Reality-Based-Weblog

Check it out

2005-12-17T09:23:00.000-08:00

For the present, I'm doing all my posting at Washington Outsiders .

Still Looking for Answers - Friday edition

2005-10-14T00:09:00.000-07:00

Juan Cole is very busy this morning and sharp as a tack... as usual.

'US can withdraw from Iraq while Army is being created'

Washington, Oct 14 (PTI) Former Secretary of Defence Melvin Laird has said the United States can withdraw from Iraq while Iraqi army is being created, as happened in case of Vietnam.

Laird noted in an article in Foreign Affairs that the United States managed to withdraw American forces while creating a viable South Vietnamese army.

The same approach, he claims, could work in Iraq today.

"I believed then and still believe today that given enough outside resources, South Vietnam was capable of defending itself, just as I believe Iraq can do the same now.

"For me, the alleged prison scandals reported to have occurred in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and at Guantanamo Bay have been a disturbing reminder of the mistreatment of our own PoWs by North Vietnam.

" The minute we begin to deport prisoners to other nations where they can legally be tortured, when we hold people without charges or trial, when we move prisoners around to avoid the prying inspections of the Red Cross, when prisoners die inexplicably on our watch, we are on a slippery slope toward the inhumanity that we deplore." PTI

Miller and the Neocons

More WMD Pie in the Sky

... How to explain Bush's strange agenda? Well, when someone doesn't read the newspapers and doesn't know anything about the wider world, and just accepts whatever close aides tell him, then he might easily believe 10 impossible things before breakfast. The real question is who his aides are really working for, who wants Bush to believe these dangerous fantasies.

All the News that fits their agenda

2005-09-21T06:38:00.000-07:00

Another prime example of the MSM being a day late and a dollar short (as it were).

TIME MAGAZINE - Sep. 26, 2005
Saddam's Revenge
The secret history of U.S. mistakes, misjudgments and intelligence failures that let the Iraqi dictator and his allies launch an insurgency now ripping Iraq apart
By JOE KLEIN

Why didn't TIME take up this story when Scott Ritter wrote about it over a year ago?

Published on Friday, July 23, 2004 by Tribune Media Services
Saddam's People are Winning the War
by Scott Ritter

Anybody got any theories?

Emotional Rather blasts 'new journalism order'
By Paul J. Gough

... occasionally forcing back tears, he (Dan Rather) said that in the intervening years, politicians "of every persuasion" had gotten better at applying pressure on the conglomerates that own the broadcast networks. He called it a "new journalism order."

He said this pressure -- along with the "dumbed-down, tarted-up" coverage, the advent of 24-hour cable competition and the chase for ratings and demographics -- has taken its toll on the news business. "All of this creates a bigger atmosphere of fear in newsrooms," Rather said. ...

Is it pay-back time, yet?

2005-09-09T10:35:00.000-07:00

Okie dokie... In Bush's FEMA appointments we've got a shining example of how utterly corrupt the Republicans are: political patronage, ultra-cronyism. I think we need an investigation by an independent council/prosecutor(meaning someone who hates Bush with a passion). The investigation should be in depth, reporting it's findings in mid-Nov. 2008. The staff could ~~leak~~ give progress reports to the press every week. With subpoena power, an unlimited budget and years to dig, there should be plenty of dirt uncovered. The person chosen to head the investigation should have certain Starr-like qualities. The investigation should have a name, hmmm lets see.... Oh, I know!... we could call it; the BrownieWater Scandal. [/satire]

neo-conomic

2005-08-30T22:00:00.000-07:00

In spite of right-wing rhetoric; for most Americans, the economy is getting worse and life is getting harder. Sadly, the Republicans are working overtime to pass laws that will favor the richest Americans while making things even tougher for the rest of us.

Poverty rate rises to 12.7 percent
JENNIFER C. KERR
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Even with a robust economy that was adding jobs last year, the number of Americans who fell into poverty rose to 37 million - up 1.1 million from 2003 - according to Census Bureau figures released Tuesday.

It marks the fourth straight increase in the government's annual poverty measure.

The Census Bureau also said household income remained flat, and that the number of people without health insurance edged up by about 800,000 to 45.8 million people. ...

... Overall, the nation's poverty rate rose to 12.7 percent of the population last year. Of the 37 million living below the poverty level, close to a third were children.
The last decline in overall poverty was in 2000, during the Clinton administration, when 31.1 million people lived under the threshold. Since then, the number of people in poverty has increased steadily from 32.9 million in 2001, when the economy slipped into recession, to 35.8 million in 2003. ...

Answer the Question, George!

2005-08-20T20:12:00.000-07:00

Published on Saturday, August 20, 2005 by CommonDreams.org

Hypocrites and Liars

by Cindy Sheehan

... "I got an e-mail the other day and it said, 'Cindy if you didn't use so much profanity '. There's people on the fence that get offended.'

And you know what I said? 'You know what? You know what, god damn it? How in the world is anybody still sitting on that fence?'

"If you fall on the side that is pro-George and pro-war, you get your ass over to Iraq, and take the place of somebody who wants to come home. And if you fall on the side that is against this war and against George Bush, stand up and speak out." ...

Bush lies unravel

2005-08-19T16:53:00.000-07:00

What noble cause???? What global war on terror... ism????
The Busheviks are so busy stealing and so incompetent at governing that we are really and truly soooo screwed!

(CNN) -- A former top aide to Colin Powell says his involvement in the former secretary of state's presentation to the United Nations on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was "the lowest point" in his life.

"I wish I had not been involved in it," says Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, a longtime Powell adviser who served as his chief of staff from 2002 through 2005. "I look back on it, and I still say it was the lowest point in my life." ...

Judge berates US failures as 9/11 supporter is convicted
By Richard Beeston, Diplomatic Editor

A GERMAN court yesterday convicted a Moroccan student of belonging to the al-Qaeda cell responsible for the attacks on America of September 11, 2001, but acquitted him of direct involvement in the murder of nearly 3,000 people.
Mounir al-Motassadeq, 31, was sentenced to seven years in prison for membership of a terrorist organisation, but the judge ruled that the more serious charges were not proven, in part because of a failure by the US authorities to co-operate with the prosecution.
In a three-hour judgment, read out before a court in Hamburg, Judge Ernst-Rainer Schudt said that the US Justice Department had refused to co-operate fully with the German court.
“How are we supposed to do justice to our task when important documents are withheld from us?” the judge asked. ...

Rockets Fired at U.S. Navy Ship in Jordan
By Megan K. Stack, Times Staff Writer

EL ALAMEIN, Egypt -- Militants fired at least three homemade rockets from a warehouse hide-out in the Jordanian port of Aqaba today, narrowly missing a U.S. Navy ship and killing a Jordanian soldier.

Jordanian forces cordoned off the port city and scoured the rough desert and surrounding hills in search of the men suspected of waging the most serious militant strike against the U.S. Navy since the destroyer Cole was bombed off the coast of Yemen in 2000.

A shadowy group loyal to Al Qaeda issued an Internet statement claiming responsibility for the attack. ...

