Dave Winer (www.scripting.com) has done it again! agrigation oif all the RNC blogs.
RNC 2004 Weblogs: News Aggregator: "A community site for bloggers participating in the RNC, Aug 30-Sep 2 "
Saturday, August 28, 2004
Deserter's Delight - letter to bush by Michael Moore
AlterNet: Election 2004: Deserter's Delight: "Dear Mr. Bush: It takes real courage to desert your post and then attack a wounded vet."
We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore by garrison keylor
We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore: How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk? -- In These Times:
We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore
How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?
Something has gone seriously haywire with the Republican Party. Once, it was the party of pragmatic Main Street businessmen in steel-rimmed spectacles who decried profligacy and waste, were devoted to their communities and supported the sort of prosperity that raises all ships. They were good-hearted people who vanquished the gnarlier elements of their party, the paranoid Roosevelt-haters, the flat Earthers and Prohibitionists, the antipapist antiforeigner element. The genial Eisenhower was their man, a genuine American hero of D-Day, who made it OK for reasonable people to vote Republican. He brought the Korean War to a stalemate, produced the Interstate Highway System, declined to rescue the French colonial army in Vietnam, and gave us a period of peace and prosperity, in which (oddly) American arts and letters flourished and higher education burgeoned—and there was a degree of plain decency in the country. Fifties Republicans were giants compared to today’s. Richard Nixon was the last Republican leader to feel a Christian obligation toward the poor.
In the years between Nixon and Newt Gingrich, the party migrated southward down the Twisting Trail of Rhetoric and sneered at the idea of public service and became the Scourge of Liberalism, the Great Crusade Against the Sixties, the Death Star of Government, a gang of pirates that diverted and fascinated the media by their sheer chutzpah, such as the misty-eyed flag-waving of Ronald Reagan who, while George McGovern flew bombers in World War II, took a pass and made training films in Long Beach. The Nixon moderate vanished like the passenger pigeon, purged by a legion of angry white men who rose to power on pure punk politics. “Bipartisanship is another term of date rape,” says Grover Norquist, the Sid Vicious of the GOP. “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.” The boy has Oedipal problems and government is his daddy.
The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.
Rich ironies abound! Lies pop up like toadstools in the forest! Wild swine crowd round the public trough! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! Hypocrisies shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age reincarnated gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of Divine Grace.
Here in 2004, George W. Bush is running for reelection on a platform of tragedy—the single greatest failure of national defense in our history, the attacks of 9/11 in which 19 men with box cutters put this nation into a tailspin, a failure the details of which the White House fought to keep secret even as it ran the country into hock up to the hubcaps, thanks to generous tax cuts for the well-fixed, hoping to lead us into a box canyon of debt that will render government impotent, even as we engage in a war against a small country that was undertaken for the president’s personal satisfaction but sold to the American public on the basis of brazen misinformation, a war whose purpose is to distract us from an enormous transfer of wealth taking place in this country, flowing upward, and the deception is working beautifully.
The concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few is the death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has survived this. The election of 2004 will say something about what happens to ours. The omens are not good."
We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore
How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?
Something has gone seriously haywire with the Republican Party. Once, it was the party of pragmatic Main Street businessmen in steel-rimmed spectacles who decried profligacy and waste, were devoted to their communities and supported the sort of prosperity that raises all ships. They were good-hearted people who vanquished the gnarlier elements of their party, the paranoid Roosevelt-haters, the flat Earthers and Prohibitionists, the antipapist antiforeigner element. The genial Eisenhower was their man, a genuine American hero of D-Day, who made it OK for reasonable people to vote Republican. He brought the Korean War to a stalemate, produced the Interstate Highway System, declined to rescue the French colonial army in Vietnam, and gave us a period of peace and prosperity, in which (oddly) American arts and letters flourished and higher education burgeoned—and there was a degree of plain decency in the country. Fifties Republicans were giants compared to today’s. Richard Nixon was the last Republican leader to feel a Christian obligation toward the poor.
In the years between Nixon and Newt Gingrich, the party migrated southward down the Twisting Trail of Rhetoric and sneered at the idea of public service and became the Scourge of Liberalism, the Great Crusade Against the Sixties, the Death Star of Government, a gang of pirates that diverted and fascinated the media by their sheer chutzpah, such as the misty-eyed flag-waving of Ronald Reagan who, while George McGovern flew bombers in World War II, took a pass and made training films in Long Beach. The Nixon moderate vanished like the passenger pigeon, purged by a legion of angry white men who rose to power on pure punk politics. “Bipartisanship is another term of date rape,” says Grover Norquist, the Sid Vicious of the GOP. “I don’t want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.” The boy has Oedipal problems and government is his daddy.
The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.
Rich ironies abound! Lies pop up like toadstools in the forest! Wild swine crowd round the public trough! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! Hypocrisies shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age reincarnated gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of Divine Grace.
Here in 2004, George W. Bush is running for reelection on a platform of tragedy—the single greatest failure of national defense in our history, the attacks of 9/11 in which 19 men with box cutters put this nation into a tailspin, a failure the details of which the White House fought to keep secret even as it ran the country into hock up to the hubcaps, thanks to generous tax cuts for the well-fixed, hoping to lead us into a box canyon of debt that will render government impotent, even as we engage in a war against a small country that was undertaken for the president’s personal satisfaction but sold to the American public on the basis of brazen misinformation, a war whose purpose is to distract us from an enormous transfer of wealth taking place in this country, flowing upward, and the deception is working beautifully.
The concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few is the death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has survived this. The election of 2004 will say something about what happens to ours. The omens are not good."
Friday, August 27, 2004
Bush denies lack of focus on korean nukes
The New York Times > Washington > Campaign 2004 > Bush Dismisses Idea That Kerry Lied on Vietnam: "Mr. Bush also took issue with Mr. Kerry's argument, in an interview at the end of May with The New York Times, that the Bush administration's focus on Iraq had given North Korea the opportunity to significantly expand its nuclear capability. Showing none of the alarm about the North's growing arsenal that he once voiced regularly about Iraq, he opened his palms and shrugged when an interviewer noted that new intelligence reports indicate that the North may now have the fuel to produce six or eight nuclear weapons.
He said that in North Korea's case, and in Iran's, he would not be rushed to set deadlines for the countries to disarm, despite his past declaration that he would not 'tolerate'' nuclear capability in either nation. He declined to define what he meant by 'tolerate.''
'I don't think you give timelines to dictators,'' Mr. Bush said, speaking of North Korea's president, Kim Jong Il, and Iran's mullahs. He said he would continue diplomatic pressure - using China to pressure the North and Europe to pressure Iran - and gave no hint that his patience was limited or that at some point he might consider pre-emptive military action.
'I'm confident that over time this will work - I certainly hope it does,'' he said of the diplomatic approach. Mr. Kerry argued in his interview that North Korea ''was a far more compelling threat in many ways, and it belonged at the top of the agenda,'' but Mr. Bush declined to compare it to Iraq, apart from arguing that Iraq had defied the world community for longer than the other members of what he once called 'the axis of evil.'' Nor would he assess the risk that Pyongyang might sell nuclear material to terrorists, though his national security aides believe it may have sold raw uranium to Libya in recent years."
He said that in North Korea's case, and in Iran's, he would not be rushed to set deadlines for the countries to disarm, despite his past declaration that he would not 'tolerate'' nuclear capability in either nation. He declined to define what he meant by 'tolerate.''
