Between The Lines

My tribute to the liquor industry

2011-05-03T21:31:00.000-05:00

GardenGuard, 09

2009-07-22T23:15:00.001-05:00

This blog ended after the campaign ended, it will remain as a chronicle of that era, unchanged henceforth.

2009-03-23T11:30:00.001-05:00

The WPA castle on Coronado Heights, in southern Saline County, Kansas

2009-01-28T10:09:00.005-06:00

Be sure to click all these photo for a breathtaking enlargement...

Here's that world class view...

and here;

Martin's Dream

2009-01-26T12:04:00.001-06:00

One wall of my office...

Sweet VICTORY!

2008-11-08T11:28:00.000-06:00

From today's Wichita Eagle; Sebelius' next great adventure.

2008-11-06T08:24:00.002-06:00

A potential Obama cabinet projected in June on the Daily Kos Web site slotted Sebelius in at secretary of Health and Human Services.

It's not a bad guess, said Mel Kahn, a professor of political science at Wichita State University.

Health care reform is expected to be a key goal of the Obama administration and Sebelius has strong credentials in that area, he said.

Kahn said that in her previous role as Kansas insurance commissioner, Sebelius established herself as someone who could stand up to powerful insurance interests.

She blocked a planned merger between the for-profit Anthem Insurance Co. of Indiana and the member-owned Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas. Sebelius also has fought for universal health coverage for children, a prime goal of Obama's health plan.
http://www.kansas.com/topstories/story/587426.html

SO That's who McCain meant when he said the economy was strong...

2008-10-30T09:43:00.003-05:00

Exxon Mobil Corp., the world's largest publicly traded oil company, reported income Thursday that shattered its own record for the biggest profit from operations by a U.S. corporation, earning $14.83 billion in the third quarter.
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2008/10/exxon_mobil_posts_biggest_us_q.php

Leopards and their spots....

2008-10-06T09:32:00.001-05:00

full length video HERE

McCainonomics.. The Hindenburg Plan

2008-09-30T11:27:00.001-05:00

Cheney ordered to stop burning his records...

2008-09-21T07:52:00.003-05:00

From the Austin Statesman
Federal judge orders Cheney to preserve VP records
By PETE YOST Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Saturday ordered Dick Cheney to preserve a wide range of the records from his time as vice president.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly is a setback for the Bush administration in its effort to promote a narrow definition of materials that must be safeguarded under by the Presidential Records Act.
The Bush administration's legal position "heightens the court's concern" that some records may not be preserved, said the judge. (DUH!!)
A private group, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, (YAY, CREW!!! you go, Mel!) is suing Cheney and the Executive Office of the President in an effort to ensure that no presidential records are destroyed or handled in a way that makes them unavailable to the public.
In a 22-page opinion, the judge revealed that in recent days, lawyers for the Bush administration balked at a proposed agreement between the two sides on how to proceed with the case.
Cheney and the other defendants in the case "were only willing to agree to a preservation order that tracked their narrowed interpretation" of the Presidential Records Act, wrote Kollar-Kotelly.
The administration, said the judge, wanted any court order on what records are at issue in the suit to cover only the office of the vice president, not Cheney or the other defendants in the lawsuit. The other defendants include the National Archives and the archivist of the United States. (Former Natl. Archivist and Kansas Governor John Carlin should have some interesting perspectives on this, they replaced him with the current hack...)
In response to the ruling, Cheney spokesman James R. Hennigan said that "we will not have any comment on pending litigation."
The lawsuit stems from Cheney's position that his office is not part of the executive branch of government.
This summer, Cheney chief of staff David Addington told Congress the vice president belongs to neither the executive nor legislative branch of government, but rather is attached by the Constitution to Congress. The vice president presides over the Senate.
The lawsuit alleges that the Bush administration's actions over the past 7 1/2 years raise questions over whether the White House will turn over records created by Cheney and his staff to the National Archives in January.
In 2003, Cheney asserted that the office of the vice president is not an entity within the executive branch.
Two historians and three groups of historians and archivists joined CREW in filing the suit two weeks ago.
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/shared-gen/ap/US_President_And_White_House_Advisers/Cheney_Lawsuit.html

The New Grapes of Wrath... our punishment for pre-emptive war?

2008-09-20T08:33:00.003-05:00

From the Seattle PI;
In hard times, tent cities rise across the country
By EVELYN NIEVES
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
RENO, Nev. -- A few tents cropped up hard by the railroad tracks, pitched by men left with nowhere to go once the emergency winter shelter closed for the summer.
Then others appeared - people who had lost their jobs to the ailing economy, or newcomers who had moved to Reno for work and discovered no one was hiring.
Within weeks, more than 150 people were living in tents big and small, barely a foot apart in a patch of dirt slated to be a parking lot for a campus of shelters Reno is building for its homeless population. Like many other cities, Reno has found itself with a "tent city" - an encampment of people who had nowhere else to go.
From Seattle to Athens, Ga., homeless advocacy groups and city agencies are reporting the most visible rise in homeless encampments in a generation.
Nearly 61 percent of local and state homeless coalitions say they've experienced a rise in homelessness since the foreclosure crisis began in 2007, according to a report by the National Coalition for the Homeless. The group says the problem has worsened since the report's release in April, with foreclosures mounting, gas and food prices rising and the job market tightening.
"It's clear that poverty and homelessness have increased," said Michael Stoops, acting executive director of the coalition. "The economy is in chaos, we're in an unofficial recession and Americans are worried, from the homeless to the middle class, about their future."
The phenomenon of encampments has caught advocacy groups somewhat by surprise, largely because of how quickly they have sprung up.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/6600ap_ca_tent_cities.html

John McCain's POW story makes him a dangerous potential President!

2008-09-02T11:40:00.003-05:00

Thanx again to Robert Greenwald of Brave New Films, and to Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo for enabling the public to see this information.

US election: It's the most vicious election campaign ever

2008-09-01T08:25:00.002-05:00

From "The Guardian"

As he bids to be president, Barack Obama is feeling the force of the mighty Republican propaganda machine. TV and radio hosts, authors and well-funded lobby groups have joined forces in a sophisticated and aggressive smear campaign.
Paul Harris reports on the attack dogs

The Republican war room in Denver looked harmless. It was on a busy road in a neighbourhood of modest motels and petrol stations. Only a handmade sign, emblazoned with an arrow and the words 'John McCain', pointed the way.
But looks can be deceiving. More than two dozen Republican staffers were camped in Denver last week, spearheading the latest assaults on Barack Obama who was addressing the Democratic convention nearby. 'We came here to piss the Democrats off,' said one Republican aide with a grin.
They have largely succeeded. Each day new adverts have hammered a relentless drumbeat of negativity, painting Obama as too liberal, too inexperienced and practically a danger to America's future. Leading lights of the Republican universe have paraded in front of the cameras in a disciplined display of party message-making. A typical performance came from former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani. 'There are still a lot of serious questions about Barack Obama's preparedness to lead the country,' Giuliani said, before stepping aside to showcase the latest ad on a huge flat-screen TV.
The ad attacked Obama as being so ignorant of foreign affairs that he was virtually a security threat himself. It touched on scare issues such as Islamic terrorism and Iranian nukes. Then it represented Obama's positions on national security as naive and weak. 'These are contrast ads,' Giuliani said afterwards. 'And both sides do them.'
That is only half-true. Democrats do launch attack ads and campaign negatively but no one does it like the Republican party. Under a succession of dark geniuses, the party has perfected the black art of negative campaigning. It has created the most effective attack machine in the Western world, with the sole purpose of destroying opponents and winning elections. For opponents it is a source of shock, misery and more than a little envy. Its tentacles stretch from the McCain campaign into the murky corners of talk radio, the internet and shadowy groups willing to use any outlandish smear.
Now that machine is focused with laser-like intensity on Obama. The clamour is loud and shrill: Obama is vain, inexperienced, liberal and dangerous. It is backed by a clandestine chorus whispering that he has a secretive Islamic past and it uses racially loaded language. It is also only going to get louder. This week, as McCain and the Republicans gather for their party convention in the Minnesota city of St Paul, the noise will become deafening. It has one purpose - to keep the White House in Republican hands at all costs and against the odds.
The current mastermind of the Republican attack machine is known as the Bullet. He is Steve Schmidt, a protégé of Bush's guru, Karl Rove. Nicknamed for his results as much as his bald head, he made his name as commander of the war room that wiped out Democrat John Kerry in 2004. Brought in to shake things up in July, Schmidt imposed discipline on a disorganised campaign. He dissuaded McCain from his off-the-cuff chats with reporters, and honed the focus solely on making Obama unelectable.
Schmidt works on the principles of repeating simple messages loudly and often. Ads attack Obama as a 'celebrity' or a faux-messiah. By doing so they hope to turn Obama's greatest strength - his ability to inspire - into a fatal flaw. That is backed up by another line: that Obama is simply not fit to be president. NotReady08 is the name of a website set up by the campaign. The language can be harsh. 'We are in the hunt for the White House. Barack Obama is going to have to step up with more than a smart tongue, snappy words and a nice suit,' said Maryland Republican politician Michael Steele.
The campaign will happily twist words. In the ad that Giuliani showed, Obama was hit for referring to the 'tiny' threat from a nuclear Iran. In reality Obama had been pointing out that the problem of Iran was '... tiny compared to the Soviet Union'. Others have interspersed footage of the Democrat candidate with images of Britney Spears. One jokey advert painted him as a Moses-type figure capable of parting the Red Sea. Mocking his message of 'hope' and 'change', radio host Rush Limbaugh has taken to referring on-air to Obama as simply 'the Messiah'.
The attack dogs will eagerly embrace formerly hated targets. All last week Republicans lauded the achievements and brilliance of Hillary Clinton, seeking to exploit divisions in the Democratic Party. It has rounded up former Clinton supporters who now back McCain and paraded them like captured prisoners of war. '[McCain] really does admire and respect her and honours the campaign that she ran,' said Carly Fiorina, a top McCain adviser. Those are astonishing words from a senior figure in a party which spent two decades demonising Clinton as a left-wing uber-feminist. But that is the key to the success of the Republican attack machine: the past does not exist. What matters is what works now. Democrats know more of the same is coming. 'This is going to be the most vicious campaign we have ever faced,' said Terry McAuliffe, Clinton's former campaign chairman.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/aug/31/uselections2008.barackobama

Freedom isn't Free...

2008-08-24T09:51:00.001-05:00

Experts: Internet filtering and censorship rife...

Believe the conspiracy theories: Out of sight and without your knowledge, governments truly are filtering what you see on the Internet.
The recent conflict between Georgia and Russia has highlighted many of the issues at play with Internet filtering, as its increasing use by governments raises serious doubts about the freedom of the Web.
Georgian authorities blocked most access to Russian news broadcasters and Web sites after the outbreak of the conflict, and both sides reported Web sites being blocked, removed or attacked as the situation unfolded.
According to one of CNN's iReporters in Georgia, the situation has been very frightening for citizens.
Andro Kiknadze said an online forum he used to organize supporters appeared to have been taken down, and he described a "cyberwar" in which some Web sites appear to be blocked.
"Please, please help us. We are losing our treasure, our freedom. I am almost crying because I'm seeing my country is falling," Kiknadze said.
So, what is Internet filtering, and why all the fuss?
Filtering simply means restricting access, blocking or taking down Web sites.
Karin Karlekar, senior researcher at freedom promoter Freedom House, said there were several ways in which content could be "filtered."
She said governments could use purpose-built filtering technology, censor Web sites, filter search results -- with the assistance of multinational corporations, and block applications and circumvention tools -- to stop online applications like Facebook, YouTube or Voice Over IPs that enable social networking.
And the use of these tactics appears to be quite widespread.
According to a 2007 report by the OpenNet Initiative, which surveyed more than 40 countries, almost two-thirds of the states involved were filtering content to some degree.
Ron Deibert, director of the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for Internet Studies at the University of Toronto, said in the research, "states are applying ever more fine grained methods to limit and shape the information environment to which their citizens have access."
"Some states block access to a wide swathe of content, while others tend to concentrate on one or two narrow baskets. South Korea, for example, tends to block access only to sites related to North Korea," Deibert said.
Although countries such as Iran and China -- home to the "Great Firewall of China" -- are obvious examples of where filtering is prevalent, other countries are also restricting content for varying reasons.
Ian Brown, research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute, said the Internet in some European countries, including the United Kingdom, was also filtered. However, this was mostly to block child pornography and content that incited or glorified terrorism, he said.
Most democracies, and particularly those of the U.S. and India, had unrestricted Internet, though more than 40 countries were known to filter content, he said.
And it's not just governments involved in filtering. Search engine Google has been heavily criticized for working with the Chinese government to block searches for material about Taiwan, Tibet, democracy and other sensitive issues on its Chinese portal.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/TECH/08/21/internet.filtering/index.html?eref=rss_tech

Exxon Mobil has biggest profit ever at $11.68B

2008-07-31T10:14:00.002-05:00

Thanx to TPM for this AP story...

Exxon Mobil earns $11.68 billion, the biggest quarterly profit ever by any US corporation

JOHN PORRETTO
AP News

Jul 31, 2008 07:46 EST

Exxon Mobil reported second-quarter earnings of $11.68 billion Thursday, the biggest quarterly profit ever by any U.S. corporation, but the results fell well short of Wall Street expectations and shares fell in premarket trading.

The world's largest publicly traded oil company said net income for the April-June period came to $2.22 a share, up from $10.26 billion, or $1.83 a share, a year ago.

Revenue rose 40 percent to $138.1 billion from $98.4 billion in the year-earlier quarter.

Excluding an after-tax charge of $290 million related to an Exxon Valdez court settlement, earnings amounted to $11.97 billion, or $2.27 per share.

Analysts on average expected Exxon Mobil to earn $2.52 a share on revenue of $144 billion, according to a survey by Thomson Financial. The estimates typically exclude one-time items.

The record-setting results were largely expected, given that crude prices in the second quarter were nearly double what they were a year ago. Natural gas prices were significantly higher too.

But investors expected even bigger profits Thursday, especially after Europe's Royal Dutch Shell reported a 33 percent jump in second-quarter earnings of $11.6 billion, which fell just shy of Exxon's own record earnings from 2007.

Shares fell 2 percent, or $1.68, to $82.70 in premarket trading.

Setting U.S. profit records has become commonplace for Irving-based Exxon Mobil. The $11.68 billion topped its own U.S. record of $11.66 billion, posted in the fourth quarter of last year. Right behind that was the $10.9 billion it reported to start 2008.

Exxon Mobil owns the record for at least the top six most-profitable quarters for a U.S. company, as well as the largest annual profit.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2008/07/exxon_mobil_has_biggest_profit.php

The hounds of justice close in on Rove...

2008-07-30T18:37:00.010-05:00

.
Thanx again to the most intrepid poll-watcher and election integrity advocate on the blogs, Brad Friedman of Bradblog. Here's the latest from his blog, and links to the original.

PLEASE NOTE THE LAST SENTENCE REFERENCED HERE, IT IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT REVELATIONS IN THIS ARTICLE!

Karl Rove has threatened a GOP high-tech guru and his wife, if he does not "'take the fall' for election fraud in Ohio," according to a letter sent this morning to Attorney General Michael Mukasey, by Ohio election attorney Cliff Arnebeck.

The email, posted in full below, details threats against Mike Connell of the Republican firm New Media Communications, which describes itself on its website as "a powerhouse in the field of Republican website development and Internet services" and having "played a strategic role in helping the GOP expand its technological supremacy."

Connell was described in a recent interview with the plaintiff's attorneys in Ohio as a "high IQ Forrest Gump" for his appearance "at the scene of every [GOP] crime" from Florida 2000 to Ohio 2004 to the RNC email system to the installation of the currently-used Congressional computer network firewall.

Connell and his firm are currently employed by the John McCain campaign, as well as the RNC and other Republican and so-called "faith-based" organizations.

For the rest of the story, and the email to Mukasey requesting protection for Connell from Rove and his minions, go to;

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6214

Boston Globe Video and article starring JEP hisseff...

2008-07-26T09:25:00.001-05:00

Boston Globe story;
http://www.boston.com:80/news/politics/2008/articles/2008/07/20/grass_roots_networks_in_kansas_connecting_online/?page=1
Video;
http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1185143625/bctid1659830773

Which of these three stories actually represents "PROGRESS?"