What we're up against

2005-07-12T19:58:00.000-07:00

- The Rabid Rights Media Menagerie -

From 'The Nation'

article |posted July 8, 2005 (web only)
M is for Moronic
Max Blumenthal
... The conservative media game was neatly summarized by Matt Labash, a former senior writer for The Weekly Standard who now writes for National Review, in a 2003 interview on the website journalismjobs.com. Labash explained: "The conservative media likes to rap the liberal media on the knuckles for not being objective. We've created this cottage industry in which it pays to be un-objective.... It's a great way to have your cake and eat it too. Criticize other people for not being objective. Be as subjective as you want. It's a great little racket." ...
-

- And as examples of that "great little racket" -

From 'Media Matters'

CNN, ABC offered unchallenged legal analysis on Plame leak from Novak's partisan friends
Reporting on White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove's alleged involvement in the leaking of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity, CNN and ABC News presented unchallenged legal analysis from Victoria Toensing and Joseph E. DiGenova, respectively, both of whom defended Rove and were identified only as a "legal analyst" and a "former US attorney." Toensing and DiGenova, however, are partisan Republicans and personal friends of CNN host and columnist Robert D. Novak, who originally outed Plame in July 2003.

CNN's Malveaux plays White House correspondent, mind-reader, judge, and jury

CNN's Kyra Phillips: "definitely a major smear campaign going on" against Rove

Fox's Cameron parsed Bush's past statements on the fate of the CIA leaker: Bush "never actually said the word 'fired'"

ABC News, Wash. Post, Newsweek: Rove did not actually disclose Valerie Plame's name
...but a five-minute Google search would have produced it

Thieves and Clowns in high places

2005-07-04T13:01:00.000-07:00

There's no excuse for the deadly mess in Iraq. Because of a combination of stupid neo-con ideology and felonious cronyism, reconstruction hasn't happened and rebellion against the occupation has grown. The Bush administration is responsible... Criminally responsible. It's time for them to go... and preferably, go to jail.

Iraq reconstruction riddled with waste, audits find

By DAVID WOOD - Newhouse News Service

WASHINGTON - The U.S.-led reconstruction of Iraq, a strategic cornerstone of the war on terrorism, has been badly mismanaged, according to a growing body of evidence compiled mostly by U.S. government auditors.

Billions of dollars - some of it in shrink-wrapped bundles of $100 bills airlifted to Baghdad from the Federal Reserve Bank in New York - should have helped pay Iraqi bureaucrats, fix power lines and build schools. Instead, much of it can't be properly accounted for and millions have been stolen, auditors say. ...

... On the streets of Baghdad, U.S. military commanders began complaining early that the money rarely seemed to trickle down.

"We're losing the peace," a frustrated U.S. Special Forces Maj. Robert Caffrey said in June 2003 as Iraq teetered between the euphoria of seeing Saddam toppled and frustration at a U.S. occupation that seemed to bring no benefits. At the time, Caffrey was furious that he could get no money to foster local government or pay for small clean-up projects and schools.

Now back home in Hartford, Conn., Caffrey wrote last week in an e-mail that "it doesn't seem that much has changed in the last two years. Much to my sadness, when I said two years ago that we were losing the peace, I was more right than I knew.

"I'm astounded they still haven't gotten it right." ...
[ full article ]

Chickenhawks dis' the troops

2005-07-01T18:37:00.000-07:00

Very interesting... PBS airs 'Frontline' "Private Warriors" a documentary about Merc's in Iraq and then FoxNews just happens to stumble across a story sympathetic to the Merc's .

[ A comment at dailykos put me onto this ]

And here's the right answer to all those "support the troops" stickers
- thanks to Jesus' General.

Republican crunchin' number crunching

2005-06-29T07:59:00.000-07:00

Many states that went red in '04 are now just seeing red.

In 19 of the states that went to Bush in the '04 election, his approval rating has now dropped below 50% - in 9 of those states his disapproval numbers are 50% or higher!

06/05 - Bush	approve	disapprove
Virginia	49%	46%
Louisiana	49%	47%
Oklahoma	49%	47%
South Carolina	48%	47%
South Dakota	48%	47%
Georgia	48%	48%
Indiana	48%	48%
Tennessee	48%	49%
West Virginia	47%	47%
Arizona	46%	49%
Florida	46%	50%
Missouri	46%	52%
New Mexico	45%	50%
North Carolina	45%	50%
Colorado	45%	52%
Arkansas	44%	52%
Iowa	44%	52%
Ohio	40%	57%
Nevada	38%	57%

-------------------
Bush approval rating is 50% or higher in only 12 states.

Utah
Nebraska
Wyoming
Idaho
Montana
Alabama
Alaska
North Dakota
Kansas
Kentucky
Mississippi
Texas

Even in Bush's home state of Texas his numbers look bad, 50% approve and 47% disapprove.

Bush sez trust me - Again

2005-06-27T06:41:00.000-07:00

Tuesday night Bush is going togive what's being advertised as a major speech. I'd say anybody who listens should keep the old saying; "Fool me once, shame on you... Fool me twice, shame on me." firmly in mind.

... 91.5 percent of all American military deaths have occurred since Bush declared on May 1, 2003, that "major combat" was over. ...

Rumsfeld told "Fox News Sunday," for example, that he had not made optimistic predictions during the prelude to war. Such a claim, he said, is "false. ... I have been balanced and measured."

Yet, on Feb. 7, 2003, more than a month before the war began, he predicted that "it could last six days, six weeks, I doubt six months." On Feb. 20, 2003, he told PBS that the Americans "would be welcomed," as happened in Afghanistan, where people in the streets were "playing music, cheering, flying kites." (Seven months later, when a broadcast journalist asked Rumsfeld about his PBS remarks, he replied: "Never said that. Never did. ... You're thinking of somebody else.")

Also Sunday, Rumsfeld told NBC's "Meet the Press" that any rosy prewar predictions (which he denies were made) would have been inappropriate. He said: "Anyone who tries to estimate the end, the time, the cost, or the casualties in a war is making a big mistake." Yet it was Cheney, on March 16, 2003, who said "I think it will go relatively quickly ... weeks rather than months." A month earlier, Bush budget official Mitchell E. Daniels Jr. publicly estimated that the war could cost roughly $60 billion. (The current cost is $208 billion.)...
[ full article ]

It's Hard Work

2005-06-25T09:05:00.000-07:00

Yep! I'm pretty sure that's how Simple Scotty McClellan is feeling about press briefings these days. (IT'S HARD WORK) It appears that the press-corps is finally rousing from it's long slumber... well, at least some of them. This exchange at Fridays Press Briefing must have made beads of sweat pop out on Scotty's forehead.

Press Briefing by Scott McClellan
James S. Brady Briefing Room
June 24, 2005 2:10 P.M. EDT
[in part]

MR. McCLELLAN: Yes, I think you can go back and look at those time periods and look at what we said during that time period. This is a very critical period in Iraq. Here's why: because the terrorists are trying to test our resolve, and they're trying to shake the will of the international community and the Iraqi people. The terrorists, as General Abizaid --

Q They've been doing that for months, don't you agree or --

MR. McCLELLAN: No, as General Abizaid talked about, there have been a growing number of foreign terrorists coming in to Iraq, because they recognize that Iraq is a central front in the war on terrorism. And, Bill, we are a nation that is at war. And the Commander-in-Chief believes it's important to keep the American people informed about --

Q Yes, but what's changed?

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, are you going to let me finish, or are you going to keep jumping in?