'I don't think you give timelines to dictators,'' Mr. Bush said, speaking of North Korea's president, Kim Jong Il, and Iran's mullahs. He said he would continue diplomatic pressure - using China to pressure the North and Europe to pressure Iran - and gave no hint that his patience was limited or that at some point he might consider pre-emptive military action.
'I'm confident that over time this will work - I certainly hope it does,'' he said of the diplomatic approach. Mr. Kerry argued in his interview that North Korea ''was a far more compelling threat in many ways, and it belonged at the top of the agenda,'' but Mr. Bush declined to compare it to Iraq, apart from arguing that Iraq had defied the world community for longer than the other members of what he once called 'the axis of evil.'' Nor would he assess the risk that Pyongyang might sell nuclear material to terrorists, though his national security aides believe it may have sold raw uranium to Libya in recent years."
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Village voice on RNC Protest backlash
Note to the Anti-Intellectual Left: "The parallels between Chicago 1968 and New York 2004 are striking.
Then, as now, authorities are besotted with 'less lethal' technology that's intended to prevent disorder (back then it was Mace), but actually increases disorder by lowering the threshold at which cops are willing to use force.
Then, as now, police officials argued that the ACLU and the federal judges were putting them in danger by 'tying their hands.' When the cops lose some of these battles—as they did this year, with rulings against four-sided pens for demonstrators and general searches of bags—they get more afraid. That yields itchy fingers at the triggers of less-than-lethal implements.
Then, as now: the strategic mobilization of 'terrorists'—a word Mayor Richard Daley in 1968 used to describe the Black Panthers, who, some residents of the Cook County jail reported, were planning assassinations. The ever reliable FBI sent 60 extra agents, though the jailbirds had made it all up—which didn't prevent the city from announcing the 'threat' to the press afterward as ex post facto rationalization for law enforcement's rampage.
Then, as now: hovering, ruthless Republican presidential campaign operatives ready to seize on any advantage to win, who suspect that arrant attempts to frame the election as a choice between George W. Bush and 'chaos in the streets' will be enough, for some small margin of voters, to inch themselves to victory.
And, the most uncanny parallel of all: Events have seen to it—perhaps by Republican intention, perhaps not, it hardly matters which—that protesters this time, just like last time, have been rendered ready and eager to demonstrate, on the Sunday before the convention, in a physical location where the city has determined they may not demonstrate. Thus the stage may be set now—as it was then—for disaster.
"
Then, as now, authorities are besotted with 'less lethal' technology that's intended to prevent disorder (back then it was Mace), but actually increases disorder by lowering the threshold at which cops are willing to use force.
Then, as now, police officials argued that the ACLU and the federal judges were putting them in danger by 'tying their hands.' When the cops lose some of these battles—as they did this year, with rulings against four-sided pens for demonstrators and general searches of bags—they get more afraid. That yields itchy fingers at the triggers of less-than-lethal implements.
Then, as now: the strategic mobilization of 'terrorists'—a word Mayor Richard Daley in 1968 used to describe the Black Panthers, who, some residents of the Cook County jail reported, were planning assassinations. The ever reliable FBI sent 60 extra agents, though the jailbirds had made it all up—which didn't prevent the city from announcing the 'threat' to the press afterward as ex post facto rationalization for law enforcement's rampage.
Then, as now: hovering, ruthless Republican presidential campaign operatives ready to seize on any advantage to win, who suspect that arrant attempts to frame the election as a choice between George W. Bush and 'chaos in the streets' will be enough, for some small margin of voters, to inch themselves to victory.
And, the most uncanny parallel of all: Events have seen to it—perhaps by Republican intention, perhaps not, it hardly matters which—that protesters this time, just like last time, have been rendered ready and eager to demonstrate, on the Sunday before the convention, in a physical location where the city has determined they may not demonstrate. Thus the stage may be set now—as it was then—for disaster.
"
The Conscience of Joe Darby - GQ article on Abu Ghraib prison whistle blower
The Conscience of Joe Darby:
(Absolutely amazing article about the effects on Joe's family. Please read the entire article)
"Like, one thing Bernadette didn't know—because almost nobody knows it, because almost everybody who does know has either been lying or keeping it a secret—is the rest of the story, what really happened at Abu Ghraib. Oh, you hear allusions to the fact that certain things haven't been told, like Rumsfeld saying in May that the whole story is 'a good deal more terrible' than what you've seen. But you don't hear Rumsfeld saying any more than that, or explaining what 'more terrible' means.
You don't hear anybody explaining, for example, how Private Lynndie England, the woman in so many of those pictures, the one smiling and laughing and giving the thumbs-up, wasn't even supposed to be in the cellblock, how she didn't have any police authority and shouldn't have been dealing with inmates in the first place. You don't hear much of anything about her job, because the truth is, her job was something else entirely. Lynndie England was an administration clerk; not an MP like Joe but the equivalent of a secretary. 'She was assigned to an MP unit,' says Blake Ellis, a paralegal with England's defense team, 'but she wasn't an MP. She did not have any police authority. She was not supposed to be walking tiers or working with inmates.'
If you don't believe him, how about the brigadier general who ran the whole prison? Janis Karpinski says that England had absolutely no business working with inmates and suggests that the only reason England was on the cellblock was because her boyfriend, Charles Graner, had invited her. 'Graner's original claim, before he clammed up,' Karpinski says, 'was that the interrogators told him to get a female over there and he thought of her immediately.'
Sound like procedure to you?
Then there's Sivits. Guess what? Not an MP, either. No business being in a cellblock, no business interacting with detainees. This is a prison with 300 military police on duty, and they've got a mechanic up at one in the morning taking pictures while they terrorize prisoners."
That it really wasn't about softening prisoners, gathering intelligence, or trying to win the war. That it wasn't even about losing control in the heat of the moment. It was about getting up in the middle of the night and going somewhere you weren't supposed to go, then beating and raping people there. It was premeditated violent crime.
(Absolutely amazing article about the effects on Joe's family. Please read the entire article)
"Like, one thing Bernadette didn't know—because almost nobody knows it, because almost everybody who does know has either been lying or keeping it a secret—is the rest of the story, what really happened at Abu Ghraib. Oh, you hear allusions to the fact that certain things haven't been told, like Rumsfeld saying in May that the whole story is 'a good deal more terrible' than what you've seen. But you don't hear Rumsfeld saying any more than that, or explaining what 'more terrible' means.
You don't hear anybody explaining, for example, how Private Lynndie England, the woman in so many of those pictures, the one smiling and laughing and giving the thumbs-up, wasn't even supposed to be in the cellblock, how she didn't have any police authority and shouldn't have been dealing with inmates in the first place. You don't hear much of anything about her job, because the truth is, her job was something else entirely. Lynndie England was an administration clerk; not an MP like Joe but the equivalent of a secretary. 'She was assigned to an MP unit,' says Blake Ellis, a paralegal with England's defense team, 'but she wasn't an MP. She did not have any police authority. She was not supposed to be walking tiers or working with inmates.'
If you don't believe him, how about the brigadier general who ran the whole prison? Janis Karpinski says that England had absolutely no business working with inmates and suggests that the only reason England was on the cellblock was because her boyfriend, Charles Graner, had invited her. 'Graner's original claim, before he clammed up,' Karpinski says, 'was that the interrogators told him to get a female over there and he thought of her immediately.'
Sound like procedure to you?
Then there's Sivits. Guess what? Not an MP, either. No business being in a cellblock, no business interacting with detainees. This is a prison with 300 military police on duty, and they've got a mechanic up at one in the morning taking pictures while they terrorize prisoners."
