You have to see today's Boondocks. It's a Halloween Nightmare.
Bush/Cheney get The Mindless Zombie vote. scary
Sunday, October 31
Saturday, October 30
New Voters in NY: success story
The last day to sign up to vote was October 9th. My son mailed his registration form on October 9th and we kept our fingers crossed. Since then my son has received 2 voter cards with the complete instructions on where to go on election day. He also received a big color postcard from our county executive with a picture of what the polling machines look like and a welcome letter that says, "Congratulations on registering to vote. " Now, The Power Of This Machine Is In Your Hands.
There was no nasty or intimidating mail sent to any of us. I'm pretty impressed with the (police) State of NY when it comes to voting. When they say NY's a democratic state, it means it's a democratic state.
It's going to be fun to be there when my son votes for the first time. Should I bring the camera or is that too tacky? He missed voting last year because his 18th birthday was just a few days later. He usually accompanied me when I voted over the years because they have a bake sale at the school where we vote. He was raised to understand the importance of being involved in elections and buying cookies to support the local school.
There was no nasty or intimidating mail sent to any of us. I'm pretty impressed with the (police) State of NY when it comes to voting. When they say NY's a democratic state, it means it's a democratic state.
It's going to be fun to be there when my son votes for the first time. Should I bring the camera or is that too tacky? He missed voting last year because his 18th birthday was just a few days later. He usually accompanied me when I voted over the years because they have a bake sale at the school where we vote. He was raised to understand the importance of being involved in elections and buying cookies to support the local school.
A Public Service Message
Keep republicans you care about away from the polls on Tuesday if you live in a swing state or where the race is close. Keep them in bed all day long if you have to. It's for the cause. It's for their own good and the good of the country. Maybe you'll get a thank you. Maybe not. Do whatever it takes, baby. Make sure you have someone fill in while you go and vote democrat across the board.
Defeat fascism in America.
Re-defeat Bush.
BTW
Yale endorsed Kerry
Defeat fascism in America.
Re-defeat Bush.
BTW
Yale endorsed Kerry
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
Do you want to help get the job done? You can! Check out VoterCall
From their website:
Clock watch
Don't forget to set your clocks back one hour before you hit the sheets tonight. No, you can't set it back four years, even as much as you might want to.
******
Meanwhile, I'm still trying to understand how the showing of the new ObL tape yesterday is going to help bush. Seeing that the man who planned and executed the attacks of 9-11 is still standing and talking makes us feel safer? How does that work exactly?
Do you want to help get the job done? You can! Check out VoterCall
From their website:
"The election on November 2nd may be the most important of our lives, but millions of people, including many of those most affected by unjust government policies, will not show up to vote on election day. VoterCall provides a simple way for individuals anywhere to make a huge difference - placing brief phone calls to encourage low-income, minority and young voters to go vote.
The set up is simple and easy to use. You can call from anywhere you have a phone and access to the web. You can call as many, or as few people as you like - there's no minimum or maximum commitment required. This site will guide you every step of the way, technical support is also available by email."******
Clock watch
Don't forget to set your clocks back one hour before you hit the sheets tonight. No, you can't set it back four years, even as much as you might want to.
******
Meanwhile, I'm still trying to understand how the showing of the new ObL tape yesterday is going to help bush. Seeing that the man who planned and executed the attacks of 9-11 is still standing and talking makes us feel safer? How does that work exactly?
Friday, October 29
Your Mental Images of the Last Four Years
by pissed off patricia
When you think back about these past four years of the bush administration, what are the first three images that come to mind? Close you eyes a second. What do you see?
Okay, now what are the three things for which you believe this administration will best be remembered?
When you think back about these past four years of the bush administration, what are the first three images that come to mind? Close you eyes a second. What do you see?
Okay, now what are the three things for which you believe this administration will best be remembered?
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
The Numbers (game?)
Think about the numbers. Numbing numbers they are too. Estimates are out that about 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed as a result of bush's desire to invade Iraq. Even if the total is half that amount, it is still staggering. Today it was announced that 1,111 soldiers have died in Iraq. We have over 8,000 wounded soldiers. The cost of this war is escalating to over 200 billion American dollars. Then there's the nearly 350 tons of explosives missing from Iraq.
The polls show that the percentage numbers for Senator Kerry and bush bounce around in every state just about every day. Sometimes it's a 50/50 split and sometimes one or the other has the lead but within the 3, 4, or 5 percent margin of error. The numbers vary.
We can move on and count the number of Americans who are jobless, insurance-less, homeless, and less a lot more of the things that they had four years ago. More staggering numbers there too.
It's all there in the numbers. What would we do without them? What about the gazillions of dollars we are paying to Halliburton? What about the those numbers? More and more numbers are flashed in our face every day. At the Kerry rallies they are holding up signs each day and those signs show the number of days until the election.
Oh shoot, let's not forget about the numbers we'll hear election night. Damn, that will be number-arama won't it? We'll hear about numbers in every state and we'll hear a lot about time, which is also composed of numbers. You can't talk about the electoral college without numbers. Numbers will be shooting out of our TV's with astonishing speed. We'll all be watching those numbers roll across the screen. How many numbers do you think we'll see and hear? I'm guessing the total will be innumerable.
Yes indeed, it's all about the numbers. It's about 9-11 and it's about nearly 3,000 people being killed that awful day. It's about these numbers verses those numbers. Sometimes the numbers are good and sometimes they can weigh you down. Tuesday night we'll want our candidate to have high numbers and we'll want his opponent to have low numbers. We'll want the voters to turn out in high numbers and we'll want the number of Americans who didn't vote to be low. We'll want an honest count of the votes too. We'll be depending on the numbers because it's all about the numbers.
Sometimes you have to wonder. If we didn't have the numbers, would anything count?
The Numbers (game?)
Think about the numbers. Numbing numbers they are too. Estimates are out that about 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed as a result of bush's desire to invade Iraq. Even if the total is half that amount, it is still staggering. Today it was announced that 1,111 soldiers have died in Iraq. We have over 8,000 wounded soldiers. The cost of this war is escalating to over 200 billion American dollars. Then there's the nearly 350 tons of explosives missing from Iraq.
The polls show that the percentage numbers for Senator Kerry and bush bounce around in every state just about every day. Sometimes it's a 50/50 split and sometimes one or the other has the lead but within the 3, 4, or 5 percent margin of error. The numbers vary.
We can move on and count the number of Americans who are jobless, insurance-less, homeless, and less a lot more of the things that they had four years ago. More staggering numbers there too.
It's all there in the numbers. What would we do without them? What about the gazillions of dollars we are paying to Halliburton? What about the those numbers? More and more numbers are flashed in our face every day. At the Kerry rallies they are holding up signs each day and those signs show the number of days until the election.
Oh shoot, let's not forget about the numbers we'll hear election night. Damn, that will be number-arama won't it? We'll hear about numbers in every state and we'll hear a lot about time, which is also composed of numbers. You can't talk about the electoral college without numbers. Numbers will be shooting out of our TV's with astonishing speed. We'll all be watching those numbers roll across the screen. How many numbers do you think we'll see and hear? I'm guessing the total will be innumerable.
Yes indeed, it's all about the numbers. It's about 9-11 and it's about nearly 3,000 people being killed that awful day. It's about these numbers verses those numbers. Sometimes the numbers are good and sometimes they can weigh you down. Tuesday night we'll want our candidate to have high numbers and we'll want his opponent to have low numbers. We'll want the voters to turn out in high numbers and we'll want the number of Americans who didn't vote to be low. We'll want an honest count of the votes too. We'll be depending on the numbers because it's all about the numbers.
Sometimes you have to wonder. If we didn't have the numbers, would anything count?
From my local paper
I forgot to post this excerpt yesterday:
This Bush problem stems from cells
By Jimmy Breslin
My friend and handyman who is helping me create my Tiki computer room told me that his brother and wife had their baby's placenta donated to a registry just after he was born. For stem cells! So who exactly is dying for stem cells?
This Bush problem stems from cells
By Jimmy Breslin
...And of her stem cells, Kathy Kenny announced, "Anybody with half a brain knows this is the future."
She meant that the one without half a brain is George Bush. Somewhere out there on Tuesday night, and then last night and as he will be on all the nights left before this election, George Bush was in his shirtsleeves to look like a working man and he flailed and whined and lied and lied. They are missing 400 tons of major explosives? What 400 tons? He is an embarrassment to the country. He cried out against stem cells because he said they are sinful. You are taking a life to perhaps save a life, he says. He sees armies of women having babies and then chopping them up like chickens for the stem cells. He is opposed to embryonic stem cells, which come from a fetus that has been fertilized in vitro. His wife says the stem cells couldn't save her father from Alzheimer's, which means nobody should have them. They get their views from a Dust-Bowl Bible left by Elmer Gantry. Fifty years from now, people will look back on this year in America and be amazed that the country was run by an obvious nitwit.
My friend and handyman who is helping me create my Tiki computer room told me that his brother and wife had their baby's placenta donated to a registry just after he was born. For stem cells! So who exactly is dying for stem cells?
another lie
I don't know how anyone can possibly trust this man. This was the guy who lied about the pretzel, his fall off a bike.
Salon.com: NASA photo analyst: Bush wore a device during debate
Physicist says imaging techniques prove the president's bulge was not caused by wrinkled clothing. By Kevin Berger
Salon.com: NASA photo analyst: Bush wore a device during debate
Physicist says imaging techniques prove the president's bulge was not caused by wrinkled clothing. By Kevin Berger
Oct. 29, 2004 | George W. Bush tried to laugh off the bulge. "I don't know what that is," he said on "Good Morning America" on Wednesday, referring to the infamous protrusion beneath his jacket during the presidential debates. "I'm embarrassed to say it's a poorly tailored shirt."
....Dr. Robert M. Nelson, however, was not laughing. He knew the president was not telling the truth. And Nelson is neither conspiracy theorist nor midnight blogger. He's a senior research scientist for NASA and for Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and an international authority on image analysis. Currently he's engrossed in analyzing digital photos of Saturn's moon Titan, determining its shape, whether it contains craters or canyons.
A professional physicist and photo analyst for more than 30 years, he speaks earnestly and thoughtfully about his subject. "I am willing to stake my scientific reputation to the statement that Bush was wearing something under his jacket during the debate," he says. "This is not about a bad suit. And there's no way the bulge can be described as a wrinkled shirt."
More on 9/11 Coverup
Supposedly 3 of the 4 black boxes were found from 9/11. Why do you suppose the contents haven't been revealed? Why are officials still saying that they were never found? "But New York City Firefighter Nicholas DeMasi has written in a book self-published by Ground Zero workers that he took federal agents on an all-terrain vehicle in October 2001 and located three of the four. His account is backed by a well-known Ground Zero volunteer."
Wow you can watch Fahrenheit 9/11 on the internet in low res! Tell everyone.
Yay, Spitzer comes through again: "On behalf of New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, Chief Investigator William Casey today accepted a Complaint and Petition from a group of New York City citizens including 9/11 family members, survivors and a Ground Zero triage physician. The Complaint demands that the AG open a criminal inquiry and/or grand jury investigation into the many still unsolved crimes of September 11, 2001 over which he has jurisdiction." I have to write him another thank you note. He is very kind and actually answers my thank you notes.
Fighting over the 9/11 commission bill in the news:
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Wow you can watch Fahrenheit 9/11 on the internet in low res! Tell everyone.
Yay, Spitzer comes through again: "On behalf of New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, Chief Investigator William Casey today accepted a Complaint and Petition from a group of New York City citizens including 9/11 family members, survivors and a Ground Zero triage physician. The Complaint demands that the AG open a criminal inquiry and/or grand jury investigation into the many still unsolved crimes of September 11, 2001 over which he has jurisdiction." I have to write him another thank you note. He is very kind and actually answers my thank you notes.
Fighting over the 9/11 commission bill in the news:
"House and Senate conferees will battle behind closed doors this week trying at least to reach an agreement among themselves before Election Day. The key issue - whether to adhere to the 9/11 commission recommendations and give full budget authority to a new intelligence director or abide by the Pentagon's desire to leave spending in the Defense secretary's control - has reached a virtual deadlock thus far.
...Vice presidential candidate John Edwards released a statement yesterday lambasting President George W. Bush for not forcing the legislation through.
"The fact that President Bush hasn't gotten this done three years after 9/11 and nearly 100 days after the Commission's report is a colossal failure of leadership," Edwards said.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Well we showed 'em... or maybe not
The NY Times reports that a conservative estimate of dead Iraqi civilians since the US invasion is at 100,000: "In 15 of the 33 communities visited, residents reported violent deaths in their families since the conflict started. They attributed many of those deaths to attacks by American-led forces, mostly airstrikes, and most of those killed were women and children. The risk of violent death was 58 times higher than before the war, the researchers reported."
And a UN Report says that the U.S. has no justification for using torture. You mean torture isn't a college prank or a family value?: ""The absolute nature of the prohibition of torture and other forms of ill treatment means that no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for torture," the report said." Bush was so proud during the debates that he didn't sign up for the ICC. I hope that he is charged for war crimes.
Or did we show them? This was on CNN last night with Aaron Brown. (you can try to watch it here)
You can see pictures here of the explosives. "....members of the 101st Airborne Division showed the 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS news crew bunker after bunker of material labelled "explosives." Usually it took just the snap of a bolt cutter to get into the bunkers and see the material identified by the 101st as detonation cords. "
Wow, 150 digital cameras were given to Iraqi's to show who they are. It was made into a movie. Boy, they'll show us.