Q Well, you said the same thing before, and I accept what you say. But what's changed?

MR. McCLELLAN: I was just talking to you --

Q It's the same condition that we found ourselves in a year ago.

MR. McCLELLAN: I was just outlining to you why it's a critical period --

Q Yes, but it was a critical period for the same reason then.

MR. McCLELLAN: -- in Iraq, and we are a nation at war. And the Commander-in-Chief has a responsibility to keep the American people informed about the progress we're making and the strategy we have for succeeding. It's important that the American people know the progress that we're making and they understand the difficulties and dangers that lie ahead. This is a time when we are seeing that the enemy is determined and ruthless in the violence that they seek to spread to try to shake our will and shake our resolve. And that's why it's important to talk to the American people. It was important to talk to the American people at that time, as well, Bill.

Q Yes, but I mean, it's the same thing that you're saying.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, I think that -- no, it's not. I think the American people want to hear from their Commander-in-Chief. And you may take it --

Q I'm not arguing about that.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, you may take a different view, but I think the American people want to hear from their Commander-in-Chief, and they will have the --

Q That's not what I'm arguing about.

MR. McCLELLAN: Well, let's go on if you're not going to --

He keeps saying this is a "critical period in Iraq" - "the terrorists are trying to test our resolve" but he just can't come up with how the situation in Iraq is any different than it was a month ago... or a year ago, for that matter!
I really hope the press-corps it growing some spine... but maybe it's just that snow-jobs can't be pulled off quite as easily in the Summer heat.

Winning the War on Terra' ? - I Wish

2005-06-22T22:38:00.000-07:00

First, under the heading; "We told you so, before the election" -

Aznar accused on Madrid bombing
Dale Fuchs in Madrid
Thursday June 23, 2005
The Guardian

A parliamentary panel investigating the Madrid rail bombings has concluded that the former government of José María Aznar "manipulated" and "twisted" information about the blasts to further its electoral interests, it emerged yesterday. ...

- Then, Two related stories under the heading; "We told you so, before the election, you dumbasses".

Iraq creating new breed of jihadists, says CIA
Ewen MacAskill, Duncan Campbell and Richard Norton-Taylor
Thursday June 23, 2005
The Guardian

The war in Iraq is creating a new breed of Islamic jihadists who could go on to destabilise other countries, according to a CIA report. The CIA believes Iraq to be potentially worse than Afghanistan, which produced thousands of jihadists in the 1980s and 1990s. Many of the recruits to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida had fought in Afghanistan. ....

British warplanes join assault on Taliban
Scores killed but US spy plane lost after mission

Declan Walsh in Islamabad
Thursday June 23, 2005
The Guardian

Afghan and US troops backed by British warplanes pounded a mountain hideout in southern Afghanistan in a day-long battle that left more than 76 Taliban guerrillas dead. The battle was the bloodiest engagement yet in a summer of escalating violence that has dimmed hopes for an early end to the Taliban insurgency. ....

- And finally tying those two stories together.

Blinded by the light at the end of the tunnel

The American public is increasingly disillusioned by the Iraq war, and Bush's triumphalism only makes things worse

Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday June
23, 2005
The Guardian

Outlawing Flag Burning?

2005-06-22T17:56:00.000-07:00

Once again, Free speech is under assault by rabid-right-wingers.
I'm not a big fan of flag burning, but I'm absolutely opposed to amending the Constitution to making political dissent a crime.

And besides: When it comes to desecration of the flag, what's the bigger crime; flames or pit stains?

Downing Street Memo's

2005-06-19T06:21:00.000-07:00

Read 'em for yourself
On the Net:
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/fcolegal020308.pdf
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/manning020314.pdf
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/meyer020318.pdf
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/ods020308.pdf
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/ricketts020322.pdf
http://hosted.ap.org/specials/dowdoc/straw020325.pdf
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1648758,00.html
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1593607,00.html

Reasoned Progress vs. Right-wing Nuts

2005-06-18T19:44:00.000-07:00

A couple of interesting stories from Iowa... See, not all of the midwest is bug-house slug-nutty.
=====================
Governor Vilsack to restore felons' voting rights

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
June 17, 2005

Gov. Tom Vilsack said Friday that he soon will sign an
executive order restoring voting rights to convicted felons who have served their sentence.

‘‘This action we take is not going to be a pardon,’’ Vilsack said.

The governor said only four other states prohibit felons from voting after completing their sentences.

‘‘We’re here today to talk about justice,’’ Vilsack aid. ‘‘When you’ve paid your debt to society, you need to be reconnected to society. ...
=========================
Civil union dissolution withstands challenge
The decision says those who wanted to overturn a judge's order to void a lesbian union had no right to interfere.
By FRANK SANTIAGO
REGISTER STAFF WRITER
June 18, 2005
...The justices ruled that those who sued over Neary's order - a group of conservative Iowa lawmakers led the effort - had no legal standing or right to interfere.

"It would be strange indeed and contrary to our notions of separation of powers if we were to recognize that legislators have standing to intervene in lawsuits just because they disagree with a court's interpretation of a statute," Chief Justice Louis Lavorato wrote. ...
==========================
on the creepy - 'how do twisted weirdo's like this get elected' - side of thing:

Editorial
Congress Assaults the Courts, Again
Published: June 18,
2005

The House of Representatives took a little- noticed but dangerous swipe at the power of the courts this week. It passed an amendment to a budget bill that would bar money from being spent to enforce a federal court ruling regarding the Ten Commandments. The vote threatens the judiciary's long-acknowledged position as the final arbiter of the Constitution. It is important that this amendment be removed before the bill becomes law.

During consideration of an appropriations bill for the Departments of State, Justice and Commerce, Representative John Hostettler, Republican of Indiana, introduced an amendment to prohibit any funds from being used to enforce Russelburg v. Gibson County. In that case, a federal court ruled that a courthouse Ten Commandments display violated the First Amendment and had to be removed. Mr. Hostettler declared that the ruling was unconstitutional, and inconsistent with "the Christian heritage of the United States." ...

A little birdie tells me, "Keep Fighting!"

2005-06-16T20:35:00.000-07:00

First the ivory-billed woodpecker reappeared in Arkansas, then it turned out the pink wildflower, Mount Diablo buckwheat wasn't extinct after all and now the least Bell's vireo is making a come back

Rare bird found in San Joaquin Valley
The Associated Press
FRESNO, Calif. — A chatty songbird thought to have disappeared from the Central Valley 60 years ago has been spotted nesting in a patch of restored habitat along the San Joaquin River. ...

What does it mean?... examples of the power of remote prayer? a sign of the end times?... Not hardly! Thirty years of environmental regulations and conservation efforts have paid off. Proof that those things work and that it's worth fighting to keep the Right-wing Free-marketist from undoing it all.

As these pay-offs of environmental regulations are hitting the news (on the back pages), the Rabidly pro-pillage Republicans are moving to undo the progress and to equate support for environmental protection with support for terrorism.

FBI: Radical-activist groups are major threat
By John Heilprin - The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Environmental and animal-rights activists who have turned to arson and explosives are the nation's top domestic-terrorism threat, an FBI official told a Senate committee yesterday. ...
...Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the panel's chairman, said he hoped to examine more closely how the groups might be getting assistance in fund-raising and communications from "mainstream activists" in tax-exempt organizations.
"Just like al-Qaida or any other terrorist organization, ELF and ALF cannot accomplish their goals without money, membership and the media," Inhofe said. ...