That it really wasn't about softening prisoners, gathering intelligence, or trying to win the war. That it wasn't even about losing control in the heat of the moment. It was about getting up in the middle of the night and going somewhere you weren't supposed to go, then beating and raping people there. It was premeditated violent crime.
Wednesday, August 25, 2004
The Rambo Coalition - The New York Times
The New York Times > Opinion > Op-Ed Columnist: The Rambo Coalition:
"After 9/11, Mr. Bush had a choice: he could deal with real threats, or he could play Rambo. He chose Rambo. Not for him the difficult, frustrating task of tracking down elusive terrorists, or the unglamorous work of protecting ports and chemical plants from possible attack: he wanted a dramatic shootout with the bad guy. And if you asked why we were going after this particular bad guy, who hadn't attacked America and wasn't building nuclear weapons - or if you warned that real wars involve costs you never see in the movies - you were being unpatriotic.
As a domestic political strategy, Mr. Bush's posturing worked brilliantly. As a strategy against terrorism, it has played right into Al Qaeda's hands. Thirty years after Vietnam, American soldiers are again dying in a war that was sold on false pretenses and creates more enemies than it kills."
"After 9/11, Mr. Bush had a choice: he could deal with real threats, or he could play Rambo. He chose Rambo. Not for him the difficult, frustrating task of tracking down elusive terrorists, or the unglamorous work of protecting ports and chemical plants from possible attack: he wanted a dramatic shootout with the bad guy. And if you asked why we were going after this particular bad guy, who hadn't attacked America and wasn't building nuclear weapons - or if you warned that real wars involve costs you never see in the movies - you were being unpatriotic.
As a domestic political strategy, Mr. Bush's posturing worked brilliantly. As a strategy against terrorism, it has played right into Al Qaeda's hands. Thirty years after Vietnam, American soldiers are again dying in a war that was sold on false pretenses and creates more enemies than it kills."
Bush on avoiding Vietnam service
American Prospect Online - ViewWeb:
"'I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment,' Bush told the Dallas Morning News in 1990. 'Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes.'
Let's parse that quotation phrase for phrase. We do not, of course, know the full context of the conversation he was having with the reporter, and we don't know exactly what question Bush was asked. But his words begin from the presumption that actually going to Vietnam was absolutely not an option. The quote is entirely about how to avoid going. He wasn't prepared to damage his hearing intentionally for the sake of securing a deferment (he probably meant a 4-F classification and confused the two). And he wasn't willing to go to Canada. So he took the third option, the Air National Guard. And note how the choice was about bettering himself, not about thinking of a way to best render service that this child of privilege might -- had he been possessed of the moral fiber and sense of duty of, say, John Kerry -- have considered his obligation, especially considering that, on paper at least, he supported the war."
"'I was not prepared to shoot my eardrum out with a shotgun in order to get a deferment,' Bush told the Dallas Morning News in 1990. 'Nor was I willing to go to Canada. So I chose to better myself by learning how to fly airplanes.'
Let's parse that quotation phrase for phrase. We do not, of course, know the full context of the conversation he was having with the reporter, and we don't know exactly what question Bush was asked. But his words begin from the presumption that actually going to Vietnam was absolutely not an option. The quote is entirely about how to avoid going. He wasn't prepared to damage his hearing intentionally for the sake of securing a deferment (he probably meant a 4-F classification and confused the two). And he wasn't willing to go to Canada. So he took the third option, the Air National Guard. And note how the choice was about bettering himself, not about thinking of a way to best render service that this child of privilege might -- had he been possessed of the moral fiber and sense of duty of, say, John Kerry -- have considered his obligation, especially considering that, on paper at least, he supported the war."
Tuesday, August 24, 2004
Daily show on Swift Boat Vets
The daily show does it again...
After showing the New York Times article outlining the links of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's connections to the Bush administration, they showed Bush Campaign manager Ken Melman who said on Meet the Press yesterday: "Reading that NYTimes article I was reminded of that old Kevin Bacon game of six degrees of separation".
Then John Stewart says "Thats a fun game.. I remember that... lets see... I used to be really good at it, lets see if I still got it. ok... there is president bush, ok... his top advisor is Karl Rove, ok.. thats one. And he is friends with Bob Perry, who is the chief financier of the swift boat vets. Hey, I did it in Two!
You now what? lets see if I can do better. There is president bush, ahh... There is Ken Cortier who appears in a swift boat ad and is a member of the presidents campaign committee on veterans issues. Wow... I did it again in one!
Wow... I am really good at connecting the dots. You know its interesting, I tried to play that game linking Saddam to Al Quieda... uh... Its much harder."
later...
John Stewart: "So your saying that this back and forth (on vietnam service) is never going to end?"
Rob Corddry: "No. In fact John, a new group has emerged. This one composed of former bush colleges challenging the Presidents activities during the vietnam era. That group: "Drunken Stateside Sons of Privilege for Plausible Deniability". They have apparently have some things to say about a certain Halloween party in 1971 that involve some trash can punch and a sodomized pinata. John, they just want to set the record straight, thats all they are out for. "
After showing the New York Times article outlining the links of the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth's connections to the Bush administration, they showed Bush Campaign manager Ken Melman who said on Meet the Press yesterday: "Reading that NYTimes article I was reminded of that old Kevin Bacon game of six degrees of separation".
Then John Stewart says "Thats a fun game.. I remember that... lets see... I used to be really good at it, lets see if I still got it. ok... there is president bush, ok... his top advisor is Karl Rove, ok.. thats one. And he is friends with Bob Perry, who is the chief financier of the swift boat vets. Hey, I did it in Two!
You now what? lets see if I can do better. There is president bush, ahh... There is Ken Cortier who appears in a swift boat ad and is a member of the presidents campaign committee on veterans issues. Wow... I did it again in one!
Wow... I am really good at connecting the dots. You know its interesting, I tried to play that game linking Saddam to Al Quieda... uh... Its much harder."
later...
John Stewart: "So your saying that this back and forth (on vietnam service) is never going to end?"
Rob Corddry: "No. In fact John, a new group has emerged. This one composed of former bush colleges challenging the Presidents activities during the vietnam era. That group: "Drunken Stateside Sons of Privilege for Plausible Deniability". They have apparently have some things to say about a certain Halloween party in 1971 that involve some trash can punch and a sodomized pinata. John, they just want to set the record straight, thats all they are out for. "
Sunday, August 22, 2004
Iraqi soccer players upset about Bush campaign ads using team
SI.com - Writers - Wahl: Iraqi soccer players upset about Bush campaign ads using team - Thursday August 19, 2004 4:59PM:
"'Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign,' Sadir told SI.com through a translator, speaking calmly and directly. 'He can find another way to advertise himself.'
Ahmed Manajid, who played as a midfielder on Wednesday, had an even stronger response when asked about Bush's TV advertisement. 'How will he meet his god having slaughtered so many men and women?' Manajid told me. 'He has committed so many crimes.'
They find it offensive that Bush is using Iraq for his own gain when they do not support his administration's actions. 'My problems are not with the American people,' says Iraqi soccer coach Adnan Hamad. 'They are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything. The American army has killed so many people in Iraq. What is freedom when I go to the [national] stadium and there are shootings on the road?'
At a speech in Beaverton, Ore., last Friday, Bush attached himself to the Iraqi soccer team after its opening-game upset of Portugal. 'The image of the Iraqi soccer team playing in this Olympics, it's fantastic, isn't it?' Bush said. 'It wouldn't have been free if the United States had not acted.'
