Notes for converts from Huffington Post

Notes for Converts
Jane Smiley
The Huffington Post: 03.21.2006

Bruce Bartlett, The Cato Institute, Andrew Sullivan, George Packer,
William F. Buckley, Sandra Day O'Connor, Republican voters in
Indiana and all the rest of you newly-minted dissenters from Bush's
faith-based reality seem, right now, to be glorying in your outrage,
which is always a pleasure and feels, at the time, as if it is
having an effect, but those of us who have been anti-Bush from day 1
(defined as the day after the stolen 2000 election) have a few
pointers for you that should make your transition more realistic.

1. Bush doesn't know you disagree with him. Nothing about you makes
you of interest to George W. Bush once you no longer agree with and
support him. No degree of relationship (father, mother, etc.), no
longstanding friendly intercourse (Jack Abramoff), no degree of
expertise (Brent Scowcroft), no essential importance (Tony Blair,
American voters) makes any difference. There is nothing you have to
offer that makes Bush want to know you once you have come to
disagree with him. Your opinions and feelings now exist in a world
entirely external to the mind of George W. Bush. You are now just
one of those "polls" that he pays no attention to. When you were on
his side, you thought that showed "integrity" on his part. It
doesn't. It shows an absolute inability to learn from experience.

2. Bush doesn't care whether you disagree with him. As a man who has
dispensed with the reality-based world, and is entirely protected by
his handlers from feeling the effects of that world, he is
indifferent to what you now think is real. Is the Iraq war a failure
and a quagmire? Bush doesn't care. Is global warming beginning to
affect us right now? So what. Have all of his policies with regard
to Iran been misguided and counter-productive? He never thinks about
it. You know that Katrina tape in which Bush never asked a question?
It doesn't matter how much you know or how passionately you feel or,
most importantly, what degree of disintegration you see around you,
he's not going to ask you a question. You and your ideas are dead to
him. You cannot change his mind. Nine percent of polled Americans
would agree with attacking Iran right now. To George Bush, that will
be a mandate, if and when he feels like doing it, because...

3. Bush does what he feels like doing and he deeply resents being
told, even politely, that he ought to do anything else. This is
called a "sense of entitlement". Bush is a man who has never been
anywhere and never done anything, and yet he has been flattered and
cajoled into being president of the United States through his
connections, all of whom thought they could use him for their own
purposes. He has a surface charm that appeals to a certain type of
American man, and he has used that charm to claim all sorts of
perks, and then to fail at everything he has ever done. He did not
complete his flight training, he failed at oil investing, he was a
front man and a glad-hander as a baseball owner. As the Governor of
Texas, he originated one educational program that turned out to be a
debacle; as the President of the US, his policies have constituted
one screw-up after another. You have stuck with him through all of
this, made excuses for him, bailed him out. From his point of view,
he is perfectly entitled by his own experience to a sense of
entitlement. Why would he ever feel the need to reciprocate? He's
never had to before this.

4. President Bush is your creation. When the US Supreme Court
humiliated itself in 2000 by handing the presidency to Bush even
though two of the justices (Scalia and Thomas) had open conflicts of
interest, you did not object. When the Bush administration adopted
an "Anything but Clinton" policy that resulted in ignoring and
dismissing all warnings of possible terrorist attacks on US soil,
you went along with and made excuses for Bush. When the Bush
administration allowed the corrupt Enron corporation to swindle
California ratepayers and taxpayers in a last ditch effort to
balance their books in 2001, you laughed at the Californians and
ignored the links between Enron and the administration. When it was
evident that the evidence for the war in Iraq was cooked and that
State Department experts on the Middle East were not behind the war
and so it was going to be run as an exercise in incompetence, you
continued to attack those who were against the war in vicious terms
and to defend policies that simply could not work. On intelligent
design, global warming, doctoring of scientific results to reflect
ideology, corporate tax giveaways, the K Street project, the illegal
redistricting of Texas, torture at Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, the Terry
Schiavo fiasco, and the cronyism that led to the destruction of New
Orleans you have failed to speak out with integrity or honesty,
preferring power to truth at every turn. Bush does what he wants
because you have let him.

5. Tyranny is your creation. What we have today is the natural and
inevitable outcome of ideas and policies you have promoted for the
last generation. I once knew a guy who was still a Marxist in 1980.
Whenever I asked him why Communism had failed in Russia and China,
he said "Mistakes were made". He could not believe that Marxism
itself was at fault, just as you cannot believe that the ideology of
the unregulated free market has created the world we live in today.
You are tempted to say: "Mistakes have been made", but in fact,
psychologically and sociologically, no mistakes have been made. The
unregulated free market has operated to produce a government in its
own image. In an unregulated free market, for example, cheating is
merely another sort of advantage that, supposedly, market forces
might eventually "shake out" of the system. Of course, anyone with
common sense understands that cheaters do damage that sometimes
cannot be repaired before they are "shaken out", but according to
the principles of the unregulated free market, the victims of that
sort of damage are just out of luck and the damage that happens to
them is just a sort of "culling". It is no accident that our
government is full of cheaters--they learned how to profit from
cheating when they were working in corporations that were using
bribes, perks, and secret connections to cheat their customers of
good products, their neighbors of healthy environmental conditions,
their workers of workplace safety and decent paychecks. It was only
when the corporations began cheating their shareholders that any of
you squealed, but you should know from your own experience that the
unregulated free market as a "level playing field" was the biggest
laugh of the 20th century. No successful company in the history of
capitalism has ever favored open competition. When you folks
pretended, in the eighties, that you weren't using the ideology of
the free market to cover your own manipulations of the playing field
to your own advantage, you may have suckered yourselves, and even
lots of American workers, but observers of capitalism since Adam
Smith could have told you it wasn't going to work.

And then there was the way you used racism and religious intolerance
to gain and hold onto power. Nixon was cynical about it--taking the
party of Lincoln and reaching out to disaffected southern racists,
drumming up a backlash against the Civil Rights movement for the
sake of votes, but none of you has been any less vicious. Racism
might have died an unlamented death in this country, but you kept it
alive with phrases like "welfare queen" and your resistance to
affirmative action and taxation for programs to help people in our
country with nothing, or very little. You opted not to take the
moral high ground and recognize that the whole nation would be
better off without racism, but rather to increase class divisions
and racial divisions for the sake of your own comfort, pleasure, and
profit. You have used religion in exactly the same way. Instead of
strongly defending the constitutional separation of church and
state, you have encouraged radical fundamentalist sects to believe
that they can take power in the US and mold our secular government
to their own image, and get rich doing it. The US could have become
a moderating force in what seems now to be an inevitable battle
among the three monotheistic Abrahamic religions, but you have made
that impossible by flattering and empowering our own violent and
intolerant Christian right.

You have created an imperium, heedless of the most basic wisdom of
the Founding Fathers--that at the very least, no man is competent
enough or far-seeing enough to rule imperially. Checks and balances
were instituted by Madison, Jefferson, Franklin, and the rest of
them not because of some abstract distrust of power, but because
they had witnessed the screw-ups and idiocies of unchecked power.
You yourselves have demonstrated the failures of unchecked power--in
an effort to achieve it, you have repeatedly contravened the
expressed wishes of most Americans, who favor a moderate foreign
policy, reasonable domestic programs, a goverrnment that works,
environmental preservation, women's rights to contraception,
abortion, and a level playing field. Somehow you thought you could
mold the imperium to reflect your wishes, but guess what--that's
what an imperium is--one man rule. If you fear the madness of King
George, you have no recourse if you've given up the checks and
balances that you inherited and that were meant to protect you.

Your ideas and your policies have promoted selfishness, greed,
short-term solutions, bullying, and pain for others. You have looked
in the faces of children and denied the existence of a "common
good". You have disdained and denied the idea of "altruism". At one
time, our bureaucracy was full of people who had gone into
government service or scientific research for altruistic reasons--I
knew, because I knew some of them. You have driven them out and
replaced them with vindictive ignoramuses. You have lied over and
over about your motives, for example, making laws that hurt people
and calling it "originalist interpretations of the
Constitution" (conveniently ignoring the Ninth Amendment). You have
increased the powers of corporations at the expense of every other
sector in the nation and actively defied any sort of regulation that
would require these corporations to treat our world with care and
respect. You have made economic growth your deity, and in doing so,
you have accelerated the power of the corporations to destroy the
atmosphere, the oceans, the ice caps, the rainforests, and the
climate. You have produced CEOs in charge of lots of resources and
lots of people who have no more sense of reciprocity or connection
or responsibility than George W. Bush.

