Outside The Box

What Is Organic?

2007-07-28T12:08:00.000-04:00

Many times this summer while plucking tomatoes from the vine or pulling weeds from my garden I find myself asking the question: what is organic? Is eating organic food a more healthy way of living or did we "Americanize" it? Are the foods we buy labeled "organic" better for us or just some meaningless security blanket to throw over our families. True organic crops may be in their last throes as a report from the Union of Concerned Scientists entitled: Gone to Seed elaborates.

Huge Pharmaceutical corporations such as Monsanto have sold their genetically modified seeds to farming nations across the world. Brazil lifted a ban on Monsanto's "roundup ready" soybean 2 years ago, and South Africa has followed suit. Of course here at home we are more than happy to support Monsanto with well over 50% of our nation's soybean crop "roundup ready". Monsanto, for those who are unfamiliar is ...no, let me just paste their self-title here for you: "Monsanto is an agricultural company. We apply innovation and technology to help farmers around the world be successful, produce healthier foods, better animal feeds and more fiber, while also reducing agriculture's impact on our environment." Oh by the way you may also recognize Monsanto as the makers of such household friendly products as Agent Orange and Roundup weedkiller.

Please, take time to read the report: Gone to Seed, check out a few organizations like Organic Consumers Association. Do some research on Monsanto yourself because believe me, genetically modified soybeans are the least of our worries. I'll leave corn and wheat seed for another article. However all is not lost yet, there are some people making large strides in Biodiversity such as Dr. Vandana Shiva and her Navdanya movement based in India.

Once again, nothing is as it seems. We must dig deeper and take nothing for face value. Just because it says "organic" doesn't mean it is! Chew on this, I didn't even mention the whole cross contamination/pollination from farms in the vicinity of "organic" farms. You can bet Monsanto is on it.

Defense Spending: The War Against Americans

2007-04-29T14:05:00.000-04:00

America Speaks Out

Is the United States spending too much on defense?

by Carl Conetta
Project on Defense Alternatives Briefing Memo #41
26 March 2007

On 1-4 February 2007, the Gallup polling organization asked a representative sample of US citizens if they thought the United States was spending too little, too much, or just the right amount on defense and the military.1 For the first time since the mid-1990s, a plurality of Americans said that the country was spending too much. The surprising result of the survey shows current public attitudes to approximate those that prevailed in March 1993, shortly after former President Bill Clinton took office. Today, 43 percent of Americans say that the country is spending "too much" on the military, while 20 percent say "too little". In 1993, the balance of opinion was 42 percent saying "too much" and 17 percent saying "too little."

What makes this result especially surprising is that few leaders in Congress and no one in the administration today argues that the United States can or should reduce military spending. Quite the contrary: leaders of both parties seem eager to add to the Pentagon's coffers, even as public anti-war sentiment builds. And Congress is not the only institution that appears insensitive to the shift in public opinion. The Gallup survey also drew little attention from the news media. Indeed, a Lexis-Nexis database search shows almost no coverage of the poll, which was released on 02 March 2007.

US military spending in comparative perspective

For FY 2008, the Bush administration has requested $647.3 billion to cover the costs of national defense and war. This includes the Defense Department budget ($483 billion), some smaller defense-related accounts ($22.6 billion), and the projected FY 2008 cost of Iraq, Afghanistan, and counter-terror operations ($141.7 billion). However, it does not include non-DOD expenditures for homeland security ($36.4 billion) or the Veterans' Affairs budget ($84.4 billion). Nor does it include the request for supplemental funds for outstanding FY 2007 war costs ($93.4 billion).

The $647.3 billion request represents a 75 percent real increase over the post-Cold War low-point in national defense spending, which occurred in 1996. Today's expenditures are higher in inflation-adjusted terms than peak spending during the Vietnam and Korean wars -- as well as higher than during the Reagan buildup.2

One way of appreciating the significance of this change is to view it in terms of world military spending. Whereas the United States accounted for 28 percent of world defense expenditures in 1986 and 34 percent in 1994, it today accounts for approximately 50 percent.

The authoritative reference work on military comparisons, The Military Balance 2007, estimates world military expenditure in 2005 to have been approximately $1.2 trillion. A plausible estimate for current world spending is $1.35 trillion. By contrast, the armaments and disarmament yearbook of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute estimates 2005 world expenditure to have been slightly more than $1 trillion. The estimates differ in large part because the two data books rely on different standards of comparison: The Military Balance relies more heavily on "purchasing power parity" (or PPP) when comparing nations' expenditures, while the SIPRI volume uses exchange rates.3

The change in America's proportion of world military expenditure is due partly to the resurgence in US spending that began after 1998, and partly to reduced spending by other nations. Significantly, the greatest average decline in spending has occurred in that group of nations that the United States might consider "adversaries" or "potential adversaries". China, for one, is spending much more than it did prior to 1990 -- but "adversary spending" as a whole has receded substantially.

Spending versus strength

The turn in US public attitudes may reflect disenchantment with the Iraq war or a general sense that increased military spending is not bringing increased security. Clearly, the flood of defense dollars has not purchased stability in either Iraq or Afghanistan, nor has it led to a general decrease in terrorist activity. Indeed, the rate of terrorist incidents and fatalities has increased significantly since the onset of the Afghanistan and Iraq wars -- even if one discounts terrorist activity occurring in these two countries.4

Relevant to threat perception: the February 2007 Gallup poll shows that the proportion of Americans thinking that the country is "not strong enough" remains high: 46 percent. Only eight percent think the country is stronger then it needs to be. Comparable figures for 1993 are not available, but in 1990 public sentiments about spending and strength correlated much more closely. At that time 9 percent thought that the United States was spending too little and 16 percent thought it was spending too much. Regarding "strength": 16 percent in 1990 thought the country was stronger than necessary, while 17 percent thought it was not as strong as it needed to be. In the recent poll, by contrast, the public leans toward seeing spending as too high and strength as too little.

Clearly (and understandably) the American public continues to perceive a high-level of threat, even as it has begun questioning the current level of military expenditure. The unusual disjuncture between sentiments about "defense spending" and "strength" may reflect doubts about how the Pentagon is spending its funds or doubts about whether military dollars can purchase the requisite type of strength. Certainly, the Iraq and Afghanistan imbroglios suggest that the utility of America's military investments has distinct limits. This may create a basis of public support for political leaders attempting a more thorough security policy reform than they have been willing to contemplate so far.

Economic concerns

Economic concerns may also play a role in the public's thinking about defense spending. Although consumer confidence is higher in 2007 than it was in 2006, it still remains lower than during the mid- and late-1990s. In real terms, US median family income stagnated between 2000 and 2007, while personal debt rose. Now, rising interest rates are pinching the credit flow. Against this backdrop, the public may be taking a second look at the steep climb in military spending – up 45 percent in real terms between 2002 and 2008. Or perhaps the effect is more impressionistic: No matter how softly it is said, $647 billion sounds like a vast sum.

Currently the Pentagon plans to spend more than $2.75 trillion during the next five years -- not counting the incremental cost of future combat operations. This is not easily reconciled with bringing the national debt under control, while also meeting pending demands on social security and medicare. There also may be detrimental macro-economic effects associated with the scale of federal deficits and debt -- unless remedial action is taken. Concerns such as these recently led the World Economic Forum to lower America's competitiveness rating, dropping it from first place to sixth.5 Similar concerns have prompted the US Comptroller General and head of the Government Accountability Office, David M. Walker, to launch a public information campaign about the long-term threat to the nation's fiscal health.6 Such concerns may not yet figure substantially in the public's thinking about defense expenditures -- but they are bound to play a bigger role as the "baby-boomer" generation begins to retire en masse.

Notes

1. Joseph Carroll, "Perceptions of "Too Much" Military Spending at 15-Year High," Gallup News Service, 02 March 2007

2. Steven M. Kosiak, Both DOD Base and War Budgets Receive Big Boosts; Total Funding at Highest Level since the End of World War II (Washington DC: Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, 5 February 2007)

3. The Military Balance 2007 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 2007); and, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, SIPRI Yearbook 2006: Armaments, Disarmament, and International Security (Oxford UK: Oxford University Press, 2006).

4. Carl Conetta, War & consequences: Global terrorism has increased since 9/11 attacks, Project on Defense Alternatives Briefing Memo #38 (Cambridge MA: Commonwealth Institute, 25 September 2006)

5. Philip Thornton, "US slides down competition league; Concern over America's growing twin deficits," The Independent (London), 27 September 2006

6. Matt Crenson, "GAO Chief Warns Economic Disaster Looms," The Associated Press, 28 October 2006

Citation: Carl Conetta, "America Speaks Out: Is the United States spending too much on defense?," Cambridge, MA: Commonwealth Institute Project on Defense Alternatives Briefing Memo #41, 26 March 2007. http://www.comw.org/pda/0703bm41.html

War On Iraq Oil: Mission Accomplished

2007-03-01T08:00:00.000-05:00

If you didn't fall into the Anna Nicole abyss, don't care about American Idol and actually don't want to hand your kids "a bag of shit" then maybe you didn't fall for: ties to 9/11, yellowcake, and WMD's. Nor did the fact that Sadam was an asshole, make you want to load up your American Freedom cannon and blast some idealism Iraq's way while raping and pillaging the cradle of civiliztion. As a person with half a brain you understood the reason we went to war with Iraq was OIL. Yesterday, the new Iraq Oil Law passed and mission was indeed accomplished.

I won't go into great detail however what the law does is open up Iraq oil to major oil companies who will also sit on the Federal Oil and Gas Counsil which will oversee all Iraq oil contracts. With Iraq oil costing around $1 a barrel and selling for over $60 you can bet Exxon will log record profits again next year. How do you expect Iraq to oversee the world's largest oil reserves with so much inner chaos?

This war is unjust and needs to end period. While Exxon and other government contractors continue to record supernatural returns in the market, this government still can't provide for the citizens struck by our forgotten disaster: Katrina. The same government that sends these Americans to murder in the name of capitalism can't even follow the code of ethics for a common gang: take care of your own. Even the mighty empires' soldiers are rising up against insanity and corruption.

Among the countless other lies remember "Iraq oil will pay for the war" well America, it's almost 4 years later, oil prices are up and guess who is paying for the war.

I have asked this question before but it begs asking again, what is the price of our greed?
Is it their lives or ours that matter? What about the people trying to provide for their families?

Iran On The Horizon

2007-02-21T08:30:00.000-05:00

My gut tells me that Iran will be the next victim of the Bush administration, here is a link to some great "REAL" information regarding Iran and our relations with them, thanks to the people at Project on Defense Alternatives. Don't believe the hype!

Looking for Info?

2006-02-02T23:00:00.000-05:00

If your an information junkie like myself then here is an e-mail I recieved from the Project on Defense Alternatives today. The link is filled with tons of great info, have fun.

Dear Jason McMaster: Excerpts and commentary on the new US defense review (QDR) are available on our Defense Strategy Review library site. We’ve also just completed an update of all our special topic libraries – China, military transformation, terrorism, etc – adding more than 300 recent links to full-text documents. And we’ve created a single gateway to all of the sites: http://www.comw.org/infogate/ Please have a look and pass the link along. I know it’s a great deal of material, but it’s pretty easy to peruse. And we do our best to keep the links current – all 7,000 of them.

Regarding the US defense review: As new information and commentary becomes available during the next week, we’ll update the Defense Strategy Review page. If you come across relevant material for this site or the others, we’d greatly appreciate your letting us know.

Carl Conetta, Project on Defense Alternatives, Cambridge & Washington DC, USA pda@comw.org

Zawahiri Video: The Real Message

2006-02-01T07:01:00.000-05:00

On Monday Ayman Zawahiri released a recently made video tape threatening the United States and exposing the fact that he was not killed in the United States bombing of Pakistan on January 13th. The administration had initially claimed Zawahiri was the target of the illegal bombing and had been killed. Six days later the administration claimed Al Qaeda's chemical weapons expert had been in the "vicinity" of the bombing; it turned out to be yet another bogus justification for the bombing of a village.

The new video will no doubt be analyzed and debated in constant rotation in the days to come with the real story being overlooked. Despite the Bush administration claims of who may have been in the area and who may have been killed the facts are the facts. We do know who was killed that day in Pakistan. 18 people were murdered by cowards high above in the skies wearing American flags. 10 of the 18 confirmed killed were women and children, a far cry from Al Qaeda's number two man and a supposed weapons expert. Once again we get a behind the scenes look at the real American military...murderers of women and children.

Not only did the United States (without any approval from Pakistan) launch an airstrike on a village, but the only people they killed were innocent women and children. The supposed target is now making new videos. A new corner of the world was exposed to the American Way and a new generation has valid reason to hate the West. Once again the only thing Bush has accomplished here is to strengthen the core and help recruitment for the group they claim we are at war with.

Here are some parting thoughts: what if Zawahiri was in the area of the bombing? What if he had been killed in the airstrike over Pakistan? Would the death of Al Queda's second in command be an acceptable tradeoff for the lives of 10 women and children? If the answer is yes, than what does that say about our country? It begs the question: Who are the real terrorists?

Record Year for Oil Companies

2006-01-31T11:00:00.000-05:00

If you live here in the Northeast, then I don't have to tell you about rising home heating costs and gasoline prices. You may find it comforting that not everyone is feeling the squeeze however. On Monday Exxon Mobil set new United States records for annual and quarterly profits. The company reported a net income for the fourth quarter of $10.7 billion and a yearly net income of $36.1 billion. Nice to know that when Americans families are struggling across the country Exxon and the other top oil companies are recording record years.

Of course some of this is simple supply and demand. There is less and less oil in the ground so the price of the available oil is going to go up. That much does make sense. One would be a fool however not to see that the Bush administration has also played a huge role in the record profits of oil companies. Tax breaks and lax energy laws have allowed these companies to wield unlimited power.

The situation will get much worse. Within the next 5-10 years we will be on the downslide. This is to say that there will no longer be as much oil in underground reserves. You cannot completely drain an oil well. There becomes a point in the life of a well when it starts to cost more money for the company to extract the oil from the earth than the company makes on the sale of a barrel.

Iraq is and always has been about one thing and one thing only....oil. This trend will also continue in the years to come as the United States fans out over the globe in an effort to control the remaining reserves. If this is not the case then explain Iraq? Explain what we are doing building new military bases across the oil rich regions of Africa. Why do you think President Chavez and Venezuela are public enemy #1.

Despite the smoke and mirrors, this administration constantly distracts us with. We are entering a new era. No longer will we fight wars for political or ideological differences. We have now started and will continue to fight wars based on control of the last strongholds of natural resources.

Kidnapping wifes: The American Way

2006-01-28T09:23:00.000-05:00

The Associated Press released a story today about the United States practice of detaining/abducting the wifes of suspected insurgents/citizens in Iraq. Recent documents released by the Pentagon under and ACLU freedom of information court order describe this disgusting and illegal practice.

One memo dated May 9, 2004 from a civilian Pentagon intelligence officer tells a tale that should make you sick to your stomach and ashamed of the United States government and our armed services. In the memo, the civilian writes that on a raid for insurgents the army detained a 28-year old women the wife of a suspected insurgent as "leverage". If this is not sick enough for you yet, hold on. The women was the mother of three young children who were also in the house, one as young as six months old and still nursing. The women was held for two days. Now close your eyes and picture that army or marine commercial you see on tv in your head: be an army of one, the few the proud. Now open your eyes and envision a mother being ripped from her three screaming children, this is the real United States war machine.

Not only is this practice barbaric and illegal, another problem is the carefree way this information is released to the American public. The story breaks on a Saturday which will avoid the news frenzy of normal weekdays and it's not even news. Anyone out there who actually pays attention to world events and gets their news from somewhere other than Fox, or CNN would know that practices like this and others are carried out by our forces all the time in Iraq, people like Dahr Jamail have been opening our eyes to things like this unfortunatly, for years now. Even if you read this blog, you would have heard of detaining innocent family members of suspected insurgents when I wrote about it in part2 of a series of posts last July titled: Is Iraq Better?

What would you do if while you were out armed men burst into your house and kidnapped your wife, ripping her from the arms of a nursing child while your other two children look on (future terrorists)? Is this the American Way?

Chemical Weapons: Not So New News

2005-11-09T09:31:00.000-05:00

In yet another example of top-notch journalism the BBC yesterday ran an article about the United States use of phosphorus weapons during the siege of Fallujah exactly one year ago. For all those who have had their heads in the sand for the past year this is a breaking story. Unfortunatly, while the story is true it is not new news. I myself wrote about this war crime in a post dated March 24, 2005, and anyone who reads Dahr Jamail's reporting from Iraq would have been aware of this atrocity last year. Certainly people and the administration will deny this practice but all one has to do is read the reports from doctors in Fallujah and look at the photos of the dead people and animals from that city and one can see the fingerprint of chemical use.

Maybe someone could correct me here but didn't we invade Iraq to remove weapons of mass destruction? Once again America here is our government carrying out practices that we would sanction and or invade other countries for. Is this how we liberate the oppressed peoples of the world? Fallujah is not the only city in Iraq that this type of warfare is being instituted, there are more cities. There is a major offensive going on right now, operation steel curtain. I ask you to do some research and examine the way in which we are carrying out this war in the cities of Iraq. The United States is using a system of collective punishment on the people of Iraq, we are destroying the cities and peoples of this once beautiful country. How can you be proud to be a citizen of a country who commits this type of outright war crime?

Spitting In Our Face

2005-11-08T20:50:00.000-05:00

Don't get me wrong, I am not surprised by any lie that President Bush spews no matter how obvious, but yesterday's episode of "liars are us" was just too much to believe. President Bush had this to say yesterday: "Our country is at war and our government has the obligation to protect the American people, (from those scary Iraqis) any activity we conduct is within the law. We do not torture."

How stupid does George Bush believe you and I are? Does he think that none of us have heard of Abu Gharib? What about GITMO? Do any of you honestly believe that the United States government does not torture people? After you answer that question chew on this for a minute: the torture being committed by the United States government under the direction of Bush and Rumsfield is your responsibility. It is our fault! It is the age-old rule that if you are in the presence of a crime and do nothing you are just as guilty. True, we are not present at the time of the abuse, however we are allowing this practice to continue by our complacency and reluctance to act. The United States government, for good or bad, is a reflection of it's citizens.

Just to give you an example of how completely obvious and ridiculous these lies are, all you had to do was click on CNN.com yesterday and read the article about President Bush's statement. Two lines underneath that article link was another link to an article regarding five Marines from the 75th Ranger Regiment that have been accused of beating detainees in Iraq. No torture abuse to see here, keep it moving.

Plain Simple Truth

2005-11-08T18:00:00.000-05:00

Q.* /Are the American people obligated to help the Iraqi people? And what could be done?

The American people are completely obliged to help the Iraqi people because it is the fault of the American people that the Bush cabal was allowed to invade Iraq. Any US citizen who is not doing everything in their power to end this illegal and immoral occupation as quickly aspossible is complicit with the war crimes being committed in Iraq on a daily basis.

This was the last question asked to Dahr Jamail in a recent interview. How guilty are you?

Are You Insulted America?

2005-10-30T10:00:00.000-05:00

Last week, President Bush give a brief statement regarding Scooter Libby being indicted on 5 charges. Bush urged all Americans to remember that Mr. Libby is innocent untill proven guilty, that is our system of justice, was his message to Americans.

I was amazed once again with the absolute "vanilla" style with which this administration uses it's propaganda and spin. They do not fabricate intricate stories and illusions, no they simply state their view/reality and America devours it without hesitation. How could this man stand there in the Rose Garden looking directly into the camera and state with a straight face that all men are innocent untill proven guilty. Of course here in the U.S. "according to the Constitution" we are all innocent untill proven guilty, but for that so-called leader to make this statement is an insult to every man and women here in America. It is an insult to your intelligence not to mention completly disrepectful to this country. I would like Bush to make that statement to Edgar Padilla! I would welcome Mr. Bush to make that same statement to the people illegally captured and held/tortured in GITMO!

Never before has an administration gone to such lenghts to strip Americans and other people of the world from this fundamental birth right. Neither Mr. Padilla (see previous post) nor any persons held in GITMO have been formally charged with a crime yet all these people are detained behind bars for in some cases over 3 years now. I ask you, are these people considered innocent untill proven guilty? There has been an inditment and there is evidence against Mr. Libby. Why has he not been afforded the same treatment?

I know this is not the first time the administration and the Republicans have double-talked us if not straight out lied to our faces but for some reason this instance has my blood boiling. What I don't understand: why are the majority of Americans not as outraged as I? Are there other people who want to grab Bush by the throat and choke some sense into him? There should be, America you should be outraged! When Bush makes these comments he is insulting your intelligence, they believe that you are stupid or scared.

I can gaurantee you this America, no matter how non-violent you may you would not allow someone to insult you and mock you on a daily basis. You would not allow someone to look you in the face and lie to you. You would not allow a person to distort matters when you know the concrete facts. No America I venture to say that you would not allow this you would stand up for yourself, you would correct this person. Maybe you would just give them a good old fashioned ass-whooping. Why then do we allow the person who represents each and every one of us and our country to act in this manner?

When we stop citizens from boarding the subway in New York are we considering all men and women innocent untill proven guilty? Has Mr. Padilla, confined to a naval brig for more than 3 years ever been considered innocent untill proven guilty? Are the men of GITMO, being held in cages for more than 3 years considered innocent untill proven guilty?

Brief History of Avian Influenza

2005-10-19T18:47:00.000-04:00

I am stealing this entire article on the history of avian flu from ringsurf.com since it explains the avian flu better than I can. I believe my last post might not have driven the point home quite enough and maybe people are still not taking this issue seriously enough. In order to understand the avian flu, we must understand the influenza virus itself and this may shed some light on how the virus will affect humans. It will mutate into a strain that is deadly to us. It has in the past and will continue to develop in this way. Our government is not prepared to protect it's people from this coming pandemic. Just think for one minute if you doubt the seriousness of this. When you go to the doctor for a virus infection and the doctor prescribes you antibiotic, they also give you specific instructions on the use; he tells you how many pills to take and for how many days. You need that type of information. The doctor does this because if people use the antibiotics too long or when they don't need them, then the virus or flu will become resistant to the particular antibiotic.

Avian influenza spreading to humans is not something to be taken lightly, it has happened in the past with deadly results. Wikipedia has some great information on the Spanish avian flu of 1918 which killed 25-50 million people worldwide. They also have a good backround on the avian influenza, please don't push this issue onto the back burner.

History of Avian Flu
The Avian Flu disease has captured considerable international attention over the past year with serious epidemics of this disease affecting Japan, South Korea, and areas of South-east Asia earlier this year. Now considered a pandemic, serious outbreaks of avian influenza had also affected the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany in 2003. Avian flu had also been reported in Australia, Pakistan, Italy, Chile, and Mexico. The impact of this serious disease has been disruptive to the poultry industries as millions of chickens, geese, and turkeys were slaughtered to prevent further transmission of this highly contagious disease.
Besides its devastating effect on domestic poultry, Avian Flu has received unprecedented publicity because of what occurred in Hong Kong in 1997. Before this time, Avian flu was thought to infect birds only, however, a different strain of Avian Flu virus was detected in humans, marking the first time that Avian Flu was transmitted to humans. During this outbreak, 18 people were hospitalized and 6 of them died. To control the outbreak, authorities killed about 1.5 million chickens to remove the source of the virus.
Earlier this year in January, a major outbreak of Avian influenza surfaced again in Vietnam’s and Thailand's poultry industry. Within a few short weeks, the disease had spread to ten countries and regions in Asia, including Indonesia, South Korea, Japan and China. Over 50 million chickens, ducks, geese, and turkey were slaughtered in an intensive effort to stop the disease from spreading any further. The outbreak was then contained in March. Unfortunately, this outbreak took a considerable toll on human lives. There were 34 people infected with the Avian Flu in Vietnam and Thailand, of which 23 of them tragically died.
Though scientists determined that the spread of the Avian flu virus from birds to humans are rare occurrences, they were also quick to express grave caution that this problem could become significantly worse if the virus mutated into a more lethal form, or a form that could pass easily from humans to humans. The World Health Organization (WHO) is particularly concerned about the Avian virus' potential to swap genes with a common flu virus, creating a lethal form of the virus that could spread around the globe within months.
Avian Flu was first recorded in Italy more than 100 years ago in 1878. As the cause of massive poultry epidemics, this disease was then known as “Fowl Plague”. This disease reared its ugly head in the United States in 1924-25, and then again in 1929. In 1955, it was determined that the virus causing Fowl Plague was one of the influenza viruses. All influenza viruses affecting domestic animals (equine, swine, avian) belong to Type A, and Type A influenza virus is the most common type producing serious epidemics in humans. Types B and C do not affect domestic animals.
There are two forms of Influenza A viruses occurring worldwide – (i) highly pathogenic and (ii) mildly pathogenic. The outbreaks in Hong Kong, and those that were found reported recently are caused by the Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza A virus (HPAI – subtypes H5 and H7). It is a form of this virus that has the ability to be transmitted to humans. Although our understanding of Avian Flu is relatively limited, the recent outbreaks have stimulated research all around the world to further our knowledge of this important disease and virus.

