Evil Catholics Defy the Sanctity of the Church

It's my job and Jesus' General's job to point out hypocrisy in religion. He does a great job of it today. Evil Catholics who don't think it's a sin to receive Holy Communion and support gay rights defiantly did so yesterday and Jesus' General applauds the Catholic Church on their efforts to block the doors to the Church. You must check it out immediately and then come back here of course.

Today's getting to know your blonde friend feature: I don't know why it's my job to point out religious hypocrisy when my life is so darn eccentric eclectic. I had a calling back in the late 1980's to do so. Seriously. It was an honest to god religious calling that forced me into a seminary for several years at night school achieving a masters degree in theology of all things. Don't get me wrong. I am no saint. I'm a guitar playing, song writing, beer swigging, butt smoking, 40 something, raspy voiced blues, rock and jazz singer who gigs in bars regularly. More on me another time.

Wing Nut Whining

Some poor 19 year old boy who writes for "Town Hall" was lamenting that hardly any right wingers got asked to speak at college commencements this year. He lamented that mostly "lefties" were asked. He was amazed that Jon Stewart of the Daily Show was the most sought after commencement speaker. Did anyone ever notice that a lot of so called "lefties" have great senses of humor? We call them comedians. It's a sign of intelligence: sense of humor and brains. I have to give this kid credit though for one hilarious part of his article:

"Strangely, prominent conservative/populist media people like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Tony Snow and Bill O'Reilly are not scheduled to speak anywhere."

The right wingers have no sense of humor. The lead story in World Net Daily is whining that Clinton is going to help the Kerry campaign because he has charisma. It's true that Kerry isn't Mr Personality, but honestly, at this point in time, who cares? He is probably one of those guys who is more friendly in person. Bush is just plain goofy when he gives a speech. I'll take serious over goofy any day.. but Clinton sure was a master of charisma and if anyone recalls, we had it pretty good during the Clinton Admin. (hat tip to Doomocracy). Mr Kerry is facing the most treacherous administration in the history of the United States. This really isn't very funny. Let the lefty pundits make the jokes this time. The candidates ought to be sticking to the serious stuff anyway.

WND's other lead story is about a book that blames Clinton for 9/11. yawn. I wonder if it blames Clinton for Mr Bush's sitting in a classroom like a dufus that morning doing nothing and blaming Clinton for NORAD being told to stand down? Over the weekend, Clinton gave a commencement address at Cornell University and challenged students to pursue "the eternal mission of American democracy" and he said "If you live in a world where you cannot kill, occupy or imprison all your actual or potential adversaries ... you have to try to build a world with more friends and fewer terrorists." How very terribly unchristian of him. NOT.

Speaking of Clinton, Michael over at Public Domain Progress noticed that a Reuter's story about Mr Bush displaying Saddam's gun in the oval office includes these absolutely unnecessary 2 sentences (only the press in Australia bothered to edit them out):

The magazine quoted a visitor who had been shown the gun, which is kept in a small study off the Oval Office where Bush displays memorabilia. It is the same room where former President Clinton had some of his encounters with former intern Monica Lewinsky.

It's Memorial Day today. Let's forget Monica Lewinsky. It was not a matter of national security, nor did she hamper our democracy. Blowjobs do not count as "sex". I went to Catholic schools all my life, and believe me, anything except actual penetration, is NOT sex. Mr Clinton sent a most powerful message to all women in the world: Some hunky, really smart powerful guys like a girl with hips. (heh) I'm digressing. Stop me! :-)

Let's remember all the men and women who fought and died for our democracy and freedom. Let's not let them down. Let's be freer with the use of the word 'fascist' when referring to our present regime. Let's call a spade a spade so that those who fought for us didn't do so in vain. God bless every single person on the planet. No exceptions. God made everyone. We are all God's children which makes us brothers and sisters. Let's try to show love where there is hatred and intolerance.

Coulter is Not Female

Just to remind you that Ann Coulter is not human therefore is not and doesn't have a c*nt.

BlondeSense Decree: Ann Coulter is not to be referred to in human terms- especially not to be referred to as "she" or "her". Coulter has no gender, sex organs or reproductive capacity. Coulter is a pre-programmed Republican "hate" cyborg.

I will thank you not to insult females by referring to "it" as a female in the future.

Thank you.
-The Management

Criminal Justice: Texas Style

For a blues musician and singer, I'm such a geek. But blues people sing about jails, bad men, the south, injustice and stuff... so today let's look at the Texas Crime Rate (Mr Bush was governator of Texas from 1994 until he became President)

~ In the 1990's, 1 out of 5 new prisoners added to US prisons was in Texas.

~ Prison growth in Texas was almost twice (11.8%) the average annual growth (6.1%) of the other states in the 1990's

~ 1 out of every 20 adults in Texas are either in prison, jail, on probation or on parole.

~ The Lone Star State now has more than 700,000 of its citizens under criminal justice control .

~ Although Texas had the most inmates incarcerated from 1999-2001, California edged ahead of the Lone Star State in June 2002. By 2003, Texas beat California and ran a close second with Mississippi.

~ The incarceration rate in California is far lower than Texas though: 455 per 100,000 residents. The National Average is 480 per 100,000 residents and Texas rates 692 per 100,000 residents.

~ If Texas were a country, it would have the highest incarceration rate in the world easily surpassing the US, Russia and China.

~ Blacks are 7 times more likely to be incarcerated than whites in Texas. Whites are more likely to be executed though.

~ Despite adding more than 100,000 prisoners, Texas crime rate declined (-5.1%) at half the national average (-10%) in the 1990's and the least of any of the nation's five largest states [California (-23%), Florida (-5.9%), Illinois (-9.0%), or New York (-21.1%).

~ 89,400 people are incarcerated in Texas for non violent crimes. Texas has more people in jail than Great Britain.

Texas has about the same population as my home state, New York. Downstate NY, where I live is sort of liberal because we are very integrated and ethnically mixed, upstate NY is rather conservative and mostly white except for the cities.

Comparing Texas to NY:

~ Texas added more prisoners (+98,081) than NY's entire prison population (73,233) in the 1990's.

~ Yet since 1995 Texas had the fastest growing prison population and NY had the 3rd slowest growing crime rate.

~ Texas' current crime rate is 5,111 per 100,000

~ Texas' crime rate is 30% higher than NY's 3,588 per 100,000.(In 1998, Texas' murder rate was 25% higher than New York State's rate.)

NY State has not executed anyone for murder since capital punishment was brought back in 1976. Since 1990, Texas has executed 283 inmates and is scheduled to execute 6 more by September of this year.

One more tidbit: the bible belt has the highest crime rate in the country and conducts more executions than any other part of the country.


I believe that the prison system needs a good overhaul nationwide. It's obviously not working nor is it a deterrent to a life of crime. There are many more statistics I did not include. I have more stuff I want to look up.

Sources:
Houston Chronical: Texas again leads U.S. in prisoners
November.org:Texas leads US in incarceration growth
Bureau of Justice Statistics Home Page: poke around here for tons of statistics on who gets executed and incarcerated by demographics, race, religion, age, etc.
Texas Center on Juvenile and Criminal Justice
Texas Death Row Home Page: charming
What to wear to a Texas execution: Not kidding.

Playing the "God" Card is Not Fair or Legal

One of the reasons separation of church and state is a good thing is because there are soooo many churches that it wouldn't be fair to pick one church and let it have any influence over the government. That would cause a bigger stink than 2 party politics. Look at Iraq for instance. They have 3 major Islamic groups who would gladly kill each other. Supposedly the same religion.... hmmm Remember Northern Ireland? Christians?

In the past week or so I was freaking out because the apocalyptic christians who are pro Israel and anti Palestine have influence with the Bush administration. These folks are clearly not Christian and they don't deserve the capitalization of the letter "c" when referring to them cause they support annihilation and armageddon. That's not a Jesus thing for anyone who is non Christian and reading this, I assure you. Plus who wants an American administration that supports annihilation anyway? Well some do, but most of us don't.

Before that or after that, I forget, I was freaking out cause some nutcase Catholic Bishop in Colorado was telling folks they are not communion worthy if they vote for any candidate who is not "pro-life". This of course means that you better vote Republican or be excommunicated. The stupid thing about all this is that the only platform that is remotely Christian about Republicans is the pro-life platform and just about everything else is anti-Christian. I was surprised a Bishop would fall for it. Today I read in the Denver Post that they are calling for an IRS investigation into the Catholic diocese of Denver and all diocese' where they intervene in political campaigns. You see they are NOT supposed to get involved or they lose their tax exemption. One way to get Catholics to toe the line is to hit them in their pocket book.

I'm firmly committed to our getting a new president. I'm firmly committed to separation of church and state. It seems that this president is playing the 'God card' for all it's worth. Visit Americans United for Separation of Church and State for more information about why this is more important than ever in American politics and for the survival of democracy as we used to know it.

Prayers For Peace

One of my favorite spirituo-political bloggers (I made that up), Father Jake Stops the World, offers some Prayers For Peace. Here's one:

WORLD PEACE PRAYER
Lead us from death to life
Lead us from falsehood to truth
Lead us from despair to hope
Lead us from fear to trust
Lead us from hate to love
Lead us from war to peace
Let peace fill our hearts, our world, our Universe.

There is a massive nationwide prayer group constantly praying or collectively willing that George Bush will meet and conquer his foes with success. Obviously this success means death, destruction, sanctions, depleted uranium, mutilations, torture, bulldozing, bombing, shooting, homelessness and years of despair for many more innocent people than guilty people. In our country, corporatism is taking a firm hold and these naive people who collectively will or pray for the success of Mr Bush are also unwittingly willing the demise of our democracy.

Back in early 2001, right after he was inaugurated, Mr Bush started repeating over and over that we were going into a recession. At the time, the economy was strong. By constant repetition and drilling the idea of a recession into the masses, it was a collective willing of the economy to decline.

My point is that even if you are not religious/spiritual and you don't pray per se, you can indeed, by your attitude, your words and your meditations along with millions of others, help change the course we are on and counter the collective willing towards doom and decay.

I deliberately posted a sort of non-religious prayer for everyone above.. a prayer to the force of the universe, the spark, the flame, the creator, your higher power, god, goddess, the 'is-ness of being'. Go to the link above for more prayers and meditations.


Hannity Insanity also called for "Praying for the election of George Bush". We gotta counter that.

Tomorrow I'll go back to being my ridiculous vulgar self.

Why is she so happy?

His name is Manadel al-Jamadi . Mr. Jamadi is the second dead prisoner to appear in photographs taken at Abu Ghraib prison. An autopsy has determined that Mr. al-Jamadi was beaten to death. Her name is Spc. Sabrina Harmon. It's not known nor has it been proven if he was a terrorist or an insurgent or anything evil at all.

I don't know that much about Sabrina. She looks like the average American girl next door with her winning smile and cheerleader expression. Take away the dead body and she looks like she just won first prize in the county fair. She is smiling with her eyes too. Why is she so happy? I dare not even speculate, dear reader.

I wish I had a way to tell the young women in uniform that they made a big mistake. The military is no place for ladies. War is definitely no place for them. Forget equal rights for a minute... women are life givers. It's biological. Unless they are mentally ill, women are nurturers. Training women to not only kill but rejoice in it goes against what it means to be female.

The women seen in the pictures from Abu Ghraib disgust me. They are a discredit to our gender. They must be from the same demon seed as Ann Coulter. Saying this goes against my creed of "live and let live" but women of this ilk shouldn't breed.

Iraqi Wedding Video

Here are some pictures of the wedding that the US fired on in Iraq.. you know, the wedding that they said wasn't really a wedding... take a look

My Letter of Hope and Salvation for All

My Dear Christian Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

Gay marriage will devastate our nation beyond repair. We will no longer be able to safely walk the streets, send our children to the playgrounds or even to school. Our televisions will show only filth and acts of sodomy. Soon polygamy will enter the playing field and orgies will be the norm. My eyes will have to be taken out of their sockets when America becomes Sodom and Gomorrah.

What's more, our children are not allowed to pray aloud in the schools nor are they allowed to view the 10 Commandments in a public place. How on earth can our children learn about values if they are not always within eyesight of our Lord's commandments? How can I remember what the Lord expects of me if it is not written everywhere I look? How can our children ace a test if they cannot pray aloud before the exam? The Holy Bible which was dictated to men thousands of years ago by God's own mouth is not allowed to be read in our schools and of course the most horrible thing is that soon Christian preaching will be deemed hate speech. How Christian speech can be deemed hate speech is beyond me, but it is construed by evil hateful liberal baby killers as such. When we proclaim that God hates homosexuals, this is not hate speech. This is dogma.

I would like to point you to an excellent website that will help us God fearing, saved Christians take refuge: ChristianExodus.org. The plan is that 50,000 of us real Christians will move to South Carolina hopefully before sodomite marriages are forced on us. We will then reestablish a constitutional governance similar to the early United States. We will no longer be beholden to the evil corrupt sodomite government of Washington DC.

George Bush is not one of us. Do not be fooled by his intellect and charm. Remember he blasphemed when he stated that Christians and Moslems worshipped the same God. There is but only 1 true God, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ Almighty. Please sign up to be one of the chosen 50,000 and save your souls. We will live together in peace and true Christianity in a new country one day soon.

God Bless You if You are Blonde Like Me.
Say Amen
amen
..............................................................................

Update 5/28: Gentle readers, The letter above is satire. Do not be alarmed. I have not lost my marbles. Unfortunately many Americans have lost theirs.

There was an article at WorldNetDaily on May 24th about this subject. This morning I did some further research and found this alarming information at WorldNetDaily again:

In the wake of WorldNetDaily's exclusive report this week, hundreds of American citizens have contacted a group of Christian activists looking to secede from the United States to form a republic based on Christian principles.

"It's unleashed a barrage," said Cory Burnell, president of Texas-based ChristianExodus.org . "It's been an incredible response, it's nothing I'm used to and is fairly gut-wrenching for me."

Burnell and like-minded believers are looking to encourage thousands of U.S. citizens to migrate to South Carolina, run for state office, and eventually prompt South Carolina to peacefully secede from the union to create a new country where "government derives its power from the consent of the governed."

He says since WND's story was first posted, the number of those actively interested has jumped from a few dozen people to hundreds. Many people are also stepping forward to work as volunteers, and Burnell himself has had numerous appearances on radio talk shows as well as "Hannity and Colmes" on the Fox News Channel.

Honestly I wouldn't mind if religious whackos went and started their own theocracy somewhere else, but I think it would be nice if they checked with the citizens of South Carolina before they invaded it. This is something to be worried about.

Stop and smell the flowers

This morning about 8 cardinals were chirping wildly and flying around in distress as my fluffy white kitty looked at them through the screen on my front door. The air was sweet with the smell of flowers and fresh from a spring rain. I decided not to read the paper or turn on the news. I went for a walk first.

They Should Stop Calling it "Intelligence"

...especially with these neocon nincompoops at the helm. It's just too ridiculous. So we were fooled by the Iranians into this war with Iraq? Well I wasn't, but Bush et al were. Rude Pundit has such a way with words and no one puts it better than he does.

American Fascism

It's interesting how Amnesty International claims that the US has proven "bankrupt of vision and bereft of principle" in its fight against terrorism and invasion of Iraq. AI has a lot of countries to complain about and the US, once the model of decency is right up there on the top of the list of human rights violators since Mr Bush took office. Thanks Mr Bush. Well it's no wonder. We are barely hanging on to being a democracy. Democracies generally do fall victim to fascist dictactorships if we read our history books.

My friend Billydoom over at Doomocracy has this and more to say about Corporatism, human rights and the seeping of fascism into a capitalistic society:

Corporatism views human rights of little value and a hindrance to realizing the objectives of the ruling elite. Through clever use of propaganda, the population is brought to accept these human rights abuses by marginalizing, even demonizing, those being targeted. The tactic is to use secrecy, denial and disinformation. -American Fascism

NY Heroes Have To Sue For Justice Revisted

How the RNC has the unmitigated gall to come to NYC after the way their leader treated NYC after 9/11 just inflames me. I hereby encourage all protesters from the world over to gather around the RNC in solidarity with New Yorkers, especially for those who died on 9/11, their families and the heroes of the NYFD and NYPD who gave their lives and their health for our city and our country only to be stabbed in the back by our President and his most evil accomplices in Washington.

Yesterday I reported that 1,700 of our heroes have to sue to get medical help they desperately need. Remember when they were promised $90 million from Bush? Well they didn't get it. They got $25 million after much begging and gnashing of teeth. That was just the NYFD, the cops didn't get anything. Remember how the EPA was told by the White House not to release any health warnings about the air quality in NY after 9/11? They finagled with the air quality report and yet Mr Bush continues to politicize 9/11 as if it's his own.

DiPierro, a cop in the 46th Precinct, worked at Ground Zero all night on Sept. 11 and every day for months afterward.

He was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in March, and underwent surgery on April 5 to have two tumors removed.

By September 2002, Shore became crippled with pains in his rib cage that spread to his spine. Months later, he was told those pains were caused by terminal pancreatic cancer.

By April 2003, Shore was having surgery at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center to remove his pancreas, gallbladder and spleen.

Shore is not expected to survive, despite extensive chemotherapy and radiation treatments. His doctor, Charles Hesdorffer, insists the deadly blend of noxious gases released by the collapse of the towers either caused or accelerated his condition. -NY Daily News

Richard Lahm, 49, who retired from the 46th Precinct in the Bronx this year, is battling terminal tonsil cancer - a condition his doctor claims was caused by the toxins released at Ground Zero.