Oh sure, the NAACP's tax exempt status is being investigated by the IRS for endorsing the preznit. Et tu, IRS? Is there anything that isn't political or racially motivated? What about the churches? Investigate the churches.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
And a UN Report says that the U.S. has no justification for using torture. You mean torture isn't a college prank or a family value?: ""The absolute nature of the prohibition of torture and other forms of ill treatment means that no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification for torture," the report said." Bush was so proud during the debates that he didn't sign up for the ICC. I hope that he is charged for war crimes.
Or did we show them? This was on CNN last night with Aaron Brown. (you can try to watch it here)
BROWN: Let me ask you then, David, the question I asked Jamie. In regard to the dispute about whether that stuff was there when the Americans arrived, is it game, set, match? Is that part of the argument now over? KAY: Well, at least with regard to this one bunker and the film shows one seal, one bunker, one group of soldiers going through and there were others there that were sealed, with this one, I think it is game, set and match. There was HMX, RDX in there. The seal was broken and quite frankly to me the most frightening thing is not only is the seal broken and the lock broken but the soldiers left after opening it up. I mean to rephrase the so-called (UNINTELLIGIBLE) rule if you open an arms bunker, you own it. You have to provide security.Does this mean that the Preznit will quit saying that Kerry doesn't have the facts about the missing 380 tons of dangerous explosives in Iraq. Perhaps Kerry did have the facts and bush didn't. bush: "This week Senator Kerry is again attacking the actions of our military in Iraq, with complete disregard for the facts."
You can see pictures here of the explosives. "....members of the 101st Airborne Division showed the 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS news crew bunker after bunker of material labelled "explosives." Usually it took just the snap of a bolt cutter to get into the bunkers and see the material identified by the 101st as detonation cords. "
Wow, 150 digital cameras were given to Iraqi's to show who they are. It was made into a movie. Boy, they'll show us.
Oh sure, the NAACP's tax exempt status is being investigated by the IRS for endorsing the preznit. Et tu, IRS? Is there anything that isn't political or racially motivated? What about the churches? Investigate the churches.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Thursday, October 28
bushmanipulations on memory lane
Amazingly CNN covered a story about a Bush ad that was manipulated. It really wasn't all that serious because I do photo manipulation and can do it to videos too. Sometimes you have to fix things up if you don't have the right footage. The story broke at DailyKos. The ad, ironically said, "Whatever it takes". heh.
This reminded me of other manipulations used by this administration. Remember the staged toppling of the Saddam Statue in Iraq? Ah those were the days. In case you don't remember, you can see it here and here where you don't see an awful lot of people gathered around to topple the statue do you? Not when you get to see a long shot. And here is more media manipulation and then here's an eyewitnesss report of the staged photo op with "rent-a-crowd". And let's not forget about the photoshopped picture of the crowd here. ooh that was a big story.
It also reminded me of the day that Preznit Codpiece landed on the aircraft carrier and the aircraft carrier had to be turned around so that the viewers wouldn't see San Diego in the background. (they were right off the coast of California that day. bush could have rowed a boat to the aircraft carrier but bush's handlers thought it would be cooler if it looked like he had to fly a fighter plane out to the middle of the ocean somewhere to meet up with the guys) We all remember the Mission Accomplished fiasco after that.
It also reminded me of last Thanksgiving where I was almost fooled into believing that bush did a pretty cool thing. The top secret trip to Baghdad. It was the great turkey tour. But alas, it was a photo-op turkey. Soldiers were turned away from the event as only pre-selected soldiers were allowed in. The weirdest part was when the story emerged that bush's plane was spotted by a British Airways Flight and souvenirs were made with the words, "Did I just see Air force one?" before bush's plane even landed back in Texas but then that British airways story was debunked because British Airways denied the whole thing and then the bushcrimefamily decided it was best to stop pushing that story. Well the whole thanksgiving was a photo-op. He was probably just jealous that Hillary was going to be there.
Well I just took a trip down memory hole lane with my bookmarks folder on the old trusty browser. What other staged and manipulated photo-ops were there? 9-11? What else?
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
This reminded me of other manipulations used by this administration. Remember the staged toppling of the Saddam Statue in Iraq? Ah those were the days. In case you don't remember, you can see it here and here where you don't see an awful lot of people gathered around to topple the statue do you? Not when you get to see a long shot. And here is more media manipulation and then here's an eyewitnesss report of the staged photo op with "rent-a-crowd". And let's not forget about the photoshopped picture of the crowd here. ooh that was a big story.
It also reminded me of the day that Preznit Codpiece landed on the aircraft carrier and the aircraft carrier had to be turned around so that the viewers wouldn't see San Diego in the background. (they were right off the coast of California that day. bush could have rowed a boat to the aircraft carrier but bush's handlers thought it would be cooler if it looked like he had to fly a fighter plane out to the middle of the ocean somewhere to meet up with the guys) We all remember the Mission Accomplished fiasco after that.
It also reminded me of last Thanksgiving where I was almost fooled into believing that bush did a pretty cool thing. The top secret trip to Baghdad. It was the great turkey tour. But alas, it was a photo-op turkey. Soldiers were turned away from the event as only pre-selected soldiers were allowed in. The weirdest part was when the story emerged that bush's plane was spotted by a British Airways Flight and souvenirs were made with the words, "Did I just see Air force one?" before bush's plane even landed back in Texas but then that British airways story was debunked because British Airways denied the whole thing and then the bushcrimefamily decided it was best to stop pushing that story. Well the whole thanksgiving was a photo-op. He was probably just jealous that Hillary was going to be there.
Well I just took a trip down memory hole lane with my bookmarks folder on the old trusty browser. What other staged and manipulated photo-ops were there? 9-11? What else?
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
The God Factor in the Election
Who ever thought that God would be a factor in an election? Who ever thought that an evil power would use God's name to recruit followers? My mom always told me that the devil would come a knocking in the guise of a good guy. There are always plenty of people who have blind faith and those are the people, while well meaning deep down inside, are being led to slaughter and have an unusually important role to play in the upcoming election. How do you convince them to vote correctly without telling them that they are ignorant? Hmmm.
I learned something since I got involved in the internet and met people from all over the world in all walks of life: There is truth in all religions. You just have to try to dig it out from under all the muck. I have befriended Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Ethical Humanists and I have learned that the one thing, the big thing that is constant in all religions, which therefore must be truth is how we treat our neighbors, especially those who are less fortunate than we are. Anything else is just filler, conjecture and opinion.
So here is the weekend reading assignment for all progressives:
Faith Abuse: When God Becomes A Campaign Ploy
Arianna Huffington:
Robert Wright, New York Times
By Steven Waldman
Understanding Pro-war Christians' Indifference to Civilian Deaths
by Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
by Jeffrey John
By Peter Wallsten, LA Times
WHAT THE BIBLE REALLY SAYS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY (repost)
Daniel A. Helminiak, Ph.D.
We're still discussing this article on Blondesense here.
And Michael Miller told me about this gem. Oy vay:
The Godly Must Be Crazy
By Glenn Scherer
*******************
I learned something since I got involved in the internet and met people from all over the world in all walks of life: There is truth in all religions. You just have to try to dig it out from under all the muck. I have befriended Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Ethical Humanists and I have learned that the one thing, the big thing that is constant in all religions, which therefore must be truth is how we treat our neighbors, especially those who are less fortunate than we are. Anything else is just filler, conjecture and opinion.
So here is the weekend reading assignment for all progressives:
Faith Abuse: When God Becomes A Campaign Ploy
Arianna Huffington:
"As someone for whom faith is incredibly important, and who regularly prays for all the people and things that matter to me, I'm hopeful that God is as appalled as I am with the way His name is constantly being taken in vain on the Bush campaign trail, and with how the president is abusing his faith to justify to himself and to the world his disastrous policies. "Faith, Hope and Clarity
Robert Wright, New York Times
"Every morning President Bush reads a devotional from "My Utmost for His Highest," a collection of homilies by a Protestant minister named Oswald Chambers, who lived a century ago. As Mr. Bush explained in an interview broadcast on Tuesday on Fox News, reading Chambers is a way for him "on a daily basis to be in the Word."Is George Bush the Christians' Christian?
Chambers's book continues to sell well, especially an updated edition with the language tweaked toward the modern. Inspecting the book - or the free online edition - may give even some devout Christians qualms about America's current guidance."
By Steven Waldman
"Conservatives are right when they say that the faith-makes-you-irrational idea is a gross caricature. What Bush supporters are less willing to admit is that President Bush has helped to promote this caricature that liberals now exploit.Why Are Some American Christians So Bloodthirsty?
The president repeatedly says he makes decisions based on "instinct" and "gut" and by looking into the hearts of world leaders. He lets it be known that he doesn't read the newspapers. He seems to discourage dissenting viewpoints. He jokes about his poor command of the English language and his lousy grades in school. He is America's most famous evangelical Christian and he's proudly anti-intellectual. "
Understanding Pro-war Christians' Indifference to Civilian Deaths
by Dr. Teresa Whitehurst
"...conservative Christianity in the U.S. has succumbed to that which it has, in decades past, most rigorously warned against: moral relativism. By restricting any discussion of morality to sexual behavior, right-wing politicians have obliterated the once-central Christian teaching that the way we teach others is of paramount importance to God. Cleverly "working the room," pro-war politicians have infiltrated churches to such a degree that killings and torture are no longer within the province of morality. When morality is only about sex, no aspect of war – even the killing of entire families – can arouse criticism, much less condemnation."The mark of a chosen person (repost)
by Jeffrey John
The Church that Jesus first assembled was a gang of sinners and rejects. Any Church that is His Church ought to know that it is the same. It has to show the same kind of love, the kind that includes and embraces first, then let’s the love do the healing from the inside. That’s what Catholic means. Michael Marshall once wrote: ‘the test of genuinely Catholic Christianity is not that it makes good people better, but that it makes bad people holy’.Conflicted Evangelicals Could Cost Bush Votes (repost)
By Peter Wallsten, LA Times
"I'm very antiabortion, but the reality is the right to life encompasses a much broader field than just abortion," he added. "If I'm a proponent of life, I have to think about the consequences of not providing prescription drugs to seniors or sending young men off to war."BIBLICAL PERVERSION ON THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT:
WHAT THE BIBLE REALLY SAYS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY (repost)
Daniel A. Helminiak, Ph.D.
We're still discussing this article on Blondesense here.
And Michael Miller told me about this gem. Oy vay:
The Godly Must Be Crazy
By Glenn Scherer
"President Reagan's first secretary of the interior, James Watt, told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. "God gave us these things to use. After the last tree is felled, Christ will come back,"
*******************
"O my Lord, if I worship You from fear of Hell, burn me in Hell,
and if I worship You in hope of Paradise, exclude me thence,
but if I worship You for Your own sake,
then withhold not from me Your Eternal Beauty..."
-- Rabi'ah Al'Adawiya ,
Muslim & Sufi mystic poet born in Basra, Iraq (717 - 801 CE)
Thanks Mohsan
and if I worship You in hope of Paradise, exclude me thence,
but if I worship You for Your own sake,
then withhold not from me Your Eternal Beauty..."
-- Rabi'ah Al'Adawiya ,
Muslim & Sufi mystic poet born in Basra, Iraq (717 - 801 CE)
My Question and Your Answers
by pissed off patricia
Whew, I thought maybe my little mental train had jumped the track. Thank goodness I was wrong.
When I asked the other day which you feared most, another attack in the US or four more years of bush, I was being a bit selfish. I had beat myself up about this question. I had asked myself the same question and my answer agreed pretty much with yours. Four more years of bush was my biggest concern.
Sometimes when I hear that over fifty percent of the country is on the opposite side of an issue than I am, I take a timeout to analyze my own feelings. I ask myself why I seem to be out of the flock on the issue. I try to keep myself in check, because with all that's happening I want to make sure I'm not getting so wrapped up in my own account of things that I blind myself to reality. It's sort of like removing my glasses and cleaning them to be sure I am seeing the picture clearly.
There is so much negative activity in our world today that at times you have to question, because you can't and don't want to believe what you're hearing. We have the voting wars of today right here at our doorstep. Americans are questioning Americans about the legitimacy of our most prized part of democracy. Americans are trying to take away one another's right to vote. Think about it. How in the world did it come to this?
In one of the polls, the majority of Americans did not believe the election will be legitimate. Yet we are encouraging Iraqis to adopt our form of democracy. Sounds to me like we need to do some work at home before we dictate how others will run their country.
I have a theory about why the Republicans seem to be on such a nasty streak. They are following their leader. They have seen bush lie time and again and he never is required to atone for his lies. Somehow his lies seem to be acceptable because of his declared religious ordainment. Seems if you lie about your reasons for doing something, these lies are of no consequence as long as you achieve the outcome you desire. That's exactly what has been happening. He lied about his reasons for invading Iraq, but now those lies are acceptable because Saddam is in a jail somewhere. The Republicans are lying and cheating and they believe their lies are acceptable if they can accomplish a second term for bush. Bush has demonstrated that in his newly created America this sort of approach is completely acceptable when trying to attain your goal. The end justifies the means and there are no rules regarding the means.