2008-07-16T08:35:00.008-05:00

Kurds Protest Iraqi Election Law
The entire bloc of Kurdish lawmakers walked out of Iraq’s Parliament on Tuesday to protest a proposed provincial election law, contending that part of it was unconstitutional.
The walkout by roughly a fifth of Parliament’s 275 members delayed voting on the bill, which governs provincial council elections scheduled to take place across Iraq this fall.
The dispute could yet be resolved quickly, but it introduced more uncertainty into preparations for the nationwide elections. Parliament will meet again on Thursday to discuss the bill, several members said, and talks are continuing in small meetings.
The walkout underscores the political power struggle among the Kurdish, Arab and Turkmen populations in the oil-rich northern province of Tamim and its ethnically mixed capital, Kirkuk.
The Kurds, claiming an ethnic majority in Tamim, have pushed to postpone the provincial council vote until a census is taken, a special agreement is forged or a constitutionally mandated referendum is held on whether the city should stay under Baghdad’s administration or join the Kurdish regional government.
Under the Constitution, the referendum was scheduled to take place by the end of last year, but logistics and the security situation have delayed the process. Many Arab and Turkmen lawmakers have insisted that Kirkuk vote at the time of nationwide provincial elections. The originally scheduled date of Oct. 1 for those elections appears unlikely.
The Kurdish officials who walked out on Tuesday said they had been prepared to vote on the draft election law, with the understanding that the only point open on Kirkuk was whether to delay the election.
But attached to the bill was a separate power-sharing proposal, requested by more than 100 Arab and Turkmen lawmakers, to create a provincial council in Kirkuk of 10 Kurds, 10 Arabs and 10 Turkmens, with 2 more representatives from the region’s small Christian population.
The Kurds contend that this arrangement, which had a good chance of passing, would not reflect their numbers. “If you already pick the seats before the election, why vote?” asked Mahmoud Uthman, a member of the Kurdish bloc in Parliament.
Mr. Uthman expressed confidence that an agreement would be reached but said the Kurds would not show up Thursday if the proposal was not removed.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/16/world/middleeast/16baghdad.html?th&emc=th

Suicide Bombers Kill 35 Iraqi Recruits
After the explosions and fireballs consumed dozens of fellow Iraqi Army recruits in Baquba on Tuesday, a dazed Fawad Hamid found himself on a stretcher at a hospital, his chest perforated by ball bearings from explosive belts worn by the two teenage attackers. He glimpsed a hospital orderly, who grasped a human head.
“Who knows whose head this is?” the orderly asked.
Mr. Hamid had already lost his father to an insurgent’s bullet, and his home to an insurgent’s bomb. On Tuesday morning, Mr. Hamid, a 26-year-old father of three, drove to an Iraqi Army recruiting center in Baquba.
He arrived just as the two suicide bombers blew themselves up, sending iron ball bearings tearing through scores of young recruits like Mr. Hamid, killing 33 people and wounding 69. It was the bloodiest attack in three months in Diyala, perhaps the most dangerous province in Iraq, and it seemed calculated to intimidate Iraqi soldiers preparing to begin the fourth major offensive since last year to drive Sunni Arab guerrillas from the province’s lush palm groves.
The fireball “ate everything,” Mr. Hamid said, as he moaned from the pain of shrapnel in his chest. “I have lost everything and my life is nothing, and that’s what made me go to join the army to earn a living for my family, who would otherwise starve in the land of oil and thieves.”
For all the statistics showing improved security in Iraq, many parts of the country remain astoundingly violent, places where bullet-ridden bodies turn up every day and bombs destroy lives and families in an instant. Nowhere is that more true than in Diyala, where Sunni Arab extremists have found refuge in the verdant river valley northeast of the provincial capital of Baquba.
But in the aftermath of Tuesday morning’s attack, which struck more than 200 recruits at the Saad military base just east of Baquba, the wounded recruits and other survivors trained their fury at more than one culprit. The recruitment event had been advertised well in advance, but there was no security to prevent a bomber from entering the compound.
“Our sons were killed because they want us to live with integrity, and because they want to earn a living for us,” said the mother of one dead recruit. “The military killed my son! Why don’t security forces protect us? How do they let all these young men outside become easy targets for the suicide bombers?”
Abu Ahmed, the father of another victim, cried and demanded that the commanders of the base be prosecuted. “They knew the risks, but they did nothing about it,” he said. “Dozens of men are killed every day without any tough response from the government.”
Hours after the attacks, a Diyala security official admitted that the recruitment was badly planned. The commanders of the camp, the official said, “didn’t take any precautions to protect the volunteers who died in this massacre.”
That was a widely held view among recruits wounded in the attacks, which came less than a minute apart. “There was no checkpoint or any kind of security,” said Taher Ghani, wounded in his back and lower legs. “You could cross the main gate without anybody asking you where you were going.”
Mr. Ghani, who called the recruitment a “golden opportunity” to advance himself, described the aftermath: “Human flesh and blood flew in every direction in front of my eyes, and I fainted. One of my friends was killed, and the other is still missing.
“I just want to know who did this to us,” he added. “We are young and we want to live in peace, and we don’t want to steal or become criminals. We just want to live for at least for a few minutes in peace. We are fed up with life in the land of death and blood.”
One doctor at a Baquba hospital said two severed heads were found that appeared to be those of the bombers. He said wounds suffered by the recruits showed that the suicide belts “contained metal balls intended to cause serious damage and increase the casualties.” Eighteen of the wounded recruits “have serious injuries in the head and chest, with a possibility of losing some of them in the next few hours,” he said.
Iraqi officials have announced (since when did an intelligent military advertise it's war plans?) an imminent military operation in Diyala, one that may prove more difficult than other recent Iraqi campaigns. In operations in Basra, Amara and the Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad, the Iraqi troops faced Shiite militias, and all three operations essentially ended in truces that allowed militia fighters to melt away.
In the northern city of Mosul, United States Army Rangers and other American Special Operations forces, highly skilled in urban combat, have killed or captured scores of the city’s most tenacious guerrillas in unpublicized operations this year that have made it far easier for Iraqi troops to move through the city, which nonetheless remains dangerous and unstable. On Tuesday in Mosul, two bombings killed 12 Iraqis and wounded at least 17. (Far easier for suicide bombers to commit their terrorism?)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/16/world/middleeast/16iraq.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

House Again Refers Impeachment to Committee
For the second time in as many months, the House has voted to refer a resolution by Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) against President Bush to the Judiciary Committee. The vote tally to refer the single impeachment article was 238-180, with nine Republicans joining every Democrat present in favor.
Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich). has said he plans to have hearings on "abuse of power" by the Bush administration, at which Kucinich would be invited to testify. But he does not plan to hold hearings on the impeachment resolution itself.
http://blog.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter

Obama's pledge to end the war in Iraq

2008-07-14T07:57:00.003-05:00

THE call by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki for a timetable for the removal of American troops from Iraq presents an enormous opportunity. We should seize this moment to begin the phased redeployment of combat troops that I have long advocated, and that is needed for long-term success in Iraq and the security interests of the United States.
The differences on Iraq in this campaign are deep. Unlike Senator John McCain, I opposed the war in Iraq before it began, and would end it as president. I believed it was a grave mistake to allow ourselves to be distracted from the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban by invading a country that posed no imminent threat and had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks. Since then, more than 4,000 Americans have died and we have spent nearly $1 trillion. Our military is overstretched. Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown.
In the 18 months since President Bush announced the surge, our troops have performed heroically in bringing down the level of violence. New tactics have protected the Iraqi population, and the Sunni tribes have rejected Al Qaeda — greatly weakening its effectiveness.
But the same factors that led me to oppose the surge still hold true. The strain on our military has grown, the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated and we’ve spent nearly $200 billion more in Iraq than we had budgeted. Iraq’s leaders have failed to invest tens of billions of dollars in oil revenues in rebuilding their own country, and they have not reached the political accommodation that was the stated purpose of the surge.
The good news is that Iraq’s leaders want to take responsibility for their country by negotiating a timetable for the removal of American troops. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. James Dubik, the American officer in charge of training Iraq’s security forces, estimates that the Iraqi Army and police will be ready to assume responsibility for security in 2009.
Only by redeploying our troops can we press the Iraqis to reach comprehensive political accommodation and achieve a successful transition to Iraqis’ taking responsibility for the security and stability of their country. Instead of seizing the moment and encouraging Iraqis to step up, the Bush administration and Senator McCain are refusing to embrace this transition — despite their previous commitments to respect the will of Iraq’s sovereign government. They call any timetable for the removal of American troops “surrender,” even though we would be turning Iraq over to a sovereign Iraqi government.
But this is not a strategy for success — it is a strategy for staying that runs contrary to the will of the Iraqi people, the American people and the security interests of the United States. That is why, on my first day in office, I would give the military a new mission: ending this war.
As I’ve said many times, we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 — two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces. That would not be a precipitous withdrawal.
In carrying out this strategy, we would inevitably need to make tactical adjustments. As I have often said, I would consult with commanders on the ground and the Iraqi government to ensure that our troops were redeployed safely, and our interests protected. We would move them from secure areas first and volatile areas later. We would pursue a diplomatic offensive with every nation in the region on behalf of Iraq’s stability, and commit $2 billion to a new international effort to support Iraq’s refugees.
Ending the war is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been. As Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq.
As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.
In this campaign, there are honest differences over Iraq, and we should discuss them with the thoroughness they deserve. Unlike Senator McCain, I would make it absolutely clear that we seek no presence in Iraq similar to our permanent bases in South Korea, and would redeploy our troops out of Iraq and focus on the broader security challenges that we face. But for far too long, those responsible for the greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy have ignored useful debate in favor of making false charges about flip-flops and surrender.
It’s not going to work this time. It’s time to end this war.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/opinion/14obama.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

The Bush legacy; wreak Republican neocon havoc and leave the clean-up to the Democrats who succeed him.

2008-07-13T08:43:00.003-05:00

U.S., Iraq Scale Down Negotiations Over Forces
Long-Term Agreement Will Fall to Next President
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 13, 2008; Page A01
U.S. and Iraqi negotiators have abandoned efforts to conclude a comprehensive agreement governing the long-term status of U.S troops in Iraq before the end of the Bush presidency, according to senior U.S. officials, effectively leaving talks over an extended U.S. military presence there to the next administration.
In place of the formal status-of-forces agreement negotiators had hoped to complete by July 31, the two governments are now working on a "bridge" document, more limited in both time and scope, that would allow basic U.S. military operations to continue beyond the expiration of a U.N. mandate at the end of the year.
The failure of months of negotiations over the more detailed accord -- blamed on both the Iraqi refusal to accept U.S. terms (100 years of occupation) and the complexity of the task -- deals a blow to the Bush administration's plans to leave in place a formal military architecture in Iraq that could last for years.
Although President Bush has repeatedly rejected calls for a troop withdrawal timeline, "we ARE talking about dates," acknowledged one U.S. official close to the negotiations. Iraqi political leaders "are all telling us the same thing. They need something like this in there. . . . Iraqis want to know that foreign troops are not going to be here forever."
(sounds like they aren't really OK with McCain's 100 year plan...)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/12/AR2008071201915.html?wpisrc=newsletter

Fox's word war against Michelle Obama

2008-07-09T11:03:00.002-05:00

Isn't it about time to hold Fox accountable for their blatant racism?

Sign the petition HERE;

or paste this into your browser;

http://foxattacks.com/michelle?utm_source=rgemail

Changing the words to hide their agenda; "privatization" didn't work, so they just use different terminology for their Wall Street hypocricy..

2008-06-23T07:23:00.008-05:00

Lest we forget, Wall Street has long depended on John McCain to help them cheat the public...

MCCAIN IS #1 OF THE KEATING 5!!!!!

McCain plus Keating equals Corruption!

Thanx once more to Josh Marshall and the whole crew at Talking Ponts Memo!

McCain financed by oil companies' windfall profits!

2008-06-17T11:00:00.000-05:00

Someone suggested this big idea, and I ran with it!

2008-06-16T12:38:00.003-05:00

I'm trying to throw together enough gas money to get to Denver and back to central Kansas, so I can blog about the Democratic Party convention on the Democratic Party Builder blog...

if you would like to help out, or just sign up for emails frm the event, just email me at jepatt07@gmail.com and put DENVER OR BUST in the subject line, it will go into a special folder I just created,and I will contact you personally.

Sounds like a blast, and if you have read any of my stuff, you know I will be at least somewhat entertaining.

Old-time Democrats; it's time to put out the welcome mat!

2008-06-12T12:54:00.002-05:00

I appeal to my fellow long-term Democrats to put out the welcome mat for the new, excited and energized citizens who have joined our ranks recently.

The historic primary season we just finished brought many new members to our party, who will prove to be a critical part of our victory in November. And a crucial part of our party for decades to come. These new voters who joined to support Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton in that primary process deserve not only our gratitude, but the sort of respect that, too often, the old-time rank and file Democrats have neglected to extend to "new blood."

I've seen this now, very personally, in six states, in my staff and volunteer work for candidates in California, Iowa, Missouri, Texas, New York and Kansas, situations where the established party folks were either negligent or downright exclusive with their local and county party organizations. Too often, the new members who join expecting to be welcomed and included and invited and involved, are ignored, shut-out, resented and disrespected by the entrenched rank-and-file.

There are many reasons for this chummy club phenomenon, but typically, as with all organizations, it comes down to the protective, territorial egos of the status quo, and nothing to do with the party itself. In the same way Republicans do not want to relinquish power in the White House, these local Democrats can't cut loose of their little bits of local power.

In terms of inclusiveness and exclusion, I've seen both good and bad over the years.

Our people here in Kansas' "Big First" Congressional district, for instance, are very accommodating and make an effort to provide an experience of kinship and membership to the new voters who come aboard. But I have also seen the opposite elsewhere, where the existing local, county, district and state officers and operatives jealously guard their positions, their authority and their territory, often to the detriment of the party. Too often, these groups have diminished over the years to include only a die-hard few, who tend to convert their party meetings into personal bridge clubs that revel in exclusivity and discourage new people from participating in order to assure their own continued personal ownership.

The Democratic Party can not afford to be a private club, if we intend to erect that big tent we all say we believe in. People need to feel welcome and involved, they need to know their ideas and enthusiasm are appreciated. And they need to know their votes will be counted, both in the local party process and in the actual elections. These new people need to be co-opted by the party old-timers, and those with the time and interest should be given working titles and tasks, to make them even more a part of the ever-growing Democratic Party

It's time for long term Democrats to put out the welcome mat, no, roll out the red carpet, sound the trumpets, bang a gong, strike up the band, stand together at the doorway and cheer them on as they enter our fold. Anything less would be unacceptable.

We should do everything in our power to make these new Democrats feel like they are a valuable and appreciated part of our party, if we hope to enter the next decade as the party of change, the party of hope, the party of the future, ... and the party of The People.

Lets welcome these new members with open arms, unbridled enthusiasm and unquestionable inclusion, and then lets join together to change the future from one we fear into one we will all be proud to pass on to the next generation. We have never had a better opportunity than the one we see today.

JEP

So, your gonna vote Republican?

2008-06-12T10:14:00.001-05:00

Our future First Lady

2008-06-11T07:40:00.000-05:00

Republicans block extra taxes on oil companies

2008-06-10T12:03:00.002-05:00

By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press Writer
via Yahoo News

WASHINGTON - Senate Republicans blocked a proposal Tuesday to tax the windfall profits of the largest oil companies, despite pleas by Democratic leaders to use the measure to address America's anger over $4 a gallon gasoline.The Democratic energy package would have imposed a tax on any "unreasonable" profits of the five largest U.S. oil companies and given the federal government more power to address oil market speculation that the bill's supporters argue has added to the crude oil price surge.

"Americans are furious about what's going on," declared Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., and want Congress to do something about oil company profits and "an orgy of speculation" on oil markets.

But Republicans argued the Democratic proposal focusing on new oil industry taxes is not the answer to the country's energy problems. (WONDER HOW MUCH THEY HAVE ALL RECEIVED IN CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS?)

"The American people are clamoring for relief at the pump," said Sen. Pete Domenici, (A REAL MAN OF THE PEOPLE, HUH?) R-N.M., but if taxes are increased on the oil companies "they will get exactly what they don't want. The bill will raise taxes, increase imports."

Read the rest of the story at;
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080610/ap_on_go_co/congress_oil_profits

Bush Lied and Cheney told him to do it.

2008-06-06T10:21:00.003-05:00

From CBS News,
June 6, 2008

Two reports issued by the Senate Intelligence Committee Thursday leveled harsh criticism at both the White House and Pentagon for their handling of intelligence concerning Iraq and Iran. One report examined statements by top Bush administration officials between October 2002 and March 2003, when the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq began, about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's regime. These officials, from President Bush on down, deliberately misled the American public about Saddam's relationship with al Qaeda and "led the nation to war on false premises," according to Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va.