...The FDNY received a $25 million federal grant to monitor health issues with firefighters. The NYPD was denied a similar grant.

...Detective John Walcott is one of those cops who has filed a notice of claim against the city seeking financial compensation after he was diagnosed with cancer last May.

...This year, Walcott has undergone bone marrow transplants and a series of chemotherapy treatments, and he often wakes up in the middle of the night with blood coming out of his eyes.

....NYPD street crime Detective Robert Williamson, 43, became sick with pancreatic cancer in March 2003, a year after he retired from the force. Williamson, his doctors and his attorney, Michael Barach, insist he became sick inhaling carcinogens at Ground Zero 16 hours a day for five months. He never smoked and has no family history of cancer.

...Uniformed Firefighters Association President Steven Cassidy said three Brooklyn firefighters have been diagnosed with thyroid cancer since working at Ground Zero. Another has leukemia. Hundreds more have retired with asthma and other respiratory issues, he said. -NY Daily News

Pete Strahl was on his belly, crawling in a tunnel of debris under 7 World Trade Center to reach an injured civilian...

Strahl is now battling a deadly throat cancer. His lung tests are also showing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, dubbed the "World Trade Center cough" by medical experts.

"They took out my voice box," said Strahl, a 21-year FDNY veteran who retired in August 2002, just months after doctors found a malignant neoplasm of the larynx in his throat.

...Strahl's oncologist, Louis Rosner, said he believes the 47-year-old father of three developed cancer because of his work on Sept. 11 and in the days after.

The deadline to apply for financial help from the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund passed on Dec. 22, 2003.

Advocates and lawyers fear that some serious, even critical, health problems related to 9/11 will not become apparent until months or years later, too late to apply to the fund.

Attorney Michael Barasch, who represents Pete Strahl and a slew of other emergency workers, said he has 73 clients who missed the deadline.

..."Their injuries were not diagnosed until after the deadline. But cancer doesn't have a calendar. Their lungs weren't informed of the deadline to apply," Barasch said. "The fund was very fair to people who had orthopedic injuries but very unfair to people who had latent diseases who were not diagnosed prior to the deadline." -NY Daily News

Message to all you rah rah rah flag wavers out there: Kiss My Big Fat Ass. Don't sing God Bless America to me. Go down to DC and appeal to congress and get them to give our heroes the money they were promised by that piece of shit you voted for in 2000. Raise millions more for their families while you are at it. If 1,700 heroes that worked at Ground Zero are in serious trouble and cannot work, 90 million bucks isn't going to cut it. Your government thinks all citizens are "fungible" and there are no heroes -only big business. Just think, last year the federal government subsidized Wal-mart to the tune of 1 billion dollars. Democracies don't subsidize corporations.

It's Almost the "Day After Tomorrow"

The movie, "The Day After Tomorrow" opens the day after tomorrow I think. As per usual, this disaster movie destroys New York as did 'Independence Day' which was also directed by Roland Emmerich, a NY hating director. This time global warming is the culprit and New York is plunged into the ice age after a tidal wave hits our fair city. If you hate NY, as Mr Bush and Al Qaeda does, then you will certainly enjoy this movie. Here are some interesting excerpts from a review by Dale Peck in the NY Observer, "Drown Town"

...the [tidal] wave in The Day After Tomorrow is medium-sized—just high enough to wet the face of the Statue of Liberty, but leaving her head and upraised arm sticking out of the water. Although the image was, I’m pretty sure, a nod to Planet of the Apes ’ iconic final moment, I was reminded more of a beach-going mom who’s decided to smoke and swim at the same time, determinedly holding that cigarette above the waves.

...The point is not that New Yorkers are living in fear, but that we’re not. We are neither offended nor horrified by these particular images because we have disinvested in the idea of our own destruction, opting instead for the safety of statistics. Another way of saying that 2,801 people died in the World Trade Center is to say that seven million New Yorkers didn’t. This is one of those rationalizations that is either very brave or very foolish, but it is, to all appearances, and for all intents and purposes, the way things are now.

...For Mr. Emmerich, New York would seem to embody all that is evil in our post-Revolutionary, pre-Apocalyptic nation...[it] seems to be the somewhat resigned notion that, well, we deserve what’s coming to us. Some sort of civilization-ending event initiated not by terrorists but by nature or fate, which we might here term our collective unconscious, or perhaps simply our collective stupidity...

...Or maybe he’s just some kind of tough-love junkie. In The Day After Tomorrow , he’s hit upon a narrative of particular, if somewhat belated, resonance to New Yorkers. Quaid’s against-all-odds quest trades on the sense of helplessness that all Americans, but especially New Yorkers, felt in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, as we watched the towers burn for a few minutes that seemed to last millennia, and then searched for endless weeks afterward for survivors, or at least something recognizable to put in the ground. Quaid’s command to Gyllenhaal to "stay in the building" is eerily reminiscent of the advice given to occupants of the World Trade Center after the plane hit the north tower. That advice, we now know, was a mistake—and, to Rudy Giuliani’s credit, just about the only fucking mistake that was made—and Quaid is setting out, not quite three years too late, to rectify it. Come hell or high water (both of which do come, if we accept Dante’s vision of the final pit as a lake frozen by Satan’s breath), Quaid will get his son out. And, of course, he does—dads always get their sons out in movies like The Day After Tomorrow . And when he does, guess what: everybody at my screening laughed again.

..The buildings stand, but the city, and indeed the nation, falls. The fact of the matter is, Americans, for good or ill, have made their pact with the devil, and will have their second homes and S.U.V.’s and personal electronic devices and 4.4 pounds of trash per day; and New Yorkers, in denial or acceptance, have made their peace with life in this city in the wake of the attack on the World Trade Center. We are a city under threat, a threat that it doesn’t take a rocket scientist (or climatologist) to predict will come sooner or later, be it another bomb, or radioactive device, or chemical or biological agent. Our fear of that attack isn’t so great that we’re willing to make changes in our lifestyle—to move, or to live under a police state. Rather, we trust to the safety of the herd: It is the stragglers that will get picked off, the weak, the sick, the old, the unwary or unwise. Someone else will die; when the helicopters come to pull the survivors out, as they do at the end of The Day After Tomorrow , we believe that we will be among the pitifully small crowds gathered on the rooftops of this metropolis we’ve chosen to live in. Mr. Emmerich’s vision of the Apocalypse is just about as plausible as the one in the Book of Revelation, but that isn’t why we don’t believe it. We’re much too busy believing in stories we’ve made up all on our own.

I just love New York disaster movies. After 9/11, it will be interesting to watch a new one. This time mother nature is the culprit but it's because we as a human race failed to heed the warnings. This reviewer mentions that at her screening, New Yorkers were giggling. We're turning Californian. She's right when she says that while almost 3,000 people died on 9/11, 7 million people didn't. I always think I could never live in California because of the earthquakes, brush fires and mudslides and I am amazed how Californians go about their business as usual not thinking about their impending doom. Most of the time nothing happens and most of the time people die of natural causes. Same here.

See the trailer here.

Bush Hates NY. Bush Hates Our Heroes

Bush Ignores Sick 9/11 Firefighters & Cops

Over the last month, President Bush has repeatedly recounted how he was inspired by "the courage of the firefighters and the police"(1) in the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks. He recounted how, when standing atop a pile of rubble at Ground Zero, he was told by a firefighter, "Don't let me down" (2). But more than two years later, he continues to ignore the needs of firefighters and police officers who are now suffering adverse health effects from their rescue efforts at Ground Zero. The situation has reached a head: yesterday, 1,700 cops and firefighters were forced to sue in court for the medical help they desperately need (3.)

While the President's very first campaign commercial used photos of coffin draped corpses (4) being pulled from the rubble, the White House has sought to hide evidence that Ground Zero firefighters and cops were exposed to hazardous toxins. Specifically, the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) intervened to doctor EPA press releases (5) that were supposed to warn the public about toxins near Ground Zero. The press releases were modified to claim that the air was safe - despite the fact that there was not adequate scientific evidence to substantiate that claim. The CEQ was headed by James Connaughton, a former asbestos industry lawyer who represented companies in toxic pollution cases (6).

When Ground Zero firefighters and cops began getting sick, the White House tried to block $90 million in funding (7) for medical treatment. When Congress forced the Administration to accept the $90 million, the Administration then delayed the money (8) and threatened to shut down the health-screening program. Even today, the New York Police Department has been denied much needed health grants (9).

Sources Daily Mislead:

1. Remarks by the President at Victory 2004 Luncheon, 04/20/2004.
2. Remarks by the President to the American Conservative Union 40th Anniversary Gala, 05/13/2004.
3. "1,700 sue over 9/11 sickness", New York Daily News, 05/24/2004.
4. "President Bush: Don't use my husband as your mascot", Salon, 03/05/2004.
5. "W. House Molded EPA's 9/11 Reports", CBS News, 08/22/2003.
6. "It's public be damned at the EPA", New York Daily News, 08/26/2003.
7. "Cough up 9/11 aid, workers tell Bush", New York Daily News, 01/25/2003.
8. "$90M in WTC aid on hold", New York Daily News, 07/10/2003.
9. "1,700 sue over 9/11 sickness", New York Daily News, 05/24/2004.

The Almighty's Gift to Humanity

click for larger version

C Student Indeed

Bush pronounced 'Abu Ghraib' differently 3 times last night within 2 minutes.
If you have a Republican Congress person or Senator, write to him/her and say that your intelligence is repeatedly insulted by this "president".

If God was actually speaking to Bush, I am sure that God would know how to pronounce words in all languages and would inspire a human to speak well on his behalf. I can't take it anymore.

A letter to the Commander in Thief

Dear Mr Bush,

I have read your commencement speech to the students of LSU and was overcome with emotion at some of your comments such as this one:

"Some in this class are graduating with honors, and I congratulate all of you on an achievement that took a lot of discipline. Others may have spent a little less time in the library -- (laughter) -- a little more time keeping the stools warm down at The Chimes. (Laughter and applause.) But you earned your degree, and you, too, can leave today with high hopes. I speak with some authority here -- (laughter) -- I've seen how things can work out pretty well for a C student."

and this one:

"There's no such thing as a self-made man or woman. Everyone has had a little help along the way."

Are you bragging that you coasted through life after doing very little in school or life other than partying? You insulted those students who worked hard to get good grades. How dare you? You became president because of your father's connections and nothing more. In your case you made nothing of yourself. In Bill Clinton's case, he was a self made man. He was a scholar and had no sugar daddy to bail him out all through life like you did.

Mr Bush, are you planning to help these students? Do you think that students who attend a state university have daddies who can set them up in lucrative businesses with rich oil investors and propel them to fame and fortune based on name recognition? The unemployment rate in Louisiana is 5.5% Did you even bother to check before you embarrassed yourself at the commencement? Can you imagine how many students must think you are a total jackass?

The construction and mining jobs are improving at the moment in Louisiana, but students don't go to higher learning institutions for those jobs. Here are some statistics: Professional and business services, 179,500, up from 178,700; educational and health services, 247,000, remained the same as in February; leisure and hospitality, 198,800, down from 200,600; and government, 379,000, down from 379,400. How many of these students do you think will be drafted to fight your wars or how many of these students will end up in the military when they realize the only jobs that they can get will be jobs where they have to wear a hair net to work? This wasn't Harvard or Yale we are talking about.

Your arrogance is astounding. You are unfit for the presidency. Your speech writers are charlatans. Your years of drugs and alcohol abuse betray your diminishing brain cells. You insult those who are deserving of your position in life based on their own merits. You should be ashamed of yourself.

A Disgusted American Patriot,
Ms. BlondeSense

Silent Night: The 7 o'clock news

High ranking US military officers were certainly aware of what was going on at Abu Ghraib and even some of them took part in the heinous interrogations. Did Army Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez protest too loudly? Indeed he did.

2,000 pages of the Taguba Report are mysteriously missing from each Senator's copy of the reports too. There are supposed to be 6,000 pages. The Taguba report is the one that Rummy didn't even look at before he held the press conference about the Abu Ghraib scandal. He already knew about it.

If a responsible news source would interview Sibel Edmonds, the public would know that these people are not responsible for 9/11. Previously secret sworn statements by detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq describe in raw detail abuse that goes well beyond what has been made public, adding allegations of prisoners being ridden like animals, sexually fondled by female soldiers and forced to retrieve their food from toilets. Videos amplify the violence.

Prisoner deaths have reached 37 in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Guardian reports that Iraqi women are also detained and raped repeatedly by US Soldiers. And the US explains its way out of being held responsible under international law. And to top off today's news, the whistleblower of the abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison was stripped of his security clearance and told he may face prosecution because his comments were "not in the national interest." God Bless America, indeed.

Hofstra graduation speaker is booed

Crowd of parents, relatives say ceremony was the wrong place for E.L. Doctorow to criticize the president.

Dear President Rabinowitz,

I am writing to commend you for your selection of EL Doctorow for commencement speaker at Hofstra. I just read about it in Newsday. My son attends Hofstra's Honors College class of 2007. At first I was saddened that Mr Doctorow was booed and wondered if Hofstra was the right place for my son but then again, I suppose everyone is entitled to their opinions.

I was glad to see that many in attendence at the commencement ceremony gave Mr Doctorow a standing ovation. whew! Unfortunately, at this time in history, Mr Doctorow's sentiments are not merely political opinion, they are fact. We are facing in American history what can only be called a dangerous revisiting of Germany before the war. I never in my life envisioned an America like we have today. I never thought we would be so dangerously close to a fascist dictatorship in this country. People say that we don't have the holocaust so it's isn't like Nazi Germany. I say, Just Wait.

The Department of Justice website, just a click away, indicates plans to return to conscription. The Bush administration, famous for denying truths, will surely be drafting our young people if this administration is elected to power in November. I am surprised that more students are not aware of how close they are to conscription. There will be no college deferments this time. A student may only finish his/her current semester. I suppose if more students were aware of this, the sentiments would be more like they were when I was in college during the Vietnam conscription years.

Again, I applaud you for the courage in bringing a speaker who dared to speak the truth in these times. The truth these days is a hard thing to swallow but I think it's high time that Americans grow up and take responsibility for their country and regain control for their future and the future of their children.


Sincerely
BlondeSense

Dear Newsday,

My son is a student at Hoftstra and I am happy to read that Hofstra had the guts to bring in a speaker like EL Doctorow who dared to speak the TRUTH about this administration.

At this time in history, the politics of the Bush administration are carving out a dangerous future for all our children. They will be faced with more wars in the event that this administration is elected in November. They will find it more difficult to find jobs as corporatism takes more of a stranglehold on our society and they face the possibility of taking jobs that require them to wear a hair net to work. They will be paying off the deficit for the rest of their lives. All our futures are uncertain as this administration makes Americans look ugly to the rest of the world. Our borders are wide open and terrorists are still free to come and go as they wish.

Those who booed Mr Doctorow were in denial of the harsh realities facing the graduates of Hofstra. This is no time to paint a rosy picture of the future for our youth. There is no rosy future. Mr Doctorow did not give an opinion, he gave facts. Facts that the students should have been aware of.

I implore Newsday to please interview Ms. Sibel Edmonds in Florida, former FBI interpreter to get the facts about the 9/11 coverup. The people of this country need to be more aware of what happened to us on that day and why. The future of our democracy depends on it. Newsday has a responsibility to its readers and to democracy.

Sincerely
BlondeSense

Urge Sharon To Quit It!

From Amnesty International
TAKE ACTION!
Israel's policy of destruction violates fundamental principles of international human rights and humanitarian law. Write to the Israeli Prime Minister and call on him to put an end to house demolitions and the destruction of land. You can base your appeals on the letter below.

Dear Prime Minister

I am writing to ask you to urgently amend your government's policy of house demolition and destruction of land and property in Israel and the Occupied Territories.

Such destruction has resulted in widespread violations of the right to adequate housing and a decent standard of living for tens of thousands of people and violates fundamental principles of international human rights and humanitarian law.

I am concerned that in Israel, homes of Palestinian citizens of Israel seem to be targeted through a policy of large-scale confiscation of land, restrictive planning regulations, and discriminatory policies in the allocation of state land. In the Occupied Territories, the destruction of Palestinian homes and land appears to be linked to a policy of appropriating as much as possible of the occupied land, notably by establishing Israeli settlements and related infrastructure, and military/security needs are often invoked as a pretext for the destruction of homes and properties, including as a form of collective punishment. House demolitions should never be anything but a last resort.

I call on you to cancel all outstanding orders for demolitions in Israel until such time as Israeli law is amended in a manner that complies with international standards. I also urge you to immediately order a halt to all house demolitions and destruction of property for punitive reasons or where there is no absolute military necessity, and cancel all demolition orders of unlicensed houses in the Occupied Territories.

Yours sincerely,

You can copy and paste this sample letter into an e-mail or a document to print out.

Please send appeals to:
Ariel Sharon
Prime Minister
Office of the Prime Minister
3 Kaplan Street
PO Box 187
Kiryat Ben Gurion
Jerusalem 91919, Israel
Fax: +972-2-5664838
E-mail: pm_eng@pmo.gov.il

This is urgent because Last spring, after President Bush announced his Road Map plan for peace in the Middle East, the Apostolic Congress co-sponsored an effort with the Jewish group Americans for a Safe Israel and placed billboards in 23 cities with a quotation from Genesis ("Unto thy offspring will I give this land") and the message, "Pray that President Bush Honors God's Covenant with Israel. Call the White House with this message." It then provided the White House phone number and the Apostolic Congress's Web address. Bush backpedaled after 50,000 postcards were sent to the White House and thousands of phone calls by Christian Zionists who are in favor of World War 3 beginning in Israel against the Palestinians. They do not want peace in the middle east. They want war and they want to see more Palestinians killed, bulldozed and brutalized.