The Coming Police State: Will the Bird Flu Trigger Martial Law?

2005-10-19T12:00:00.000-04:00

I have been reading some interesting information regarding the avian flu and the eventual spreading of it here in America. Recently the bird flu reached Eastern Europe, and scientists warn that if and when the virus jumps to humans it could cause results similar to the 1918 Spanish avian flu in which 40-50 million people worldwide died. Remember last year when the United States (the global super-power) ran out of regular flu vaccinations?

Currently only one drug, Tamiflu, has proven to reduce symptoms of avian flu. How many doses of Tamiflu does the world's richest country own? Current stockpiles in the United States would be able to treat roughly 2% of the population. Which 2% do you think would receive the treatment? Have no fear, America, the Bush administration has just placed a desperate last-minute order for Tamiflu with the Roche company for 81 million doses. The problem with this is if the avian flu hits this winter (which scientists predict it will) the doses will not be available in time. Roche has stated that the 81 million dose order will not be produced in time for winter.

It is no surprise that other nations have prepared ahead of time for the coming pandemic threat by stocking up on Tamiflu; countries like Canada, France, Britain and Japan are prepared to protect their citizens.

What did you expect, America? We are spending hundreds of billions of dollars on war in Iraq. Why would the Bush administration try to protect it's people against a real threat? In light of this recent discovery of the shortage of Tamiflu doses, it is no surprise to me that the Bush administration has recently introduced legislation that would hand over all powers to the Pentagon in case of emergency here in America. Surely an outbreak of the avian flu with shortages of the drug needed to treat it could result in mass rioting and chaos. That is where the armed forces step in and lock us down. I believe in my heart of hearts that the response to Katrina in New Orleans was a test run for just this type of situation.

You can't argue this one. While Bush claims he is fighting the war in Iraq to make us more safe here, he is actually making us less safe and it has nothing to do with terrorism. It is your money, America! Instead of it being used to buy drugs needed to treat your children and loved ones, it is being used to murder and conquer. It is time to take back our money and maybe a little of our self respect too.

Who Is Watching Your Money?

2005-10-19T07:00:00.000-04:00

A recent article by Knight Ridder has exposed the lack of contract oversight in Iraq. The inspector general for the Department of Defense withdrew all auditors from Iraq in the fall of 2004, according to Lt. Col. Rose-Ann Lynch, spokeswoman for the Defense Department's inspector generals office. What does this mean for you and I? Currently there is $142 billion in taxpayer money allocated for the reconstruction of Iraq with no auditors from the Defense Department reviewing how the money is being spent. According to the article, between October of 2004 and this month only 1 of the 107 audits listed on the Defense Department IG's website involved Iraq. Lt. Col. Lynch told Knight Ridder that the Defense Department Inspector General "currently has no specific audits being conducted in Iraq."

This is our money America. It is taxpayer money that we worked hard for. Would you sit by and allow someone to rip you and your family off? Do you look at receipts to check if your being "swindled". I will end this asking just one question: If you were running a business, is this how you would handle your contracting and spending?

Cleaning Up on the Cleanup: Katrina Contracts

2005-10-18T14:45:00.000-04:00

The New York Times recently ran an article detailing some of the contracts awarded for Katrina cleanup based on the first release of contract details from the government. The report shows that there was 15 contract that exceed $100 million with 5 of them exceeding $500 million. One alarming fact is that more than 80% of the contracts were awarded without competative bidding, on top of that the contracts are cost plus. For anyone who doesn't understand this type of contract, a cost plus contract means that the contractor bills the government for all it's costs plus a mark up which can balloon the original price of the contract.

AshBritt recieved a $586 million contract to collect and process debris. This company is based out of Pompano Beach, Florida and is a former client of a lobbying firm run by the current Governor of Mississippi. Senate filings show that AshBritt paid roughly $40,000 in 2005 to the Washington lobbying firm founded by Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi. Mr. Barbour was also the former chairman of the Republican National Committee. The report shows that AshBritt is charging the government $15 per cubic yard to remove debris and also will be additionally reimbursed for it's costs to dispose of the materials. The problem with this is that three towns in Mississippi hired their own contractors and records show they paid between $10.64 and $18.25 a cubic yard to remove debris, which includes the cost of disposal. The New York Times article quotes Mike Carroll who is a municipal official in Orlando, Florida with much expierence in hurricane cleanups as saying: "Let me put it to you this way: If $15 was my best price, I would rebid it."

Richard Skinner is the inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security who is reviewing the Katrina contracts, told the New York Times: "We are very apprehensive about what we are seeing." He was also quoted saying that most of the deals had been sealed with no more than a handshake and no documentation.

The contracts show alarming differences in prices with trailers costing $15,000-$23,000, house inspections that cost between $15-$81 per home and ferries and ships that are being used as housing, costing between $13-$70 million for six months of use.

The question I ask is how many bad contracts and over-charging does it take before the government stops using certain companies? Betchel Corporation was awarded a contract of roughly $100 million and I can assure you from expirence that this company not only does a bad job they severely overcharge, take it from a person in Massachusetts who has seen them at work on the Big Dig. Another questionable company recieving contracts is Kellogg, Brown & Root which was awarded $60 million in contracts. This company is a subsidiary of Halliburton and I believe we all know of their stellar track record in Iraq.

All of us can agree that this work needs to be done, and it needs to be done as fast as possible, however you would not run a company in this manner and I believe it is no way to run a government. That is unless the government is trying to line the pockets of these big corporations. A simple solution to this problem as pointed out by the New York Times would be if FEMA and other government agencies simply entered into more "indefinite delivery or indefinite quantity" contracts. These contracts are awarded through open biding in advance of the need for services and would allow for quicker response in the case of emergencies.

The Bush Administration's Attack on the Forest Service

2005-10-13T18:20:00.000-04:00

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility produced a press release today regarding the October 11, 2005 order issued by the National Park Service that requires workers to submit to a political loyalty test. The mandatory screening will be carried out by the Park Service headquarters and the Assistant Secretary of Interior (3rd crony in charge).

Exactly who would have to submit to these screenings? According to the press release, the order would apply to all persons hired for park superintendents, assistant superintendents and program managers covering more than 1,000 management and supervisory posistions. Jeff Ruch, Executive Director of PEER had this to say about the new order: "“It is outrageous that park superintendents must swear political loyalty to the Bush agenda and parrot hokey mottos in order to earn a promotion, the merit system is supposed to be about ability, not apple polishing.”

I believe the purpose of this new order is to stifle anyone from the National Park Service from speaking out against Bush administration policies, in particular the policies of Gail Norton, Secretary of Interior. The new order may have been sparked as a result of the recent U.S. Forest Service official who voiced concerns about pesticide misuse in forests located in the Southwest of the country.

Doug Parker, the Forest Service official who voiced concern, was fired from his job as pesticide coordinator and assistant director of forestry health. Mr. Parker, who worked for the Forest Service for over 40 years, believes he was fired as a result of his public complaints- complaints he made because he feared the Forest Service was not obeying laws or policies, in particular the National Environmental Policy Act. Mr. Parker had this to say about his pestiside concerns: "When it comes down to it, besides the violation of policy and law, it's a betrayal of the public trust, if we're going to use toxic chemicals out in the environment, we need to assure the public that what we're doing meets our policy, which is ensuring the proper use of pesticides."

Once again America, it is clear that while we continue to stick our heads in the sand the Bush administration leaves no stone unturned in their quest to infect the entire country with cronies in all areas of public interest.

The Real War In Iraq

2005-10-12T20:45:00.000-04:00

So you still support the war in Iraq? This may make you sick, it may just give you nightmares but I urge each and every one of you to go to http://www.nowthatsfuckedup.com/bbs/forum23.html and check out some of the pictures sent to that site from troops in Iraq. This is what war looks like folks, take a good hard look at the pieces of human beings. I imagine most will not want to see these truly gruesome images but you should, these are the things being done in the name of each and every one of us Americans. War is not pretty, our bombs are not "smart" look death in the face and then think about weither or not you support this war.

If it helps out just imagine these images as your family and friends, maybe that will put this into perspective for all of you.

Oil Companies Taking You To The Pump

2005-10-11T07:00:00.000-04:00

What is the cost of capitalism? Check out this report by the Center for American Progress on the profits of oil companies. Did you know that ExxonMobil had the highest profits for any company in the history of keeping such records last year? Seems everyone has to make sacrifices these days, except the oil companies. Thanks in part to Washington.

Who Are The Insurgents?

2005-10-10T20:24:00.000-04:00

Here is a little piece of a post by A Family in Baghdad: "And a strange story from Basra, its stars are British dressed in Arabic clothes, inside a car full of explosives, who were caught by the Iraqi Police, and were put in jail for investigation, and then a British tank came along, attacked the jail, and set them free. People were very angry, and burned a number of armed vehicles, whose pictures we saw in newspapers; the Iraqi Police demand an explanation and an apology from the British troops in Basra, the people are angry, wondering: perhaps those have some hands in inflaming disturbances among the Iraqis… just like in Israel, where there is a group called: the Arabists, who are dressed in Arabic clothes, and slip among the Palestinians in demonstrations or gatherings, to perform explosions or assassinations…."

It wouldn't surprise me one bit to find out that most of the suicide bombings were carried out by "coalition" forces in an attempt to plunge the country into a civil war, and justify the continuing occupation. There have also been reports from Iraq of suicide car bombings with no drivers. Of course this is all very hard to prove due to the lack of honest reporting on the ground in Iraq.

New Orleans Beating

2005-10-10T12:56:00.000-04:00

I honestly have nothing to say about this clip from CNN showing the disgusting beating of a 64 year old man in New Orleans. Please view both clips and then read the CNN article, pay close attention to the end paragraphs when they start to justify this brutal beatdown, the poor cops were under some stress. Why not America, fuck it this guy deserved being beat by a bunch of gung-ho white assholes (oh I'm sorry I meant heros) he was drunk. What do you think they do to people in Iraq? What do you think they (the troops who come home and become cops) will do to the rest of us? Do you think this is a black and white issue, because it isn't. These assholes don't give a fuck about you or me, that could just as easy be you laying in a pool of your own blood. I would love to see the day when a group of citizens tied up and beat the shit out of a cop, opps there I go again I mean hero. FUCK THE POLICE!!!

While your at it check out this other story from CNN about police looting (actually it is not called looting when white people or cops do it) and leaving their posts. Oh how I love those power-hungry coward pieces of shit. Not to advocate violence, well maybe but this is exactly the reason EVERYONE in America should have an automatic weapon. Protection against the SS, you may know them as police.

President Bush's Speech Part 1: Laying the Propaganda Foundation

2005-10-07T19:00:00.000-04:00

Yesterday President Bush gave a speech to the National Endowment for Democracy in the Ronald Reagan Building. The topic of the speech was the war on terror, with most of the talk focusing on the "terrorist" ideology along with the war in Iraq and how the aforementioned relates to the latter.

The tone of the speech was set early on with 9/11 references in 3 of the first 9 paragraphs, or about the first 3 minutes. After Bush played the 9/11 fiddle for America, he quickly reminded us who we should be afraid of and/or angry at. This is when the propaganda really started flying, as Bush introduced America to some new stereotype labels: Islamic Radicalism, Militant Jihadism and my personal favorite Islamo-fascism.

Can you start to see the foundation that is being poured here? Islamo-Fascism: the knee jerk reaction is Hitler, WWII. We know fascism is bad and we know that America defeated it! If Iraq is Islamo-Fascist, then stay the course. Keep the fight going until we get Hitler. I also believe a bit of this may have been the old "throwing shit against the wall and seeing what sticks". I say this due to the fact that a few minutes later in the speech, Bush equates fighting Islamic radicals to our fight against communism. Once again, Bush paints a face on Iraq and that is the face of communism. Citing yet another clear cut enemy of America's yesteryear and insinuating another victory for America.

"The murderous ideology of the Islamic radicals is the great challenge of our new century. Yet, in many ways, this fight resembles the struggle against communism in the last century."-President Bush (Speech to the National Endowment for Democracy)

What is happening here? Bush is painting a picture for us, a giant propaganda mural with Iraq sketched as a Hitler/Stalin hybrid. Important to note, however, is that America did win the battle against communism and fascism. So by labeling Iraq and "Islamic radicals" as such, it is easily believable and accepted that we will win this battle in Iraq.

This may be true if it were not for one small detail. Iraq is not the center of the world for all evil to gather. Iraq is a country that America invaded and now occupies. Most of the "terrorists" there are the citizens of what was once Iraq and they are fighting for their lives and their homes. This war, no, this illegal land-grab in Iraq is nothing like the battle against fascism or communism. For the people of Iraq, however, it is a little similar to the battle we fought against England, the battle we fought to gain our freedom!

Take It From A Republican....

2005-10-05T18:18:00.000-04:00

Here is an article written by William Odom the former Director of The National Security Agency under President Reagan. I love when the former Reagan administration members speak out against the Bush administration. How could they possibly argue with a member of the Reagan administration, we all remember how much they sang his praises when he died.

By William E. Odom

If I were a journalist, I would list all the arguments that you hear against pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq, the horrible things that people say would happen, and then ask: Aren’t they happening already? Would a pullout really make things worse? Maybe it would make things better.

Here are some of the arguments against pulling out:

1) We would leave behind a civil war.
2) We would lose credibility on the world stage.
3) It would embolden the insurgency and cripple the move toward democracy.
4) Iraq would become a haven for terrorists.
5) Iranian influence in Iraq would increase.
6) Unrest might spread in the region and/or draw in Iraq's neighbors.
7) Shiite-Sunni clashes would worsen.
8) We haven’t fully trained the Iraqi military and police forces yet.
9) Talk of deadlines would undercut the morale of our troops.

But consider this:

1) On civil war. Iraqis are already fighting Iraqis. Insurgents have killed far more Iraqis than Americans. That’s civil war. We created the civil war when we invaded; we can’t prevent a civil war by staying.

For those who really worry about destabilizing the region, the sensible policy is not to stay the course in Iraq. It is rapid withdrawal, re-establishing strong relations with our allies in Europe, showing confidence in the UN Security Council, and trying to knit together a large coalition including the major states of Europe, Japan, South Korea, China, and India to back a strategy for stabilizing the area from the eastern Mediterranean to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Until the United States withdraws from Iraq and admits itsstrategic error, no such coalition can be formed.

Thus those who fear leaving a mess are actually helping make things worse while preventing a new strategic approach with some promise of success.

2) On credibility. If we were Russia or some other insecure nation, we might have to worry about credibility. A hyperpower need not worry about credibility. That’s one of the great advantages of being a hyperpower: When we have made a big strategic mistake, we can reverse it. And it may even enhance our credibility. Staying there damages our credibility more than leaving.

Ask the president if he really worries about US credibility. Or, what will happen to our credibility if the course he is pursuing proves to be a major strategic disaster? Would it not be better for our long-term credibility to withdraw earlier than later in this event?

3) On the insurgency and democracy. There is no question the insurgents and other anti-American parties will take over the government once we leave. But that will happen no matter how long we stay. Any government capable of holding power in Iraq will be anti-American, because the Iraqi people are increasingly becoming anti-American.

Also, the U.S. will not leave behind a liberal, constitutional democracy in Iraq no matter how long it stays. Holding elections is easy. It is impossible to make it a constitutional democracy in a hurry.

President Bush’s statements about progress in Iraq are increasingly resembling LBJ's statements during the Vietnam War. For instance, Johnson’s comments about the 1968 election are very similar to what Bush said in February 2005 after the election of a provisional parliament.

Ask the president: Why should we expect a different outcome in Iraq than in Vietnam?

Ask the president if he intends to leave a pro-American liberal regime in place. Because that’s just impossible. Postwar Germany and Japan are not models for Iraq. Each had mature (at least a full generation old) constitutional orders by the end of the 19th century. They both endured as constitutional orders until the 1930s. Thus General Clay and General MacArthur were merely reversing a decade and a half totalitarianism -- returning to nearly a century of liberal political change in Japan and a much longer period in Germany.

Imposing a liberal constitutional order in Iraq would be to accomplish something that has never been done before. Of all the world's political cultures, an Arab-Muslim one may be the most resistant to such a change of any in the world. Even the Muslim society in Turkey (an anti-Arab society) stands out for being the only example of a constitutional order in an Islamic society, and even it backslides occasionally.

4) On terrorists. Iraq is already a training ground for terrorists. In fact, the CIA has pointed out to the administration and congress that Iraq is spawning so many terrorists that they are returning home to many other countries to further practice their skills there. The quicker a new dictator wins the political power in Iraq and imposes order, the sooner the country will stop producing well-experienced terrorists.

Why not ask: "Mr. President, since you and the vice president insisted that Saddam's Iraq supported al Qaeda -- which we now know it did not -- isn't your policy in Iraq today strengthening al Qaeda's position in that country?"

5) On Iranian influence. Iranian leaders see US policy in Iraq as being so much in Teheran's interests that they have been advising Iraqi Shiite leaders to do exactly what the Americans ask them to do. Elections will allow the Shiites to take power legally. Once in charge, they can settle scores with the Baathists and Sunnis. If US policy in Iraq begins to undercut Iran's interests, then Teheran can use its growing influence among Iraqi Shiites to stir up trouble, possibly committing Shiite militias to an insurgency against US forces there. The US invasion has vastly increased Iran's influence in Iraq, not sealed it out.

Questions for the administration: "Why do the Iranians support our presence in Iraq today? Why do they tell the Shiite leaders to avoid a sectarian clash between Sunnis and Shiites? Given all the money and weapons they provide Shiite groups, why are they not stirring up more trouble for the US? Will Iranian policy change once a Shiite majority has the reins of government? Would it not be better to pull out now rather than to continue our present course of weakening the Sunnis and Baathists, opening the way for a Shiite dictatorship?"

6) On Iraq’s neighbors. The civil war we leave behind may well draw in Syria, Turkey and Iran. But already today each of those states is deeply involved in support for or opposition to factions in the ongoing Iraqi civil war. The very act of invading Iraq almost insured that violence would involve the larger region. And so it has and will continue, with, or without, US forces in Iraq.

7) On Shiite-Sunni conflict. The US presence is not preventing Shiite-Sunni conflict; it merely delays it. Iran is preventing it today, and it will probably encourage it once the Shiites dominate the new government, an outcome US policy virtually ensures.

8) On training the Iraq military and police. The insurgents are fighting very effectively without US or European military advisors to train them. Why don't the soldiers and police in the present Iraqi regime's service do their duty as well? Because they are uncertain about committing their lives to this regime. They are being asked to take a political stand, just as the insurgents are. Political consolidation, not military-technical consolidation, is the issue.

The issue is not military training; it is institutional loyalty. We trained the Vietnamese military effectively. Its generals took power and proved to be lousy politicians and poor fighters in the final showdown. In many battles over a decade or more, South Vietnamese military units fought very well, defeating VC and NVA units. But South Vietnam's political leaders lost the war.

Even if we were able to successfully train an Iraqi military and police force, the likely result, after all that, would be another military dictatorship. Experience around the world teaches us that military dictatorships arise when the military’s institutional modernization gets ahead of political consolidation.

9) On not supporting our troops by debating an early pullout. Many US officers in Iraq, especially at company and field grade levels, know that while they are winning every tactical battle, they are losing strategically. And according to the New York Times last week, they are beginning to voice complaints about Americans at home bearing none of the pains of the war. One can only guess about the enlisted ranks, but those or a second tour – probably the majority today – are probably anxious for an early pullout. It is also noteworthy that US generals in Iraq are not bubbling over with optimistic reports they way they were during the first few years of the war in Vietnam. Their careful statements and caution probably reflect serious doubts that they do not, and should not, express publicly. The more important question is whether or not the repressive and vindictive behavior by the secretary of defense and his deputy against the senior military -- especially the Army leadership, which is the critical component in the war -- has made it impossible for field commanders to make the political leaders see the facts.

Most surprising to me is that no American political leader today has tried to unmask the absurdity of the administration's case that to question the strategic wisdom of the war is unpatriotic and a failure to support our troops. Most officers and probably most troops don't see it that way. They are angry at the deficiencies in materiel support they get from the Department of Defense, and especially about the irresponsibly long deployments they must now endure because Mr. Rumsfeld and his staff have refused to enlarge the ground forces to provide shorter tours. In the meantime, they know that the defense budget shovels money out the door to maritime forces, SDI, etc., while refusing to increase dramatically the size of the Army.

As I wrote several years ago, "the Pentagon's post-Cold War force structure is so maritime heavy and land force weak that it is firmly in charge of the porpoises and whales while leaving the land to tyrants." The Army, some of the Air Force, the National Guard, and the reserves are now the victims of this gross mismatch between military missions and force structure. Neither the Bush nor the Clinton administration has properly "supported the troops." The media could ask the president why he fails to support our troops by not firing his secretary of defense.

■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
So why is almost nobody advocating a pullout? I can only speculate. We face a strange situation today where few if any voices among Democrats in Congress will mention early withdrawal from Iraq, and even the one or two who do will not make a comprehensive case for withdrawal now.Why are the Democrats failing the public on this issue today? The biggest reason is because they weren’t willing to raise that issue during the campaign. Howard Dean alone took a clear and consistent stand on Iraq, and the rest of the Democratic party trashed him for it. Most of those in Congress voted for the war and let that vote shackle them later on. Now they are scared to death that the White House will smear them with lack of patriotism if they suggest pulling out.
Journalists can ask all the questions they like but none will prompt a more serious debate as long as no political leaders create the context and force the issues into the open.

I don't believe anyone will be able to sustain a strong case in the short run without going back to the fundamental misjudgment of invading Iraq in the first place. Once the enormity of that error is grasped, the case for pulling out becomes easy to see.

Look at John Kerry's utterly absurd position during the presidential campaign. He said “It’s the wrong war, in the wrong place, at the wrong time," but then went on to explain how he expected to win it anyway. Even the voter with no interest in foreign affairs was able to recognize it as an absurdity. If it was the wrong war at the wrong place and time, then it was never in our interest to fight. If that is true, what has changed to make it in our interest? Nothing, absolutely nothing.

The US invasion of Iraq only serves the interest of:

1) Osama bin Laden (it made Iraq safe for al Qaeda, positioned US military personnel in places where al Qaeda operatives can kill them occasionally, helps radicalize youth throughout the Arab and Muslim world, alienates America's most important and strongest allies – the Europeans – and squanders US military resources that otherwise might be finishing off al Qaeda in Pakistan.);

2) The Iranians (who were invaded by Saddam and who suffered massive casualties in an eight year war with Iraq.);

3) And the extremists in both Palestinian and Israeli political circles (who don't really want a peace settlement without the utter destruction of the other side, and probably believe that bogging the United States down in a war in Iraq that will surely become a war between the United States and most of the rest of Arab world gives them the time and cover to wipe out the other side.)

The wisest course for journalists might be to begin sustained investigations of why leading Democrats have failed so miserably to challenge the US occupation of Iraq. The first step, of course, is to establish as conventional wisdom the fact that the war was never in the US interest and has not become so. It is such an obvious case to make that I find it difficult to believe many pundits and political leaders have not already made it repeatedly.

Lieutenant General William E. Odom, U.S. Army (Ret.), is a Senior Fellow with Hudson Institute and a professor at Yale University. He was Director of the National Security Agency from 1985 to 1988. From 1981 to 1985, he served as Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, the Army's senior intelligence officer.

Supreme Court Under Attack: Harriet Miers

2005-10-03T17:05:00.000-04:00

What is happening to the U.S. Supreme Court? Last week Judge Roberts was confirmed as the chief justice of the court, a position usually filled from within. It took William Rehnquist 11 years of service on the Supreme Court before he was promoted to Chief Justice. Not in the Bush era however. In these days and times you get your promotion before you even start work.

This leads us to this morning when President Bush nominated Harriet Miers to fill the final vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court. Once again Bush has flown in the face of standard practice and nominated someone with zero experience as a judge. How could she possibly be qualified to be one of the highest ranking judges in the country? It is simple: this is classic Bush cronyism, only this time he raised the stakes.