According to the report, officials erroneously linked Saddam to the Sept. 11 attacks and al Qaeda; claimed Iraq would give terrorist groups chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, and said Iraq was developing drones to spread chemical or biological agents over the United States. None was borne out by intelligence. "These reports are about holding the government accountable and making sure these mistakes never happen again," Rockefeller said Thursday. Bush's press secretary, Dana Perino, said the problem was flawed intelligence heading into the war. "We had the intelligence that we had, fully vetted, but it was wrong. And we certainly regret that," she said.

According to Rockefeller, the problem was that the Bush administration concealed information that would have undermined the case for war. "We might have avoided this catastrophe," he said. However, the report found that intelligence substantiated most of the administration's statements about Iraq before the war. But officials often did not mention the level of dissension or uncertainty in the intelligence agencies about the information. Two Republicans, Sens. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska and Olympia Snowe of Maine, endorsed the report. The committee's five other Republicans, however, assailed it as a partisan exercise. They accused Democrats of covering for their own members, including Rockefeller and Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., who made similar statements about Iraq based on the same intelligence the Bush administration used.

A report released earlier Thursday concluded that Pentagon officials concealed from U.S. intelligence agencies potentially useful tips from Iranian agents in 2001 and 2002, including one that Tehran allegedly sent hit teams to Afghanistan to kill Americans. The Iranians also told two Pentagon employees at a December 2001 meeting in Rome of a purported tunnel complex used to store weapons and covertly move personnel out of Iran after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks on the U.S., according to the Senate Intelligence Committee. In addition, the Iranians told of a long-standing relationship with the Palestine Liberation Organization and the growth of anti-government sentiment inside Iran. The information was questionable, the report suggests, citing the sources: a discredited former arms dealer who was peddling a plan to overthrow the Iranian government and a former U.S. official whose leads had failed to yield any substance for the CIA.

Nonetheless, the report sheds new light on the mistrust and lack of cooperation by Vice President Dick Cheney and former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld with the CIA and the State Department after 9/11. Committee Republicans, in a dissent, said the report had nothing to do with the original scope of the review prewar intelligence on Iraq. They said it would be a "disappointment" to people looking for evidence of Pentagon wrongdoing. The Iran-related report focuses on the series of meetings in Rome held over three days in December 2001. The U.S. was fighting in Afghanistan and working on initial planning for the Iraq war. Then-Deputy National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley authorized the meetings. Two Pentagon employees, one of whom worked for then-Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Doug Feith, went to Rome to meet with two Iranians - one a current member of the security service, the second a former member. Manucher Ghorbanifar, an Iranian middleman already dismissed by the CIA as untrustworthy, also attended, as did a representative from an unspecified foreign government's intelligence service.

Michael Ledeen, a former Pentagon official and an analyst with the conservative American Enterprise Institute, arranged the meeting and attended. In one meeting, Ghorbanifar pressed for a change of government in Iran and, on a napkin, outlined a plan to do that, saying he would need $5 million to set it in motion, according to the report. The report said Hadley failed to fully inform then-CIA Director George Tenet and then-Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage about the meeting. But Hadley and the Pentagon were within their rights to conduct the meeting, the report said. White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Hadley notified all parties concerned appropriately. But the report said Defense Department officials refused to allow "potentially useful and actionable intelligence" to be shared with intelligence agencies, even in the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Then-Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz briefed the head of the DIA on the Iranian intelligence but would not let him discuss it, the report said. Ledeen said Thursday that the meetings were not kept secret from U.S. intelligence, and said he had briefed the U.S. ambassador to Italy twice about them. "Any time the CIA wanted to find out what was going on all they had to do was ask," he said. One of the two Pentagon representatives, Larry Franklin, now faces jail time after pleading guilty to espionage-related charges unrelated to the Rome meeting. Franklin told the committee he believed the intelligence gathered at the meetings "saved American lives." He passed word of the alleged hit teams to a special operations forces commander in Afghanistan.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/05/national/main4158427.shtml

More McCain Hypocrisy! Fundraising Felonies at $86,200 each!

2008-05-25T07:44:00.006-05:00

By Dan Morain,
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
May 25, 2008

From the San Joaquin Valley to Wall Street, John McCain has been headlining a series of high-dollar Republican fundraisers, including one at a billionaire's gated home here that asked couples to make donations of $86,200. (so much for contribution limits...) The events combine fundraisers for McCain's presidential campaign with those for the national and state GOP. They will help ensure that the longtime advocate for campaign finance restrictions will have the money to compete in the presidential election, even as some say the events call into question his credentials as a reformer.

For a single $2,300 donation to McCain, donors received a lapel pin. (pseudo-Patriotism has its rewards!) But the invitation made clear McCain wanted couples to arrive with checks for as much as $86,200. At other fundraisers, couples have been encouraged to give $140,000 or more.

-snip-

Former Univison Chairman A. Jerrold Perenchio, MGM Chairman Harry Sloan and eight others promised to raise $250,000 each. According to the invitation, they will "receive a Private Greet with Senator McCain, a Private Reception with Photo Opportunity and Premier Seating at Dinner." (just what is ego-stroking worth these days?) Eleven others pledged to raise $125,000 each, while 16 others promised to raise between $43,100 and $86,200.

"All the events are in the seven-figure range," (an ongoing felony, unless I am mistaken, didn't McCain already sign the legal agreement to take public financing?) said a member of McCain's fundraising committee, who was not authorized to speak for the campaign and therefore asked for anonymity. Pointing to the cost of the fall campaign, the person said: "The only way you will get there is to have people write these larger checks."

To attract high-rollers to Spanos' estate, Schwarzenegger was a featured guest, as was former Gov. Pete Wilson. Florida real estate entrepreneur Mel Sembler, former ambassador to Italy and a longtime friend of Spanos, was one of 13 co-chairs, a designation indicating that each had raised $25,000 minimum."The RNC's job, first and foremost, above all else, is to elect a president," Sembler said. "Everything else is secondary. Nothing is more important. (How about integrity and truth? On this point I will take them at their word... nothing, not even our constitution, matters more to these monopolists in capitalist clothing, than getting another Wall Street-managed President into office...)

Nothing else takes precedence."Sembler, a former RNC finance chairman, and his family have given more than $1 million in the last decade to Republican candidates and causes, and at least $20,700 to McCain this year.
(They break their own laws with impunity, while they hold everyday voters to legal ID standards that inhibit participation in the process. They really DO want a government of, by and for the rich, if this isn't proof I don't know what is...)
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-mccainmoney25-2008may25,0,5790369.story

HJC issues subpoena for Rove to testify about Siegelman

2008-05-23T07:37:00.002-05:00

By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 23, 2008; Page A03

The House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed former presidential adviser Karl Rove yesterday to testify about his alleged meddling in Justice Department operations, escalating a long fight over lawmakers' authority to question Bush administration aides.

Committee Chairman John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.) wants to ask Rove about alleged politicization of the Justice Department, including the firings of U.S. attorneys and any role Rove may have played in the prosecution of former Alabama governor Don Siegelman. Siegelman, a Democrat, was convicted on fraud charges but was released from prison in March pending the results of his appeal.

In recent weeks, Siegelman has intensified his accusations that the Bush administration targeted him for political reasons.

Separately, Conyers disclosed yesterday that the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility has opened an investigation of possible selective prosecution of Siegelman and at least three others, at the request of the House Judiciary panel.

Attorney General Michael B. Mukasey has vigorously rejected allegations of political motivation by department lawyers.

Rove's lawyer, Robert D. Luskin, accused House Democrats of "provoking a gratuitous confrontation" and of refusing reasonable offers in which Rove would have provided written answers to questions. (since when did the defendant get to name the terms of his own testimony?)

"The decision about when, where and what a former assistant to the President (remember when Karl Rove was a walking Hatch Act violation?) may testify about raise issues of Executive Privilege and separation of powers (I think the term he's grasping for is "lawlessness") that Mr. Rove does not control," Luskin wrote in a letter dated May 21 that was released yesterday.

"It is unfortunate that Mr. Rove has failed to cooperate with our requests," Conyers said in his own statement. "Although he does not seem the least bit hesitant to discuss these very issues weekly on cable television and in the print news media, Mr. Rove and his attorney have apparently concluded that a public hearing room would not be appropriate."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/22/AR2008052203563.html

The DCCC/Obama contribuion pledge

2008-05-21T13:48:00.002-05:00

Let me invite my fellow Obama supporters to make a pledge that ON THE DAY AFTER HILLARY CONCEDES we WILL give another $25.08 to the Obama campaign, and just for good luck and to encourage party unity, $25.08 to the DCCC.

$50,000,000 in pledges on the day after Hillary concedes ought to impress even the DLCers.And I am sure Van Hollen could find a way to use that other $50,000,000 for those down-ticket races.

Here's what we can do about it. just click this link and send Van Hollen a pledge/promise that you will contribute $25.08 to the DCCC the day after Hillary concedes, and another $25.08 to the Obama campaign.

Don't send any emails to the campaign itself, just make sure you include in your letter to Van Hollen that $25.08 is going to the campaign and $25.08 is going to the DCCC, then let the DCCC tell the campaign about it.

But don't make the contribution until Hillary concedes.

If you want, copy and paste this letter in your email;

Congressman Van Hollen:
I am at this time making a pledge that the day after Hillary Clinton concedes this race, I will contribute $25.08 to the DCCC and $25.08 to the Obama campaign.
Signed_________________________

Plain and simple... and your .08 will always identify you as one of these pledge signers.

Mass bribery, you say?

Not hardly. This is public financing at its most powerful.

Anyone else want to join the pledge list?

Obama wins round one of the general election...

2008-05-19T09:11:00.004-05:00

Michael Tomasky in Washington
The Guardian,
Monday May 19 2008
So, round one of the 2008 foreign policy debate goes to ... Barack Obama? Improbable as it seems, in the first direct rhetorical showdown of the general election campaign - over a question, foreign policy "toughness", that's been a perceived Democratic weakness since Vietnam - it was the guy with the thin foreign policy résumé, suspected by some of his compatriots of being a Muslim, who out-punched the war hero with the extensive résumé. And shall I add that the one with the thin résumé and the strange name has a dodgy position on the question at hand, and yet still won?

Here's how it unfolded. Last Thursday, speaking before the Knesset in Jerusalem, George Bush compared "some" Democrats to those who thought in 1939 that war might have been avoided if we'd just been able to sit down with Hitler and talk some sense into him. This was, despite some White House demurrals, a clear shot at Obama, who has repeatedly announced his intention to negotiate personally as president, and "without preconditions", with the likes of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hugo Chávez.

John McCain, that same Thursday morning, was giving a speech in part about the need to move beyond the partisan bickering of the last decade. Within an hour or two, following Bush's lead, McCain attacked Obama: "What does he want to talk about with Ahmadinejad, who said Israel is a stinking corpse?" The Obama campaign emailed reporters accusing Bush of launching "a false political attack".

Now here's the important part. In the past two presidential campaigns, that's where this would have ended. The Democrat "responded" for the record, but somewhat perfunctorily, while the Republicans got their point across: the Democrats are appeasers, the Democratic nominee wants to talk to terrorists and he won't keep the country safe.

Game, set, match. This is how Bush built margins of trust with voters over Al Gore and John Kerry on national-security questions. Invoke appeasement of Hitler, toss in Israel's safety: this is exactly the kind of thing that sent Gore and Kerry running for the hills. Even Bill Clinton, who knew better how to return a punch, would have tried to change the subject back to the economy.
But the current version of the story ends differently. Last Friday, in South Dakota, Obama gave an extended and aggressive press conference in which he hit back hard. Bush and McCain, he told Americans, "are trying to fool you. They're trying to scare you. And they're not telling you the truth." He ticked off the lies that were told about Iraq and the benefits that would redound from making war there, noting that not one of the promises had come to pass.

The headline that afternoon on the influential blog of Mark Halperin, of Time magazine, conveyed the takeaway: "Bam!! Bop!!!! Bash!!"

After the Kerry loss of 2004, Democrats began to vow: we understand what happened. We're not going to let ourselves get outboxed and intimidated next time around, especially on national security. There was every reason in the world to think this was an empty promise. If Hillary Clinton were the nominee, it wouldn't be exactly empty, because the Clinton camp does know how to return fire. But it would be a dissatisfying thing for most Democrats to watch, because Clinton's returns of serve would consist of hawkish statements designed to prove that she could be just as tough as the Republicans (witness her recent promise to "obliterate" Iran).

Obama is doing something altogether different. He is standing for an alternative vision of how America should operate in the world, and he is defending it tooth and nail. I'm not sold on the idea that negotiations without preconditions with hostile powers are the world's best strategy. If the US had some leverage over Iran that might be one thing, but, in our current state, we have little. Still, this is one of those cases where the symbolic message of what Obama did last Friday is more important, for now, than the substance.

He said: These people have screwed up foreign policy and security. I have a different way of doing things. And I'm not ceding an inch."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/may/19/barackobama.uselections2008

Would the REAL John McCain please stand up?

2008-05-18T13:00:00.010-05:00

One more big thanx to Robert Greenwald at Brave New Films for this collection of contrasting McCain flip-flops.

Just a note to the armchair and professional psychologists and psychiatrists ou there, I am beginning to think McCain may have dual personalities, at times it seems as if his two faces don't remember what each other said. Either he is growing more senile by the day, or he's got some serious conflicting personalities vying for control of the man. Or he is a pathological liar.

And I don't mean this as snark, the thought of a Jeckyl/Hyde President should make us all stop to ponder the implications.

I suppose the big question would be, which one will have their finger on the button?

"Flip" McCain or "Flop" McCain?

Also, if you want to stay on top of the McCain flip-flops, no one covers it better than Cliff Schecter on his "Silo" blog at the FDL mothersite, and his book "The Real McCain", you can find it by clicking this link...

World’s Poor Pay Price as Crop Research Is Cut

2008-05-18T08:54:00.002-05:00

from the New York Times
By KEITH BRADSHER and ANDREW MARTIN
Published: May 18, 2008
LOS BAÑOS, Philippines — The brown plant hopper, an insect no bigger than a gnat, is multiplying by the billions and chewing through rice paddies in East Asia, threatening the diets of many poor people.
The damage to rice crops, occurring at a time of scarcity and high prices, could have been prevented. Researchers at the International Rice Research Institute here say that they know how to create rice varieties resistant to the insects but that budget cuts have prevented them from doing so.
This is a stark example of the many problems that are coming to light in the world’s agricultural system. Experts say that during the food surpluses of recent decades, governments and development agencies lost focus on the importance of helping poor countries improve their agriculture.
The budgets of institutions that delivered the world from famine in the 1970s, including the rice institute, have stagnated or fallen, even as the problems they were trying to solve became harder. (Unlimited no-bid billions for war, as the world's poor starve?)
“People felt that the world food crisis was solved, that food security was no longer an issue, and it really fell off the agenda,” said Robert S. Zeigler, the director general of the rice institute.
Vital research programs have been slashed. At the rice institute, scientists have identified 14 genetic traits that could help rice plants survive the plant hopper, which sucks the juices out of young plants while infecting them with viruses. But the scientists have had no money to breed these traits into the world’s most widely used rice varieties. (Maybe, like the oil industry has monopolized and engineered their market, this is all being done by design to make the world's billionaires even more wealthy?)
The institute is the world’s main repository of rice seeds as well as genetic and other information about rice, the crop that feeds nearly half the world’s people.
But nowadays at the International Rice Research Institute, greenhouses have peeling paint and holes in their screens and walls. Hallways are dotted with empty offices. In the 1980s, the institute employed five entomologists, or insect experts, overseeing a staff of 200. Now it has one entomologist with a staff of eight.
“We’ve had an exodus here,” said Yvette Naredo, an assistant geneticist.
Similar troubles plague other centers in Asia, Africa and Latin America that work on crop productivity in poor countries. Agricultural experts have complained about the flagging efforts for years and warned of the risks.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/18/business/worldbusiness/18focus.html

Edwards Throws Support to Obama

2008-05-15T07:32:00.002-05:00

By Peter Slevin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 15, 2008; Page A01

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich., May 14 -- Former Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards gave his long-sought endorsement to Sen. Barack Obama on Wednesday night, calling on Democrats to unite behind him and turn their attention to the fall campaign.

"The reason I am here tonight," Edwards declared, "is the voters have made their choice, and so have I."

Edwards had been heavily courted by Obama and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton since he quit the race three months ago. His decision to climb off the fence with just five contests remaining is likely to yield limited benefits, but it sends a strong signal that Edwards, at least, thinks the nomination battle is over.

Appearing with Obama at a rally here, the former senator from North Carolina and 2004 Democratic vice presidential nominee gave what sounded in places like a eulogy for Clinton's candidacy, praising her tenacity and describing her as "made of steel." But he emphasized that the party must now get behind Obama.