Christian Zionists are not true Christians. Jewish Zionists are not true Jews.
Do not vote for officials who support Sharon's Israel. They want only war and devastation.

Reliving 9/11 and A Message to Warmongers: Pt.I

The 9/11 Commission keeps rolling on. I am reliving the horror following 9/11 because of it... of course not nearly as much as those who lost their very dear loved ones that day. Things changed that day. I am filled with bitterness and anger.... not so much for the hijackers anymore, but for those who are trying to coverup what happened here. Don't try to tell me who to be angry at now. I was here. I will report what it was like to be New Yorker who lived here on 9/11 and what my message is to Faux 9/11 Sympathizers and War Mongers. I'll deliver it in several parts. This is PART I:

I am so positively sick of the faux sympathy for New Yorkers after 9/11. I go around the internet and read blogs by war mongers who keep asking how we could forget 9/11 and where is our anger.... why are those "liberals" protesting the war in Iraq.. and blah blah blah. I wasn't even a liberal until GW Bush came into power.
...
Quit trying to squash the really bad thing that happened on 9/11, by trying to make me think that what is happening in Iraq will somehow make up for the intense trauma I went through that day and months after it. ... You are hateful people who use this tragedy as an excuse to act out your intolerance and bigotry for those who are not exactly like you. The government has politicized the tragedy to make corporations even more wealthy and to promote American Imperialism.

You have no idea what it was to be covered with dusty remains of our neighbors and friends who died in those towers for months after the attack. You have no idea how very vulnerable we felt here. Almost everyday for months a firefighter or cop's funeral passed my house on the way to the cemetery near my house. Every time another one passed my house, I relived the horror and the loss. Every time I attempted to simply dust the remains of the WTC off my furniture, it wouldn't budge for it was gritty and sticky and needed to be scrubbed. I scrubbed human remains from my table tops...

Read the whole thing in it's entirety and Listen to My Songs right here

Strippers Vow to Vote Democrat in '04

The Most Very Christian, John Ashcroft spoke yesterday at the Club Badda Bing reminding its patrons that they were indeed hellbound. He promised to push through legislation the shut down of such clubs as they are breeding grounds for gay marriage, prostitution, masturbation and abortion. Ashcroft has never masturbated and considers it a grievous sin. A constitution amendment prohibiting the suggestion of anything sexual in nature outside the marriage bed is in consideration at this time.

"We'd like to model our society after the Saudi society and require all women to be covered up at all times when outside of their respective homes," Ashcroft claimed. This will create jobs, he explained, as young christian men will be hired right out of college to view and censor all printed material, photographs, videos and internet sites for anything sexual in nature. Mr Ashcroft will then be called in to view said pornography and will make the final assessment before any material can be accessed by the public.

A heckler started calling out sexual Bible passages that indeed got a rise out of Mr Ashcroft who became uncomfortable and sought refuge behind his podium. He told the heckler to cease at once and called him a blasphemer. "Get thee behind me Satan! The dirty parts of the Bible are not inspired by the Lord!", he proclaimed.

Ashcroft quieted the crowd and himself, then noted that Miss Candy, a pole dancer from Nebraska should not be extolled for her disgraceful deformity, obviously due to the sins of her parents. Patrons applauded loudly, but not for Ashcroft as Miss Candy swung her massive mammaries on top of Ashcroft's head and knocked him to the ground swifty. When he regained consciousness he was quickly ushered out of the 'Bing swinging his fists and singing "Let The Eagle Soar".

After hearing the news, southern Wisconsin Strip Clubs began registering people to vote and encouraged them to oust Bush. Republican strippers and patrons alike promise to vote Democratic in the next election in order to keep their industry alive. Newly registered voters also vowed to vote Democrat.

Miss Candy, a 250ZZZZ cup, was very concerned that her livelihood was at stake. "It's not like I can be a secretary or sumpthin' "

It's The BIG ONE, Elizabeth!

Livid Lizzy Speaks Out

House Speaker Dennis Hastert laid down a budget making it easier to pass future tax cuts regardless of their impact on the federal deficit.

John McCain, a Republican Senator said something that made sense and he was shot down for it. You see, in politics, particularly Republican politics, you are not allowed to have an opinion other than that put forth by the powers that be - even if they are bumbling idiots who have made the US into a worldwide mockery.

"Throughout our history, wartime has been a time of sacrifice. ... What have we sacrificed?" McCain said. "As mind-boggling as expanding Medicare has been, nothing tops my confusion for cutting taxes during wartime. I don't remember ever in the history of warfare when we cut taxes."

Hastert joked, "Who? Where's he from? A Republican?"

Oh Hastert wasn't talking about money, he was commenting about sacrifice. Republicans don't need no stinking sacrifice. Silly me. Just visit one of the thousands of troops with their arms and legs blown off for oil. How many times did we change the reason for invading Iraq anyway? How come we invaded Afghanistan again? I can't keep up with the excuses.

Then Hastert said, "If you want to see sacrifice, John McCain ought to visit our young men and women at Walter Reed and Bethesda (two Washington area military hospitals). There's the sacrifice in this country. We're trying to make sure that they have the ability to fight this war, that they have the wherewithal to be able to do it..."

What a maroon. We need money to fight war and cutting taxes to the wealthy is making that vein in my forehead throb.

Hastert went on, "And at the same time, we have to react to keep this country strong not only militarily but economically. We want to be able to have the flexibility to do it. That's my reply to John McCain."

WHAAAAA? Now I am having a heart attack. How pray tell is cutting taxes making our country strong? The wealthy don't buy stuff that stimulates the economy. Corporations are making money hand over fist but do not raise the salaries of the workers they don't lay off accordingly. Corporations in their unmitigated greed continue to outsource jobs to foreign countries so they can make even more money, while college educated, tax paying citizens are forced to vie for minimum wage jobs requiring one to wear a hair net. I didn't learn hairnet jobs in college, goddammit. Is that the sacrifice we are supposed to make? They cut healthcare benefits or make them so expensive that employees can barely pay their bills with all the money being taken out of their paychecks.

"The speaker is correct in that nothing we are called upon to do comes close to matching the heroism of our troops," McCain said. "All we're called upon to do is not spend our nation into bankruptcy while our soldiers risk their lives. I fondly remember a time when real Republicans stood for fiscal responsibility."

Yeah me too. How the hell is cutting taxes helping our troops? When those poor bastards come back to the US from Iraq, how the hell are they going to support their families? They'll be paying taxes, and their kids will be paying taxes and their kid's kids will be paying taxes to pay off the gluttony of these sad excuses for representatives of the people in government.

Where was the call to conserve gasoline? We've got idiots driving SUVs the size of Army tanks and sucking up gasoline like there's not tomorrow. Where is the responsibility? Where is the sacrifice? When the troops come home, they will be welcomed with paycuts, no healthcare, no money in the bank cause their freaking spouses had to drain the savings to make ends meet while they sacrificed for the wealthy SOB Republicans whose only goal is to make themselves richer and pay less taxes.

America is run by Fascists.

Dude, I Want My Country Back

The US and Israel have proved to be the bullies of the world. Israel trumps Abu Ghraib this week, the wedding massacre trumps Nick Berg, prompting many Americans to be afraid of traveling overseas due to anti-American sentiment this summer and forced to pay top dollar at the gas pumps while trying to vacation here on the Homeland.

Citizens are so happy that our leaders are so very excellent at selecting paid allies in Iraq such as Chalabi who was able to earn 27 million of US Taxpayers money up until now. When it was discovered that he was preparing for a coup, he was fired. I'd like my money back.

Armageddon Started in Massachusetts

“Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked ..." -Nazi Reich Marshal Hermann Goering, at the Nuremberg Trials

All the blunders by BushCo in Iraq can easily be swept under the carpet when a new enemy is brought to the forefront: Homosexuals being married. Bill Berkowitz in Working For Change:

"...the number one issue facing Americans is whether Massachusetts, on May 17, unleashed the fatal blow to America's moral fabric. Armageddon is not what is happening on the ground in the Middle East; it's the havoc gay marriage will bring to America's cultural and political landscape.
...
According to the Wall Street Journal, in several battleground states -- including Arkansas, Louisiana, Ohio, Oregon, Missouri, and Michigan -- "a vote on gay marriage may be included on November ballots, a move that could prompt a large turnout among socially conservative voters."
...
Will social conservatives be able to turn their collective rage against same-sex marriage into a bona fide campaign issue?
...
If that "silent majority" is awakened, the results could seriously affect John Kerry's campaign for the presidency."

BushCo has an uncanny way of inciting hatred in his constituency and getting the sheep to follow. You know how the wingers are always accusing Kerry of politicizing? Yeah right. Remember how your mom always told you that if your jealous husband accuses you of cheating, it's because he is afraid that you are doing what he is doing? This is the same thing.

Justice Department Coverup

I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I'm positive there is a conspiracy surrounding 9/11. If you don't think so, then you haven't been paying attention.

Remember right after 9/11/01, the FBI Hired Sibel Edmonds to translate intelligence information? She discovered that we were indeed warned about 9/11 but not in English. Remember when Bush said last month, that if he had known the time, date and place of the terrorist attack on US soil that he would have done something to stop it? Well he should have added, "and in English." Ms Edmonds was fired the next year by the FBI. She appeared on 60 Minutes complaining that the FBI was incompetent. She did testify to the 9/11 Commission that the FBI sure as hell was forewarned. Well we all remember this anyway.

Here's the scoop from the NY Times:

The Justice Department has taken the unusual step of retroactively classifying information it gave to Congress nearly two years ago regarding a former F.B.I. translator who charged that the bureau had missed critical terrorist warnings, officials said Wednesday.

Law enforcement officials say the secrecy surrounding the translator, Sibel Edmonds, is essential to protecting information that could reveal intelligence-gathering operations. But some members of Congress and Congressional aides said they were troubled by the move, which comes as critics have accused the Bush administration of excessive secrecy.
...
"I have never heard of a retroactive classification two years back,'' said an aide who spoke on condition of anonymity because the subject is classified.

"It would be silly if it didn't have such serious implications,'' the aide said. "People are puzzled and, frankly, worried, because the effect here is to quash Congressional oversight. We don't even know what we can't talk about.''

Senator Grassley said, "This is about as close to a gag order as you can get."

The F.B.I. denied the accusation.

"We're not imposing a gag order,'' the F.B.I. official said. Members of Congress have the information, but have to treat it as classified, the official said. "The problem is that while these pieces of information may look innocuous on their own, you put them all together and it reveals a picture of sensitive intelligence collection, and that's a security problem.''

Yes it reveals that the government knew that we were going to be attacked and it explains why Bush sat in the classroom on 9/11, why NORAD stood down, why Cheney sat in his office watching CNN on the morning of 9/11 and why Rummy sat in his office in the Pentagon doing nothing that day. This was Bush's Reichstag Fire boys and girls. Call your elected officials and demand answers.

Mad At Ahmad

"American soldiers and armed U.S. civilians could be seen milling about Chalabi's compound in the city's fashionable Mansour district. Some people could be seen loading boxes into vehicles. Aides said documents and computers were seized without warrants. "

"A senior coalition official said several people were arrested and that arrest warrants were issued for "up to 15 people" on allegations of "fraud, kidnapping and associated matters." "

"Newsweek magazine has reported that Chalabi and some of his aides are suspected of giving information about U.S. security operations in Baghdad to Iran."

Well how do you like that? We've been paying Chalabit $350,000/month and he turns out to be a crook. How many of you are not surprised?

""I am America's best friend in Iraq," Chalabi said. "If the CPA finds it necessary to direct an armed attack against my home, you can see the state of relations between the CPA and the Iraqi people." " -CBS News

I hope we cut off his salary.

The Wedding Was a Blast

The US Military refuses to answer questions about whether or not wedding guests were killed when they opened fire on a house in western Iraq on Wednesday. The US says it was a "suspected foreign fighter safe house" and the Iraqi's say it was a wedding and as many as 45 men, women and children were killed. From the picture above, it seems that if it was a safe house, the foreign fighters were mighty tiny. Dozens of mourners got out their shovels and buried the dead. Apparently in Iraq part of celebration requires shooting guns in the air. It seems that on occasion the US can't tell if there is celebratory fire going on or if they are being attacked. Read more

This is not the first time that the US has canceled a wedding. Many weddings in Afghanistan were also attacked...mistakenly.

After Wednesday's "Shock and Awe" wedding, a man who was interviewed said, "This was a wedding and the (U.S.) planes came and attacked the people at a house. Is this the democracy and freedom that (President) Bush has brought us?

Commission Kisses Guiliani's Ass: New Yorkers Still In The Dark

Rudy's a legend all right. While NYers were getting ready to vote in the NY Mayoral Primaries on Sunny September 11th, 2001, and happy that Guiliani would be gone come January, 2002, planes crashed into the WTC towers.

Mr Guiliani was heckled by relatives of victims who died on 9/11 in NYC yesterday. The so called "commission" kissed his ass while family members called out what questions they wanted answered, particularly about the non working radios that would have kept the emergency personel in contact with their command center. People felt the whole commission thing was a waste. Which it is. It's a big coverup. We'll never find out why Bush, Cheney and Rummy sat down while we were under attack. We'll never find out why no fighter planes intercepted the hijacked planes.

From the The NY Times regarding Guiliani's testimony yesterday in NY:

Elsewhere, some of the family members lingered and spoke of how they had not heard the questions and answers they had come to hear. Some had lost faith in the commission, saying it seemed to be committed to a sanitized history of that day.

"We fought like crazy to get this commission established," said Lorie Van Auken, whose husband, Kenneth, died in the north tower. "We want the truth. If we're not being told the truth, if we are only being told one side of the story, the commission is not doing its job properly."

Betsy Parks, who lost her brother, Robert Emmett Parks Jr., on Sept. 11, had yelled out in the room for a family member and a first responder to be on the panel. Now she said, "I wanted to hear why everybody above the fire in both buildings was simply forgotten about." She said, "I was disappointed by Giuliani's testimony. I was bored by it."

One young woman shook her head and smiled: "He's a legend. No one takes on a legend."

Rain continued to fall from the sky. Rudolph Giuliani was long gone.

Bush Is the Worst President Ever: Proof

Read Historians Vs Bush

Fascism Anyone

Another Excerpt from Doomocracy:

By institutionalizing the "war on terrorism" a government may acquire a rationale for expanding its powers and furthering its domestic agenda. While the nation's resources are directed toward endless war, promoting tax cuts in the midst of recession, leaving few resources available for domestic programs.

This form of fascism will sneak up on you in a disguise. Slowly it's roots will grow deeply, spreading in all directions, entangling the entire society.The ideologically driven party nurturing its own intellectuals and supporting a network that transforms the national ideology from mildly liberal to predominantly conservative, slowly pushes the Democrats to the right enfeebling opposition. The government responds primarily to corporate interests; voters become cynical, resigned and opposition decreases. It adopts a reckless unilateralism, demands unquestionable support on terms it dictates; ignores treaties and violates international law at will; invades other countries without provocation; and incarcerates persons indefinitely without charging them with a crime or allowing access to counsel.

Read the whole thing here

Dealing With Horror

This is an excerpt from Fr Jake Stops the World Blog which I visit regularly for a daily dose of spirituality and a realistic view of what is happening to us as a people:

Most of us invest much time and energy trying to hide from the horror. We live in gated communities behind locked doors, with armed police units only three digits away. We hoard our resources, keep to our routines, and avoid strangers. We want to be safe. Our society enables this facade that safety is an external commodity. Yet, regardless of our efforts, in the middle of the night we awaken trembling; the fragility of our fate made manifest within the darkness that surrounds us. We cannot keep the horror out, because it dwells within;

"...I no longer had a healthy mind that could contemplate the world in a cheerful light. I had found that any such vision was indeed infirm and weak, because I had experienced the horror that lay just beneath our ordinary waking consciousness. Nothing could change that. Even if I never had another panic attack, I would never be able to forget what I have seen... "
- The Spiral Staircase, Karen Armstrong.

Even though the horror is nothing new, our means of global communication is greatly enhanced today. More of humanity is being forced to confront the horror than ever before. To some, it is the death of an age of innocence.

We are witnessing a time of grieving over the loss of more carefree days. Fear, denial, anger, and depression are to be anticipated responses.

Read the whole post here

America, We Are Fucked.

Hope my language isn't too offensive. I am trying to utilize my right to free speech as much as I can before it goes away. -The Mgmt.


I still have an AOL account and I should be shot. I still get email there so I log in occasionally and look at the news. It usually has a link to a chat room or a message board so I go to see what people are thinking. DON'T GO THERE. It's hatred central.

Lynndie England is a hero to them. There are tons of comments like this: "She deserves a medal for a job well done. I hope she shoved a cattle prod up their terrorist asses." "Lynddie is an American Hero"

There are very few reasonable people commenting on the message boards. They are branded as liberal commies who only want to have sex and drugs. They have convinced themselves that anyone who is anti-war is a liberal who hates freedom. It made me ill. Here are some quotes that I copied off the message boards. Read while I vomit:

"My local News Paper reported that the Iraqi people want those guards executed for the abuse in the Iraqi Prisons. Well Folks, if that be the case, than we must execute every towel-headed detainee for the crimes that they have committed. Their crimes are far more serious than taking photos of naked prisoners."