Since Ms. Miers has never served a day as a judge it is interesting to examine her "qualifications":

*She received her schooling from Southern Methodist University, finishing her studies in 1970.

*From 1970-1972 she worked as a clerk for U.S. District Judge Joe Estes.

* In 1972 she took a job as a lawyer for the firm Locke, Purnell, Raine & Harrell, where she stayed until 1999 serving as, among others, George W. Bush's personal lawyer.

*In 1992 she became the President of the Texas Bar Association.

*Ms. Meirs served on George Bush's gubernatorial campaign in 1994 (she also served on his presidential campaign in 2000).

*She served as Chairwoman of the Texas Lottery Commission from 1995-2000 when she resigned.

*Her close ties to George Bush continued in 2000 when she was hired as the Assistant to the President while also serving as Staff Secretary.

*Ms. Miers was appointed Deputy Chief of Staff for the White House in 2003.

*In 2004 she was named the White House Counsel.

So why not, America? Let's fill the Supreme Court vacancy with a person who has as much experience as a judge as I do. Urge the Congress to confirm another Bush crony! Why not look how good the last crony (I mean Mike Brown) did.

For some more good information on Ms. Miers, check out this post by Attytood it goes a little more into detail about Miers and her time as President of the Texas Bar Association and as the Chairwoman for the Texas Lottery Commission.

Racist Republicans

2005-09-29T14:44:00.000-04:00

"But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could -- if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down. So these far-out, these far-reaching, extensive extrapolations are, I think, tricky." - Bill Bennett (From the September 28 broadcast of Salem Radio Network's Bill Bennett's Morning in America)

If you are any type of rational human then you are asking yourself what kind of racist crap is that? This was the response to a question a caller asked on Bill Bennett's radio show. Why is this middle-aged white man any different than any other "good 'ol boy"? He has power.

Bill Bennett is one of the driving forces behind the republican party and a "Distinguished Fellow" at the Heritage Foundation, a republican "think-tank" (if you don't know about the Heritage Foundation then you know nothing of the Republican party). In addition to this, Bennett was Secretary of Education during the Reagan administration and served as Drug Czar. Imagine that. No wonder our education system is years behind other countries. This super-intelligent racist was running the show.

Even more important (as to who William J. Bennett is and why his comments are so important and revealing) is the fact that he has edited or written various George Bush speeches and nearly became the chairman of the Republican National Committee just a few years ago. This is not just another pig-headed racist spewing hate; this is the republican party speaking to us. This man is revered by the party. His views are devoured and turned into actions. In order to understand the republican party you must listen to what the leaders of the group have to say. How many more republicans have to make such outrageous statements revealing their true self before America sees them for the snakes they are?

Abu Ghraib Photos: Round 2

2005-09-29T14:15:00.000-04:00

Late last night federal judge Alvin Hellerstein ruled in favor of the ACLU, ordering the government to release 4 videos and 144 pictures of torture committed at Abu Ghraib. The judge gave the Army one month to release the videos and photos to the ACLU under the Freedom of Information Act.

In an ironic twist, the government argued against the release of the photos and videos claiming that their release would be in violation of the Geneva Convention. This is an interesting argument considering jailing these people and torturing them is clearly a violation of the Geneva Convention.

I am starting to hear alot of people express displeasure over this ruling, asking: "Why stir things up now?" People have actually used the excuse that releasing this information will put our troops in harms way. To this I say who cares! Bush put them in harm's way by sending them to war, and if they are involved in torture and degradation of humans, then they deserve to be put into harm's way.

This is not about politics; this is about getting to the truth. The earlier photos of Lynndie England pointing at men's genitalia is Dr. Suess type stuff compared to what is in these 144 pictures and 4 videos. Honestly, America, if we are torturing and perpetrating perverse sexual acts onto these people then we deserve what we get. Think about it. These are supposed to be our so-called heroes, torturing men and boys, then taking pictures and videos like it's some kind of sick vacation. Look in the mirror, America. We reap what we sow.

Fight For Women Not With Them

2005-09-29T00:00:00.000-04:00

I am posting my latest e-mail from Sen. Joe Biden urging all of us to write our politicians demanding they renew the Violence Against Women Act. IT WILL EXPIRE AT THE END OF THIS WEEK, THAT'S TOMORROW! This is just the e-mail text you let everyone know, please check out Uniteourstates.com or Joe Biden's web page to sign the petition which will be sent to all your local politicians. Please don't hesitate this issue is a no-brainer.

Dear Jason,

Act Now Click here to send a letter to Congress urging them to renew the Violence Against Womean Act.I believe that ending violence against women is truly a shared goal -- one that is held by Democrats and Republicans, one that is upheld by men and women, and one that is desired by both government and by the private sector. I am writing today because the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) is set to expire at the end of this week and we need your help to make sure this landmark piece of legislation is renewed. Please help me renew the Violence Against Women Act by contacting your Senator and Representative today. VAWA is the legal backbone of our country's fight to end domestic violence and sexual assault. Since 1994, when I first led the fight to pass this law, it has helped dramatically reduce incidents of violence against women: Domestic violence has dropped by almost 50%. Incidents of rape are down by 60%. The number of women killed by an abusive husband or boyfriend is down by 22%. More than half of all rape victims are stepping forward to report the crime -- a significant increase over the past ten years. Over a million women have found justice in our courtrooms and obtained domestic violence protective orders. The Act also changed the way that the law enforcement community views violence against women. No longer are these crimes considered "domestic matters". Today, they are properly treated as criminal acts and are strongly prosecuted. The Violence Against Women Act of 2005 continues to build on these gains by further improving housing options for battered women; tightening criminal laws; enlisting health care professionals in the process; helping to treat children who are victims of, or witness, abuse; and supporting widespread prevention strategies. The Act has more than 50 Republican and Democratic co-sponsors and has gathered endorsements from a wide-ranging group of supporters, including the American Bar Association, the National Association of Attorneys General, the International Association of Forensic Nurses, the American Medical Association, the National Sheriffs Association, and more than 70 victim services and advocacy organizations. Nevertheless, this law will expire unless there is quick action taken by Congress. Please help me renew the Violence Against Women Act by contacting your Senator and Representative today. We simply cannot afford to let this vital piece of legislation lapse or become buried in partisan bickering. Please act today.

Thank you,

Joe BidenU.S. Senator

Visit the web address below to tell your friends about this. Tell-a-friend!If you received this message from a friend, you can sign up for Unite Our States.

This Could Be You

2005-09-28T07:00:00.000-04:00

He was arrested May 8, 2002 in Chicago and since that time he has been confined to a 5' x 7' windowless constantly-lit cell located in a naval brig in South Carolina. His name is Jose Padilla and regardless of his past crimes or alleged plots he is an American citizen being held without a charge, without access to court or a lawyer and without contact from the outside world.

Earlier this month, on September 9th, a three-judge panel of the Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Bush administration, confirming the authority to detain Padilla without charges. The case has been appealed and will come before the U.S. Supreme Court sometime in the future. Until then Mr. Padilla sits in his cell unaware of his fate.

Before going forward, it is important to be aware of Title 18, section 4001 (a) of the U.S. Code passed by Congress more than 30 years ago which states: "No citizen shall be imprisoned or otherwise detained by the United States except pursuant to an Act of Congress." This law alone makes the detention of Mr. Padilla illegal but it is not all. The 5th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states: "No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Jose Padilla was arrested after his flight from Switzerland to Chicago touched down. Although he had no bomb-making materials with him, he was detained first as a material witness to the 9-11 attacks. A warrant signed by U.S. District Court Judge Michael Mukasey from New York authorized the arrest and transfer of Padilla to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan. The same judge appointed Donna Newman as Mr. Padilla's lawyer.

The case against Mr. Padilla changed drastically on June 11, 2002 when Judge Mukasey, reportedly acting on a request from Theodore Olsen, solicitor general, vacated Mr. Padilla's warrant and released him to the custody of the Department of Defense. It is at this time that Jose Padilla lost all rights granted to U.S. citizens as he was labeled an "enemy combatant". There is a glaring problem with the designation "enemy combatant". For one, Mr. Padilla was not picked up on a battlefield or in a war zone. Second, there were no weapons or weapon making information in Mr. Padilla's possession.

The case itself has been well traveled throught the court system in the 3 years since Jose Padilla's "arrest". The Cato Institute, the Center for National Security Studies, the Constitution Project, the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, People for the American Way, and the Rutherford Institute filed a friend-of-the-court brief in Padilla v. Rumsfeld and the journey began.

The Second District Court of Appeals in New York City ruled in favor of Jose Padilla, declaring his detention to be illegal and unconstitutional. The Bush administration appealed this ruling with the U.S. Supreme Court. The court refused to rule on the case but did declare that the Second District Court had no jurisdiction, ordering the case to be heard by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia (they have jurisdiction over South Carolina).

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Virginia ruled that the lawyers for Jose Padilla had improperly named Donald Rumsfeld as the Respondent, thus bogging the case down in more bureaucracy. The court ruled the warden of the military brig where Padilla is being held should be the Respondent. Donna Newman, his lawyer, argues this judgment claiming: "President Bush, as Commander in Chief, and Secretary of the Defense Rumsfeld ordered and directed Padilla's arrest, the transfer of custody from the Department of Justice to the Department of Defense...and the conditions of his detention..Padilla's absence from this district and his inability to (file a petition for habeas corpus on his own) are due entirely to the actions of Bush and Rumsfeld."

In winning the ruling, the government argued that the New York court lacked the jurisdiction to rule in the case because Mr. Padilla was transferred to South Carolina. Another argument by the government was that the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals lacked the jurisdiction to summon the President and his cabinet as respondents. Finally, the government challenged Donna Newman's request of a writ of habeas corpus for Jose Padilla. The government questioned her "next friend" status. The habeas statute requires that a detainee sign the petition, or if he is unable to do so, that someone with "next friend" standing must sign. The whole reasoning for Newman signing the petition is because she was and has been denied access to Mr. Padilla. This is in addition to Padilla himself being denied access to anyone involved in the case or the courts themselves. It has become a rock under which Mr. Padilla cannot free himself. How can he sign a petition when he is allowed no access to lawyers?

The facts are that Mr. Padilla did spend time traveling in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan and Pakistan and he was, at the time, a muslim by the name of Abdullah al-Muhajir. The government claims he made contacts with Al Qaeda, became knowledgeable in bomb making skills and conspired to use a "dirty bomb" to blow up apartment buildings in the U.S.. Despite these claims, the evidence or lack thereof is completely circumstantial, at best, with nothing concrete tying Jose Padilla with Al Qaeda or any knowledge of bomb making.

I was going to include a brief biography of Jose Padilla in this story, but that is not fair. Regardless of his past, regardless of the evidence the government may or may not have, the fact is that Jose Padilla is an American citizen being held illegally without charge and without access to the criminal justice system all Americans are entitled to. If the government has a case, then they should charge and prosecute Mr. Padilla to the fullest extent of the law. Is this what America is all about, holding her citizens incommunicado for indefinite lengths of time?

"The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands...may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." - James Madison (Federalist #47)

"I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution." -Thomas Jefferson, 1789

Quotes

2005-09-27T14:20:00.000-04:00

Here are some quotes I find relavent to the current administration. Take it from these guys, they knew what they were talking about.

"Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power" -Benito Mussolini

"It is humiliating to remain with our hands folded while other write history. it matters little who wins. To make people great it is necessary to send them to battle even if you have to kick them in the pants. That is what I shall do." -Benito Mussolini

"Another weapon I discovered early was the power of the printed word to sway souls to me. The newspaper was soon my gun, my flag - a thing with a soul that could mirror my own." - Benito Mussolini

"The German people have no idea of the extent to which they have to be gulled in order to be led" - Adolf Hitler

"The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed, for the vast masses of the nation are in depths of their hearts more easily decieved than they are consciously and intentionally bad. The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one, for they themselves often tell little lies but would be ashamed to tell a big one." - Adolf Hitler

"All propaganda must be so popular and on such an intellectual level, that even the most stupid of those towards whom it is directed will understand it. Therefore, the intellectual level of the propaganda must be lower the larger the number of people who are to be influenced by it." - Adolf Hitler

"Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way around, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise." - Adolf Hitler

"A violently active, intrepid, brutal youth - that is what I am after...I will have no intellectual training. Knowledge is ruin for my young men." - Adolf Hitler

Suggestions Please

2005-09-26T20:36:00.000-04:00

I have been sitting on some information for almost a year now, not sure how to deliver it or if anyone would be interested. Now, in the wake of the recent hurricanes and the way our government handled these situations, I believe the time is ripe for this information to be illuminated.

The Committee on Government Reform's publishes a "Policy and Supporting Positions", otherwise known as the Plum Book. I have a copy of this publication and I am very interested in sharing the wealth of knowledge it contains.

The subject at hand is the appointment of less than qualified or just plain cronies to positions within the U.S. government. This includes the cabinet and a list of more than 3,000 government positions the President is allowed to fill.

What I am asking for is the best way to deliver this information. Now, after seeing how Mike Brown's appointment related to everyday people, it may be interesting to find out who Bush is appointing to various government agencies and the background of these people. It is definitely too much information to comprise a single post, so maybe someone has some ideas how to best relay this valuable information.

Congested Evacuation: Hurricane Rita

2005-09-23T14:27:00.000-04:00

I was reading through some of the stories of people trying to leave Texas before the hurricane hits and it just made me think back to right after Katrina slammed New Orleans. I remember many people some my friends, some news and media saying with almost disregard for human life that the people who died- the ones who stayed behind "should have just left".

I ask those people now to read the stories from Texas. People are on the roads bumper to bumper for 10-15 hours and only traveling 5-10 miles. Cars are running out of gas and people are abandoning them on the road. Once again it will be the poor who will feel the brunt of this storm. People are standing in lines to cash checks from banks that are closing shop. Put yourself in their posistion for a second. You have no car or maybe it's broken down, you just recieved your paycheck from work but the banks and check cashing stores are closed and abandoned. How do you "just leave" when you have no transportation and or no money?

This is why we needed to have some sympathy for the people in New Orleans who stayed or could not leave. Things are not always black and white, there is a gray area, it's not as easy as saying "they should have left", maybe they tried and could not.

Home Heating Heartache: Food vs. Heat

2005-09-23T14:00:00.000-04:00

Break out the vaseline and bend over, here comes old man winter. Massachusetts lawmakers today announced a new energy package in anticipation of the coming price increases for oil and gas to heat your home.

In the proposal there is a $800 one-time home heating tax deduction for homeowners. Sorry, if you rent an apartment then go broke or freeze! Another issue I have with this proposal is the numbers they quote. According to the Telegram & Gazette article, natural gas users can expect to see an increase in costs from $1000 last year to $1800 this year. The article fails to explain where or how it came up with these numbers which I proclaim to be incorrect. Heating my apartment last year with natural gas cost me over $500 a month. A friend of mine who heats a larger apartment with oil spent well over $500 a month. A homeowner friend of mine who heats his house with propane spends over $800 a month for heat in the winter. So once again I call out the Gazette and their bogus $1000 number, that is unless the number was $1000 a month for heating last year.

This shows how inept the new energy package is. It may be a nice gesture but what good does a $800 tax credit do when you pay more than $800 a month to heat your house for 5-6 months of the year. The proposal does some to help out the poor with energy assistance but again too little too late and the people left "out in the cold" are the middle class workers.

Here is the good news folks: don't worry, I am sure that much like Congress our bosses will be generous enough to give us all here in the Northeast a "cost-of-living" raise. Oh right, Congress gets to vote on their raises themselves, my bad.

Pre-Emptive Nuclear War: More Administration Secrecy

2005-09-22T19:45:00.000-04:00

On Monday of this week the Pentagon removed from it's website a Joint Chiefs Of Staff publication finished on March 15, 2005, entitled: Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations. I have urged people to read this document in the past as it is an invaluable insight into the future of war for America. This document lays out scenarios in which the United States would use nuclear weapons on it's enemies. Clearly the government does not want the people to see how they are trying to resurrect nuclear weaponry. There is no reason ever to use nuclear weapons! Our government lies to the world about trying to stop the spread of weapons of mass destruction. Well, actually Bush and company are not lying. They want all the weapons for themselves so no other country can challenge the mighty America unless they want the Nagasaki/Hiroshima treatment.

Once again I beg you to print this document and read it when you can. Please don't delay. This information will not be available for much longer. How dare we know the truth!

Racism?

2005-09-16T15:30:00.001-04:00

I know I am borrowing alot of material today from other places but this next piece is something that I noticed while reading through various news sources, but the people at A Social Life found the perfect example of what I have been SCREAMING about since the hurricane hit. I will let the picture speak for itself. What racism in America, you must be mistaken.

FEMA

2005-09-16T15:30:00.000-04:00

In order to understand what went wrong on the Federal level regarding Katrina, you must understand what FEMA is and what they do. Here is a link to the best article I have found yet regarding FEMA past and present. Thanks to the people at slangeditorial.blogspot.com for this information.

Mitt the Halfwit

2005-09-15T20:14:00.000-04:00

Anyone reading this post that does not live in Massachusetts please I beg you: when 2008 rolls around don't vote for Mitt Romney. Take it from someone here in the state that he has abandoned, he is the worse thing to happen to MA. since Mike Dukakis (and that is a strong statement).

Recently Mr. Romney gave a speech to the ultra-conservative "think" tank the Heritage Foundation. Here is what Mitt had to say about Muslims: "I am talking about monitoring people who come here from foreign countries that are terror-sponsored countries -- individuals that may have been taught at places where terrorist training is going on. Tracking students, visitors, and how about people who are in settings, mosques for instance, who may be teaching doctrines of hate and terror. Are we monitoring that? Are we wiretapping? Are we following what is going on? Are we seeing who is coming in?"

Also during this speech, Mitt let us know where his heart is with this line: "A lot of us red-state folks...I'm a red speck in a blue state but I still consider myself red-state folk." That's funny because I consider Mitt more of speck of corn in my shit.

Why I Hate Religion: Pat Robertson

2005-09-15T19:22:00.000-04:00

Here is a link to the latest hate speech by Pat Robertson in which he blames hurricane Katrina, 9/11 and the insurgency in Iraq on Ellen Degeneres. This is the guy with millions of followers who wants to assasinate the elected President of Venezula. This is why religion is evil. How could a god condone this type of behavior and hate? Just goes to show how many stupid people there are in the world who will blindly follow anything and hate everything that is not approved by their religion. Way to go Pat, I am sure your god is pleased.

The Latest News From Iraq

2005-09-15T19:10:00.000-04:00

Here is the latest e-mail update from our friend Dr. Dahr Jamail about the current occupation of Iraq.

** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
** http://dahrjamailiraq.com/ **

September 15, 2005

For the last several days at least 6,000 US soldiers along with approximately 4,000 Iraqi soldiers (Read-members of the Kurdish Peshmerga and Shia Badr Army) were laying siege to the city of Tal-Afar, near Mosul in northern Iraq. It is estimated that 90% of the residents have left their homes because of the violence and destruction of the siege, as well as to avoid home raids and snipers. The Fallujah model is being applied yet again, albeit on a smallerscale. I haven’t received any reports yet of biometrics being used(retina scans, finger printing, bar coding of human beings) like in Fallujah, but there are other striking similarities to the tactics used in November. While the US military claims to have killed roughly 200 “terrorists” in the operation, reports from the ground state that most of the fighters inside the city had long since left to avoid direct confrontation with the overwhelming military force (a basic tenet of guerrilla warfare). Again like Fallujah, most of the families who fled are staying in refugee camps outside the city in tents amidst horrible conditions inthe inferno-like heat of the Iraqi summer. The LA Times reported that Ezzedin Dowla, a Turkmen leader in the area said, “Families are homeless and the government has not provided any shelter, food or drink for them.” Nor has the US military.The targets of this military operation are the Sunni Turkmen who are politically on the side of the Sunni Arabs. Most Sunnis will be voting against the constitution during the coming vote of October, 15th. The Cheney Administration is desperate for something it can spin as “good news” from Iraq; thus, it most certainly behooves them to have the referendum on the constitution to boast about. But in order to do so, the voting ability and power of the Sunni (and Sunni Turkmen) must be severely compromised, as well as punishment meted out for rightfully assuming what will be a Sunni no-vote on the constitution. Both the Cheney Administration and its current puppet-government in Iraq benefit from destroying the voting (and living) ability of the majority of people in the “Sunni triangle,” so we have the operation in Tal-Afar,most likely to be followed by similar operations in Al-Qa’im, Haditha,Samarra, and possibly more.In Tal-Afar, the propaganda spewed by the US military (and Iraqi“government”) was that the operation was to fight terrorists coming into Iraq via Syria. If that were true, why did the US military remove troops from the border with Syria who were supposed to be preventing infiltration by foreign fighters? Instead of guarding the border, as they should, they engaged in the operation against Iraqi Sunni Turkmen. Working in unison, the US military launched the heavy-handed attack with the “authorization” of Prime Minister Ibrahm Jaafari, the leader of the Shia Dawa Party. Jaafari even went so far as to venture to Tal-Afar onTuesday to visit troops and have his photograph taken. “Authorization” was given by the Iraqi government for the attack on Tal-Afar, just as “authorization” was given by then interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi for the November, 2004 massacre in Fallujah. “Authorization,” when the US military would never, ever allow any foreign power jurisdiction over American forces, least of all a puppet government. Correspondents with Azzaman media in Tal-Afar miraculously made it into the city and reported that residents are disputing reports that US and Iraqi soldiers have killed scores of “insurgents.” Like Fallujah, these residents of Tal-Afar are reporting that most of the people killed were civilians who had no place to go so they chose to stay in their homes. People also stayed because they feared persecution at the hands of the Peshmerga and Badr Army.I recently interviewed an Iraqi man from that area at the Peoples’ UN conference in Perugia, Italy. He told me, “Most people in Mosul and Tal-Afar would rather be detained by the Americans now, because they know if Iraqi soldiers or Iraqi police detain them they will be tortured severely, and possibly killed. This gives you an idea of how bad it is with these Iraqi soldiers, even in the shadow of what the Americans ares till doing in Abu Ghraib.” As for “foreign fighters,” one of the Azzaman correspondents quoted aresident of Tal-Afar as saying, “We used to hear (from news reports) of the presence of some Arab (foreign) fighters in the city, but we have seen none of them.” Life in Iraq remains a living hell. Blood flowed in the streets of Khadamiya yesterday as a horrendous car bomb killed 112 people in the predominantly Shia neighborhood. And once again, calls of solidarity were made from the nearby Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiya and residents emerged from their homes to help their brothers and sisters across the river, just as they did after the panic and chaos which recently took the lives of nearly 1,000 Shia. The horrendous totals from yesterday were 160 dead, 570 wounded Iraqis as the result of the string of attacks and at least a dozen car bombs. The blowback from the Jafaari “authorized” state-sponsored terrorism inTal-Afar took little time to materialize in the capital city. If Jafaari was more honest with his press appearances, along with his photo-op in Tal-Afar he should have had his photo taken amidst the charred, smoking body parts strewn about the streets of Khadamiya, which was a result (albeit just as horrific) of his Tal-Afar “authorization.” On that note, Jalal Talabani, Iraq’s puppet president, was in a press conference in Washington D.C. with Mr. Bush just hours before the blowback began. Meanwhile, one of my friends in Baghdad writes me, “Dear Dahr, how are you dear pal? I am very sorry for what happened after Hurricane Katrina. It is a real tragedy. I hope none of your friends or family was affected. It is a tragedy which makes one speechless.” This when he goes to work each day hoping to make it home alive to see his wife and newborn daughter. And another of my friends in Baghdad wrote me recently, “I’m so sorry that I didn’t email you the previous days…the situation in Tal-Afar has become so much worse for the people. It is terrible what is going on there and nobody can say anything because as usual the military operation is still going on and they are trying to keep all the media out. They have also started another operation in another area of Al-Anbar province and they will soon start one in Samarra.” My interpreter when I’m in Iraq, Abu Talat, has been willing to take the risk of working with me there. To give you an idea of the lengths he’s willing to go to, he gave me the green light to come to Iraq last November, just before the massacre in Fallujah began. It is safe to say times were quite tense then, with kidnappings and beheadings having long since become the norm. “The Minister of Defense is threatening not only Fallujah but all of the Ramadi Governorate, I can tell you very surely about that,” he wrote in a recent email to me and a colleague who was hoping to enter Iraq to work as a reporter. (Today, US warplanes began dropping bombs inside the city of Ramadi.) “No one can support you working here. We are having a very critical situation. For this reason, I think that coming to Iraq in this critical time is not accepted. I was very, very welcoming to any of your friends, Dahr, but not in this time. Sorry, but for your own safety. Take good care of yourself.” Today at least 30 more Iraqis have died in violence across their occupied country and it will only continue to worsen.