"When this nomination battle is over, and it will be over soon, brothers and sisters," he said, "we must come together as Democrats and in the fall stand up for what matters in America and make America what it needs to be."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/14/AR2008051404014.html

Vote for Change! Obama voter registration drive

2008-05-14T21:51:00.004-05:00

The Patterson Family stumps for Obama

2008-05-14T21:47:00.002-05:00

Pat Roberts of Kansas; A record to run from.

2008-05-02T16:43:00.001-05:00

The Real McCain...

2008-05-02T13:25:00.003-05:00

is the next Bush? Actually, he has been all along. Here's an interesting game MoveOn put together take a few minutes to find out just how much they are alike...

The Bush/McCain challenge... which is which?

http://www.bush-mccainchallenge.com/challenge/index.html?p=normal8&a=bush&id=12560-6281842-lsCg2N

Up $10.9 Billion, Exxon Worries About New Tax

2008-05-02T09:11:00.004-05:00

By Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 2, 2008; Page A01

Bolstered by winter's record crude oil prices, Exxon Mobil yesterday reported a huge first-quarter profit and provoked new congressional vows to come up with legislation that would tax windfall profits or demonstrate concern about high gasoline prices.
The oil giant earned $10.89 billion, up 17 percent from the previous year. (how many factory workers can show a 17% increase in their revenues over last year?) The amount was short of the all-time record Exxon set in the previous quarter but high enough to put the company on the defensive in the face of consumer ire and congressional indignation.
"Crude prices are at historic highs (Mission Accomplished!) and we recognize that they are having a significant impact on many in our society through higher gasoline prices and higher energy costs in other sectors," said Exxon's vice president for public affairs, Kenneth P. Cohen. He warned, however, that "high prices also have the potential to result in bad public policy, such as windfall profits tax, that will hurt consumers in the long run."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/01/AR2008050100908.html?wpisrc=newsletter

McCain's thin veil of old lies and wealthy connections

2008-04-22T05:59:00.012-05:00

A New Tag Category;
John McCain's broken vows...
One more proof of another long, big lie; the lie that tells us somewhere along the way, McCain stopped taking special-interest campaign money and benefits in exchange for wielding his powerful influence in the Senate, to expedite deals and otherwise give unfair advantage and aid to wealthy campaign contributors and personal cronies.

Lest we forget,
JOHN MCCAIN WAS ONE OF THE KEATING 5!!
He did not make his anti-sleaze vows as an act of honor, he made them out of CONTRITION, obviously for political salvation, because HE JUST GOT CAUGHT PEDDLING HIS SENATORIAL INFUENCE!
THIS LIE WAS HIS MEA CULPA!

More on the McCain's membership in the infamous Keating 5
From Wikipedia
In 1989, the Lincoln Savings and Loan Association of Irvine, Calif., collapsed. Lincoln's chairman, Charles H. Keating Jr., was faulted for the thrift's failure. Keating, however, told the House Banking Committee that the FHLBB and its former chief Edwin J. Gray were pursuing a vendetta against him. Gray testified that several U.S. senators had approached him and requested that he ease off on the Lincoln investigation. It came out that these senators had been beneficiaries of $300,000 (collective total) in campaign contributions from Keating. McCain received $112,000 by 1987 from Keating and Keating's relatives and employees to McCain's Senate campaign, more than any of the other Senators. (and yet, as the lone Republican among the 5, he was spared deeper scrutiny and public censure) [1] In October 1989 The Arizona Republic reported that in addition to campaign contributions, McCain's wife and her father had invested $359,100 in a Keating shopping center in April 1986, a year before McCain met with the regulators. The paper also reported that the McCains, sometimes accompanied by their daughter and baby-sitter, had made at least nine trips at Keating's expense, sometimes aboard the American Continental Corporation (parent of Lincoln) jet. Three of the trips were made during vacations to Keating's opulent Bahamas retreat at Cat Cay. McCain also did not pay Keating for some of the trips until years after they were taken, after he learned that Keating was in trouble over Lincoln. [2] Lincoln Savings and Loan's collapse is said to have cost taxpayers $3.4 billion [3]. This allegation set off a series of investigations by the California government, the United States Department of Justice, and the Senate Ethics Committee. The ethics committee's investigation focused on five senators: Alan Cranston (D-CA); Dennis DeConcini (D-AZ); John Glenn (D-OH); John McCain (R-AZ); and Donald W. Riegle, Jr. (D-MI), who became known as the "Keating Five".

A Developer, His Deals and His Ties to McCain
From the NYTimes
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and JIM RUTENBERG
Published: April 22, 2008

Donald R. Diamond, a wealthy Arizona real estate developer, was racing to snap up a stretch of virgin California coast freed by the closing of an Army base a decade ago when he turned to an old friend, Senator John McCain.

When Mr. Diamond wanted to buy land at the base, Fort Ord, Mr. McCain assigned an aide who set up a meeting at the Pentagon and later stepped in again to help speed up the sale, according to people involved and a deposition Mr. Diamond gave for a related lawsuit. When he appealed to a nearby city for the right to develop other property at the former base, Mr. Diamond submitted Mr. McCain’s endorsement as “a close personal friend.”

Writing to officials in the city, Seaside, Calif., the senator said, “You will find him as honorable and committed as I have.” (AND not only does he have a pad in the Islands, he's loose with his cash!)

Courting local officials and potential partners, Mr. Diamond’s team promised that he could “help get through some of the red tape in dealing with the Department of the Army” because Mr. Diamond “has been very active with Senator McCain,” (aboard his flotilla of yachts?) a partner said in a deposition.

A longtime political patron, Mr. Diamond is one of the elite fund-raisers Mr. McCain’s current presidential campaign calls Innovators, having raised more than $250,000 (how much of that was or is illegal, isn't McCain violating his public-financing contract with the F.E.C. when he raises more money?) so far. At home, Mr. Diamond is sometimes referred to as “The Donald,” Arizona’s answer to Donald Trump — an outsized personality who invites public officials aboard his flotilla of yachts (the Ace, King, Jack and Queen of Diamonds), specializes in deals with the government, and unabashedly solicits support for his business interests from the recipients of his campaign contributions. (Am I imagining something here, or is this just about as blatant an example of political opportunism as one can find in DC? McCain's not just "dirty," he's swimming laps in the hog manure. How can he expect to keep up the squeaky clean, straight talk image that sucks in the independents and libertarians, when he's standing there, dripping wet and emanating a familiar porkine odor?? Talk about "fool all of the people some of the time..." it is wearing thin with the public, please, would the Real Media step forward and talk about the Real McCain?)

Mr. McCain has occasionally rebuffed ("occasionally" doesn't cut it at the Round Table, just once is all it takes to constitute a violation of even his floating "vows"...) Mr. Diamond’s entreaties as inappropriate, but he has also taken steps that benefited his friend’s real estate empire. Their 26-year relationship (aboard his flotilla of yachts?) illuminates (exposes, uncovers, betrays?) how Mr. McCain weighs requests from a benefactor against his vows, adopted after a brush with scandal (Keating 5 was a "brush?") two decades ago, not to intercede with government authorities on behalf of a donor or take other official action that serves no clear public interest.

In California, the McCain aide’s assistance with the with the Army helped Mr. Diamond complete a purchase in 1999 that he soon turned over for a $20 million profit. And Mr. McCain’s letter of recommendation reinforced Mr. Diamond’s selling point about his McCain connections as he pursued — and won in 2005 — a potentially much more lucrative deal to develop a resort hotel and luxury housing. (and who knows what else McCain's done for his pal since then?)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/22/us/politics/22diamond.html

As our nation struggles with recession or worse, Halliburton profit lifted by international growth

2008-04-21T09:51:00.008-05:00

By Anna Driver
HOUSTON (Reuters) -
Halliburton Co (HAL.N: Profile, Research) said on Monday that first-quarter profit rose 6 percent, meeting Wall Street expectations, as customers in markets including the Middle East and Asia spent more on oil and gas exploration and production.

Halliburton and rivals including Schlumberger Ltd (SLB.N: Profile, Research) and Weatherford International Ltd (WFT.N: Profile, Research) have seen faster growth in overseas markets, while North America has slowed.

Record crude oil prices and a two-year high in natural gas futures prices have prompted exploration companies to increase spending, leading to a more optimistic outlook--even in North America--for the oilfield services companies.

"The fundamentals of the world oil and gas market are projecting that the next leg up (sounds like something a dog would do to a fire hydrant) in this extended cycle is near," Dave Lesar, Halliburton's chief executive, said in a statement.
Lesar also said North America "...is much stronger than may have been anticipated just a few months ago." (so much for the environment...)

Halliburton, which opened a headquarters in Dubai last year (ALONG WITH WORLD-COURT-IMMUNE-RETIREMENT PROPERTY FOR THEIR BUSH ERA NEOCON CO-CONSPIRATORS) in a bid to win more international business, said first-quarter profit increased to $584 million, or 64 cents per share, from $552 million, or 54 cents per share, a year earlier.

Analysts on average had expected a profit of 64 cents, according Reuters Estimates.

Revenue rose 18 percent to $4 billion. (Can we find out what percentage of that was in no-bid contracts?)
thanks and a HT to Satyam at ThinkProgress for this link
http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSWNAS851320080421?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews

Siegelman; 2002 Alabama Gov. Election stolen!

2008-04-11T15:40:00.006-05:00

Former AL Gov. Don Siegelman Says Media Ignoring Details
of His 'Electronically Stolen' 2002 Election

Has Given Story to 60 Minutes, Dan Abrams, LA Times...All Have Failed to Report His Allegations While Covering Other Aspects of His Story...

Still paging Dan Abrams...
The following email comes from Mark Crispin Miller, NYU media professor, and author of the landmark election integrity book, FOOLED AGAIN.
It includes an email exchange from yesterday with the finally-free-on-bond former Democratic Governor of Alabama Don Seigelman, concerning his allegations that his 2002 election was electronically flipped. (A rarely seen video interview, featuring Siegelman in 2004 discussing details of what he believes happened, is at posted at end of this article.)
Yesterday I emailed Don Siegelman, as I had a few matters to discuss with him.
Here's the crucial part:
At 12:12 AM -0400 4/9/08, Mark Crispin Miller wrote:
The other, more important thing is this: As you may or may not know, the one aspect of your long ordeal that the press has stubbornly refused to mention--or, I think, even to perceive--is the theft of that election in 2002. Like you, I believe that that was crucial; but the press, quite typically, won't mention it. Frankly, I believe that they, and most leading Democrats, are in denial about it, as its implications are too frightening. Just as they've looked away from all the evidence of vast election fraud throughout Bush/Cheney's reign, therefore, they've also looked away from the subversion of that gubernatorial race in Alabama. And so that chapter of your story is unknown to most Americans, even those who've lately heard the rest of it.
Here is his reply:

"Mark, I mention the vote stealing in every interview. 60 Minutes cut it out. Don Abrams didn't want to go there either. I have told the story to the Washington Post and LA Times. The hook is Rove's fingerprints are found there too. First, in that Rove's friend Jack Abramoff hires Dan Gans,was in charge of " electronic ballot security" in Baldwin County, Alabama,where the votes were stolen. Gans, working for the Alexander Strategies Group, claims credit for the win on his website, which he then takes down when Abramoff gets arrested. The second is Rove's business partner, Kitty Mc Cullough (a/k/a Kelly Kimbrough) is given credit for the electronic vote switch by the state Republican Party."

I asked Don if I could send that out, and he said yes ("Have at it"). So now I offer it to you. If you're an election reform activist, please start your (search) engines. If you're a journalist, please do your job. And if you're just another patriotic citizen, please do whatever you can do to get the press, and/or the Democratic Party, to pay heed.
For starters, how about asking "60 Minutes" why they "cut it out," and asking Dan Abrams why he "didn't want to go there either"? And since Don also told the Washington Post and LA Times about the theft of that election, how about we ask them, too?
This stuff will just keep on happening, until we make it dangerous to do such things."
thanx once again to BradBlog...
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5889

for more, go to THIS LINK!

The Underlying Essence of the Bush Tribulations

2008-04-09T07:49:00.005-05:00

In 2005, federal authorities concluded that a Monsanto consultant had visited the home of an Indonesian official and, with the approval of a senior company executive, handed over an envelope stuffed with hundred-dollar bills. The money was meant as a bribe to win looser environmental regulations for Monsanto’s cotton crops, according to a court document. Monsanto was also caught concealing the bribe with fake invoices.

A few years earlier, in the age of Enron, these kinds of charges would probably have resulted in a criminal indictment. Instead, Monsanto was allowed to pay $1 million and avoid criminal prosecution by entering into a monitoring agreement with the Justice Department.

In a major shift of policy, the Justice Department, once known for taking down giant corporations, including the accounting firm Arthur Andersen, has put off prosecuting more than 50 companies suspected of wrongdoing over the last three years.

Instead, many companies, from boutique outfits to immense corporations like American Express, have avoided the cost and stigma of defending themselves against criminal charges with a so-called deferred prosecution agreement, which allows the government to collect fines (bribes) and appoint an outside monitor to impose internal reforms without going through a trial. (I would bet Siegelman would have liked a similar deal) In many cases, the name of the monitor and the details of the agreement are kept secret.

Deferred prosecutions have become a favorite tool of the Bush administration. But some legal experts now wonder if the policy shift has led companies, in particular financial institutions now under investigation for their roles in the subprime mortgage debacle, to test the limits of corporate anti-fraud laws.

Firms have readily agreed to the deferred prosecutions, (well, DUH!) said Vikramaditya S. Khanna, a law professor at the University of Michigan who has studied their use, because “clearly it avoids a bigger headache for them.” (The Rule of Law is a headache?)

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/09/washington/09justice.html

Siegelman on CBS

2008-04-07T09:45:00.005-05:00

Rove considers CBS "shoddy"??
Time to blame the messenger...

Bush's Mini-Me

2008-04-06T22:03:00.003-05:00

The Media Darling: Isn't he a cute little warmonger!

The Bush-Hitler Connection

2008-04-06T10:50:00.001-05:00

Johnny's Bus

2008-03-30T20:20:00.005-05:00

Bush; Normalcy (violence) has returned to Iraq.

2008-03-29T09:12:00.004-05:00

Things were getting pretty quiet there, this recent violence must be what Bush considers "normal."
By Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, March 29, 2008; Page A11
As U.S. warplanes attacked targets in Basra yesterday, Bush administration officials acknowledged that their hands-off strategy toward southern Iraq in recent years has left them with little knowledge of the conflicts among competing Shiite groups there and few ways of influencing them. President Bush yesterday hailed the decision of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to launch a full-scale military offensive against militias in Basra as a "defining moment" for his leadership. But other officials said the administration remains unsure of Maliki's motives (what did Cheney offer him, or threaten him with, last week ?) and warned that the ongoing battle risks sending the country spiraling back toward the cataclysmic violence levels of 2006 and early 2007.
"This is a precarious situation," a senior official familiar with U.S. intelligence in southern Iraq said, with "a lot to be gained and a lot to lose." This official and others said that even as Maliki takes needed military action in Basra, he appears to be positioning himself and his Shiite political allies for dominance in provincial elections this fall.
Competition for power and resources in the oil-rich south has been ongoing for months among the Mahdi Army of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr; the Badr Corps militia of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, the largest single party in the Iraqi parliament; and the breakaway Sadrist movement known as Fadhila. The Shiite groups are opposed and allied with each other in a tangle of national and local issues, with many divisions reflected in factions of the Shiite-dominated Iraqi security forces.
Although the Bush administration has tried to monitor the growing conflict in Basra, Iraq's second-largest city, "our intelligence in that area is far less than we would like. (sounds familiar) We don't have any forces there," the senior official said, adding that "we are operating with a good dose of opaqueness." (which is a new drink they serve instead of koolaid these days in the WH)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/28/AR2008032803622.html?wpisrc=newsletter

Hillary's new campaign theme song..

2008-03-23T12:22:00.006-05:00

Me and John McCain
From "The Nightmare Ticket" files,
(This was too easy...)
-sung slightly flat, in a dull monotone-

Me and John McCain
we've got a thing going on.
We all know that it's wrong,
but it's much too strong
to let it go now.

We meet every day
at the Senate café
in DC, I know - I know he'll be there.
Shaking hands - making all kinds of plans
while the media plays our favorite song.

Me and John McCain,– John McCain– John McCain– John McCain
we've got a thing going on.
We all know that it's wrong,
but Obama's much too strong, can't just let him win now.

We've gotta be extra careful
That they don't build their hopes up too high.
'Cause John's got his own obligations
And so – and so do I...