Read my whole post here

More on Nick Berg: Psy-Ops?

Interesting information regarding Nick Berg's decapitation. Lots of weird things about video disclosed. Be sure to scroll down and check out the whole page. Just stuff to think about.

Eric Idle's New Song to the FCC

From PythonOnline.com:
Eric Idle presents... The FCC Song.
"Here’s a little song I wrote the other day while I was out duck hunting with a judge… It’s a new song, it’s dedicated to the FCC and if they broadcast it, it will cost a quarter of a million dollars."
You can download the MP3. It's called "Fuck You Very Much"

Bush Admin Consults with Zionist Apocalyptic Christians!

The end of the world according to the Mayan calendar is 12/21/2012. Every generation of Christian since St. Paul has been convinced that they were living in the end times. Seriously. Read St. Paul's letters towards the back of the New Testament. They were wacky back then because they thought they were going to die soon. So it's natural that in this new millennium, fringe religious wackos are going to drag out the Book Of Revelation from the Bible. Revelation and the Mayan prediction of the end times really gives this credence for them. (The Mayans also believed that life on earth came from god's from outer space which sort of goes along with the Bible too in some cases) The only thing that really really bugs me and should bug everyone on the planet is this: Our government is in cahoots with these wackos; especially George W Bush. The Bible may have saved him from his alcoholism, but it's not going to save him from destroying the world in the name of God. How did this happen? Why are so many people in America literally asleep at the wheel?

One way to gain control of the population and string it along is with fear and hatred. Bush did a great job of that with 9/11 and pushing us into war just like the Nazi's did. Rah Rah Rah. Kill the bad guys. Save us from evil. It's so Orwellian and Hitlerian, it's uncanny.. but it worked on millions of Americans. Since the rest of us who maintained some sort of intelligence are still around, the fascists/corporatists took over the mass media and more or less squashed our voices.

Corporatism, a nice word for fascism is taking over our society in record breaking time compared to the way Hitler did it. With a good solid fascist government in control, the White House can pursue it's agenda of World Domination.. and they don't give a shit whether you and I get killed in the process. Huge fundamentalist Christian Corporations (in addition to oil companies and the energy industry) back this President and they have millions of Americans under their spell; many are apocalyptic Christians who are hell bent on being raptured because they are tired of trying to take responsibility for their actions on earth and want to die and be saved. Quickly.

These corporations back Bush with lots and lots of money. Since Bush is allied with Israel and likes to invade other countries to make his friends rich through war profiteering and building pipelines so you and I can drive SUVs, he's pretending to go along with the apocalyptic Christians. Why do I know that Bush doesn't buy this apocalypse stuff? Because he is a money hungry, greedy, selfish kid who never grew up is why.

There are 3 other possibilities: Bush doesn't believe this shit and is merely pursuing a fascist dictatorship for the benefit of the very rich, who according to the Bible are going to hell anyway so they might as well have fun here on earth now, or he is really the antichrist who is responsible for bring on Armageddon or he has the Messiah Complex to the nth degree and wants to lead the charge to Armageddon as a good guy. Nah. He's too greedy.

For me personally, if there is an Armageddon, I believe that it will come from an alien invasion. Remember Reagan? But let's get back to the wacko fundies...

They believe that they will be raptured, that is caught up with Jesus in the blink of an eye. I call it being nuked (by aliens or else nuked by the rest of the world) who are sincerely pissed at the US for it's imperialism and war profiteering. Here are the Bible quotes supposedly endorsing the rapture:

1 Thessalonians 4:13-18: For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.

Mark 13:26-27: And then shall they see the Son of man coming in the clouds with great power and glory. And then shall he send his angels, and shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from the uttermost part of the earth to the uttermost part of heaven.

Revelation 11:11-12: And after three days and an half the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet; and great fear fell upon them which saw them. And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud; and their enemies beheld them.

Sounds like an alien invasion. I don't mean to be smart. But really now. Anyway, it's pretty clear now that Bush is pursuing this armageddon, end times agenda with Christian Zionists to keep their $upport and get votes on election day.

The story in a nutshell is this: The Temple in Israel that was destroyed in 70AD needs to be rebuilt according to prophecy, the Jews in Israel are supposed to be there cause God said so thousands of years ago, the Jews need to be converted (fat chance and I don't blame them), a great war, Armageddon will happen and these very righteous, holy Christians will get raptured up to heaven without feeling the heat.

So while the US government is supporting Israel because they need some sort of presence in oil rich mid eastern lands, the Christian Zionists are supporting the government thinking that they are complicit with the plan to help Jesus start the end times. It's very complicated but I assure you that the US motives are not to bring on the absolute end of the world.. it's to dominate the world. Sure they will start a huge world war and millions will be nuked and killed, but that's ok cause they want a new world order and they have bunkers.

So far, and lucky for us who are awake, BushCo is sinking in their own stink they created in Iraq. Bush knew about the torture prisons being run by the CIA. Read the news. If he didn't, don't you think he would have fired his cabinet? If he had an ounce of compassion, he would have. But we know he doesn't because he signed execution orders for over 150 people in Texas without allowing DNA evidence to be checked. He even mocked the pleas of a woman on death row begging for reconsideration. This man is no Christian, let me tell you.

Today in the Village Voice there is an article called: Bush White House checked with rapture Christians before latest Israel move:The Jesus Landing Pad. It seems that the Bush administration still needs the so called "Christian" support of his electorate so they "consulted" with the "Apostolic Congress" which is part of an important and disciplined political constituency courted by recent Republican administrations. As a subset of the broader Christian Zionist movement, it has a lengthy history of opposition to any proposal that will not result in what it calls a "one-state solution" in Israel according to the article. The US National Security Council's top Middle East aide consults with apocalyptic Christians eager to ensure American policy on Israel conforms with their sectarian doomsday scenarios. These Christians oppose a Palestinian state at all costs because the bible says that this land belongs to the Jews. They also need to have the mosque where the temple once was torn down so a new temple can be built. If this doesn't happen, then Jesus won't come back! in his flying saucer

Are you vomiting yet? Our US National Security Council is in on this? Hey what ever happened to the people's say in the government of this country? Oh yeah, we gave it up after Bush's Reichtag Fire, I mean 9/11.

The Apostolic Congress dates its origins to 1981, when, according to its website, "Brother Stan Wachtstetter was able to open the door to Apostolic Christians into the White House." ...Ronald Reagan bore theological affinities with such Christians because of his belief that the world would end in a fiery Armageddon....

While the language of apocalyptic Christianity is absent from George W. Bush's speeches, he has proven eager to work with apocalyptics—a point of pride for Upton [he's the pastor for the Apostolic Congress]. "We're in constant contact with the White House," he boasts. "I'm briefed at least once a week via telephone briefings. . . . I was there about two weeks ago . . . At that time we met with the president."

Oh my. These nuts get to meet with the president and I can't go and talk some sense into him. Oh yeah, I don't make enough money to not pay taxes, so he isn't going to listen to me.

Last spring, after President Bush announced his Road Map plan for peace in the Middle East, the Apostolic Congress co-sponsored an effort with the Jewish group Americans for a Safe Israel that placed billboards in 23 cities with a quotation from Genesis ("Unto thy offspring will I give this land") and the message, "Pray that President Bush Honors God's Covenant with Israel. Call the White House with this message." It then provided the White House phone number and the Apostolic Congress's Web address.

Then what happened was the White House got 50,000 postcards opposing the Road Map, which aims to create a Palestinian state. Then Bush started backpedaling. Now if the rest of us knew about this stuff, we'd be sending millions of postcards to the White House. Maybe we better get cracking.

Bush doesn't know what he wants does he? On one hand he is proposing ways to achieve peace in the Middle East (supposedly) and on the other hand his staff is consorting with Christian Zionists who really don't give a shit if there is peace in the Middle East or not as long as they get raptured.

Now go and read this article then report back to me

French Guy Writes Book with No Verbs

"The verb is like a weed in a field of flowers," he said. "You have to get rid of it to allow the flowers to grow and flourish.

First, there was the novel written without using the letter "e". Now a French author has produced what he claims is the first book with no verbs. Read More

Horrific War Crimes in Afghanistan

"Thousands of Afghan prisoners were killed while travelling in sealed containers on their way from Konduz to a prison at Sheberghan. The bodies of the dead and some who survived were then buried in a mass grave at nearby Dasht Leile. US special forces were closely involved and in charge at the time. Were they involved in a war crime? The Pentagon denies the events. The eyewitnesses tell what happened." Read more

See part of the documentary "Afghan Massacre: the Convoy of Death" - produced and directed by award-winning Irish filmmaker Jamie Doran here (52MB). This movie has been seen all over the world but banned here in the US. Wonder why? If you have a fast internet connection, definitely check it out.

Stuff a Sock in it Zell

Who else but Senator Zell "The Smell" Miller had this to say about the "torture" at Abu Ghraib on Imus today:

Senator Zell Miller: "The two times I think I have been most humiliated in my life was standing in a big room, naked as a jaybird with about fifty others and they were checking us out, now that was humiliating. It was humiliating showering with sixty others in a public shower. It didn't kill us did it? No one ever died from humiliation."
Imus: "Whenever I was naked I always felt sorry for the other guys."

Zell, the moron that he is, left out the part where he was sodomized with a light stick and broomstick, forced to keep a bag over his head, forced to perform sex with other men, forced to (imitate?) oral sex, kicked, leashed like a dog, photographed and beaten almost to death. That was the most humiliating part and Zell couldn't even bring himself to recall that.

The excuses from God fearing Christian politicians about Abu Ghraib scandal are outrageous. The excuses are worse than what happened there and more embarrassing to us as a nation. Can't they just shut the hell up already?

'Nuff Said

From Rense.com

A Musical Interlude

Ok. I was asked to calm down a bit. It's very hard after reading the papers and listening to Air America. But here goes: This morning I'd like to turn you on to some very Patriotic Music. I'll be updating this article periodically as I find more music of interest. If anyone wants to turn me on to other artists of note, let me know!

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Sonny Meadows: How Does a Patriot Act?
September 11th - the day a criminal act of terror shook our world. But it was only the beginning. The fear and terror engendered by the Bush Administration and their corporate protectorate dwarfed the events of 9/11 and turned our country, once the bastion of Liberty and Justice, into the homeland of fear, anger and revenge. It is time for logic to replace emotion and bring America back home.

I highly recommend this CD to progressive patriots. Sonny Meadows is a musical colleague of mine on LI whose music is topical, ironic, witty, intelligent and informed. Never at a loss for lyrics or music, Sonny Meadows is a true American Patriot. This CD is a follow up to his very popular "Bibles, Guns and Flags".

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Someone sent me a link to this: This is hilarious
The Poetry of Donald Rumsfeld put to music! If you think of Rumsfeld as a character in a Gulf Wars II musical, these are the songs he might sing. The seven songs show the Secretary not only holding forth from his press podium, but in introspective moments as well. You can listen to sound clips here. Just check it out.

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Another one of my most favorite musical activists is Michael Franti and Spearhead who play liberation music. I went to see Ziggy Marley at Westbury Music Fair and Michael opened for Ziggy. Michael stole the show and his message was one of peace and harmony in the world. I cried. It was just what I needed.

Michael Franti and a delegation of peace workers, musicians, artists and filmakers are planning a trip to Iraq, Israel and Palestine from from June 2nd through the 15th. The intention of the trip is to see first hand the affects of the war on all those involved from Iraqui civilians to men and women in uniform. Although no concerts are planned for the trip, Michael and the others are planning on meeting with as many Iraqui musicians and artists as possible as well as students and other youth organizations.

Definitely visit his site today at Spearheadvibrations.com. Click on Sounds and Video to see and hear this amazing artist. You can download free mp3s there.

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Linda Ronstadt is my musical idol. I like her even more now. "We need a different president right away, I think. I think we should impeach this one [rather than wait for] the next election," she told WABC Radio's Mark Simone on Saturday. Yay Linda!

Shocked Senators Subjected to Porn for Hours

Satire(quotes are real): One hundred duly elected US Senators gathered to watch hundreds of pictures of prisoner abuse from Abu Ghraib prison. Many of the photos showed naked penises. We don't call it the American Penal System for nothing. Homo-erotic torture of male prisoners kept the Senators squirming in their seats looking straight ahead with an occassional furtive glance toward the lap of another Senator.

Oregon Senator Ron Wyden said: “I expected that these pictures would be very hard on the stomach lining and it was significantly worse than anything that I had anticipated." I think he means that more than his stomach lining was affected. Nevertheless he took a swig out of a bottle of Maalox that was being passed around.

“Almost everybody was naked all the time.” This is one of the perks of being a Senator.

Other Senators remarked, “There were several pictures of Iraqi women who were disrobed or putting their shirts up." Some shots showed Iraqi women commanded to expose their breasts. They also said that this was the only way that our stressed out soldiers could re-enact their carefree spring break days at Ft Lauderdale. There was something titillating about playing "Girls Gone Wild" with those prudish Iraqi women. Quick! Take pictures! Senator Lieberman, gathered up the remains of his Joe-memtum and attempted to lighten up the group quirking, "It just deepens the conclusion that this was a cell block that had gone wild." That's right Mr. Lieberman. That's all it was. We see this stuff on late night infomercials back in America all the time.

Thank Allah, “They were not smiling in the pictures, that’s for sure. But it didn’t look like they had been beaten or hurt,” another Senator remarked relieved that this only amounted to soft core porn and not torture.

“I don’t know how the hell these people got into our army,” said Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, from Colorado. Another Senator reminded Ben that they were recruited. You know how the recruiters stalk high schools across America looking for boys and girls who want a glamorous career seeing the world and getting college money.

“It was pretty disgusting, not what you’d expect from Americans,” said Senator Norm Coleman. Hey Norm, we're not in Kansas anymore but thanks for your comment. Fortunately, most of the rapes of Iraqi women and men were handled by highly paid mercenaries who, thanks to the forward thinking CIA, are above the law, and are not all Americans. whew!

The Senators were also treated to some consensual porn videos. Pte Lynddie England, of trailer park, West Virginia engaged in sex acts with other US soldiers for the video camera, some senators told news reporters. They were relieved that it was consensual sex on one hand but saddened that it lacked much of homo-erotic zing of her dominatrix photos. Senators like that stuff.

With the 37 cases of rape reported from the front by female GI's, it would be just appalling if any of these were actually video taped and in the hands of the American public. On the other hand, hundreds of sexy female US soldiers had to leave Iraq due to pregnancy because they too needed to blow off a little steam.

“She [England] was having sex with numerous partners. It appeared to be consensual,” said one very relieved senator who was able to enjoy this part of the presentation with our own little Lynddie England as the star. Another Senator was very relieved that they were not doing it with their clothes on. Yep, they were nekkid. “There was lots of sexual stuff – not of the Iraqis, but of our troops,” giggled another Senator recalling his younger days when a gang bang in the frat house was a great stress reliever.

blowjob for a dolla?

Sadly, Iraq is no Thailand. There are no Asian beauties awaiting our troops. The Iraqi's weren't geared up in advance for the influx of US GI's who would greatly "Stimulate" their economy as our troops are historically known to do when they reach port. The Senators agreed that luckily some of our most patriotic female US troops are more than willing to donate their services to our boys.

All in all the Senators, the moral bastions of our society who never have sex with anyone except for pro-creation, were feigning disgust while secretly pleased that they didn't have to pay to see these and other such photos on American porn websites.

Many Senators sat back and had a cigarette after the show recalling the glory days of the Bill Clinton Inquisition.

No one brought up the subject of how all the Iraqi porn ended up on pay for porn websites though.

Pte England went on American television yesterday in a bid to defend herself. She said she was following orders when commanded to appear in photographs. Is the US Government running a porn ring? oy vay.

Irony Watch: Gay Marriage a Threat to Society

Front Page NY Times:

...In a last effort to publicize their cause before the impending wave of same-sex marriages, conservative Christian groups are organizing an emergency telecast to churches around the country...

...The Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, chairman of the Traditional Values Coalition, said: "I don't see any traction. The calls aren't coming in and I am not sure why."

... "Other issues are far more important to most Americans, including evangelicals — issues like the economy, jobs, health care, the war in Iraq," said Matt Foreman, executive director of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

...The amendment's backers contend that the reason people are not responding more vocally is that many grass-roots conservatives do not yet understand how same-sex marriages affect them personally.

Hey I am not a conservative Christian, but I would like to know what the emergency is and how gay marriages would affect me and my family personally. Do tell!

5 months till elections

Can anyone imagine what it would have been like if American colonists stood around with signs calling for an end to English rule?

We'd still be saying things like "By jove" and "Jolly Good".


Update 5/17/04: George Orwell said, "Speaking the truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act."

Excellent article in Commondreams called Which Side Are You On. Thanks to Michael at Public Domain Progress for the heads up.

Doomocracy is Here

There's a new kid in town, BillyDoom, over at Doomocracy. He used to live in a dictatorship before he came to the US 25 years ago. He gives his analysis of what is happening to our democracy. He loves this country and is worried about it as I am. Take it from someone who's been there.

"Under fascism the big business virtually owns the government. How is that possible? By forming a capitalist oligarchy - an alliance of big business that takes over a political party; financing, buying, coercing elections; controlling  the media, the economic assets of the society, it's representation in government and privatizing all agencies of the government. For the capitalists within the alliance, privatization of government agencies is a great source of revenue without competition or bidding process. It's like "wolves guarding the sheep"... " Read the whole article.