Lightbulb reading for the weekend

2005-06-11T11:46:00.000-07:00

Ok. friends, here's my (populist) recommended read list for the weekend.

On Rebalancing the Rights of Corporations and Communities

Redefining "Corporate Governance"

Losing Our Country
by Paul Krugman

Dean isn't the Problem
by Joan Vennochi

Dean Just Told Them The Truth and They Thought It Was Hell
by Thom Hartmann

The Myth That Populism & Anger Lose Elections

They're all relatively short articles and if you read them in order, there's actually a 'what's wrong and what to do about it' theme to the list.

- And when you're done reading we can all sing a verse from
Bob Dylans "THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN’".

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don’t stand in the
doorway
Don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who
has stalled
There’s a battle outside
And it is ragin’.
It’ll soon shake
your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin’.

Homeland Security?

2005-06-08T10:06:00.000-07:00

Man With Chain Saw Allowed to Enter U.S.
Hmmmm? White guys with bloody chainsaws aren't on the Border Patrols "things to watch for" list?

But then again, I suppose if you let one angry/crazy white-guy in

you have to let them ALL in.

How can we tell if we're safer

2005-04-20T22:12:00.000-07:00

The Bush Administration has been lying to the American people. The Bush Administration is still lying to the American people. Some of us have known that all along; but now the hard evidence is coming to light

Tinkers tailoring information
Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service
(KRT) - The following editorial appeared in the Seattle Times on Tuesday, April 19:
X X X
The details vary of course, but the story line is becoming too familiar. Information into or out of the Bush administration is either manipulated toward a desired outcome or completely hidden. ...
[ full article ]

Are We Safer?
04/20/2005 @ 5:29pm
- Kristin Breitweiser -
... Where are we today? Are the democratic principles that Osama Bin Laden tried to destroy on 9/11 still safely intact? Do nations around the world still respect and admire Americans? Are we still 'all Americans' like we were in the immediate wake of September 11th when almost every country in the world declared their solidarity with us? Or have we squandered that worldwide good will, faith and common purpose to fight terrorism? Have we learned any lessons since 9/11? And, most importantly, have our country's choices made us any safer than we were pre-9/11? ...
[ full article ]

So, with the Bush Administration hiding the facts from us, how will we be able to tell is we are safer? So far, all the evidence that's come to light says the Bush Administration is incompetent and-or more interested in setting up sweat-heart deals for their friends than in keeping America safe.
===

The War on Truth

2005-04-16T12:02:00.000-07:00

Here's a Friday afternoon story that was supposed to fly in under the radar.
This is one more example of what a horror show the Bush Administration is! They are massively incompetent and rather than make any effort to address their incompetence, they make every effort to cover it up.

Bush administration eliminating 19 year-old international terrorism report

By Jonathan S. Landay
Knight Ridder
Newspapers

WASHINGTON - The State Department decided to stop publishing an annual report on international terrorism after the government's top terrorism center concluded that there were more terrorist attacks in 2004 than in any year since 1985, the first year the publication covered. ...

..."Instead of dealing with the facts and dealing with them in an intelligent fashion, they try to hide their facts from the American public," charged Larry C. Johnson, a former CIA analyst and State Department terrorism expert who first disclosed the decision to eliminate the report in The Counterterrorism Blog, an online journal.

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., who was among the leading critics of last year's mix-up, reacted angrily to the decision.

"This is the definitive report on the incidence of terrorism around the world. It should be unthinkable that there would be an effort to withhold it - or any of the key data - from the public. The Bush administration should stop playing politics
with this critical report." ...

... statistics that the National Counterterrorism Center provided to the State Department reported 625 "significant" terrorist attacks in 2004.

That compared with 175 such incidents in 2003, the highest number in two decades.

The statistics didn't include attacks on American troops in Iraq, which President Bush as recently as Tuesday called "a central front in the war on terror." ....

[ full story ]

Where are the Republicans really taking us?

2005-03-10T00:38:00.000-08:00

House warned on rise in debt
GAO chief says current spending path
won't work

Thursday, March 10, 2005
By Maeve Reston, Post-Gazette
National Bureau

WASHINGTON -- U.S. Comptroller General David M. Walker warned members of Congress yesterday that government spending is on an unsustainable path and that Social Security's financial problems made up only a fraction of the spending headaches Congress will face in coming years.

During the House Ways and Means Committee's first hearing on Social Security this year, Walker reminded members that while they are struggling to find a way to make up Social Security's $3.7 trillion shortfall, Medicare's is facing a shortfall that will be about eight times larger at $28 trillion.

The government is so deeply in debt, Walker said, that if spending rises at the pace of the growth of the economy and if the president's tax cuts are extended, the money coming into the Treasury in 2040 might only be enough to pay interest on the money the government is borrowing to pay for its programs.

"We are on an imprudent path," said Walker, who heads the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office. "The government has no money. The government owes money."
... [ full article ]

Don't be fooled into thinking this situation is accidental. Massive deficit spending coupled with tax cuts for the wealthy is part of a plan to destroy the government of the United States. Bush is part of the cabal of free market maniacs who are out to steal the resources of the whole world.

To understand what Bush/Republican policies are aiming for we can look to the activities of the World Bank and IMF, who's leaders are also member of the cabal of free market maniacs. Time after time the World Bank and IMF have lent money to less developed countries knowing the money was being spent badly. Then when the poorly designed development projects came to nothing and all the money had disappeared, they forced the governments to cut social spending to nothing and sell off the nations assets at fire-sale prices.

If this cabal of free market maniacs isn't stopped, that is where they will take the United States. Tax cuts for the wealthy, massive deficit spending and Privatizing Social Security are just steps in bankrupting the U.S.. If allowed to carry out their plan; once the U.S. government is bankrupted, Republicans will begin demanding not only an end to ALL social programs but also the liquidation of assets to raise money to pay on the national debt. That would mean selling off inter-state hiways and bridges, auctioning of federal buildings and public lands. Our national forests and national parks would go on the auctions block.

And who will be the buyers? For the answer, just look to who's accumulating cash because of big tax cuts.

Just say NO!

2005-03-03T16:30:00.000-08:00

Don't be fooled

2005-03-01T19:57:00.000-08:00

Ownership Society?

2005-02-02T01:18:00.000-08:00

Yeah, that's right! Bush and his pals want to OWN America.

Promises of wealth and easy living, wrapped up in Buzz words. This is just the latest ultra-Right-wing bait'n'switch scheme designed to enrich the insiders while impoverishing and disenfranchising ordinary Americans.
Like Georgie-boy keeps saying, fiefdom is on the march!
Today it's 'Privatizing Social Security'. Tomorrow it'll be 'Tort Reform', so they'll have immunity when they're caught stealing our 'Privatized Social Security'.

The Kansas City Star
Posted on Wed, Feb. 02, 2005

Bush Offering Expanded 'Ownership Society'

NANCY BENAC
Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Richard Nixon promised a "new American revolution." Ronald Reagan pushed his "new federalism." Bill Clinton invoked a "new covenant." Now, George Bush is offering Americans a new, expanded "ownership society." ...