That's what makes a second term for bush so frightening to me. During these last four years the rules have changed and there may be "no turning back". Many of us cling to the belief that one must be held accountable for their mistakes and surely for their lies. We are of the attitude that a leader should be accountable to the citizens he leads. Wasn't that the way we grew up? Weren't we taught that in order to be a good person you kept your nose clean, you had to accept responsibility for your own actions, and you must at all times be considerate of those around you? Now we have a group of people leading our country and trashing everything we believe to be the positive backbone or our society. No wonder we're frightened by four more years of bush. We are frightened that bush and his supporters have lost their heart, their conscience, and most fearfully, their respect and consideration for the truth. When the value of truth has been discarded, what is left? When lies are conveniently relegated to simple justification, we can see the darkness of the future and that is surely frightening.
Whew, I thought maybe my little mental train had jumped the track. Thank goodness I was wrong.
When I asked the other day which you feared most, another attack in the US or four more years of bush, I was being a bit selfish. I had beat myself up about this question. I had asked myself the same question and my answer agreed pretty much with yours. Four more years of bush was my biggest concern.
Sometimes when I hear that over fifty percent of the country is on the opposite side of an issue than I am, I take a timeout to analyze my own feelings. I ask myself why I seem to be out of the flock on the issue. I try to keep myself in check, because with all that's happening I want to make sure I'm not getting so wrapped up in my own account of things that I blind myself to reality. It's sort of like removing my glasses and cleaning them to be sure I am seeing the picture clearly.
There is so much negative activity in our world today that at times you have to question, because you can't and don't want to believe what you're hearing. We have the voting wars of today right here at our doorstep. Americans are questioning Americans about the legitimacy of our most prized part of democracy. Americans are trying to take away one another's right to vote. Think about it. How in the world did it come to this?
In one of the polls, the majority of Americans did not believe the election will be legitimate. Yet we are encouraging Iraqis to adopt our form of democracy. Sounds to me like we need to do some work at home before we dictate how others will run their country.
I have a theory about why the Republicans seem to be on such a nasty streak. They are following their leader. They have seen bush lie time and again and he never is required to atone for his lies. Somehow his lies seem to be acceptable because of his declared religious ordainment. Seems if you lie about your reasons for doing something, these lies are of no consequence as long as you achieve the outcome you desire. That's exactly what has been happening. He lied about his reasons for invading Iraq, but now those lies are acceptable because Saddam is in a jail somewhere. The Republicans are lying and cheating and they believe their lies are acceptable if they can accomplish a second term for bush. Bush has demonstrated that in his newly created America this sort of approach is completely acceptable when trying to attain your goal. The end justifies the means and there are no rules regarding the means.
That's what makes a second term for bush so frightening to me. During these last four years the rules have changed and there may be "no turning back". Many of us cling to the belief that one must be held accountable for their mistakes and surely for their lies. We are of the attitude that a leader should be accountable to the citizens he leads. Wasn't that the way we grew up? Weren't we taught that in order to be a good person you kept your nose clean, you had to accept responsibility for your own actions, and you must at all times be considerate of those around you? Now we have a group of people leading our country and trashing everything we believe to be the positive backbone or our society. No wonder we're frightened by four more years of bush. We are frightened that bush and his supporters have lost their heart, their conscience, and most fearfully, their respect and consideration for the truth. When the value of truth has been discarded, what is left? When lies are conveniently relegated to simple justification, we can see the darkness of the future and that is surely frightening.
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
Question: Who was voted the Movie Villain of the Year?
Answer: The president of these United States is the winner. The man many believe was chosen by god. The compassionate leader of our country.
Bush voted "Movie Villain of the Year"
"The American "Axis of Evil" fighter is wooing voters with security pledges ahead of the presidential election next week, but it was Bush's role in Michael Moore's anti-war film "Fahrenheit 9/11" that won him the villainous title.
In a poll for Total Film magazine, the U.S. leader fought off competition from such well-known baddies as atomic scientist Doctor Octopus from "Spider-Man 2" and fellow Texan Leatherface from "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre".
"The overwhelming response of our readers voting Bush top villain just goes to show how frightening people found him in Fahrenheit 9/11," Total Film's editor Matt Mueller told Reuters.
"He was absolutely terrifying in that film. The infamous scene where he's informed about the Twin Towers attack while visiting a school, and sits there absolutely paralysed, is enough to strike fear into anyone's heart," he said."
Question: Who was voted the Movie Villain of the Year?
Answer: The president of these United States is the winner. The man many believe was chosen by god. The compassionate leader of our country.
Bush voted "Movie Villain of the Year"
"The American "Axis of Evil" fighter is wooing voters with security pledges ahead of the presidential election next week, but it was Bush's role in Michael Moore's anti-war film "Fahrenheit 9/11" that won him the villainous title.
In a poll for Total Film magazine, the U.S. leader fought off competition from such well-known baddies as atomic scientist Doctor Octopus from "Spider-Man 2" and fellow Texan Leatherface from "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre".
"The overwhelming response of our readers voting Bush top villain just goes to show how frightening people found him in Fahrenheit 9/11," Total Film's editor Matt Mueller told Reuters.
"He was absolutely terrifying in that film. The infamous scene where he's informed about the Twin Towers attack while visiting a school, and sits there absolutely paralysed, is enough to strike fear into anyone's heart," he said."
"I hope I am not responsible for Armageddon"
Eyewitness to a failure in Iraq
By Peter W. Galbraith
Excerpt from Boston Globe
On April 16, 2003, a mob attacked and looted the Iraqi equivalent of the Centers for Disease Control, taking live HIV and black fever virus among other potentially lethal materials. US troops were stationed across the street but did not intervene because they didn't know the building was important.
When he found out, the young American lieutenant was devastated. He shook his head and said, "I hope I am not responsible for Armageddon." About the same time, looters entered the warehouses at Iraq's sprawling nuclear facilities at Tuwaitha on Baghdad's outskirts. They took barrels of yellowcake (raw uranium), apparently dumping the uranium and using the barrels to hold water. US troops were at Tuwaitha but did not interfere.
You were only doing what your commanders ordered you to do, soldier. Nothing. But thanks for caring.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Help Bush Win
Go here to donate money to bush's lawyers to ensure compliance with federal law for general election legal and for recount expenses in the event there is a post Election Day legal battle.
Bush Finger
If you click on the picture of bush giving you the finger on the sidebar, you will see the complete video which was made into a Flash file by my other favorite online priest, Rev. Mykeru of Mykeru.com.
Wednesday, October 27
Just what you expected...
"She went to Valle Del Norte Community Center in Albuquerque, planning to vote for John Kerry. "I pushed his name, but a green check mark appeared before President Bush's name," she said.
Griffith erased the vote by touching the check mark at Bush's name. That's how a voter can alter a touch-screen ballot.
She again tried to vote for Kerry, but the screen again said she had voted for Bush. The third time, the screen agreed that her vote should go to Kerry.
She faced the same problem repeatedly as she filled out the rest of the ballot. On one item, "I had to vote five or six times," she said."
Read the rest
Ranting about morality
By Blondesense
What is morality?
Some people seem to think that morality is owned by the "right". This couldn't be further from the truth. The right is confused about what morality is and what the bible says about morality. Sexual morality is a teeny tiny part of morality. In the big picture of life, how we treat others defines our morality. How we treat the poor and disenfranchised is the most important and most often referred to virtue in the "right's" bible.
Jesus didn't say, "When I was hungry, you took away women's rights; when I was thirsty, you persecuted homosexuals; when I was homeless, you embarked on a crusade against brown skinned people; when I was sick, you ripped off senior citizens."
Today's activity for right wingers: Cut out all the references to the poor from your bible and you can stash your handgun in there.
What is so moral about the right these days?
Opposition to raise minimum wage? no
Restricting women's reproductive rights? no
Systematic undermining of minorities via voting, schools, prisons? no
Turning a blind eye to the atrocities in prisons? no
Laughing off the atrocities at Abu Ghraib as silly college pranks? no
Not funding the No Child Left Behind Act? no
Opposition to affordable housing? no
Tax cuts for the very wealthy? no
Top 1% have more wealth than rest of country? no
Opposing affordable healthcare for all? no
Undermining homosexuals at all costs? no
A kill the opposition or throw them in jail mentality? no
Turning a willfully blind eye to the atrocities committed by our countrymen in the middle east? no
There are more, you add them.
The ironic thing is that the right will tell the moderates and the left that we cannot expect the government to help poor people because it would cost too much. An unjust war in Iraq is ok? 225 billion dollars to kill brown skinned people for oil is ok? And corporate welfare isn't costing us anything? 43 billion dollars in tax cuts. People are losing good jobs to India and getting new jobs at Burger King. The corporations are doing just great and the rich are benefiting.
Is it moral to just sit back while the poor are refused relief? Is that what Jesus would have wanted? Can the right sleep at night knowing that so many American children go to bed hungry? How can these children concentrate in school on an empty stomach? How will they rise out of their poverty if they are too hungry to pay attention at school? Instead of trying to lift the poor out of oppression, they build more prisons for them.
"Oh you're just a socialist" they like to say. So? So the hell what! Who said socialism is bad? Any Christian theologian would tell you that Jesus was a socialist, liberal Jew. The right doesn't study the bible. They pick and choose verses that seemingly back up their warped beliefs. They do not take bible verses in context. They use it like a quote generator. They use it to oppress and hurt others.
Why do a vocal minority of people in this country oppose homosexuality? Guilt, baby. Guilt. They are gay themselves and refuse to deal with it. They falsely believed that the bible condemns homosexuality and chose to live a life in the closet. They want to break free but are too sexually repressed, hung up or just plain embarrassed. They are bitter people who are unhappy with their own lives and feel better when they hurt those who are brave enough to accept who they are.
What is morality?
Some people seem to think that morality is owned by the "right". This couldn't be further from the truth. The right is confused about what morality is and what the bible says about morality. Sexual morality is a teeny tiny part of morality. In the big picture of life, how we treat others defines our morality. How we treat the poor and disenfranchised is the most important and most often referred to virtue in the "right's" bible.
Jesus didn't say, "When I was hungry, you took away women's rights; when I was thirsty, you persecuted homosexuals; when I was homeless, you embarked on a crusade against brown skinned people; when I was sick, you ripped off senior citizens."
Today's activity for right wingers: Cut out all the references to the poor from your bible and you can stash your handgun in there.
What is so moral about the right these days?
Opposition to raise minimum wage? no
Restricting women's reproductive rights? no
Systematic undermining of minorities via voting, schools, prisons? no
Turning a blind eye to the atrocities in prisons? no
Laughing off the atrocities at Abu Ghraib as silly college pranks? no
Not funding the No Child Left Behind Act? no
Opposition to affordable housing? no
Tax cuts for the very wealthy? no
Top 1% have more wealth than rest of country? no
Opposing affordable healthcare for all? no
Undermining homosexuals at all costs? no
A kill the opposition or throw them in jail mentality? no
Turning a willfully blind eye to the atrocities committed by our countrymen in the middle east? no
There are more, you add them.
The ironic thing is that the right will tell the moderates and the left that we cannot expect the government to help poor people because it would cost too much. An unjust war in Iraq is ok? 225 billion dollars to kill brown skinned people for oil is ok? And corporate welfare isn't costing us anything? 43 billion dollars in tax cuts. People are losing good jobs to India and getting new jobs at Burger King. The corporations are doing just great and the rich are benefiting.
Is it moral to just sit back while the poor are refused relief? Is that what Jesus would have wanted? Can the right sleep at night knowing that so many American children go to bed hungry? How can these children concentrate in school on an empty stomach? How will they rise out of their poverty if they are too hungry to pay attention at school? Instead of trying to lift the poor out of oppression, they build more prisons for them.
"Oh you're just a socialist" they like to say. So? So the hell what! Who said socialism is bad? Any Christian theologian would tell you that Jesus was a socialist, liberal Jew. The right doesn't study the bible. They pick and choose verses that seemingly back up their warped beliefs. They do not take bible verses in context. They use it like a quote generator. They use it to oppress and hurt others.
Why do a vocal minority of people in this country oppose homosexuality? Guilt, baby. Guilt. They are gay themselves and refuse to deal with it. They falsely believed that the bible condemns homosexuality and chose to live a life in the closet. They want to break free but are too sexually repressed, hung up or just plain embarrassed. They are bitter people who are unhappy with their own lives and feel better when they hurt those who are brave enough to accept who they are.
Bitchin' and It's Getting Too Damned Easy.
by pissed off patricia
Today bush said about Kerry, referring to Kerry's comments about the missing explosives in Iraq, "A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as commander in chief"
Okay, we rest our case. Bush just admitted that he is not a person we want as commander in chief. Apparently bush has forgotten that he is a political candidate who jumped to conclusions and then into war without knowing the facts. Ha! We got him. What a great campaign ad that would make for Kerry.
Today bush said about Kerry, referring to Kerry's comments about the missing explosives in Iraq, "A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as commander in chief"
Okay, we rest our case. Bush just admitted that he is not a person we want as commander in chief. Apparently bush has forgotten that he is a political candidate who jumped to conclusions and then into war without knowing the facts. Ha! We got him. What a great campaign ad that would make for Kerry.
More from Reuter's about the new tape threat
Here's what Reuters has on their site about the new tape.
" ABC News has asked U.S. security officials to examine a videotape it obtained in Pakistan of an English-speaking man threatening a massive attack on the United States in retaliation for its war against al Qaeda, the network said on Wednesday.
A source familiar with the tape -- whose authenticity U.S. intelligence officials have so far been unable to verify -- said it contains a threat that the "streets will run with blood."