Now you are fleeing him, but it's only because he's got the earmarks
of a loser. Your problem is that you don't know why he's losing. You
think he's made mistakes. But no. He's losing because the ideas that
you taught him and demonstrated for him are bad ideas,
self-destructive ideas, and even suicidal ideas. And they are
immoral ideas. You should be ashamed of yourselves because not only
have your ideas not worked to make the world a better place, they
were inhumane and cruel to begin with, and they have served to
cultivate and excuse the inhumane and cruel character traits of
those who profess them.

6. As Bad as Bush is, Cheney is Worse.

http ://www.huffingtonpost.com/jane-smiley/notes-for-converts_b_17662.html?view=print

"Network" 1976

"You have meddled with the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale, and I
won't have it!! Is that clear?! You think you've merely stopped a
business deal. That is not the case. The Arabs have taken billions of
dollars out of this country, and now they must put it back! It is ebb
and flow, tidal gravity! It is ecological balance!

"You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations and peoples. There
are no nations. There are no peoples. There are no Russians. There are
no Arabs. There are no third worlds. There is no West. There is only one
holistic system of systems, one vast and immanent, interwoven,
interacting, multivariate, multi-national dominion of dollars.
Petro-dollars, electro-dollars, multi-dollars, Reichmarks, yen, rubles,
pounds, and shekels.

"It is the international system of currency which determines the
totality of life on this planet. That is the natural order of things
today. That is the atomic and subatomic and galactic structure of things
today! And YOU have meddled with the primal forces of nature, and YOU
WILL ATONE!

"You get up on your little twenty-one inch screen and howl about America
and democracy. There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only
IBM and ITT and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, Union Carbide, and Exxon. Those
are the nations of the world today.

"What do you think the Russians talk about in their councils of state --
Karl Marx? They get out their linear programming charts, statistical
decision theories, minimax solutions, and compute the price-cost
probabilities of their transactions and investments, just like we do.

"We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies, Mr. Beale. The
world is a college of corporations, inexorably determined by the
immutable bylaws of business. The world is a business, Mr. Beale. It has
been since man crawled out of the slime. And our children will live, Mr.
Beale, to see that perfect world in which there's no war or famine,
oppression or brutality -- one vast and ecumenical holding company, for
whom all men will work to serve a common profit, in which all men will
hold a share of stock, all necessities provided, all anxieties
tranquilized, all boredom amused."

Pedro Knows His History... (funny)

How this History Lesson should be an insult to every political
party......

It was the first day of school and a new student named Pedro Martinez,
the son of a Mexican restaurateur, entered the fourth grade.

The teacher said, "Let's begin by reviewing some American history.

"Who said 'Give me Liberty, or give me Death?' "

She saw a sea of blank faces, except for Pedro, who had his hand up.

"Patrick Henry, 1775."

"Very good!" apprised the teacher. "Now, who said, "Government of the
people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the
earth?"

Again, no response except from Pedro: "Abraham Lincoln, 1863."

The teacher snapped at the class, "Class, you should be ashamed! Pedro,
who is new to our country, knows more about its history than you do!"

She heard a loud whisper: "Screw the Mexicans!"

"Who said that?" she demanded.

Pedro put his hand up. "Jim Bowie, 1836."

At that point, a student in the back said, "I'm gonna puke." The
teacher glared and asked, "All right! Now, who said that?"

Again, Pedro answered, "George Bush to the Japanese Prime Minister,
1991."

Now furious, another student yelled, "Oh yeah? Suck this!"

Pedro jumped out of his chair waving his hand and shouting to the
teacher, "Bill Clinton to Monica Lewinsky, 1997!"

Now, with almost a mob hysteria, teacher said, "You little shit. If you
say anything else, I'll kill you!"

Pedro frantically yelled at the top of his voice, "Gary Condit to
Chandra Levy, 2001."

The teacher fainted, and as the class gathered around her on the floor,
someone said, "Oh shit, we're in BIG trouble now!"

Pedro whispered, "Saddam Hussein, 2003."

Finally someone throws a eraser at Pedro, someone shouted "Duck"!

Teacher, just waking, asked "Who said that?

Pedro: Dick Cheney 2006!

Neocon architect says: 'Pull it down'

Scotsman.com News - International - Neocon architect says: 'Pull it down': "Mr Fukuyama once supported regime change in Iraq and was a signatory to a 1998 letter sent by the Project for a New American Century to the then president, Bill Clinton, urging the US to step up its efforts to remove Saddam Hussein from power. It was also signed by neoconservative intellectuals, such as Bill Kristol and Robert Kagan, and political figures Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle and the current defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld.
However, Mr Fukuyama now thinks the war in Iraq is the wrong sort of war, in the wrong place, at the wrong time.
'The most basic misjudgment was an overestimation of the threat facing the United States from radical Islamism,' he argues.
'Although the new and ominous possibility of undeterrable terrorists armed with weapons of mass destruction did indeed present itself, advocates of the war wrongly conflated this with the threat presented by Iraq and with the rogue state/proliferation problem more generally.'
Mr Fukuyama, one of the US's most influential public intellectuals, concludes that 'it seems very unlikely that history will judge either the intervention [in Iraq] itself or the ideas animating it kindly'.
Going further, he says the movements' advocates are Leninists who 'believed that history can be pushed along with the right application of power and will. Leninism was a tragedy in its Bolshevik version, and it has returned as farce when practised by the United States'."

Annexing Khuzestan; Battle-Plans for Iran

Annexing Khuzestan; Battle-Plans for Iran: "But, step by step, Iran is being set up for war. What difference does the provocation make? The determination to consolidate the oil reserves in the Caspian Basin was made more than a decade ago and is clearly articulated in the policy papers produced by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC) The Bush administration is one small province away from realizing the its dream of controlling the world's most valued resource. They won't let that opportunity pass them by."

Top 10 Mistakes Bush made reacting to Al-Qaeda

Informed Comment : "Top Ten Mistakes of the Bush Administration in Reacting to Al-Qaeda

Usamah Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri murdered 3,000 Americans, and they both issued tapes in the past week, blustering and threatening us with more of the same. Most of us aren't wild about paying for the Bush administration with our taxes, but one thing we have a right to expect is that our government would protect us from mass murderers and would chase them down and arrest them. It has not done that. When asked why he hasn't caught Bin Laden, Bush replies, 'Because he's hidin'.' Is Bush laughing at us?

On September 11, 2001, the question was whether we had underestimated al-Qaeda. It appeared to be a Muslim version of the radical seventies groups like the Baader Meinhoff gang or the Japanese Red Army. It was small, only a few hundred really committed members who had sworn fealty to Bin Laden and would actually kill themselves in suicide attacks. There were a few thousand close sympathizers, who had passed through the Afghanistan training camps or otherwise been inducted into the world view. But could a small terrorist group commit mayhem on that scale? Might there be something more to it? Was this the beginning of a new political force in the Middle East that could hope to roll in and take over, the way the Taliban had taken over Afghanistan in the 1990s? People asked such questions.

Over four years later, there is no doubt. Al-Qaeda is a small terrorist network that has spawned a few copy-cats and wannabes. Its breakthrough was to recruit some high-powered engineers in Hamburg, which it immediately used up. Most al-Qaeda recruits are marginal people, people like Zacarias Moussawi and Richard Reid, who would be mere cranks if they hadn't been manipulated into trying something dangerous. Muhammad al-Amir (a.k.a Atta) and Ziad Jarrah were highly competent scientists, who could figure the kinetic energy of a jet plane loaded with fuel. There don't seem to be significant numbers of such people in the organization. They are left mostly with cranks, petty thieves, drug smugglers, bored bank tellers, shopkeepers, and so forth, persons who could pull off a bombing of trains in Madrid or London, but who could not for the life of them do a really big operation.

The Bush administration and the American Right generally has refused to acknowledge what we now know. Al-Qaeda is dangerous. All small terrorist groups can do damage. But it is not an epochal threat to the United States or its allies of the sort the Soviet Union was (and that threat was consistently exaggerated, as well).

In fact, the United States invaded a major Muslim country, occupied it militarily, tortured its citizens, killed tens of thousands, tinkered with the economy-- did all those things that Muslim nationalists had feared and warned against, and there hasn't even been much of a reaction from the Muslim world. Only a few thousand volunteers went to fight. Most people just seem worried that the US will destabilize their region and leave a lot of trouble behind them. People are used to seeing Great Powers do as they will. A Syrian official before the war told a journalist friend of mine that people in the Middle East had been seeing these sorts of invasions since Napoleon took Egypt in 1798. 'Well,' he shrugged, 'usually they leave behind a few good things when they finally leave.'"