More Wafer Madness

The Most Very Heterosexual Gen. J.C.Christian has also contacted Bishop Sheridan in Colorado regarding the new Catholic Inquisition. Of course, the General is pro-Inquisition.

You will get a rise out of his letter to the Bishop and then read the very shocking response from him!

I can't wait to get a response from the bishop for my letter.

I'll post it here

Bubba's Back

woo hoo!
From The Independent

The final sentence of his memoirs completed, Bill Clinton is back, ripping into President George Bush's handling of the crisis in Iraq, and signalling that he intends to play a role in the race for the White House.

Liberated from literature, the old master is limbering up a new for political action. On Tuesday evening, he ripped into his successor for neglecting the real menace of Osama bin Laden to go after Saddam Hussein, and for gratuitously turning world opinion against America.

English lesson for our leaders

From The Boston Globe

THE BUSH administration seems to have a serious problem with reality. The most recent reality challenge is the policy of torture in both Iraq and Afghanistan, which the administration is frantically redefining as "abuse," "excesses," and "humiliation." We even have Secretary Rumsfeld describing footage of several American soldiers "having sex" with a female Iraqi prisoner. Let's have a little plain English here. "Having sex" with a prisoner is known as "rape." Systematic beatings are called "torture." Excesses that lead to death are called "murder." The hundreds of women and children in mass graves in Fallujah are the product of a "massacre." Taken together, all of these add up to "atrocities."

The dissemination of "incomplete information" from "imperfect intelligence" is called "lies." The billions of dollars that Halliburton and Bechtel have reaped in profits are called "war profiteering." The invasion of Iraq is called "illegal." The destruction of America's international standing is called "permanent." And Texaco/Phillips's high bid for Iraqi oil is called "why we are in Iraq."


ERICA VERRILLO Williamsburg 
May 12, 2004

Letter To Bishop Sheridan Regarding Wafer Madness and Redemption

Dear Bishop Sheridan,

First we heard from St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke who barred John Kerry from accepting Communion, and then bishops in Boston, Portland and New Orleans had taken general stands that dissenting politicians should avoid taking it. Today I read that you have issued a pastoral letter saying Catholics cannot receive Communion if they vote for politicians who support abortion rights, stem-cell research, euthanasia or gay marriage..

The letter said: "Any Catholic politicians who advocate for abortion, for illicit stem cell research or for any form of euthanasia ipso facto place themselves outside full communion with the Church and so jeopardize their salvation. Any Catholics who vote for candidates who stand for abortion, illicit stem cell research or euthanasia suffer the same fateful consequences."

Jeopardizing our salvation? Living in America today is jeopardizing our salvation if we stick by our current mostly Republican government. There is a lot more to being a politician and a Catholic than these issues.

Read the rest

New Letter to the Long Island Catholic (they must love me)

Dear Long Island Catholic,

First we heard from St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke who barred John Kerry from accepting Communion, and then bishops in Boston, Portland and New Orleans had taken general stands that dissenting politicians should avoid taking it. I picked myself up off the floor after reading that Colorado Springs Bishop Michael Sheridan has issued a pastoral letter saying Catholics cannot receive Communion if they vote for politicians who support abortion rights, stem-cell research, euthanasia or gay marriage and now I am writing to you.

The article said: "Any Catholic politicians who advocate for abortion, for illicit stem cell research or for any form of euthanasia ipso facto place themselves outside full communion with the Church and so jeopardize their salvation. Any Catholics who vote for candidates who stand for abortion, illicit stem cell research or euthanasia suffer the same fateful consequences."

Read the rest

Troops Get a Chance to Question Rumsfeld

This Washington Post article is truly-uly surreal.

It seems that troops in Iraq got to ask Rummy a bunch of questions today. He thought it would be cake. They asked really hard and probing questions. Rummy got caught off guard and naturally didn't have answers to most questions.. especially the one about why the troops DIDN'T HAVE PROPER BODY ARMOR! The article looks like it is going to have a real good kicker at the end.. and it does.. but not the one I was hoping for....the troops got up and applauded Rummy! He got cheered after his pathetic excuses and non answers. Are you singing the theme to the Twilight Zone now?

Mysterious Stuff about Berg's Beheading

Ya know how everyone is saying that there was something fishy about the beheading of Mr Berg? Already there are a bunch of conspiracy theorists hard at work on the internet.
Interestingly it is noted that there wasn't enough blood in the beheading. It would denote that Mr Berg was already dead when he was decapitated. hmmm. Another thing is confusion with dates as to when he was found. I heard on cable news that Iraqi's said that those guys on the video didn't have Arabic accents. Apparently Arabs can tell what village you're from by your accent. hmmm. Why is the video time not in Arabic? Do Arabs use military time? The Guatanamo Bay type US issue prison suit is very suspicious. I can't make an assessment one way or the other because I don't know all the facts in the first place. There are a whole bunch of conspiracy websites to check out here and here and here it says that al-Zarqawi was killed long ago. And here is a story about Berg being held by the US Military even though they deny it. What is going on? And how did they know that the headless body was Berg's so fast when it was lying on the side of the road?

We'll have to wait and see what other stuff comes out about this. It really did seem suspicious that it happened so fast after the Abu Ghraib story. Then again it could all be absolutely true and it did happen the way the government said it happened.....nah.

Corrente's blog for May 13th has a lot of information about this case and how fishy it is. It is definitely worth a trip to read what information he has gathered. You won't need to wear your tinfoil hat for this stuff.... yet.

A Call to More War

I know what newspaper some people must be reading. The NY Post. Around here, I hate to sound like a snob, but the NY Post and the Daily News are looked upon as sensationalist and tabloid-ish. The NYT, WSJ and Newsday are considered 'real' newspapers. Below is the sentiment I heard a lot last night when I was out. This is from a NY Post Editorialtoday:

Some people - some Americans - have forgotten about 9/11.

That attack should have been enough to justify all-out war. But the hand-wringing over the war in Iraq - and over even the modest steps America took to defend itself, like the Patriot Act - suggests that folks truly have lost sight of what the war is about.

Yesterday they got a shocking reminder. And now they know: This war cannot be waged with half-measures.
It can end only with the total annihilation of those who practice butchery and barbarism. Those who have set as their goal the destruction of America.
There is no negotiating with such people. There can be no compromise with those who mean to destroy us.
Yesterday, the White House promised to "pursue those responsible and bring them to justice." That's the least of it.
America has to come out swinging.
And not stop until every last one of the savage thugs is dead.
If that means a resumption of major combat in Iraq, so be it.
...
To hell with political sensitivities in the region.
To hell with negotiating with radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in Najaf and the Sunni insurgents in Fallujah.
To hell with handing Saddam Hussein over to Iraqis, as some want to do, and risking some reverse - perverse - kangaroo trial that results in his survival.
Evil, cutthroat terrorists need to be eradicated.
Let's face it: This is a job that's going to take overwhelming - yes, brutal - force. There is simply no "nice" or painless way to accomplish this.
As yesterday's slaughter showed (yet again), the enemy is bound by no moral compunctions.
America won't go that far.
But it had better steel it's backbone and get ready to fight like it means it.
It's the only way to win this war.

So there you have it. Even the lead editor in the NY Post thinks Iraq had something to do with 9/11. An American civilian who was over there trying to make some money got beheaded by nutcases. It's a horrible thing and I was sickened by it, so now the NY Post proclaims we must pursue total "annihilation of those who practice butchery and barbarism" and "not stop until every last one of the savage thugs is dead." "If that means a resumption of major combat in Iraq, so be it."

Is it wrong for me to read between the lines? Is it wrong for me to pay close attention to this rhetoric (and I use the term loosely)? He is suggesting, if I may take the liberty of interpreting this, that we resume aggressive combat to annihilate those savage thugs who practice butchery and barbarism. It's quite clear that he doesn't give a shit if innocent Iraqi's get killed in the crossfire and he even seems to intimate that they all (Iraqi's) fall in the category of savage thugs because he doesn't include a sentence in there to say otherwise.

Now this comes from the very same editor who said that we shouldn't get all excited over a handful of American's who committed atrocities in Iraq... yet if a handful of radical nutcase extremists beheaded an American, we should fucking annihilate all of them? Are you with me? I am really trying to be logical here.

We invaded them first. We took out their military last year. We got Saddam. Now we are dealing with insurgents who are pissed. Why? Because thousands and thousands of innocent Iraqi's got killed and they are fucking pissed at the occupation of their country. Even Bush said he understood how people would feel if their country was occupied. We aren't dealing with military over there. We are dealing with civilians who are really really pissed at us.

Here is the Kicker: We knew before we went to Iraq that the Muslim factions didn't exactly get along. Somehow Saddam kept them under control though. Yeah it was a lousy way of doing it and now Mr NY Post Editor is suggesting we do the same. Oh Boy. Is our collective face red.

Is It Patriotic to Oppose a War?

I kept my mouth shut pretty much during the Afghanistan invasion although it made me ill. I was still in shock from 9/11 though and here in NY our roads were blocked, we had National Guardsmen at checkpoints with automatic weapons, sounds of sirens always blaring and of course the gritty, sticky film from the WTC towers permeating our homes and our nostrils. It reminded me of one of those futuristic movies about NY and I felt I was living in the twilight zone long after most of the country got back to normal. Funeral processions going past my house almost daily for about 3 months was the norm. People accuse me of forgetting. LOL. People write to me from all over the place asking me if I forgot.. hell no! duh. It was a horror.

It's no secret that I am vehemently opposed to the war in Iraq. I am opposed to it on many levels. I am opposed because we rushed into it and didn't take care to properly equip our soldiers with the proper armor, I am opposed because we rushed into it period and I am opposed to it because there was no plan or exit strategy and of course because Saddam was not an imminent threat and a multitude of other reasons, not to mention I lived during the Vietnam quagmire and remember that quite well. This whole "religious war" theme also really freaks me out. I have all the information and facts here that support my reasoning on this blog so I am not going to reiterate it.

I am under attack from people for being unpatriotic for my stance. I get flack daily. I really don't give a shit though because I need to exercise my first amendment right as long as we still have it.... sort of. I back up my arguments with facts and statistics as much as I can. I don't go around saying we should 'nuke the bastards' like many of those who support the war say. They can't back up their statements with facts at all. The pro-war people seem to be way more emotional than us anti-war people. My emotional response to the war is based on reasoning and fact finding. I find that most anti-war people are loaded with information about the false assumptions that led up to the war. We know that never before in the history of this country did we go to war based on intelligence (?) alone. If I really believed and knew for a fact that another country was about to invade us, then hell yeah, I wouldn't be protesting the war. I wouldn't be an avid supporter but you wouldn't hear a peep from me.

Here are some results from a PEW Poll:

Is Criticism of the War Patriotic?

Nearly half of Americans (49%) say that criticism of how the war is being handled is neither patriotic or unpatriotic, while the other half divides evenly on the question (22% say it is unpatriotic, 23% say it is patriotic). Not surprisingly, views about criticism are highly partisan and strongly related to views about the war itself, with 43% of conservative Republicans saying critics of the war are unpatriotic, while just 6% of liberal Democrats agree. Interestingly, more male veterans than non-veterans weigh in on either side of the patriotism debate, though there is no agreement on the issue: 27% of male veterans say such criticism is unpatriotic, while 31% view it as patriotic.

Those who say criticism of the handling of the war is either patriotic or unpatriotic were asked why they feel this way. Several themes run through comments by people who see criticism as unpatriotic. Many mention the need to support the troops, or the idea that criticism undermines their efforts. A typical comment was that criticism is wrong "because it's a smack in the face to those boys over there." Mentions of George W. Bush and the need to support the president in time of war were also very common. "I just think you should stand by what your president does. He wouldn't send our boys to war to fight for our freedom for no reason," said one respondent.

Those who said criticism is patriotic tended to stress the principle of freedom of speech. "Patriotism is your ability to disagree," said one respondent. Another said that criticism is patriotic "because this country is founded on the idea that you can express opinions which are unpopular." Many people said we need to hear the criticism in order to avoid costly mistakes. One person remarked that "knowing the truth will prevent another Vietnam."

I hear the one about supporting our president in a time of war the most often around here. It doesn't fly with me. I need facts and figures.

In Other News...

Rumsfeld Flew to Baghdad to see what's going on and told the Pentagon to squash anymore pics of Iraqi abuse from being made public. Well we knew that was coming.

More Facts You Should Know

More bad news today, oh boy... US Health Care sucks. As much as you would love to believe that this is the greatest country in the whole wide world and nothing can compare to the US... well you are wrong again. Once again big business trumps tax payers.

Did you know that the US has the highest rates for at least 10 cancer types and the HIGHEST INFANT MORTALITY RATE of all developed nations? Imagine with all the newest medicines being developed in this country we have such a high cancer rate? Luckily we have drugs that give men harder erections though. Whew. Glad that was such a priority.

According to statistics compiled from World Health Organization data and a Harvard University study:

The US ranks NUMBER ONE in COST of health care, but NUMBER 24 in disability-adjusted life expectancy, and NUMBER 37 in the overall performance of its medical system and NUMBER 40 in the level of satisfaction recipients express for their care.

Nearly half of all people in the US with below-average incomes report that it is "extremely, very, or somewhat difficult" to get medical care when they need it.

INFANT MORTALITY RATE per 100,000 births
Sweden: 382 Japan: 396 Norway: 413 France: 476 Austria: 492 Denmark: 551 Canada: 552 UK: 586 Israel: 662 US 772
ELDERLY CARE (From 2000 Harvard School of Public Health report)
More than 1 in 4 (29%) elderly Americans have a difficult time meeting their basic monthly expenses. Additionally, 32% of US elderly have no drug coverage, 20% of US elderly pay $50-$100 per month out-of -pocket for drugs, while 16% pay more than $100 per month. By contrast, under 5% of the elderly in four other developed countries pay more than $100 per month. Finally, 15% of elderly people have foregone filling prescriptions because they could not afford it, while 18% have problems paying medical bills.

The US also has the greatest disparity between the health of the poor and that of the wealthy of all industrialized nations. Black infants, for example, have a mortality rate that is more than twice that of white children (14 versus 6 per 100,000).

While we are hell bent as a nation to stop abortions, we can't provide healthcare to all people and even if a woman takes a child to term, we still have the highest infant mortality rate of any developed nation. And God forbid you live to be old, you will get zapped unless of course you are among the wealthy or have good children who can take care of you.

The US also has the highest rates in the world of the following cancers: colon cancer in males, cancer of lung, breast, oropharynx, larnynx and bladder in women; and for both sexes: pancreas, thyroid, non-Hodgkins lymphoma, multiple myeloma, myeloid leukemia. America's five-year cancer survival rates for all types of cancer for all races: 4% (whites 5%; blacks: 2%).

And now here's a crowning fact in the cancer department. Billions upon billions of dollars are donated each year to cancer research from private, local, state, and federal sources. But cancer research fundraising has become just another Enron-style cash cow and PR op for the elite. .... only 16% of the billions poured into cancer research goes to cancer research. The rest goes to high-profile, big-buck figurehead positions and schmoozing.

More people over 30 are dying of cancer than ever before. Cancer research is a big waste of money. Drug companies are big business and corrupt and in cahoots with big government.

Interestingly just a week before the 9/11 attacks, Thirteen major medical journals from around the world joined forces to expose and condemn the manipulation of drug trial results by pharmaceutical companies. It seems the drug barons have been pressuring the university researchers who conduct drug trials into producing reports of results that will help gain drug approval. That story quickly dropped.

Remember Tom Brokaw holding up a bottle of Cipro after the Anthrax attacks? Well big business drug companies got their foot in there too. Cipro was very very expensive, yet a much much cheaper drug, doxycycline would do the same thing as Cipro and with less side effects. (remember how I was talking about irresponsible journalism yesterday?)

So what is the answer to this systematic abuse of Americans? For the Democrats it is to aggressively promote a universal healthcare system which guarantees that every American has an equal shot at healthcare. The misinformation about universal health care that is being spread by the insurance industry and their henchmen in the GOP is appalling. For example, promoting the lie that universal healthcare would bankrupt the government. Study after study has shown that the cost of administering a centralized single-payer program would be less per citizen than the current ridiculous HMO system. In addition, the reduced number of lost days due to sickness and disability would be greatly reduced, as would the cost to the taxpayer of taking care of people who have gone without healthcare so long that they are, ultimately, thrown onto welfare or SSI unnecessarily.

Healthcare MUST be independent of job. Corporate indifference to employee well-being is notorious. Workers are routinely finding their providers changed, 'edited' (as in covering less for more $) or the cost jacked up. Then, when the company decides to throw its workers overboard so the overpaid CEOs can hoard the lifeboats, right in the midst of the stress of becoming jobless, workers are suddenly without access to healthcare.

Considering that most of us are not secure in our jobs anymore and benefits vary from company to company, why aren't more Americans alarmed about this? Most of us are just one paycheck away from no healthcare or we have no healthcare. Yet somehow we elect those who do everything in their power to hamper universal healthcare and buy the myth that it would bankrupt the country or cause us to wait on long lines which is simply not true. That is part of the propaganda. Once more, our government only has big business in mind and not you!

Faux Journalism May Cause Brain Death in Average Americans

In my menopausal ranting way I discussed the fact that American's don't know what is going on in the world here on April 27 because the mass media reports lies and falsehoods and simply leaves stuff out. I referred to the PIPA Poll to show how grossly uninformed American's are. This has a great deal to say why American's are so very brain dead. I hold Fox News very responsible for the dissemination of faux journalism and think they should be sued for claiming that their news is fair and balanced.