Responding to questions about the tape after its existence was first reported by Internet columnist Matt Drudge, ABC News vice president Jeffrey Schneider said the network has not aired the video because its authenticity has not been verified.
"We've been working around the clock in an effort to authenticate the content of the tape," Schneider told Reuters. "We have worked with the CIA and the FBI, neither of whom have authenticated the tape. Obviously, it would be beyond irresponsible to broadcast this tape without first authenticating it."
He said the tape was obtained from a source in Pakistan over the weekend and arrived in New York on Monday, where it was first viewed by network officials. He declined to discuss details of it.
Government officials in Washington confirmed that the CIA was analyzing the videotape. One official said it was not yet known whether the tape is authentic or a hoax.
The source familiar with the tape told Reuters that the hourlong video features a man, whose face is concealed by a headdress, warning that a forthcoming attack on the United States would dwarf the suicide hijackings on Sept. 11, 2001, that claimed nearly 3,000 lives.
According to the source, the man says, "The streets will run with blood" and says the United States has brought this on itself for electing a president who has declared war on Islam by attacking the former Taliban rulers in Afghanistan and waging war against al Qaeda.
The source added that linguistic experts who have examined the tape believe the man, who identifies himself only as "Assam the American," learned English at a very young age but is not a native speaker of the language.
"The intelligence community is analyzing it, working to verify its authenticity," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters in Vienna, Ohio.
A U.S. intelligence official said, "We have been unable to verify the tape's authenticity." The official added the review was continuing.
The question of whether the United States could be subjected to another Sept. 11-type attack has been a major issue in the presidential campaign."
Ya Gotta Love This Guy
Write More About Skull & Bones
Secret societies? UFOs?
The truth about what really happened on 9/11?
The media cowers
By Mark Morford
I get this a lot: Hey Mark, you're a rather weird, unconventional columnist, why don't you quit toeing the typical blasé journalism line and renounce the corporate-controlled news feeds and standard pop-culture drivel and instead write about the real truths, the real and sinister power structures at work in America and the world?
Like for example how both Kerry and Bush are members of mega-yuppie Yale secret society/boys' club Skull & Bones, and therefore suckle at the same tit of nefarious primeval Illuminati power and draw their ideas from same trough of covert draconian ideology, the one that is right now running the world via an insanely intricate network of corporate fronts and Swiss bank accounts and invisible spaceships and ancient cabals featuring really elaborate handshakes that would make "The Da Vinci Code" seem like a day at the sandbox? Hmm?
And why, furthermore, don't you talk about the real truths of 9/11? Like how BushCo not only allowed the tragedy to occur to further his administration's snarling agenda but also how he actually made it happen, signed the order himself, with the full and complicit cooperation of the FBI and the CIA and the Saudis and maybe even Enron and the Wal-Mart heirs and probably the Olsen twins.
Read the rest
Secret societies? UFOs?
The truth about what really happened on 9/11?
The media cowers
By Mark Morford
I get this a lot: Hey Mark, you're a rather weird, unconventional columnist, why don't you quit toeing the typical blasé journalism line and renounce the corporate-controlled news feeds and standard pop-culture drivel and instead write about the real truths, the real and sinister power structures at work in America and the world?
Like for example how both Kerry and Bush are members of mega-yuppie Yale secret society/boys' club Skull & Bones, and therefore suckle at the same tit of nefarious primeval Illuminati power and draw their ideas from same trough of covert draconian ideology, the one that is right now running the world via an insanely intricate network of corporate fronts and Swiss bank accounts and invisible spaceships and ancient cabals featuring really elaborate handshakes that would make "The Da Vinci Code" seem like a day at the sandbox? Hmm?
And why, furthermore, don't you talk about the real truths of 9/11? Like how BushCo not only allowed the tragedy to occur to further his administration's snarling agenda but also how he actually made it happen, signed the order himself, with the full and complicit cooperation of the FBI and the CIA and the Saudis and maybe even Enron and the Wal-Mart heirs and probably the Olsen twins.
Read the rest
Fox news reporting threatening tape
Fox News is reporting that there is a new tape and the content threatens another attack on the US and the threat is that the next attack will be bigger than 9-11. Seems the man on the tape speaks English and the tape came out of Pakistan.
Observations
by pissed off patricia
I see that Zell Miller is along for the ride today as bush does his campaign monologue. Why? Does the bush campaign really want to remind voters of the insanity in their party? I mean, come on. Is the face of Zell Miller and the memories of his insanity during and after his speech at the Republican convention, something you would want in the back ground as you tried to convince the public that your decisions during the last four years were based on sound judgment? The person who made the decision to go to the asylum and spring old Zell for a campaign appearance really should be fired. Talk about the fear factor.
Why does Lynn Cheney always appear with Dick? She is seen sitting on a stool behind him at almost every one of his appearances. Maybe they think that seeing her eases the pain of seeing Dick. It doesn't work for me. She is sort of like the Ed McMahon to Dick's Johnny Carson or the Charles McCord to Dick's Don Imus. The ass kissing sidekick who laughs at all the right times whether or not the jokes are funny. The ever-present person who nods in agreement no matter how ridiculous the last statement might have been. The built in cheerleader to the big guy. I guess because of Dick’s persistent dour expression, they need someone to let you know when he's attempting to be funny. Sad thing is, Dick isn't funny. He's mocking Senator Kerry and being evilly sarcastic, because his administration has squat to brag about. He reminds me of a fiend who sits drooling, rubbing his hands together and licking his chops, before munching on some poor unsuspecting victim.
Then finally, we have bush with that funky hand gesture. You know the one. The one where he acts like he's trying to slam something down on the podium. He does it when he makes one of his almost coherent declarations, such as he has made us safer, or he will not change course no matter what. He slams his hand down as though he is hammering the fact into the heads of his audience. It's sort of a “here's what I'm telling you, don't argue with me” slam down hand and case closed. Notice also that he seems to smile at the most peculiar and inappropriate times during his speech. What's that all about?
I see that Zell Miller is along for the ride today as bush does his campaign monologue. Why? Does the bush campaign really want to remind voters of the insanity in their party? I mean, come on. Is the face of Zell Miller and the memories of his insanity during and after his speech at the Republican convention, something you would want in the back ground as you tried to convince the public that your decisions during the last four years were based on sound judgment? The person who made the decision to go to the asylum and spring old Zell for a campaign appearance really should be fired. Talk about the fear factor.
Why does Lynn Cheney always appear with Dick? She is seen sitting on a stool behind him at almost every one of his appearances. Maybe they think that seeing her eases the pain of seeing Dick. It doesn't work for me. She is sort of like the Ed McMahon to Dick's Johnny Carson or the Charles McCord to Dick's Don Imus. The ass kissing sidekick who laughs at all the right times whether or not the jokes are funny. The ever-present person who nods in agreement no matter how ridiculous the last statement might have been. The built in cheerleader to the big guy. I guess because of Dick’s persistent dour expression, they need someone to let you know when he's attempting to be funny. Sad thing is, Dick isn't funny. He's mocking Senator Kerry and being evilly sarcastic, because his administration has squat to brag about. He reminds me of a fiend who sits drooling, rubbing his hands together and licking his chops, before munching on some poor unsuspecting victim.
Then finally, we have bush with that funky hand gesture. You know the one. The one where he acts like he's trying to slam something down on the podium. He does it when he makes one of his almost coherent declarations, such as he has made us safer, or he will not change course no matter what. He slams his hand down as though he is hammering the fact into the heads of his audience. It's sort of a “here's what I'm telling you, don't argue with me” slam down hand and case closed. Notice also that he seems to smile at the most peculiar and inappropriate times during his speech. What's that all about?
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
"It does not seem to trouble either Rove or Bush that they are moving us toward a Twenty-first Century civil war -- and that, once again, Southern conservatism is at its core. Only a miracle, it strikes me, can prevent this election from descending into post-election chaos. But given the alternatives, a miracle is what I am hoping for."
-John Dean-���
"It does not seem to trouble either Rove or Bush that they are moving us toward a Twenty-first Century civil war -- and that, once again, Southern conservatism is at its core. Only a miracle, it strikes me, can prevent this election from descending into post-election chaos. But given the alternatives, a miracle is what I am hoping for."
-John Dean-���
Conflicted Evangelicals Could Cost Bush Votes
Oh my gawd, many evangelicals are christian after all. They are starting to get it. They don't all have it yet, but they are thinking. Maybe they will decide to stay home on November 2nd.
There is a God! Here's Proof.
This kind of news makes me realize that people are basically good and they can spot evil lurking behind a bogus "pro-life" stance.
There is a God! Here's Proof.
"I'm very antiabortion, but the reality is the right to life encompasses a much broader field than just abortion," he added. "If I'm a proponent of life, I have to think about the consequences of not providing prescription drugs to seniors or sending young men off to war."
That kind of talk, coming from a conservative Christian who might ordinarily be inclined to vote Republican, could portend trouble for Bush.
This kind of news makes me realize that people are basically good and they can spot evil lurking behind a bogus "pro-life" stance.
100 Facts and 1 Opinion
The Non-Arguable Case against the bushcrimefamily at The Nation
This is a must see and must pass around story. It's all here.
This is a must see and must pass around story. It's all here.
Get yer banjos out of the closet
Several States to Consider Gay Marriage Ban Amendments on November 2: Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, and Utah.
Are you humming the theme to Deliverance yet?
Are you humming the theme to Deliverance yet?
Tuesday, October 26
Uh Oh
Allawi blames U.S. for soldiers massacre
Aljazeera.com reports:
"Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi has accused the U.S. occupation forces of “gross negligence” over the massacre of 49 unarmed Iraqi soldiers, who were found shot to death on Saturday.
"There was great negligence on the part of some coalition forces," Allawi told Iraq's interim national assembly.
He also denounced the massacre as a "heinous crime" against the Iraqi National Guards and said that a special investigation was under way."
Aljazeera.com reports:
"Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi has accused the U.S. occupation forces of “gross negligence” over the massacre of 49 unarmed Iraqi soldiers, who were found shot to death on Saturday.
"There was great negligence on the part of some coalition forces," Allawi told Iraq's interim national assembly.
He also denounced the massacre as a "heinous crime" against the Iraqi National Guards and said that a special investigation was under way."
Grandmother asks Cheney about Iraq
CNN.com reports that Cheney may have a tiny bit of heart left because this 62 year old grandmother in a wheelchair whose grandson was killed in Iraq, was not kicked out of the Bush-Cheney rally. You decide:
"I appreciate very much obviously the sacrifice they made." Wow what a show of emotion. What a man! God bless america, land that I love... etc etc
Hobbs asked Cheney, "Is there anybody who knows a time limit" for pulling out of Iraq? "I have four over there. ... I had one killed. ... I'd like a little peace."
Given to understatement, the vice president calmly replied: "I appreciate very much obviously the sacrifice they made. ... If you put an artificial date on it, what with the terrorists just waiting until that day arrives, Americans withdraw, and then they'll reinsert themselves, that's not acceptable."
"I appreciate very much obviously the sacrifice they made." Wow what a show of emotion. What a man! God bless america, land that I love... etc etc
Bitchin' again
This falls under the "holy shit" category!
By Greg Palast
Reporting for BBC's Newsnight
A secret document obtained from inside Bush campaign headquarters in Florida suggests a plan - possibly in violation of US law - to disrupt voting in the state's African-American voting districts, a BBC Newsnight investigation reveals.
Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign's national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called "caging list".
It lists 1,886 names and addresses of voters in predominantly black and traditionally Democrat areas of Jacksonville, Florida.
An elections supervisor in Tallahassee, when shown the list, told Newsnight: "The only possible reason why they would keep such a thing is to challenge voters on election day."
Ion Sancho, a Democrat, noted that Florida law allows political party operatives inside polling stations to stop voters from obtaining a ballot.
Mass challenges
They may then only vote "provisionally" after signing an affidavit attesting to their legal voting status.
Mass challenges have never occurred in Florida. Indeed, says Mr Sancho, not one challenge has been made to a voter "in the 16 years I've been supervisor of elections."
"Quite frankly, this process can be used to slow down the voting process and cause chaos on election day; and discourage voters from voting."
Sancho calls it "intimidation." And it may be illegal.
In Washington, well-known civil rights attorney, Ralph Neas, noted that US federal law prohibits targeting challenges to voters, even if there is a basis for the challenge, if race is a factor in targeting the voters.
The list of Jacksonville voters covers an area with a majority of black residents.
When asked by Newsnight for an explanation of the list, Republican spokespersons claim the list merely records returned mail from either fundraising solicitations or returned letters sent to newly registered voters to verify their addresses for purposes of mailing campaign literature.
Republican state campaign spokeswoman Mindy Tucker Fletcher stated the list was not put together "in order to create" a challenge list, but refused to say it would not be used in that manner.
Rather, she did acknowledge that the party's poll workers will be instructed to challenge voters, "Where it's stated in the law."
There was no explanation as to why such clerical matters would be sent to top officials of the Bush campaign in Florida and Washington.
Private detective
In Jacksonville, to determine if Republicans were using the lists or other means of intimidating voters, we filmed a private detective filming every "early voter" - the majority of whom are black - from behind a vehicle with blacked-out windows.
The private detective claimed not to know who was paying for his all-day services.
On the scene, Democratic Congresswoman Corinne Brown said the surveillance operation was part of a campaign of intimidation tactics used by the Republican Party to intimate and scare off African American voters, almost all of whom are registered Democrats
UPDATE: Here is a link to watch the report in Real Video. One million black votes were not counted in 2000.