Sadir, Wednesday's goal-scorer, used to be the star player for the professional soccer team in Najaf. In the city in which 20,000 fans used to fill the stadium and chant Sadir's name, U.S. and Iraqi forces have battled loyalists to rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr for the past two weeks. Najaf lies in ruins.
'I want the violence and the war to go away from the city,' says Sadir, 21. 'We don't wish for the presence of Americans in our country. We want them to go away.'
In fact, Manajid says, if he were not playing soccer he would 'for sure' be fighting as part of the resistance.
'I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?' Manajid says. 'Everyone [in Fallujah] has been labeled a terrorist. These are all lies. Fallujah people are some of the best people in Iraq.'
'The war is not secure,' says Hamad, 43. 'Many people hate America now. The Americans have lost many people around the world--and that is what is happening in America also.'"
"'Iraq as a team does not want Mr. Bush to use us for the presidential campaign,' Sadir told SI.com through a translator, speaking calmly and directly. 'He can find another way to advertise himself.'
Ahmed Manajid, who played as a midfielder on Wednesday, had an even stronger response when asked about Bush's TV advertisement. 'How will he meet his god having slaughtered so many men and women?' Manajid told me. 'He has committed so many crimes.'
They find it offensive that Bush is using Iraq for his own gain when they do not support his administration's actions. 'My problems are not with the American people,' says Iraqi soccer coach Adnan Hamad. 'They are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything. The American army has killed so many people in Iraq. What is freedom when I go to the [national] stadium and there are shootings on the road?'
At a speech in Beaverton, Ore., last Friday, Bush attached himself to the Iraqi soccer team after its opening-game upset of Portugal. 'The image of the Iraqi soccer team playing in this Olympics, it's fantastic, isn't it?' Bush said. 'It wouldn't have been free if the United States had not acted.'
Sadir, Wednesday's goal-scorer, used to be the star player for the professional soccer team in Najaf. In the city in which 20,000 fans used to fill the stadium and chant Sadir's name, U.S. and Iraqi forces have battled loyalists to rebel cleric Moktada al-Sadr for the past two weeks. Najaf lies in ruins.
'I want the violence and the war to go away from the city,' says Sadir, 21. 'We don't wish for the presence of Americans in our country. We want them to go away.'
In fact, Manajid says, if he were not playing soccer he would 'for sure' be fighting as part of the resistance.
'I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists?' Manajid says. 'Everyone [in Fallujah] has been labeled a terrorist. These are all lies. Fallujah people are some of the best people in Iraq.'
'The war is not secure,' says Hamad, 43. 'Many people hate America now. The Americans have lost many people around the world--and that is what is happening in America also.'"
Medical professionals complicit in Abu Ghraib torture, says bioethicist
Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things: "Medical professionals complicit in Abu Ghraib torture, says bioethicist
Dr. Stephen Miles wrote a scathing editorial for UK medical journal The Lancet which says that U.S. military medical personnel were complicit in detainee torture incidents that took place in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. According to the University of Minnesota bioethicist, 'The US military medical system failed to protect detainees' human rights, sometimes collaborated with interrogators or abusive guards, and failed to properly report injuries or deaths caused by beatings.' Based on data gleaned from government documents, he details cases of alleged abuse participation by medical personnel, and calls for a formal inquiry.
There are isolated reports that medical personnel directly abused detainees. Two detainees' depositions describe an incident where a doctor allowed a medically untrained guard to suture a prisoner's lacertation from being beaten. The medical system failed to accurately report illnesses and injuries. Abu Ghraib authorities did not notify families of deaths, sicknesses, or transfers to medical facilities as required by the Convention. A medic inserted a intravenous catheter into the corpse of a detainee who died under torture in order to create evidence that he was alive at the hospital. In another case, an Iraqi man, taken into custody by US soldiers was found months later by his family in an Iraqi hospital. He was comatose, had three skull fractures, a severe thumb fracture, and burns on the bottoms of his feet. An accompanying US medical report stated that heat stroke had triggered a heart attack that put him in a coma; it did not mention the injuries.
Death certificates of detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq were falsified or their release or completion was delayed for months. Medical investigators either failed to investigate unexpected deaths of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan or performed cursory evaluations and physicians routinely attributed detainee deaths on death certificates to heart attacks, heat stroke, or natural causes without noting the unnatural aetiology of the death. In one example, soldiers tied a beaten detainee to the top of his cell door and gagged him. The death certificate indicated that he died of 'natural causes . . . during his sleep.' After news media coverage, the Pentagon revised the certificate to say that the death was a 'homicide' caused by 'blunt force injuries and asphyxia.'"
Dr. Stephen Miles wrote a scathing editorial for UK medical journal The Lancet which says that U.S. military medical personnel were complicit in detainee torture incidents that took place in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. According to the University of Minnesota bioethicist, 'The US military medical system failed to protect detainees' human rights, sometimes collaborated with interrogators or abusive guards, and failed to properly report injuries or deaths caused by beatings.' Based on data gleaned from government documents, he details cases of alleged abuse participation by medical personnel, and calls for a formal inquiry.
There are isolated reports that medical personnel directly abused detainees. Two detainees' depositions describe an incident where a doctor allowed a medically untrained guard to suture a prisoner's lacertation from being beaten. The medical system failed to accurately report illnesses and injuries. Abu Ghraib authorities did not notify families of deaths, sicknesses, or transfers to medical facilities as required by the Convention. A medic inserted a intravenous catheter into the corpse of a detainee who died under torture in order to create evidence that he was alive at the hospital. In another case, an Iraqi man, taken into custody by US soldiers was found months later by his family in an Iraqi hospital. He was comatose, had three skull fractures, a severe thumb fracture, and burns on the bottoms of his feet. An accompanying US medical report stated that heat stroke had triggered a heart attack that put him in a coma; it did not mention the injuries.
Death certificates of detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq were falsified or their release or completion was delayed for months. Medical investigators either failed to investigate unexpected deaths of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan or performed cursory evaluations and physicians routinely attributed detainee deaths on death certificates to heart attacks, heat stroke, or natural causes without noting the unnatural aetiology of the death. In one example, soldiers tied a beaten detainee to the top of his cell door and gagged him. The death certificate indicated that he died of 'natural causes . . . during his sleep.' After news media coverage, the Pentagon revised the certificate to say that the death was a 'homicide' caused by 'blunt force injuries and asphyxia.'"
New Enland Journal of Medicine- Doctors and Torture
NEJM -- Doctors and Torture: "
"There is increasing evidence that U.S. doctors, nurses, and medics have been complicit in tourture and other illegal procedures in Iraq, Afganistan and Guantanamo Bay. Such medical complicity suggests still another disterbing dimension ot this broadening scandal."
Entire article is available as pdf.
"There is increasing evidence that U.S. doctors, nurses, and medics have been complicit in tourture and other illegal procedures in Iraq, Afganistan and Guantanamo Bay. Such medical complicity suggests still another disterbing dimension ot this broadening scandal."
Entire article is available as pdf.
George Bush is Up to His Old Tricks
New Internet Ad: George Bush is Up to His Old Tricks: "The ad, titled “Old Tricks,” features Senator John McCain rebuking then candidate Bush during a 2000 Larry King debate for refusing to disavow or condemn hateful and vicious attacks on McCain’s military record during the South Carolina Republican primary.
McCain’s comments will ring true for Americans who are once again seeing their Commander-in-Chief dishonor America’s veterans through his silent support of the group “Swift Boat Veterans for Bush” while they smear John Kerry’s military service and the service of those who served in great danger with him on the Navy’s Swift Boats.