Me-e-e and Johnny,– John McCain– John McCain– John McCain
we've got a thing going on.
We all know that it's wrong,
to string it along,
but I just can't let it go now.

Well it's time for us to be leaving
It can't believe it- it hurts so much deep inside
Now he'll go his way
And I'll go mine.
Next session, we'll meet, the same place – the same time.

Me and John McCain,– John McCain– John McCain– John McCain
we've got a thing going on.
We've gotta be extra careful.
We can't let them build their hopes up too high.

Johnny, I wanna meet ya,
and talk with you,
at the same place,
the Senate café,the same time
And we're gonna shake hands like we talked about,
We're gonna talk it over, make a deal
We know, they know, and you know and I know that it is wrong
But we'll make it strong...
We can't quite let 'em know yet,
There's this "thing" going on......thing going on..

Why was Spitzer targeted?

2008-03-21T07:46:00.004-05:00

Here's a link to the editorial in reference.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/13/AR2008021302783.html

And lets not forget, it was his own bank that snitched on Spitzer.
Thanks to the folks at Brasscheck TV (here's a link to their sign-up page, anyone who wants to keep tabs on the most egregious of the Republican and Bush shenanigans, sign up and start getting their emails.)

http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/291.html

We MUST ask the hard questions, folks, if we are ever to get a handle on our rogue government. And the connection between the OCC's abdication of it's duties and the White House's part in that crime, is one of those questions. When our watchdogs become enablers for the criminals they are supposed to watch out for, we have lawlessness. If there ever was an age of "The Rule of Lawlessness" is is NOW!

One note of warning; Any Democrat out there will need to be (or become) squeaky-clean in their daily lives, Spitzer's double life and the secrets of all our lawmakers have been compromised by the FISA fiasco. There are no secrets any more.

Refugees of the sub-prime meltdown...

2008-03-19T16:50:00.006-05:00

Tent Cities in America!
Are we becoming a nation of Economic Refugees?

thanx and a HT to Jamie at Crooks and Liars
http://www.crooksandliars.com/

Neocons as The Synagogue of Satan?

2008-03-19T10:59:00.007-05:00

Neoconism would be “a legitimate school of intellectual thought” only if it had remained an academic discussion.

But "neocon" has become the nom-de-plume for power-hungry, hypocritically decadent, filthy rich (never has that term been better exemplified than it is today) wannabe royals. This new “ruling class” gains its power through billionaire status, not bloodlines.

Every day our U.S. middle-eastern diplomatic policies revolve around these neocon posers, the real-world danger to Israel (as a physical nation) grows.

These “Jews” aren’t Jews in the spiritual sense, or in terms of loyalty and allegiance. They are nothing more than the progenitors of a money-hungry war-for-profit machine, and they are infinitely more concerned with profits than the Prophets. The "security" of Israel is just one more tool in thier pattern of cultural disruption.

For anyone who might want to read it, there is a passage in The Bible, Revelations chapter 2 verse 9, where Jesus talks about these money-lovers... “I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.”

Considering that the love of money IS the synagogue of Satan, (it’s where “trickle-down” starts) I would guess that explains a lot of this neocon confusion. They aren’t really in it for Israel, they are in it for money, and they use Israel as their front.

It all becomes much more clear when one realizes, while they claim to protect Israel, all they really want to protect is their burgeoning war profits.

“Israel” means nothing to them, it is just an incendiary word they use conveniently to foment fear and prejudice.

Many voting for Clinton to boost GOP

2008-03-17T09:47:00.004-05:00

HYPOCRITES, UNITE!
GOP crossover primary voters seek to prolong bitter battle...
(from the "I voted FOR Hillary before I voted against her!" files)
By Scott Helman
Boston Globe Staff
March 17, 2008
For a party that loves to hate the Clintons, Republican voters have cast an awful lot of ballots lately for Senator Hillary Clinton: About 100,000 GOP loyalists voted for her in Ohio, 119,000 in Texas, and about 38,000 in Mississippi, exit polls show.
A sudden change of heart? Hardly.
Since Senator John McCain effectively sewed up the GOP nomination last month, Republicans have begun participating in Democratic primaries specifically to vote for Clinton, a tactic that some voters and local Republican activists think will help their party in November. With every delegate important in the tight Democratic race, this trend could help shape the outcome if it continues in the remaining Democratic primaries open to all voters.
Spurred by conservative talk radio, GOP voters who say they would never back Clinton in a general election are voting for her now for strategic reasons: Some want to prolong her bitter nomination battle with Barack Obama, others believe she would be easier to beat than Obama in the fall, or they simply want to register objections to Obama.
"It's as simple as, I don't think McCain can beat Obama if Obama is the Democratic choice," said Kyle Britt, 49, a Republican-leaning independent from Huntsville, Texas, who voted for Clinton in the March 4 primary. "I do believe Hillary can mobilize enough [anti-Clinton] people to keep her out of office."
Britt, who works in financial services, said he is certain he will vote for McCain in November.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/03/17/many_voting_for_clinton_to_boost_gop/

Financial Cost Of War Skyrocketing

2008-03-10T19:17:00.003-05:00

Economists' Book Estimates Iraq War Costing
About $12 Billion Per Month This Year
(AP)
The flow of blood may be ebbing, but the flood of money into the Iraq war is steadily rising, (and yet, their oil revenues are rising, so where is it going?) new analyses show. In 2008, its sixth year, the war will cost approximately $12 billion a month, triple the "burn" rate of its earliest years, (more proof that war profiteers rule our government) Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and co-author Linda J. Bilmes report in a new book. Beyond 2008, working with "best-case" and "realistic-moderate" scenarios, they project the Iraq and Afghan wars, including long-term U.S. military occupations of those countries, will cost the U.S. budget between $1.7 trillion and $2.7 trillion - or more - by 2017. Interest on money borrowed to pay those costs could alone add $816 billion to that bottom line, they say...

... These numbers don't include the war's cost to the rest of the world. In Iraq itself, the 2003 U.S.-led invasion - with its devastating air bombardments - and the looting and arson that followed, severely damaged electricity and other utilities, the oil industry, countless factories, hospitals, schools and other underpinnings of an economy. No one has tried to calculate the economic damage done to Iraq, said spokesman Niels Buenemann of the International Monetary Fund, which closely tracks national economies. But millions of Iraqis have been left without jobs, and hundreds of thousands of professionals, managers and other middle-class citizens have fled the country. In their book, "The Three Trillion Dollar War," Stiglitz, of Columbia University, and Bilmes, of Harvard, report the two wars will have cost the U.S. budget $845 billion in 2007 dollars by next Sept. 30, end of fiscal year 2008, assuming Congress fully funds Bush administration requests. That counts not just military operations, but embassy costs, reconstruction and other war-related expenses. That (one year) total far surpasses the $670 billion in 2007 dollars the Congressional Research Service says was the U.S. price tag for the (entire) 12-year Vietnam war.
(In case anyone noticed some changes. some worm tried to post a sleaze-virus in a comment here so I had to re-post, and initiate a moderating tool, which I had hoped would never be necessary. Viva la Blogs!)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/09/iraq/main3920289.shtml

Illinois Democrat Wins Race to Succeed Hastert

2008-03-09T09:27:00.003-05:00

By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 9, 2008; Page A09

The Democratic Party scored a major symbolic win last night when a soft-spoken Democratic physicist claimed the suburban Chicago seat held by the former Republican House speaker, J. Dennis Hastert, for nearly 21 years. (Not quite the thousand years they hoped for...)

Democrat Bill Foster took 52 percent of the vote to 48 percent for Republican dairy magnate Jim Oberweis, in a district that President Bush won in 2004 with 55 percent. The Democratic victory in what was once a safe Republican seat gave the clearest sign yet that the anti-GOP wave that swept Republicans from control of Congress in 2006 may still be rolling. ( MAY BE? ...isn't that a bit soft, it seems that this is a place where "IS" applies quite graciously)
"A victory in the seat held by Speaker Hastert will send a political shock wave that will be felt across the country," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. "It's a stunning repudiation of President Bush, his allies and John McCain, who wants to carry on his legacy."
(Senator John McBush?)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/08/AR2008030802294.html?wpisrc=newsletter

Officials Lean Toward Keeping Next Iraq Assessment Secret

2008-03-07T07:30:00.001-06:00

By Walter Pincus and Karen DeYoung
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, March 7, 2008; Page A07

A new National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq is scheduled to be completed this month, according to U.S. intelligence officials. But leaders of the intelligence community have not decided whether to make its key judgments public, a step that caused an uproar when key judgments in an NIE about Iran were released in November.
The classified estimate on Iraq is intended as an update of last summer's assessment, which predicted modest security improvements but an increasingly precarious political situation there, the U.S. officials said.
It is meant to be delivered to Congress before testimony in early April by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and U.S. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker, according to a letter sent last week by Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell to Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.).
Since the Iraq invasion in 2003, the intelligence community has been more cautious than the military and the White House in assessing political, economic and security gains in Iraq. And the war's progress has been a prominent issue in the presidential campaign.
In his letter to Warner, McConnell said that separate estimates are also being prepared on the "terrorist threat to the homeland" -- focusing on al-Qaeda and Pakistan -- and on "the tactical and longer-term security and political outlook for Afghanistan." Both are scheduled for publication by early fall.
Warner requested all three estimates in January, describing them as key to upcoming policy discussions in Congress.
Intelligence officials said that the National Intelligence Board -- made up of the heads of the 16 intelligence agencies plus McConnell -- will decide whether to release the Iraq judgments once the estimate is completed. But they made clear that they lean toward a return to the traditional practice of keeping such documents secret.
In internal guidance he issued in October, McConnell said that his policy was that they "should not be declassified." One month later, however, the intelligence board decided to publicly release key judgments from an NIE on Iran's nuclear weapons program, saying that it had weighed "the importance of the information to open discussions about our national security against the necessity to protect classified information."
The estimate, which said Iran had halted the weaponization element of its nuclear program, appeared to undermine the Bush administration's position on Tehran's overall effort. With Bush arguing that Iran remained "a danger," McConnell publicly said the NIE judgment was poorly written because it emphasized a halt in the weapons program rather than Iran's continuing nuclear enrichment.
Key NIE judgments on Iraq had previously been made public, beginning with a highly controversial October 2002 assessment warning that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. That estimate was later proved wrong, with no such weapons discovered in Iraq after the U.S. invasion, and the matter led to charges that the intelligence community had been politicized by the Bush administration.
"Overall, professional life is less complicated if nothing becomes public, (what we don't know CAN hurt us...) and one doesn't have to organize classified assessments always having in the back of one's mind, 'If this is ever leaked, how would it read' " in the news media, a former intelligence analyst said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/03/06/AR2008030603900.html?sub=AR

The $2 Trillion Nightmare

2008-03-04T07:40:00.004-06:00

From the "The War Tanked The Economy, stupid!" files
in today's New York Times
By BOB HERBERT
Published: March 4, 2008
We’ve been hearing a lot about “Saturday Night Live” and the fun it has been having with the presidential race. But hardly a whisper has been heard about a Congressional hearing in Washington last week on a topic that could have been drawn, in all its tragic monstrosity, from the theater of the absurd. The war in Iraq will ultimately cost U.S. taxpayers not hundreds of billions of dollars, but an astonishing $2 trillion, and perhaps more. There has been very little in the way of public conversation, even in the presidential campaigns, (Maybe it is time for someone to change that and start talking about the connection between the economic woes we suffer and the war we have perpetuated for the profit of our worst corporate rogues. Even from the sidelines, the Edwards people are on top ot it, the Obama people need to get on it from the campaign.) about the consequences of these costs, which are like a cancer inside the American economy. On Thursday, the Joint Economic Committee, chaired by Senator Chuck Schumer, conducted a public examination of the costs of the war. The witnesses included the Nobel Prize-winning economist, Joseph Stiglitz (who believes the overall costs of the war — not just the cost to taxpayers — will reach $3 trillion), and Robert Hormats, vice chairman of Goldman Sachs International.
Both men talked about large opportunities lost because of the money poured into the war. “For a fraction of the cost of this war,” said Mr. Stiglitz, “we could have put Social Security on a sound footing for the next half-century or more.”
Mr. Hormats mentioned Social Security and Medicare, saying that both could have been put “on a more sustainable basis.” And he cited the committee’s own calculations from last fall that showed that the money spent on the war each day is enough to enroll an additional 58,000 children in Head Start for a year, or make a year of college affordable for 160,000 low-income students through Pell Grants, or pay the annual salaries of nearly 11,000 additional border patrol agents or 14,000 more police officers.
What we’re getting instead is the stuff of nightmares. Mr. Stiglitz, a professor at Columbia, has been working with a colleague at Harvard, Linda Bilmes, to document, among other things, some of the less obvious costs of the war. These include the obligation to provide health care and disability benefits for returning veterans. Those costs will be with us for decades.
Mr. Stiglitz noted that nearly 40 percent of the 700,000 troops from the first gulf war, which lasted just a month, have become eligible for disability benefits. The current war is approaching five years in duration.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/04/opinion/04herbert.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

A REAL Expert uncovers the fear-mongering truth about terrorists and the myth of Jihad.

2008-02-28T10:30:00.007-06:00

The Fading Jihadists
From the Washington Post

By David Ignatius Thursday, February 28, 2008; Page A17

Politicians who talk about the terrorism threat (you reading this John McCain?) -- and it's already clear that this will be a polarizing issue in the 2008 campaign -- should be required to read a new book by a former CIA officer named Marc Sageman. It stands what you think you know about terrorism on its head and helps you see the topic in a different light.
Sageman has a résumé that would suit a postmodern John le Carré. He was a case officer running spies in Pakistan and then became a forensic psychiatrist. What distinguishes his new book, "Leaderless Jihad," is that it peels away the emotional, reflexive responses to terrorism that have grown up since Sept. 11, 2001, and looks instead at scientific data Sageman has collected on more than 500 Islamic terrorists -- to understand who they are, why they attack and how to stop them.
The heart of Sageman's message is that we have been scaring ourselves into exaggerating the terrorism threat -- and then by our unwise actions in Iraq making the problem worse. He attacks head-on the central thesis of the Bush administration, echoed increasingly by Republican presidential candidate John McCain, that, as McCain's Web site puts it, the United States is facing "a dangerous, relentless enemy in the War against Islamic Extremists" spawned by al-Qaeda.
The numbers say otherwise, Sageman insists. The first wave of al-Qaeda leaders, who joined Osama bin Laden in the 1980s, is down to a few dozen people on the run in the tribal areas of northwest Pakistan. The second wave of terrorists, who trained in al-Qaeda's camps in Afghanistan during the 1990s, has also been devastated, with about 100 hiding out on the Pakistani frontier. These people are genuinely dangerous, says Sageman, and they must be captured or killed. But they do not pose an existential threat to America, much less a "clash of civilizations."
It's the third wave of terrorism that is growing, but what is it? By Sageman's account, it's a leaderless hodgepodge of thousands of what he calls "terrorist wannabes." Unlike the first two waves, whose members were well educated and intensely religious, the new jihadists are a weird species of the Internet culture. Outraged by video images of Americans killing Muslims in Iraq, they gather in password-protected chat rooms and dare each other to take action. Like young people across time and religious boundaries, they are bored and looking for thrills.
"It's more about hero worship than about religion," (and didn't the GOP-controlled government and it's neocon handlers give them more than one handy martyr to hero-worship?) Sageman said in a presentation of his research last week at the New America Foundation, a liberal think tank here. Many of this third wave don't speak Arabic or read the Koran. Very few (13 percent of Sageman's sample) have attended radical madrassas. Nearly all join the movement because they know or are related to someone who's already in it. Those detained on terrorism charges are getting younger: In Sageman's 2003 sample, the average age was 26; among those arrested after 2006, it was down to about 20. They are disaffected, homicidal kids -- closer to urban gang members than to motivated Muslim fanatics. (I have noted that myself in past blogs, how the violence in Baghdad had become more like our own gang warfare than anything akin to a military campaign...)
Sageman's harshest judgment is that the United States is making the terrorism problem worse by its actions in Iraq. "Since 2003, the war in Iraq has without question fueled the process of radicalization worldwide, including the U.S. The data are crystal clear," he writes. We have taken a fire that would otherwise burn itself out and poured gasoline on it. " Is it really worth it, fomenting war just to maintain the military industrial complex? I think not... our national soul is at stake, and until we learn to accept the reality of a peaceful world, instead of fomenting fearful delusions of war, we remain a duped public, taken for a neocon ride down the war-for-profit path. As long as we enable these warmakers and fall for their fear mongering, we remain nothing more than suckers to the neocon PT Barnums who manage our political and military affairs. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/27/AR2008022703179.html?hpid=opinionsbox1 Here's a link to the book istelf on Amazon.com... http://www.amazon.com/Leaderless-Jihad-Networks-Twenty-First-Century/dp/0812240650/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1204216063&sr=1-1

McCain's straight-talk has ALWAYS been crooked!