...the president is taking the noble idea of an "ownership society" and using it to sugarcoat a scheme that would unwisely saddle ordinary Americans with even greater risks and costs for Social Security, health care, retirement benefits and other programs.

"Hokum, that's a good word for it," says former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich. "They have a knack for putting labels on their policies that stand for exactly the opposite of what the policies aim to achieve." ...
[ full article ]

Killing the Goose

2005-01-31T21:07:00.000-08:00

There is a CRISIS in Social Security
and HIS name is George W. Bush!

Principles and Guts enough to stand up for them

2005-01-26T11:12:00.000-08:00

Today The Senate voted, 85 to 13, to confirm Ms. Rice as Secretary of State. Twelve democrats and one independent voted against Rice. I can't figure out what the other Democratic Senators thought they were doing. Any way you slice it Condi Rice is unfit to represent the United State of America. Either she lied about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein or she's not bright enough to tell when she's being lied to.

Those who voted NO on confirming Rice:

1.) Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.)
2.) Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.),
3.) Mark Dayton (D-Minn.),
4.) Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.)
5.) Tom Harkin (D-Iowa)
6.) Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii),
7.) Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.),
8.) Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.),
9.) John F. Kerry (D-Mass.),
10.) Jack Reed (D-R.I.)
11.) Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.),
12.) Evan Bayh (D-Ind.)
13.) indepedent Sen. James M. Jeffords of Vermont.

Reference = NYTIMES

Approaching the point-of-no-return

2005-01-23T10:24:00.000-08:00

Even the Busheviks hand picked people can't deny global warming, now that it's too late.

Global warming approaching point of no return, warns leading climate expert

By Geoffrey Lean, Environment Editor
The Independent
23 January 2005

Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the official Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), told an international conference attended by 114 governments in Mauritius this month that he personally believes that the world has "already reached the level of dangerous concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere" and called for immediate and "very deep" cuts in the pollution if humanity is to "survive". . . .

A memorandum from Exxon to the White House in early 2001 specifically asked it to get the previous chairman, Dr Robert Watson, the chief scientist of the World Bank, "replaced at the request of the US". The Bush administration then lobbied other countries in favour of Dr Pachauri - whom the former vice-president Al Gore called the "let's drag our feet" candidate, and got him elected to replace Dr Watson, a British-born naturalised American, who had repeatedly called for urgent action. . . .
[ full article ]

Corporate Power vs. The People

2005-01-09T23:29:00.000-08:00

The Social Conservative dupes aren't moving fast enough for Big-Money, so they're stepping in. "Moral Values" have always been a red herring. The Big-Money gang has used it effectively in the past to stir things up and mobiles the suckers.

But now, with real American fascism just a few more judicial appointments away, the Wealthy-Elite have grown impatient. They see their chance to make 'Their Property Right' the law of the land and finally sweep away all those pesky civil rights, once and for all.

Lobby backs Bush's picks for judges

By Tom Hamburger and Peter Wallsten
Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON - A powerful business lobby is preparing a multimillion-dollar campaign to aid the White House in its quest to win approval for conservative judges, a move that could transform the ideological battles over the federal judiciary and the Supreme Court. ...

The engineer is longtime Bush friend and former Michigan Gov. John Engler, who recently took the helm of the National Association of Manufacturers, which represents such large, blue-chip firms as Boeing and General Motors, as well as 10,000 small and medium-sized manufacturers. ...

He said federal judicial-confirmation debates are important to business, particularly because of judges' roles in civil cases.

"There has been too much of a tendency in the past to cast these judgeship battles as a social debate about abortion or gay rights," Engler said. "In fact, there are very few of those cases in contrast to those dealing with the tort system and the rights of individuals and companies." ...

[ full article ]

Not Republican enough

2005-01-03T14:34:00.000-08:00

Obviously, honesty and integrity are not part of Republican moral values. Republican activist in Washington state are angry at Secretary of State Sam Reed because he wouldn't use his position to fix the Governors race. The activist are vowing revenge against Reed.

Monday, January 03, 2005
Republican Reed faces GOP wrath over recount decisions
By David Postman - Seattle Times chief political reporter

. . .

Not Republican enough

Now Reed believes the anger toward him is driven by a feeling he hasn't been Republican enough. For example, some think he should have backed the party's call for county auditors to reopen their tallies in hopes of getting more Rossi votes counted.
"There are people who think I should be using the position of secretary of state simply to weigh the scales on the side of my own party. I just don't accept that, and it would not be proper," he said.

"There are some people who have been dismayed that I wasn't a Katherine Harris who took the position, 'I'm a Republican, and by God that comes first.' "
...

John Giese, a Republican political consultant and close adviser to Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi, appeared ready to blame Reed for problems he expects under a Gregoire administration.

"Every time taxes are increased, new regulations passed, new rules written by state agencies without underlying statutory authority and economic opportunity is stifled, this election will be remembered," he wrote. "Passions may be cooler but memory cells won't be dead."

Pete DeLaunay, a Seattle public-relations executive, wrote the group that he had e-mailed Reed to ask him not to certify the election last week.

"Sam responded as sympathetic, but says there's a constitutional issue at play," DeLaunay wrote. "I say let the cards fall where they may." ...
[ full article ]

Any Pooh in a Storm

2004-12-09T20:51:00.000-08:00

If it serves the corporate greed-heads purposes, organic food might be bad for you because manure was spread on the field where the food was grown.

The Corporate Attack on Organic Agriculture
by Steve Sprinkel and Mark Kastel

. . . these multinational corporations can’t stand that consumers are voting with their pocketbooks because of their discomfort with conventional farming practices and have turned organic food marketing from a small, eclectic niche into the fastest growing segment of the food industry, with over $12 billion in sales this year. . . .

. . . The Hudson Institute charges that manure use increases the incidence of food-borne diseases. Hudson’s claim completely twists the results of a recent independent University of Minnesota study that found no statistically different risk in the pathogenic contamination of certified organic food verses its conventionally produced counterparts, according to lead author, Dr. Francisco Diez-Gonzalez. . . .
[ full article ]

But, if it serves the greed-heads purposes, a little sewage in your drinking water shouldn't be a big deal.

EPA May Allow the Discharge of Partially Treated Sewage
Guidelines That Are Near Release Would Permit Blended Waste

By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, December 9, 2004; Page A03

The Environmental Protection Agency is close to issuing new guidelines making it easier for sewage authorities to dump partially treated wastewater during heavy rainfalls, according to documents obtained by The Washington Post. . . .
[ full article ]

These greed-heads think all Americans are stupid. They think they can sell us any old load of manure.

Safer? . . .

2004-12-06T15:33:00.000-08:00

Bush and his cronies keep saying they're fighting terrorism... and that we're safer. But, whenever FACTS finally do bubble to the surface; those FACTS always show that Bush and his cronies are falling down on the job and that it's the terrorist who are deciding whether or not we're safe.
We'll be lucky if we survive 4 more years of this kind of safer.

Bin Laden trail is cold, Musharraf admits

Pakistani leader admits impasse as US offers deal to Taliban

David Teather in New York and Declan Walsh in Islamabad
Monday December 6, 2004
The Guardian

The hunt for Osama bin Laden has gone cold, reducing Pakistan's security forces to little more than guesswork, President Pervez Musharraf admitted at the weekend.
Speaking to reporters in Washington before flying to Britain yesterday, Mr Musharraf blamed the US for failing to send enough troops to neighbouring Afghanistan.