More writing, photos and commentary at http://dahrjamailiraq.com/

Sneaky Sneaky

2005-09-14T19:40:00.000-04:00

OpenTheGovernment.org has just released a report on government secrecy. It highlights the current surge in documents the Federal government is labeling as classified, along with other examples of secrecy in our government.

Some interesting numbers were in the report. For instance, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court approved 1,754 orders in 2004, rejecting none. For all those not up to date, this is the Federal Court that issues physical search and surveillance warrants under the FISA Act of 1978. It is also worth noting that this court has rejected only 4 government requests for surveillance in the history of the court.

During 2004, the government classified documents 15.6 million times. The total amount of taxpayer money spent on classifying this information was an amazing $7.2 billion. Compare that to the $3.3 billion spent in 1997 and the $3.7 billion spent in 1999 to classify documents.

Another very interesting number is how many times President Bush has used the "state secrets" privilege. The overall number itself may not seem like alot but when put into perspective, it is alarming. The President has used the "state secrets" privilege 23 times from 2001 to 2005. The privilege is a result of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in the case United States v. Reynolds from 1953. Since then, the privilege has been used 56 times not including the years 2001-2005. Again, the number may not seem like much but when you think that it is now being used 33 times more than it was during the Cold War when secrets were the fad, it comes into perspective a little.

The Federal Advisory committee Act was established to ensure that information and advice given to the various government committees, boards and task forces was unbiased, objective and open to the public. The report highlighted that of the 7,045 meetings of the Department of Defense, Department of Health and Human Services, and The National Science Foundation, 64% of these meetings were completely closed to the public. Of the other remaining agencies, 396 or 17.7% of the total 2,237 meetings were completely closed to the public. Now that's democracy!

Overall, the report notes that the government has created 81% more secrets than it did prior to the attacks of 9/11. You may stop here and say, "well that's why- right there" However, the 9/11 commission itself recommended reducing unnecessary secrets that can clog up government response time.

How do Americans feel about this surge in secrecy? During 2004 there were 4,080,737 requests for documents under the Freedom of Information Act, a 25% increase from the year 2003. Interestingly enough there were only 1,908,083 FOIA requests in the year 1999.

Maybe these are the times we live in. Secret squirrel to woodchuck...the eagle has landed. I do find it hard to believe that we need more secrets now than we did during the Cold War years. What is most disturbing is the way our government makes more and more decisions without us knowing or being allowed to know everyday. Democracy, if that is what we have, needs openness and truth in order for it to work. If not, then it becomes more and more of a totalitarian rule everyday. I guess another way to look at it would be if you were a parent. Would you keep more and more secrets from your child every day they grow or would you try to inform and educate them as best as you could and hope they make the right decision based on the facts?

Policing the Press

2005-09-14T13:42:00.000-04:00

Maybe I am a bit morbid or sick even, but I want to see dead bodies from Iraq and Afghanistan. I want to see the dead, sick and dying from New Orleans. Not because I like to see death and destruction, but because these things are happening now and they are real.

Here in America we have freedom of the press. In theory the press is allowed to report on anything and everything without restraint. Why, then, do we not see the death and destruction from the war in Iraq and the dead from hurricane Katrina? It took being challenged in court by CNN for the Bush administration to agree not to prevent the media from covering the effort to recover the dead bodies in New Orleans.

Sfgate.com reported yesterday in an article titled: "As bodies recovered, reporters are told no photos, no stories". The article tells of a member of the Army 82nd Airborne Division who approached a reporter on Kentucky Street and told him: "no photos, no stories." This was after the soldier threatened to take away the reporters press credentials and kick them out of the state if they reported on the body recovery process.

On Monday another soldier from the 82nd Airborne told reporters that the Army's policy is that media must be 300 meters away from the scene of any body recovery effort in New Orleans. Reporters were told that if they took pictures or wrote stories about the recovery effort they would be reported and would face "consequences". This was in the Bywater district of New Orleans.

Who would want to see pictures or read stories like this and why? I am that person. More people should want to see these types of things. How else can we grasp the concept of how vicious war is or how catastrophic this disaster was? In these times of "talking points" and polished up G-rated news reports, I believe it is imperative that we see with our own eyes the things that are happening around us, good or bad.

Never mind the fact that a "free press" is guaranteed in a little thing I like to call the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. Limiting what and where the press can report sounds a little like something that would happen in China or Cuba, not here in America.

Truly Shameful

2005-09-13T19:40:00.000-04:00

What is the definition of a leader? If the last 5 years hasn't shown time and time again that George Bush lacks leadership qualities, then Katrina is a punch in the face. Once again during this disaster Bush has proven his lack of respect for the people he serves, Americans.

Cuba has offered to send 1,600 medics, field hospitals and 83 tons of medical supplies to Katrina stricken areas. The offer was made shortly after Katrina hit New Orleans and even now the doctors are on standby awaiting an answer from Bush. What does the administration have to say about this very generous offer from Cuba? State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the team from Cuba would not be needed because there was a "robust response from the American medical community." White House press secretary Scott McClellan said this about the Cuban offer: "When it comes to Cuba, we have one message for Fidel Castro: He needs to offer the people of Cuba their freedom."

Cuba is not the only "non-friendly" country to offer assistance to America in our time of need. Last week, Iran offered to send the United Stated 20 million barrels of crude oil. I don't have to tell you that America needs help in the area of oil; just go to your nearest gas station. State Department executive secretary Harry Thomas Jr. has stated the offer was rejected because it was conditional.

We all know that Cuba and Iran are not two of America's closest allies, but in a time when Americans are dying in the streets, their assistance is invaluable. Why can't Bush just set aside our differences for a day and welcome the goodwill of others? This may strike to the heart of why Bush is not a true leader. These are the days and times when we should be reaching out to our non-allies to try to bridge the gap that separates us. Why doesn't Bush see the opportunity in these offers to open the lines of communication? I am going out on a limb here, but I would venture to guess that the homeless, dying and sick in New Orleans don't have a beef with Iran or Cuba right now. I bet they would just like to stay alive and appreciate the goodwill of man.

Cleaning Up on Hurricane Katrina

2005-09-09T14:40:00.000-04:00

Please America, I beg you to wake up and realize what George Bush and his administration are doing to this country and the people in it. This is not Bush bashing. This is common sense and
compassion for your fellow man and woman.

In what may be the most disgusting display of greed and capitalism ever, a proclamation was made by President Bush yesterday: To Suspend Subchapter IV of Chapter 31 of Title 40, United States Code, Within a Limited Geographic Area in Response to the National Emergency Caused by Hurricane Katrina.

What is this proclamation and what does it mean? President Bush is suspending the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931. Here is the opening text of the Davis-Bacon Act:

"That the advertised specifications for every contract in excess of $2,000, to which the United States or the District of Columbia is a party, for construction, alteration, and/or repair, including painting and decorating, of public buildings or public works of the United States or the District of Columbia within the geographical limits of the States of the Union or the District of Columbia, and which requires or involves the employment of mechanics and/or laborers shall contain a provision stating the minimum wages to be paid various classes of laborers and mechanics which shall be based upon the wages that will be determined by the Secretary of Labor to be prevailing for the corresponding classes of laborers and mechanics employed on projects of a character similar to the contract work in the city, town, village, or other civil subdivision of the State in which the work is to be performed, or in the District of Columbia if the work is to be performed there; and every contract based upon these specifications shall contain a stipulation that the contractor or his subcontractor shall pay all mechanics and laborers employed directly upon the site of the work, unconditionally and not less often than once a week, and without subsequent deduction or rebate on any account, the full amounts accrued at time of payment, computed at wage rates not less than those stated in the advertised specifications, regardless of any contractual relationship which may be alleged to exist between the contractor or subcontractor and such laborers and mechanics, and that the scale of wages to be paid shall be posted by the contractor in a prominent and easily accessible place at the site of the work; and the further stipulation that there may be withheld from the contractor so much of accrued payments as may be considered necessary by the contracting officer to pay to laborers and mechanics employed by the contractor or any subcontractor on the work the difference between the rates of wages required by the contract to be paid laborers and mechanics on the work and the rates of wages received by such laborers and mechanics and not refunded to the contractor, subcontractors, or their agents."

Earlier in the week, the Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root (you might recognize them from their top-notch work in Iraq) started work under a $500 million contract with the Navy.

Can you start to see what is happening now? President Bush has suspended the law that requires contractors working under a government issued contract to pay their workers on a weekly basis and to pay them at least minimum wage. Not only is Halliburton going to make money off this disaster, but they are going to make a huge profit on the backs of cheap labor. The work does need to be done and I am not saying that KB&R is not the right company for the job. What I don't understand is -why? Why would Bush suspend a law that protects the American worker from low and or inconsistent pay?

The answer is simple as usual. Bush and company do not care about you or me! Dick Cheney worked for Halliburton and now they make more money than can be imagined. When will America wake up and realize that the Bush administration is selling us off to capitalist corporations?

FEMA and the Katrina Aftermath: It is Bush's Fault!

2005-09-08T19:00:00.000-04:00

To all those who question how people can blame President Bush for the complete failure of FEMA in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, I point you to the staff of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Not only did President Bush take FEMA, which used to be a cabinet-level agency, and reorganize them under the office of Homeland Security, he also stacked the now defunct agency with his political buddies. New York Daily News ran an article yesterday exposing the many appointments Bush has made to this once respectable agency.

One such appointment is FEMA's deputy director and chief of staff, Patrick Rhode. Mr. Rhode's previous jobs include: working on the Bush-Cheney campaign and work at the Commerce Department and Small Business Administration. His bio on the FEMA website does not list any jobs related to disaster management.

Another example of Bush politics is the Deputy Chief of Staff, Scott Morris. Mr. Morris was a PR man who worked previously for Maverick Media, a Texas company that produced television and radio ads for the Bush-Cheney campaign. In addition, Mr. Morris also worked as the White House liaison for the U.S. Small Business Administration. Again, according to his bio posted on the FEMA website, Mr. Morris has no past experience in disaster management.

This is not a new problem and many blame the former director of FEMA, Joe Allbaugh, for many of the appointments. Mr. Allbaugh was appointed by Bush after he took office in 2000 and Allbaugh left his office in March of 2003. Before his job as director, Mr. Allbaugh worked as chief of staff for Bush when he was governor of Texas and then went on to head the Bush-Cheney campaign.

Once again here are Bush administration politics: you wash my back, I wash yours. These people have no right to work in an agency that deals with disasters. The only qualifications these people have is that they are close to 'ol Georgy. Read between the lines people: this is why the relief efforts have been so uncoordinated. These people don't belong in these jobs. They don't know what they are doing and it is President Bush's fault.

Wake Up Call: Gas Prices and Refineries

2005-09-08T18:10:00.000-04:00

The recent spike in gas prices across the nation in the wake of hurricane Katrina has recently been blamed on a shortage of refineries in America. The oil companies have gone so far as to even blame the shortage of refineries on environmental regulations. This may seem like a bit much, but it is as simple as supply and demand. The less oil that is refined into gas the more expensive gas prices are.

Hurricane Katrina did in fact slow the refining process due to the fact that there were offshore refineries in the Gulf of Mexico; this much is true. What has been brought to light recently, however, is why there are so few refineries in the United States in the first place. Contrary to what the oil companies are telling us, it is not environmental regulations that limit the amount of refineries. It is the oil companies themselves who have closed down and limited the amount of refineries in the United States. Why would they do that, you ask? The answer is as simple as supply and demand: less refineries means less gas. Less gas means higher prices. Higher prices means more money for the oil companies.

The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights yesterday exposed inter-office memos from the big three American oil companies Mobil, Chevron and Texaco in their press release: "Internal Memos Show Oil Companies Intentionally Limited Refining Capacity To Drive Up Gasoline Prices". These memos demonstrate how the oil companies closed down refining capacity, and opposed the opening of more oil refineries in the U.S.. All this in an effort to make more money at the expense of the American people.

Wake up America! Capitalism does not care about you or me, just the bottom line. We are seeing this now in the wake of hurricane Katrina. We are all expendable. The only thing that matters is the almighty dollar. It's time we stand up to the oil companies. We do have the power because they need our money.

Katrina: The Facts

2005-09-06T14:00:00.000-04:00

Although the hurricane could not have been avoided, the disaster that has materialized could have been avoided. The blood is on the hands of the government at many levels. Here are some articles in the lead-up to Katrina. This did not have to happen and the writing was on the wall.

Dear Colleague: I thought you and your readers might find useful this short collection of historical articles detailing the impact of the Iraq war on hurricane preparedness in the United States: "Background articles on Iraq & New Orleans: A perfectly avoidable catastrophe"
http://rempost.blogspot.com/2005/09/background-articles-on-iraq-war-new.html

Sincerely,
Carl Conetta
Project on Defense Alternatives

The "Iraq" Constitution

2005-09-06T13:45:00.000-04:00

Here is another e-mail regarding the drafting of the Iraqi constitution. Is this the freedom we were supposed to give them. It is another classic example of our beautiful "democracy" at work.

U.S. Influence 'Too Much'
Inter Press Service Dahr Jamail

*London, Sep 5 (IPS) -* U.S. influence in the process of drafting a constitution for Iraq is excessive and "highly inappropriate", a United Nations official says."It is a matter of public record that in the final weeks of the process the newly arrived U.S. ambassador (Zalmay Khalizad) took an extremely hands-on role," Justin Alexander, legal affairs officer for the office of constitutional support with the United Nations Assistance Mission toIraq (UNAMI) told IPS. "Even going so far as to circulate at least one U.S draft."Alexander, who oversaw the recent proceedings in Baghdad added: "This involvement was highly inappropriate for a country with 140,000 soldiers in country."Zaid al-Ali, a legal expert who also oversaw the drafting process inBaghdad, made a similar case at a meeting at the International Association of Contemporary Iraqi Studies in London."There are three ways in which the occupation intervened in the context of Iraq's constitution-writing process," he said. "Firstly, the occupation authorities selected and affected the makeup of the commission that was charged with drafting Iraq's transitional law, andits permanent constitution. Second, the occupation determined the limitsand parameters within which the constitution was to be drafted. Third, the occupation authorities intervened directly in order to safeguard itsinterests in the context of the constitutional negotiations."Al-Ali said it was significant that one article in the draft constitution on foreign military bases was dropped from the finalversion. "One article contained in a previous draft provided that setting up foreign military bases in Iraq was to be forbidden, and that the only way in which this could be deviated from would have been by a two-thirds majority vote in Parliament."Al-Ali said "this article was dropped from the final draft of the constitution."An alliance including the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars and the large movement of Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said it rejected the draftand a "political process which had been led by occupiers and theircollaborators." The group said in a media statement: "We consider this draft as a next step of this process which does not represent the peoples' will." The alliance also expressed "major suspicions about the honesty of the next referendum, which will take place under occupation and with neither international nor Arabic and Islamic supervision."Dr. Marinos Diamantides, senior lecturer in law at the University of London, said the entire drafting process could be illegal under international law."One could argue the entire process is against the law," Diamantides told IPS. "According to the 1907 Convention (the convention for thepacific settlement of disputes), the occupying power has a duty tomaintain the legal system of the country it occupies. This is the first time ever that an occupying power has dismantled the internal law system of the country it occupies." He also pointed out that ironically the Sunnis now have power to derail the upcoming referendum vote by a two-thirds vote in three provinces. That power was originally intended to give Kurds power to veto the constitution.When Iraq's Kurdish and Shia dominated parliament recently approved the draft, Sunnis immediately began campaigning for a 'no' vote in the upcoming October referendum. If the draft were to pass the referendum, it would be followed two months later by election for a government. At least four provinces are predominantly Sunni, and Sunni clerics have urged their followers to reject the draft if it does not meet Sunni demands. Adding further complexity to the already muddled situation, former UN humanitarian coordinator in Iraq during the sanctions Denis Halliday believes that even the United Nations has no place in occupied Iraq." The UN doesn't have a position in Iraq today," Halliday told IPS. "Oncethe invasion took place, the UN became collaborators with the enemy (the United States)." Halliday, who had resigned from his UN post in protest against "genocidal sanctions" added: "This lesson should have been learned in August, 2003 when our office in Baghdad was blown up, as we werecollaborators. The UN has simply become a tool of the U.S., and Iraqiscan no longer distinguish between the U.S. and the UN." Justin Alexander said Iraq might need a new constitution. "If Iraq creates a progressive and effective constitution and laws to implement the constitution, then this could benefit Iraqis. But in the absence of mutual reconciliation and an end to the occupation this is all futile."

More writing, photos and commentary at http://dahrjamailiraq.com/

If you would like to reprint Dahr's Dispatches on the web, you need to include this copyright notice and a prominent link to the DahrJamailIraq.comwebsite. Any other use of images and text including, but not limited to, reproduction, use on another website, copying and printing requires the permission of Dahr Jamail. Of course, feel free to forward Dahr's dispatches via email.

Katrina Aftermath

2005-09-06T12:37:00.000-04:00

Here if some information about what is happening in New Orleans, and a look into the future of how things will be conducted here in America.

Dear Colleague: For your readers, these background articles on the New Orleans crisis have been permanently reposted at the URLs below.

Troops begin combat operations in New Orleans (Army Times, 2 Sept 2005) http://rempost.blogspot.com/2005/09/troops-begin-combat-operations-in-new.html

Fearing riots, Guard rejects food airdrops; Officials exploring other options for delivering supplies (Stars and Stripes, 3 Sept 2005) http://rempost.blogspot.com/2005/09/fearing-riots-guard-rejects-food.html

Homeland Security won't let Red Cross deliver food (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 3 Sept 2005) http://rempost.blogspot.com/2005/09/homeland-security-wont-let-red-cross.html

Sincerely, Carl Conetta, Project on Defense Alternatives

The Bush Administration's Love of Human Life: Land Mines

2005-09-01T15:30:00.000-04:00

How do you feel about land mines? An example of how the world views land mines might be the fact that 145 total countries (including every member of NATO) are party to the Mine Ban Treaty (otherwise known as the Ottawa Convention). This treaty prohibits the use, production, trade or stockpiling of antipersonnel mines. Antipersonnel self-destructing mines (mines that blow up after a set period of time) as well as persistent mines (mines that do not self-destruct) are prohibited by the Mine Ban Treaty.

It appears that the Bush administration is ready to resume production of antipersonnel mines, something the United States has not produced since 1997. Recently the Pentagon requested $1.3 billion for development and production of a new antipersonnel mine system named Intelligent Munitions System (IMS) which has sparked concern from Human Rights Watch.

In addition to the Pentagon's budget request, the Bush administration announced a new landmine policy on February 27, 2004 that slipped under the radar. The U.S. Department of State laid out the administrations new agenda in it's bullet form fact sheet titled: "New United States Policy on Lanmines-Reducing Humanitarian Risk and Saving Lives of United States Soldiers." To quote the administration: "The United States will not join the Ottawa Convention because its terms would have required us to give up a needed military capability. However, this new policy dramatically reduces the danger posed to civilians from unexploded landmines--both anti-personnel and anti-vehicle--left behind after military conflicts."

This claim is false. A study published by the International Committee of the Red Cross in conjunction with a group of over 30 retired officers from various countries had this to say about "smart" mines: "Because of the vast numbers [of mines] involved, and the complete absence of any [mine] marking, it is likely that the number of civilian casualties resulting from a large-scale strike with remotely delivered mines will greatly exceed the casualty rates seen with conventional minefields.... Even the doubtful benefit of self-destruction and self-deactivation at a later date will not prevent widespread casualties in the initial days after the strike. There is little doubt that the development of remotely delivered mines has increased the probability of a major rise in post-conflict mine casualties."

The Mine Ban Treaty prohibited the use, production, trade or stockpiling of antipersonnel mines. As of November 2004, the United States had stockpiled 10.4 million antipersonnel mines, only China and Russia have larger stockpiles. Add to this the 7.5 million antivehicle mines the U.S. also has in stockpile. In addition to the stockpiling of mines, the U.S. continues to produce and export antivehicle mines, 124,000 sold to South Korea alone in 2004.

Budget documents released in February show the Pentagon has requested $688 million for research and $1.08 billion between fiscal years 2006 through 2011 for production of new landmine systems. These new mines will be triggered by command detonation or "man-in-the-loop" and also through victim-activation.

One of these new programs is the Spider system of land mines. It is a control unit capable of monitoring eighty-four hand placed unattended munitions that deploy a web of tripwires across an area. This style of mine is controlled by a man-in-the-loop type system which allows for activation by either the victim or a soldier. A decision to produce the Spider is set to be made in December of 2005, but to date the U.S. has already spent $135 million on development and another $11 million for research. According to the report by the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics: "U.S. Department of Defense Removal and Destruction of Persistent Landmines and Development of Landmine Alternatives", a total of $390 million has been budgeted to produce 1,620 Spider systems and 186,300 munitions.

In addition to this, the administration will be further developing what they call Intelligent Munitions Sytems (IMS) or "smart" landmines otherwise known as self-destructing mines. These mines either self-destruct within a certain period of time, or have a battery that dies after time rendering the mine non-active. One problem with these types of mines is that the Landmine Protocol of CCW, which the U.S. and China belong to, allows for a 10% failure rate. On top of this the Landmine Protocol allows for 120 days before self-destruction must occur. This is not the only problem with so-called "smart" mines. These types of mines are usually delivered by aircraft or artillery at the rate of thousands per minute. The results of this type of delivery system are scattered areas of landmines hard to map or fence off unlike a traditional field of hand-laid "dumb" mines. The U.S. last used these mines (Gator Mines) in the Gulf War, scattering 117,634 landmines across Kuwait and Iraq.

Just in case you are keeping a running total on just how much the U.S. government spends on landmines, here are some more numbers to crunch. Between the fiscal years 1999 to 2004 the Pentagon spent over $319 million on alternatives for antipersonnel mines. One such program named the Remote Area Denial Artillery Munition (RADAM) was cancelled in 2002 after costs reached $12.1 million. The RADAM program produced zero munitions. A total of $172 million was spent on research and development of IMS systems between the fiscal years of 1999 to 2004. Currently $1.3 billion has been requested for IMS development and production between the fiscal years of 2005 to 2011. In February of 2004, the Pentagon requested $20.2 million to produce 40,000 M18A1E1 Clymore mines ($16 million in supplemental funding provided from the Emergancy Wartime Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2003).

Maybe this is just me, but wouldn't the best way to reduce the humanitarian risk of landmines just be as easy as not producing or using them. Clearly the Bush administration has made it's stance clear on this issue, if it helps the U.S. military kill people, then it's ok for us to use, produce and export. This seems like a lot of time money and energy spent on what I would classify as a weapon of mass destruction. Wouldn't you? All the numbers can be fact checked, in August Human Rights Watch report: "Back in Business? U.S. Landmine Production and Exports." Footnotes to the various reports, fact sheets and policies can be found in the Human Rights Watch briefing paper.

What Is A Terrorist Attack?

2005-08-31T18:00:00.000-04:00

I was reading through President Bush's last speech commemorating the 60th Anniversary of V-J Day when his references to WWII made me think. What is a terrorist attack? Who are terrorists?

In the speech, Bush drew a comparison to WWII and the current war in Iraq, a comparison that made me think. In an attempt to justify this illegal war in Iraq, Bush said this: "Once again, war came to our shores with a surprise attack that killed thousands in cold blood." This is where I have a problem with history. Pearl Harbor was indeed a surprise attack killing over 2,300 and launched us into war, no one would argue that. What I argue is the perception of the attack at Pearl Harbor and its reference to 9/11. When Japan attacked our Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbor they were striking a military target. Granted some civilians did die but the attack itself was a military strike upon a known military target, a naval base to be exact. How then could George Bush possibly compare this to the terrorist attacks of 9/11? The World Trade Towers were not a military target, and the highjackers were not part of an army. All blame does not fall on Bush however. History teaches us that Pearl Harbor was a terrorist attack, a cheap shot if you will, on poor little America.

Because of this perceived terrorist strike by Japan on the helpless naval base of Pearl Harbor, the nuclear bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima were accepted. Again, this is where I have some serious concern for the way America perceives it's actions upon others. How can the bombings of Nagasaki which incinerated 73,884 innocent civilians, and Hiroshima which incinerated 200,000 innocent civilians not be considered a terrorist attack? It was then and is to date the largest single terrorist attack launched. Those were not military bases, although there may have been some bases located inside those cities which were completely destroyed. The cold hard facts are: those were innocent people sitting in their homes in a country whose government they may or may not have supported.