2008-02-22T16:19:00.002-06:00

It is about time someone called him on it. Thanks again and again to Bob Greenwald, and the powerchicks at FDL, Jane, Christy and Marcy, for accumulating, archiving and accentuating these patent McCain hypocrisies. Notice that is plural...

2008 Election already stolen by Republicans?

2008-02-16T08:57:00.000-06:00

FIRSTFRUITS OF THE EDWARDS WITHDRAWAL...

2008-02-03T08:35:00.000-06:00

The Nuclear Energy Industry, which backed GOP candidates in past elections, gives large sums to Obama and Clinton.
By Dan Morain and Maloy Moore, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers
February 3, 2008
Looking back, Joseph Cosgrove said he was naive to think that Sen. Barack Obama could require that nuclear power plant operators publicly disclose any radioactive releases.

Cosgrove and others who live and work in the hamlet of Godley, Ill., sought help after discovering years after the fact that there had been releases from the nearby Braidwood Generating Station.

Two years later, Obama's legislation, lobbied by one of his largest corporate backers, has stalled.

Cosgrove, glimpsing the nuclear industry's sway, said he watched as the bill's "teeth" were removed.

Many references to "nuclear" were stripped. (...thought reform, framing, brainwashing, its all the same deception, you might even call this selective editing of the word "nuclear" propaganda...) More important, Obama allowed deletion of a provision that nuclear plant operators "shall immediately notify" state and local officials about any release.

The issue is relevant in the 2008 presidential campaign. In an about-face, companies that have a stake in the nuclear energy industry are giving large sums to Democrats running for president, after having showered their money on Republicans in past campaigns.

In Washington and elsewhere, nuclear energy is being promoted as a way to generate large amounts of electricity without spewing greenhouse gases that exacerbate global warming.

Obama is the largest beneficiary of money from companies that have a stake in nuclear energy's future. The Braidwood plant's owner, Exelon Corp., has donated $275,000 to Obama over his career.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a co-author on the 2006 bill, is the second-largest recipient.

Neither candidate has come out in opposition to nuclear power, unlike their onetime rival, former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina.

The donations come as the industry reasserts itself. Several companies have filed or are considering filing applications to build plants after a generation-long moratorium.

Farewell to our Friends, The Edwards'... at least this time around...

2008-01-31T12:55:00.000-06:00

My advice to everyone? Support Obama in your local caucus, and in the general election. He's our only remaining "Hope" for "Change." And I sincerely hope he will change his stand on nuclear energy expansion.

Remember, take a daily moment to pray for Peace and Justice.

Let Sibel Edmonds Speak!

2008-01-23T14:54:00.000-06:00

This story is about to clip the underpinnings out from under the house of cards that Cheney and his neocons built. Along with our economy, we may see the virtual collapse of our government, at least until the next election. Heads need to roll, but lets make sure we have the right ones. Here's a hint...

Bush tanked the US economy.. by Bonnie Erbe

2008-01-12T12:24:00.000-06:00

From the Seattle PI:
Bonnie Erbe is a TV host and writes this column for Scripps Howard News Service. E-mail bonnieerbe(at)CompuServe.com.
Recession, like menopause, is a retrospective diagnosis. You don't know you're in one until you've been in it for at least two quarters (referring to a recession) or a year (for menopause). The question for me is not: Are we hitting a recession in 2008? It is: What has made the economy so buoyant that we didn't submerge into a recession several years ago?
Wall Street giant and billion-dollar bank Merrill Lynch announced last week that the United States had entered a recession for the first time in 16 years. It was a controversial call denied by a chorus of economists who do not think we're there yet. But the announcement comes from the bank's chief American economist, David Rosenberg -- widely respected on Wall Street.
The largest factor driving this country's economy into recession has been the Bush administration's profligate spending. Please read the following quote from the conservative/libertarian think tank Cato Institute's Web site:
"George Bush is mired in a fiscal policy crisis worse than anyone could have envisioned when he entered the Oval Office ... This crisis is the resurgence of record federal deficits ... The deterioration of America's fiscal health cannot be blamed on ... pro-spending coalitions in the Democrat-controlled Congress -- although certainly some of the blame lies there. It is almost exclusively the creation of the Bush administration itself."
Sound familiar? The article, which I edited heavily (taking out references that would have dated it immediately, such as the use of the term "Reaganomics"), is about George H.W. Bush, not George W. But it might as well have been about the son.
Forget about the $127 billion surplus that President Clinton left the nation after he moved out of the White House or the fact that Clinton paid down hundreds of billions of dollars in federal debt. President George W. Bush has produced nothing but deficits since he's been in office. Last year's, at $163 billion, was the lowest in five years. But it probably would not have been if his trillion-dollar war in Iraq hadn't been paid for "off budget." That little budgetary trick by the administration means that cost isn't tallied in the deficit and debt figures.

Then, of course, there's Bush's multitrillion-dollar tax cut.

Here's a lesson Bush never learned and one that probably could have kept this country out of recession:
You can't fight an expensive war AND cut taxes simultaneously without sending the U.S. economy into the tank.

That is just what Bush has done.
There are other contributing factors, of course. The housing bust has hurt this consumer-driven economy mightily. Americans felt richer and borrowed heavily against home equity at the height of the boom. These factors kept corporate profits and the economy growing.
But the bust that has now followed was highly predictable. Real estate always runs in cycles. The last real-estate boom lasted an incredibly long five years. The president should not have been piling up irresponsible debt, knowing the crash would come at some point.
Then there is oil. Prices have been high since Hurricane Katrina, more than two years ago. When you consider that early in Bush's first term oil was selling for about $25 per barrel, and we're now paying about four times that much, it's incredible that fact alone didn't drive us into recession territory much sooner. (Exxon Mobil just posted the biggest one-quarter of profit in the history of mumankind, and they are the benefisiaries of some of those tax breaks) What has kept our economy growing these past few years? My theory is: immigration. When millions of people flood into this country with few possessions, buy homes and fill them with consumer goods, of course our consumer economy is pumped. But that artificial pump-up won't last forever. Unfortunately, the overdevelopment they prompt and the environmental degradation they create will.
What's the solution? It won't be resolved with this guy in the White House. Cut defense spending. Use a pay-go system for all future domestic spending programs and tax cuts. Get the deficit down and bring the surplus back. And while we're at it, pay down the national debt.

Adding the AE911 site to my list

2008-01-11T09:32:00.000-06:00

I'm not one for wild conspiracy theories, but this isn't wild, it is real.
Thanks again to Brasscheck TV for giving us this video below, it is worth the time to watch and ponder, then go to the AE911 website and see if you can find any terrorists hiding there.

Just how desperate are the Republicans for Clinton to be Candidate in November?

2008-01-10T11:17:00.000-06:00

Thanks once again to Brad Friedman at Bradblog, who has covered the election fraud issue(s) exhaustively.

As promised, in my long, and much-updated original piece from last night, first expressing concerns and asking questions about the NH results, folks today have been looking at the precinct numbers to compare the difference between those which "counted" ballots on Diebold op-scan systems (for about 80% of NH's voters), versus those that still hand-count ballots in the Granite State (about 20% of the votes).
Ben Moseley of The Contrarian, most succinctly covers what other folks have found as well today. Namely, a 7 point overall bump for Clinton over Obama where the machines were used instead of hand-counts...
I just spent the last two hours putting together a spreadsheet of the Democratic results of the NH primary for each town with almost all but a few towns reporting, and the results were somewhat surprising....I say "somewhat" because some people will say this entirely foreseeable. What the informal statistics show is that Hillary Clinton received a 4.5% boost in towns using Diebold voting machines compared to towns that didn't. Meanwhile, Obama was hurt in these towns showing a 2.5% decrease in the Diebold towns.
Moseley responsibly notes, however, that there could well be other reasons for Clinton's popularity in areas where Diebold's machines are used, in lieu of actually counting ballots. For example, hand-counting in NH is generally done in the more rural areas and smaller precincts. Perhaps Obama is more popular, or Clinton less, in such areas for any number of reasons. (Unless I miss my guess, Edwards should have been the strongman in the rural aras, like he was in Iowa...)
The comparisons are only anecdotally useful for that reason. However, had the hand-counted results matched up similarly to those in Diebold areas, it might well have been a sign that there was little to worry about. (Even if I personally think not counting ballots is always something to worry about. But that's just me, one of those whacky pro-Democracy fellers, I guess.)
Moseley a blogger and political science student from American University, writes about Clinton's Diebold bump: "Does this show election fraud? Right now I'm not sure, but the possibility definitely remains and must not be taken off the table."
Then, in two updates, he offers a coupla more eye-brow raisers...

Update: Some more statistics from the data shows that Obama in non-Diebold towns garnering 38.7% of the vote to Clinton's 36.2%. The results in Diebold towns show the exact opposite: Clinton with 40.7% of the vote and Obama with 36.2%. Not only are the positions swapped but the informal statistics have the second place candidate holding 36.2% in both cases, which could easily be a pure coincidence. What doesn't make a lot of sense to me right now and this could be a mathematical mistake on my part is where Clinton got the extra 2% of votes in Diebold towns. All the other numbers almost exact for every candidate, even Edwards who recieved 17% of the vote in Diebold towns compared to 17.6% in non-Diebold towns. That still doesn't make up for the extra 2% vote Clinton is receiving when she leads in certain towns compared to when Obama has the lead.
Update II: Another thing to keep in mind when looking at these statistics is that the Diebold machines create a 7 point difference (+4.5 for Clinton, -2.5 for Obama) which is exactly what the polls had been predicting. Again, I'm not explicitly stating there has been fraud, but in a supposed democracy such as ours, skepticism is a virtue and necessity.
"In a supposed democracy such as ours, skepticism is a virtue and necessity."
Bless you, Mr. Moseley. (Ditto from JEP)For that, and for your good work on the numbers, you win the BRAD BLOG Patriot of the Week Award (if we had one.)
Here were my comments on Brad's posting:
Doesn't Rove still command a small cadre of fake Democrats in New Hampshire, the same ones he used to caller-ID those Democratic call centers and jam them?
So, considering that Rove knows something the rest of us as yet don't (Hillary's "fatal flaw" was never articulated, but it was referenced by the Rovian, so we might assume it's a trump card held close for the general election)is it any wonder they might make certain Hillary gets the nomination, so they can skewer her with their dirty little secret(s) when the time comes?
And what of the billion-dollar campaign projections that a New Hampshire loss for Clinton would have halved? Those media moguls aren't about to give this newest Diebold deception any coverage, Matthews keeps questioning the results, but no one seems to want to make this Diebold connection on the MSM.
And who benefits most from a continuation of Clinton's campaign?
1. The Republicans who think they have some dirt that will bury her in the general, or
2. the MSM that wants that easy-money campaign advertising revenue?
Hillary may not even know what happened, but no doubt someone on her staff does.
Something's rotten in New Hampshire this time around.
Once again...

COMMENT #15 [Permalink]... JEP said on 1/10/2008 @ 8:16 am PT...
This couldn't happen in Iowa, where you must have the courage to show yourself and your loyalties, in person, physical, a regular live body count, up front, no secrets, no machines to bend the results.
Maybe Iowa's got a good thing going after all.

Jumpin' Jack Flash?

2008-01-10T08:07:00.000-06:00

The helicopter was hovering over a Baghdad checkpoint into the Green Zone, one typically crowded with cars, Iraqi civilians and United States military personnel. Suddenly, on that May day in 2005, the copter dropped CS gas, a riot-control substance the American military in Iraq can use only under the strictest conditions and with the approval of top military commanders. An armored vehicle on the ground also released the gas, temporarily blinding drivers, passers-by and at least 10 American soldiers operating the checkpoint.
“This was decidedly uncool and very, very dangerous,” Capt. Kincy Clark of the Army, the senior officer at the scene, wrote later that day. “It’s not a good thing to cause soldiers who are standing guard against car bombs, snipers and suicide bombers to cover their faces, choke, cough and otherwise degrade our awareness.”
Both the helicopter and the vehicle involved in the incident at the Assassins’ Gate checkpoint were not from the United States military, but were part of a convoy operated by Blackwater Worldwide, the private security contractor that is under scrutiny for its role in a series of violent episodes in Iraq, including a September shooting in downtown Baghdad that left 17 Iraqis dead.
None of the American soldiers exposed to the chemical, which is similar to tear gas, required medical attention, and it is not clear if any Iraqis did. Still, the previously undisclosed incident has raised significant new questions about the role of private security contractors in Iraq, and whether they operate under the same rules of engagement and international treaty obligations that the American military observes.
“You run into this issue time and again with Blackwater, where the rules that apply to the U.S. military don’t seem to apply to Blackwater,” said Scott L. Silliman, the executive director of the Center on Law, Ethics and National Security at the Duke University School of Law.
Officers and noncommissioned officers from the Third Infantry Division who were involved in the episode said there were no signs of violence at the checkpoint. Instead, they said, the Blackwater convoy appeared to be stuck in traffic and may have been trying to use the riot-control agent as a way to clear a path.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/10/world/middleeast/10blackwater.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
(Maybe they are just practicing riot control for when they return to America?)

Something is happening in America; signs of a sea-change.

2008-01-07T08:44:00.000-06:00

Thanks to Craig Crawford's Trail Mix email newsletter for the link...

The NFL playoffs kicked off Saturday night, but at the Barley House, an upscale tavern across the street from the state Capitol, it seemed as if the only games worth watching were the back-to-back Republican and Democratic presidential debates.

Backers of Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton packed the bar and punctuated long, listening silences with bursts of applause for their respective candidates.

“This is very telling,” Gerard Dillon, one of the handful of Republicans in the joint, said during the Democratic debate. “It’s impressive that it’s on here. You’d expect the football games to be on.”

The games were showing in one corner of the bar’s basement, where about a dozen patrons huddled. Even some of them felt out of place.

“We want to be in there,” 36-year-old Mike Holt said of an adjacent room where about 60 debate-watchers gathered. “There’s no tables.”

Roughly 150 political junkies positioned around big-screen televisions on the bar’s two floors were affiliated with one campaign or another. Obama backers dominated the basement while a mix, including a large contingent of Clinton supporters and some devotees of John Edwards , seated themselves on the main floor.

Waiters and waitresses wore tavern T-shirts advertising “Campaign Trail Ale” and advising “It’s about the beer, stupid.”

But the beer flowed slowly when the candidates spoke, with transactions picking up only during commercial breaks.

Chet Whye, a veteran Democratic political activist from New York, talked about the momentum he believes Obama is building in New Hampshire, based in part on telephone calls he has made to voters.

“I have people finishing my pitch for me,” he said.

Still, Whye said he is bracing for the possibility of a nomination decided at the Democratic convention later this year.

“We need to be prepared for a convention where we have to outstrategize the best politician in the world — and that’s Bill Clinton,” he said.

One New Hampshire voter who is pulling for Clinton in the Democratic primary is Republican Alan Harkabus. Harkabus is voting for John McCain because of his party affiliation and because he says McCain needs his help in the GOP primary more than Clinton does in the Democratic race, but Harkabus was impressed with Clinton at a campaign stop earlier in the day.

“After listening to her today, I’d think seriously about voting for her,” he said — even if Clinton and McCain face off in November.

“She may be a more rounded candidate than he is,” said Harkabus, who spoke in a room filled with Obama volunteers.

For those working on the campaigns who didn’t get enough politics on Saturday, they’ll have another chance Sunday.

But for some of the out-of-towners, that could provide a tougher choice between football and politics.

“It’ll be hard tomorrow when the [New York] Giants are playing,” Whye said.

http://blogs.cqpolitics.com:80/trail-less-traveled/2008/01/debates-pack-more-punch-than-f.html

Cheney Playing Games with Pakistan's Elections?

2008-01-01T13:28:00.000-06:00

From Marcy Wheeler's "Emptywheel" blog at the FDL mothersite.

McClatchy is off to a running start in the new year--reporting that Benazir Bhutto was about to hand over to Arlen Specter and Patrick Kennedy evidence of an ISI plan to steal this next month's election in Pakistan.

The day she was assassinated last Thursday, Benazir Bhutto had planned to reveal new evidence alleging the involvement of Pakistan's intelligence agencies in rigging the country's upcoming elections, an aide said Monday.

Bhutto had been due to meet U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Rep. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., to hand over a report charging that the military Inter-Services Intelligence agency was planning to fix the polls in the favor of President Pervez Musharraf.