The admission confirmed the fear that Bin Laden is no closer to capture than when he fled the Tora Bora caves three years ago, probably across the border into Pakistan. . . . .
[ full article ]

What's Good for the Goose - is - Good for the Gander?

2004-12-03T13:01:00.000-08:00

So, if senator Coleman thinks Kofi Annan should resign because of alleged "corruption and mismanagement" while Kofi headed the U.N. ; Does senator Coleman also think that George Bush should resign because of the mismanagement of the war on Iraq?

U.S. senator wants Annan to resign as U.N. leader
Coleman looking into alleged fraud in oil-for-food program run by U.N.
Wednesday, December 1, 2004 Posted: 8:01 PM EST (0101 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The U.S. senator leading the investigation into allegations of corruption and mismanagement in the Iraq oil-for-food program is urging U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan to resign, saying the "massive scope of this debacle demands nothing less." ....

"If we're to get to the bottom of this, if there's to be any credibility, the person that was at the helm during the course of this thing cannot be the guy that Paul Volcker reports to, cannot be the guy that we go asking for help and assistance in getting the people we need to talk to," Coleman told CNN. "He needs to step back, step down for the credibility of the organization itself." ....
[ full article ]

Gee, senator Coleman; that sounds so reasonable... "If we're to get to the bottom of this, if there's to be any credibility, the person that was at the helm during the course of this thing cannot be the guy that we go asking for help and assistance in getting the people we need to talk to,"

Halliburton Surges After Bush Re-Election
Wed Nov 3, 2004 05:51 PM ET

.....
But the company still faces a number of problems over its Iraq contracts.

In the latest move, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' top contracting official last week called for an investigation into the award the of multi-billion dollar contracts to Halliburton, calling it the worst case of contracting abuse she had seen.

Bunnatine Greenhouse, in a television interview, said, "It was misconduct, and part of the misconduct was blatant." At the center of Greenhouse's complaint is a no-bid contract worth $7 billion awarded last year to KBR to rebuild Iraq's oil industry.

U.S. auditors have also accused KBR of being unable to account for over a third of the items it handled in Kuwait under a work order for the U.S. occupation authority in Iraq.

In addition, the U.S. Army is threatening to withhold payment of 15 percent, or about $600 million, of Halliburton's bills because of a dispute over whether KBR properly documented its bills for feeding and housing troops in Iraq and Kuwait. ....
[ full article ]

Property Halliburton managed in Iraq missing
GLOBEANDMAIL.COM - Saturday, November 27, 2004 - Page A26

Washington -- A third or more of the government property Halliburton Co. was paid to manage for the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq could not be located by auditors, investigative reports to Congress show.

Auditors could not locate hundreds of CPA items worth millions of dollars in Iraq and Kuwait this summer and fall, the report said.

Vice-President Dick Cheney's former company is the focus of both a criminal investigation into alleged fuel-price gouging and an FBI inquiry into possible favouritism from the administration. AP
[ full article ]

I suppose we could ask:

Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minnesota,
Washington Office:
320 Senate Hart Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Main: 202-224-5641
Fax: 202-224-1152
email contact form

If he plans to ask Bush to step down - or - if he (Norm Coleman, R-Minnesota) is a hypocrite.

Rumsfeld facing war crimes case in Germany

2004-11-30T06:43:00.000-08:00

Tue 30 November, 2004 05:33

BERLIN (Reuters) - Lawyers acting for a U.S. advocacy group will today file war crimes charges in Germany against senior U.S. administration officials for their alleged role in torture at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.
[ full article ]

From Deutsche Welle: Rumsfeld Sued for Alleged War Crimes

From al Jazeera: Group to charge US with war crimes

With a lapdog Congress, perhaps international pressure is the only avenue of redress for our grievances.

More evidence of the new fascist state

2004-11-27T04:28:00.000-08:00

The Republicans are coming out in the open with their real agenda; The destruction of American Democracy.

Analysis
Hastert's new House order

By Charles Babington
The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — In scuttling major intelligence legislation that he, the president and most lawmakers supported, House Speaker Dennis Hastert last week enunciated a policy in which Congress will vote on bills only if most House Republicans back them, regardless of how many Democrats favor them.

Hastert's position, which is drawing fire from Democrats and some outside groups, is the latest step in a decade-long process of limiting Democrats' influence and running the House virtually as a one-party institution. Republicans earlier barred House Democrats from helping draft major bills such as the 2003 Medicare revision and this year's intelligence package. Hastert, R-Ill., now says such bills will reach the House floor, after negotiations with the Senate, only if "the majority of the majority" supports them. . . .
[ full article ]

Don't just take my word for it. Read the signs of Fascism and give it some thought.

Fascism Anyone?
Laurence W. Britt
from Free Inquiry magazine, Volume 23, Number 2.
http://secularhumanism.org/library/fi/britt_23_2.htm

...the fascist or protofascist model...
...fourteen common threads...

1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism.
2. Disdain for the importance of human rights.
3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause.
4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism.
5. Rampant sexism.
6. A controlled mass media.
7. Obsession with national security.
8. Religion and ruling elite tied together.
9. Power of corporations protected.
10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated.
11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts.
12. Obsession with crime and punishment.
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption.
14. Fraudulent elections.

Unfit to govern

2004-11-23T23:59:00.000-08:00

The Istook amendment wasn't a mistake. It's the new Republican way... The new proto-fascist congress, where Representatives and Senators are just window-dressing for the 'Leadership'. Amendments inserted into bills in the middle of the night (by person or persons unknown). In both houses, whether they're Democrats or Republicans, the 'rank and file' won't be allow to participate... because it's not democracy anymore. The snooping into Americans finances (Istook) amendment may be removed from law, but a stealth anti-choice amendment won't... It too was slipped into the spending bill without proper legislative process and consensus.

House to Return to Quell Tax Controversy
Killing Expansion of Hill Access to IRS Returns Dec. 6 Frees Spending Bill
By Helen Dewar
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, November 24, 2004; Page A07

House Republican leaders were forced yesterday to summon lawmakers back into session next month to quell an uproar over a belatedly discovered provision in a huge spending bill that would have given Appropriations Committee chairmen access to Americans' tax returns. . . . .

Doubts remained yesterday over exactly how the controversial tax-return provision -- which allows Appropriations Committee chairmen or their "agents" access to Internal Revenue Service facilities or "any tax returns or return information contained therein" -- got into the omnibus spending bill late last week. House Republicans blamed committee staff aides and the IRS.

Rep. Ernest J. Istook Jr. (R-Okla.), chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that oversees the IRS, denied any role. Yesterday Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), who had referred to the proposal as the "Istook amendment" Saturday, issued a statement expressing regret for "any confusion my earlier remarks may have created."
[ full article ]

November 22, 2004
Congress Passes "Back-Door" Abortion
Gag Rule
An anti-abortion provision with potentially widespread impact will remain intact as part of the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations Bill for 2005, in spite of efforts by pro-choice Senators to block the measure. President Bush is expected to sign the omnibus spending bill.