See the article for the full list:

http://www.juancole.com/2006/01/top-ten-mistakes-of-bush.html#comments

The Proposed Iranian Oil Bourse By Krassimir Petrov, Ph.D.

The Proposed Iranian Oil Bourse By Krassimir Petrov, Ph.D.: "The Proposed Iranian Oil Bourse
By Krassimir Petrov, Ph.D."

The Cost of The War

TPMCafe || The Cost of The War: "NEW STUDY SUGGESTS ECONOMIC COST OF IRAQ WAR MUCH LARGER THAN PREVIOUSLY RECOGNIZED � A new study by two leading academic experts suggests that the costs of the Iraq war will be substantially higher than previously reckoned. In a paper presented to this week%u2019s Allied Social Sciences Association annual meeting in Boston MA., Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes and Columbia University Professor and Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz calculate that the war is likely to cost the United States a minimum of nearly one trillion dollars and potentially over $2 trillion."

Pentagon Expanding Its Domestic Surveillance Activity

Has there been even one, single, solitary instance of a “terrorist” being caught by all this nonsense? What exactly is all this good for, other than spying on citizens at will?

The “evidence” against Padilla was apparently obtained by waterboarding (drowning reflex torturing) two al Queda members until they made up something that the torturers wanted to hear. No case, no evidence, no “dirty bombs”, no admin officals declaring him guilty without trial on TV anymore. And he was one of their Big Wins By Using Theeir New Freedom To Find Terrorists.

Still, people don’t understand what’s happening to their rights. And they won’t care. Torture, false imprisonment, stripping a US citizen of his constitutional rights by executive fiat based on stories made up under torture, keeping him prisoner and helpless to answer his accusers for over three years, then a nonsense charge to maintain face — and he’s still under the King’s justice, unable to examine the evidence against him — because there never was any. Why is a US citizen in a secret gulag under trumped up charges? Why don’t people care? How many others are out there?

They demanded trust, and they blew it. They don’t care about justice, just power. Don’t give them more.

Jeff Huber - Top 10 Bad Reasons for "Staying the Course" in Iraq (and One Good One)

"Top 10 Bad Reasons for %u201CStaying the Course%u201D in
Iraq (and One Good One)
by Jeff Huber"
http://www.epluribusmedia.org/columns/20051003huber.html

5. We need to support our troops.

I applaud and deeply respect our men and women in uniform for their magnificent service and sacrifice. These are my people, remember? However, comma….

In the first place, we are supporting our troops — to the tune of nearly half a trillion dollars a year.

Second, when we continue to commit those men and women in uniform to a struggle for which there is no military solution, we are abusing them, not supporting them.

Third — and most importantly — America does not exist for the purpose of supporting its military. Our military exists to support America. And if it’s not defending us at home or achieving our national aims overseas, it’s not supporting our country.

1. We set out to establish a military base of operations from which we can control the Middle East and its oil, and we should persist until we "get the job done."

Even though it’s true, the argument’s still specious. Our "besttrained, bestequipped, bestfunded" military can’t get Iraq or Afghanistan under control. How can we possibly expect to lock down the entire Middle East?

Hullabaloo

From Hullabaloo:

"I am of the opinion that alienating our allies, exposing ourselves as having an intelligence community that can't find water if they fall out of a boat and then screwing up Iraq in spectacular fashion, we have destroyed our mystique and have made this country less safe. We were much better off speaking softly and carrying the big stick than flailing around like a wounded, impotent Giant.

I see no reason to believe that these people see that. They believe that to 'cut and run' is the equivalent of emasculating this country and that is what puts us at risk. George W. Bush is not bugging out."

Once Upon a Time...:

"The attacks of 9/11 tore aside a significant part of the veneer of civilization that had shrouded us from certain continuing, ugly truths about ourselves. In the wake of the attacks of that day, many of us -- led by our president, cheered on by the neoconservatives, and also by many conservatives and liberventionists (those alleged "libertarians," who think government should stay out of our lives at home but should simultaneously seek to rearrange the globe by military force -- and who appear to think it represents the apex of intellectual integrity never to even acknowledge this contradiction, let alone try to justify it) -- enthusiastically embraced a simple storyline: Western civilization, more particularly the United States, constitutes the highest point of possible human development. It is only "freedom" and "democracy" as practiced in the West that can guarantee a future of peace. (Never mind the West's uninterrupted history of warfare within its own ranks, and never mind the West's unending, centuries-long interference with the rest of the world.)The West has the answer to successful human life. Since it does, and because certain elements in the rest of the world have now chosen to attack us on our own ground (and never mind that we have invaded and ruled over vast portions of the rest of the world since time immemorial), we must enlighten those benighted portions of the globe in our defense. Our chosen method of enlightenment is brute military force, to be deployed even against countries that did not threaten us. The lack of a genuine threat is no argument against spreading our version of "civilization," for our mission is grounded not only in self-defense: it is also a moral mission. Our success and our "peace" directly correlates to our virtue. Those countries and those civilizations that do not enjoy the same success and peace are without virtue. In the most extreme (and, one could argue, most consistent) version of this tale, non-Western parts of the world are less than human -- and they are subhuman by choice. They are immoral, and sometimes even evil. Since we represent the good and they represent the evil, we are surely entitled to improve them, by invasion and bombing if necessary. If they do not threaten us today, they might at some indeterminate time in the future. And while we might kill many innocent civilians in our campaign of civilization, those who survive will be infinitely better off than they would have been otherwise. Besides, how "innocent" can any of them be -- since they are members of inferior, less than fully human civilizations, and since they are so by choice?">Once Upon a Time...: Myths of New Orleans: Poor, Bad Blacks -- Who Got What They Deserved: "The attacks of 9/11 tore aside a significant part of the veneer of civilization that had shrouded us from certain continuing, ugly truths about ourselves. In the wake of the attacks of that day, many of us -- led by our president, cheered on by the neoconservatives, and also by many conservatives and liberventionists (those alleged 'libertarians,' who think government should stay out of our lives at home but should simultaneously seek to rearrange the globe by military force -- and who appear to think it represents the apex of intellectual integrity never to even acknowledge this contradiction, let alone try to justify it) -- enthusiastically embraced a simple storyline: Western civilization, more particularly the United States, constitutes the highest point of possible human development. It is only 'freedom' and 'democracy' as practiced in the West that can guarantee a future of peace. (Never mind the West's uninterrupted history of warfare within its own ranks, and never mind the West's unending, centuries-long interference with the rest of the world.)The West has the answer to successful human life. Since it does, and because certain elements in the rest of the world have now chosen to attack us on our own ground (and never mind that we have invaded and ruled over vast portions of the rest of the world since time immemorial), we must enlighten those benighted portions of the globe in our defense. Our chosen method of enlightenment is brute military force, to be deployed even against countries that did not threaten us. The lack of a genuine threat is no argument against spreading our version of 'civilization,' for our mission is grounded not only in self-defense: it is also a moral mission. Our success and our 'peace' directly correlates to our virtue. Those countries and those civilizations that do not enjoy the same success and peace are without virtue. In the most extreme (and, one could argue, most consistent) version of this tale, non-Western parts of the world are less than human -- and they are subhuman by choice. They are immoral, and sometimes even evil. Since we represent the good and they represent the evil, we are surely entitled to improve them, by invasion and bombing if necessary. If they do not threaten us today, they might at some indeterminate time in the future. And while we might kill many innocent civilians in our campaign of civilization, those who survive will be infinitely better off than they would have been otherwise. Besides, how 'innocent' can any of them be -- since they are members of inferior, less than fully human civilizations, and since they are so by choice?"

Abraham Lincoln, letter to William Elkins, Nov 21, 1864

HaloScan.com - Comments:

"'I see in the near future a crisis approaching. It unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. The money powers preys upon the nation in times of peace and conspires against it in times of adversity. It is more despotic than a monarchy, more insolent than autocracy, more selfish than bureaucracy.

It denounces, as public enemies, all who question its methods or throw light upon its crimes. I have two great enemies, the Southern Army in front of me & the financial institutions at the rear, the latter is my greatest foe. Corporations have been enthroned, and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until the wealth is aggregated in the hands of a few, and the Republic is destroyed.'