Safraz Khan Lashari, a member of the Pakistan People's Party election monitoring unit, said the report was "very sensitive" and that the party wanted to initially share it with trusted American politicians rather than the Bush administration, which is seen here as strongly backing Musharraf. ,,,

Given Bhutto's apparent worries about handing over evidence to the Bush Administration, I couldn't help but think of this story.

Current and past U.S. officials tell me that Pakistan policy is essentially being run from Cheney's office. The vice president, they say, is close to Musharraf and refuses to brook any U.S. criticism of him. This all fits; in recent months, I'm told, Pakistani opposition politicians visiting Washington have been ushered in to meet Cheney's aides, rather than taken to the State Department.
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/

Looks like more classic Cheney diplomacy to me! One more reason to get behind Drexler and Kucinich and IMPEACH DICK CHENEY, here's another in the long list of high crimes (not misdemeanors) that Cheney started with his Energy Industry Task Force, and continues from his CEO bubba's club. Now the no-bid book-cookers will pull out all the stops to maintain their stranglehold on our political and economic processes.

And if we get suspicious, and the public starts demanding accountability, expect another fire to break out in another Cheney storage closet.

But some skeletons are hard to bury or burn... especially when they relate to political assassinations and mass murders.

WE NEED THIS DVD IN KANSAS!!!!!

2007-12-20T16:03:00.001-06:00

From BillO, who is one of the real pinheads

2007-12-19T12:26:00.000-06:00

Fox sucks!

Shades of future past... Bush/CheneyCo drives young voters to Democratic Party

2007-12-16T09:13:00.000-06:00

From the Seattle Post Intelligencer
President Bush has made a strong impression on younger Americans; it's not the one Republicans wanted.
Faster than you can say "Facebook," the under-30 set is moving toward the Democratic Party. That is forcing Republicans to redouble their appeals to these voters, who are heading to the polls in bigger numbers, reversing years of declining participation. The shift may have implications for Republicans beyond 2008.

"Younger voters are critical," said Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster who isn't affiliated with any candidate. "There's a good deal of evidence that partisan inclinations reached when you first go through your formative political years tend to be reasonably stable."
Forty-four percent of 18-to-29-year-olds consider themselves Democrats, while 23 percent identify with the Republican Party, according to a Bloomberg/Los Angeles Times poll. It wasn't always this way: President Ronald Reagan won 59 percent of the youth vote in his 1984 bid for a second term.
"It cannot help your party if you're a Republican to have had many people come of age in an administration that has so botched so many enterprises," said Michael O'Hanlon, director of Opportunity 08, a broad study of the electorate by the Washington-based Brookings Institution.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/343442_youthonline16.html
The Republican party can not buy, beg or bequeath themselves the future, as long as they aren't willing to be good stewards of the present day. And here is th beginning of their demise, they are the only ones to blame for their own undoing.

Blackwater, other mercenary groups, under serious scrutiny..

2007-11-20T08:54:00.000-06:00

Thanks once again to Spencer Ackerman at TPMMuckraker for pointing us to this story:

Remember that recently-impaneled grand jury looking at Blackwater's Nisour Square shootings? Turns out it's not just about Blackwater. Four years into the occupation, prosecutors are attempting to build the first criminal case against private security companies -- who up until now worked in a system rigged to ensure unaccountability.
The Washington Post:
"The Washington grand jury has issued subpoenas to several private security firms, including Blackwater, a legal source briefed on the probe said yesterday. Authorities are seeking company "after-action" reports and other documents that may shed light on specific incidents, he said. (Buy Shredder Company Stock This Week!)
The source, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the probe, declined to say which incidents have been targeted, but he said the investigation ranges well beyond Blackwater. Private security companies in Iraq "have been shooting a lot of people," he said."
That's an understatement.
http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/

Pentagon to Cheney: Shut your warmongering mouth!

2007-11-16T09:39:00.000-06:00

The Pentagon has launched a preventive strike against a target that military chiefs presumably regard as one of the most active current threats to U.S. and world security—namely, the office of the vice president of the United States. Thrusting back hard against Vice President Dick Cheney’s warmongering, the head of U.S. forces in the Mideast declared that an attack on Iran “is not in the offing,” and more or less urged the vice president and his political allies to shut up.

In a front-page interview published on Nov. 12 by the Financial Times, Admiral William Fallon, who heads the U.S. Central Command, spoke in diplomatic tones, as top military officers usually tend to do when they make strong political statements. Yet there was no mistaking the admiral’s message. While Iran certainly poses a “challenge,” he said, U.S. policymakers must engage Tehran to encourage changes in the regime’s behavior. But the Iranians won’t “come to their senses” while under threat of bombardment, invasion or worse. (Actually they probably would come to their senses, but not the ones we imagine...) Very special thanks to Joe Conason at Truthdig... http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20071115_sane_officers_oppose_cheney/

The John Edwards Army Marches on to Victory!

2007-11-13T13:18:00.001-06:00

The Edwards Army marches on to Victory in 2008, as they follow John Edwards from the Des Moines Convention center to Vet's Memorial Auditorium for the Jefferson/Jackson Days Event on November 10, 2007

Tired of seeing trashy videos on Fox News? Then it's time to make cable TV companies give us ala-carte TV

2007-11-08T18:05:00.000-06:00

Robert Greenwald takes the lead once again. Go to this link and sign the petition to remove FOX NEWS from your cable selection. It's time to tell the cable industry that trash like this doesn't belong in the news cycle, and we all should be able to choose the services and channels we want.

Bush WASN'T listening to his Generals....

2007-10-13T06:15:00.000-05:00

In a sweeping indictment of the four-year effort in Iraq, the former top commander of American forces there called the Bush administration’s handling of the war “incompetent” and said the result was “a nightmare with no end in sight.” Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, who retired in 2006 after being replaced in Iraq after the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal, blamed the Bush administration for a “catastrophically flawed, unrealistically optimistic war plan” and denounced the current addition of American forces as a “desperate” move that would not achieve long-term stability. “After more than four years of fighting, America continues its desperate struggle in Iraq without any concerted effort to devise a strategy that will achieve victory in that war-torn country or in the greater conflict against extremism,” General Sanchez said at a gathering of military reporters and editors in Arlington, Va.
General Sanchez said he was convinced that the American effort in Iraq was failing the day after he took command, in June 2003. Asked why he waited until nearly a year after his retirement to voice his concerns publicly, he responded that it was not the place of active-duty officers to challenge lawful orders from the civilian authorities. General Sanchez, who is said to be considering writing a book, promised further public statements criticizing officials by name.
“There has been a glaring and unfortunate display of incompetent strategic leadership within our national leaders,” he said, adding that civilian officials have been “derelict in their duties” and guilty of a “lust for power.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/13/washington/13general.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Marine Corps (the hunters) want to go after Bin laden

2007-10-11T12:05:00.000-05:00

AND IT IS ABOUT TIME

WE NEED TO LET THE MILITARY DO ITS REAL JOB, INSTEAD OF USING THEM AS A FRONT FOR PRIVATE SECURITY ARMIES AND NO-BID WAR PROFITEERS!!!

The Marine Corps is pressing to remove its forces from Iraq and to send marines instead to Afghanistan, to take over the leading role in combat there, according to senior military and Pentagon officials.
The idea by the Marine Corps commandant would effectively leave the Iraq war in the hands of the Army while giving the Marines a prominent new role in Afghanistan, under overall NATO command.
The suggestion was raised in a session last week convened by Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and regional war-fighting commanders. While still under review, its supporters, including some in the Army, argue that a realignment could allow the Army and Marines each to operate more efficiently in sustaining troop levels for two wars that have put a strain on their forces.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/11/washington/11military.html

Here's my voter registration card....

2007-10-09T14:09:00.000-05:00

Ella Justine

2007-10-06T21:50:00.001-05:00

Our tax money paying for Chinese weapons in Iraq!!!

2007-10-04T08:57:00.000-05:00

Iraq has ordered $100 million worth of light military equipment from China for its police force, contending that the United States was unable to provide the materiel and is too slow to deliver arms shipments, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said yesterday. The China deal, not previously made public, has alarmed military analysts who note that Iraq's security forces already are unable to account for more than 190,000 weapons supplied by the United States, many of which are believed to be in the hands of Shiite and Sunni militias, insurgents and other forces seeking to destabilize Iraq and target U.S. troops.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/03/AR2007100302464.html

Blackwater hearings today!

2007-10-02T08:43:00.000-05:00

Blackwater USA, the private security contractor under scrutiny for its role in a deadly Baghdad shootout last month, has fired 122 of its armed guards in Iraq since it started protecting U.S. diplomats there three years ago, congressional investigators said Monday.The firings, most frequently for weapons-related incidents, amount to about 15% of Blackwater's current workforce in Iraq. None of those fired has been subject to any legal proceedings or other sanction, the investigation found. The disclosures came in a memo about the investigation by aides to Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills). He is chairman of the House oversight committee, which is holding a hearing on Blackwater today. Blackwater founder Erik Prince, a former Navy SEAL, is to appear. The detailed allegations, which the committee said were backed by thousands of documents, depict a security firm that almost routinely opens fire in Iraq's streets, occasionally attempts to cover up its transgressions and is frequently protected from censure and prosecution by its State Department overseers.The memo describes incidents in which Blackwater guards eagerly rushed to battles involving U.S. soldiers; plowed their armored trucks into civilian vehicles for no apparent reason; and left scenes of violence without assisting wounded civilians.In the 15-page memo, Waxman's staff says State Department officials ignored misconduct by Blackwater. And in one high-profile incident, the memo says, State officials were directly involved in making sure that a Blackwater employee who had been accused of killing an Iraqi guard while intoxicated was flown out of the country less than 36 hours after the Christmas Eve shooting.
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-na-blackwater2oct02,0,3271039.story?coll=la-tot-topstories&track=ntothtml

Blackwater security contractors in Iraq have been involved in at least 195 "escalation of force" incidents since early 2005, including several previously unreported killings of Iraqi civilians, according to a new congressional account of State Department and company documents. In one of the killings, according to a State Department document, Blackwater personnel tried to cover up what had occurred and provided a false report. In another case, involving a Blackwater convoy's collision with 18 civilian vehicles, the firm accused its own personnel of lying about the event.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/01/AR2007100100882.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter

Redeploy to Darfur!!!

2007-10-01T08:46:00.000-05:00

Hundreds of Darfurian rebels overran an African Union peacekeeping base in the central Darfur region of Sudan in a surprise raid over the weekend, killing at least 10 soldiers, possibly kidnapping dozens more and seizing supplies that included heavy weapons, African Union officials said Sunday. The raid, which began late Saturday and appeared to be highly organized, was the deadliest and boldest attack on African Union peacekeepers since they arrived in Darfur three years ago.
It came just as the United Nations has been trying to persuade member countries to commit troops and support to a greatly expanded Darfur peacekeeping force. Aid officials now fear that some of those countries may have second thoughts about participating.
According to Noureddine Mezni, an African Union spokesman, the rebels swarmed the base just after sunset with 30 heavily armed trucks, surprising the guards and overwhelming the peacekeepers with a barrage of machine-gun fire.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/01/world/africa/01darfur.html

Bush lies and people die...

2007-09-26T09:22:00.000-05:00

Sunni Arab extremists have begun a systematic campaign to assassinate police chiefs, police officers, other Interior Ministry officials and tribal leaders throughout Iraq, staging at least 10 attacks in 48 hours. Eight policemen have been killed, among them the police chief of Baquba, the largest city in Diyala Province. Two other police chiefs survived attacks, though one was left in critical condition, and about 30 police officers were wounded, according to reports from local security officers.
“We warned the government just a few days ago that there is a new plan by terrorist groups to target senior governmental officials, and particularly Interior Ministry officials,” said Maj. Gen. Hussein Kamal, the deputy interior minister for information and national investigations. The Interior Ministry is dominated by Shiites.
One group, the Islamic State of Iraq, took responsibility on Tuesday for the attack in Diyala, which killed at least 18 people on Monday. The group has ties to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, a homegrown extremist group whose leadership has foreign ties, according to American intelligence officials.
The latest outbreak of violence closely follows the concerted efforts of President Bush and Gen. David H. Petraeus to portray the American troop “surge” as having succeeded in bringing more stability to Iraq. Iraqi officials said Tuesday that the attacks might well have been intended to blunt that message.
“The main reason behind all these attacks are the signs of improvement of the security situation mentioned in the Crocker-Petraeus report,” said Tahseen al-Sheikhly, the Iraqi spokesman for the security plan, in a reference to the recent Congressional testimony of General Petraeus and the American ambassador to Iraq, Ryan C. Crocker. “The terrorist groups are just trying to say to the world that the report did not reflect the reality of the security situation in Iraq.” (Bush lied, people died... Are we seeing a pattern here?)
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/26/world/middleeast/26iraq.html

History Channel on West Virginia

2007-09-25T19:10:00.000-05:00

Anyone who saw the History Channel coverage of the old West Virginia story hosted by Billy Ray Cyrus last night might remember the thugs who worked for the coal mining robber-barrons, the ones who murdered so many union workers in cold blood back in the 30’s. Yhose thugs were the Blackwater of the depression era.
I have to admit, I was more than impressed with Cyrus’ presentation.
I will never again be able to use the term “redneck” in a durogatory fashion, and let me take this public forum to apologize for ever using it negatively in the past.

The truth is, The Rednecks were populist heroes, not dumb hicks (well, OK, most of us are dumb hicks in the eyes of anyone from NY or LA.) And they were defending their families and their way of life from those Blackwater type bullies.
Seriously, folks, if you missed it, you missed one of the best history lessons I’ve seen in quite a while.

Also, just a passing observation, but it sounds like these Blackwater thugs are tweakers, they sure seem to have have the uncontrolled outburst rages.
Considering that Blackwater is now planning to come back here and get into the drug enforcement business, who wants to bet it won’t be long til’ Robocop is sniffing out the smoke and raiding people’s homes.

They plan to return here and make “drugs” the old/new boogey man, so they can wreak havoc on our own society with impunity that comes from stupidity and greed.

Why are we allowing Blackwater to even have a license?

These Blackwater ops, like the goons in Billy ray’s history lessons, ARE THE DEVIL!

Evil, plain and simple, to quote my old pal Buckaroo.

Laugh while you can, monkey-boy.

How "white" is Blackwater?

2007-09-22T08:03:00.000-05:00

had another "duh" epiphany watching Jeremy Scahill's flicks from Iraq, (which I embedded below, thanks to The Nation, for the loan) and some of the news coverage about it...
Here's the $64,000 question..
Are all the Blackwater goons white? Or most of them...
Just think "Erik Prince, North Carolina, KKK," and the implications are startling, if not frightening.
IS this band of mercenaries an expression of the old south racist agenda? If so, their return, AS A UNIT, to this country represents a very dangerous and disconcerting potential.
Considering that the Republican candidates won't even talk to minority groups, and the evidence of a very deliberate move to the right down in Jena, one might assume they have written-off the ethnic vote.
So how much of a leap is it to the conclusions I've drawn here?
I don't even need a tin-foil hat for this one...
And I think it would behoove all the blogs to converge on the Republican candidates' obvious racist direction in this long season of lies.

then there's this:
Iraq Probe of U.S. Security Firm Grows
Blackwater, Accused of Killing 11 on Sunday, Cited in Earlier Deaths
By Joshua Partlow and Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, September 22, 2007; Page A01
BAGHDAD, Sept. 21 -- Iraq's probe into a deadly shooting by Blackwater USA in Baghdad last weekend has expanded to include allegations about the security firm's involvement in six other violent episodes this year that left at least 10 Iraqis dead.

The incidents include the killing of three guards at a state-run media complex and the shooting death of an Iraqi journalist outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, (doesn't that just prove they are state-sponsored terrorists?) said Brig. Gen. Abdul-Karim Khalaf, chief spokesman for the Interior Ministry.

Iraqi officials say these violent encounters have made them increasingly frustrated with Blackwater's conduct in Iraq, but the government backed away Friday from its attempt to expel the company. Blackwater has said its guards acted appropriately in the weekend incident, but it did not respond to requests for comment Friday on the other episodes cited by Khalaf.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/21/AR2007092102271.html?wpisrc=newsletter

Blackwater's secrets unveiled

2007-09-21T12:52:00.001-05:00

Jeremy Scahill, with The Nation

author of the bestselling

Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army,

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071008/scahill0921

Are Lost U.S. Weapons In Enemy Hands?

2007-09-21T08:05:00.000-05:00

From CBS News:
Last month, a government report revealed the U.S. military could not account for 190,000 -- or 30 percent -- of all weapons issued to Iraqi Security Forces between June 2004 and December 2005.