By Greg Palast
Reporting for BBC's Newsnight
A secret document obtained from inside Bush campaign headquarters in Florida suggests a plan - possibly in violation of US law - to disrupt voting in the state's African-American voting districts, a BBC Newsnight investigation reveals.
Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign's national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called "caging list".
It lists 1,886 names and addresses of voters in predominantly black and traditionally Democrat areas of Jacksonville, Florida.
An elections supervisor in Tallahassee, when shown the list, told Newsnight: "The only possible reason why they would keep such a thing is to challenge voters on election day."
Ion Sancho, a Democrat, noted that Florida law allows political party operatives inside polling stations to stop voters from obtaining a ballot.
Mass challenges
They may then only vote "provisionally" after signing an affidavit attesting to their legal voting status.
Mass challenges have never occurred in Florida. Indeed, says Mr Sancho, not one challenge has been made to a voter "in the 16 years I've been supervisor of elections."
"Quite frankly, this process can be used to slow down the voting process and cause chaos on election day; and discourage voters from voting."
Sancho calls it "intimidation." And it may be illegal.
In Washington, well-known civil rights attorney, Ralph Neas, noted that US federal law prohibits targeting challenges to voters, even if there is a basis for the challenge, if race is a factor in targeting the voters.
The list of Jacksonville voters covers an area with a majority of black residents.
When asked by Newsnight for an explanation of the list, Republican spokespersons claim the list merely records returned mail from either fundraising solicitations or returned letters sent to newly registered voters to verify their addresses for purposes of mailing campaign literature.
Republican state campaign spokeswoman Mindy Tucker Fletcher stated the list was not put together "in order to create" a challenge list, but refused to say it would not be used in that manner.
Rather, she did acknowledge that the party's poll workers will be instructed to challenge voters, "Where it's stated in the law."
There was no explanation as to why such clerical matters would be sent to top officials of the Bush campaign in Florida and Washington.
Private detective
In Jacksonville, to determine if Republicans were using the lists or other means of intimidating voters, we filmed a private detective filming every "early voter" - the majority of whom are black - from behind a vehicle with blacked-out windows.
The private detective claimed not to know who was paying for his all-day services.
On the scene, Democratic Congresswoman Corinne Brown said the surveillance operation was part of a campaign of intimidation tactics used by the Republican Party to intimate and scare off African American voters, almost all of whom are registered Democrats
UPDATE: Here is a link to watch the report in Real Video. One million black votes were not counted in 2000.
Homosexuality in the Bible
From Heterosexualbreeding.com
Excerpts from:
I also learned this in the seminary. The sin of Sodom was inhospitality towards strangers and the sin of pride. I also learned that Mary Magdalen was NOT a prostitute.
Romans 2:1: "You therefore have no defence—you who sit in judgement, whoever you may be—for in judging your fellow-man you condemn yourself, since you, the judge, are equally guilty."
Most of all, what did Jesus say about homosexuality?
NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH
(He did say a lot about adultery, divorce and remarriage. Those are no no's that the Christian right are conveniently ignoring.)
Excerpts from:
BIBLICAL PERVERSION ON THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT: WHAT THE BIBLE REALLY SAYS ABOUT HOMOSEXUALITY
Daniel A. Helminiak, Ph.D. (Roman Catholic theologian Daniel A. Helminiak was ordained a priest in the city of Rome and holds two Ph.D.'s—in theology and psychology )
1. Genesis 19:1–11 tells the story of Sodom, destroyed by fire and brimstone. What was the sin? Ezekiel 16:49 names it outright: "They had pride, excess of food and prosperous ease, and did not aid the poor and needy." No mention of sex at all! Same thing in the deuterocanonical book of Wisdom 19:13: "hatred toward strangers." When Jesus sent out his disciples, he told them it would be worse for a town who rejects them than it was for Sodom and Gomorrah (Matthew 10:5–15).
I also learned this in the seminary. The sin of Sodom was inhospitality towards strangers and the sin of pride. I also learned that Mary Magdalen was NOT a prostitute.
2. According to Leviticus 18:22, "You shall not lie with a man as with a woman: it is an abomination." Abomination sounds pretty bad in contemporary English, but the Hebrew and the ancient Greek translation both use words that mean a religious violation: unclean, impure, taboo—exactly like eating pork or shellfish, sewing two kinds of cloth into one garment, or having a menstrual flow of blood or a seminal emission. In the Hebrew Scriptures, abomination means religious taboo, ritual impurity; it does not imply inherent wrong or sin.I learned this in the seminary too. Homosexuality is about as serious a sin to catholics as was eating meat on Friday.
3. Romans 1:26–27: "Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another."Let's not forget that Paul also suggested that people do not marry unless they are unable to abstain from sex (I Corinthians 7:8–9). That has to be put into context though. When St Paul was writing his letters, people at that time believed that Jesus' return was imminent. They truly believed that they were in the last days. That passage is what got the catholics to demand that their priests wouldn't marry. oy what a mess that turned into.
The Greek words translated as "unnatural," para physin , would more accurately read "atypical" or "uncustomary." The early Stoic philosophers used these words to mean unnatural, but the words imply no ethical condemnation for the apostle Paul. In Romans 11:24, he applies these same words to God's actions. God grafted the Gentiles into the Jewish people, a wild branch into a cultivated vine. Not your standard modus operandi; rather, an unusual thing to do, i.e., "atypical," nothing more. The whole anti-gay "unnatural" hullabaloo rests on this mistranslation.
Likewise, Paul's other words describing gay sex, "degrading" and "shameless," carry no ethical connotation for Paul. They merely imply social disapproval. Paul is talking about impurities, taboos, uncleanness. He has the ancient Jewish Law about impurity in mind. He says so outright in 1:24.
The whole point of Paul's letter is to insist, with Jesus, that impurity is irrelevant for Christians. He uses gay sex as his example, and he is indifferent to the matter: "I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself" (Romans 14:14). In mentioning homosexuality, Paul was merely echoing the Jewish Christians' prejudice in order to win initial approval and a hearing from them. Then he went on to rebuke their self-righteousness.
The religious right makes the mistake of reading their own preoccupations into Paul's terminology. They make the further mistake of uniting verses 26–27 of Romans 1 with verses 28–32. But verse 28 changes topics. Paul is contrasting impurity with real sin. He is not identifying homosexuality, as the Fundamentalists would, with "evil, covetousness, malice, envy, murder, etc., etc." Far from condemning gay sex, Paul was reprimanding the Jewish Christians for dividing the Christian community over it. Every textual consideration supports this conclusion.
Romans 2:1: "You therefore have no defence—you who sit in judgement, whoever you may be—for in judging your fellow-man you condemn yourself, since you, the judge, are equally guilty."
Most of all, what did Jesus say about homosexuality?
NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH
(He did say a lot about adultery, divorce and remarriage. Those are no no's that the Christian right are conveniently ignoring.)
When did the explosives go missing?
CNN Report: Explosives could not be found when U.S. troops arrived
"The mystery surrounding the disappearance of 380 tons of powerful explosives from a storage depot in Iraq has taken a new twist, after a television news crew embedded with the U.S. military during the invasion of Iraq reported that the material could not be found when American troops arrived.
NBC News reported that on April 10, 2003, its crew was embedded with the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division when troops arrived at the Al Qaqaa storage facility south of Baghdad.
While the troops found large stockpiles of conventional explosives, they did not find HMX or RDX, the types of powerful explosives that reportedly went missing, according to NBC.
The International Atomic Energy Agency revealed Monday that it had been told two weeks ago by the Iraqi government that 380 tons of HMX and RDX disappeared from Al Qaqaa after Saddam Hussein's government fell." Read the rest
"The mystery surrounding the disappearance of 380 tons of powerful explosives from a storage depot in Iraq has taken a new twist, after a television news crew embedded with the U.S. military during the invasion of Iraq reported that the material could not be found when American troops arrived.
NBC News reported that on April 10, 2003, its crew was embedded with the U.S. Army's 101st Airborne Division when troops arrived at the Al Qaqaa storage facility south of Baghdad.
While the troops found large stockpiles of conventional explosives, they did not find HMX or RDX, the types of powerful explosives that reportedly went missing, according to NBC.
The International Atomic Energy Agency revealed Monday that it had been told two weeks ago by the Iraqi government that 380 tons of HMX and RDX disappeared from Al Qaqaa after Saddam Hussein's government fell." Read the rest
A peek into bushmail
Republican insider emails published, sent accidentally to www.georgewbush .org , not .com .
Check it out.
UPDATE: See Patricia's post above by Greg Palast and the caging list which is on the bushmail link. This information has been helpful in discovering how the Florida Republicans plan to block black votes in Florida on November 2nd. Here is the video. You have to see this.
Check it out.
UPDATE: See Patricia's post above by Greg Palast and the caging list which is on the bushmail link. This information has been helpful in discovering how the Florida Republicans plan to block black votes in Florida on November 2nd. Here is the video. You have to see this.
A Culture of Cover-Ups
By PAUL KRUGMAN , NY TIMES
Published: October 26, 2004
Aides to John Kerry say that if he wins, he'll replace Porter Goss as head of the C.I.A. Let's hope so: Mr. Goss has already confirmed the fears of those who worried about his appointment by placing Republican staff members from Capitol Hill in key positions and raising fears about a partisan purge.
But the flap over Mr. Goss is only a symptom of a much broader issue: whether the Bush administration will be able to maintain its culture of cover-ups. That culture affects every branch of policy, but it's strongest when it comes to the "war on terror."
Although President Bush's campaign is based almost entirely on his self-proclaimed leadership in that war, his officials have thrown a shroud of secrecy over any information that might let voters assess his performance.
Yesterday we got two peeks under that shroud. One was The Times's report about what the International Atomic Energy Agency calls "the greatest explosives bonanza in history." Ignoring the agency's warnings, administration officials failed to secure the weapons site, Al Qaqaa, in Iraq, allowing 377 tons of deadly high explosives to be looted, presumably by insurgents.
The administration is trying to play down the importance of this loss, arguing that because Iraq was awash in munitions, a few hundred more tons don't make much difference. But aside from their potential use in nuclear weapons - the reason they were under seal before the war - these particular explosives, unlike standard munitions, are exactly what a terrorist needs.
Informed sources quoted by the influential Nelson Report say explosives from Al Qaqaa are the "primary source" of the roadside and car bombs that have killed and wounded so many U.S. soldiers. And thanks to the huge amount looted - "in a highly organized operation using heavy equipment" - the insurgents and whoever else have access to the Qaqaa material have enough explosives for tens of thousands of future bombs.
If the administration had had its way, the public would never have heard anything about this. Administration officials have known about the looting of Al Qaqaa for at least six months, and probably much longer. But they didn't let the I.A.E.A. inspect the site after the war, and pressured the Iraqis not to inform the agency about the loss. They now say that they didn't want our enemies - that is, the people who stole the stuff - to know it was missing. The real reason, obviously, was that they wanted the news kept under wraps until after Nov. 2.
The story of the looted explosives has overshadowed another report that Bush officials tried to suppress - this one about how the Bush administration let Abu Musab al-Zarqawi get away. An article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal confirmed and expanded on an "NBC Nightly News" report from March that asserted that before the Iraq war, administration officials called off a planned attack that might have killed Mr. Zarqawi, the terrorist now blamed for much of the mayhem in that country, in his camp.
Citing "military officials," the original NBC report explained that the failure to go after Mr. Zarqawi was based on domestic politics: "the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq" - a part of Iraq not controlled by Saddam Hussein - "could undermine its case for war against Saddam." The Journal doesn't comment on this explanation, but it does say that when NBC reported, correctly, that Mr. Zarqawi had been targeted before the war, administration officials denied it.
What other mistakes did the administration make? If partisan appointees like Mr. Goss continue to control the intelligence agencies, we may never know.
This isn't speculation: Mr. Goss is already involved in a new cover-up. Last week Robert Scheer of The Los Angeles Times revealed the existence of a devastating but suppressed report by the C.I.A.'s inspector general on 9/11 intelligence failures. Newsweek has now confirmed the gist of Mr. Scheer's column.
The report, the magazine says, "identifies a host of current and former officials who could be candidates for possible disciplinary procedures." But although the report was completed in June, Mr. Goss has refused to release it to Congress. "Everyone feels it will be better if this hits the fan after the election," an official told the magazine. Better for whom?
What really happened on 9/11, or in Iraq? Next week's election may determine whether we ever find out.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Published: October 26, 2004
Aides to John Kerry say that if he wins, he'll replace Porter Goss as head of the C.I.A. Let's hope so: Mr. Goss has already confirmed the fears of those who worried about his appointment by placing Republican staff members from Capitol Hill in key positions and raising fears about a partisan purge.
But the flap over Mr. Goss is only a symptom of a much broader issue: whether the Bush administration will be able to maintain its culture of cover-ups. That culture affects every branch of policy, but it's strongest when it comes to the "war on terror."
Although President Bush's campaign is based almost entirely on his self-proclaimed leadership in that war, his officials have thrown a shroud of secrecy over any information that might let voters assess his performance.
Yesterday we got two peeks under that shroud. One was The Times's report about what the International Atomic Energy Agency calls "the greatest explosives bonanza in history." Ignoring the agency's warnings, administration officials failed to secure the weapons site, Al Qaqaa, in Iraq, allowing 377 tons of deadly high explosives to be looted, presumably by insurgents.