Beginning today, the Kerry-Edwards campaign will begin a systematic campaign to expose the president’s tactics, with a special emphasis on the veterans community. “Old Tricks” will be emailed to 200,000 veterans activists who will share it in their communities, posted on veterans websites and emailed to the entire Kerry online community of well over 1 million supporters."
McCain’s comments will ring true for Americans who are once again seeing their Commander-in-Chief dishonor America’s veterans through his silent support of the group “Swift Boat Veterans for Bush” while they smear John Kerry’s military service and the service of those who served in great danger with him on the Navy’s Swift Boats.
Beginning today, the Kerry-Edwards campaign will begin a systematic campaign to expose the president’s tactics, with a special emphasis on the veterans community. “Old Tricks” will be emailed to 200,000 veterans activists who will share it in their communities, posted on veterans websites and emailed to the entire Kerry online community of well over 1 million supporters."
Imagine Clinton sliming Dole on his Vietnam record
Boston.com / News / Boston Globe / Opinion / Editorials / Big lies for Bush: "IMAGINE IF supporters of Bill Clinton had tried in 1996 to besmirch the military record of his opponent, Bob Dole. After all, Dole was given a Purple Heart for a leg scratch probably caused, according to one biographer, when a hand grenade thrown by one of his own men bounced off a tree. And while the serious injuries Dole sustained later surely came from German fire, did the episode demonstrate heroism on Dole's part or a reckless move that ended up killing his radioman and endangering the sergeant who dragged Dole off the field?
ADVERTISEMENT
The truth, according to many accounts, is that Dole fought with exceptional bravery and deserves the nation's gratitude. No one in 1996 questioned that record. Any such attack on behalf of Clinton, an admitted Vietnam draft dodger, would have been preposterous.
Yet amazingly, something quite similar is happening today as supporters of President Bush attack the Vietnam record of Senator John Kerry.
The situations are not completely parallel. Bush was not a draft dodger, but he certainly was a Vietnam avoider, having joined the Texas Air National Guard rather than serving in the regular military.
Kerry, on the other hand, may have done more than Dole to qualify as a genuine war hero. Although his tour in Vietnam was short, on at least two occasions he acted decisively and with great daring in combat, saving at least one man's life and earning both a Silver Star and a Bronze Star. That's not our account or Kerry's; it is drawn from eyewitnesses and the military citations themselves."
ADVERTISEMENT
The truth, according to many accounts, is that Dole fought with exceptional bravery and deserves the nation's gratitude. No one in 1996 questioned that record. Any such attack on behalf of Clinton, an admitted Vietnam draft dodger, would have been preposterous.
Yet amazingly, something quite similar is happening today as supporters of President Bush attack the Vietnam record of Senator John Kerry.
The situations are not completely parallel. Bush was not a draft dodger, but he certainly was a Vietnam avoider, having joined the Texas Air National Guard rather than serving in the regular military.
Kerry, on the other hand, may have done more than Dole to qualify as a genuine war hero. Although his tour in Vietnam was short, on at least two occasions he acted decisively and with great daring in combat, saving at least one man's life and earning both a Silver Star and a Bronze Star. That's not our account or Kerry's; it is drawn from eyewitnesses and the military citations themselves."
Thursday, August 19, 2004
John Stewart is amazing...
GW Bush: "The new plan will help us fight and win these wars of the 21st centruy."
John Stewart: "Im sorry, did you say plural? Was that war's? Did you say... uh... How many more of these do you have in mind?"
later...
GW Bush: "No one cares more about curing diseases than Laura and me. I mean, thats one of our responsiblities."
John Stewart: "One of our responsiblities? Since when is the President responsible for curing diseases? Isn't that what we got the doctors for? Thats you too? You do a lot... How do you have so much time for vacation? It really is suprising."
later...
GW Bush: "I do think its important for us to promote a culture of life in America.
John Stewart: "Culture of life is of course the title of the 8th grade film strip the President bases most of his social policies on."
and finally,
GW Bush: "Stem cells is one issue, another is theraputic human cloning. Which I am against. I think that leads down a slippery slope for people to, you know... uh... to kind of... you know.. designer clones.
John Stewart: (in his Bush voice) "and once you have designer clones, they can only be controled with a robot army. We dont have the kind of army for a robot army right now. You see... designer clones will fight the robot army and then the Preditor will come in and then the aliens...... You see where were leading here??? Thats John Kerry's America!"
John Stewart: "Im sorry, did you say plural? Was that war's? Did you say... uh... How many more of these do you have in mind?"
later...
GW Bush: "No one cares more about curing diseases than Laura and me. I mean, thats one of our responsiblities."
John Stewart: "One of our responsiblities? Since when is the President responsible for curing diseases? Isn't that what we got the doctors for? Thats you too? You do a lot... How do you have so much time for vacation? It really is suprising."
later...
GW Bush: "I do think its important for us to promote a culture of life in America.
John Stewart: "Culture of life is of course the title of the 8th grade film strip the President bases most of his social policies on."
and finally,
GW Bush: "Stem cells is one issue, another is theraputic human cloning. Which I am against. I think that leads down a slippery slope for people to, you know... uh... to kind of... you know.. designer clones.
John Stewart: (in his Bush voice) "and once you have designer clones, they can only be controled with a robot army. We dont have the kind of army for a robot army right now. You see... designer clones will fight the robot army and then the Preditor will come in and then the aliens...... You see where were leading here??? Thats John Kerry's America!"
Wednesday, August 18, 2004
WR Pitts letter to Bush
Brain Dead, Made of Money, No Future at All
By William Rivers Pitt
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/081704A.shtml
Tuesday 17 August 2004
To: George W. Bush
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Dear George:
A pretty awful joke has been making the rounds lately. Some might say it's an awful joke because of the comparison. Most, however, think it's an awful joke because it isn't funny. It's too close to the truth to be funny.
The joke: What is the difference between President George W. Bush and President Ted Bundy?
The answer: Bush killed more people than Bundy.
See? I told you it was a terrible joke. On the one hand, it is in poor taste by commonly accepted standards to compare a sitting President to a notorious serial killer. On the other hand, though, the 943 dead American soldiers in Iraq, the more than ten thousand dead Iraqi civilians, the more than five thousand dead civilians in Afghanistan, and let's not forget the large crowd of Americans you toddled off to the Texas killing bottle while Governor, pretty much means you have left Mr. Bundy in the deep shade when it comes to the body count.
....
Three more American kids got killed in Iraq today, George. That makes 30 dead American soldiers in the first 16 days of August. That's thirty more names to be added to the commemorative wall which will appear somewhere in Washington DC someday. Thirty more etchings in ebon stone, thirty more people who would not now be dead but for your decisions and your actions and your appalling dishonesty.
I'm pretty bored with those commonly accepted standards that are supposed to be applied in the treatment of a sitting President. Too many people have been playing patty-cake with you over the last three years, George. Too many journalists looking to keep their sweet seat in the press crunch at the White House, too many television news anchors who think research and context is for other people, too many media outlet owners - read: 'massive corporations' - whose profit margins are intimately wed to your suicidal policies, and, frankly, too many politicians for the 'loyal opposition' who have been tested in the forge of true crisis these last years, and been found to be sorely wanting.
So let's not have any patty-cake between us, George. Let's get down to brass tacks. Your people compared Senator Max Cleland to Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein during the 2002 midterm campaign. Cleland left two legs and an arm in Vietnam, but your people did that to him anyway. A little hard talk, East Texas style, shouldn't be anything new to you.