Two attacks and two completely different points of view, not so surprising that both views favor the United States government. Which brings me to my next question. Who is the biggest group of terrorists in the world? The U.S.? How many innocent people have died in Iraq, a war the President continues to try to connect to the very real terrorist attacks of 9/11.

Maybe this is one of the root problems of the current administration and our way of thinking as a whole. History has been distorted. We continue to bully our way through the globe never once stopping to think of the consequences of our actions, but alas, history teaches us so.

Those Crazy Troops: More Bush Administration Support

2005-08-30T19:40:00.000-04:00

Alright, so you know the number of dead US troops in Iraq: 1,643. You know about the number of wounded US troops in Iraq: 13,877. I would like to direct your attention to another little statistic created from this war: 13,263 U.S. Army medical evacuations, 6% of which were for psychiatric reasons, and this is just the Army.

A study published by the New England Journal of Medicine in July of 2004 showed 15.6% of Marines and 17.1% of soldiers interviewed after their tour of duty in Iraq "met the screening criteria for major depression, generalized anxiety, or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)." This according to the the study published by the Center for American Progress: "Hidden Toll of the War in Iraq-Mental Health and the Military". Another report showed 17.4% of paratroopers showed symptoms of PTSD.

Earlier this month the Army's surgeon general stated that 30% of returning Iraq vets have developed stress-related mental health problems. This statement was the result of a survey done by the Army of 1,000 troops, a survey that found problems such as: anxiety, depression, nightmares, anger and inability to concentrate. Sounds just like the qualities I am looking for in say, a state police officer, the kind of job some of these troops will come home and work.

The standard procedure for troops departing to and returning from a war zone is the military health questionnaire that is issued to troops before departure and upon end of their tour of duty. However much like many other departments in this administration the DOD (Department of Defense) has managed to "drop the ball" on this procedure. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued a Congress requested report in September of 2003 dealing with the practice of issuing the questionnaires. The GAO went over the record of 1,071 Army and Air Force members and found that 38% to 98% of the troops were missing one or both of their health questionnaires. This means that the numbers quoted above regarding troops mental health are severely under-reported.

According to Operation Truth, between January and September of 2004, the number of Iraq vets seeking care VA increased by 280%. More alarming is the 390% increase in troops needing treatment for mental health issues.

If you support this war, will you support these people when they come home from this rampage and integrate back into your community? How will the Bush administration support these mentally ill men and women who will no doubt be the next generation of people standing on the corner with a sign. Stop and add up all the numbers: the dead, the wounded, the discharged and the mentally ill. Now ask yourself if this is enough? How many more families and lives need to be destroyed by this war before support ceases?

Hurricane Katrina and the War

2005-08-30T15:30:00.000-04:00

How do you think the people of Louisiana feel about the war in Iraq right now? Martial law has been declared in New Orleans, as hurricane Katrina slams the coast. What does this have to do with George Bush and his decision to go to war?

The National Guard was established to well, guard the nation. Right now there are 8,902 National Guard and reserves serving in Iraq from Mississippi and Louisiana. These are thousands of people who could be home defending and protecting their homes and cities.

This is not a new problem, just public now. Back on August 1, 2005 ABC26.com ran this article: " LA National Guard Wants Equipment to Come Back From Iraq." The article exposed the problem of equipment taken to Iraq, namely: high water vehicles, humvees, refuelers and generators.

Wake up America, we have not made ourselves more secure with this illegal war. What has happened is that we have drained resources from the homeland thus exposing ourselves to attacks or natural disaters.

To make all this worse the Bush administration is destroying FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) the Cabinet-level agency that deals with natural disaters. The Department of Homeland Security has downgraded FEMA. They are no longer responsible for disaster preparedness. The only thing the Bush administration is concerned with is a possible terrorist attack, never mind the hurricanes and other natural disasters that are much more common.

Once again the Bush administration is not making us any more safe, just more scared so they can strip us of our rights. Eric Holdeman, director of the King County, Wash., Office of Emergency Management puts it best in his article: Destroying FEMA,
"To be sure, America may well be hit by another major terrorist attack, and we must be prepared for such an event. But I can guarantee you that hurricanes like the one that ripped into Louisiana and Mississippi yesterday, along with tornadoes, earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, floods, windstorms, mudslides, power outages, fires and perhaps a pandemic flu will have to be dealt with on a weekly and daily basis throughout this country. They are coming for sure, sooner or later, even as we are, to an unconscionable degree, weakening our ability to respond to them."

Support the Troops...Or Else!

2005-08-25T20:15:00.000-04:00

When will we start to lose our liberties in the name of this so-called war on terror? Many liberties have already been swept under the rug in the name of security by the Bush administration, but when will it become illegal to express your opinion? Perhaps the "snowball" has already started down the mountain.

Earlier this week the 2.7 million member strong American Legion (you know the building in every town) declared a "war on protestors". At the national convention in Honolulu, the National Commander, Thomas Cadmus, declared his wish for an end to all public protests and media events against the war in Iraq. What this means, I am not sure so here are the words of the American Legion:

"The American Legion will stand against anyone and any group that would demoralize our troops, or worse, endanger their lives by encouraging terrorists to continue their cowardly attacks against freedom-loving peoples."

Mr. Cadmus then went on to say: "No one respects the right to protest more than one who has fought for it, but we hope that Americans will present their views in correspondence to their elected officials rather than by public media events guaranteed to be picked up and used as tools of encouragement by our enemies."

Where do the freedoms of the average American rank with Mr. Cadmus? He had this to say about our "freedoms": "It would be tragic if the freedoms our veterans fought so valiantly to protect would be used against their successors today as they battle terrorists bent on our destruction.”

Maybe you think I am over-reacting. Certainly people wouldn't go to jail for speaking out against the government or the war? Not in America! Time for a history lesson regarding this wonderful "democracy" we have here in America and all we have to do is go back to WWI.

The First World War was very unpopular and quite similar to this war in regards to the way it was "sold" to the people via propaganda and lies. For time purposes I won't get into the Woodrow Wilson/George Bush similarities but one may be surprised regarding the anti-war movement of the day.

In the name of "security" from the Germans and other sympathizers, the Espionage Act of 1917 was passed. This act made it a crime for a person to convey false reports or false statements with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the military or naval forces of the United States or to promote the success of its ememies, punishable by 20 years in prison and a fine of $10,000. Can you imagine how bad George and company would love to resurrect this one?

People were still marching and protesting the war at this point so the Sedition Act of 1918 was passed. This act was an admendment to the Espionage Act of 1917. The act forbade an American to use "disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language" about the United States government, flag, or armed forces. Also the act allowed the Postmaster General to deny mail delivery to dissenters.

This was America in the late nineteen-eighteens, on the verge of and then involved in a war that was vastly unpopular, a war that the President led America into on the back of lies and false "intelligence". It was a country where it was illegal to speak out against the government or the troops and hundreds of people went to federal prison.

Why is this important? We must learn from history or it repeats itself over and over. America of today is not that far removed from the America of 1918. Not only did these laws choke the life out of the anti-war movement, it may be the reason we have only a two party system of government today. Eugene V. Debs, the leading Socialist of the time, and a 4 time Presidential nominee in a time when Socialism was gaining imense popularity in America was jailed for 10 years under the Sedition Act of 1918 and the entire party was suffocated without the use of the United States Postal Service. Taking away freedom in the name of freedom, how absurd!

Death and Casualty Count for Operation Iraqi "Freedom"

2005-08-25T15:30:00.000-04:00

How many families has this illegal war touched? Here is a link to the number of dead and injured American troops, it breaks down the deaths and injuries into categories and is accurate as of August 6, 2005. Unfortunately this was the deadliest month so the numbers are even higher now. Support the war? Know the facts. The blood is on Bush's hands, how many more need to come home in caskets or in wheelchairs?

Valuable Information

2005-08-24T13:00:00.000-04:00

Thought I would share this e-mail from The Project on Defense Alternatives, have fun.

Dear Colleague: The Project on Defense Alternatives has just added one thousand full-text links to its public access Internet Library pages. These links lead to online documents, reports, and articles published in 2005 by more than 200 official and NGO sources. Our libraries include:

>> Terrorism, counter-terrorism, homeland security: http://www.comw.org/tct/
>> Defense Strategy Review: http://www.comw.org/qdr/
>> Chinese Military Power: http://www.comw.org/cmp/
>> Revolution in Military Affairs: http://www.comw.org/rma/
>> Occupation Distress: http://www.comw.org/od/
>> War Report (Iraq & Afghanistan): http://www.comw.org/warreport/

The sites also contain more than 4,000 document links from pervious updates. I hope you find them useful for research, reference, and teaching. If so, please share the URLs with others.

>> Also see: PDA publications index: http://www.comw.org/pda/pub-list.html
>> And: PDA Military, War, & Peace Bookmarks: http://www.comw.org/pda/milbkmrk.html

Support the War? Know the Facts

2005-08-23T14:00:00.000-04:00

Here is another E-mail from Dahr Jamail regarding the ongoing conflict in Iraq. This is the type of account we don't get from our "media". Once again here it is, if you support this war then you support this type of practice...sleep well.

*** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **** http://dahrjamailiraq.com ***

This is an appeal written by Iraqi Doctors concerning what is happening in western Iraq. It is both extremely informative as well as an important appeal. Operations in many of these areas are on going today,despite the fact that this press release is a week old: Doctors for Iraq warns of urgent humanitarian crisis as us/Iraq military attacks continue in the west of Iraq* As US/ Iraqi military attacks continue in Haditha, Rawa, Parwana and Heet in the West of Iraq, Doctors for Iraq is warning of an urgent health and humanitarian crisis unfolding on the ground.Haditha, Rawa and Parwana have been under attack for the past three weeks with US/ Iraqi military activities intensifying over the past fewdays. The main hospitals in the area are reporting shortages of medicine oxygen, sugerical kits, anti-biotics and other basic medicines. Civilians have fled to neighbouring towns and villages such as Ana andare in need of basic foods, water and shelter. Shop keepers are unable to open their premises because of the US/ Iraqi operation, and trucks with urgent food supplies are facing serious difficulties entering the seiged areas. Eyewitnesses and medical personal have told Doctors For Iraq that snipers are operating inside some of the seiged cities. Haditha hospital estimates that at least eleven civilians were killed during the attack and 15 injured. The US military prevented ambulances from entering the areas and medics from working freely. The area remains under siege. Local people say that US marines invaded the town of Rawa and carried out air strikes bombing many buildings and homes. It unclear how many civilians have been killed or injured in the areas where the military is carrying out operations a school building in Parwana was bombed with people inside the school. It is unclear how many people were inside the school and who they were. Doctors for Iraq has organised for medical aid to reach some of the hospitals and a medical team has been sent to the affected areas. The military operations in the West of Iraq have left the health care system paralysed. Hospitals in the area are unable to provide sufficient medical services for the population. The new military attacks are further compounding the suffering of people in the area. Doctors for Iraq is calling for the *_immediate_* *_end_* of US/ Iraqi military attacks in the area. Doctors for Iraqi is calling for an independent investigation into the serious breaches of the Geneva Convention, the alleged killing of civilians and obstructing medical personal from carrying out there work. We need urgent medical supplies to be delivered to the hospitals in the area.

Lousy Reporting or a Lousy Paper?

2005-08-19T18:50:00.000-04:00

Here in central Massachusetts, one of our local papers is the Telegram & Gazette, a paper owned by the New York Times (did you know that RedSox fans, our paper is Yankee run). I would like to take a second and point out some of the issues I have with this paper.

For an example of what I am talking about, I would refer you to yesterdays issue, Thursday, August 18, 2005. The subtle Jedi mind-tricks start on page A4 with an article about Jean Charles De Menezes, the Brazilian shot dead by British police. The first paragraph outlines the recent leaked report regarding the investigation of the shooting. It is with the second paragraph that I have issue. So here it is:

"Also yesterday, an Italian court approved the extradition to Britain of suspected London bomber Hamdi Issac but said he must remain in Italy for another 35 days so Italian authorities can finish their investigation. Issac's lawyer said she would appeal the ruling."

Here is the problem I have with this paragraph. It doesn't belong. The paragraph is there on purpose, and I believe the purpose is to lead the reader into a state of fear, to believe that Mr. De Menezes had something to do with the London bombings. Why put it there otherwise? The whole story, which is 8 paragraphs long, has to do with the investigation of his death, not the subway bombings. The bombings were used as an excuse to murder this man in public and now it is being used as an excuse once again. If I am writing about apple pie, why throw in a paragraph about jogging? Again, this is not an accident. It is a deliberate attempt to sway your thought process. Its persuasion disguised as reporting.

Yet another example of this ever-so-subtle suggestioning would be on page A12, in an article titled: Cheap gas in Iraq seen as threat to economy. Well, maybe this one isn't so subtle, as you can figure out for yourself from the story title. Other than the obvious hate-driven title of this article, I would like to direct you to the first paragraph:

"Motorists stuggling with high gas prices in the United States and Europe may be surprised to learn that consumers in Iraq pay as little as 6 cents a gallon, according to the International Monetary Fund's first assessment of the Iraqi economy in 25 years."

Why don't they mention that in Iraq, in order to fill up your canister with this super-cheap gas, you need to stand in line for 24-48 hours under constant threat of suicide bomber or military fire? Why doesn't the Telegram & Gazette mention anywhere in this article that the gas mentioned is the property of Iraq? Of course it's cheap there! It comes from there! What this article is trying to do is sway your thought once again. This time blaming Iraqis for our high gas prices and not the government. Hate the Iraqis; they have cheap gas. How dare they!

I will say this. I am not sure the T&G has any staff reporters. The articles I mentioned were written by members of the Associated Press, and maybe the blame lies there. Then again it is the T&G that chooses to publish these skewed articles under their name. Of course they also publish the weekly Thomas L. Friedman article, but this blog isn't large enough for me to start in on what is wrong with his writing.

English Terrorism: What Excuse Will They Use Now?

2005-08-19T16:45:00.000-04:00

Funny how the truth finds a way to wiggle itself free from the chains of lies. British ITV news has reported a leak in the investigation into the shooting of Charles De Menezes, who I wrote about previously in a post titled: Judge, Jury and Executioner. The facts are starting to ooze out based on eyewitness accounts and closed circuit TV footage.

The original account from police claimed they were immediately concerned with the "suspect" (you might want to substitute "innocent man" here) due to his clothing, which they claim was a bulky winter coat. Wrong! It comes as no surprise that, just as the family of Mr. De Menezes has claimed all along, he was in fact wearing a denim jacket. Doesn't that sound suspicious? Who knows what he had under that denim jacket! Maybe he had patches on it.

The second and most disturbing piece of information to leak out flies in the face of the official report, to which Blair and Lord Stevens all but congratulated the officers for their work under "stress". The original account from police claimed officers drew their weapons and ordered Mr. De Menezes to "stop", at which time the "suspect" ignored orders, ran into the subway station, hurdled a ticket barrier, and leaped onto the Northern Line train. Wrong! It turns out Mr. De Menezes was never approached or ordered to stop. The truth is that Mr. De Menezes casually walked to Stockwell Station, actually stopping to pick up a newspaper before he rode down the escalator, boarded the train and sat down. This is when British terrorists, call them police if you will, pumped 7 shots at close range into the skull and face of Mr. De Menezes. How terrifying: a Brazilian man dressed in a denim jacket buying a newspaper and boarding the train!

Remember, this is the policy of the British police. It is the policy implemented by then Commissioner of the Met, Lord Stevens. This same policy is backed by Tony Blair and George Bush; the "shoot-to-kill-to-protect" policy. Explain to me how shooting and killing an innocent man protects anyone? Who dies in the name of "security" tomorrow? You, me?

More Troop Support: College and Malaria

2005-08-18T20:30:00.000-04:00

How do you feel about the Iraq war? Do you think we should leave Iraq? Do you support the troops, really? Here are some of the wonderful ways the Bush administration is showing its support for the men and women it sends to Iraq to do their bidding.

The first little story takes place in Austin Texas. Surely they support the troops in Texas. Carl Basham, a decorated Marine recently back from two tours of duty in Iraq, decided to enroll in classes at Austin Community College. Being a Texas resident, Mr. Basham thought he would only have to pay roughly $500, compared to around $2,600 for out of state registrants.

Support the troops, because Mr. Basham did two tours of duty in Iraq and he now no longer meets state requirements for residence in Texas. This means he now has to pay $2,600 a semester for these classes. Now if that isn't support, what is? I wonder if this is what the armed services mean when they speak of all the college money you can earn ( Here is an e-mail the army sent me: Hi Jason, I just wanted to get in touch with you to discuss the great opportunities in the Army Reserve. Give me a call as soon as you get this email so we can discuss, the college money, bonuses, income and vocational training. SSG Delmolino 508-347-5089)

Another great way Bush has shown his support was the government's usage of Lariam on our troops. This controversial anti-malaria medication (Is there even malaria in Iraq? Not one troop has contracted malaria-even since they stopped using Lariam last year) has been used on thousands of troops. According to Pentagon records, the number of prescriptions issued for active-duty personnel are as follows: 18,704 in 2002; 36,451 in 2003 and 12,363 in 2004 taken in the form of white pills every week.

So, what is the problem with Lariam, which is the brand name for the anti-malaria drug Mefloquine? Well, the FDA has a pamphlet (18-pages) that is required to be given to all patients receiving Lariam. Some side-effects listed in the pamphlet and on the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) website are: headache, nausea, dizziness, difficulty sleeping (great for troops), depression (also a bonus for a person with a gun) and my personal favorite psychosis.

The FDA itself warns that because of these side-effects, Lariam is not recommended for people suffering from depression, anxiety or other psychological disorders. I have never been in a combat situation before, but it seems common sense to me that people in such an atmosphere might feel depression and/or anxiety. The troops are under fire and under threat of death every day. They are in Iraq; how can they not feel anxious or depressed?

These are just two examples of how the Bush administration is showing their support for the troops. How about you? How could a person possibly claim they support the troops when this so-called support results in this type of treatment by our own government on the people they claim to be our heroes? Is this how you would like the people coming back from this illegal war to be treated? What about when they come home and are living in your neighborhood with their service-issued firearm and the Lariam related hallucinations start, then will you support them?

Support the Troops

2005-08-17T17:15:00.000-04:00

If you really want to show some support, take that stupid meaningless ribbon magnet off your car and drive yourself to your nearest Cindy Sheehan candlelight vigil. As of this morning, there are over 1,400 planned vigils across the country. Check out MoveOn.org for your nearest vigil. If you claim to support the troops, then support the mother of someone who died in combat. She has paid the ultimate sacrifice.

The vigils start at 7:30 nationwide. Show this administration that we don't want anymore dead soldiers or grieving mothers. If you can't make it to one, then maybe you could just go out on your porch/deck/lawn, have a moment of silence, and light a candle. As a side note, you may also want to take a second during the vigil to think about the mothers in Iraq also grieving for their dead sons and daughters.

Abu Ghraib, Gen. Myers and those Wacky Troops

2005-08-16T20:50:00.000-04:00

The Pentagon opposes the release of 87 photos and 4 videotapes ordered for released under the Freedom of Information Act filed by the ACLU. The photos in question come from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. I believe we all remember the first set of photos to come out of there. So, why have they not been released yet?

General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has an answer for that. He believes if the tapes and photos are made public they could incite riots and violence. Wait, that isn't the only reason the world cannot see what we are doing to the people of Iraq. Gen. Myers also had this to say: "It is probable that Al Qaeda and other groups will seize upon these images and videos as grist for their propaganda mill, which will result in, besides violent attacks, increased terrorist recruitment, continued financial support and exacerbation of tensions between Iraqi and Afghani populaces and U.S. and coalition forces."

Stop, let's try to sort this out here. The administration is afraid that if Al Qaeda and other groups get a hold of the photos and videos that show the mighty democratic America torturing (reportedly raping) innocent people, then they might use it as propaganda? Whose propaganda mill do you think is larger? Ours or theirs? I think we may have just had a breakthrough. The images that are on the tapes and photos are the reason these groups hate us and our blatant hypocrisy. So our illegal invasion and occupation of a country did not help terrorist recruitment, but videos and photos of what our "boys" are doing in Iraq will? The truth will?

Who knows exactly what is on these tapes and photos, but judging by the lengths to which the Pentagon is going to keep them from the public would suggest they are much worse than the previously released photos. Gen. Myers had this to say of the tapes and photos: "I condemn in the strongest terms the misconduct and abuse depicted in these images. It was illegal, immoral and contrary to American values and character." I would disagree, I bet what is in the photos and tapes is exactly in line with current administration's values and character.

Certainly, the most pathetic and feeble excuse for not releasing these tapes and photos was when Gen. Myers stated that the release of these materials could instigate violence similar to what happened in May after Newsweek published a story of Koran abuse. The pathetic part of that excuse is that Gen. Myers is clearly grasping at straws. It was he who told reporters in May: "It is the judgment of our commander in Afghanistan, General Eichenberry, that in fact the violence that we saw in Jalalabad was not necessarily the result of the allegations about disrespect for the Koran, but more tied up in the political process and the reconciliation process that President Karzai and his cabinet are conducting in Afghanistan. He thought it was not at all tied to the article in the magazine." There is that propaganda mill churning again. Only in America could the government not release things the court ordered them to and use the excuse of "security" as reasoning.

Out of Touch Democrats

2005-08-16T19:21:00.000-04:00

What is wrong with the people in Washington? Recently democrats Joseph Biden and Hillary Clinton have called for increasing the troop size in Iraq. How at a time when even the administration is considering lowering troop levels can these democrats now decide that more troops are needed. Did they get the memo? We could send the entire population of the U.S. to Iraq and it won't solve the problem. They don't want us there! This is just another example of what is wrong with the democratic party.

Stay the Course

2005-08-12T18:50:00.000-04:00

This is to President Bush, his administration and anyone else who supports the war in Iraq:

If you claim to support the war then enlist. If you are too old, have your children enlist. If you have no children then send another family member. Wait until you/they are deployed to Iraq and then tell me how much you support the war. Come back here and tell me then how much you want to bring "freedom" to the people of Iraq. I beg you to throw off your facade of support, your ribbon magnets and actually put you or your family's ass on the line. When you have someone that matters to you in harms way, let me know how much you support the murder of these people.

Judge John Roberts and Executive Order 13233

2005-08-11T20:00:00.000-04:00

The White House is withholding an estimated 50,000 pages of documents relating to John Roberts work as Special Assistant to Attorney General William French Smith from 1981 to 1982, and as Associate White House Counsel during the Reagan administration from 1982 to 1986. Along with those documents, the White House is also reviewing specific memoranda relating to 16 cases Roberts worked on while principal deputy to Solicitor General Ken Starr, during the Bush I administration from 1989 to 1993.

The documents in question were requested by the Senate Judiciary Committee for the upcoming nomination hearings, set to start September 6, 2005. These documents are crucial to the process, especially in lieu of the fact that Judge Roberts has little experience in the District Courts and has few published opinions. Why are these documents being held up and reviewed by the White House? President Bush hides behind the facade that this is the law and the White House has the right to withhold and review documents from previous Presidents. The fact is: it is true! On November 5, 2001 President Bush signed Executive Order 13233 ,giving the White House the power to do just that.

In order to understand Executive Order 13233, we must first look at the law the order affects, the 1978 Presidential Records Act. Among other things, it established that:
* Presidential papers are the property of the public
* Presidential papers are public record 12 years after the President is out of office

Of course, there were exceptions to the rule and in those circumstances (national security) the incumbent President did have the right to withhold and review said documents. Executive Order 13233 changed all of that, giving the incumbent President the right to withhold and review all papers and documents from previous administrations, even if the former President (after review) decides the documents may be made public. What a great deal! There is a law allowing Bush to withhold sensitive political documents because he previously made and passed just such a law saying he can; doesn't that reek of democracy?

So here we have it: the Bush administration nominates a candidate for the Supreme Court, a lifetime position on the most important court in the land, and he then sifts through, withholds, and delays the information that is needed to make a proper vote on the nominee. What are they trying to hide, and how long have they been working at this? This is not an issue of pro or con Judge Roberts. This is simply an issue of giving the Judiciary Committee the proper tools needed to do their job. Don't worry though, the administration promises the documents will be delivered by August 22, 2005, just two week before hearings are set to begin. That should be plenty of time to properly review all 50,000 pages and formulate questions.