The administration is trying to play down the importance of this loss, arguing that because Iraq was awash in munitions, a few hundred more tons don't make much difference. But aside from their potential use in nuclear weapons - the reason they were under seal before the war - these particular explosives, unlike standard munitions, are exactly what a terrorist needs.
Informed sources quoted by the influential Nelson Report say explosives from Al Qaqaa are the "primary source" of the roadside and car bombs that have killed and wounded so many U.S. soldiers. And thanks to the huge amount looted - "in a highly organized operation using heavy equipment" - the insurgents and whoever else have access to the Qaqaa material have enough explosives for tens of thousands of future bombs.
If the administration had had its way, the public would never have heard anything about this. Administration officials have known about the looting of Al Qaqaa for at least six months, and probably much longer. But they didn't let the I.A.E.A. inspect the site after the war, and pressured the Iraqis not to inform the agency about the loss. They now say that they didn't want our enemies - that is, the people who stole the stuff - to know it was missing. The real reason, obviously, was that they wanted the news kept under wraps until after Nov. 2.
The story of the looted explosives has overshadowed another report that Bush officials tried to suppress - this one about how the Bush administration let Abu Musab al-Zarqawi get away. An article in yesterday's Wall Street Journal confirmed and expanded on an "NBC Nightly News" report from March that asserted that before the Iraq war, administration officials called off a planned attack that might have killed Mr. Zarqawi, the terrorist now blamed for much of the mayhem in that country, in his camp.
Citing "military officials," the original NBC report explained that the failure to go after Mr. Zarqawi was based on domestic politics: "the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq" - a part of Iraq not controlled by Saddam Hussein - "could undermine its case for war against Saddam." The Journal doesn't comment on this explanation, but it does say that when NBC reported, correctly, that Mr. Zarqawi had been targeted before the war, administration officials denied it.
What other mistakes did the administration make? If partisan appointees like Mr. Goss continue to control the intelligence agencies, we may never know.
This isn't speculation: Mr. Goss is already involved in a new cover-up. Last week Robert Scheer of The Los Angeles Times revealed the existence of a devastating but suppressed report by the C.I.A.'s inspector general on 9/11 intelligence failures. Newsweek has now confirmed the gist of Mr. Scheer's column.
The report, the magazine says, "identifies a host of current and former officials who could be candidates for possible disciplinary procedures." But although the report was completed in June, Mr. Goss has refused to release it to Congress. "Everyone feels it will be better if this hits the fan after the election," an official told the magazine. Better for whom?
What really happened on 9/11, or in Iraq? Next week's election may determine whether we ever find out.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
Are They Dodging the "D" Word?
Check out this article in USA TODAY
Now add this little tidbit from the Seattle Times.
Are They Dodging the "D" Word?
Check out this article in USA TODAY
"U.S. considers ways to increase troops in Iraq for vote"
"Concerned that they won't get enough new troops from allies to help provide security for Iraqi elections in January, Pentagon officials are considering increasing the current U.S. force by delaying the departures of some U.S. troops now in Iraq and accelerating the deployment of others scheduled to go there next year."
AND
"The goal is to temporarily raise the number of U.S. troops in Iraq from the current 138,000 to almost 160,000 to help protect international and Iraqi election workers and secure polling locations.
That addition would bring the sustained U.S. troop presence in Iraq to its highest level since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1, 2003.
Defense officials were reluctant to discuss the options on the record. But Capt. Harold Pittman, a spokesman for Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of Central Command, said, "Obviously, we are looking at all of those options and taking everything into account. ... There are a lot of options, possibilities and venues on the table to provide additional security during the election time frame."
Now add this little tidbit from the Seattle Times.
"The Bush administration intends to seek about $70 billion in emergency funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan early next year, pushing total war costs close to $225 billion since the invasion of Iraq early last year, Pentagon and congressional officials said yesterday.This war is draining our soldiers lives and our pocket books, with no end in sight. Could be that bush's chosen war will bleed our country dry. These two articles seem to suggest we have already become anemic.
White House budget office spokesman Chad Kolton emphasized that final decisions on the supplemental spending request will not be made until shortly before the request is sent to Congress. That may not happen until early February, when President Bush would submit his budget for fiscal 2006 if he wins re-election."
God Holds His Nose And Uses What He's Got
My favorite blogging priest, Fr Jake, pointed out this article which should be read in its entirety.
P.S. You can ignore my religious ramblings if you wish. What actually brought me to politics was the misuse of Jesus' ministry by the religious right who are so very wrong. Even though I am agnostic, like I've said many times, we need more Jesus-oriented people in the world and less formal rules and obligations. Love and compassion are in your heart no matter what your god is. Rules and regulations obliterate what is etched in our hearts by the creator.
Excerpt:If you're ever disillusioned by other Christians it's your own fault because you shouldn't have had illusions in the first place - either about them or yourself. We are all on the margins where God is concerned, but he holds his nose and he uses what he's got. If he wants to use a bad-tempered old bag to feed the poor of Calcutta, who are we to say otherwise? If he wants to use a rampant adulterer to bring freedom to a billion black people, who are we to complain? It was probably their sins that brought them to God in the first place. The question for us is, what comparable good have we achieved to balance out ours?Reminds me of my good friend who belonged to a rather unusual Christian sect/religion. Her priest visited her while I was there. I didn't mean to be rude, but I was a newly graduated M.Div and eager to challenge the world. Her priest warned her not to watch tv, not to bring her son to a bowling alley (bowling alleys were completely outlawed) and all sorts of rules and regulations. So naturally I had to bring up Jesus' ministry to the marginal, the outcasts, etc. I inquired of the priest why shouldn't good Christians be permitted to bowl with the dregs of society in a bowling alley if only to witness to the loving character of god and to be a light in the world. He explained that Christians are not of this world. He was wrong. I told him so. When I received my diploma in 1992 from the catholic bishop in our diocese, he asked me what I, a lowly catholic woman, was planning on doing with my degree in theology. I told him that I would probably be a bartender or something. He thought that was a splendid idea and fully in keeping with Jesus' ministry. I ended up teaching children for several years and now I play my music in bars.
The Church that Jesus first assembled was a gang of sinners and rejects. Any Church that is His Church ought to know that it is the same. It has to show the same kind of love, the kind that includes and embraces first, then let’s the love do the healing from the inside. That’s what Catholic means. Michael Marshall once wrote: ‘the test of genuinely Catholic Christianity is not that it makes good people better, but that it makes bad people holy’.
Or as Oscar Wilde, another good Catholic put it: We are all in the gutter; but some of us are looking at the stars.
P.S. You can ignore my religious ramblings if you wish. What actually brought me to politics was the misuse of Jesus' ministry by the religious right who are so very wrong. Even though I am agnostic, like I've said many times, we need more Jesus-oriented people in the world and less formal rules and obligations. Love and compassion are in your heart no matter what your god is. Rules and regulations obliterate what is etched in our hearts by the creator.
bush supporters still living in la la land
It blows my mind to see how ill informed bush supporters are in contrast to Kerry supporters. According to PIPA, 72% of bush supporters still believe there were WMDs in Iraq and 75% believe that Iraq was supporting al Qaida. Is this willful ignorance or are bush supporters just naive?
Here comes the really strange part and this is the part where the media and John Kerry didn't do their jobs: Asked whether the US should have gone to war with Iraq if US intelligence had concluded that Iraq was not making WMD or providing support to al Qaeda, 58% of Bush supporters said the US should not have, and 61% assume that in this case the President would not have.
I've actually met bush supporters who were college educated and seemingly bright and competant. So what gives? I still come across Long Island rednecks who actually argue with me about verifiable facts regarding the war in Iraq. What is to argue? Facts are facts. My own inlaws in New Hampshire who are college educated, both veterans of WWII and they actually read the newspapers are still supporting bush. They still believe there were WMDs in Iraq! They are in their 80's and sharp as tacks, except when it comes to bush. I found out that they listen to bush and cheney speeches as well as conservative talk radio. We need a news filter, ladies and gentleman.
So basically bush supporters are lied to and they believe it. Why shouldn't they? Many of them, like my inlaws fought against fascism in WWII and they believe that this country is the greatest so it's inconceivable that they would be lied to or deliberately mislead by radio talk show hosts or their very own president and veep. I was raised to believe that this was the greatest, most honest country in the world. I can still hear my father admonishing me whenever I suggested that something was not right with America.
Some think I took glee in discovering that we were fed more propaganda than the Russians. I absolutely did not enjoy that revelation. I was so freaked out that I was that I went back to my shrink in the summer of 2003 after months of trying to get people to listen to me. He medicated the hell out of me. I didn't change my position, but I was much calmer. He thought I was making stuff up (and I shouldn't tell anyone what I was thinking) until this past summer when he apologized and confirmed that I was right on the money all along. My friends thought I had lost it. It's tough living here in Republicanland. Most people prefer to live in denial. I think it's nice to live in denial too. Sometimes I wish I were one of those bush supporters living in fantasy land. Facing reality was a tough thing for this blonde lady. It is a great tragedy to wake up from a dream to find out that there was an underlying nightmare all along.
How about you?
Here comes the really strange part and this is the part where the media and John Kerry didn't do their jobs: Asked whether the US should have gone to war with Iraq if US intelligence had concluded that Iraq was not making WMD or providing support to al Qaeda, 58% of Bush supporters said the US should not have, and 61% assume that in this case the President would not have.
I've actually met bush supporters who were college educated and seemingly bright and competant. So what gives? I still come across Long Island rednecks who actually argue with me about verifiable facts regarding the war in Iraq. What is to argue? Facts are facts. My own inlaws in New Hampshire who are college educated, both veterans of WWII and they actually read the newspapers are still supporting bush. They still believe there were WMDs in Iraq! They are in their 80's and sharp as tacks, except when it comes to bush. I found out that they listen to bush and cheney speeches as well as conservative talk radio. We need a news filter, ladies and gentleman.
So basically bush supporters are lied to and they believe it. Why shouldn't they? Many of them, like my inlaws fought against fascism in WWII and they believe that this country is the greatest so it's inconceivable that they would be lied to or deliberately mislead by radio talk show hosts or their very own president and veep. I was raised to believe that this was the greatest, most honest country in the world. I can still hear my father admonishing me whenever I suggested that something was not right with America.
Some think I took glee in discovering that we were fed more propaganda than the Russians. I absolutely did not enjoy that revelation. I was so freaked out that I was that I went back to my shrink in the summer of 2003 after months of trying to get people to listen to me. He medicated the hell out of me. I didn't change my position, but I was much calmer. He thought I was making stuff up (and I shouldn't tell anyone what I was thinking) until this past summer when he apologized and confirmed that I was right on the money all along. My friends thought I had lost it. It's tough living here in Republicanland. Most people prefer to live in denial. I think it's nice to live in denial too. Sometimes I wish I were one of those bush supporters living in fantasy land. Facing reality was a tough thing for this blonde lady. It is a great tragedy to wake up from a dream to find out that there was an underlying nightmare all along.
How about you?
Bush: Weak on Nature
Mercury is dangerous. You know it. I know it.
I saw Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Bill Maher's show explaining how his mercury levels were high in his body- 3 times normal. He eats a lot of fish. He said that a woman with the same levels of mercury would bear children with cognitive brain damage. Last December, the bushcrimefamily wanted the EPA to remove mercury as a toxic substance. Yes you read that right. Corporations mean more to bush than people do. Bush is Weak on Nature, says Robert Kennedy
I saw Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Bill Maher's show explaining how his mercury levels were high in his body- 3 times normal. He eats a lot of fish. He said that a woman with the same levels of mercury would bear children with cognitive brain damage. Last December, the bushcrimefamily wanted the EPA to remove mercury as a toxic substance. Yes you read that right. Corporations mean more to bush than people do. Bush is Weak on Nature, says Robert Kennedy
The best Dubya movie
trailer I have ever seen is at Dubyamovie.com.
Don Knotts plays Dubya.
Or
did Dubya play Don Knotts?
Don Knotts plays Dubya.
Or
did Dubya play Don Knotts?
Monday, October 25
There Once Was A Fairness Doctrine In Media
For many years, television and radio stations were required to give equal time to opposing sides of public or political issues to ensure the American public heard all sides of a debate. It was a requirement made by the Federal Communications Commission that came to be known as The Fairness Doctrine.
In 1986, a federal court ruled that the Fairness Doctrine did not have the force of law and could be overturned without congressional approval. Congress passed a bill to make the doctrine law but the bill was vetoed by President Reagan in 1987 and the Fairness Doctrine was abolished.
Now there is a petition to Renew the Fairness Doctrine.
Spread this around. We could have used this like a year ago. Better late than never?
In 1986, a federal court ruled that the Fairness Doctrine did not have the force of law and could be overturned without congressional approval. Congress passed a bill to make the doctrine law but the bill was vetoed by President Reagan in 1987 and the Fairness Doctrine was abolished.
Now there is a petition to Renew the Fairness Doctrine.
Spread this around. We could have used this like a year ago. Better late than never?
just when you were sure no one cared
Watch this powerful video clip from Representative Tim Ryan from Ohio at the League of Pissed Off Voters
http://www.indyvoter.org/
Part of the plan to crush our spirit and break our will is to isolate and marginalize liberals. It is part of the plan that we believe the propaganda that liberalism is dead. There is this notion in the wind that we have no credibility if we question Bush and his authority. What authority?