Today, David Neiwert at Orcinus, one of my favorite bloggers has a very good post about this very subject. LA Times Editor John S Carrol delivered a lecture titled titled "The Wolf in Reporter's Clothing: The Rise of Pseudo-Journalism in America." He said, "All over the country there are offices that look like newsrooms and there are people in those offices that look for all the world just like journalists, but they are not practicing journalism," he said. "They regard the audience with a cold cynicism. They are practicing something I call a pseudo-journalism, and they view their audience as something to be manipulated."

It goes on to say that Americans are simply misinformed especially about the war in Iraq and WMDs as a direct result of a mass media beholdent to corporate interests and the Bush Administration rather than accurate reporting of facts.

It's no stretch for me to say that I feel that cable news and most mass media is in bed with corporations. Real journalists feel that way too. Good. But this is still reminding me of Germany before the war. (yeah I read a lot of books.)

Food For Thought

Rush keeps saying that the abuses at Abu Ghraib are 'no different than the initiation rites at at Skull and Bones'. hmmm.

Those abuses were rather homo-erotic. Is that what went on at Skull and Bones? Hmmm.
Is not Skull and Bones Mr. Bush's elite club?

Rush's audience who are pro-Bush people don't see a problem with this? Aren't the pro-Bush people rabid anti-Clinton people? Clinton had heterosexual relations. And that's bad but homo-erotic relations are ok? My brain is exploding.

It's no secret that Republicans are obsessed with sex and genitalia as I recall from 8 years of the Clinton presidency. It's no secret that Republicans are obsessed with stopping homosexuals from having equal rights with heterosexual people and even going so far as promoting a constitutional amendment to prohibit their rights.

So then why are some Republicans dismissing these homoerotic actions at Abu Ghraib as frat pranks and Skull and Bones pranks?

I'm not going to say that these Bushites are the most hypocritical, sexually repressed, homophobic, pieces of ignorant shit in the whole world, but I am thinking it.

Just War Doctrine

The strict conditions for legitimate defense by military force require rigorous consideration. The gravity of such a decision makes it subject to rigorous conditions of moral legitimacy. At one and the same time:

- the damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be lasting, grave, and certain;

- all other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;

- here must be serious prospects of success;

- the use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated.

- The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition.

These are the traditional elements enumerated in what is called the "just war" doctrine. The evaluation of these conditions for moral legitimacy belongs to the prudential judgment of those who have responsibility for the common good.

further explanation on "Just War Doctrine"
and more from Minnesota Council of Churches
and more from Questia
and a Judeo-Christian and Islamic Perspective
against Just War theory

Do a google search on "Just War" for even more information and debate. This is not something new. I am just surprised that our most Christian and Holy President send by God above didn't seem to even think about this. This is not just a "christian' thing though although it was thought of by St. Augustine. Ethical people and non-christians consider this as well. Happy Reading!

Outraged by Outrage

Today Senator Inhofe of Oklahoma said, "as I watch this outrage that everyone seems to have about the treatment of these prisoners I have to say and I'm probably not the only one up at this table that is more outraged by the outrage than we are by the treatment.

"The idea that these prisoners, they're not there for traffic violations. If they're in cell block 1A or 1B, these prisoners, they're murderers, they're terrorists, they're insurgents, and many of them probably have American blood probably on their hands and here we're so concerned about the treatment of those individuals."

But the Red Cross (ICRC) report on the treatment of prisoners in Iraq in February 2004 said that certain CF military intelligence officers told the ICRC that in their estimate between 70% and 90% of the persons deprived of their liberty in Iraq had been arrested by mistake.

Inhofe said the photographs of U.S. soldiers mistreating hooded, naked prisoners should be accompanied by photos of mass graves and the executions of prisoners under Saddam.

Though he called the soldiers charged with abusing Iraqi prisoners "seven bad people," he added, "I am also outraged that we have so many humanitarian do-gooders right now crawling all over these prisons looking for human rights violations while our troops, our heroes, are fighting and dying."

Well Sieg Heil, baby. Welcome to the Nazification of America. It's tough being a moderate in America today. One one hand we have those lefties trying to make sure that I don't smoke myself to death or eat McDonald's to death or accidentally use the name of G-d in public... and on my right, we have the 3rd Reich coming to power. I think John Ashcroft is just as bad as whoever went to court to get G-d taken out of the pledge of allegiance. Whether or not I believe in God.. I am not offended if his name is written or uttered or on a statue. If it said 'Allah'.. I don't care either. I think the Patriot Act sucks as much as banning people from having certain public areas to smoke in. I live in both a liberal police state and a right wing radical country. They both suck. Where's my democracy?

Corporate Profits Up: not yours

Oh man. So Bush and friends did everything in their power to make sure that companies wouldn't have to pay overtime to employees so companies could make more money. Positions were outsourced to foreign countries so that companies could save money and make more profit. Wage increases are nominal, if anything. The stockmarket isn't doing bad if you're an investor. But if you are an employee of a corporation, you're getting the shaft. And Bush doesn't care. Corporate profits are enormous yet nothing is trickling down to help the economy. Oh yeah, inflation's back too. Boot Bush!

From Bloomberg:

U.S. corporate profits surged 87 percent from the third quarter of 2001 to the end of 2003, according to Commerce Department figures. Wages and salaries grew 4.5 percent. ....After inflation, real wage gains were 1.1 percent...

...Executive pay hasn't been as restrained as that of workers. Salaries of chief executive officers rose 8.7 percent on average in 2003 at 70 companies studied by Bloomberg, while U.S. employees' average pay inched up 1.5 percent. In 1980 CEO pay was 40 times that of the average worker, now it is as much as 400 times to 550 times higher.

...Motorola Inc., Eastman Kodak Co. and Caterpillar Inc. all announced first-quarter profits last month that at least doubled from a year earlier... Like other U.S. corporations, all three have trimmed their payrolls since 2001.

...Wage gains have been curbed by a loss of 1.5 million jobs since January 2001 and productivity gains of more than 4 percent in each of the past two years, the first time that's happened since records were kept in 1947.

So productivity is up and corporations don't need as many employees, profits are up, yet employees pay is virtually the same as it was 2 years ago.

``They basically froze our pay scale,'' Green said. United Auto Workers Union members last month rejected Caterpillar's latest contract proposal to cut wages for new workers.
...
The lack of real gain in wages may hurt President George W. Bush's re-election chances. ``There's a tension between what's good for the stock market and what's good for Bush in the election,'' said Tom Gallagher, a Washington political analyst for International Strategy and Investment Group Inc...

The contrast between stagnant wages and soaring profits "is a good part of the explanation for Bush's negative polling numbers on the economy,'' Gallagher said.

Well there you go. Bush is only interested in corporate gains for their wealthy stockholders. Profits have not trickled down to the actual workers who made the corporation grow. The profits are staying in the corporations. How does that do anything for the economy? It doesn't.

Some companies have begun to cut benefits. Motorola and Deere & Co. have stopped offering health-care coverage for future pensioners. Others, such as DuPont Co. and General Motors Corp., are charging them more.

Some companies including Delphi Corp., the world's largest maker of auto parts, and Visteon Corp., the fourth-largest, plan to cut new workers' wages. Georgia-Pacific Corp., the biggest U.S. plywood maker, reported April 29 a first-quarter profit of $147 million....[union workers are] about to vote on a contract that calls for 2 percent-a-year pay increases in two of the next four years, with cash payments instead of wage boosts in the other two.

Dow Chemical Co., the largest U.S. chemical company, reported April 29 that its profit increased sixfold in the first quarter, to $469 million... wages increased by 4 percent in 2003 after pay boosts of 3 percent in each of the two previous years, some of it absorbed by higher medical insurance costs.

Bye bye middle class.

Still No Body Armor?

As anti-war as I am, I still investigate regularly what our troops are up to and up against in Iraq because they are the sons and daughters of my generation and I care about them. Since the wars started the word was that our troops were not properly outfitted with body armor and the vehicles they use are inadequately armored and unfit for desert conditions. There are lots more concerns I have but the flagrant disregard for our troop's safety just blows my mind. Not only am I outraged that the US got into this bloody war, I am outraged that our soldiers are ill equipped.

We as a nation were led to believe that Iraq was a disaster waiting to happen and we must send troops in as fast as possible before we were faced with a "mushroom cloud". We then witnessed a year later, Sec of Defense Rumsfeld on Face the Nation deny ever intimating that Iraq was an immediate or imminent threat. If that is so and he is telling the truth, then our government should be held accountable for sending thousands of troops into Iraq unprepared.

As Americans we should unite together with politics aside to let our government know that we are outraged at the improper planning, execution and lack of exit strategy of the war. The pro-war and anti-war movement should both be writing letters to congress calling for an investigation and holding those at the top responsible for the thousands of casualties suffered by our children in Iraq due to improper armor.

Click here to read my report.

Terrorist Attack Looming?

I am wondering how many folks are thinking what I am thinking.
Do you think we are about ripe for another major terror attack in order to take the focus off all the bad press?

If you think I am way off base, you are most welcome to tell me why not.

Please post your opinion in the comments below

Sermon on the Mount

I posted Jesus' "Sermon on the Mount" here. Just in case anyone forgot what he said. Non-Christians may also be interested what Christianity is supposed to be about. Wonder what happened?

Bush Wants People To Underestimate Him

He Wants People To Underestimate

From today's Washington Times:

President Bush is resolved not to repeat what he thinks were the two fundamental blunders of his father's one-term presidency: abandoning Iraq and failing to vanquish the Democrats.

...Mr. Bush said his father had "cut and run early" from Iraq in 1991.

...    "Freedom will prevail, so long as the United States and allies don't give the people of Iraq mixed signals, so long as we don't cower in the face of suiciders, or do what many Iraqis still suspect might happen, and that is cut and run early, like what happened in '91," Mr. Bush said.

... Mr. Bush also said Mr. Kerry thinks "that the federal government will solve the medical issues facing small businesses and large businesses and the unemployed."

    "I don't," he said. "I think that the federal government needs to pass policies that will enable private-sector solutions to emerge, such as medical-liability reform, associated health care plans, expansion of health-savings accounts."

...Mr. Bush acknowledges that he encourages such misjudgments by detractors.
    "People tend to discount my ability to get things done, and that's exactly what I want," the president said in an interview. "I want people to underestimate.

I've said it here that this man has severe oedipus issues. This is also the man who said, "They want the federal government controlling Social Security like it's some kind of federal program."

"But this president came from West Texas," Mr. Card said of the younger Bush, contrasting the two resumes. "And West Texas was his home for a lot longer than it was for the former president.

And I should be impressed why? What exactly does West Texas have to do with the rest of the world? I'm having a heart attack here, you know.

"He was the governor of Texas. He wasn't the first envoy to China or the U.N. ambassador or the CIA director. His training was dealing with problems on the streets of Laredo or Dallas or Houston or Midland or Austin. This president came with a kind of street smarts and recognition of the importance of the resolve of America."

The 'resolve of America' is reflected in the streets of Laredo? Somebody pour me a drink.

Coulter Speaks Out

This is great from Scoobie Davis. Ann Coulter proves beyond the shadow of a doubt that she is not of the human race nor is she a woman (but we already knew that)

These are excerpts from 'it's' interview with KABC radio's Al Rantel May 5, 2004 about the Abu Ghraib situation and it is not a hoax:

"...And, you know, for one thing, I'm a little disappointed in Rumsfeld--he allows the greatest fighting force on the face of the globe to have girl generals--what are we doing with girl generals?""

"...our military was trained how to bury the dead so that their heads were facing Mecca. That's an incredibly honorable thing to do--and, by the way, it's something that doesn't occur to a woman because we are vicious. You don't want us in the military."

"...It's in our genes to protect the hearth and home. to respond viciously to the enemies, to intruders, whereas, just think of immediately after the 9/11 attack, I was huffing and puffing and fuming the very night of it that we weren't already dropping bombs in Afghanistan?-- "

Clinton's Fault

Clinton's reign of terror just never seems to end. First his staff took all the "w"'s off the WH keyboards, he left so much surplus in the budget that Bush had give it back to us, he somehow left us in a recession and was the reason for 9/11. It was Clinton's fault that the Bush Administration had no idea about terrorists or Al Qaeda, and his fault that more people in the FBI didn't know Turkish or Arabic. It's Clinton's fault that he didn't bomb the shit out of Afghanistan and it's his fault that he didn't take out Baghdad even though he once bombed Iraq. He should have finished the job but he was too busy having oral sex in the oval office.

It's Clinton's fault that there wasn't enough body armor for his troops. It's Clinton's fault for making Americans feel somewhat secure in the booming economy during his administration. Now we have to pay the price of all his mistakes. The most devastating mistake, of course is the stain on the blue dress.

Because of Clinton's BJ, our country's morality just plummeted to new depths never before realized in the history of America. We were forced to watch on our media, months and months and months of investigative reporting concerning his disgusting tryst with a young intern. Luckily Ken Starr managed to get every gory detail of his immorality documented and broadcast the details coast to coast and around the world. I don't know about you, but I could never smoke a cigar again.

The result of the Starr Report was that millions of Americans learned about the degradation of oral sex. Our children were asking their parents about it all the time. Mommy what is oral sex? Tell me about it. I need to know why everyone is talking about it. Once our innocent children found out about Clinton's behavior, the country went straight to hell. Morality was out the window. Our president was immoral and our country was disgraced in front of the whole world. Not one single country on the face of the earth had respect for us after Clinton's 8 years.

The saddest result of Clinton's sexual deviancy is now seen in the pictures from Abu Ghraib jail. We see US soldiers coaxing their prisoners into performing exactly what happened in the White House only a few years ago - sodomy. How else would our innocent youth learn about such things unless they too learned about this from Clinton himself through the Starr Report. Clinton was clearly to blame for this indecency we face today as a nation. The whole country is wearing the blue dress and now thousands of people across the world are dead.

I hope you will all join me in prayer today. May God damn Clinton to hell. Amen.

News From Baghdad

Another blog I read frequently is Baghdad Burning. I was almost too ashamed to see what the girl from Baghdad had to say. I'm so ashamed of Americans like Rush Limbaugh saying that this was nothing but a college type prank. I went to a lot of colleges and nothing like this ever happened. I'm ashamed of Rumsfeld trying to make this seem trivial and I am ashamed of our president's lack of apology. I'm ashamed of cable news networks who hide the truth behind lies and election propaganda.

It's time for Americans to wake up and demand a stop to the madness. Pray hard for healing and peace in the world. Our military actions only inflame others. This is what it said at Baghdad Burning on Friday:

"People are so angry. There’s no way to explain the reactions- even pro-occupation Iraqis find themselves silenced by this latest horror. I can’t explain how people feel- or even how I personally feel. Somehow, pictures of dead Iraqis are easier to bear than this grotesque show of American military technique. People would rather be dead than sexually abused and degraded by the animals running Abu Ghraib prison.

"There was a time when people here felt sorry for the troops. No matter what one's attitude was towards the occupation, there were moments of pity towards the troops, regardless of their nationality. We would see them suffering the Iraqi sun, obviously wishing they were somewhere else and somehow, that vulnerability made them seem less monstrous and more human. That time has passed. People look at troops now and see the pictures of Abu Ghraib… and we burn with shame and anger and frustration at not being able to do something. Now that the world knows that the torture has been going on since the very beginning, do people finally understand what happened in Falloojeh?"

"...All I can think about is the universal outrage when the former government showed pictures of American POWs on television, looking frightened and unsure about their fate. I remember the outcries from American citizens, claiming that Iraqis were animals for showing 'America's finest' fully clothed and unharmed. So what does this make Americans now?

"...Today's lesson: don't rape, don't torture, don't kill and get out while you can- while it still looks like you have a choice... Chaos? Civil war? Bloodshed? We’ll take our chances- just take your Puppets, your tanks, your smart weapons, your dumb politicians, your lies, your empty promises, your rapists, your sadistic torturers and go."

And don't forget my fellow Americans that Bush gave a campaign speech just this past Monday saying that the torture and rape rooms were gone. Remember that at the voting booth this November.

More inside information on the war without the spin:
Iraqi Dispatches

Saudi's Join War on Terrorism

My favorite Saudi blogger, The Religious Policeman , informs us of this tidbit from the Arab news:

We are at War With The Terrorists, said Naif
-JEDDAH, 8 May 2004 — Saudi Arabia is in a state of war with terrorism, Interior Minister Prince Naif declared yesterday. But he also said efforts at communicating with extremists had been effective in bringing a number of them back into the fold....................

...................Speaking to top military and civilian officials in Jeddah last Saturday when four terrorists went on a shooting spree in Yanbu killing five Westerners and a National Guard officer, the crown prince said he believed Zionists were behind most terrorist attacks in the Kingdom. But in a press statement after the attack, Prince Naif blamed Al-Qaeda.

“I don’t see any contradiction in the two statements, because Al-Qaeda is backed by Israel and Zionism,” he said.

Mmmm. Sounds like fighting words to me. That should take Bush's mind off the Iraqi prison scandal.. oh wait, he doesn't read and will have to wait until this story is on 60 Minutes. WW3 anybody? Which side are we going to be on? Feeling a draft kiddies?

America's Dark Side Exposed

Bush told the Arabs that the nature of American people is not reflected in those photographs from Abu Ghraib. In a way he is sort of correct. I personally don't torture people and then take pictures of them. I imagine that the large majority of Americans do not do that. I imagine that most Americans do not intentionally torture or harm others.