A wiser man once wrote this:
"Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose, and you allow him to make war at pleasure....if, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, 'I see no probability of the British invading us' but he will say to you, 'Be silent; I can see it, if you don't.'"
The wiser man who wrote these words was Abraham Lincoln, in a letter to his law partner Billy Hendron. Lincoln wrote this letter in 1848 while serving in the House of Representatives, years before he himself would assume the office of the Presidency. Lincoln became, in the fullness of time, a war President who unwillingly inherited his war, and then pursued it with grim determination.
....
You fancy yourself a war President, right? "I'm a war President," you said on television not long ago. "I make decisions in the Oval Office with war on my mind." Your war in Iraq is a war of choice, not of necessity. It had nothing to do with September 11, weapons of mass destruction, or bringing democracy to the Iraqi people. It had nothing to do with defending the American people.
Your boys wanted to get paid. Cash money on the barrelhead for Halliburton, right? Almost twelve billion dollars they've made to this point. Hey, it's good work if you can get it. All you had to do was use September 11th against your own people for months, scare them to death, denigrate the work of the weapons inspectors you agreed to send in there, flap around some claims about weapons of mass destruction (26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX gas, per your own words from your 2003 State of the Union Address), and then fly onto an aircraft carrier and declare victory while your people were still dying.
As if that wasn't bad enough, you're also losing your war of choice.
Hard to believe, isn't it? Your daddy rolled up Iraq like a windowshade when it was his turn at the big wheel. Your daddy made it look easy, which is perhaps why you thought you could take care of business over there on the cheap. Do you have trouble looking daddy in the eyes these days?
....
I worry about you, George. You live in a stark black-and-white world, and you actually think God speaks to you. There are a lot of people in padded rooms, wearing coats that button up the back, because they have had similar delusions. You see monsters everywhere. Some of them do exist, to be sure, but I am forced to remember the words of Frederich Nietzsche: "Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and international bestseller of two books - 'War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You To Know' and 'The Greatest Sedition is Silence.'
By William Rivers Pitt
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/081704A.shtml
Tuesday 17 August 2004
To: George W. Bush
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Dear George:
A pretty awful joke has been making the rounds lately. Some might say it's an awful joke because of the comparison. Most, however, think it's an awful joke because it isn't funny. It's too close to the truth to be funny.
The joke: What is the difference between President George W. Bush and President Ted Bundy?
The answer: Bush killed more people than Bundy.
See? I told you it was a terrible joke. On the one hand, it is in poor taste by commonly accepted standards to compare a sitting President to a notorious serial killer. On the other hand, though, the 943 dead American soldiers in Iraq, the more than ten thousand dead Iraqi civilians, the more than five thousand dead civilians in Afghanistan, and let's not forget the large crowd of Americans you toddled off to the Texas killing bottle while Governor, pretty much means you have left Mr. Bundy in the deep shade when it comes to the body count.
....
Three more American kids got killed in Iraq today, George. That makes 30 dead American soldiers in the first 16 days of August. That's thirty more names to be added to the commemorative wall which will appear somewhere in Washington DC someday. Thirty more etchings in ebon stone, thirty more people who would not now be dead but for your decisions and your actions and your appalling dishonesty.
I'm pretty bored with those commonly accepted standards that are supposed to be applied in the treatment of a sitting President. Too many people have been playing patty-cake with you over the last three years, George. Too many journalists looking to keep their sweet seat in the press crunch at the White House, too many television news anchors who think research and context is for other people, too many media outlet owners - read: 'massive corporations' - whose profit margins are intimately wed to your suicidal policies, and, frankly, too many politicians for the 'loyal opposition' who have been tested in the forge of true crisis these last years, and been found to be sorely wanting.
So let's not have any patty-cake between us, George. Let's get down to brass tacks. Your people compared Senator Max Cleland to Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein during the 2002 midterm campaign. Cleland left two legs and an arm in Vietnam, but your people did that to him anyway. A little hard talk, East Texas style, shouldn't be anything new to you.
A wiser man once wrote this:
"Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem it necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose, and you allow him to make war at pleasure....if, today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him, 'I see no probability of the British invading us' but he will say to you, 'Be silent; I can see it, if you don't.'"
The wiser man who wrote these words was Abraham Lincoln, in a letter to his law partner Billy Hendron. Lincoln wrote this letter in 1848 while serving in the House of Representatives, years before he himself would assume the office of the Presidency. Lincoln became, in the fullness of time, a war President who unwillingly inherited his war, and then pursued it with grim determination.
....
You fancy yourself a war President, right? "I'm a war President," you said on television not long ago. "I make decisions in the Oval Office with war on my mind." Your war in Iraq is a war of choice, not of necessity. It had nothing to do with September 11, weapons of mass destruction, or bringing democracy to the Iraqi people. It had nothing to do with defending the American people.
Your boys wanted to get paid. Cash money on the barrelhead for Halliburton, right? Almost twelve billion dollars they've made to this point. Hey, it's good work if you can get it. All you had to do was use September 11th against your own people for months, scare them to death, denigrate the work of the weapons inspectors you agreed to send in there, flap around some claims about weapons of mass destruction (26,000 liters of anthrax, 38,000 liters of botulinum toxin, 500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX gas, per your own words from your 2003 State of the Union Address), and then fly onto an aircraft carrier and declare victory while your people were still dying.
As if that wasn't bad enough, you're also losing your war of choice.
Hard to believe, isn't it? Your daddy rolled up Iraq like a windowshade when it was his turn at the big wheel. Your daddy made it look easy, which is perhaps why you thought you could take care of business over there on the cheap. Do you have trouble looking daddy in the eyes these days?
....
I worry about you, George. You live in a stark black-and-white world, and you actually think God speaks to you. There are a lot of people in padded rooms, wearing coats that button up the back, because they have had similar delusions. You see monsters everywhere. Some of them do exist, to be sure, but I am forced to remember the words of Frederich Nietzsche: "Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
William Rivers Pitt is a New York Times and international bestseller of two books - 'War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You To Know' and 'The Greatest Sedition is Silence.'
Jeff wants to know if we can kill em all now
On Aug 18, 2004, at 4:30 PM, Jeff Evans wrote:
--A report on May 28 in Al-Sharq Al-Awsat reported that an Iranian intelligence unit has established a center called “The Brigades of the Shahids of the Global Islamic Awakening.” The paper claimed that it had obtained a tape with a speech by Hassan Abbassi, a Revolutionary Guards intelligence theoretician who teaches at Al-Hussein University. In the tape, Mr. Abbassi spoke of Tehran’s secret plans, which include “a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization.”
“Woe to the enemy if Khamenei commands me to wage jihad,” Mr. Khamenei said, “If someone harms our people and invades our country, we will endanger his interests anywhere in the world.” --
May we kill them now?
-------------------------------------------
Winterbear responds:
You can kill em now... but it wont do any good. In fact, it makes things worse.
First of all, people in the USA write/say goofy shit like this every day. Listen to Art Bells show every night... or read the writings of the various conspiracey theorists or religious fundamentalists. Or the neocons of the Bush admin for that matter. The best thing to do is just ignore it.
If the transendental meditation new age Californians invaded Texas for no reason and were breaking into our houses and torturing our kids in captured prisions... well, we might draw up a document called "a strategy drawn up for the destruction of new age california civilization."
dont mess with texas....
real point? Radical islam is tiny today... very few people actual support it and even less are willing to take part in the violence. It only has credence in a few places. Its about the size of the KKK in this country at its hight in the 1920's.