ABC News Sunday night reported that there is a possibility that hanging chads could happen again in Florida and Ohio. That's right. Blame the voter. Don't discuss how the voting apparatus failed. How that was part of the plan to steal Florida. Make sure the voter cannot punch through the chad so the ballot doesn't get counted. The elections officials didn't have the apparatus cleaned so that voters could properly punch holes on the punch card ballot.
They can't quite bring themselves to tell us the truth.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
http://www.indyvoter.org/
Part of the plan to crush our spirit and break our will is to isolate and marginalize liberals. It is part of the plan that we believe the propaganda that liberalism is dead. There is this notion in the wind that we have no credibility if we question Bush and his authority. What authority?
ABC News Sunday night reported that there is a possibility that hanging chads could happen again in Florida and Ohio. That's right. Blame the voter. Don't discuss how the voting apparatus failed. How that was part of the plan to steal Florida. Make sure the voter cannot punch through the chad so the ballot doesn't get counted. The elections officials didn't have the apparatus cleaned so that voters could properly punch holes on the punch card ballot.
They can't quite bring themselves to tell us the truth.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
My Question
by pissed off patricia
Seriously, which worries you or frightens you more, another terrorist attack in the US, or another four more years of george bush? If you chose to answer, please explain. Think of the short and long term effects. How would each of these events effect you, our country and the world. I'm sincerely interested in what you have to say.
Seriously, which worries you or frightens you more, another terrorist attack in the US, or another four more years of george bush? If you chose to answer, please explain. Think of the short and long term effects. How would each of these events effect you, our country and the world. I'm sincerely interested in what you have to say.
Conservatives For Kerry?
Front page of American Conservative: They don't support Bush
Excerpt from "Kerry’s the One" By Scott McConnell
But neoconservatism now encompasses much more than Israel-obsessed intellectuals and policy insiders. The Bush foreign policy also surfs on deep currents within the Christian Right, some of which see unqualified support of Israel as part of a godly plan to bring about Armageddon and the future kingdom of Christ. These two strands of Jewish and Christian extremism build on one another in the Bush presidency—and President Bush has given not the slightest indication he would restrain either in a second term. With Colin Powell’s departure from the State Department looming, Bush is more than ever the “neoconian candidate.” The only way Americans will have a presidency in which neoconservatives and the Christian Armageddon set are not holding the reins of power is if Kerry is elected.
Excerpt from "Kerry’s the One" By Scott McConnell
But neoconservatism now encompasses much more than Israel-obsessed intellectuals and policy insiders. The Bush foreign policy also surfs on deep currents within the Christian Right, some of which see unqualified support of Israel as part of a godly plan to bring about Armageddon and the future kingdom of Christ. These two strands of Jewish and Christian extremism build on one another in the Bush presidency—and President Bush has given not the slightest indication he would restrain either in a second term. With Colin Powell’s departure from the State Department looming, Bush is more than ever the “neoconian candidate.” The only way Americans will have a presidency in which neoconservatives and the Christian Armageddon set are not holding the reins of power is if Kerry is elected.
This is telling
by pissed off patricia
As far as TV coverage, I know more about Ashley Simpson's screw up on Saturday Night Live, than I know about the missing 380 tons of missing explosives in Iraq.
Until now, I had no idea who Ashley Simpson was or what she did. However we have had ample coverage of the fiasco. I now know that she is a singer, I know the name of both songs she was supposed to sing, where she was holding the microphone when the music started, what she did before leaving the stage, when she left the stage and the excuse she later gave for leaving the stage.
If I depended on TV news alone, I would only know that the explosives were missing in Iraq but I would be sadly short on details.
As far as TV coverage, I know more about Ashley Simpson's screw up on Saturday Night Live, than I know about the missing 380 tons of missing explosives in Iraq.
Until now, I had no idea who Ashley Simpson was or what she did. However we have had ample coverage of the fiasco. I now know that she is a singer, I know the name of both songs she was supposed to sing, where she was holding the microphone when the music started, what she did before leaving the stage, when she left the stage and the excuse she later gave for leaving the stage.
If I depended on TV news alone, I would only know that the explosives were missing in Iraq but I would be sadly short on details.
Jon Stewart Roasts Real News
Did ya see Jon Stewart on 60 Minutes last night?
""I can't believe that the National Guard memo scandal is the only scandal in four years that has gotten elevated to the status of having a gate attached to it," says Stewart. "Rather-gate. For God's sake, we launched a war based on forged documents. That doesn't get a gate. How do you not get a gate outta that?"
"Dick Cheney's old company does business with Iran, in an offshore Cayman Islands group," adds Stewart. "No gate. Nothing." "
""I can't believe that the National Guard memo scandal is the only scandal in four years that has gotten elevated to the status of having a gate attached to it," says Stewart. "Rather-gate. For God's sake, we launched a war based on forged documents. That doesn't get a gate. How do you not get a gate outta that?"
"Dick Cheney's old company does business with Iran, in an offshore Cayman Islands group," adds Stewart. "No gate. Nothing." "
Bitchin'
by pissed off patricia
John Lennon told us to "Imagine". Imagine this: Visualize Winning
After you view it, I'll bet you'll be smiling and energized. You may even be crying because it sounds and looks so damned good!
Enjoy!
John Lennon told us to "Imagine". Imagine this: Visualize Winning
After you view it, I'll bet you'll be smiling and energized. You may even be crying because it sounds and looks so damned good!
Enjoy!
Bitchin' Something to Consider
by pissed off patricia
Yesterday I heard someone talking about a gutsy move on behalf of a female and they said the woman "had balls". Well, I'm not fond of that phrase for a couple of reasons. First is sounds crude to me and second it seems to insinuate that for a woman to be strong, she has to imitate a man. Believe it or not, men did not invent strength and power, even though some would like you to believe that they did.
I think maybe I have a better idea. If, when a man is gutsy he is said to have balls, then I think if a woman is gutsy, she should be said to have bells. Men have balls, and women have bells. It sounds nicer and it doesn't associate a woman's strength with male genitalia. That is not where a woman's strength originates. To say that a woman has bells suggests that when women are strong their strength rings out. See, isn't that a better and more appropriate mental image?
Yesterday I heard someone talking about a gutsy move on behalf of a female and they said the woman "had balls". Well, I'm not fond of that phrase for a couple of reasons. First is sounds crude to me and second it seems to insinuate that for a woman to be strong, she has to imitate a man. Believe it or not, men did not invent strength and power, even though some would like you to believe that they did.
I think maybe I have a better idea. If, when a man is gutsy he is said to have balls, then I think if a woman is gutsy, she should be said to have bells. Men have balls, and women have bells. It sounds nicer and it doesn't associate a woman's strength with male genitalia. That is not where a woman's strength originates. To say that a woman has bells suggests that when women are strong their strength rings out. See, isn't that a better and more appropriate mental image?
The news today, oh boy
Compassiongate is a website dedicated to clearing up misinformation about John Kerry.
Because there is no regulation demanding that political candidates speak the truth, many Americans need to get their facts straight.
Try not to be mean to bush supporters as many of them have simply been hoodwinked by all the lies. I for one was very surprised and dismayed that there are no standards when it comes to politics for being honest. I am sickened when I watch tv and see pundits excusing lies as
"simply politics". There should be no excuse for lies and misleading by politicians. Why do we tolerate this?
Fascist Characteristic 3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause -- The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
Fascist Characteristic 6. Controlled Mass Media -- Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or through sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in wartime, is very common.
----------------------------------------
Compassionate, my foot. bush's w is for women campaign is an outright fraud.
He is supposedly making inroads with women, especially mom's, using a fear tactic. It is reprehensible. Blair and Bush licking BBC makes a bogus case for women to support bush.
Characteristic of Fascism 7. Obsession with National Security -- Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
----------------------------------------
The Coming Post-Election Chaos:
----------------------------------------
The NY Times Reports: Huge Cache of Explosives Vanished From Site in Iraq:
----------------------------------------
Want proof that your government doesn't give a shit about our soldiers?
Iraq war veterans are speaking out.
If you are watching tv supposed news, you would get the impression that everything going wrong with our country is John Kerry's fault. The media allows this. Our media is corrupt and must be challenged. CNN, MSNBC, FOX should not be allowed to use the word "news" in their slogans or their titles. "News" insinuates reporting of facts. Americans are being misled by faux news and faux reporting.
----------------------------------------
Rampant Sexism
Abortion crusade turns Republican women off Bush
Can you believe it? Well I can believe it because women, sorry guys, are intuitively more intelligent than men are, generally speaking. Women can easily see through the lies and distortions of the current republican party. We can see that their so-called "pro-life" stance is just a political ploy. The bush administration's actions in every other situation clearly show a disregard for human life and a deep hatred for women. For a neocon republican, the only good woman is a barefoot and pregnant woman.
Moderate republican women are calling for a return to the original republican party. A group called "Republicans Who Want Their Party Back". It's about time.
Characteristic of Fascism 5. Rampant Sexism -- The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and antigay legislation and national policy.
Because there is no regulation demanding that political candidates speak the truth, many Americans need to get their facts straight.
Try not to be mean to bush supporters as many of them have simply been hoodwinked by all the lies. I for one was very surprised and dismayed that there are no standards when it comes to politics for being honest. I am sickened when I watch tv and see pundits excusing lies as
"simply politics". There should be no excuse for lies and misleading by politicians. Why do we tolerate this?
Fascist Characteristic 3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause -- The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial, ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.
Fascist Characteristic 6. Controlled Mass Media -- Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or through sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in wartime, is very common.
----------------------------------------
Compassionate, my foot. bush's w is for women campaign is an outright fraud.
He is supposedly making inroads with women, especially mom's, using a fear tactic. It is reprehensible. Blair and Bush licking BBC makes a bogus case for women to support bush.
Characteristic of Fascism 7. Obsession with National Security -- Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.
----------------------------------------
The Coming Post-Election Chaos:
A Storm Warning of Things to Come If the Vote Is as Close as ExpectedFascist Characteristic 14. Fraudulent Elections -- Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against (or even the assassination of) opposition candidates, the use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and the manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.
From John Dean's alarming article in FindLaw
"It does not seem to trouble either Rove or Bush that they are moving us toward a Twenty-first Century civil war -- and that, once again, Southern conservatism is at its core. Only a miracle, it strikes me, can prevent this election from descending into post-election chaos. But given the alternatives, a miracle is what I am hoping for."
----------------------------------------
The NY Times Reports: Huge Cache of Explosives Vanished From Site in Iraq:
"The huge facility, called Al Qaqaa, was supposed to be under American military control but is now a no man's land, still picked over by looters as recently as Sunday. United Nations weapons inspectors had monitored the explosives for many years, but White House and Pentagon officials acknowledge that the explosives vanished sometime after the American-led invasion last year. "Get our boys out of that country now. Our government is oblivious.
...The White House said President Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, was informed within the past month that the explosives were missing. It is unclear whether President Bush was informed.
...The explosives could also be used to trigger a nuclear weapon, which was why international nuclear inspectors had kept a watch on the material, and even sealed and locked some of it. The other components of an atom bomb - the design and the radioactive fuel - are more difficult to obtain.
...The International Atomic Energy Agency publicly warned about the danger of these explosives before the war, and after the invasion it specifically told United States officials about the need to keep the explosives secured, European diplomats said in interviews last week. Administration officials say they cannot explain why the explosives were not safeguarded, beyond the fact that the occupation force was overwhelmed by the amount of munitions they found throughout the country.
----------------------------------------
Want proof that your government doesn't give a shit about our soldiers?
Iraq war veterans are speaking out.
Iraq veterans open up on mishandling of war----------------------------------------
[Boetcher, a soldier] presented the audience with statistics showing how veterans are losing service benefits at a rapid rate. With lowered funding for support programs and the rising trend of soldiers being reactivated for a second tour of duty, there is little incentive to remain in the service.
[Jennifer Giese of the 826th Ordinance ]While the unit suffered no fatalities in Iraq, they were plagued the entire time by supply chain glitches. The unit never received body armor, and had to resort to stealing scrap metal for vehicle armor. Bottled water had to be rationed due to shortages, but Giese later filled a swimming pool for a general's use.
"This was a complete, chaotic mess," Giese said. "In my opinion there was no plan ... no one knew where we were going."
If you are watching tv supposed news, you would get the impression that everything going wrong with our country is John Kerry's fault. The media allows this. Our media is corrupt and must be challenged. CNN, MSNBC, FOX should not be allowed to use the word "news" in their slogans or their titles. "News" insinuates reporting of facts. Americans are being misled by faux news and faux reporting.
----------------------------------------
Rampant Sexism
Abortion crusade turns Republican women off Bush
Can you believe it? Well I can believe it because women, sorry guys, are intuitively more intelligent than men are, generally speaking. Women can easily see through the lies and distortions of the current republican party. We can see that their so-called "pro-life" stance is just a political ploy. The bush administration's actions in every other situation clearly show a disregard for human life and a deep hatred for women. For a neocon republican, the only good woman is a barefoot and pregnant woman.
Moderate republican women are calling for a return to the original republican party. A group called "Republicans Who Want Their Party Back". It's about time.
Characteristic of Fascism 5. Rampant Sexism -- The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to abortion is high, as is homophobia and antigay legislation and national policy.
Another reason why the corporate media needs to be taken to task
Characteristic of Fascism #6: Controlled Mass Media -- Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or through sympathetic media spokespeople and executives.