-Abraham Lincoln, letter to William Elkins, Nov 21, 1864 (after the passage of the debt causing National Bank Act [June 3, 1864])"

Latest Mark Morford (SF gate) article: George W. Bush Still Rocks

All:

Mark has always had a rapier-like writing style; this time
he skewers with great abandon.

Note: not for the squeamish. But Mark usually isn't.

WinterBear

========================


George W. Bush Still Rocks!
Stop criticizing! The rich man's CEO president is
executing his job requirements perfectly
http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/morford/

By Mark Morford, San Francisco Gate columnist
Friday, September 9, 2005


Everyone is slamming poor Dubya. Everyone is saying,
oh my God, he's more inept than we ever imagined, he
has no idea what's really going on, he's oblivious and
in denial and he pretty much let all those poor black
people die in filth and misery, and he basically
ignored the massive Katrina disaster for days before
finally being pressured into cutting his umpteenth
vacation short and actually taking action.

This is what they're saying. Kanye West was right,
Bush doesn't care about black people, or the poor, or
anything that doesn't directly serve his handlers'
agenda or flatter his monochromatic ego or anything
that isn't spelled out for him in nice simplistic pie
charts and reassuring matronly tones.

And lo, the darts are slinging in from around the
world, according to SF Gate's own World Views column:
"Maddening incompetence ... reminiscent of a
drought-stricken African state," says Britain's Daily
Mail. "Can't get it together," says a major paper in
Italy. "A plethora of grim tales of disaster," says
the Scotsman. "Superpower or Third World?" asks the
Spanish daily Noticias de ?lava. Why did BushCo fail
its first great national-security test since Sept. 11,
despite having two days' advance notice of Katrina's
wrath? asks Le Monde. And on it goes, the world's
powers looking on in one part shock and one part
disgust and all parts repugnance for Bush's rampant
ineptitude and America's apparent inability to take
care of its own.

But it's so unfair, isn't it, to attack poor Dubya
like this? Just a little misplaced? After all, Bush
has always been the rich white man's president. He is
the CEO president, the megacorporate businessman's
friend, the thug of the religious right, a big
reservoir-tipped condom for all energy magnates,
protecting against the nasty STDs of humanitarianism
and progress and social responsibility.

He has always been merely an entirely selective
figurehead, out of touch and eternally dumbfounded, a
hand puppet of the neoconservative machine built and
fluffed up and carefully placed for the very specific
job of protecting their interests, no matter what.
Repeat: No. Matter. What. Flood hurricane disaster war
social breakdown economic collapse? Doesn't matter.
Corporate interests ?ber alles, baby. Protect the
core, reassure the base, screw everyone else unless it
begins to affect the poll numbers and then
finger-point, deflect, prevaricate. All of a piece,
really. Because Bush, he was never actually meant to,
you know, lead.

So maybe it's time to stop with the savaging of poor
Dubya. He is, after all, doing a simply beautiful job
of kowtowing to his wealthiest supporters while
slamming the poor and running the nation into a deep
hole and creating the largest deficit in American
history, all while his cronies in oil and industry and
military supply and Big Energy gain immense and
staggering wealth and pay less and less tax on it.
This is what he was hired to do. This is why he is in
office. Hell, the day after Katrina, Bush flew right
by Louisiana and headed straight to San Diego to party
with his Greatest Generation cronies. Reassure the
masters, first and foremost, eh Shrub? Understood.

Is this not what we all expected? Can you reasonably
say you thought it would be different? Just look. All
major social services are being gutted. The Federal
Emergency Management Agency is a joke, second in line
only to the ungodly useless Homeland Security
Department, which has become about as reassuring and
trustworthy and humane an organization as a prison in
Guant?namo.

The Associated Press reported that the Army Corps of
Engineers asked for $105 million for hurricane and
flood programs in New Orleans just last year. The
White House hacked that down to about $40 million,
even as it passed the most bloated and nauseatingly
pork-filled $12.3 billion energy bill in recent
history, one that guaranteed we'd be sucking at the
tit of foreign oil and kneeling before Bush's pals in
Big Energy for decades to come, even as more and more
teenagers die in Iraq for Bush's inept and failed war.
Yay politics.

Why didn't National Guardsmen from Louisiana and
Mississippi march into New Orleans immediately after
Katrina exited to take charge and keep the peace? Why,
because most of them are serving in that same violent
and brutally costly war in Iraq, silly. Fully 30
percent of the guard is stuck over there, along with
50 percent of their equipment. Yay Vietnam 2.0.

Why did FEMA chief Michael Brown wait hours after
Katrina struck to timidly plead with his parent
company, Homeland Security, for some backup, not to
actually get their hands dirty but rather to help
"convey a positive image" about the government's
response to the victims? Why, because he's an
incompetent lackey Bush appointee who was fired from
his former job as head of something called the
International Arabian Horse Association. Yay pathetic
nepotism.

Just look. Senate majority leader Sen. Bill Frist,
icon of hollow self-righteousness and the energy
magnate's friend, has already leveraged the Katrina
nightmare to argue for more drilling in Alaska, much
in the way BushCo whored Sept. 11 to cram the Patriot
Act down the nation's throat and make fear and
xenophobia a national pastime. And let's not forget
trusty profit-sucking sidekick Halliburton, which has
already scored a sweet deal to help repair Katrina
damage, thanks to the fact that the former director of
FEMA is now a Halliburton lobbyist. Ah, war and death
and tragedy. They are just so goddamn profitable,
right, Dubya?

And then, the kicker. Then you read that Bush has
actually ordered an official probe into the botched
Katrina relief efforts, a formal federal investigation
into what went wrong, which is a bit like a shark
ordering an investigation into what happened to all
the fish. Unless this probe starts and ends in the
White House, unless it hangs Bush himself up by his
monkey ears and dangles him over a river of toxic
Louisiana sewage, it's merely useless and insulting
and more than a little sad.

Let's say it outright. The truest measure of any
president, of any leader, is how well he takes care of
his own people. And Bush, well, Bush has done a simply
spectacular job of taking care of exactly his own
people -- the wealthy, the corporate, the extreme
religious right, his core base of supporters -- while
happily and fiercely ignoring, restricting,
condemning, destroying the rest. Are you educated or
progressive or liberal or alternative-minded or
sexually open or homosexual or anti-war? This means
you. Are you dirt poor and belong to a minority and
don't drive an SUV and contribute six figures per
annum to the RNC and maybe live in a flooded swamp in
the Louisiana bayou? This means you, squared. Sucker.

Here, then, is the new American motto, as reimagined
by BushCo: Give us your tired, your poor, your huddled
masses, and we'll let them die in a filthy and
decrepit storm-ravaged American football stadium while
our president languishes on vacation and ponders his
oil futures and fondly remembers his good ol' days of
getting drunk at Mardi Gras before going AWOL from the
military. God bless America.

Fox gets a Clue. Wow.

OMFG.... who woulda thunk it.

Fox. Yep, Fox News. yes, the mouthpiece of the NeoCons... That Fox.

Fox Gets a Clue. Astonishing.....

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,169041,00.html

for more stuff on Fox News check out the blog:

www.newshounds.com

Winterbear

Who to blame, who to blame

Blanche,

I have seen this kind of thing talked about in various news outlets, web sites and on msnbc and cnn. Nobody is faulting the federal response before the event. The problems is what happened from Tuesday until now and into the future.

Local and state wide failures were also horrendous. if your going to start assigning blame, mayor and the Governor are for sure on the list.

But, the failure of the federal government was huge and I think the reasons for that failure were the following:

1) Lowering the status of FEMA from a Cabinet Position to a sub organization within HomeLand Security. In a time of Crisis, this extra level of bureaucracy got people killed.

2) In the last 4 years FEMA has been given a lot more to do (Terrorist response) while having its budget cut. One former employee of FEMA claims that this lack of focus on FEMA's traditional role got a lot of people killed. Many current and former FEMA employees are speaking out and expressing same in whats happened to their organization.

3) The last two directors of FEMA have been hand picked political appointees who have almost no experience at disaster relief and have made some terrible decisions that got a lot of people killed. Both were appointed to this "Plum" posting because of the work they did for the election campaigns.

4) Michael Brown, Current director of FEMA has no executive management experiance, has no experiance with any form of disaster or emergency response. His previous job was with the International Arabian Horse Association as a lawyer. According to people at the association, he was fired for gross incompetence and the association had to change its name because it was bankrupted.