But as long as we poke the moderate people in the eyes, ignorantly lumping all Moslems into the same basket and we keep treating em like subhuman morons, they are going to keep getting stronger until they actually become a real threat to our civilization. Gandhi had it right, Violence is not the answer and only makes the enemy stronger. For every one you kill, 3 more pop up.
9-11 was a crime, not an act of war. We could suffer a 9-11 style act ever few months and it would not "destroy our civilization". It would suck but as long as opportunists like Karl Rove didnt use it for political gain and another opportunity to invade another country, it wouldnt amount to much. Most of the damage we have suffered in the west since 9-11 has been self inflicted. Either by blind fear of this tiny marginalized threat or by over reaction by people that have a selfish financial interest in US hegmony, colonial conquest and militarism.
less than 4000 people have died from Terrorist activity in the USA in the last 20 years. Dude, thats a bad labor day weekend on our highways...
If re-elected the neocons are going to use documents like this as an excuse to invade Iran. If for no other reason, we should throw them out of office for this.
The best thing that could happen is to get the relations between Iran and the US normalized like the way we have done in Vietnam. Sure, there are some radical elements both inside and outside of Iranian government that hate us. Same can be said about the US radicals hating Iran. But if we will stop acting unilaterally and doing stupid obnoxious things on the world stage we can strenghthen the moderate majority inside Iran. There is no reason to go to war with these people. Just like Iraq (in fact worse, because they have a real army) its a loose/loose situation for all involved... in fact, it could lead to WW4 if it goes nuts. Which seems to be something our nut job right wing wants to see happen.
Just like our olympic basketball team learned on sunday... the USA will not win every contest for ever and ever, amen. Some day our republic will crumble into dust. That day will be all the sooner if we allow the morons who have hijacked the Republican party to invading Iran and widen our conflict with Islam to the rest of the world and it becomes the next world war. That ain't good for nobody, old friend.
--A report on May 28 in Al-Sharq Al-Awsat reported that an Iranian intelligence unit has established a center called “The Brigades of the Shahids of the Global Islamic Awakening.” The paper claimed that it had obtained a tape with a speech by Hassan Abbassi, a Revolutionary Guards intelligence theoretician who teaches at Al-Hussein University. In the tape, Mr. Abbassi spoke of Tehran’s secret plans, which include “a strategy drawn up for the destruction of Anglo-Saxon civilization.”
“Woe to the enemy if Khamenei commands me to wage jihad,” Mr. Khamenei said, “If someone harms our people and invades our country, we will endanger his interests anywhere in the world.” --
May we kill them now?
-------------------------------------------
Winterbear responds:
You can kill em now... but it wont do any good. In fact, it makes things worse.
First of all, people in the USA write/say goofy shit like this every day. Listen to Art Bells show every night... or read the writings of the various conspiracey theorists or religious fundamentalists. Or the neocons of the Bush admin for that matter. The best thing to do is just ignore it.
If the transendental meditation new age Californians invaded Texas for no reason and were breaking into our houses and torturing our kids in captured prisions... well, we might draw up a document called "a strategy drawn up for the destruction of new age california civilization."
dont mess with texas....
real point? Radical islam is tiny today... very few people actual support it and even less are willing to take part in the violence. It only has credence in a few places. Its about the size of the KKK in this country at its hight in the 1920's.
But as long as we poke the moderate people in the eyes, ignorantly lumping all Moslems into the same basket and we keep treating em like subhuman morons, they are going to keep getting stronger until they actually become a real threat to our civilization. Gandhi had it right, Violence is not the answer and only makes the enemy stronger. For every one you kill, 3 more pop up.
9-11 was a crime, not an act of war. We could suffer a 9-11 style act ever few months and it would not "destroy our civilization". It would suck but as long as opportunists like Karl Rove didnt use it for political gain and another opportunity to invade another country, it wouldnt amount to much. Most of the damage we have suffered in the west since 9-11 has been self inflicted. Either by blind fear of this tiny marginalized threat or by over reaction by people that have a selfish financial interest in US hegmony, colonial conquest and militarism.
less than 4000 people have died from Terrorist activity in the USA in the last 20 years. Dude, thats a bad labor day weekend on our highways...
If re-elected the neocons are going to use documents like this as an excuse to invade Iran. If for no other reason, we should throw them out of office for this.
The best thing that could happen is to get the relations between Iran and the US normalized like the way we have done in Vietnam. Sure, there are some radical elements both inside and outside of Iranian government that hate us. Same can be said about the US radicals hating Iran. But if we will stop acting unilaterally and doing stupid obnoxious things on the world stage we can strenghthen the moderate majority inside Iran. There is no reason to go to war with these people. Just like Iraq (in fact worse, because they have a real army) its a loose/loose situation for all involved... in fact, it could lead to WW4 if it goes nuts. Which seems to be something our nut job right wing wants to see happen.
Just like our olympic basketball team learned on sunday... the USA will not win every contest for ever and ever, amen. Some day our republic will crumble into dust. That day will be all the sooner if we allow the morons who have hijacked the Republican party to invading Iran and widen our conflict with Islam to the rest of the world and it becomes the next world war. That ain't good for nobody, old friend.
Florida's new voting machine
timmerca.com: funny stuff: florida's new voting machine: florida's new voting machine (tiny): "florida's new voting machine
"
"
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
Bush's Brain : A Review
The Talent Show: Bush's Brain : A Review:
URL to movies web site: http://www.bushsbrain.com
"Let's face it, Karl Rove is a political genius. He wouldn't have gotten as far as he has if he was sloppy enough to get caught. So while the film builds a persuasive case (at least to those of us who go into the film ready to accept its conclusions), there's nothing in this film that couldn't be refuted by a competent spin doctor. So if the film is primarily an attack on Karl Rove, it's a failure.
The more important story told in the film is the list of dirty tricks that seem to follow every campaign that Rove is associated with. From his early days in which he 'allegedly' planted a bug in his own office a few days before the election in order to make the Democrats look like crooks, to the 2000 election in which rumors that John McCain's adopted daughter from Bangladesh was the result of an affair he'd had with a black prostitute, clearly Rove campaigns have a dark side that follows them. Even if Rove isn't personally responsible for attacks like these, the fact that his campaigns are an environment in which dirty tricks are deemed acceptable is enough the convict the man for me."
URL to movies web site: http://www.bushsbrain.com
"Let's face it, Karl Rove is a political genius. He wouldn't have gotten as far as he has if he was sloppy enough to get caught. So while the film builds a persuasive case (at least to those of us who go into the film ready to accept its conclusions), there's nothing in this film that couldn't be refuted by a competent spin doctor. So if the film is primarily an attack on Karl Rove, it's a failure.
The more important story told in the film is the list of dirty tricks that seem to follow every campaign that Rove is associated with. From his early days in which he 'allegedly' planted a bug in his own office a few days before the election in order to make the Democrats look like crooks, to the 2000 election in which rumors that John McCain's adopted daughter from Bangladesh was the result of an affair he'd had with a black prostitute, clearly Rove campaigns have a dark side that follows them. Even if Rove isn't personally responsible for attacks like these, the fact that his campaigns are an environment in which dirty tricks are deemed acceptable is enough the convict the man for me."
World War Four? thats the dumbest thing I ever heard
Commentary - July-August 2004:
In an article by Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient Norman Podhoretz called "World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win", Norman argues that our current "war on Terrorism is like the second world war.
This is the dumbest thing I have ever heard.