On Friday, nine female Senators, including Olympia Snowe (R-ME), sent a letter to chair of the Appropriations Committee Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK), requesting that the language of the clause be changed and protesting the fact that the Federal Refusal Clause had not been discussed in committee, nor had it been put to a vote on the Senate floor. According to the women Senators, the clause, sponsored by Rep. Dave Weldon (R-FL), would allow a broad range of health-care companies refuse to comply with federal, state, and local laws and regulations pertaining to abortion services. Should this provision become law, federal, state, or local governments may no longer require any institutional or individual health-care provider to provide, pay for, or refer abortion services. This will mean that medical providers in hospitals and clinics across the country will likely be victims of demonstrations and intimidation as this provisions allows that they be forbidden from providing abortion care to women who need it, and also to deny women referrals to another provider. . . .
[ full article ]

Borrow and Spend

2004-11-17T21:27:00.000-08:00

I hope all you clowns that voted Republican are real happy with an Eight Trillion Dollar debt!

Nov 17, 11:14 PM EST
Senate OKs $800B Debt Limit Hike
By ALAN FRAM
Associated Press Writer

...The mostly party line, 52-44 vote was expected to be followed by House passage Thursday. Enactment would raise the government's borrowing limit to $8.18 trillion - $2.23 trillion higher than when Bush became president in 2001, and more than eight times the debt President Reagan faced when he took office in 1981. ...

... "This can be called a birth tax, a birth tax that is dumped on the back of every American child unwillingly," said Kerry, who voted against the borrowing increase. ...
[ full article ]

Making it up as they go.

2004-11-16T15:55:00.000-08:00

Isn't this sweet!
The Republicans -[the Moral Values people]- are changing the rules to shield Tom DeLay -[Political Thug extraordinaire]-.

House GOP May Change Leadership Rules
By Charles Babington Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 16, 2004;
House Republicans were contemplating changing their rules in order to allow members indicted by state prosecutors to remain in a leadership post, a move designed to benefit Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) in case he is charged by a Texas grand jury that has indicted three of his political associates, GOP leaders said today. ...

Combine this with Republicans -[the Moral Values people]- plans to change Senate rules on filibusters to ram through Judicial nominees and Their complete disrespect for Democracy is crystal clear.

It's BAD...REALLY BAD!

2004-11-15T21:52:00.000-08:00

This 'so called' shake up in the C.I.A. is a disaster in the making. They're bringing in political hacks to fill important positions... the same kind of political hacks that Bremer took to Iraq with him [and look how well that's turned out]. These MoFo's are applying a political litmus test to civil servants and squeezing out competent people who don't meet their criteria of loyalty to this pResident and his party.
CIA departures concern Congress

CIA Chief Seeks to Reassure Employees
E-Mail Sent After 2 Officials Resign

By Dana Priest and Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 16, 2004; Page A01

...Goss has said he believes the CIA's clandestine service is dysfunctional and needs changes. His critics say the director, a former CIA case officer and Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee, is purging the agency of career officers whom he incorrectly perceives as critical of Bush administration policies.

In addition, Goss has over the last month put in charge several former Hill staff members who are not well regarded by senior officials because they lack managerial and operational experience, and are believed to have treated career officers disrespectfully.

This is not the first time a new director's personnel changes have put the agency in turmoil, but the criticism of the Goss team's actions is the first to raise questions of partisanship. ....

This seems to be happening in other parts of the government too. Apparently these Republicans are planning to leave a very insidious legacy of political operatives within the civil service.

It's bad enough that they're politicizing the civil service... but, what do you call people who'd make that politicizing a priority above wiping out al Qaida.

Do you feel a DRAFT?

2004-11-13T16:15:00.000-08:00

During the campaign, Bush insisted he had no plans to restart the draft. Was that just another LIE? Did God tell Georgie-boy to lie?

Saturday, October 30, 2004
Potomac Watch: Administration's own actions fuel rumors of draft
By ERIC ROSENBERG
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld indignantly scoffs and scolds about the relentless rumors that the Bush administration is planning to reinstate the military draft.
"This plot is so secret that it doesn't exist," Rumsfeld wrote this week in the desert News of Salt Lake City. "To my knowledge, in the time I have served as secretary of defense, the idea of reinstating the draft has never been debated, endorsed, discussed, theorized, pondered or even whispered by anyone in the Bush administration."
In a radio interview earlier this month, Rumsfeld denounced the rumors as "a mischievous political effort that's being made to frighten young men and women."
This may come as a shock to the Pentagon chief, but most of the rumors have arisen from actions within the Bush administration, which has studied how to expand draft registration to include women, target some civilian work specialties for special attention by the draft and extend the required draft registration age from 25 years old to 34 years. .... [ full article ]

Here's what's been done to gear up for the draft.

The Selective Service System, the Bush Administration, and the Pentagon have been quietly moving to fill draft board vacancies nationwide in order to prepare for a military draft that could start as early as June 15, 2005. In preparation several million dollars have been added to the 2004 Selective Service System (SSS) budget. The SSS Administration must report to Bush on March 31, 2005 that the system, which has lain dormant for decades, is ready for activation. The Pentagon has quietly begun a public campaign to fill all 10,350 draft board positions and 11,070 appeals board slots nationwide. An unpopular election year topic, military experts and influential members of Congress are suggesting that if Rumsfelds prediction of a long, hard slog in Iraq and Afghanistan (and a permanent state of war on terrorism) proves accurate, the U.S. may have no choice but to draft. ... (more)
SOURCE: Project Censored

Torture-Guy for Attorney General?

2004-11-11T21:54:00.000-08:00

What a Horrible Idea!

What can they be thinking over at
the Christian Science Monitor?

A more moderate voice as AG
By Peter Grier Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

WASHINGTON – One of the most important things to remember about Attorney General-designate Alberto Gonzales is obvious: He's not John Ashcroft.
A moderate conservative with a mild demeanor, White House counsel Gonzales - unlike Ashcroft - isn't a polarizing figure in Washington. He'll draw some tough questions from Senate Democrats, but he's likely to be easily confirmed. ....

Gonzales wrote a draft memo on the treatment of prisoners that called some of the Geneva Convention provisions on prisoner treatment "quaint." His office also played a role in the formulation of a 2002 Justice Department memo that concluded torture of suspected terrorists might be legal under some circumstances. ... [ The Christian Science Monitor ]

Safer? Not likely!

2004-11-11T15:58:00.000-08:00

Slowly but surely, the truth is leaking out.
Bush and Co. have other priorities.
Protecting America and defeating al Qaeda sure aren't at the top of their list!

CIA Officer Criticizes Agency's Handling of Bin Laden
By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 9, 2004; Page A28

One of the most senior intelligence officers in the CIA's Osama bin Laden unit said yesterday that fewer experienced officers are assigned to defeating the al Qaeda leader and his followers now than there were on Sept. 11, 2001. ....
[ full article ]

Mandate My Ass! Part II

2004-11-07T09:39:00.000-08:00

If you accept the election results as legitimate and not the result of vote fraud; Bush got 51% of the popular vote and 53% of the electoral vote.
Fifty-one per cent is a majority, not a mandate!

PRESIDENTIAL RESULTS (270 Electoral Votes Needed to Win)
.	Electoral Votes	Popular Votes	% Popular Votes
Bush (R)	286	58,978,616	51
Kerry (D)	252	55,384,497	48

Here's a little historical perspective on the make up of the House of Rep's. Notice that in the 107th Congress Republicans held 50.8% of the seats. Now it looks like they may have push their majority to 53%.
Far from a mandate to rewrite the laws of the land!