5) President Bush didnt get engaged and didnt take this seriously quickly enough. That got a lot of people killed. He has created an environment around himself where no one tells him bad news so he didnt really find out there was a problem until late wednesday. And they he did not take charge of the situation and kick butts to fix the problem until Friday and some are saying that was pretty weak. He congratulated his cronies for doing a good job when things were completely out of control.

Blanche, please stop watching fox news. They are trying to spin this whole thing as a failure at the local level. It was that, but its shameful how the Bush administration is ultimately to blame for the failure at the federal level.

We live in a wonderful time where incompetent politicians can no longer control information. Google around a bit and find people who are reporting the truth. Dont trust the left wing blogs or the right wing either... but get the real story... its out there and available via the net.

Who's on First, FEMA addition

HorsesAss.Org: "Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff and FEMA director Michael Brown: make headway%u2026
Chertoff: All I%u2019m tryin%u2019 to find out is what%u2019s the guy%u2019s name in charge of food and water.
Brown: : Oh, no, wait a minute, don%u2019t switch %u2018em around. What is in charge of evacuation.
Chertoff: I%u2019m not askin%u2019 you who%u2019s in charge of evacuation.
Brown: : Who is on food and water.
Chertoff: I don%u2019t know!
Brown: : He%u2019s in charge of media spin%u2026now we%u2019re not talkin%u2019 %u2019bout him.
Chertoff: Now, how did I get on media spin?
Brown: : You mentioned his name!
Chertoff: If I mentioned the media spin guy%u2019s name, who did I say is in charge of media spin?
Brown: : No%u2026Who%u2019s in charge of food and water.
Chertoff: Never mind food and water, I wanna know what%u2019s the guy%u2019s name in charge of media spin.
Brown: : No, What%u2019s in charge of evacuation.
Chertoff: I%u2019m not askin%u2019 you who%u2019s in charge of evacuation!
Brown: : Who%u2019s in charge of food and water.
Chertoff: I don%u2019t know!
Brown: : He%u2019s in charge of media spin.
Chertoff: Aaah! Would you please stay on media spin and don%u2019t go off it?
Brown: : What was it you wanted?
Chertoff: Now who%u2019s in charge of media spin?
Brown: : Now why do you insist on putting Who in charge of media spin?
Chertoff: Why? Who am I putting over there?
Brown: : Yes. But we don%u2019t want him there.
Chertoff: What%u2019s the guy%u2019s name in charge of media spin?
Brown: : What is in charge of evacuation.
Chertoff: I%u2019m not askin%u2019 you who%u2019s in charge of evacuation.
Brown: : Who%u2019s in charge of food and water.
Chertoff: I don%u2019t know.
Brown: & Chertoff: MEDIA SPIN!!
Chertoff: You got someone in charge of fixing the levees?
Brown: : Oh yes!
Chertoff: The guy%u2019s name?
Brown: : Why.
Chertoff: I don%u2019t know, I just thought I%u2019d ask you.
Brown: : Well, I just thought I%u2019d tell you%u2026"

Hughes for America: Barbara Bush: First Moron

Hughes for America: Barbara Bush: First Moron: "Barbara Bush: First Moron

What the hell was Barbara Bush thinking when she said this today on National Public Radio's 'Marketplace' (Crooks and Liars has the audio)?In a segment at the top of the show on the surge of evacuees to the Texas city, Barbara Bush said: 'Almost everyone I%u2019ve talked to says we're going to move to Houston.'

Then she added: 'What I%u2019m hearing is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality.

'And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this %u2013 this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.'Yeah, if by 'working very well' you mean 'their worst fear realized,' then you'd be onto something, Barbara. Making light of the victims being underprivileged while also making light of the fact they're displaced largely because of your incompetent son's criminal negligence: Now that's what I call a Texas two-step!"

-----------------
Barbra is like an awful lot of older American women who voted for George W in the last election. I know for a fact that her thought process here is exactly like that of my mother.

My Mom doesnt want to hear about any bad news. She watches Fox because "there are lots of possitive things going on in Iraq too." and she would rather hear stories of happy evacuees in shelters than about floating bodies and hellish conditions at the convention center.

So, she can honestly say "everything appears to be going well... the problems are being taken care of. This was a massive disaster and some people got hurt but you cant blame the Hurricane on the president"

I call it the "Happy Happy Hurrican Syndrome". Fox and to some extent the other news channels have made it possible for people to watch hours and hours of the news and never see anything that is in the least bit disturbing to their world view that everything is going well.

Florida compared to New Orleans - Bush's election year response to disaster

Whiskey Bar: Where There's a Will: "This catastrophe isn't a product of the anti-government biases of the conservative true believers; it's a product of the uses to which government has been put by the Mayberry Machiavellis and their GOP ward heelers in Congress.

Even the legally blind can see the Rovians are serious about the essential functions of government. It's just that in their value system, funneling federal money to sympathetic interest groups while simulatenously redistributing the tax burden away from those same groups are the two essential functions of government.

Likewise, the Bush family is prepared to spend almost unlimited amounts of federal money on preventative measures -- that is, on efforts to prevent them from losing an election.

It's instructive, on that score, to compare the current response to Hurricane Katrina (in which the Three Stooges apparently have seized control of the Federal Emergency Management Agency in a bloodless coup) with the administration's efforts on behalf of the voters of Florida following last year's triple storms -- Charley, Frances and Ivan.

True, the 2004 disasters didn't completely take down a major metropolitan area by turning its urban center into a bowl of shit soup. But the difference in the federal goverment's performance before, during and after those storms had passed is stlll rather striking. It appears there's something special about years divisible by two -- and particularly every other year divisible by two -- that can inspire amazing feats of bureaucratic energy and competence, at least in large, populous swing states."

Head of FEMA has an unlikely background

THE NEWS BLOG: "Head of FEMA has an unlikely backgroundBY MATT STEARNS AND SETH BORENSTEINKnight Ridder NewspapersWASHINGTON - (KRT) - From failed Republican congressional candidate to ousted 'czar' of an Arabian horse association, there was little in Michael D. Brown's background to prepare him for the fury of Hurricane Katrina.But as the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Brown now faces furious criticism of the federal response to the disaster that wiped out New Orleans and much of the Gulf Coast. He provoked some of it himself when he conceded that FEMA didn't know that thousands of refugees were trapped at New Orleans' convention center without food or water until officials heard it on the news.'He's done a hell of a job, because I'm not aware of any Arabian horses being killed in this storm,' said Kate Hale, former Miami-Dade emergency management chief. 'The world that this man operated in and the focus of this work does not in any way translate to this. He does not have the experience.'Brown ran for Congress in 1988 and won 27 percent of the vote against Democratic incumbent Glenn English. He spent the 1990s as judges and stewards commissioner of the International Arabian Horse Association. His job was to ensure that horse-show judges followed the rules and to investigate allegations against those suspected of cheating.'I wouldn't have regarded his position in the horse industry as a platform to where he is now,' said Tom Connelly, a former association president."

The 14 characteristics of Fascism

Dr. Lawrence Britt has examined the fascist regimes of Hitler (Germany), Mussolini (Italy), Franco (Spain), Suharto (Indonesia) and several Latin American regimes. Britt found 14 defining characteristics common to each:

1. Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.

2. Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of "need." The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, long incarcerations of prisoners, etc.

3. Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: racial , ethnic or religious minorities; liberals; communists; socialists, terrorists, etc.

4. Supremacy of the Military - Even when there are widespread
domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.

5. Rampant Sexism - The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional gender roles are made more rigid. Divorce, abortion and homosexuality are suppressed and the state is represented as the ultimate guardian of the family institution.

6. Controlled Mass Media - Sometimes to media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation, or sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Censorship, especially in war time, is very common.

7. Obsession with National Security - Fear is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.

8. Religion and Government are Intertwined - Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government's policies or actions.

9. Corporate Power is Protected - The industrial and business aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.

10. Labor Power is Suppressed - Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

11. Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to higher education, and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts and letters is openly attacked.

12. Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Under fascist regimes, the police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego civil liberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.

13. Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

14. Fraudulent Elections - Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by smear campaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

tonypierce.com busblog

This president of ours, youre right, had to do something after 9/11, but what he did was start a trillion dollar war with a country that had no wmds, no ties to al queda, and was not responsible for 9/11.

