report said.

Carlson told police they often visit the motor home, and he wanted assurances that they wouldn’t handle his child.

He said his wife could force open the door of the motor home at any time because it was secured with a padlock that cost $1.

Carlson was arrested on suspicion of two counts of unlawful imprisonment, a felony punishable by up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine, or both.

He was being held at Thurston County Jail. Bail was set at $5,000.

And from the same paper:

The principal of Olympic Elementary School in Chehalis has been charged with child rape.

Dion Labadie is accused of having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old Napavine girl he met online, according to Lewis County Prosecutor Jeremy Randolph.

Labadie, 35, resigned Nov. 20 and now is in the Lewis County Jail, where bail has been set at $50,000.

A guardian for the girl became suspicious when he discovered several hundred text messages from Labadie and found the two together at a restaurant early one morning, according to authorities.

The girl told detectives she loved Labadie and believed he was ready to leave his wife and children to be with her.

Randolph said the girl is the only suspected victim.

Want A 1940's Style of Diversity?

2005-12-05T21:54:00.000-08:00

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights groups call for urgent meeting with Ford Motor Company!

UPDATED: This is turning into a big story folks. Weigh in. Call or email your local Ford dealer and let her or him know that you are not pleased. Then write a letter to your local paper. More: click on the words "confidential agreement" in the story below to read about the meeting between AFA and Ford. (another thanks to Americablog).

WASHINGTON, Dec. 5, 2005 — Below is a unity statement on media reports of Ford Motor Company entering into a confidential agreement with the American Family Association:

“We are deeply dismayed by reports in the media and otherwise that the Ford Motor Company has entered into a confidential agreement with the extremist American Family Association (AFA) that requires Ford to stop advertising in lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) media. If there is an agreement with AFA, we expect Ford to disavow it. We expect Ford to publicly reaffirm its historic support for our community. And, we expect Ford to meet with LGBT representatives this week to resolve these concerns.”

Family Pride
Freedom to Marry
Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD)
Gay and Lesbian Medical Association
Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN)
Human Rights Campaign
Mautner Project, the National Lesbian Health Organization
Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund
Lesbian and Gay Rights Project, American Civil Liberties Union
National Black Justice Coalition
National Center for Lesbian Rights
National Center for Transgender Equality
National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs
National Gay and Lesbian Task Force
National Youth Advocacy Coalition (NYAC)
Out & Equal Workplace Advocates
PFLAG National (Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays)
Servicemembers Legal Defense Network
Triangle Foundation
* * * * * * *

Ford Motor Company rolled over when this anti-gay group showed up and accused them of being "pro-gay". If we just silently stand by and let this happen then within a very short time other corporations will start following suit. We have worked too hard for decades in our struggle for equality to be forced back into the closets of the 1940's. The strides that we have made over those years are at severe risk right now. Each and every one of us must speak up. Now.

No "tip of the hat" here, instead a full "bow from the waist" to John Aravosis at Americablog.com for outstanding reporting and organizing on this issue. Please, head over there and follow John's suggestions to help move this issue.

Stop Paying The War Tax Included On Your Phone Bill?

2005-12-04T12:16:00.000-08:00

According to an article by San Francisco Chronicle consumer watchdog David Lazarus, thousands of Americans are expressing their opposition to the Iraq war by refusing to pay the "war tax" levied on all US phone subscribers as part of their monthly bill. Not only are they refusing to pay, but many phone service providers are making it easy for them to do so. For example, AT&T and Cingular Wireless when requested to do so by the customer will no longer include the tax on that customer's bill, but they do warn that under federal law they must report that customer's actions to the IRS.

As the article points out, refusing to pay this or any other federal tax can leave individuals open to prosecution, but due to the small amounts involved - well less than $2 per month for most folks in the San Francisco area - and the large amount it would take to threaten, much less prosecute those involved, the government has little incentive to take legal action.

For more information visit www.hanguponwar.org

Paul's rants

So what else is new?

PAULS RANTS EXCLUSIVE!

GOOD NEWS FOR THE DEMOCRATS

Nothing wrong with overly friendly emails

AT LEAST THAT'S CLEARED UP

Catholic League's Head blames boys for being molested.

COMPUTER TECHS DESPERATELY NEEDED

CANDIDATE FACING "N-WORD" ACCUSATIONS

FOR SHAMES SAKE

CONSERVATIVES CARE!

MAKING AMERICA SAFER

Trust Us?

Aleta Fenceroy 12/27/1948 - 9/23/2006

Congratulations America!

To a friend who is leaving us too soon...

Is there a doctor in the house?

Bind Moggling

Linux is just so gay

Action Alert - State helping homos recruit children

Operation Iraqi Liberation - update

Bush's Other Iraq Invasion

By Antonia Juhasz, AlterNetPosted on August 22, 2005, Printed on August 5, 2006http://www.alternet.org/story/24307/

Home Depot Rules!

The Final Solution

And We Accomplished Exactly What?

Have We No Shame?

Food For Thought

A "Must Watch" Video

No S--t, Sherlock

Time To Pay The Piper

I Could Tell You, But Then I Would Have To Kill You

"Siga El Dinero" (Deepthroat)

And How's Your Day?

It's Baaack!

What The Fuck, Fox?

More Good News Being Ignored By Liberal MSM!

The Danger Is On The OTHER Border!

Bless You, Steve

Damn It. Why Can't People Just Stay In Their Pigeon Holes?

In Unity With Our Young

"The Decider" determined to take on oil companies

Who Woulda Thought?

Courageous Long Island county takes action to protect health workers

President Bush finds cause of skyrocketing gas prices - Enviormental protection regulations

Treehuggers Lies Debunked

Unpatriotic Tree-Huggers Sign On To Demo's "Global Warming" Myth

Why Does The Press Hate Freedom Of Speech?

Iraqi March To Democracy Ahead Of Schedule, Rummy and Bush Vindicated

The American Taliban's Foot Soldiers?

There Should Be A Special Place In Hell For People Like This

White House Breathes Sigh of Relief

Press gets it wrong - again

The Prez is right

Oh My God, They're Going To Kill Kenny!

The Long War

Sheiks Royally Pissed At Port Delay - Threaten Retaliation

Welcome To South Dakota

All Your Ports Are Belong To Us

Bite Me

Democrats Face New Threat

The truth behind the truthiness

Iraq: Worst Case Scenerio Now Has It's Own Worst Case Scenerio

Drink The Kool Aid And Repeat After Me: The World Is Safer Now That We Have Toppled Suddam. The World ...

"Bush Confident Bin Laden Will Be Captured"

First Amendment - Few Know Or Care About Outdated, Obsolete Document

Military Disputes Troop Poll - Claims Their Poll Shows 98% Support Bush Policies

Blind Justice

Oh How Sweet It Is

Can People Be This Stupid? People Can.

Party time!

No comment needed...

I won! I won!

Freedom Of Speech

Moving in the right direction

Two Turkish Children Die From Bird Flu

Worst Parents Award Goes to...

Thursday's news clips

Linux and Apple users urge others to stick with Windows even in face of huge new threat

Want a good laugh?

By Antonia Juhasz, AlterNet
Posted on August 22, 2005, Printed on August 5, 2006
http://www.alternet.org/story/24307/