By the way, this is not the first time the administration has refused to turn over information for the benefit of the public. Early in 2001, Bush blocked the release of 68,000 pages of confidential communications between then President Reagan and his advisors, despite the wishes of the National Archives and the Reagan library to make them public. Why was this important? The requested papers had to do with people in high ranking positions with the current Bush administration. Ah, democracy at work.

Today, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) said: "While the privilege is not absolute, it is my conclusion that the absence of any issue of misconduct and the extensive disclosure of numerous other relevant documents prepared by Judge Roberts support the White House conclusion." So let's get this straight; if there is an issue of misconduct then the President should turn over the documents? Who is going to let us know if the documents that the White House holds have misconduct issues in them--Bush?

The administration has also used the excuse of lawyer-client confidentiality for withholding documents of past Presidents. Think about it: if a lawyer represents the President, in his role as President, and the President is a public servant in a public office, then who is the lawyer really working for?

Rising Oil Prices: A Solution in the SPR?

2005-08-10T20:50:00.000-04:00

Oil prices are increasing, winter is looming, and President Bush's energy bill does not address U.S. dependence on oil, or gas and oil prices. What can be done? My suggestion is for Bush to sell off some of our oil reserves.

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) was created in 1975 as a result of the 1973 energy crisis. The program was built on tax dollars and set up to prevent another economic crisis, and to have some leverage against OPEC. The SPR has a total capacity of 700 million barrels of oil. Since 2001 it has been receiving about 160,000 barrels a day, delivered to the U.S. on a "royalty-in-kind" program. This, in essence, is free oil. It comes from companies who acquire leases on the federally-owned Outer Continetal Shelf in the Gulf of Mexico. As of August 2005, the SPR was 99% full, and the Bush administrations stance on the reserve is that it is not to be touched.

On January 17, 1991, President Bush I announced that the U.S. Energy Department would sell as much as 2.5 million barrels of oil a day from the stockpile. As a result of this announcement (the U.S. did not sell that amount), oil prices around the world fell. Just the thought that the U.S. was going to flood the market with more oil was enough for the world market and OPEC to reduce oil prices.

Here we are again. Whether it's the war, civil rights, the economy, or the nation's energy, President Bush continues his one way street mentality of always taking and never giving. Why do we need 700 million barrels of oil on reserve? The whole program was set up on the American taxpayers money, and even worse the government has been receiving the oil free for the last 4 years. They owe us! Much like his father, all Bush has to do is just tell the world that the U.S. is considering releasing oil from the SPR and prices would fall back in line. Ah, but there is the ever present problem: Bush and the administration are friends of oil companies. Why would they want to help the average American when Bush and Cheney can fatten the pockets of thier oil buddies?

Military Lawyers Speak: GITMO Military Tribunal "Rigged"

2005-08-10T14:10:00.000-04:00

With the "trials" in GITMO set to start up again thanks in part to Judge Roberts, the recent memos obtained by various news sources from two former military prosecutors offer a great view into the process.

These memos were sent to the Office of Military Commissions in March of 2003, from prosecutors Major Robert Preston and Captain John Carr. Once again, if you claim to support the troops then listen to them speak of the actions of this administration.

Major Preston wrote in his memo: "I consider the insistence on pressing ahead with cases that would be marginal even if properly prepared to be a severe threat to the reputation of the military justice system and even a fraud on the American people." He went on to say: "Surely they don't expect that this fairly half-arsed effort is all that we have been able to put together after all this time." In the most telling part of the memo Major Preston expresses his dilemma with the process: "I lie awake worrying about this every night." "After all, writing a motion saying that the process will be full and fair when you don't really believe it is kind of hard, particularly when you want to call yourself an officer and a lawyer."

Captain John Carr had this to say of the GITMO proceedings: "When I volunteered to assist with this process and was assigned to this office, I expected there would at least be a minimal effort to establish a fair process and diligently prepare cases against significant accused. Instead, I find a half-hearted and disorganised effort by a skeleton group of relatively inexperienced attorneys to prosecute fairly low-level accused in a process that appears to be rigged." Later in the memo, Captain Carr had this to say: "You [chief prosecutor] have repeatedly said to the office that the military panel will be handpicked and will not acquit these detainees and that we only needed to worry about building a record for the review panel."

So there you go, straight from a Captain and a Major in the armed services who were assigned to prosecute the "detainees": the process is corrupt and rigged. The people in GITMO are low-level accused who have been illegally detained, tortured and now are being dragged through a kangaroo court. How can anyone support the detention of these people? Even the administration is starting to admit that most of the detainees are not the "most dangerous" people that they had previously claimed. This is obvious from the recent Bush plan to release nearly 70% of the 510 detainees from Guantanamo.

Absentee President

2005-08-08T20:10:00.000-04:00

I would like to direct you to a post by JJ, on Truth Be Told, dated August 7, titled Bush on Vacation. This information is too good not to pass on. How can Bush justify his frequent vacations while Americans and Iraqi's die everyday? No matter if you agree with Bush or not the amount of days he has spent on vacation should be a crime. How can he claim to be making America safer while relaxing on his ranch in Texas?

Just This Once...

2005-08-08T16:45:00.000-04:00

I am going to put up something personal and not related to politics, couldn't help myself. I can die in peace.

Ask A Veteran

2005-08-05T17:45:00.000-04:00

I don't usually like to post other people's work on this blog, but this interview by Dahr Jamail is too important to just link to. These are the words of U.S. soldiers who have been to Iraq. How can you possibly support the war after hearing their accounts?

** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **** http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/index.php ** August 05, 2005

"What Have We Done?"

As the blood of US soldiers continues to drain into the hot sands of Iraq over the last several days with at least 27 US soldiers killed and the approval rating for his handling of the debacle in Iraq dropping toan all-time low of 38%, Mr. Bush commented from the comforts of his ranch in Crawford, Texas today, “We will stay the course, we will complete the job in Iraq.”

Just a two hour drive away in Dallas, at the Veterans for Peace National Convention in Dallas, I’m sitting with a roomful of veterans from the current quagmire.

When asked what he would say to Mr. Bush if he had the chance to speak to him, Abdul Henderson, a corporal in the Marines who served in Iraq from March until May, 2003, took a deep breath and said, “It would be two hits-me hitting him and him hitting the floor. I see this guy in the most prestigious office in the world, and this guy says ‘bring it on.’ A guy who ain’t never been shot at, never seen anyone suffering, saying‘bring it on?’ He gets to act like a cowboy in a western movie…it’s sickening to me.”

The other vets with him nod in agreement as he speaks somberly…his anger seething.

One of them, Alex Ryabov, a corporal in an artillery unit which was inIraq the first three months of the invasion, asked for some time to formulate his response to the same question.

“I don’t think Bush will ever realize how many millions of lives he and his lackeys have ruined on their quest for money, greed and power,” hesays, “To take the patriotism of the American people for granted…the fact that people (his administration) are willing to lie and make excuses for you while you continue to kill and maim the youth of America and ruin countless families…and still manage to do so with a smile onyour face.”

Taking a deep breath to steady himself he continues as if addressing Bush first-hand; “You needs to resign, take the billions of dollars you’ve made off the blood and sweat of US service members….all the suffering you’ve caused us, and put those billions of dollars into the VA to take care of the men and women you sent to be slaughtered. Yet all those billions aren’t enough to even try to compensate all the people who have been affected by this.”

These new additions to Veterans for Peace are actively living the statement of purpose of the organization, having pledged to work with others towards increasing public awareness of the costs of war, to work to restrain their government from intervening, overtly and covertly, inthe internal affairs of other nations and to see justice for veterans and victims of war, among other goals.

I type furiously for three hours, trying to keep up with the stories each of the men shared….about the atrocities of what they saw, and committed, while in Iraq.

Camilo Mejia, an army staff sergeant who was sentenced to a year in military prison in May, 2004 for refusing to return to Iraq after being home on leave, talks openly about what he did there:

“What it all comes down to is redemption for what was done there. I was turning ambulances away from going to hospitals, I killed civilians, I tortured guys…and I’m ashamed of that. Once you are there, it has nothing to do with politics…it has to do with you as an individual being there and killing people for no reason. There is no purpose, and now I’m sick at myself for doing these things. I kept telling myself I was there for my buddies. It was a weak reasoning…because I still shut my mouth and did my job.”

Mejia then spoke candidly about why he refused to return:

“It wasn’t until I came home that I felt it-how wrong it all was and that I was a coward for pushing my principles aside. I’m trying to buy my way back into heaven…and it’s not so much what I did, but what I didn’t do to stop it when I was there. So now it’s a way of trying to undo the evil that we did over there. This is why I’m speaking out, and not going back. This is a painful process and we’re going through it."

Camilo Mejia was then quick to point towards the success of his organization and his colleagues. “When I went back to Iraq in October of2003, the Pentagon said there were 22 AWOL’s. Five months later it was500, and when I got out of jail that number was 5,000. These are the Pentagons’ numbers for the military. Two things are significant here-the number went from 500-5,000 in 11 months, and these are the numbers from the Pentagon.”

While the military is falling short of its recruitment goals across the board and the disaster in Iraq spiraling deeper into chaos with each passing day, these are little consolation for these men who have paid the price they’ve had to pay to be at this convention. They continue topay, but at the same time stand firm in their resolve to bring an end tothe occupation of Iraq and to help their fellow soldiers.

Ryabov then begins to tell of his unit firing the wrong artillery rounds which hit 5-10 km from their intended target.

“We have no idea where those rounds fell, or what they hit,” he saysquietly while two of the men hold their heads in their hands, “Now we’ve come to these realizations and we’re trying to educate people to save them from going through the same thing.”

After talking of the use of uranium munitions, of which Ryabov stated 300 tons of which were used in the ’91 Gulf War, and 2,200 tons and counting having been used thus far in the current war, he adds, “We were put in a foreign country and fire artillery and kill people…and it shouldn’t have even happened in the first place. It’s hard to put into words the full tragedy of it-the death and suffering on both sides. I feel a grave injustice has been done and I’m trying to correct it. You do all these things and come back and think, ‘what have we done?’ We just rolled right by an Iraqi man with a gunshot in his thigh and two guys near him waving white flags….he probably bled to death.”

Harvey Tharp sitting with us served in Kirkuk. His position of being incharge of some reconstruction projects in northern Iraq allowed him to form many close friendships with Iraqis…something that prompts him to ask me to tell more people of the generous culture of the Iraqi people. His friendships apparently brought the war much closer to home for him.

“What I concluded last summer when I was waiting to transfer to NSA was that not only were our reasons for being there lies, but we just weren’t there to help the Iraqis. So in November of ‘04 I told my commander I couldn’t take part in this. I would have been sent into Fallujah, and he was going to order me in to do my job. I also chose not to go back because the dropping of bombs in urban areas like Fallujah are aviolation of the laws of warfare because of the near certainty of collateral damage. For me, seeing the full humanity of Iraqis made me realize I couldn’t participate in these operations.”

Tharp goes on to say that he believes there are still Vietnam vets who think that that was a necessary war and adds, “I think it’s because that keeps the demons at bay for them to believe it is justified…this is their coping mechanism. We, as Americans, have to face the total obvious truth that this was all because of a lie. We are speaking out because we have to speak out. We want to help other vets tell other vets their story…to keep people from drinking themselves to death.”

When he is asked what he would say to Mr. Bush if he had a few moments with him, he too took some time to think about it, then says, “It is obvious that middle America is starting to turn against this war and to turn against you…for good reason. The only thing I could see that would arrest this inevitable fall that you deserve, is another 9/11 or another war with say, Iran. There are some very credible indications in the media that we are already in pre-war with Iran. What I’m trying to do is find a stand Americans can take against you, but I think people are willing to say ‘don’t you dare do this to us again.’ My message to the American people is this-do you want to go another round with these people? If not-now is the time to say so.”

The men are using this time to tell more of why they are resisting the illegal occupation, and it’s difficult to ask new questions as they areadding to what one another share.

“I didn’t want to kill another soul for no reason. That’s it,” adds Henderson, “We were firing into small towns….you see people just running, cars going, guys falling off bikes…it was just sad. You just sit there and look through your binos and see things blowing up, and you think, man they have no water, living in the third world, and we’re just bombing them to hell. Blowing up buildings, shrapnel tearing people to shreds.”

Tharp jumps in and adds, “Most of what we’re talking about is war crimes…war crimes because they are directed by our government for power projection. My easy answer for not going is PTSD…but the deeper moral reason is that I didn’t want to be involved in a crime against humanity.”

Ryabov then adds, “We were put in a foreign country to fire artillery and kill people…and it shouldn’t have even happened in the first place. It’s hard to put into words the full tragedy of it-the death and suffering on both sides. I feel a grave injustice has been done and I’m trying to correct it. You do all these things and come back and think,what have we done?”

Michael Hoffman served as a Marine Corps corporal who fought in Tikrit and Baghdad, and has since become a co-founder of Iraq Veterans Against the War.

“Nobody wants to kill another person and think it was because of a lie. Nobody wants to think their service was in vain,” says Hoffman.

His response to what he would say to Mr. Bush is simple, “I would look him straight in the eye and ask him ‘why?’ And I would hold him there and make him answer me. He never has to deal with us one on one. I dare him to talk to any of us like that, one on one, and give us an answer.”

Hoffman then adds, “What about the 3 year old Iraqi girl who is now an orphan with diseases and nightmares for the rest of her life for what we did? And the people who orchestrated this don’t have to pay anything. How many times are my children going to have to go through this? Our only choice is to fight this to try to stop it from happening again.”

Earlier this same day Mr. Bush said, “We cannot leave this task half finished, we must take it all the way to the end.”

However, Charlie Anderson, another Iraq veteran, had strong words forBush. After discussing how the background radiation in Baghdad is now five times the normal rate-the equivalent of having 3 chest x-rays anhour, he said, “These are not accidents-the DU [Depleted Uraniaum]-it’s important for people to understand this-the use of DU and its effects are by design. These are very carefully engineered and orchestrated incidents.”

While the entire group nods in agreement and two other soldiers stand up to shake his hand, Anderson says firmly, “You subverted us, you destroyed our lives, you owe us. I want your resignation in my hand in the next five minutes. Get packin’ Georgie."

More writing, photos and commentary at http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/weblog/

CIA Sponsored Terrorism: The Scorpions

2005-08-05T12:15:00.000-04:00

We are in a global war on terrorism according to Bush, but what do we do when it is the United States that is supporting/creating terrorist groups? A recent Washington Post article reveals the creation of an Iraqi terrorist group code-named the Scorpions.

The group, made up mostly of former exiles recruited by the Kurds, were authorized by a presidential finding signed by Bush in February or March 2002 according to the article. It is reported that the CIA spent millions of dollars training and equipping the Scorpions for prewar missions of "sowing confusion". It turns out the CIA did not use the Scorpions for pre-war and instead started using the armed group of thugs in the interrogation process. According to Curtis E. Ryan, an Army investigator: "At some point, and it's not really clear how this happened, they (Scorpions) started being used in interrogations...because they spoke the local dialect."

It is here that the story really starts to reveal itself. The Scorpions were used by the military to interrogate non-compliant detainees. Iraqi Maj. Gen. Abed Hamed Mowhoush was detained after showing up at a base named "Tiger" in Qaim on November 10, 2003. First reports from the military were that he had been detained in a raid, and so the lies begin. According to a Washington Post article regarding the murder charges of two Army soldiers with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment in Fort Carson, Colorado, Mr. Mowhoush died in military custody November 26, 2003. What happened to Mr. Mowhoush in the 16 days of his detention illustrates the hypocrisy of this administration regarding terrorism and freedom.

Mr. Mowhoush was found dead in a sleeping-bag, wrapped in electrical cord. The official death certificate listed the cause of death as "asphyxia due to smothering and chest compression." A December 2. 2003 autopsy revealed contusions and abrasions covering Mr. Mowhoush's body along with six fractured ribs. In an interesting twist, the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology's autopsy examination report regarding Mr. Mowhoush had this to say about his death: "This Iraqi [redacted] died while in U.S. custody. The details surrounding the circumstances at the time of death are classified." What was the government trying to hide?

The propaganda machine started to spin hours after Mr. Mowhoush's death. The U.S. military issued a news release claiming the detainee had died of natural causes after complaining of feeling sick. Clearly, the government and namely the CIA were trying to cover up the death of Mr. Mowhoush at this point, but why? On the day of November 21, 2003, Mr. Mowhoush was moved from Qaim to a detention facility in the Iraqi desert. It is here that he encountered the Scorpions, which led to the CIA cover-up of his death.

In the Washington Post article mentioned earlier, one Army soldier tells talks about the use of the Scorpions in interrogation processes:

"Detainees knew that if they went to those people, bad things would happen, it
was used as a motivator to get them to talk. They didn't want to go with the
masked men." Army Special Agent Curtis Ryan testified in court: "Soon after
Mowhoush's detention began, soldiers in charge of him reached a collective
decision that they would try using the [redacted] who would, you know, obviously
spoke the local, native Iraqi Arabic as a means of trying to shake Mowhoush up,
and that the other thing that they were going to try to do was put a bunch of
people in the room, a tactic that Mr. [redacted] called 'fear up' "

Mr. Mowhoush was interrogated by the Scorpions on November 24, 2003. He was then punched and beaten with a hose according to investigative records quoted in the Washington Post. It was also reported that Mr. Mowhoush had to be carried back to his cell by Army guards after his interrogation. On November 26, 2003 he was taken to an interrogation room and questioned for roughly 30 minutes. After a 15-minute break, Chief Warrant Officer Lewis E. Welshofer Jr. and Spec. Jerry L. Loper decided to put Mr. Mowhoush into a sleeping bag and tie him up in electrical cord in order to induce claustrophobia and "crack" the prisoner. Reports show that Mr. Mowhoush died at 9:06 a.m. that day.

What does the military have to say about the death? Col. David A. Teeples declared in court: "My thought was that the death of Mowhoush was brought about by [redacted] and then it was unfortunate and accidental, what had happened under an interrogation by our people." While the practice of "stuffing" a human being into a sleeping back to psychologically torture him completely unacceptable to most, it is apparently approved by the U.S. government. The real story here, however, is the CIA's creation and implementation of a terrorist group called the Scorpions.

Who knows how many people this group has tortured and/or murdered. The actions of the CIA since the death of Mr. Mowhoush indicates it is worse than can be imagined. This is the freedom we have brought to Iraq: CIA directed bands of armed thugs who beat and murder illegally detained persons of Iraq. Is this practice of creating a group that terrorizes the people of a country not terrorism? More is bound to come from this trial; the layers of lies and wrongdoings will come to the surface. Once again, the administration proves the old adage: do as I say, not as I do.

White House Reports: President Bush's Second Term Accomplishments and Agenda

2005-08-04T16:00:00.000-04:00

This post may be asking a bit much, but here's my request: go to the White House website and read the new fact sheet: President Bush's Second Term Accomplishments and Agenda. It may take a minute, but really read it and the propaganda within. Some people may just write this post off as Bush-bashing but it is not. This is a real critique of his supposed accomplishments and agenda. The "fact sheet" is broken down into categories so I will address each of these.

Economic Growth:
1. The American Economy Is Growing And Creating Jobs. I don't think I have to put up numbers or stats here. If you live in America, ask yourself how much better is the economy now? When was the last time you got a raise? How much have gas/oil bills increased?

2. The Deficit Is Decreasing. No thanks to Bush's tax cuts. Despite the bloated numbers the administration originally projected for the deficit and the subsequent actual deficit being a bit lower, it is not decreasing. The only thing that has decreased is the "projected" deficit.

The Central America And Dominican Republic Free Trade Agreement:
1. Bush signed CAFTA to "level the playing field for U.S. workers and create new markets for American goods. Bush claims that this will keep jobs in the United States. Is that what free trade has done for America? Or are we losing our jobs to out-sourcing?

2. CAFTA makes America safer and supports young democracies in the region. I honestly don't know how to respond to this ridiculous statement, exept to say, how? (The President does not explain...)

Energy Legislation:
1. President Bush will sign into law the first national energy plan in more than a decade. This is true; it is an energy plan. However, it does not address our growing dependence on foreign oil, nor does it address global warming. It does give more money to Halliburton and other energy companies in Texas, and it does ignore alternative energy sources such as solar and wind technologies.

Highway Bill:
1. President Bush will sign into law the highway bill. I don't usually quote or reference a Robert Novak article, but he hits the nail right on the head with his assesment: this bill is full of pork.

Patient Saftey Bill:
1. President Bush signed the patient safety and quality improvement act of 2005. What does this bill do? Well, in general, the legislation encourages health professionals to confidentially report errors. Patient safety organizations would be established to analyze them, look for weaknesses in the system and recommend ways to reduce mistakes and save lives -- without setting off an avalanche of malpractice lawsuits. That sounds great for doctors: make a mistake and avoid a malpractice suit. Sounds like more of Bush's support for the rich and powerful at the expense of the average American.

Class Action Reform:
1. The President signed class action reform to curb lawsuit abuse. This takes the class action lawsuit away from state courts where the people involved have issue, and turns them over to the Federal Courts where it is much harder to get a case processed. What this does is effectively stop groups of citizens from suing large corporations for damages.

Bankruptcy Reform:
1. President Bush signed Bankruptcy reform that makes the system fairer for creditors and debtors. This bill pretty much wipped out the ability for the average American to claim bankruptcy. I could go further into detail however, I direct you to my post on this subject from 4-1-05 in the archives.

A Disciplined Budget Resolution:
1. President Bush is calling on Congress to deliver a fair and disciplined budget. Obviously, it is convenient for Bush to ask Congress to do something when it benefits him (I guess there is no way to pass a budget while Congress is on recess).

War Supplemental :
1. President Bush delivered the funds our troops need to fight and win the war on terror. Did he really? Or, were the troops complaining of being ill-equipped? What about the unarmored Hummers and the soldiers without bullet proof vests? Not to mention equipment that was never meant to be used in desert warfare.

Education:
1. No child left behind is working. Is no child left behind working? It sure is for the armed service recruiters who now have access to schools and student information under this new program. Fact is that no child left behind may indeed work, but to date it has been grossly underfunded.

Judge Roberts:
1. President Bush calls on the Senate to confirm Judge John Roberts before October 3rd. If the Senate does not confirm Roberts, Bush will just wait untill they are on recess. Once again I would go more in depth into this subject had it not been discussed in a previous post (7-20-05 in the archives).

Social Security:
1. President Bush is working hard to strengthen social security for future generations. His "hard work" was a program that would take your money and invest it into the not-so-stable stock market. We all know about this mess.

Taxes:
1. President Bush has called on Congress to make his tax relief permanent, repeal the death tax, and reform tax code. There really is no way to spin Bush's tax cut to the rich as a tool for economic growth, though the administration has tried. This tax "relief" does not help the economy. It is a break for the richest in the country, the people who have lived the "American dream" and now don't want to give back.

Immigration Reform:
1. President Bush supports comprehensive immigration reform. Nobody wants illegal immigrants in the country taking jobs away from American workers, but isn't this supposed to be a melting pot? Everyone reading this (except Native Americans) should be thankful for our immigration policies, since at some point we were all immigrants.

Medicare/Medicaid:
1. President Bush's new medicare coverage will ensure everyone on medicare has better choices. This is a complex issue and I confess to not have the knowledge to dive into this subject so I will link to a statement by Rep. Pete Stark.

2. President Bush supports efforts to institute savings in medicaid.

Welfare Reform:
1. The President supports welfare reform. No he doesn't, and having never been on welfare he has no idea what it is about. His program will mandate recipients to put in 40 hour weeks either working or doing "work activities". This may sound nice, but take it from someone who came from a single mother household that was on welfare: if a person on welfare could work a 40 hour week that paid enough to support their family, they would. Along with this, the 2005 budget cuts low-income child-care funding by $300,000. The Healthy Marriage Plan is Bush's real welfare reform bill. This bill doles out $1.7 billion in federal and state funds to marry off the poor women of America and get them off welfare. The "Healthy Marriage Plan" is tucked into the FY2005 budget, giving out grants for such things as "healthy marriage promotion and research", while further limiting options for women and the gay community.

President Bush Is Committed To Winning The War On Terror:
1. America Is Fighting Terrorism Across The World. Are we really fighting terrorism across the world, or are we interfering with people and governments? Do our actions just help create terrorism by alienating and exploiting other countries? And for the record, terrorism is a form of warfare not an enemy.