He turned a terrible moment which had created the largest outpouring of support for the usa into what we have now which is a moment in time when we are currently despised by more nations than ever before.there are times when we can show our teeth but we have to show them to the right people and we have not done that. there are times when we should dethrone tyrants but we chose the wrong tyrant.the majority of the terrorists of 9/11 were saudi, a land of run by much more stronger tyrants than saddam and a country that most say are supplying the majority of insurgents. but we wont fight the real fight because bush is in bed with the saudis. if anything we have proven that the us military, as strong as it is, cannot win battles alone, and the world is too smart to enter into wars that they know are unjust. this is not a world war. this is the us and the brits fighting a war that they lied about against a phantom enemy that did not attack us four years ago.

We will continue to lose, and there will continue to be anarchy in that country until we get out of there and let the iraqi people stand up for themselves and determine their own future, which very well may be another dictator.

All george bush has done is kill hundreds of thousands of people, ruin our relationships with the world, and waste money we didnt have."

The Project for the New American Century

The People versus the Powerful is the oldest story in human history. At no point in history have the Powerful wielded so much control. At no point in history has the active and informed involvement of the People, all of them, been more absolutely required.

William Rivers Pitt: 02/25/03

The Project for the New American Century, or PNAC, is a Washington-based think tank created in 1997. Above all else, PNAC desires and demands one thing: The establishment of a global American empire to bend the will of all nations. They chafe at the idea that the United States, the last remaining superpower, does not do more by way of economic and military force to bring the rest of the world under the umbrella of a new socio-economic Pax Americana.

VERBATIM QUOTES FROM WHEN CLINTON WAS COMMITTING TROOPS TO BOSNIA

DW: "VERBATIM QUOTES FROM WHEN CLINTON WAS COMMITTING TROOPS TO BOSNIA:

'You can support the troops but not the president.'--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

'Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years.'--Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

'Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?'--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

'[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy.'--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

'American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy.'--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

'If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy.'--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush

'I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area.'--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

'I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today'--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

'Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is.'--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX) "

Someone Tell the President the War Is Over - New York Times

Someone Tell the President the War Is Over - New York Times: "Someone Tell the President the War Is Over

By FRANK RICH

Published: August 14, 2005

LIKE the Japanese soldier marooned on an island for years after V-J Day, President Bush may be the last person in the country to learn that for Americans, if not Iraqis, the war in Iraq is over. 'We will stay the course,' he insistently tells us from his Texas ranch. What do you mean we, white man?
Skip to next paragraph

A president can't stay the course when his own citizens (let alone his own allies) won't stay with him. The approval rate for Mr. Bush's handling of Iraq plunged to 34 percent in last weekend's Newsweek poll - a match for the 32 percent that approved L.B.J.'s handling of Vietnam in early March 1968. (The two presidents' overall approval ratings have also converged: 41 percent for Johnson then, 42 percent for Bush now.) On March 31, 1968, as L.B.J.'s ratings plummeted further, he announced he wouldn't seek re-election, commencing our long extrication from that quagmire."

STONES PUT TODAY'S ROCK STARS TO SHAME

LOW RENT RAT ...blog it with attitude...: "STONES PUT TODAY'S ROCK STARS TO SHAME
Why is it that The 60 plus Rolling Stones are willing to stand up against the Bush cult while others do nothing?


Back in 91 they wrote Highwire, one of the few, if any, anti-war songs about the first Gulf War:

We sell 'em missiles, We sell 'em tanks
We give 'em credit, You can call the bank
It's just a business, You can pay us in crude
You love these toys, just go play out your feuds
Got no pride, don't know whose boots to lick
We act so greedy, makes me sick sick sick

14 years and another Bush presidency later, the Stones are back speaking truth to power:

You call yourself a Christian, I call you a hypocrite,

You call yourself a patriot. Well, I think you are full of shit!

The Stones! The fucking Rolling Granda Pa Stones!

Why is it that they are doing what this generation has failed so miserably to do? HUH?

Where are the Hip hop stars? Too busy rappin about bling?

Where are the rock stars? Too busy being afraid? Don't want to piss off the corporate media who will ban you from MTV's cribs?

Do you mean to tell me when Rage against the Machine left, they took the only set of balls that today's music 'artist' have?

In this day and age. An age were young people are dying in an unjust war.

Where a president acts like a gangsta. That we have NO ONE speaking out against it in the music community is a damning statement about our society today.

Are we that infatuated with bullshit? With reality TV? With wanting to be a fucking Hilton, that we no longer care????
Sweet Jesus! We are wallowing in the toilet bowl of history...



"

we did it to ourselves...

We did it to ourselves incrementally and with few misgivings.

Huge personal info databases? We created the technology and wrote the code to make it possible. We gave the information when asked, because we didnt want the hassle that would occur when we said "no, thats none of your business".

We accepted the notion of Social Security and believed the government when they told us that SS's would *never* be used for identification except by the SSA.
We elected officials based on the performance of the economy which encouraged them to stay out of the way of businesses as they tracked, junk-mailed, and spammed us.

We accepted the transition from cash to credit cards because we liked the convenience never blanching at the fact that we were leaving a paper trail for ourselves every month.

We accepted the notion that the First Amendment was all about the right to any kind of free speech whatsoever, even commercial junk mail by corporations, who are persons only as a legal convenience.

We were so scared of sexual predators in our schools that we willingly asked the government to take fingerprints of every school employee to match against their databases.

And above all, we clamored for greater security in our own countr. We accepted the 9/11 commission report because losing all of our rights seemed more palatable and *less likely* than our becoming the next Twin Towers victims.

Has government and business taken away our privacy? Yes... but only because we wanted them to."

Why World War IV Can't Sell - by John Brown and Tom Engelhardt

Why World War IV Can't Sell - by John Brown and Tom Engelhardt: "

''I have to infer from that (statement) that you would be happier if Saddam
Hussein were still in power.' - Paul Wolfowitz.

'It's the classic retort given by neocons and other war supporters when
anyone questions the wisdom of the Iraq War. But let's say I get disturbed
by a spider crawling the garage wall. I slam the car into it at 50 miles an
hour, destroying the car and causing a few thousand dollars in damage to the
garage. When my wife objects, I say: 'I have to infer from that statement that
you would be happier if that spider were still crawling up the wall.' No, schmuck,
she says, I'd be happier if we still had a car and didn't have to fork out ten
thousand dollars to fix the garage.'"

Did Bush's opertunistic terror alert and claims of arrests cause the London bombings?

This is amazing... and is one of the most incompetent things the Bush admin has ever done.


Bush admin may be responsible for botching effort to thwart London bombing

NPR : Maintaining Focus: Rove and Iraq War Data

NPR : Maintaining Focus: Rove and Iraq War Data: "NPR Senior News Analyst Daniel Schorr says that the real issue in the Karl Rove controversy is not a leak, but a war, and how America was misled into that war.

SOCIOECONOMICS: 7/7 Attacks and Arrogance

SOCIOECONOMICS: 7/7 Attacks and Arrogance: "Be it Al-Qaida or not, most people today are suffering from the actions of those who believe to be in the possession of ultimate truth, and do not feel a need to check their premises or try and see the world from other viewpoints."

The Mess You Have Made Will Take Generations to Clean Up

Take it to Karl: "Army Aviator: The Mess You Have Made Will Take Generations to Clean Up
From the mailbag:Karl Rove politicized one of the darkest days in American history, and rather than apologize he says he was 'refering to MoveOn.org' or some other lie, and it makes me sick. These neo-cons are causing American men and women to die daily for a lie, they are running up an Enron style debt and they refuse to take responsibility for their actions. Quote this: Their slow but deadly hemorraging of this country's resources and their naive and boneheaded disaster in Iraq is a much greater threat to our security than al Quada and all the terror organizations anywhere in the world. Combined. The mess you have made will take generations to clean up. "

The US war with Iran has already begun

Aljazeera.Net - The US war with Iran has already begun
: "

The violation of a sovereign nation's airspace is an act of war in and of itself.�But the war with Iran has gone far beyond the intelligence gathering phase.The reality is that the US war with Iran has already begun.�As we speak, American over flights of Iranian soil are taking place, using pilotless drones and other, more sophisticated, capabilities.The violation of a sovereign nation's airspace is an act of war in and of itself.�But the war with Iran has gone far beyond the intelligence-gathering phase.� President Bush has taken advantage of the sweeping powers granted to him in the aftermath of 11 September 2001, to wage a global war against terror and to initiate several covert offensive operations inside Iran.The most visible of these is the CIA-backed actions recently undertaken by the Mujahadeen el-Khalq, or MEK, an Iranian opposition group, once run by Saddam Hussein's dreaded intelligence services, but now working exclusively for the CIA's Directorate of Operations.It is bitter irony that the CIA is using a group still labelled as a terrorist organisation, a group trained in the art of explosive assassination by the same intelligence units of the former regime of Saddam Hussein, who are slaughtering American soldiers in Iraq today, to carry out remote bombings in Iran of the sort that the Bush administration condemns on a daily basis inside Iraq. Perhaps the adage of 'one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist' has finally been embraced by the White House, exposing as utter hypocrisy the entire underlying notions governing the ongoing global war on terror."