76th Congress (1939-1941)
Total Membership: 435 Representatives, 2 Delegates, 2 Resident Commissioners
Party Divisions: 262 Democrats, 169 Republicans, 2 Progressives, 1 American-Labor, 1 Farmer-Labor

88th Congress (1963-1965)
Total Membership: 435 Representatives, 1 Resident Commissioner
Party Divisions: 259 Democrats, 176 Republicans

97th Congress (1981-1983)
Total Membership: 435 Representatives, 4 Delegates, 1 Resident Commissioner
Party Divisions: 242 Democrats, 192 Republicans, 1 Independent

107th Congress (2001-2003)
Total Membership: 435 Representatives, 4 Delegates, 1 Resident Commissioner
Party Divisions: 221 Republicans, 212 Democrats, 2 Independents

global warming is here, but don't tell anybody

2004-11-06T04:18:00.000-08:00

What kind of people are in power here in the United States?
Climate change brought about by human activity is increasing.
The evidence is solid.
And the Bush Administration wants everybody to keep quiet about it.

U.S. tries to block support for policies on global warming
By Juliet Eilperin
The Washington Post

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has been working for months to keep an upcoming eight-nation report from endorsing broad policies aimed at curbing global warming, according to domestic and foreign participants.

The group working on the report has concluded Arctic latitudes face historic increases in temperature, glacial melting and abrupt weather changes. State Department representatives have argued that the group lacks evidence to prepare detailed policy proposals.

Several participants in the negotiations, all of whom requested anonymity for fear of derailing the Nov. 24 report, said officials from the eight nations and six indigenous tribes involved in the effort had ample science on which to draft policy. .... [ full article ]

Mandate My Ass!

2004-11-05T09:34:00.000-08:00

Another stolen election and Bush is preparing to ram through legislation that only a tiny minority want. That's right, a tiny minority... Corporate crooks and religious fanatics.

Confident Bush Outlines Ambitious Plan for 2nd Term
By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
Published: November 5, 2004
WASHINGTON, Nov. 4 - A confident President Bush vowed on Thursday to move quickly and vigorously to enact the ambitious agenda he set out during the campaign, saying, "The people made it clear what they wanted."

..... [ full article ]

The European Reaction

2004-11-04T03:53:00.000-08:00

U.S.A. = third-world country?

2004-10-28T18:00:00.000-07:00

Here's what Republican rule comes down to; We're in need of election monitors.
Our political system have been so corrupted by the Right-wing that even the most basic element of democracy is endangered.

Foreign Observers Ready to Monitor US Elections

On Thursday, short-term observers from the OSCE arrive in the United States. For the first time ever, a foreign organization will be officially monitoring a US presidential vote. [ full article ]

Bush's Steal and Spend Policy

2004-10-25T22:01:00.000-07:00

In the old Popeye cartoons, Wimpy always said "I'll gladly pay you tuesday for a hamburger today".

To all Republicans/Conservatives/Ditto-Heads/freepers:
If you felt that Democrats "tax and spend" policies were taking money straight out of your wallet, then you should realize that the new "neo-con+religious-right" Republican spending policies are credit card theft. You might still have a couple bucks in your pocket, but your credit-line is maxed out and the bill WILL be coming due.

[ More details coming soon ]

Bush/Cheney + Halliburton = Cronyism

2004-10-24T23:59:00.000-07:00

Will the facts get through to voters before the election? Bush/Cheney are crooks! The signs have been there all along, now the evidence is coming to light.
Tell everyone you know!

Oct 25, 2:52 AM EDT
Army Faces Probe on No-Bid Deals With KBR
By WILLIAM C. MANN Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon's internal watchdog is looking into claims by a top Army contracting official that a Halliburton Co. subsidiary unfairly won no-bid contracts worth billions of dollars for support services in Iraq and the Balkans.

The complaint alleges that the award of contracts without competition to restore Iraq's oil industry and to supply and feed U.S. troops in the Balkans puts at risk "the integrity of the federal contracting program as it relates to a major defense contractor. ....
[ Full Article ]

Election day fear factor

2004-10-24T13:23:00.000-07:00

More evidence that the Bush Administration is trying to frighten citizens into unquestioning obedience. Bush and Cheney travel the country telling us to be afraid, very afraid. Time after time the Terror Level was raised as a distraction from bad news, bad news for the Administration that is. But underlying the distractions, are the tactics of control by fear; modeled on practices of Hitler and the Nazi's.

Little Evidence of Qaeda Plot Timed to Vote
By DAVID JOHNSTON and DON VAN NATTA Jr.
Published: October 24, 2004

WASHINGTON, Oct. 23 - In early July,
the Homeland security secretary, Tom Ridge, declared that credible intelligence showed Al Qaeda intended to launch a "large-scale attack" inside the United States to "disrupt our democratic process." More than three months later, counterterrorism officials in the United States and overseas say they are still concerned, but have uncovered little specific evidence of a plot timed to the election......

..."I've seen some analytical pieces from the bureau and the agency," said one senior American counterintelligence official, referring to election threat reports by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Central Intelligence Agency. "On a scale of one to a hundred, I'd give it about a two." .....
[ Full Article ]

Air America Radio lands here Monday

2004-10-23T20:39:00.000-07:00

Happy News for the Puget Sound!

By Mark Rahner
Seattle Times staff reporter

Country-music fans tuning in to 1090-AM next week are in for a radical change. As of 12:01 a.m. Monday, KYCW will be KPTK, Seattle's new home for the liberal Air America Radio.

The New York-based network, home of Al Franken, Janeane Garofalo and other left-wing talkers, made the announcement yesterday. Before adding the Seattle station, Air America's Web site listed 36 local affiliates and XM and Sirius satellite radio, which carry its programming along with its Internet broadcast....
[ full article ]

Levin Releases Report on Pre-War Intelligence

2004-10-23T20:16:00.000-07:00

It's Taken far to long to document what most of us in the Reality-Based Community have known since before the invasion of Iraq. Bush and Co. Lied!

Senator Carl Levin (D-MI), the Ranking Member of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) released a report today of an inquiry he initiated on June 27, 2003 and conducted by the SASC Minority Staff. The report focuses on 1) the establishment of a non-Intelligence Community source of intelligence analysis in the office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Douglas Feith, and 2) the extent to which policy makers utilized that alternative source rather than the analyses produced by the Intelligence Community with regard to the issue of any relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda before the Iraq war.
The report demonstrates how intelligence relating to the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship was exaggerated by high ranking officials in the Department of Defense to support the Administration’s decision to invade Iraq when the intelligence assessments of the Intelligence Community did not make a sufficiently compelling case. The Intelligence Community’s analysis of the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship as a relatively weak one was as definitive as reliable reporting would permit, and their conclusions were subsequently supported by the 9/11 Commission and the Report of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the U.S. Intelligence Community’s Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq.

Senator Levin believes that the professional objectivity and independence required in the assessment of the Iraq-al Qaeda relationship were compromised to support the policy goal of removing Saddam Hussein. He hopes that this report will help to bring about corrective legislation, including better Congressional oversight of intelligence assessments, which was strongly recommended by the 9/11 Commission and is a pending issue in the Intelligence reform bills before Congress.