But there's a lot of them who do apparently. Don't we have more prisons and a larger percentage of of the population in prison than any other country? Ideally we'd like America to be crime free and safe. Makes sense. But we have deep dark secrets that most Americans don't even want to know about. The prison situation in Abu Ghraib was based on our prison system in THIS country.

When do "frat boy pranks" cross the line? What exactly do "frat boy pranks" say about the character of these individuals who enjoy humiliating initiates who want to join secret societies? It's certainly an issue of power and control. Is it a virtue or does it enforce our base nature? If it supposedly means nothing, then why not have initiates do a month of community service? It's not appealing to them.

Maybe there's a fine line, a very fine line between a guard and a prisoner. Maybe the only difference is that one is on this side of the law and the other one is on the other side of the law. That is not a blanket statement obviously. But we know that there are thousands of instances where this is true. Not everyone who goes into their chosen profession, does so with pure intentions. Clergy and teachers may deliberately set out to deceive and hurt children. Cops may join the force to deliberately act out their personal biases and prejudices. Some soldiers just may really be keen on killing people.

What kind of men run for governor in a state that has the death penalty? Either the kind of man who wishes to abolish it or the kind of man who wishes to enforce it. It's either/or. You can't ignore it. What kind of person signs up to be an executioner? If that person did not get a job on the right side of the law, perhaps he would be one of the criminals behind bars. What kind of people sign up to be interrogators? You certainly can't be a wimp like me. There are people are willing to use fire to fight fire. That's the dirty secret behind living in a democracy.

As human beings, just like anywhere else in the world, Americans have a dark side. Luckily most of us try not to think about it or act on it.

Let's Beat Them at Their Own Game

Up until May 3rd of this year, President Bush has burned it into his election campaign comments that there are no more torture rooms and no more rape rooms in Iraq thanks to his administration. On this day in May, Bush said, "Because we acted, torture rooms are closed, rape rooms no longer exist, mass graves are no longer a possibility in Iraq." Hurray!

Happy campers who pay $2000/plate for finger foods cheerfully applaud his wonderful news from the war front as Bush travels town to town to collect money to air attack ads against Kerry. They are Republicans and they have always been Republicans and therefore they must support Republicans. That's how it works. I know. I grew up Republican and I am actually still registered as a Republican. [memo to self: register as independent]

Now we find out that we are in fact keeping alive the Iraqi tradition of torture and rape rooms thanks to the US Army. Not only that, those torturers are really into depicting homosexuality and really getting off on it. I had always wondered about homophobes. I usually accuse homophobes I know of being a closeted gays and tell them to just get over it and quit picking on them. We always seem to hate in others what we hate about ourselves.

On May 4th, Rumsfeld did his usual talking in circles routine that says nothing except for that he talks in circles and gets us nowhere. He used to confuse me, but now I am on to him. He said, "I'm not a lawyer. My impression is that what has been charged thus far is abuse, which I believe technically is different from torture."

Ok. I checked. I'm not in the Twilight Zone, Rummy is. Torture means extreme mental and/or physical distress or pain. Abuse means The willful infliction of injury, unreasonable confinement, intimidation, or punishment with physical harm, pain, or mental anguish. It's the same thing, Rummy! Waddaya think I'm stoopid?

I mentioned a few posts ago that Rummy said in a Pentagon press conference, he had not read the Taguba Report nor had he actually seen the pictures that the soldiers so proudly captured cause he didn't have copies. Interestingly, I had seen the pictures and read the Taguba report and I am just a regular citizen.

As I recall, I was outraged at his comments. I was outraged at his willful ignorance. Or maybe I was outraged at his arrogance to act just like this was nothing to be alarmed about, or maybe I was outraged at what could be bold faced lies on his part. Whatever. I was pissed. Most Americans have no clue what he said nor did they care. This is the last week of "Friends" on NBC.

Ok, so we know what kind of secretary of defense Rummy is: lousy.

Let's move on to the President's character. It was very telling this week. He acted shocked and appalled at the Iraq prison situation. He claimed he didn't know about it until he saw it on TV. He waited a week to address the Arabs and he didn't even say he was sorry. It also tells me a lot about Bush's religion. It is one of no remorse.

I am guilty of accusing the president of being downright stupid. I accuse him of being Cheney and Rove's puppet. But if we prove that he is truly stupid, then he cannot be held responsible for his actions. We can't hold him culpable. We must no longer declare that Bush is a stupid man. It only serves to make him more lovable to the masses.

Who are the masses? The people who applauded when Bush said, "They want the federal government controlling Social Security like it's some kind of federal program." or "The legislature's job is to write law. It's the executive branch's job to interpret law." or "I think we ought to raise the age at which juveniles can have a gun." or '"You teach a child to read and he or her will be able to pass a literacy test." and my favorite, "I think it's fine, as long as it's Christian prayers. Anything else is un-American." You get the picture. This man not only doesn't understand history, politics and the government, he proudly proclaims it. He admits he doesn't read, he admits he goes to bed early and even said he is the master of "low expectations". And we called Clinton, a Rhodes Scholar, Bubba?

It makes sense now. The masses love a regular down home boy. Clinton wasn't really one of them, he was too smart, too educated. He was in his 50's and attracted a young woman, many young women. The masses don't relate to that. Bush went to fancy schools but he had low marks and slid by. He liked the parties and the women when he was young. He made a mistake in being a drug abuser and alcoholic but Jesus forgave him. The masses don't relate to Yale and Harvard, but they relate to Bush's pre-fab farm in mythical Crawford, Texas, his low grades and frat boy pranks. Bush deserved an A+ in marketing when he declared that Jesus was his favorite philosopher. He appeared sincere. That is what sold him to the American people.

Now what do we do? Bush has sold people a false sense of security, a vengeful angry god, a hatred of anything unChristian and the possibility of wars that would rid the world of "evil-doers" and mostly likely a lot of non-evil-doers. Hey I would give him credit for his incredible play acting if it weren't for the fact that we are on the brink of world wide disaster. This man knows not what he does. Seriously. He doesn't have a clue.

But that is our secret. How can we expose him in a way that would make the masses think twice about Bush? How can his facade of being "one of us" be stripped away? Reverse Psychology 101 is how. We can proclaim him to be a genius who knew exactly what was going on in his chain of command from day 1, we can declare that Bush holds all the strings in the White House, we can aver that Bush was absolutely in control on 9/11 and that he personally masterminded the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq. Let's allow Bush take all the credit!

How can we start? CNN reported that the torture chambers were flourishing in Iraq under US supervision back on January 21, 2004. Obviously if CNN knew of this, then certainly the president, the commander in chief was fully aware of the situation. I was just being sarcastic.So why would Mr. Bush then declare that he knew nothing about it this week? There's a place to start. Let's call him on the lies and let him take responsibility for the mistakes. Bush is getting away with murder. Literally. Either the masses will surely find him to be incredibly stupid or they may just see him as an evil genius who was caught in a masterful charade.

New Meme: George Bush is a genius.

Memo to Kerry: Dumb down a bit.

The Cost of Freedom

"One thing is for certain: There won't be any more mass graves and torture rooms and rape rooms."
G W Bush, Monterrey, Mexico, 2/12/04

"There's still remnants of that regime that would like to take it back. … They could torture people and have rape rooms, and the world would turn their head from that and let it happen. But they can't do that anymore."
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, BBC interview, 3/16/04

"Our military is … performing brilliantly. See, the transition from torture chambers and rape rooms and mass graves and fear of authority is a tough transition. And they're doing the good work of keeping this country stabilized as a political process unfolds."
G W Bush, Iowa, 4/15/04

Female Seeks Male For S&M

Home: Trailer park, West Virginia; Age: 21; Hopes: See the world and make money; Likes: hunting, smoking, drinking, gang bangs, homo-erotic role playing; Favorite Song: Theme from Deliverance; Pet Peeves: boys who don't do what they're told. Read more about me...

Going over the War Crimes Travesty So Far

Bush should really be embarrassed that he was kept out of the loop. If he would have asked me, I would have told him not to trust Rummy and fire his ass. The President chastised Rumsfeld for his handling of this scandal on Wednesday. I'm wondering if the President is more upset that this wasn't covered up. I'm sure he's pissed that the soldiers who committed these acts actually took pictures and shared them with each other.

"The disclosures by the White House officials, under authorization from Bush, were an extraordinary display of finger-pointing in an administration led by a man who puts a high premium on order and loyalty. The officials said the president had expressed his displeasure to Rumsfeld during a meeting in the Oval Office because of Rumsfeld's failure to tell Bush about photographs of the abuse, which have enraged the Arab world.

The disclosure of the dressing-down of the combative Rumsfeld was the first time Bush has made public his anger with a senior member of his administration. It also exposed the fault lines in Bush's inner circle that have only deepened with the violence and political chaos in American-occupied Iraq.

Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is antagonistic to Rumsfeld, went so far Tuesday night as to talk about the prison-abuse scandal in the context of the My Lai massacre in the Vietnam War, a historical reference that was not in the White House talking points that sought to stem the damage from the scandal.

Powell, in an interview on CNN's "Larry King Live," brought up My Lai without prompting from King, saying he served in Vietnam "after My Lai happened" and that "in war, these sorts of horrible things happen every now and again, but they're still to be deplored." -LA Daily News

Colin Powell would be the one I would have kept in the loop if I had no other choice. Condi and Karen Hughes are just "yes men" and would be of no use to me. The big problem I have with Powell though is that while he sort of is a man of principle... he really isn't. It's time for him to quit and come out and tell the truth. Or just quit. That would say it all. Then again, he knows that he will be smeared mercilessly. But then again, a real man should come forward and take the consequences. If he did so now, he would probably win the hearts of American people and save us from more wars. Waiting much longer really is a signal that Powell is complicit with this Messiah complex of the POTUS, a former coke head and alcoholic. Powell's aides are disgusted with the situation. One aid came out and said that the secretary of state is fed up with apologizing for the administration and is disdainful of 'ideological' hawks. But Bush still backs Rummy.

""The president met with Secretary Rumsfeld yesterday and they had a good discussion. I will leave it at that," said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. "The president very much appreciates the job Secretary Rumsfeld is doing and the president has great confidence in his leadership."

So we found out that Bush had -no idea about the atrocities going on in Iraqi prisons until it was aired on 60 Minutes II. He should be out of his freaking mind with rage at his chain of command if this is true. And it must be true. Why? Because he was happily trotting across the country for months raising money for his election campaign and explaining how we are winning the 'war on terror'. If he really knew about these atrocities, he would have done something to get this covered up or dealt with it over a year ago while the Army was investigating it.

"In the last 16 months, the Army has conducted more than 30 criminal investigations into misconduct by American captors in Iraq and Afghanistan, including 10 cases of suspicious death, 10 cases of abuse, and two deaths already determined to have been criminal homicides, the Army's vice chief of staff said Tuesday." -NY TImes

On the other hand, Bush must have known, someone must have told him, that war is hell and some soldiers and "Paid Contractors" might do stuff that is really bad and against the Geneva Convention because Bush made sure that the US couldn't be dragged before the International Criminal Court for war crimes back in 2002. It probably wasn't his idea to come up with that idea, but it should have raised some flags in his mind. (I am assuming that he actually has a couple of brain cells left to rub together)

Unfortunately our President doesn't read. The US Military was also committing war crimes by demolishing homes and civilian properties in Iraq, which is prohibited by the Geneva Convention. A letter was sent by a NY Human Rights group to Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld asking him to assure that US Troops were abiding by the 1949 Geneva Conventions and hold troops who violated it responsible for their actions. Apparently Rummy did not mention this to the POTUS.

Guess Bush didn't know about the investigation into sadistic and wanton criminal abuses at U.S. military prisons in Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca, Iraq. It was requested by the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, and written by Maj. Gen. Antonio M. Taguba in January. It was discovered that:

"... the intentional abuse of detainees by military police personnel included the following acts:
Punching, slapping and kicking detainees; jumping on their naked feet.
Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees.
Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing.
Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped.
Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them.
Positioning a naked detainee on a box [of meals ready to eat], with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wires to his fingers, toes and penis to simulate electric torture.
Writing "I am a Rapest" (sic) on the leg of a detainee alleged to have forcibly raped a 15-year-old fellow detainee, and then photographing him naked.
Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee's neck and having a female soldier pose for a picture.
A male MP [military police] guard having sex with a female detainee.
Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case biting and severely injuring a detainee.
Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees.

Well why wouldn't the President know about it? Apparently Rummy didn't even read and he admitted it in a press conference at the Pentagon. Can you imagine having a press conference and then not being familiar with the very report that the journalists had already read? Read the Pentagon News Briefing and be as embarrassed as I am.
oy.

"There certainly are allegations of abuse in various other locations," Rumsfeld said. He called the images of hooded, naked Iraqi prisoners being made to stand or kneel in humiliating poses before smiling American guards "troubling ... disturbing ... (and) clearly unhelpful." [unhelpful? this man has such a -stupid way with words .- BlondeSense]

But Rumsfeld rejected criticism of how he handled the matter as per usual. He said the slow pace of reporting the allegations up the chain of command was "perfectly proper." Asked why he did not demand to see photographs of the alleged abuses that his top general was trying to keep off of a CBS broadcast, Rumsfeld said, "I think I inquired about the pictures and was told we didn't have copies." -Arizona Central

Do you believe the arrogance of this man? He really doesn't even a shit and doesn't care if we know about it.

"The same day that Rumsfeld added his contribution to the history of Orwellian statements by high officials, the Senate armed services committee was briefed behind closed doors for the first time not only about Abu Ghraib, but about military and CIA prisons in Afghanistan. It learned of the deaths of 25 prisoners and two murders in Iraq; that private contractors were at the centre of these lethal incidents; and that no one had been charged. The senators were given no details about the private contractors. They might as well have been fitted with hoods.

Many of them, Democratic and Republican, were infuriated that there was no accountability and no punishment and demanded a special investigation, but the Republican leadership quashed it. The senators want Rumsfeld to testify in a public hearing, but he is resisting and the Republican leaders are blocking it. -The Guardian"

Are you getting nauseaus? I am. Didn't the Republican leaders take an oath to defend the constitution? They are defending their party, right or wrong. Now that is just plain despicable. The Guardian goes on to say:

Bush has created what is in effect a gulag. It stretches from prisons in Afghanistan to Iraq, from Guantánamo to secret CIA prisons around the world. There are perhaps 10,000 people being held in Iraq, 1,000 in Afghanistan and almost 700 in Guantánamo, but no one knows the exact numbers. The law as it applies to them is whatever the executive deems necessary. There has been nothing like this system since the fall of the Soviet Union. The US military embraced the Geneva conventions after the second world war, because applying them to prisoners of war protects American soldiers. But the Bush administration, in an internal fight, trumped its argument by designating those at Guantánamo "enemy combatants". Rumsfeld extended this system - "a legal black hole", according to Human Rights Watch - to Afghanistan and then Iraq, openly rejecting the conventions.

Private contractors, according to the Toguba report, gave orders to US soldiers to torture prisoners. Their presence in Iraq is a result of the Bush military strategy of invading with a relatively light force. The gap has been filled by private contractors, who are not subject to Iraqi law or the US military code of justice. Now, there are an estimated 20,000 of them on the ground in Iraq, a larger force than the British army."

I heard from an insider last evening that private contractors are being paid $125,000/yr. The US is sending letters to former Marines to come back to Iraq. Big bucks. Killing spree with no laws, baby. The Democrats today are calling for Rumsfeld to be fired. Like that will ever happen.

U.S. soldiers who detained an elderly Iraqi woman last year placed a harness on her, made her crawl on all fours and rode her like a donkey, Prime Minister Tony Blair 's personal human rights envoy to Iraq said Wednesday to the Associated Press.. This is just sick.

Back to Bush. He agreed to go on Arab television to appease the Arabs. "Hours before President George W. Bush announced plans to address the Arab world to condemn the abuse of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. military personnel at the Abu Ghraib prison, Rush Limbaugh justified the U.S. guards' mistreatment of the Iraqis, stating that they were just "having a good time," and that their actions served as an "emotional release.""(*) Way to go asshole. And on May 4, the same day that Rush Limbaugh released his spew, Weekly Standard online editor Jonathan V. Last said on CNBC's Dennis Miller that he believed worse things happen in fraternity houses ..." (*) I think I have entered a parallel universe. In real life I have encountered people with similar comments too. I don't know if I am long for this world. Am I the aberration? Or has this country gone totally bonkers? Apparently it has. While the Arabs warned us that a war in Iraq would threaten middle east stability, right wing hawks still call for more war. History would show however, that Arabs are not into 'democracy'. It doesn't matter to the Bush White House. Bush keeps saying we have a calling to bring freedom and democracy to the world. No we don't. Where does he get this stuff? There's nothing in the constitution about it and I doubt Bush read that anyway. His hawk advisors probably only told him what parts fit their agenda. I urge you to read Maureen Farrell's editorial at Buzzflash for more chilling information and commentary cause I'm digressing and will never finish this blog post.

Ok, so Bush decided to address the Arabs while American media was applauding the naughty soldiers for their frat boy pranks. The Arab's are angry though. They say it's too late now to apologize and guess what? Bush offered no apology Nope. No sirree. Bush doesn't apologize for anything and no one gets fired. Nope. Scott McClellan apologized for Bush at a press gaggle later on. Read an account of how Arabs in many countries viewed the President's lousy apology.

Slate has a great commentary on Bush's speeches where he states how there was no more torture in Iraq, no rape rooms, no mass graves. If this guy gets re-elected, if there is another republican house and senate after November, I don't know people, I don't know.