Two Years Before 9/11, Bush was Already Talking About Attacking Iraq

Two Years Before 9/11, Bush was Already Talking About Attacking Iraq: "Two years before the September 11 attacks, presidential candidate George W. Bush was already talking privately about the political benefits of attacking Iraq, according to his former ghost writer, who held many conversations with then-Texas Governor Bush in preparation for a planned autobiography.

'He was thinking about invading Iraq in 1999,' said author and journalist Mickey Herskowitz. 'It was on his mind. He said to me: 'One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as a commander-in-chief.' And he said, 'My father had all this political capital built up when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it.' He said, 'If I have a chance to invade�.if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and I'm going to have a successful presidency.'
Herskowitz said that Bush expressed frustration at a lifetime as an underachiever in the shadow of an accomplished father. In aggressive military action, he saw the opportunity to emerge from his father's shadow. The moment, Herskowitz said, came in the wake of the September 11 attacks. 'Suddenly, he's at 91 percent in the polls, and he'd barely crawled out of the bunker.'

That President Bush and his advisers had Iraq on their minds long before weapons inspectors had finished their work - and long before alleged Iraqi ties with terrorists became a central rationale for war - has been raised elsewhere, including in a book based on recollections of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill. However, Herskowitz was in a unique position to hear Bush's unguarded and unfiltered views on Iraq, war and other matters - well before he became president."

the people can be lead into war if they think they are attacked - Herman Goering

Urban Legends Reference Pages: Questionable Quotes (Hermann Goering):

"Of course the people don't want war. But after all, it's the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it's always a simple matter to drag the people along whether it's a democracy, a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
-- Herman Goering at the Nuremberg trials

"Goering was one of the highest-ranking Nazis who survived to be captured and put on trial for war crimes in the city of Nuremberg by the Allies after the end of World War II.

His comments were made privately to Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking intelligence officer and psychologist who was granted free access by the Allies to all the prisoners held in the Nuremberg jail. Gilbert recorded Goering's observations that the common people can always be manipulated into supporting and fighting wars by their political leaders:


"We got around to the subject of war again and I said that, contrary to his attitude, I did not think that the common people are very thankful for leaders who bring them war and destruction.
'Why, of course, the people don't want war,' Goering shrugged.

'Why would some poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best that he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece. Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship.'

'There is one difference,' I pointed out. 'In a democracy the people have some say in the matter through their elected representatives, and in the United States only Congress can declare wars.'

'Oh, that is all well and good, but, voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.'"

I Used To Be a Neocon by Drew O'Neill

I Used To Be a Neocon by Drew O'Neill: "This
is a difficult trick that requires the media to be an active participant
in government deception. To imply that they do so knowingly would
be too conspiratorial, and it would be too grand an operation to
be plausible. In truth, the mainstream media does not believe they
are participating in lies.

During the build-up to the war they were being pulled without knowing it,
by the engine of the U. S. government. This swarm of nationalism
begat a pro-American media, a complacent media, a lapdog media and
a corporate media that to this day will not inform the American
public.

When the Bush Administration was found to be creating fake news propaganda
for public consumption the media did not inform the public. When
the Bush administration marched towards pre-emptive war with Iraq
the media was a lapdog instead of a watchdog. When the Bush administration
described the assault on the Iraqi public as Shock and Awe, the
media used that phrase to scroll alongside the words 'War on
Terror' without questioning if the assault on Iraq had anything
to do with terrorism. When the Bush Administration tore into the
U. S. Constitution with the Patriot Act, causing the illegal imprisonment
of American citizens while denying them counsel, the media acted
more like a timid cocker spaniel than an aggressive Doberman pincher,
and failed to defend a sacred American document. When the Downing
Street memo implicated the Bush Administration as being hell bent
on a pre-emptive invasion on Iraq before even going to the UN, the
American media was silent and once again failed to inform the public.

But the tiny wheels still want to call the media liberal. The tiny wheels
still want to say the media is not reporting the good things happening
in Iraq. Most of all the tiny wheels do not know about the big wheel
that is pulling them. But now I do. That is why I am an ex-neocon
and I am in recovery. It is more clear to me now than ever that the
most American thing one can do is speak out against the actions
of their country because it means you love your country.

And in the end it does not matter if we are liberals or conservatives
because all that matters is that we are on the side of the U.S.
Constitution and of international law. Both of which have been thrown into the
toilet by this administration. At least the Quran has company."

Startling new underground group spreads lack of panic!

Startling new underground group spreads lack of panic!
Citizens declare themselves "relatively unafraid" of threats of undeclared rationality. People can still go to France, terrorist leader says.

Jon Carroll
Friday, April 8, 2005

The following is the first communique from a group calling itself Unitarian Jihad. It was sent to me at The Chronicle via an anonymous spam remailer. I have no idea whether other news organizations have received this communique, and, if so, why they have not chosen to print it. Perhaps they fear starting a panic. I feel strongly that the truth, no matter how alarming, trivial or disgusting, must always be told. I am pleased to report that the words below are at least not disgusting:

Greetings to the Imprisoned Citizens of the United States. We are Unitarian Jihad. There is only God, unless there is more than one God. The vote of our God subcommittee is 10-8 in favor of one God, with two abstentions.Brother Flaming Sword of Moderation noted the possibility of there being no God at all, and his objection was noted with love by the secretary.

Greetings to the Imprisoned Citizens of the United States! Too long has your attention been waylaid by the bright baubles of extremist thought. Too long have fundamentalist yahoos of all religions (except Buddhism -- 14-5 vote, no abstentions, fundamentalism subcommittee) made your head hurt. Too long have you been buffeted by angry people who think that God talks to them. You have a right to your moderation! You have the power to be calm! We will use the IED of truth to explode the SUV of dogmatic expression!

People of the United States, why is everyone yelling at you??? Whatever happened to ... you know, everything? Why is the news dominated by nutballs saying that the Ten Commandments have to be tattooed inside the eyelids of every American, or that Allah has told them to kill Americans in order to rid the world of Satan, or that Yahweh has instructed them to go live wherever they feel like, or that Shiva thinks bombing mosques is a great idea? Sister Immaculate Dagger of Peace notes for the record that we mean no disrespect to Jews, Muslims, Christians or Hindus. Referred back to the committee of the whole for further discussion.

We are Unitarian Jihad. We are everywhere. We have not been born again, nor have we sworn a blood oath. We do not think that God cares what we read, what we eat or whom we sleep with. Brother Neutron Bomb of Serenity notes for the record that he does not have a moral code but is nevertheless a good person, and Unexalted Leader Garrote of Forgiveness stipulates that Brother Neutron Bomb of Serenity is a good person, and this is to be reflected in the minutes.

Beware! Unless you people shut up and begin acting like grown-ups with brains enough to understand the difference between political belief and personal faith, the Unitarian Jihad will begin a series of terrorist-like actions. We will take over television studios, kidnap so-called commentators and broadcast calm, well-reasoned discussions of the issues of the day. We will not try for "balance" by hiring fruitcakes; we will try for balance by hiring non-ideologues who have carefully thought through the issues.

We are Unitarian Jihad. We will appear in public places and require people to shake hands with each other. (Sister Hand Grenade of Love suggested that we institute a terror regime of mandatory hugging, but her motion was not formally introduced because of lack of a quorum.) We will require all lobbyists, spokesmen and campaign managers to dress like trout in public. Televangelists will be forced to take jobs as Xerox repair specialists. Demagogues of all stripes will be required to read Proust out loud in prisons.

We are Unitarian Jihad, and our motto is: "Sincerity is not enough." We have heard from enough sincere people to last a lifetime already. Just because you believe it's true doesn't make it true. Just because your motives are pure doesn't mean you are not doing harm. Get a dog, or comfort someone in a nursing home, or just feed the birds in the park. Play basketball. Lighten up. The world is not out to get you, except in the sense that the world is out to get everyone.