2. The President Calls On Congress To Complete Reauthorization Of The Patriot Act. Honestly, this would take another post to explain all the ways that the Patriot Act is raping the American people of their liberties. What the Patriot Act definitely does is trample all over the Fourth Amendment, just to name one.

3. A Strategy For Sucess In Iraq. Whoa, did I miss something here? We have been in Iraq for over 3 years and I see no strategy for success. Once again, this would require multiple posts. Fortunately, I have already posted on this topic multiple times. There is no strategy and if there was one, it is not working.

Intelligent Design Is Not Intelligent

2005-08-04T12:40:00.000-04:00

On Monday, President Bush came out with an endorsement of intelligent design, saying that schools should teach both theories of evolution and intelligent design. The latter is the belief that life forms are so complex that their creation can't be explained by Darwinian evolutionary theory alone, but rather points to intentional creation, presumably divine. This is where Bush and the religious right are completely off-base. They want schools across the country to teach intelligent design in science classes. The problem is this: intelligent design is not a science. As the National Academy of Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science have stated:

"The claim that equity damands balanced treatment of evolutionary theory and special creation in science classrooms reflect a misunderstanding of what science is and how it is conducted. Creationism, intelligent design, and other claims of supernatural intervention in the origin of life or of species are not science because they are not testable by the methods of science."

Not only are intelligent design and creationism not science, but whose god do they want us to believe created all this? Teaching intelligent design in school clearly flies in the face of separation of church and state. If you want your child to learn about creationism and intelligent design send them to a private school, otherwise keep religion out of the school system.

Who Needs Democracy When You Have Bush?

2005-08-03T19:35:00.000-04:00

President Bush sure has been busy this week while Congress is on break.

First, on Monday, Bush made John Bolton the U.N. ambassador for the United States in a "recess appointment". This appointment was made despite the fact that Congress (you know, the body of government who is supposed to approve this type of nomination) did not vote on it. This means that Bolton will be the U.N. ambassador until a new Congress takes office in January of 2007. Why bother with a vote when you can sneak your man in the "backdoor"?

On Tuesday, in the newest and certainly not the last "recess appointment", Bush decided he did not need the Senate and appointed Peter Cyril Wyche Flory to the position of Assistant Secretary of Defense for international security policy. Much like Bolton, Flory had not been voted on in the Senate since his nomination in June of 2004.

Who needs democracy and Congress when you have a guy like President Bush? I don't know about you, but I trust him to make all the decisions and appoint all the people he wants without any argument or investigation. All Hail Bush!

Enough Is Enough

2005-08-03T17:00:00.000-04:00

Here we are, August 3, 2005, continuing our illegal occupation of Iraq. Despite what the Bush administration continues to say, things are not getting better. They are progressively getting worse. Iraqi security forces are under-equipped and ill-trained, if not outright corrupt. Electricity and water availability have dipped to levels never before seen in Iraq. Unemployment is at it's highest and people's properties are in ruins.

What Iraq didn't have before the United States illegaly attacked:
*Weapons of Mass Destruction
*Chemical Weapons
*Nuclear Weapons
*Technology to deploy chemical/nuclear/biological weapons
*Terrorism
*Car bombs
*Ties with Al-Queda
*Yellow cake
*Mobile chemical weapons labs
*Any connection to 9/11
*Chaos in the streets

What Iraq has now, after the invasion and occupation:
*Car bombs
*Limited electricity
*Limited gas
*Limited water
*Occupying forces
*Insecurity
*Plundered archeaological sites
*Bombed mosques
*Cities in ruins ( like Fallujah)
*Over 100,000 dead Iraqi's
*Estimated 1,000 to 2,000 tons of Depleted Uranium (something I will address soon)

More recently, 37 U.S. military personnel have been killed in the last 10 days alone, bringing the total U.S. military death toll to more than 1,800. An even more under-reported statistic is the 6,568 wounded U.S. soldiers, and these aren't paper cuts. These are the kind of things that are happening to "our" boys when they are not out kicking in doors and stealing money and jewelry from the Iraqis we are "liberating"(if you don't believe our troops would do this type of thing check out the documentary Soldier's Pay and hear it from them).

A recent GAO report on Iraqi spending shows a complete "cluster fuck", for lack of a better word. Contracts are given without any documentation or paperwork, money is un-accounted for and corruption is rampant. Halliburton and other "Americanalistic" companies are reaping huge rewards for stealing the resources of Iraq.

Is this all worth it? Did we do what we (Bush) said we were going to do in Iraq? The "insurgency" is not dying down, security forces are not being trained/equipped well, and all we have brought to the average Iraqi is death and destruction. Please, it is time we push this administration harder to leave Iraq! Let the people of Iraq rule and govern Iraq, let them have their oil and resources. Why must we push "our version" of democracy on the people of Iraq?

Enough is enough; it is time to end this war.

Shortfalls of the Energy Bill: Gas Mileage

2005-07-29T09:20:00.000-04:00

In a time when gas and oil prices are ever increasing, and with the administration set to drill in Alaska in order to "limit our dependence on foreign oil", why does the new energy bill not address gas mileage? I believe if the administration honestly cared about limiting our dependence then there would be a bigger push for more compact cars, hybrids and alternate fuel automobiles. Why in this day and age would the auto industry and the administration, for that matter, push people to buy SUVs?

For all cars manufactured in 2004, the average miles per gallon is 20.8. This number is down from the record high, 22.1 miles per gallon, for cars manufactured in 1988. Why then in the last 16 years have we been going backwards? This is not only bad for our pocketbooks, but we are growing more dependent on foreign oil in sharp contrast to what the administration wants.

It gets worse. The model T Ford, invented in 1908, managed to get 25 miles to the gallon. Compare that to the Ford Explorer which manages a pathetic 16 miles per gallon! I believe we are actually becoming more dependent on oil and gas, and maybe that's extacly what Bush and his Texas oil buddies want. It makes it easier to find an excuse for going to war. If this isn't the reason, then why? Why are we going backwards as the oil and gas becomes more sparse? Why in a world where we can put man into space, have we managed to produce cars that get 4.2 miles per gallon less than a car that was made in 1908?

To make this all worse, the miles per gallon number that is on the sticker of the car or quoted by the maker/dealer is not the actual number a driver will receive. It appears the government (EPA) uses emission testing procedures to determine the gas mileage of a car, and not real-life driving. Because of this, drivers only actually achieve about 75% of the miles per gallon that is listed on the sticker.

Good Guys

2005-07-28T13:30:00.000-04:00

After my last post, to be fair I should mention another politician working hard to get answers out of this administration:Rep. John Conyers Jr. You can sign up for his e-mails, but even better is his daily blog, covering all issues.

Clearly his is a "left leaning" blog, and both Conyers and Waxman are indeed Democrats. But, don't think they all have a free pass. I also get the not-so-frequent e-mails from my local politicians, Kerry and Kennedy. In sharp contrast to the Waxman and Conyers e-mails, they are usually loaded with rhetoric and not much in the way of independent thought.

Henry Waxman: Working for Us

2005-07-28T13:00:00.000-04:00

In a time when I find little faith in politicians, it is always a pleasure to get the newest Henry Waxman e-mail. This man must truly be the hardest worker in Washington; his reports are worth their weight in gold. I suggest signing up for e-mail alerts and also reading some of the reports on the Committe on Government Reform website. They are a great starting point for getting involved. His recent letter to Speaker of the House J. Dennis Hastert regarding the $1.5 billion giveaway to Halliburton and Tom Delay's district, secretly inserted into the Energy Bill, is a must read.

In the Name of Security

2005-07-27T02:45:00.000-04:00

Today is a sad day for the American people. Commuters using the public subway in New York City will be forced to undergo random bag checks. How can this be justified? Does the threat of a bomber diminish the rights and liberties of all?

New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly assured the public there will be no racial profiling. Apparently, the Transit police will be using a random number search technique, meaning they will search every 4 or 8 people, for example (apparently terrorists travel in certain numbered patterns). Anyone refusing an illegal search will not be questioned or detained, but will not be allowed to enter the station (to use the public subway they pay taxes for). Will this new procedure prevent an attack? Maybe it will and maybe it won't; that is not the issue at hand. This new policy is in direct violation of our Constitution of the United States Fourth Admendment which clearly states:

'The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and siezures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be siezed.'

Stop; re-read the Fourth Admendment. Where in there does it allow this type of random search of a person and their effects? This won't stop here. Rail commuters in New Jersey and bus and ferry passengers in New York City are also subjected to illegal searches. Police in Washington, D.C. are considering the same policy for subway passengers. When is enough enough in the name of "security"? Do we allow the government and police to strip all our rights away before we realize the direction we are heading?

"First they came for the Jews. I was silent. I was not a Jew. Then they came for the Communists. I was silent. I was not a Communist. Then they came for the trade unionists. I was silent. I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for me. There was no one left to speak for me. [Martin Niemoller]"

Judge, Jury and Executioner

2005-07-26T15:40:00.000-04:00

Why are the U.S. and U.K. fighting a war in Iraq? Some would say it is to spread freedom and democracy, while others may say it's to fight terrorism. If this is so, then what happened in England last week?

Undercover anti-terror police were conducting surveillence of a block of flats located in Scotia Road, Tulse Hill, South London when, at 9:30am, Jean Charles De Menezes, 27, of Brazil stepped out of one of the buildings. Police were immediately concerned with the "suspect" due to his clothing: a bulky winter coat. Mr. De Menezes then proceded to walk to the Tulse Hill station (300 yards away) where he boarded a bus to Stockwell (a 15-min ride). At 10:00am, Mr. De Menezes walked off the bus and crossed the street heading to the Tube entrance.

It is here that the undercover force drew weapons and ordered Mr. De Menezes to stop. To this, the "suspect" ignored the orders of the police and ran into the Tube station, leaping over a ticket barrier. Mr. De Menezes then jumped onto the Northern Line train falling onto the floor. This is when the police decided to empty 5 shots into his head, killing him.

First reports were that the suspect who was shot was an Asian man suspected to have a bomb strapped to his waist. Of course it came out later that Mr. De Menezes was innocent; he did not have a bomb and his only "crime" was not obeying undercover police. Although Blair and police officials publicly apologized, the polioce methods used were never critiqued. Blair had this to say about the actions of the police: "The only way to deal with this is to shoot to the head. There is no point in shooting at someone's chest because that is where the bomb is likely to be."

Former Commissioner of the Met, Lord Stevens, confirmed the "shoot-to-kill-to-protect" policy. In an article written by Lord Stevens posted in the News of the World titled: "Shooting to kill saves lives..one tragedy will not change that", the former commissioner states: "But we are living in unique times of unique evil, at war with an enemy of unspeakable brutality, and I have no doubt that now, more than ever, the priniciple is right despite the chance, tragically, of error. And it would be a huge mistake for anyone to even consider rescinding it."

The most troubling part of all this is (as usual) the lack of respect for human life the U.K. government and police have shown. England, a supposed model of freedom and democracy, has now enacted a shoot first approach to policing. So here we are, pitching our version of society and freedom/democracy on the people of the middle east, when clearly the United Kingdom and the United States have the "freedom wagon" in reverse. What kind of society can justify murdering innocent people in the name of safety?

Let us not forget that certain past groups were set up for the "security" of the people (Hitler's SS, Soviet KGB) too.

CIA In Italy

2005-07-26T01:45:00.000-04:00

In a follow up to a previous post, an Italian prosecutor last week asked a judge to issue six more arrest warrants to CIA agents involved in the abduction of Abu Omar (Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr). This would bring the total amount of arrest warrants issued by the Italian courts for CIA operatives to 19.

Not only was it wrong for the U.S. to abduct a person off the streets of another country, but the Italian police were investigating this man and had their case blown out of the water. Fortunately for us, this has turned the Italian police investigation onto the CIA and their actions in Milan. So what did it cost the American taxpayer for the CIA to kidnap a man and send him to Egypt to be tortured?

The hotel costs alone were $144,984! That includes rooms at Principe di Savoia, Westin Palace, Milan Hilton, and Star Hotel Rosa. These are all 5-star hotels, with the Principe di Savoia labeled as one of the finest hotels in the world. It is reported by Craig Whitlock, in an article on TomDispatch, that the agents charged as much as $500 a day. How did they transport Abu Omar to Egypt once they illegally abducted him? It appears that they used a Learjet to transport him to Germany and from there he was put onto a Gulfstream V bound for Egypt. Are these security agents being paid by the American taxpayer, or CEO's on an Italian vacation?

Is Iraq Better? Part 4

2005-07-22T17:10:00.000-04:00

Are the people of Iraq better off after the U.S. led invasion and occupation of Iraq? Maybe you should ask the women of Iraq that question. After a brief moment of hope, the future of the Iraqi women looks bleak. Reports are begining to surface of violent oppression of women and their rights across the country. Some of the tactics being used to intimidate women are rape, murder, and the throwing of acid onto their faces.

You may think that all muslim countries oppress their women, but the history of Iraq would beg to differ. In 1948, Iraq was one of the first countries in the middle east to have a woman judge. Nazila al-Dulaima became one of the first female goverment ministers on the whole Arabian penninsula. More recently during the Saddam Hussein rule, women played an increasing role in government and business. The Ba'ath Party took control in 1968 and proclaimed on of its goals was the equality of men and women.

In 1970 the Ba'athists passed a constitution which made men and women equal in the eyes of the law. During the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) women played an increasing role in the military, oil, science, and other male dominated industries. In 1989, 27 women were elected to Iraq's 250-seat national assembly, that's 10.8%. By comparision, in 1989, the British House of Commons had 41 women out of 650 or 6.3%.

Now many of the rights afforded to women during the Saddam years are being stripped away. Women of Iraq are being forced/intimidated into wearing veils, and not just arab or muslim women, but christian women too. Under the rule of Saddam, women were free to choose whether to wear western-style clothes or the traditional black abaya. Recently, the bodies of dead Iraqi women are showing up in rivers and other spots with the veil tied around their heads. A professor from Babylon University told Lesley Abdela (Iraq's war on women) the story of a young female student who refused to wear the veil despite continued death threats. The woman was raped and murdered, resulting in the professor telling his daughter who also attends the university to wear the veil or leave the school.

Another story of oppression comes from a report by Sahar al-Haideri and Wa'ad Ibraheem of the Institute for War & Peace. It reports the story of a christian lawyer named Ishaq living in Mosul. She received a call in the form of a threat to wear the veil or face death, on her way to work a group of men approached her and threw acid in her face.

It is clear that although life was not peaches & cream under the rule of Saddam, women clearly had western-style rights and privileges. Now what we are seeing is a roll-back of women's rights under the new United States imposed government.

Is Iraq Better? The Human Rights Watch Report: Part 1

2005-07-22T15:30:00.000-04:00

The Human Rights Watch released a report in January of 2005 titled: The New Iraq? Torture and ill-treatment of detainees in Iraqi custody. The research for the report was conducted in Iraq from July to October of 2004.

What is happening these days in Iraq is not the "better off without Saddam Iraq" that the Bush administration sold to the world in the lead-up to and invasion of Iraq. What is starting to surface from first hand accounts and reports like this one is a country of rampant illegal police arrests, extortion, illegal detention, torture and forced statements. The police and intelligence services routinely conduct arrests without warrants issued by the appropriate judicial authorities. The Iraq Code of Criminal Procedure (CCP) states clearly in section 5, paragraph 123 that defendants are to be brought before an investigative judge within twenty-four hours of arrest. What the report found was continued instances of people being detained and tortured for weeks, if not months, before being brought before an investigative judge. Pre-trial detention conditions were described as poor, with people being crammed into small overcrowded cells, unable to lay-down with little or no food. Many of the detainees in the report complained of being beaten. Another common complaint by detainees was the practice of the police forcing detainees to sign statements without being informed of their content or having the opportunity to read the statement. More common complaints made by detainees were the police officials threatening them with indefinite detention if they failed to pay money for their release. Detainees also reported not being allowed access to lawyers or family members.

This report, which I will attempt to cover in future posts, consisted of interviews with ninety current and former detainees in Iraq, seventy-two of which alleged they had been tortured. The report focused on three "categories" of detainees. The first category consisted of twenty-one people arrested for their alleged affiliation with an armed group. The second category consisted of fifty-four suspects whose cases were referred to the Central Criminal Court of Iraq in Baghdad. This court, set up by the CPA in July 2003, hears serious criminal offenses. The third category of the report consists of fifteen detainees held in seven different police stations for various alleged crimes. In addition to the detainees, Human Rights Watch also conducted interviews with investigative judges assigned to the Central Criminal Court, as well as U.S. troops and other Iraqi government officials and doctors at Baghdad's Medico-Legal Institute. The Institute examined thirty-seven cases referred to them by the courts, and found external injuries consistent with torture or abuse in twenty of them. As one detainee told Human Rights Watch:

"This is much worse than in Saddam's days. Then, it was only the security forces doing it, but now it is also the police."

Here Come The WMD's: Microwave Iraq

2005-07-22T14:40:00.000-04:00

What exactly is a weapon of mass destruction? I think most rational people would assume it to be a weapon that can inflict damage or death to a number of people over a large area. Apparently, the U.S. government and the Bush administration have a completely different view on WMDs. The U.S. government has, to date, used chemical weapons and cluster bombs and now they are preparing to use Active Denial System (ADS) weapons in Iraq.

The weapon that will be deployed in the near future is called the Sheriff. This is a vehicle-mounted microwave weapon to be used for crowd dispersal. There are also portable versions being worked on. This new age weapon would fire a 95-gigahertz microwave beam with a range of approximatley 640 meters that heats the skin causing pain within 2 to 3 seconds and then becoming intolerable after less than 5 seconds. The beam will heat the skin to about 50 degrees celsius, which may not pose a danger to the skin during short exposure but could pose significant risk to the cornea. A study published in the jounal Health Physics last year showed exposure from 2 watts per square centimeter for three seconds could damage the corneas of rhesus monkeys. The burning stops only when a person moves from the path of the beam or when the beam is turned off. For the skin to burn, all that is needed is exposure to the beam for 250 seconds.

Not only is this new weapon being deployed in Iraq within the next year, Raytheon (who received a 7.5 million cost-plus award-fee contract to develop ADS's) is working on models to be used at nuclear power plants, and a portable version to be used by police in the U.S.. The government claims that no permanent damage results from exposure to the microwave beam, however not enough human research has been done. The only organization conducting research into the effects of this weapon is the Air Force lab. Can we really trust the armed forces to give a fair and balanced study into the use of their new weapon? Louis Slesin, editor of Microwave News ,sums it up best:

"The only people who are doing health research on the effects of electromagnetic
radiation are the people who are developing this weapon-the Air Force Lab.
They're the only people who have any money in the United States to do research
on the health effects, and they're in firm control of the (safety)
standard-setting process... That's a clear conflict."

I am not a scientist and have very little knowledge of electromagnetic radiation, but I do know that if you put something into the microwave and press start...it cooks! I have to say President Bush was correct when he stated before the Iraq invasion that there were WMDs in Iraq. He just should have made the comment after we invaded and deployed these weapons.

Religous Republicans

2005-07-22T13:10:00.000-04:00

I just couldn't let this one slip by: yesterday Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) spoke on the nomination process of Judge John Roberts. Speaking of the senate confirmation process that Judge Roberts will go through, Mr. Hatch had this to say about democratic questions of the nominee:

"It's a little like biblical Pharisees, you know, who
basically are always trying to undermine Jesus Christ. You know, it goes on the
same way. If they can catch him in something, they can then criticize and the
outside groups will go berserk."

I could be reading too much into this, but is Sen. Hatch comparing himself and other republicans to Jesus Christ? Is he then attempting to degrade democrats as people who don't love Jesus Christ? It amounts to nothing more than another classic example of the religious middle-aged white men who pull the strings trying to drive another wedge into the class-divide.

Judge John Roberts in Florida

2005-07-22T12:55:00.000-04:00

In a follow up, it is also worth mentioning that during the 2000 Presidential recount in Florida, John Roberts was the advisor to Jeb Bush. With Roberts having worked for the Reagan and Bush I administrations and having been an advisor to the person in charge of electing the president who is now nominating him, one has to wonder just how partisan is John Roberts?

Judge John Roberts: A Review

2005-07-20T20:35:00.000-04:00

President Bush has nominated Judge John Roberts of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals for the vacant Supreme Court position. While his views and opinions may be questioned, he is certainly qualified for the position. He has argued 39 cases before the Supreme Court in the public and private sector, winning 25 of them. He is regarded by some as the finest oral advocate to come before the Supreme Court in the last 20 years. Judge Roberts is a member of the Republican National Lawyers' Association and the National Legal Center For The Public Interest (Serves on the Legal Advisory Council). He also has stated to the Senate Juciciary Committe that he regularly participates in press briefings sponsored by the Washington Legal Foundation.

Here's a brief look at his biography:
*Born in Buffalo, Ny 1955, graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School
*1979-1980-clerk for Judge Henry J. Friendly (2nd Circuit Court of Appeals)
*1980-1981-clerk for Associate Supreme Court Justice William H. Rehnquist
*1981-special assistant to Attorney General William French Smith
*1982-associate counsel to the President in the Office of White House Counsel
*1986-1989-Associate with law firm Hogan&Hartson
*1989-Principal Deputy Solicitor General
*1993-partner with law firm Hogan&Hartson
*July 19, 2005 to present-Judge D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals

While certainly qualified for the position, it is the rulings and opinions of Judge Roberts that raises some questions about his nomination.

Judge Roberts was co-author of the governments amicus brief in the case Rust v. Sullivan. In this case Roberts, on behalf of the government, argued for the gag rule which would prohibit family planning programs who receive federal aid from giving any abortion-related counseling or other services. This disallowed such clinics to counsel clients about abortion or even refer them to places where abortions are preformed. In his brief Roberts argued "we continue to believe that Roe was wrongly decided and should be overruled...The Court's conclusion in Roe that there is a fundamental right to an abortion...finds no support in the text, structure, or history of the Constitution." The case had nothing to do with Roe v. Wade and was a clear indication of his views of precedent. It is worth noting here that the Supreme Court upheld the gag rule but on the grounds that the rule itself was not unconstitutional, there was no reference to Roe v. Wade.

Roberts also co-authored the government's amicus brief in the case Bray v. Alexandria Women's Health Clinic. The brief argued that protesters from Operation Rescue who blocked women from entering the clinic were not engaged in a conspiracy to deprive women of equal protection.
The Supreme Court accepted the argument 5-1-3. Justice Souter, in his dissent, wrote:

"It is obvious that petitioners' conduct was motivated "at least in art" by the invidious belief that individual women are not capable of deciding whether to terminate a pregnancy, or that they should not be allowed to act on such a decision. Petitioners' blanket refusal to allow any women access to an abortion clinic overrides the individual class members' choice, no matter whether she is the victim of rape or incest, whether the abortion may be necessary to save her life, or even whether she is merely seeking advice or information about her options. Petitioners' conduct is designed to deny every women the opportunity to exercise a constitutional right that only women posesses. Petitioners'conspiracy, which combines massive defiance of the law withe vialent obsturction of the constitutional rights of their fellow citizens, represents a paradigm of the kind of conduct that the statute was intended to cover."

A year after this ruling by the Supreme Court, Congress enacted the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE) in an effort to protect women and health care workers.

As Solicitor General, Roberts was the lead counsel for the government in the Supreme Court case Lujan v. National Wildlife Federation. Citizens had brought the case before the court seeking to enforce environmental protections due to the opening of 4,500 acres of public land for mining. The plantiffs argued that they would be "injured" by decision to open the land to mining. Roberts argued that the plantiffs had no right to file claims due to the fact that they had not presented sufficient proof of the impact of the government's actions on them.

Roberts was on the losing end of a 1992 amicus brief which he co-authored on behalf of the government in the case Lee v. Weisman. The brief was in support of letting public high schools include religious activities in their graduation programs.

Also as Solicitor General, Roberts authored the government's Supreme Court brief in the case Burns v. United States. William Burns was convicted of government theft and attempted tax evasion, he agreed to a plea bargain with the government for a sentence of 30-37 months. At sentencing, however, the judge sua sponte issued a 60-month sentence. The Court ruled 5-4 in favor of Burns with Justice Marshall, Blackmun, Stevens, Scalia and Kennedy stating:

"In our view, it makes no sense to impute to Congress an intent that a defendant have the right to comment on the appropriateness of a sua sponte departure but not the right to be notified that the court is contemplating such a ruling... Such a reading...renders meaningless the parties' express right. The Government's construction of congressional "silence" would thus render what Congress has expressly said absurd."