Two Bush ads full of misleading and false statements ran more than 9,000 times in 45 cities last week. (Factcheck.org) This is absolutely disgraceful. A Truth in Presidential Candidates Act needs to be implemented.
Two Bush ads full of misleading and false statements ran more than 9,000 times in 45 cities last week. (Factcheck.org) This is absolutely disgraceful. A Truth in Presidential Candidates Act needs to be implemented.
Sunday, October 24
speaking from sugar land, texas
Speaking from the gutter that is our political world, Tom DeLay said this week, “I’ve never had a campaign where the entire nation has tried to destroy my name. They are going after me in the most personal and vindictive way. It's gutter politics."
"I am effective and that's why they are after me," DeLay said. "I am passionate and aggressive about what I do."
They can’t do it alone. Are you passionately, aggressively doing your part to destroy the political career of Tom DeLay & George W. Bush?
According to the Houston Chronicle, “In recent weeks, the House ethics committee admonished DeLay for offering a political favor to a fellow Republican lawmaker if he voted for a Medicare prescription drug bill; for perceived links of political donations to legislation; and for asking federal aviation officials to help search for Democratic Texas state representatives who fled Austin last year during the redistricting fight.
Three of his political associates were recently indicted on charges of illegal political fund raising. DeLay called those charges laughable.”
What is tragic is DeLay, like George W. Bush, considers much of the solid science on global warming and the use of pesticides like DDT laughable. He thinks that his degree from the University of Houston and his career as a pest control businessman puts him in a position to criticize Nobel Prize laureates.
Like Bush who deeply believes that if one is “resolute” in the face of reality, reality will yield, and science will not matter.
This thinking is best exemplified by the word “Truth” encased by the plastic silhouette of a fish eating the plastic silhouette of a fish encasing the word “Darwin” on the bumpers of thousands of Bush and DeLay constituents in Texas.
If John Kerry is able to out-macho George W. Bush and is elected in November, he will have to contend with a House of Representatives led by Tom DeLay. DeLay isn’t going down for his crimes. Not in Texas, not with any jury impaneled here. He must be seen as such a liability that his own party rejects him as their majority leader.
The only way to defeat DeLay is by a national effort to marginalize him. Running a well financed credible candidate who can capitalize off of DeLay’s own maniacal egomania without allowing the press to characterize his candidacy as some romantic lost cause would be nice, but isn’t going to happen in the world of Texas, Inc. Robert Redford and Paul Newman could do advertisements for DeLay’s opponent and it would not defeat DeLay unless Redford or Newman moved to Sugar Land, Texas, ran against DeLay, registered and drove to the polls every unregistered voter in the district and held press conferences wearing haz-mat suits standing in the middle of the Brazos River.
It is going to take more than politics. It is going to take passion about the environment and corporate greed. Until we take back our right to clean air, clean water, and the right to control what we ingest, the Tom DeLay’s and the George W. Bush’s are going to win. Until we demand media coverage of their environmental atrocities, we lose.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
"I am effective and that's why they are after me," DeLay said. "I am passionate and aggressive about what I do."
They can’t do it alone. Are you passionately, aggressively doing your part to destroy the political career of Tom DeLay & George W. Bush?
According to the Houston Chronicle, “In recent weeks, the House ethics committee admonished DeLay for offering a political favor to a fellow Republican lawmaker if he voted for a Medicare prescription drug bill; for perceived links of political donations to legislation; and for asking federal aviation officials to help search for Democratic Texas state representatives who fled Austin last year during the redistricting fight.
Three of his political associates were recently indicted on charges of illegal political fund raising. DeLay called those charges laughable.”
What is tragic is DeLay, like George W. Bush, considers much of the solid science on global warming and the use of pesticides like DDT laughable. He thinks that his degree from the University of Houston and his career as a pest control businessman puts him in a position to criticize Nobel Prize laureates.
Like Bush who deeply believes that if one is “resolute” in the face of reality, reality will yield, and science will not matter.
This thinking is best exemplified by the word “Truth” encased by the plastic silhouette of a fish eating the plastic silhouette of a fish encasing the word “Darwin” on the bumpers of thousands of Bush and DeLay constituents in Texas.
If John Kerry is able to out-macho George W. Bush and is elected in November, he will have to contend with a House of Representatives led by Tom DeLay. DeLay isn’t going down for his crimes. Not in Texas, not with any jury impaneled here. He must be seen as such a liability that his own party rejects him as their majority leader.
The only way to defeat DeLay is by a national effort to marginalize him. Running a well financed credible candidate who can capitalize off of DeLay’s own maniacal egomania without allowing the press to characterize his candidacy as some romantic lost cause would be nice, but isn’t going to happen in the world of Texas, Inc. Robert Redford and Paul Newman could do advertisements for DeLay’s opponent and it would not defeat DeLay unless Redford or Newman moved to Sugar Land, Texas, ran against DeLay, registered and drove to the polls every unregistered voter in the district and held press conferences wearing haz-mat suits standing in the middle of the Brazos River.
It is going to take more than politics. It is going to take passion about the environment and corporate greed. Until we take back our right to clean air, clean water, and the right to control what we ingest, the Tom DeLay’s and the George W. Bush’s are going to win. Until we demand media coverage of their environmental atrocities, we lose.
Use BugMeNot.com to get user names and passwords for some articles.
Apathetic Voters
Say you were an apathetic voter. What reasons would you give?
- I'm too tired to vote after work. I just want to get home and stay there.
- It doesn't matter, my vote doesn't count anyway.
- I live in a red state and I'm a democrat, so it doesn't matter who I vote for.
- I live in a blue state and I'm a republican, so it doesn't matter who I vote for..
- The candidates don't care about my state. They are always in Pennsylvania or Florida.
- I can't tell which candidate is telling the truth. They both insist that the other is lying and I don't have time to make sense of it all.
- As usual, both candidates stink and I don't relate to anything they are talking about.
- I don't like their nasty smear advertising. I don't know who to believe.
- The electoral college is ridiculous. Why are candidates campaigning in states with such a few electoral votes and we in a state with a lot of electoral votes are being ignored? We have needs too.
- They had 4 years to fix the voting system and they blew it.
- It's all crooked. The elections are rigged. Who cares?
- When they get rid of the electoral college, I'll vote. My vote doesn't count anyway.
- What's the electoral college?
- They should have the election on a weekend like in other countries. More people would vote.
******
All these reasons are valid. First of all, the electoral college, which was started so that candidates wouldn't ignore less populated states has completely backfired. Larger states with more taxpayers haven't seen many advertisements or seen a candidate in a rally.
The electoral college makes voters feel disenfranchised. For instance if I want to vote for a Democrat and I live in a red state and the weather is lousy, I may not bother to go to the polls after work.
There is no truth in advertising when it comes to political ads. It's down to a "he said, he said" campaign and the media is only playing up the lies rather than exposing the lies. The media isn't using the airwaves fairly. The FCC is run by a partisan republican operative and the best interest of the American citizens comes after partisan politics.
The media is always talking about polls and the polls are always changing. There must be something wrong with the polls. How can a thousand or so people really reflect the national sentiment? I don't believe it.
The electoral college needs to go. The polls should be run by the people and not by politicians. Why are partisan politicians having a say in election issues? In each state, there should be a non-partisan board whose main concern is making sure that all the votes are counted and that all votes count. The whole nation should use the same methods of voting. More citizens should be encouraged to get involved in the election process.
Why is election day on a Tuesday? More people are off from work on Sunday than Tuesday. In Europe, the reason more people vote is because elections are held on weekends. Makes sense.
People are ill informed. It takes a lot of work as many of us here know to find out the truth about a candidate. Reporters and journalists don't do the research. How many times have I discovered something or another blogger has discovered something that didn't even make the mass media for weeks, or ever? The media is of no use to anyone who doesn't have time to research the candidates. The American people are fooled by the so called 24 hour news stations. They are partisan corporate shills who occasionally give a voice to the opposing side just for show.
It's time for those of us who do give a shit, to hold our states accountable for the electoral process, to work to abolish the electoral college and to actively push for truth in advertising for all political advertising whether it comes from the candidates, the parties and 527's. I'm sure a volunteer task force would be glad to review all advertisements for accuracy before they are allowed to go on the air. Free speech is one thing, but lies and misleading information should not be tolerated when it comes to something as important as a national election.
Election reform should start now.
I urge everyone to start writing letters and urge the media to listen to us, do their jobs and help the American people win the country back.
**************
With Jeb Bush as governor, and voting machine maker Diebold contributing to the Republican party, this might be what voting is like across Florida on Nov 2:
Watch this video in Quicktime or Windows Media
Take action now.
Republicans attempt to confuse voters in Democratic-leaning areas of Philadelphia by requesting the city relocate 63 polling places- 53 of which are in Black and Latino neighborhoods. Denied
We're sorry the Republicans threw away all the Democrat's voter registrations but it's too late to do anything about it. Oh well!
Not only is Bush wrong, most of his supporters are too, "According to the study, 75 percent Bush supporters also believe 'Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda.'
A team of international observers who are monitoring the November 2 elections is calling for major reforms in the U.S. electoral process to promote confidence in that each voting system. But most Americans will probably not even find out about this because the mass media won't report it.
What kind of democracy do we live in where American citizens are refused the right to see their president speak unless they declare support for him? Is this a democracy or a dictatorship?
What kind of democracy do we live in where concerned citizens for clean air are treated like terrorists?
- I'm too tired to vote after work. I just want to get home and stay there.
- It doesn't matter, my vote doesn't count anyway.
- I live in a red state and I'm a democrat, so it doesn't matter who I vote for.
- I live in a blue state and I'm a republican, so it doesn't matter who I vote for..
- The candidates don't care about my state. They are always in Pennsylvania or Florida.
- I can't tell which candidate is telling the truth. They both insist that the other is lying and I don't have time to make sense of it all.
- As usual, both candidates stink and I don't relate to anything they are talking about.
- I don't like their nasty smear advertising. I don't know who to believe.
- The electoral college is ridiculous. Why are candidates campaigning in states with such a few electoral votes and we in a state with a lot of electoral votes are being ignored? We have needs too.
- They had 4 years to fix the voting system and they blew it.
- It's all crooked. The elections are rigged. Who cares?
- When they get rid of the electoral college, I'll vote. My vote doesn't count anyway.
- What's the electoral college?
- They should have the election on a weekend like in other countries. More people would vote.
******
All these reasons are valid. First of all, the electoral college, which was started so that candidates wouldn't ignore less populated states has completely backfired. Larger states with more taxpayers haven't seen many advertisements or seen a candidate in a rally.
The electoral college makes voters feel disenfranchised. For instance if I want to vote for a Democrat and I live in a red state and the weather is lousy, I may not bother to go to the polls after work.
There is no truth in advertising when it comes to political ads. It's down to a "he said, he said" campaign and the media is only playing up the lies rather than exposing the lies. The media isn't using the airwaves fairly. The FCC is run by a partisan republican operative and the best interest of the American citizens comes after partisan politics.
The media is always talking about polls and the polls are always changing. There must be something wrong with the polls. How can a thousand or so people really reflect the national sentiment? I don't believe it.
The electoral college needs to go. The polls should be run by the people and not by politicians. Why are partisan politicians having a say in election issues? In each state, there should be a non-partisan board whose main concern is making sure that all the votes are counted and that all votes count. The whole nation should use the same methods of voting. More citizens should be encouraged to get involved in the election process.
Why is election day on a Tuesday? More people are off from work on Sunday than Tuesday. In Europe, the reason more people vote is because elections are held on weekends. Makes sense.
People are ill informed. It takes a lot of work as many of us here know to find out the truth about a candidate. Reporters and journalists don't do the research. How many times have I discovered something or another blogger has discovered something that didn't even make the mass media for weeks, or ever? The media is of no use to anyone who doesn't have time to research the candidates. The American people are fooled by the so called 24 hour news stations. They are partisan corporate shills who occasionally give a voice to the opposing side just for show.
It's time for those of us who do give a shit, to hold our states accountable for the electoral process, to work to abolish the electoral college and to actively push for truth in advertising for all political advertising whether it comes from the candidates, the parties and 527's. I'm sure a volunteer task force would be glad to review all advertisements for accuracy before they are allowed to go on the air. Free speech is one thing, but lies and misleading information should not be tolerated when it comes to something as important as a national election.
Election reform should start now.
I urge everyone to start writing letters and urge the media to listen to us, do their jobs and help the American people win the country back.
**************
With Jeb Bush as governor, and voting machine maker Diebold contributing to the Republican party, this might be what voting is like across Florida on Nov 2:
Watch this video in Quicktime or Windows Media
Take action now.
Republicans attempt to confuse voters in Democratic-leaning areas of Philadelphia by requesting the city relocate 63 polling places- 53 of which are in Black and Latino neighborhoods. Denied
We're sorry the Republicans threw away all the Democrat's voter registrations but it's too late to do anything about it. Oh well!
Not only is Bush wrong, most of his supporters are too, "According to the study, 75 percent Bush supporters also believe 'Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda.'
A team of international observers who are monitoring the November 2 elections is calling for major reforms in the U.S. electoral process to promote confidence in that each voting system. But most Americans will probably not even find out about this because the mass media won't report it.
What kind of democracy do we live in where American citizens are refused the right to see their president speak unless they declare support for him? Is this a democracy or a dictatorship?
What kind of democracy do we live in where concerned citizens for clean air are treated like terrorists?
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