Brother Gatling Gun of Patience notes that he's pretty sure the world is out to get him because everyone laughs when he says he is a Unitarian. There were murmurs of assent around the room, and someone suggested that we buy some Congress members and really stick it to the Baptists. But this was deemed against Revolutionary Principles, and Brother Gatling Gun of Patience was remanded to the Sunday Flowers and Banners committee.

People of the United States! We are Unitarian Jihad! We can strike without warning. Pockets of reasonableness and harmony will appear as if from nowhere! Nice people will run the government again! There will be coffee and cookies in the Gandhi Room after the revolution.

The president's real goal in Iraq

The president's real goal in Iraq :

"The official story on Iraq has never made sense. The connection that the Bush administration has tried to draw between Iraq and al-Qaida has always seemed contrived and artificial. In fact, it was hard to believe that smart people in the Bush administration would start a major war based on such flimsy evidence.

The pieces just didn't fit. Something else had to be going on; something was missing.

In recent days, those missing pieces have finally begun to fall into place. As it turns out, this is not really about Iraq. It is not about weapons of mass destruction, or terrorism, or Saddam, or U.N. resolutions.

 This war, should it come, is intended to mark the official emergence of the United States as a full-fledged global empire, seizing sole responsibility and authority as planetary policeman. It would be the culmination of a plan 10 years or more in the making, carried out by those who believe the United States must seize the opportunity for global domination, even if it means becoming the 'American imperialists' that our enemies always claimed we were.

Once that is understood, other mysteries solve themselves. For example, why does the administration seem unconcerned about an exit strategy from Iraq once Saddam is toppled?

Because we won't be leaving. Having conquered Iraq, the United States will create permanent military bases in that country from which to dominate the Middle East, including neighboring Iran."

Read the entire article...

testing one two three...

this is just a test of MarsEdit.

Mathew Gross: The Politics of Victimization

Mathew Gross: The Politics of Victimization:

"Watch Dan Rather apologize for not getting his facts straight, humiliated before the eyes of America, voluntarily undermining his credibility and career of over thirty years. Observe Donna Brazille squirm as she is ridiculed by Bay Buchanan, and pronounced irrelevant and nearly non-existent. Listen as Donna and Nancy Pelosi and Senator Charles Schumer take to the airwaves saying that they have to go back to the drawing board and learn from their mistakes and try to be better, more likable, more appealing, have a stronger message, speak to morality. Watch them awkwardly quote the bible, trying to speak the new language of America. Surf the blogs, and read the comments of dismayed, discombobulated, confused individuals trying to figure out what they did wrong. Hear the cacophony of voices, crying out, “Why did they beat me?”


And then ask anyone who has ever worked in a domestic violence shelter if they have heard this before.


They will tell you, every single day.


The answer is quite simple. They beat us because they are abusers. We can call it hate. We can call it fear. We can say it is unfair. But we are looped into the cycle of violence, and we need to start calling the dominating side what they are: abusive. And we need to recognize that we are the victims of verbal, mental, and even, in the case of Iraq, physical violence.


As victims we can’t stop asking ourselves what we did wrong. We can’t seem to grasp that they will keep hitting us and beating us as long as we keep sticking around and asking ourselves what we are doing to deserve the beating.


Listen to George Bush say that the will of God excuses his behavior. Listen, as he refuses to take responsibility, or express remorse, or even once, admit a mistake. Watch him strut, and tell us that he will only work with those who agree with him, and that each of us is only allowed one question (soon, it will be none at all; abusers hit hard when questioned; the press corps can tell you that). See him surround himself with only those who pledge oaths of allegiance. Hear him tell us that if we will only listen and do as he says and agree with his every utterance, all will go well for us (it won’t; we will never be worthy).


And watch the Democratic Party leadership walk on eggshells, try to meet him, please him, wash the windows better, get out that spot, distance themselves from gays and civil rights. See them cry for the attention and affection and approval of the President and his followers. Watch us squirm. Watch us descend into a world of crazy-making, where logic does not work and the other side tells us we are nuts when we rely on facts. A world where, worst of all, we begin to believe we are crazy.


How to break free? Again, the answer is quite simple.


First, you must admit you are a victim. Then, you must declare the state of affairs unacceptable. Next, you must promise to protect yourself and everyone around you that is being victimized. You don’t do this by responding to their demands, or becoming more like them, or engaging in logical conversation, or trying to persuade them that you are right. You also don’t do this by going catatonic and resigned, by closing up your ears and eyes and covering your head and submitting to the blows, figuring its over faster and hurts less is you don’t resist and fight back. Instead, you walk away. You find other folks like yourself, 56 million of them, who are hurting, broken, and beating themselves up. You tell them what you’ve learned, and that you aren’t going to take it anymore. You stand tall, with 56 million people at your side and behind you, and you look right into the eyes of the abuser and you tell him to go to hell. Then you walk out the door, taking the kids and gays and minorities with you, and you start a new life. The new life is hard. But it’s better than the abuse."

Pictures from Fallujah that probably won't be on your television.

Fallujah in Pictures

Quotes from Ben Laden tape

you must admit that Osama bin Laden was far more articulate and direct about the causes of 9/11 than both Kerry and Bush, who call it "terror" and refuse to think about it too much. Like someone else observed, both candidates are asserting "We be tough on terrorism" "I'm tough too, very tough" "terror is evil and I will fight it will he?" "I will fight it harder" as both candidates are desperate not to challenge the comfort of their constituencies with any semblance of thought. God forbid anything that forces self-examination. Because that is exactly what America has done - call it "evil", call it "terrorism", vow to "fight" it (can you really fight an ideology?) and refuse to address any American defects. The "we never do nothing wrong - they are EVIL" rhetorical approach is a wonderful way to avoid addressing real issues. The fact is that America is falling deeper and deeper into an illusionary world, where any show of strength is close enough to actual accomplishment. In truth, far from fighting the ideology created from American imperialism - the ideology that culminated in 9/11 - America has nourished it.

No, no, anything but self-examination. We've branded Osama bin Laden as "evil", so we're not going to listen to him. CNN is going to censor the tape so we don't have to consider any of the more controversial things he said, and in the interests of defending "freedom", U.S. authorities around the Arab world will try to stop his alternate world view being aired at all (al-Jazeera ignored their requests not to air it).

"All that we have to do is to send two Mujahideen to the furthest point East to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there to cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses without their achieving for it anything of note other than some benefits for their private companies...And so it has appeared to some analysts and diplomats that the White House and us are playing as one team towards the economic goals of the United States, even if the intentions differ... So we are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy." Can anyone deny that Osama bin Laden has been nothing but successful? Al-Qaeda may have been hurt since 9/11 (I personally think they've just become more decentralized), but in the process, America has hurt themselves more. Who is winning in this thoughtless show of "strength"?

Frankly, I am wondering if America is going to strengthen itself into its grave. What Osama bin Laden did on 9/11 was horrific, but was it more horrific than the years and years of the U.S.'s post-WWII interventionist policies? What about their toll, both in civilian lives and in the loss of self-determination, of U.S. foreign policy? Let's think about our world, here. Our world's most powerful nation claims to fight for freedom but suppresses its own citizens' with the Patriot Act and offhand practices like "free speech zones." Our most powerful nation pretends to fight "evil" by killing tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. So its (new) prime enemy responds to America's brutality with more brutality; America responds in kind. What an uninspiring world this is. Isn't anyone going to do any good? Does such a thing exist? Is there only the pursuit of our own pragmatic interest, the lives of civilians, children be damned? If that's the case, what exactly are the differences between the U.S. and al-Qaeda?

Are we making more ben Ladins? - M. Kane Jeeves

M. Kane Jeeves: "rage. We know he’s a madman. We are all still outraged about 9/11.


But, if I had to sum up the editorial content of this tape? It boils down to one thing. Actions have consequences. I know it’s an idea that we haven’t heard bandied about for the last four years but, think about it. If bin Laden was inspired by an incident nearly twenty years before 9/11?


Who are we inspiring now in Iraq?


100,000 Iraqi civilians dead, conservatively.


What happens if we pull a “Dresden” on Fallujah?


Suppose we are forced to send in more troops because the Iraqi National Guard winds up just not cutting it?


How many more bin Ladens are judging this entire country by this Administration’s Crusade…right now? They’re ten, maybe eleven years old today.


Twenty years from now?


God help us."

Ron Suskind claims we are an empire that creates its own reality

The Smirking Chimp: "The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community.'... I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality – judiciously, as you will – we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors ... and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.'
-- Ron Suskind talking to senior Bush advisor, The New York Times Magazine"