9-11 WAS A CRIME! It was not an act of war. The few thousand members of AlQuida are laughing their asses off ever time they think about what has happened after 9-11. They killed people in a criminal act and they got the USA to over react and invade a country run by a secular dictator that they hated. We played right into the hands of this tiny group of criminal terrorists. Today they are stronger, more famous and credible than ever.
The appropriate response to 9-11 was to work with the worlds various police forces and to bring the criminals to justice. We should have hunted the leaders down and made the world a very unsafe place for these people to operate. Instead, the neocons in the administration used this tragedy as an excuse to invade Iraq.
George Bush started calling himself a "war president" the minute Karl Rove made up the term "War on Terror" on or about September 12th. Look at the gleam in his eye when he says that he is beyond all critisism because he is the War president. Like the war on drugs, its not a real war.
We have only gone to war in the country a few times. The Revolution was not really a war, it was a rebellion. But its more of a war than the War on Terror. The War of 1812 was our first real war. Then you have Mexico, Civil, Spanish and then the 1914 war we call WWI. WWII which began in 1939 was a real war for the united states only after it was declared and voted on in 1941. Hitlers adventures during the Spanish revolution, his invasion of french controled Rhur Valley, the annexing of Austria and Czech Sudatanland were not wars. It wasnt until the German invasion caused the English and French to honor their treaty obligations that WWII became a real war.
The Police action in Korea was never officially a real war. The kids protesting the Vietnam police action were quite daring when they called that conflict a war. The dozens of invasions the USA launched into Central America over the last 100 years are not officially wars.
All this has gotten very muddy under G.W. Bush. What we did in Afganistan was more of a police action than a war. The Iraq Invasion is more troublesome because the president got war powers from congress but kind of forgot to declare war. One of the reasons he did this was to avoid the rules of war. Among many other things, this allowed him to ignore the Geneva conventions which lead to the tortures in Abu Grahab prison and the suspension of legal rights of the people held in Guantanamo Bay.
Wars are fought between states. Its a very formal state of being. When a country goes to war, then all sorts of treaty obligations are invoked. After WWII we set things up (Nato) so that if any of our friends (UK, Germany, and yes, France) were attacked, then we would all attack the agressor. War is serious business. Shame on us for using this term so lightly.
The war on terror... the wars on drugs, Poverty, Polio, Dandruff... These are just semantical tricks. Every year in Dallas they have a war between Texas and Oklahoma at the state Fair. But OU vrs Texas Football game is not really a War... its just called one. There is no war here. Marketing/PR flacks came up with these terms to hijack the gravitas of the real thing.
What is currently happening is not World War 4. Its much harder to say that the situation in Iraq is not a War" today, now that the USA has committed an act of war by invading Iraq and toppling its government. Our president has used the crime of 9-11 as an excuse to invade an unrelated country so that he can establish bases that can project US power into the region. We would be at peace right now if the administration had not invaded Iraq. We would still be in a "war on Terror" but thats just a tern of phrase and nothing real at all.
We are not at war with Islam right now. There is no way we ever will be. Islam is a Religion. And while Bush and Rove may decide some day that it is politically expediant to publically declare that we are at "war with islam", this cannot happen. Wars are between states.
I do not mean to say that our ill advised adventures in Iraq will not lead to WW4 type situation. Especially if GW Bush gets re-elected and the neocons get their wish and we invade Iran. If it then spreads to other places and god forbid eventually into a full blown shooting war with China.... Ok, Norman, you were right, we are in the early days of WW4. But if Kerry gets elected and we pull back from our recent experiment with unilateral exstremist militarism and avoid any more invasions for a few years, Norman is dead wrong. Only time will tell.
But based on this article, I know one thing: Norman Podhoretz is a war monger and a sensationalist.
In an article by Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient Norman Podhoretz called "World War IV: How It Started, What It Means, and Why We Have to Win", Norman argues that our current "war on Terrorism is like the second world war.
This is the dumbest thing I have ever heard.
9-11 WAS A CRIME! It was not an act of war. The few thousand members of AlQuida are laughing their asses off ever time they think about what has happened after 9-11. They killed people in a criminal act and they got the USA to over react and invade a country run by a secular dictator that they hated. We played right into the hands of this tiny group of criminal terrorists. Today they are stronger, more famous and credible than ever.
The appropriate response to 9-11 was to work with the worlds various police forces and to bring the criminals to justice. We should have hunted the leaders down and made the world a very unsafe place for these people to operate. Instead, the neocons in the administration used this tragedy as an excuse to invade Iraq.
George Bush started calling himself a "war president" the minute Karl Rove made up the term "War on Terror" on or about September 12th. Look at the gleam in his eye when he says that he is beyond all critisism because he is the War president. Like the war on drugs, its not a real war.
We have only gone to war in the country a few times. The Revolution was not really a war, it was a rebellion. But its more of a war than the War on Terror. The War of 1812 was our first real war. Then you have Mexico, Civil, Spanish and then the 1914 war we call WWI. WWII which began in 1939 was a real war for the united states only after it was declared and voted on in 1941. Hitlers adventures during the Spanish revolution, his invasion of french controled Rhur Valley, the annexing of Austria and Czech Sudatanland were not wars. It wasnt until the German invasion caused the English and French to honor their treaty obligations that WWII became a real war.
The Police action in Korea was never officially a real war. The kids protesting the Vietnam police action were quite daring when they called that conflict a war. The dozens of invasions the USA launched into Central America over the last 100 years are not officially wars.
All this has gotten very muddy under G.W. Bush. What we did in Afganistan was more of a police action than a war. The Iraq Invasion is more troublesome because the president got war powers from congress but kind of forgot to declare war. One of the reasons he did this was to avoid the rules of war. Among many other things, this allowed him to ignore the Geneva conventions which lead to the tortures in Abu Grahab prison and the suspension of legal rights of the people held in Guantanamo Bay.
Wars are fought between states. Its a very formal state of being. When a country goes to war, then all sorts of treaty obligations are invoked. After WWII we set things up (Nato) so that if any of our friends (UK, Germany, and yes, France) were attacked, then we would all attack the agressor. War is serious business. Shame on us for using this term so lightly.
The war on terror... the wars on drugs, Poverty, Polio, Dandruff... These are just semantical tricks. Every year in Dallas they have a war between Texas and Oklahoma at the state Fair. But OU vrs Texas Football game is not really a War... its just called one. There is no war here. Marketing/PR flacks came up with these terms to hijack the gravitas of the real thing.
What is currently happening is not World War 4. Its much harder to say that the situation in Iraq is not a War" today, now that the USA has committed an act of war by invading Iraq and toppling its government. Our president has used the crime of 9-11 as an excuse to invade an unrelated country so that he can establish bases that can project US power into the region. We would be at peace right now if the administration had not invaded Iraq. We would still be in a "war on Terror" but thats just a tern of phrase and nothing real at all.
We are not at war with Islam right now. There is no way we ever will be. Islam is a Religion. And while Bush and Rove may decide some day that it is politically expediant to publically declare that we are at "war with islam", this cannot happen. Wars are between states.
I do not mean to say that our ill advised adventures in Iraq will not lead to WW4 type situation. Especially if GW Bush gets re-elected and the neocons get their wish and we invade Iran. If it then spreads to other places and god forbid eventually into a full blown shooting war with China.... Ok, Norman, you were right, we are in the early days of WW4. But if Kerry gets elected and we pull back from our recent experiment with unilateral exstremist militarism and avoid any more invasions for a few years, Norman is dead wrong. Only time will tell.
But based on this article, I know one thing: Norman Podhoretz is a war monger and a sensationalist.
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