Thursday, Pentagon officials said $88 billion in spending in Iraq and Afghanistan is now under audit by the Department of Defense for fraud.

Now, in his exclusive report CBS News chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian has learned some of those missing weapons have ended up in the worst possible hands.

CBS News has learned that the CIA has photographic evidence that Austrian-made Glocks intended for Iraqi security forces and paid for by U.S. taxpayers are now in the hands of Iraqi insurgents -- in numbers that the intelligence community believes are in the thousands.

According to an intelligence source, the U.S. contractor in charge of the Glocks somehow lost track of an entire shipment. That mysterious disappeance is now part of a massive military bribery investigation centered around a contracting office run out of a small trailer at a military base in Kuwait. Eighteen federal investigators are digging into the actions of dozens of high-ranking U.S officers and military contractors.
http://www.cbsnews.com:80/stories/2007/09/20/cbsnews_investigates/main3283595.shtml

Ft. Riley cemetery running out of space...

2007-09-20T23:06:00.000-05:00

Kansas' Ft. Riley military cemetery has run out of space after the burial of another casualty of the Iraq war, officials said on Thursday.

We are full," said Alison Kohler, spokeswoman for the Fort Riley U.S. Army post, home of the 1st Infantry Division.

U.S. Sens. Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts, both Kansas Republicans, on Thursday sent a letter to William Tuerk, the under secretary for memorial affairs at the Department of Veterans Affairs, urging for full funding for a new cemetery for Fort Riley.

"While a new cemetery would not be completed in time to alleviate this situation immediately, it is vitally important," Roberts and Brownback, a Republican presidential candidate, said in their letter.

"We truly owe our military members a debt of gratitude and the least we can do is provide them with an honorable burial ground," the senators wrote.

Since the 2003 beginning of the war in Iraq, Fort Riley has lost 133 soldiers and airmen, though not all are buried in the Fort Riley cemetery. Sgt Joel Murray, who died September 4 in Iraq, took the last available plot, said Kohler.

Fort Riley can bury bodies on top of other bodies if family members want to share a plot, said Kohler.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070920/ts_nm/usa_iraq_cemetery_dc

More than a million Iraqi displaced..

2007-09-19T04:13:00.000-05:00

A vast internal migration is radically reshaping Iraq’s ethnic and sectarian landscape, according to new data collected by thousands of relief workers, but displacement in the most populous and mixed areas is surprisingly complex, suggesting that partitioning the country into semi autonomous Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish enclaves would not be easy.

The Red Crescent compiled the figures from reports filed as recently as the end of August by tens of thousands of relief workers scattered across all parts of Iraq who are straining to provide aid for an estimated 280,000 families swept up nationwide in an enormous and complex migration.

...the new figures show that the migration is not neatly dividing Baghdad along the Tigris, separating Sunnis who live predominantly on the west bank from Shiites, who live predominantly on the east. Instead, some Sunnis are moving to the predominantly Shiite side of the river, into neighborhoods that are relatively secular, mixed and where services are better, according to Red Crescent staff.

Just last week within Baghdad itself, a Sunni tribe of 250 families that lived in Dora, one of the most violent neighborhoods, was forced to flee. Rather than going to an area where they would be with others of their sect, they went to their neighbors to the south, in Abu Dshir, a Shiite area. They were welcomed by the local tribe and given places to stay in people’s homes, according to field staff both for the Red Crescent and the International Office for Migration, an intergovernmental agency.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/world/middleeast/19displaced.html

Blackwater shoots first, asks no questions later... victims include infants.
BAGHDAD, Sept. 18 — A preliminary Iraqi report on a shooting involving an American diplomatic motorcade said Tuesday that Blackwater security guards were not ambushed, as the company reported, but instead fired at a car when it did not heed a policeman’s call to stop, killing a couple and their infant. The report, by the Ministry of Interior, was presented to the Iraqi cabinet and, though unverified, seemed to contradict an account offered by Blackwater USA that the guards were responding to gunfire by militants. The report said Blackwater helicopters had also fired. The Ministry of Defense said 20 Iraqis had been killed, a far higher number than had been reported before.
In a sign of the seriousness of the standoff, the American Embassy here suspended diplomatic missions outside the Green Zone and throughout Iraq on Tuesday.
“There was not shooting against the convoy,” said Ali al-Dabbagh, the Iraqi government’s spokesman. “There was no fire from anyone in the square.”
A State Department spokesman, Edgar Vasquez, said he had not heard of the report and repeated that the department was conducting an investigation supported by the American military. A spokeswoman for Blackwater did not respond to an e-mail request for comment.
...
In video shot shortly after the episode, the child appeared to have burned to the mother’s body after the car caught fire, according to an official who saw it.

In interviews on Tuesday, six Iraqis who had been in the area at the time of the shooting, including a man who was wounded and an Iraqi Army soldier who helped rescue people, offered roughly similar versions.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/world/middleeast/19blackwater.html

So who's really the King of Babylon? So much for Iraqi sovereignity.

2007-09-18T08:52:00.000-05:00

Because Blackwater guards are so central to the American operation here, having provided protection for numerous American ambassadors, it was not clear on Monday whether the United States would agree to end a relationship with a trusted protector so quickly. Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker praised private security companies in a speech on Sept. 11, referring to Blackwater by name.
“This incident will be the true test of diplomacy between the State Department and the government of Iraq,” said one American official in Baghdad.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/18/world/middleeast/18iraq.html?th&emc=th

Blackwater gets their walking papers from Iraq.

2007-09-17T11:14:00.000-05:00

Iraq has cancelled the licence of the private security firm, Blackwater USA, after it was involved in a gunfight in which at least eight civilians died.
The Iraqi interior ministry said the contractor, based in North Carolina, was now banned from operating in Iraq.
The Blackwater workers, who were contracted by the US state department, apparently opened fire after coming under attack in Baghdad on Sunday.
Thousands of private security guards are employed in lawless Iraq.
They are often heavily armed, but critics say some are not properly trained and are not accountable except to their employers.

More like tens of thousands...So now when they back here, what will they all do for a living?

Ethnic cleansing's equilibrium factor...

2007-09-17T08:59:00.000-05:00

Violence swept over the Muhammad family in December, taking the father, the family’s house and all of its belongings in one chilly morning. But after the Muhammads fled, it subsided and life re-emerged — ordinary and quiet — in its wake. Now they no longer have to hide their Shiite last name. The eldest daughter does not have to put on an Islamic head scarf. Grocery shopping is not a death-defying act.
Although the painful act of leaving is behind them, their minds keep returning to the past, trying to process a violation that was as brutal as it was personal: young men from the neighborhood shot the children’s father as they watched. Later, the men took the house.
“I lost everything in one moment,” said Rossel, the eldest daughter. “I don’t know who I am now. I’m somebody different.”
They are educated people, and they say they do not want revenge. But typical of those who are left from Iraq’s reasonable middle, the Muhammads have been hardened toward others by violence, and they have been forced to feel their sectarian identity, a mental closing that allows war made by militants to spread.
“In the past the country lived all together, but now, no,” Rossel said. “I don’t trust anyone.”
Iraqis have continued to flee their homes throughout the American troop increase, which began early this year, and despite assurances that it is becoming safe to return, uncrossable lines have been left in Iraqi minds and neighborhoods. Schools, hospitals and municipal buildings are quickly losing their diversity, and even moderate Iraqis like the Muhammads say they cannot imagine ever going back."

Sadly, this division will eventually resettle the outsiders, it is the only reason that the sectarian violence will diminish. But this is not due to anything we have done, this is the story of eternal war, it has always been, and if we don't do something to change our basic instincts, we can never break the cycle of vengeful futility.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/17/world/middleeast/17baghdad.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

The BOOKS ARE COOKED! And just how do they plan to get away with it?

2007-09-16T12:45:00.000-05:00

Ten years after Congress ordered federal agencies to have outside auditors review their books, neither the Defense Department nor the newer Department of Homeland Security has met even basic accounting requirements, leaving them vulnerable to waste, fraud and abuse. An Associated Press review shows that the two departments' financial records are so disorganized and inconsistent that they have repeatedly earned "disclaimer" opinions, meaning that they simply cannot be fully audited.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2007/09/federal_agencies_flunk_their_a.php

Probably more than 50...

2007-09-15T01:13:00.000-05:00

..we were on a mission in that
thin-skinned old Humveee
The guys just out in front of us,
they hit an IED
We tried to help them in their struggle
To get free...
There must be fifty ways
To leave a bad war...

You know it's really not our habit
To attack
But there's a lot of oil buried in Iraq
They had it once before,
and now they want it back
There must be fifty ways
To leave a bad war
Fifty ways to leave a bad war

You just jump off the ship, Dick
Forget about those Iran plans
Lets redeploy, Roy
Just listen to me..
Hop on the plane, Jane
No need to complain, James
Just get out of Baghdad
Lets set em' all free.

You know he came home
having nightmares, wracked with pain
I wish we could go back in time
To change it all again
He said "I appreciate that,
But would you please explain
About the fifty ways
to leave a bad war.. "
fifty ways to leave a bad war

And in the darkness of that
fallen angel flight
coffins surround you
and you know it isn't right
They felt the sting of death
in some bloody firefight.
There must be fifty ways
To leave a bad war
Fifty ways to leave a bad war

Zipped up in black, Jack
Laid out on a plank, Hank
completely destroyed, Roy
With a tag on your feet.
Missin' a limb Slim
Or shot in the head Fred.
Just one of the wounded, Lee
That's how it can be.

There must be...
fifty ways to leave a bad war...

The half truth, and nothing but the half truth, so help me Cheney!

2007-09-14T06:59:00.000-05:00

from a Washington Post Editorial:

PRESIDENT BUSH'S explanation of his latest plans for Iraq last night was marred by a couple of important omissions. First, the president failed to acknowledge that, according to the standards he himself established in January, the surge of U.S. troops into Iraq has been a failure -- because Iraqi political leaders did not reach the political accords that the sacrifice of American lives was supposed to make possible. Instead he focused on the real but reversible military gains achieved in and around Baghdad and on the unexpected decision of Sunni tribes to take up arms against al-Qaeda, a development facilitated but not caused by the surge.

Mr. Bush also failed to mention one of the principal reasons for the drawdown of troops he announced. The president said that the tactical military successes meant that American forces could be reduced in the coming year to pre-surge levels. What he didn't say is that the Pentagon has no choice other than to carry out the withdrawals, unless Mr. Bush resorts to politically explosive steps such as further extending deployments. Another way of describing Mr. Bush's plan is that it leaves every available Army and Marine unit in place in Iraq for as long as possible.

If the war were going worse than it is, the deployment schedule probably couldn't have been much different.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/13/AR2007091302342.html?wpisrc=newsletter

So, what's it really all about?
Why are we still in Iraq?
Here's half of the equation, the other half is still buried underground as fossil fuel.

THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION IS A WEAPONS DEALER OF HISTORIC PROPORTIONS, IT IS THE TRUE LEGACY OF THIS PROFANE ERA, AND HAS BEEN SINCE ITS INCEPTION!

THEY ARE THE CONGRESSIONAL/MILITARY/INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX!

from Gary Kamiya at Salon.com
When it comes to dealing with countries in the Middle East, the Bush administration knows only two approaches. It either tries to blow them up or bribe them. God forbid that Washington should try to find out what the people in the region actually want -- or what might actually work.

Bush tried the blowing-up approach in Iraq. With the results now in, he has returned to the more traditional approach of bribery. After the bizarre neocon aberration of Iraq, with its highfalutin talk of democratization and its ostentatious hand-wringing over Washington's past support for autocratic regimes, Team Bush has returned to the tried-and-true path: propping up dubious allies with vast arms deals and using them as proxies to fight an evil empire. Belatedly, the Bush administration has embraced a Cold War paradigm in the Middle East, with the good guys -- Egypt, the Gulf states and Saudi Arabia -- being paid off to contain the bad guys -- al-Qaida, Iran, Syria, Hamas and Hezbollah.

The Bush administration's proposed $60 million to $70 billion Mideast arms deal takes us back to the cynical realpolitik of traditional great power politics, with puppet-master America jerking around half-willing strongmen with billion-dollar strings. Washington (N0, ITS REALLY CHENEY) is offering to sell $20 billion of high-tech weaponry to Saudi Arabia, and also sell arms to the Gulf States of Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and the United Arab Emirates. To ensure that Israel maintains its military superiority over its neighbors, the U.S. will increase the already vast amount of annual military aid it gives the Jewish state by 30 percent, offering $30 billion over 10 years. And Egypt will also wet its beak, with a $14 billion 10-year arms deal. (...these 10-year arms deals certainly do suggest that our neocons and theirs expect to be killing their neighbors for a long time to come. Sure gives creedence to Kucinich'c call for a Secretary of Peace...)
http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2007/08/14/bush_arms_deal/

BUSH KNEW BEFORE THE WAR THAT SADDAM HAD NO WMD!!!

2007-09-06T06:57:00.000-05:00

(My personal commentary is in blue type.)

"the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted in order to justify it."

"The intelligence" wasn't bad. But Bush's selective version of it was really just a big fat lie, not just another stupid mistake!!!

THIS IS UNQUESTIONABLY IMPEACHABLE, FOLKS, NO IFS ANDS OR BUTS! ARGUE ALL YOU WANT, YOU CAN'T CHANGE REALITY, BUSH LIED TO ALL OF US IN HIS STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS ABOUT MUSHROOM CLOUDS, HE DIDN'T JUST "GET IT WRONG" BECAUSE OF BAD INTELLIGENCE! THAT WAS THEIR DESIGNATED RUSE FROM DAY ONE, TO CLAIM THE CIA "GOT IT WRONG", WHEN THEY ACTUALLY GOT IT RIGHT, BUT THEIR PROOF WAS IGNORED TO FIT THE PLAN!!!!

BUSH LIED!

...ABOUT SADDAM HUSSEIN'S WMD!

He didn't just "get it wrong!"

And if you read between the lines, (follow the trail of smoking guns that suggests quite graphically that there was a concerted effort to manage the information, not study it) you can see that Bush joined others in a Cheney-driven conspiracy to hide this information from our own active intelligence agents and even from Collin Powell and Congress, and from the public in general, all for one reason alone: To get the unprecedented executive power to start an undeclared "war" on Saddam Hussein, while the memory of 9-11 was still a fresh wound in the American psyche.

How many have died because of it!?!

EXCLUSIVE FROM SIDNEY BLUMENTHAL AT SALON
"On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush (guided by Cheney)dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam's inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail.
Tenet never brought it up again. (There's "conspiracy theory" smoking gun #1)
Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. (There's "conspiracy theory" smoking gun #2)
No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, (There's "conspiracy theory" smoking gun #3) This is an absolutely crucial factor leading up to the "war", Cheney was in full-spin mode to accomplish this "hide the truth" feat!) a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD. (This is "conspiracy theory" smoking gun #4, when intelligence agencies are deliberately denied access to the whole picture, it certainly constitutes a conspiracy within the administration to deceive the public)
On April 23, 2006, CBS's "60 Minutes" interviewed Tyler Drumheller, the former CIA chief of clandestine operations for Europe, who disclosed that the agency had received documentary intelligence from Naji Sabri, Saddam's foreign minister, that Saddam did not have WMD. "We continued to validate him the whole way through," said Drumheller. "The policy was set. (By Cheney) The war in Iraq was coming, and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy." (Downing Street memo?)
Now two former senior CIA officers have confirmed Drumheller's account to me and provided the background to the story of how
the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted (by Cheney) in order to justify it.
They described what Tenet said to Bush about the lack of WMD, and how Bush responded, and noted that
Tenet never shared Sabri's intelligence with then Secretary of State Colin Powell. ("conspiracy theory" smoking gun #5)
According to the former officers, the intelligence was also never shared with the senior military planning the invasion, which required U.S. soldiers to receive medical shots against the ill effects of WMD and to wear protective uniforms in the desert.
Instead, said the former officials, the information was distorted in a report written to fit the preconception that Saddam did have WMD programs. That false and restructured (by Cheney, and this is "conspiracy theory" smoking gun #6) report was passed to Richard Dearlove, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), who briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair on it as validation of the cause for war. (Downing Street memo!) And behind the scenes throughout this story, is the sub-plot of Cheney racing back and forth to the CIA HQ, sticking his manipulative fingers into the intelligence pie, and outing Valerie Plame, all to get his no-bid, book-cooker's war for profit underway, consequences be damned! This was a conspiracy at the highest levels to deceive the public and the Democrats, it was a desperate and profanely successful leap into an era of "War at all Cost!" LITERALLY!!!
http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/09/06/bush_wmd/