Roberts also co-authored a brief agruing that the 1989 Flag Act did not violate the First Admendment. The government brief argued that the Court should treat flag burning like obscene words and defamatory statements and allow the government to ban it for the common good. The Supreme Court rejected the argument and ruled 5-4 that the Flag Act was unconstitutional.

In private practice Roberts represented Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, Inc., in their sucessful petition to the Supreme Court. The petition argued that a worker with carpal tunnel syndrome is not disabled such that he/she is entitled to accomodations at work under the Americans with Disabilites Act. Ella Williams, and automobile assembly line worker, was fired because she could no longer preform her duties due to the carpal tunnel syndrome she aquired while working at the plant.

Roberts also was the attorney for Fox Television in the case Fox Television Stations, Inc. v. Federal Communications Commission. In this case Fox won its challenge to the federal government's ownership and cross-ownership rules. This case is too much to get into but we all see the effects of Fox Television and Rupert Murdoch's ownership of television, print, and radio news which this case made possible.

Of all these rulings and briefs, I believe the most disturbing and revealing cases involving Judge Roberts are the cases he has been involved in during the 20 months he has served as a Judge on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Last October in the case Hedgepeth v. WMATA, Judge Roberts upheld the arrest, handcuffing and detention of a 12-year-old girl.

In the 2003 case Rancho Viejo v. Norton, Judge Roberts wanted the full D.C. Circuit to reconsider a panel's decision that upheld a Fish and Wildlife Service regulation protecting the Arroyo Southwestern Toad under the Endangered Species Act. Roberts stated there could be no interestate commerce rationale for protecting the toad. He was quoted saying: "[the toad] for reasons of its own lives its entire life in California."

Last June, Roberts was on the panel that supported the Bush Administration in a case brought to the court by veterans of the first Gulf War. The soldiers were captured and tortured by the Iraqi government and were trying to sue the Iraqi government for damages. They won a settlement of nearly $1 billion in the district court. After the fall of Saddam in 2003, the administration claimed the government of Iraq was no longer in existence and therefore should not have to pay damages. The case is in appeal before the Supreme Court.

Judge Roberts was one of the dissenters in a 5-3 denial of a petition for a rehearing en banc filed by the Bush administration in efforts to aviod releasing records relating to Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force. This was the fourth such denial by a judicial panel. The Supreme Court, at the urging of the administration, agreed to review the case, which it sent back down to the Court of Appeals in June of 2004.

In the most recent decision, Judge Roberts was on the 3-judge panel (1-Regan judge, 1-Bush I judge, 1-Bush II judge) which ruled last Friday that the 1949 Geneva Convention governing prisoners of war does not apply to al-Qaida and its members, thus giving no rights to the 520 detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

Is Iraq Better? Part 3

2005-07-19T18:25:00.000-04:00

There are many security/police forces at work in Iraq detaining suspected insurgents and sympathizers. Reports and first hand accounts are surfacing about the practices going on after people are being arrested. Peter Beaumont, a foreign affairs editor in Baghdad, recently wrote the article "Revealed: grim world of new Iraqi torture camps".

In this article he wrote of a man named Hassan an-Ni'ami a suspected insurgent who was detained by commandos from Rapid Intrusion. His "arrest" made the local television news. Twelve hours after the arrest, his body was in the morgue. This is where the trouble starts: this man was detained and then murdered under the watch of the so-called "police" without so much as a trial or formal charges. The tragedy of his story is best characterized by Mr. Beaumont's quote that "What happened to him in his 24 hours in captivity was written across his body in chapters of pain, recorded by the camera."

Mr. an-Ni'ami still had his handcuffs on one wrist, which was swollen. There were multiple burn marks around his nipple, and welts around his chest and back as if whipped with a cable or hose. His nose and arm were broken along with some vertebrae that were pushed in. In addition to this, there were small even sized holes through his left knee as if drilled through. What finally killed this man were the bullets fired into his chest and head from close range.

Another example of this type of "dirty harry" policing is the May 5, 2005 arrest of 14 Sunni farmers, picked up in a market in east Baghdad. Ali Karim, a local fruit vendor, described the people who detained the farmers: "A partrol of more than 10 police vehicles drove up and parked, they were running through the street with their guns, saying that the farmers had a car bomb with them. They pushed them against the walls and asked them for their ID's." This story was coroborated by another vendor, Ahmed Adil.

The bodies of all the farmers were found in a shallow grave the next day. Most of the bodies show extensive torture with some of the bodies blackened by strangulation, brusies to the forehead, fractured eyes, burns, and puncture wounds similar to those inflicted by a spiked knuckle type device.

Tahar Mohammed Suleiman al-Mashhadani was kidnapped from the Abu Ghraib area by the Rapid Intrusion commandos. His body was found 20 days later and was almost unrecognizable to his family for identification.

The director and chief forensic investigator of the Baghdad morgue, the person who has seen some of these bodies, says that although he does not have enough doctors to catalog all the deaths, he sees 700 to 800 suspicious deaths a month.

Some of the people "arrested" by the police forces may be insurgents or criminals and if so they should be charged with a crime and have a trial. Is this what it is all about: an Iraq where security forces kidnap people off the streets and play judge, jury and executioner? Sounds alot like the Iraq of Saddam to me!

Is Iraq Better? Part 2

2005-07-14T19:40:00.000-04:00

General Adnan Thabit is the leader of a counter-insurgency group, the Special Police Commandos, which is about 5,000 strong. A good backround of this group and their actions can be found in the article written by Peter Maass: The Salvadorization of Iraq? The commandos are broken into two brigades; one is lead by Rashid al-Halafi and the other by General Muhammed Muther . Both are former high ranking members of Saddam's army, as well as General Thabit.

Peter Maass traveled with one of the commando units and describes some of these patrols. On one such patrol the commados picked up a detainee who directed them to a house. The commanding officer, Major Falah, decided the informant was misleading them. The captains then began beating the detainee. Maass describes the attack as "a series of sustained blows, it was a dockyard mugging." Of course there are American forces teamed up with the commando units to provide support. On this particular mission the American squad was headed by Capt. Jeff Bennett. During the attack he turned his back to the beating. Asked about the incident, his response was: "If I think they're going to shoot somebody or cut his finger off or do any sort of permanent damage, I will immediately stop them, as Americans, we will not let that happen. In terms of kicking a guy, they do that all the time, punches and stuff like that."

Another of these missions/raids reported by Maass was on March 8. The commados were looking for the suspected leader of an insurgent cell, Najim al-Takhi. When they arrived at his farmhouse he was not present so the commados detained his son (a preferred tactic is to kidnap a family member of a suspected insurgent or sympathizer). They drove al-Takhi's son to another farmhouse down the road and searched for his father but found nothing. Frustrated now, the captain of the commado unit pushed the son up against a wall and raised his AK-47 at his face, removing the saftey. The captain repeatedly asked where the boy's father was, to which the son responded that he did not know his father's whereabouts. Finally after a few minutes of this intense treatment the American officer who was accompaning them, Maj. Robert Rooker, stepped in and pointed the captain's weapon toward the ground. He told him "You are a professional soldier, you know and I know that you need to put the weapon down." At this time the commandos moved roughly 100 yards away and started to interrogate the detainee again, without an AK-47. Maj. Rooker's statement in regards to this was: "They'll shake him up a little bit more, stay back and let them do their job."

Keep in mind now, this is a "suspected" insurgent they were looking for in the first place. They then proceeded to kidnap/abduct his son (who was accused of nothing) and beat, intimidate and threaten to kill him. Is this justice? Is this what Bush and crew had in mind for the people of Iraq? Is this what they want?

Is Iraq Better? Part 1

2005-07-14T17:20:00.000-04:00

Somewhere in the leadup to the war, or after the war started, one of the reasonings for the war was to better the life of the people living in Iraq under the rule of Saddam. Three years into this war/conflict/occupation is a good time to take an in-depth (at least as in-depth as I can get from this side of the globe) look at what we installed for a government in place of Saddam.

We all know about the terror and torture that was routine under the rule of Saddam, however recent reports, studies and first-hand accounts have shown the new government and the security forces of Iraq are operating with similar brutality. The main players in this new regime of intimidation and ruthless killings are the forces set in place to safeguard the people of Iraq, mainly: The Iraqi National Guard (ING), The Iraqi Special Forces (ISF) and the Ministry of Interior. The Human Rights Watch has released a 94-page report titled The New Iraq? Torture and Ill-treatment of Detainees in Iraqi Custody, documenting the many cases of abuse.

The Iraqi government has even acknowledged, on July 3, 2005, that security forces were torturing people very similiarly to practices going on under the rule of Saddam. The response from the spokesman for the Prime Minister of Iraq, Laith Kubba, was: "These things happen. We know that." Saad Sultan, head of a board overseeing the treatment of prisoners at the Human Rights Ministry estimates that up to 60% of the roughly 12,000 detainees in the prisons are subject torture.

A new television show airing on the American financed network Al Iraqiya showing daily in prime time is: "Terrorism in the Grip of Justice." This show, the brainchild of General Adnan Thabit (we will get back to him later) is a reality type program that airs live confessions of detainees. I use the word detainee here because although some of these people may indeed be "insurgents", they are arrested (for lack of a better word) and tortured/interrorgated into giving confessions-many times showing visible signs of abuse. A recent report by the Iraqi Lawyers Association has sharply criticized the new show. The report names 27 Iraqis that are alive, despite televised confessions by people claiming to have killed them.

Who makes it on the show? One such lucky contestant was Khalida Zakiya, a 46 year old housewife. She appeared on the program in February after being detained for 13 days, arrested in Mosul by the Wolf Brigade (more on them later also). What happened in the 13 days of detention without a charge before she gave a confession of supplying insurgents with money and explosives? Zakiya claims she was blindfolded, handcuffed and gagged while being beat by six men with electric cables. She claims one interrorgator threatened to sodomize her with a bottle. On the 13th day she says she was handed a scripted confession which she read on the television show. She was transferred to local authorities when the Wolf Brigade left Mosul. Local authorities deemed her innocent and released her 10 days later. She was even visited by the chief of police for Mosul who appoligized to her in her home on television.

Iraq Update

2005-07-13T14:45:00.000-04:00

In an update to a recent post I made about archeological sites in Iraq, I thought it would be worth noting (since you won't hear this kind of stuff in the news) that the World Monuments Fund has for the first time in its 40 year history named an entire country endangered. The list was released Wednesday June 22, 2005. That's right the whole country has been listed as well as specific sites such as: the ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh, the ziggurat in Ur, the temple precinct in Babylon, and the ninth-century spiral minaret in Samarra. Why did we go there again?

Sweet Irony

2005-07-12T18:45:00.000-04:00

The effects of the Supreme Court ruling in Kelo v. New London have already started, but perhaps a little closer to home than any of the justices who ruled in favor of New London could have imagined. In an ironic twist of fate, Logan Darrow Clements CEO of Freestar Media, LLC, faxed a request to start the application process to build a hotel in Weare, New Hampshire using eminent domain.
Why is this request of particular importance? The site requested for the hotel to be named "The Lost Liberty Hotel" is 34 Cilley Hill Road, home of Justice David Souter. Souter voted in favor of New London last month and because of this ruling, city governments may take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.
The beauty of the irony does not end there, the hotel will include a museum open to the public which will feature a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America. In addition the hotel will supply each room with a copy of Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged" instead of the bible. Let the land grab begin. Walmart, your up!

Karl Rove Makes McClellan Dance

2005-07-12T17:45:00.000-04:00

Although Scott McClellan did manage to slither and squirm his way around answering any questions at yesterday's press briefing, it may mark a much needed change of attitude in the media.
During the 56 question briefing, Scott McClellan was asked about Karl Rove and the administration's stand on his involvement in the Valerie Plame case 36 times. His responses were a repeated and re-jumbled version of his first answer: "The criminal investigation that you reference is something that continues at this point. And as I've previously stated, while that investigation is ongoing, the White House is not going to comment on it."
Over and over this snake charming routine played out with the press corps trying to get a comment on Rove and McClellan twisting and turning in avoidance of being cornered in. The press even managed to present McClellan with his own blatent hypocrisy when they quoted his statement on September 29, 2003 (while the investigation was already under way): "If anybody from the White House was involved, they would be fired."
Now having nailed down McClellan as already making comments on the case he claims he won't comment on, the press asked him when "he changed his mind and decided to no longer comment on this case." To this McClellan responded: "There came a point when the investigation got underway when those overseeing the investigation asked that it would be their--or said that it would be their preference that we not get into discussing it while it is ongoing." Backed into the corner now and having his pathetic excuse for not answering questions deteriorating by the minute, the press asked McClellan when exactly those overseeing the investigation requested that the White House not comment. The snake was running out of energy and excuses, McClellan's answer to the question was: "Back at that time period." Although they did not receive an answer to the question asked, the press did also manage to expose the fact that 9 months after McClellan's comment on the case in September of 2003, Mr. Bush also made a public comment on the case.
It is becoming harder and harder for the administration to keep their lies and propaganda together. The White House's failure to answer questions about an official from the administration and their involvement in a criminal investigation is a positive sign of weakness. I believe if this was anyone else Rove would be in the weeds waiting with the counter move, devising the gameplan. This time it is Rove in the center of the storm and the White House can't even speak.
Let us not forget what is at the center of the whole issue. The administration, through Karl Rove and Robert Novak, made a clear statement in the lead up to the war in Iraq. The leaking of Valerie Plame's name was retaliation toward her husband Joesph Wilson, who exposed the fake "yellow cake" Iraq/Niger claim (I believe that was reason #10A for the Iraq War) . Mr. Wilson proved the yellow cake claim was false, if not a blatent lie, and the administration leaked the name of his under-cover CIA wife. The message was simple: question the administration and your family is not safe.

Raping The Cradle of Civilization

2005-07-08T17:15:00.000-04:00

It is disturbing enough to see the atrocities that we are committing on the people of Iraq; but one other disgusting practice that has been going on since the start of the war is the looting, robbing and general destruction of one of the world's most prized archaeological sites. No matter what your religion is, Iraq is the cradle of civilization and has a history going back over 7,000 years. Whatever name you use, Babylon, Shinar or Mesopotamia, it is here that man first discovered philosophy, religion, math and of course the skill of writing. It is believed that there are over 10,000 significant archaeological sites in the country. A link here to a recent BBC article shows satellite photos of the damage caused to some of these sites by looting. The National Library and the Library of Korans were destroyed by fires in April of 2003. Among the treasures lost forever in these fires were the Ottoman Imperial documents and roughly a million books and ten million documents.
In the ancient 6,000 year old city of Ur, the marines spray-painted Semper Fi onto the walls of the ziggurat (a stepped temple-tower built in the period 2112-2095 B.C.). In the city of An Nasiriyah the U.S. government set up Tallil Air Base. In order to construct this air base the military removed 9,500 truckloads of dirt, thus completly destroying this site.
Elsewhere in Babylon, American forces decided to build a depot. Here, it has been observed by John Curtis (the British Museum's authority on Iraq), there are cracks and gaps where somebody tried to gouge out the decorated bricks forming the famous dragons of the Ishtar Gate. The 2,600 year old brick pavement has been crushed under the weight of tanks. The wall of the Temple of Nabu and the roof of the Temple of Ninmah have both collapsed as a result of helicopter movement, this after lasting since the sixth century B.C.. To this day machines and vehicles still sit parked on the remains of a Greek theater from the time of Alexander the Great.
Another horrible practice by the military was the filling of thousands of sandbags with sand from
archaeological sites. When the military realized this mistake they actually made it worse by starting the practice of importing sand to the area, thus contaminating everything. Why did the U.S. government decide to set camp in the city of Babylon and thus ruin the entire area? Why did the U.S. government send out 2,000 troops to secure the northern oilfields of Iraq but sent out zero troops to secure the history of mankind? Granted, the military is not to blame for all of the losses of archaeological significance. However, all these artifacts and sites were in perfect order before we invaded Iraq and caused widespread death and destruction.

Iraq Says: Get Out!

2005-07-08T16:00:00.000-04:00

Two weeks ago in Iraq, 103 members of the 275 member National Assembly of Iraq demanded “a clear plan for army building and a timetable for the withdrawal of occupation troops." This is the new government of Iraq that is making this request. I would like all the people who keep saying that we cannot leave Iraq now, to stop and listen to the words of the Iraq government and it's people. They do not want us there, a majority of the American people do not want us there, it's time to leave and let them rebuild the country that we have destroyed.

Global Warming?

2005-07-08T15:00:00.000-04:00

What is our congress doing about global warming? We know the administration's stand on the issue: it doesn't exist, and if it did then doing anything about it would hurt our economy. Joe Barton is Chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce he recently sent a letter out to three of the world's most prominent global warming scientists demanding to see all the financial support they have recieved. Barton is also demanding to see the funding for every study they have done and the archives for all the studies they have published.
Why would Mr. Barton send intimidating letters to these scientists instead of having them appear before the Congress for a Committee hearing? The answer is simple, in his 11 years on the Committee Joe Barton has not held one single hearing on global warming. Fortunately for us, Henry Waxman is asking the same questions. Mr. Waxman recently sent a letter to Joe Barton requesting him to withdraw his letters of demand and hold a hearing to discuss global warming on an intellectual level. Thanks to Stephen McArthur for bringing this to my attention.

Terror: Here, There, Everywhere

2005-07-08T14:05:00.000-04:00

One day after the bombings in London we have to ask ourselves some real questions. Are we winning the war on terror? What is the war on terror? Is Iraq the front in the war on terror, or are we just creating more terrorists? As recently as President Bush's last speech we heard the administrations claim that "we are fighting the terrorists there, so we don't have to face them here." Tell that to the families of the dead and injured from yesterday's bombings. If you are ignorant enough to believe in the propaganda that Bush spews, then how do you explain the attacks yesterday? Clearly this is just rhetoric. We are not fighting terrorists there; we are killing the innocent people of Iraq. Terrorism will not stop when we bomb a nation. Terrorism will only stop when we stand up and stop tolerating our government making decisions on behalf of us, the American people, that cause people to resort to terrorism. Heartless as this may sound, nobody is innocent in these attacks, not as long as we continue to allow our governments to brutalize the people of the world in our name.

Stop, Watch, and Think......

2005-07-08T11:30:00.000-04:00

They say a picture is worth a thousand words so I would like to ask you now to take a couple minutes and watch this video that was shown to me by Debbe Kennedy at Global Dialogue Center. Now just ask yourself if this is worth it? Is all the killing worth whatever it is that we are trying to accomplish? Do you really want to see more suffering from the families of these dead and injured? It's time to get together and do all that we can to stop this war.

Doing Business In Iraq: Part 2 Custer Battles

2005-07-07T20:15:00.000-04:00

How do you handle security at the world's most dangerous airport? If you're the U.S. government the answer is simple: hire a security firm with 2 years experience that has never guarded a site in the history of the company. This upstart company was founded by Scott Custer, a former Army Ranger, and Mike Battles, an ex-CIA agent. The company, Custer Battles, had less than $200,000 in revenue before the war and saw their revenue jump to over $32 million within six months of winning the Baghdad Airport contract. The airport contract alone was worth $16.8 million, and the new company beat out two more experienced firms. Shortly after securing the airport contract, Custer Battles won a second contract worth $9.8 million to build housing for workers. This contract grew to $21.4 million and problems started surfacing. Custer Battles was missing deadlines, and not paying subcontractors. Despite a Pentagon investigation into fraudulent invoicing (reports of $2.1 million in charges for $913,000 worth of work) the Coalition Authority approved an additional $5.6 million in contract changes. The Air Force in September of 2004 forbid any U.S. agency from issuing contracts to Custer Battles. There is also a False Claims Act lawsuit filed on behalf of the U.S. government against Custer Battles. In addidtion the Justice Department has an ongoing criminal investigation of the company in place. Pentagon auditors tried to look at the company's books in February of 2004 but were unsucessful due to the fact that the contract signed had no audit clause in it. What did this company do in the 15 months before they were banned from government contracts? It seems most of the company is made up of former military personel and some of them have gone public with accounts of the type of work being done by Custer Battles. Retired Capt. Bill Craun quit his work for Custer Battles after being disgusted by the practices of their employees and management. What does this Bronze Star recipient have to say about Custer Battles : "These aren't insurgents that we're brutalizing, it was local civilians on their way to work. It's wrong. What we saw, I know the American population wouldn't stand for." How does current employee Shawn Green handle traffic jams in Iraq: "Usually, you know, we give them a tap at about 20 miles an hour or so." (Keep in mind these are American contractors driving the streets of Iraq) I believe there is a name for the type of people who work for this company: mercenaries. Once again I have to ask the question: why would the U.S. government give such large and important contracts to such a new company? Why did they continue to receive contracts after reports of inflated invoices and brutality? Maybe a better question would be why does the U.S. government have its head in the sand when it comes to controlling and tracking government contracts in Iraq? Could anyone be this careless? Do you not know how much money you have in your wallet/account and how and where you spent that money? Why does the government not keep track of money in this way, or maybe just maybe they don't care. Stay with me here, maybe they even know about these practices of overcharging and they like it. War is good business and there are some companies out there making a killing off of the U.S. taxpayer and the blood of the Iraqi people.

Doing Business In Iraq: Part 1 Halliburton

2005-07-06T18:45:00.000-04:00

The army has just awarded another $4.97 billion to Halliburton for support in Iraq. Add this new number to the $6.3 billion that Halliburton received for logistics support during the first two years of the war. These orders of business originate from a 10-year contract known as LOGCAP( Logistics Civil Augmentation Program) that was won by KBR (a subsidiary of Halliburton) in 2001 worth $12 billion.
KBR originally won this contract in 1992 but was stripped of it when the GAO (General Accounting Office) discoverd they had overcharged the Army for work in Bosnia. DynCorp was awarded the contract in 1997, but KBR won it back in 2001.
Why does a company that has recently been accused of $1.4 billion in bogus charges to the government keep receiving huge contracts? Seems this is not a new issue: Halliburton received over $2.2 billion in contracts during the Clinton administration for work in Kosovo. During this time Halliburton was charged with the same type of practices it is now being charged with in Iraq: overcharging for gasoline, supplies and food.
Why would the government keep doing business with a company that has repeatedly abused and overcharged on contracts? Well, dive a little deeper and this turns out to be a deeply imbedded problem in our government for over 30 years. KBR, the subsidiary of Halliburton, started in Texas in the 1940's. They managed to get a state dam project through the help of a Texas congressman named Lyndon B. Johnson.
Guess which company had the most contracts in Vietnam? Guess which company was investigated for overcharging the government? Once again, I ask why would the U.S. government keep doing business with such a company? Just for fun let's take a quick look at some other government contracts that Hallibuton has (these were contracts for the year 2003):
1. Camp Bondsteel and Camp Monteith-Kosovo=$829.2 million
2. Taszar airbase & Camp McGovern-Bosnia/Herzegovinia=$695.2 million
3. Incirlik airbase-Turkey=$100 million
4. Bagram & Kandahar airbase-Afghanistan=$52.2 million
5. Camp Able Century-Macedonia=$30.5 million
6. Camp Lemonier-Djibouti=$28 million
7. Training mission in Georgia=$25.1 million
8. Camp Stronghold Freedom-Uzbekistan=$22.1 million
In February of 2002 KBR had to pay out $2 million to settle a suit with the Justice Department. This suit alleged that the company defrauded the government during the 1990's by inflating project costs. A classic example of the ballooning costs was the GAO study showing that the KBR operation in Bosnia was estimated at $191.3 million when presented to Congress in 1996. A year later the cost was $461.5 million.
Last week the Pentagon confirmed a report saying the Defense Contract Audit Agency is questioning more than $1 billion of Halliburton's bills for work in Iraq under the LOGCAP contract. Finally, a report from last July by the Governmant Accountabilty Office found that the government could save $31 million in Kuwait if it did not do business through KBR.

Would This Fly Here?

2005-07-01T14:40:00.000-04:00

An Italian court has charged 13 CIA agents with the kidnapping of a Muslim cleric in February 2003. Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr was drugged and taken away while walking to a mosque in Milan. The Italian government has made the charge because it claims the CIA did not inform them of the abduction. Whether this man is a terrorist or not remains to be seen. What is most disturbing is the way the United States government is acting across the world.
Ask yourself how the U.S. would respond to, say, the Russian KGB snatching a citizen off the streets of New York without informing the government of their intent. Well, this is how your government works now. When they think they have a suspect, they just scoop them up no matter where on the globe they are. We do this with total disregard for the laws and rules of the country we are acting in. I guess the criminal justice system and our courts and laws are no longer needed: the government says you're bad, then you disappear!