UPDATE 5/11/04: The Army Times has an editorial that puts the blame all the way to the top of the chain of command. Check it out.

Viral marketing. Sinister as hell.

More on twisted viral marketing and cat decapitations. Ya gotta love Mark Morford for telling it like it is.

The right to life doesn’t end at the moment of birth

John Kerry has been getting some flack from a few Catholic Bishops regarding his pro-choice stance on abortion. I feel that John Kerry ought to speak to Mario Cuomo.

Mario Cuomo was a Catholic Governor of New York State for 12 years. He gave an amazing speech about Religion and Public Policy back in 1984. Read it. He argued that as a politician in a pluralistic society where he is sworn to uphold the constitution, that he does have the right to advocate for certain Catholic values that the Church holds. He questions,

"But should I?  Is it helpful?  Is it essential to human dignity?  Does it promote harmony and understanding?  Or does it divide us so fundamentally that it threatens our ability to function as a pluralistic community?... When should I argue to make my religious value your morality"

Cuomo argues that we must press on to make abortions a rare occurrence through proper health, education and welfare. From his speech:

"Are we asking government to make criminal what we believe to be sinful because we ourselves can’t stop committing the sin?

"The failure here is not Caesar’s. This failure is our failure, the failure of the entire people of God.

  ..."That [Christian Responsibility] it doesn’t end with abortion.  Because it involves life and death, abortion will always be a central concern of Catholics.  But so will nuclear weapons.  And hunger and homelessness and joblessness, all the forces diminishing human life and threatening to destroy it. 

..."We should understand that whether abortion is outlawed or not, our work has barely begun: the work of creating a society where the right to life doesn’t end at the moment of birth, where an infant isn’t helped into a world that doesn’t care if it’s fed properly, housed decently, educated adequately, where the blind or retarded child isn’t condemned to exist rather than empowered to live."

Rock on Mario Cuomo. In April of this year, Mr Cuomo was interviewed by Religion and Ethics regarding the controversy over Kerry's pro-abortion stance by certain Bishops. Cuomo makes it clear that not many bishops are saying anything about the political role of Catholics. It's a very few. My opinion is that the loud mouths are getting all the press but there is a lot more to being a Catholic politician than the abortion issue. We are still a pluralistic society. Cuomo explains, and I believe I made the point many times, that if one were to try to legislate all Catholic dogma, we'd have to live in a Catholic Theocracy. I always thought we'd have to be like the Amish if we stuck to pure Catholic dogma in daily life. Cuomo, like myself, doesn't believe that Kerry will be denied communion except by that St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke. In all honesty, around here, you can go to one Catholic parish where they are very strict and dogma abiding, then pop over to the next town and find a very loving forgiving pastor who welcomes everyone to share in the Mass as Jesus would surely do.

They [Catholic Church] did not oppose slavery in 1865 and in the late nineteenth century, although the pope had spoken against it. They do not bring the same ardor to insisting on their position against the death penalty today. Nobody knows that better than I. I was badly mauled by people in New York State for being against the death penalty for 12 years. In all that period, the Church never spoke against it. Now they have spoken and said it's wrong except in very few emergent situations...

Cuomo is asked if he feels the Church's stance against Kerry will hurt his chances in states with large Catholic populations?

"If it is a political issue, I suspect that it will not hurt John Kerry, but it may hurt the Church. And that troubles me....

"One of the reasons the country was created was for me to be free to be a Catholic and you to be whatever you wish to be. In order to protect that freedom of religion, you must be careful not to intrude upon other people's freedom of religion. For me to be protected in my right to be against abortion and against contraceptives, I have to make sure not to tread upon your right not to believe in those things, because if I can impose my religion on you, you can impose your religion on me. And so the best way to preserve the freedom of religion in this country is for government to stay away from making rules that are basically religious in nature."

..."They [Catholics] will make a judgment as to whether they think it's correct for the Church to punish John Kerry for not taking the position they wish him to take on abortion, while at the same time they're not saying the same thing about the death penalty, they're not saying the same thing about the war in Iraq, which the bishops said was not a just war."

Mr Cuomo talks about what made him give his speech in 1984. He said then Cardinal O'Connor of NY said that Catholic politicians were on the verge of losing their [Catholic] rights to this or that if they didn't toe the line.

"It went through me like a blade. That's when I sat down and did something that no Catholic had done before. I said, "We have to discuss this, discuss the theology of it. And we have to do it in a place where there are Catholics who know. And we have to let people witness it and make a determination: is this theology, as I see it, correct or isn't it?" I said that in 1984. It was discussed by theologians. It was written [about] by theologians. If you look at the ENCYCLOPEDIA OF CATHOLICISM that's put out by Notre Dame, it's referred to. It's referred to as a proper statement. So it's a very big, very important subject. "

When I attended a Catholic seminary for my MA in Theology, we studied Cuomo's speech. I had to write a paper opposed to it or defending it with sound theology. I supported the speech and explained how a ban on abortion in this secular society would be unfeasible at this time. First you would have to change societal values. Catholic women have just as many abortions as any other women in this country. How can a politician argue for a principle that the rest of the Church doesn't live up to?

Cuomo comments on how to reduce the number of abortions at length and says teaching about abstinence is important and birth control should also be available for those who believe in it. If a woman should become pregnant:

"Try to convince her, "Look, you don't need an abortion here if you think you're not ready for this child, if you think you're not in a position to do the child justice. Let's work toward an adoption." Let's make it easier to have an adoption. "And we'll pay for your going to term. We'll give you a good doctor. We'll deliver the child and we will arrange the adoption." I think if we worked aggressively at all those things, we could reduce significantly the number of abortions, without ever offending anybody, without ever denying a woman choice, and without ever breaking any religious rules."

This is exactly where the Republican right wing Christians fail. They offer no alternatives. You can't force a woman to have a baby and then not help her. If you are against abortion based on Christian theology, you can't ignore the living from the womb to the grave.

RNC NOT WELCOME IN NYC

Will the RNC bring 265 million dollars to struggling NYC companies? In Philadelphia at the RNC in 2000, they made 159 million. Streets will be closed for blocks and blocks. Security will cost taxpayers about 65 million.

New Yorkers will not be able to get around. Trains, tunnels, bridges and major roadways will be monitored and there will be checkpoints everywhere. I don't see how they expect to make any money since most New Yorkers are going to try to get the hell out of the city during the RNC. New Yorkers spend a lot more money than any GOP delegates. NYC will probably lose money. Pinheads.

We don't want the RNC here. They are exploiting NY for 9/11. Pigs. They didn't help us. We helped ourselves. Bush never paid NY what he promised for restoration. Bush told the EPA not to release the report that our air was unsafe. Thousands of NYers became ill due to poor air quality. NYC is 49th for receiving federal anti-terrorism funds. The GOP hates NY. America hates New Yorkers.

We don't want any favors from the sick perverts who rally behind the most corrupt and secretive government in the history of the US.

Waddaya think we're stoopid?

We're Noo Yawkiz.

The RNC can bite me.

Not My God

I'm not sure I understand humanity anymore. I understand now that while God made us in his image, we are doing the same to God. We have created an awful God. Quite honestly I wouldn't worship that God. I was given a free will. So throw me in hell for all eternity. I am not worshipping a God I totally disagree with. This God can go ahead and rapture all his people who are intolerant, bigoted and holier than I. I would be happy if he got them off this planet. I just hope their God doesn't rapture their car keys.

I wasn't created by their God. I am appalled at his creation. I am appalled at the so called Christian God of the right wing. He is mad, jealous, vengeful and conceited. He is not the father of Jesus Christ. I liked that God much better. I wonder if he exists? And if he does, how come he doesn't do away with the bad God?

• Fighting for our freedom indeed. Scroll and read the whole page after you watch the video. Some interesting perspectives on war.
• Watch this fine display of how our country liberates Iraqi's.
• Adults only: this was an illegal attack

I was terrorized on 9/11 because I smelled it and the ashes covered my home. But is this how God want's us to avenge the attack? Well I hope he's happy cause I'm not. Our soldier's cheering and enjoying their duty makes us no better than those who cheered on 9/11. George Bush can keep his God. I'm going to be an atheist.

Mark Twain on Imperialism

     I left these shores, at Vancouver, a red-hot imperialist. I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific. It seemed tiresome and tame for it to content itself with the Rockies.

     Why not spread its wings over the Phillippines, I asked myself? And I thought it would be a real good thing to do.

    I said to myself, here are a people who have suffered for three centuries. We can make them as free as ourselves, give them a government and country of their own, put a miniature of the American constitution afloat in the Pacific, start a brand new republic to take its place among the free nations of the world. It seemed to me a great task to which had addressed ourselves.

     But I have thought some more, since then, and I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Phillippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem. . . 

     It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.

Be Afraid

A female musician friend of mine was fired from her job simply for being gay when Mr Bush was governor of Texas . Now she lives in Georgia and has been evicted from her apartment because she is pro-Kerry and anti-war. Someone in her apartment building told on her.

So let's see...
Free Speech out the window
Gay rights almost obliviated
Right to choose almost obliviated

And our soldiers are fighting for what? Our freedoms?

Uh Mr Kerry, American's Pay Attention to the Dirt... on Fox

"How is that they have you on the run?" asked Repps Hudson, a Vietnam veteran, according to an account by a pool reporter.

Mr. Kerry appeared irritated and insisted the Republican attacks were not so effective. "Americans aren't listening to all that junk," he said.

But Mr. Black seemed unpersuaded.

"He [Bush] doesn't know where he serves or what time period it was," he said of Mr. Bush's Air National Guard stint. "It should be made an issue. Because if he can send someone else's son to go fight or die, where were you doing your service?"-NY Times

Seriously Mr, Kerry. Most people don't read the papers. The TV News is brainwashed by your opposition. You'll never get your point across if you don't fight back!

UPDATE 5/4: A reader pointed out this article to me at BuzzFlash. Kerry better get on the stick. I want Dean back. At least he was mad as hell and wasn't going to take it anymore.

Marathon Brings Local Residents Together

In my little microcosm of the world in suburbia, we had the Long Island Marathon this morning. It started in the big county park across the street from my house.

I'm not sure how the marathon path went this year exactly because they changed it from last year and they closed off my street and many others including main arteries and a State Parkway for the marathoners. I believe they ran to Jones Beach. (I live about 15 minutes from the beach for all you inlanders)

I woke up too late to see my friend ToddShea.com appear on Fox and Friends this morning and I also missed most of the marathoners. I got to see the tail end though and I found it both amusing and encouraging. They have more stamina than I. I try to walk everyday. That's my exercise. The neighborhood kids were out in the street mimicking some of the participants and I guess that is what cracked me up. Another bunch of boys were so thrilled that there were no cars, they set up a skateboard jump.

I missed the actual runners because I slept too long. I caught what I call "scooters" because they look like people when they are scooting across the street when the light is about to change. Their arms are stiffly by their sides and their knees don't bend. It's kind of like a run/walk. Maybe I should call it scurrying? Well there were a whole bunch of scooters anyway. The kids thought it was simply hilarious and the kids were 'scooting' up and down the street.

There were some men and women with those strollers that you can push by running or skating. Maybe it was their day to take the kids? Maybe the kids just like the ride.

The gray haired brigade came up next. They were walking and looked out of breath. But I have to give them a lot of credit for coming out as I puffed on another cigarette and drank Diet Pepsi for breakfast. I found out later that this was mile 11. I'm not sure if these folks planned on walking all the way to Jones Beach though. There were school busses going by slowly to pick up people who were exhausted.

After the seniors came chatty women pushing strollers and doling out Cheerios to their whining kids and after them came the people with all sorts of braces on their legs. I was very impressed. I was running out of Pepsi though and I couldn't get my car out of the driveway.

It would haven been no problem to walk a mile to the store on this day that salutes those who master mind over matter and push their endurance to the limit. But I was really running out of caffeinated Diet Pepsi. Still had a carton of butts left, thank god or I would have definitely walked or rode my bike to the store in the rain. I waited.

Finally I saw cars go by at 12:30. I was free! I took my car out and had a bit of trouble getting through a cross street but made my way to the store where they sell Pepsi!

Well talk about a community gathering together against an enemy. When I got to the little strip mall, local residents who barely speak to other unless they just dug out of a blizzard, were telling war stories about trying to navigate through our streets this morning. Imagine the horror that so many people couldn't get where they were going the usual way and had to go waaaaay out of their way and sometimes to the next town, Hicksville to accomplish their goals. (bagels)

When I told people what street I lived on and that it was completely shut down, I became a sort of war survivor in their eyes. [memo to self: print up hundreds of "I survived the LI Marathon" Tshirts.] Yep, it was a long, long morning being cooped up in my house overlooking the park puffing away on cigarettes and lacking the caffeine I so desperately needed to start my day. I heard that a girl on my block who was getting married today was threatening to sue the County for her inconvenience. People were kind of walking around the shops like they had been through the wringer this morning. You know that kind of flat footed stagger people use when they want to signify that they had just over exerted themselves and literally been through hell and back? It was good to see the residents all talking to each other and sharing stories. Haven't seen this kind of comaraderie since 9/11. Yep, war is hell

Iraqi Liberation: torture, kidnapping, rape, mass graves replaced by same

2 years ago in May, 2002, The Bush Administration "unsigned" the International Criminal Court (ICC) treaty. The ICC Treaty was signed by President Clinton in December 2000 and signed by 144 countries. The Bush Administration claimed it "has no legal obligations arising from its signature (to the treaty) on December 31, 2000." What the US is saying that they don't want their soldiers to be held accountable for any war crimes.Furthermore the US declared that it will require assurances from where US troops are deployed that they will not drag any servicemen before the ICC.

Interestingly by June 2002, a documentary "Massacre in Mazar" by Irishman Jamie Doran was being shown all over Europe. This 20 minute film, blocked by US media, of course,alleges that the US Military was complicit in the deaths of thousands of Afghani POWs, many of whom were not combatants. At the bottom of the article are more links to more atrocities.

By January of 2004 the Human Rights Watch accused US military troops of destroying civilian property and detaining relatives of suspected combatants which is prohibited by the Geneva Convention.

In this month's issue of the New Yorker, Seymour M. Hersh gives a blazing expose of how American soldiers brutalized Iraqi's in Abu Ghraib, a former Iraqi prison. The story broke on CBS '60 Minutes this week and exposed the inhuman torture used against Iraqi prisoners by US soldiers. Interestingly, this prison was once declared a reason to rid Iraq of Saddam Hussein. It seems to me that the ugliness has all but disappeared. Are American's more civilized and more than Iraqi's? Does our occupation make Iraqi's feel more secure? Doesn't appear that way. There are mass graves in Fallujian soccer fields filled with Iraqi women and children. The devastation of our "liberating" army is inciting anger against America. Pictures of Iraqi civilian victims don't make it to American media but the photos are shocking.

The US still fought for exeption from the War Crimes Court last June and we'll probably hear about it again this or next month. There is currently a petition online asking for No impunity for war crimes by US Troops. 20 victims of war crimes in Iraq are bringing suit against the US and are filing charges before the federal prosecutor of Belgium for violations of International Humanitarian Law. The plaintiffs have been seriously injured or have lost relatives as the result of: the use of cluster bombs, attacks on the civilian population including journalists, acts of aggression against health services and other Iraqi infrastructure, looting protected by or under orders from the U.S. army.

Saddam would be snickering if he knew of the "liberating" tactics used by the US to overthrow his regime.

On this morning's politics talk shows, they talked at length about John Kerry in 1971 chucking his medals/ribbons over a fence in protest of the war atrocities he witnessed in Vietnam. No one spoke about the atrocities of this war. The pundits agreed that Bush won the week in politics. If Bush truly won the hearts of Americans this week, he most certainly lost the hearts of the rest of the world and mine too. Journalism is dead in America.

American Conservative

Pat Buchanan in this month's American Conservative comments on American imperialism and lousy politics:

"We are not that kind of people. Never have been. Americans, who preach the equality of all races, creeds, and cultures, are, de facto, poor imperialists. When we attempt an imperial role as in the Philippines or Iraq, we invariably fall into squabbling over whether a republic should be imposing its ideology on another nation. A crusade for democracy is a contradiction in terms.

"While it would be nice if Brazil, Bangladesh, and Burundi all embraced democracy, why should we fight them if they don’t, and why should our soldiers die to restore democracy should they lose it? Why is that our problem, if they are not threatening us?"

The story is worth a read. Thank goddess all conservatives don't have their heads in the sand.

Mark Twain on American Atrocities in the Phillippines

Battle Hymn of the Republic (Brought Down to Date)
by Mark Twain c.1900

Mine eyes have seen the orgy of the launching of the Sword;
He is searching out the hoardings where the stranger's wealth is stored;
He hath loosed his fateful lightnings, and with woe and death has scored;
His lust is marching on.

I have seen him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded him an altar in the Eastern dews and damps;
I have read his doomful mission by the dim and flaring lamps --
His night is marching on.

I have read his bandit gospel writ in burnished rows of steel:
"As ye deal with my pretensions, so with you my wrath shall deal;
Let the faithless son of Freedom crush the patriot with his heel;
Lo, Greed is marching on!"

We have legalized the strumpet and are guarding her retreat;*
Greed is seeking out commercial souls before his judgement seat;
O, be swift, ye clods, to answer him! be jubilant my feet!
Our god is marching on!

In a sordid slime harmonious Greed was born in yonder ditch,
With a longing in his bosom -- and for others' goods an itch.
As Christ died to make men holy, let men die to make us rich --
Our god is marching on.