Jul 16, 2005

This is what freedom, liberty and democracy looks like

Now, not only one of our own soldiers, Leonard Clark, is in jail for dissent (they say it is because he is campaigning for the Senate, even though he has not even formally done so, and he is in Iraq fighting in a bogus war he does not believe in and probably writes his feelings to avoid PTSD)but now an Iraqi young man hasbeen arrested for his views/dissent.http://secretsinbaghdad.blogspot.com/

Riverbend of Baghdad Burning is right to keep her identity secret. Even the book she wrote did not reveal her identity. I have no doubt they are looking for her.

If you feel so inclined, write about it in your articles and get the word out to people so they can react and write or call. Whether you are liberal or conservative, the appropriate response should be anger. We arrest our own with trumped up charges because he dissents, and our example of bringing freedom to Iraqi makes it okay to arrest theirs for the same thing. Not that I believe they didn't have a little help from the Americans to do so, but even if they didn't, our example of bringing freedom and democracy to others is shameful.

Sharin Bowers
California

World Peace Herald

Well, well, well. Now we have a bunch of armed American "Minutemen" (so-called because of their reputed sexual prowess) hanging on the Canadian border!...apparently ready to shoot anything they don't like (whicjh includes just about everything Canadians treasure about Canada). Well, let me express to any of them tuning in here, that I will be sitting just the other side of the border with a GPS, and should one of you fascist cocksuckers wanders so much as a foot onto Canadian land.......
Got it?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Thousands to join vigil along both U.S. borders
By Jerry Seper
The Washington Times
Published July 15, 2005

WASHINGTON -- More than 15,000 volunteers will man observation posts and conduct foot and horseback patrols this fall along the Mexican border from Texas to California and in seven states along the Canadian border in a new Minuteman vigil to protest what organizers call the government's lax immigration enforcement policies. "

Rove E-Mailed Security Official About Talk

Rove E-Mailed Security Official About Talk

By JOHN SOLOMON
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- After mentioning a CIA operative to a reporter, Bush confidant Karl Rove alerted the president's No. 2 security adviser about the interview and said he tried to steer the journalist away from allegations the operative's husband was making about faulty Iraq intelligence.
Cont......

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Frank, Conyers Inquire Into Impeachment of 'Senior White House Officials'!

Letter Sent to 'Neutral Legal Authority' at Library of Congress for Clarification of Constitutional Impeachment Clause
Congressmen Express Belief that Clause 'Clearly Applies to High-Ranking Officials'

The BRAD BLOG has learned that Congressmen John Conyers (D-MI) and Barney Frank (D-MA) have inquired with officials at the Library of Congress' Congressional Research Service this afternoon into whether impeachment proceedings would be appropriate for Senior White House Officials.
Cont...... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

State Dept. Memo Gets Scrutiny in Leak Inquiry on C.I.A. Officer
By RICHARD STEVENSON

WASHINGTON, July 15 - Prosecutors in the C.I.A. leak case have shown intense interest in a 2003 State Department memorandum that explained how a former diplomat came to be dispatched on an intelligence-gathering mission and the role of his wife, a C.I.A. officer, in the trip, people who have been officially briefed on the case said.

cont........

Jul 15, 2005

MOF. The last heist of Bonnie and Clyde?

Doesn't the plea for cash (below) sound an awful lot like the last desperate attempt of a couple of con-artist who, realizing that the house of cards is about to collapse, make a last desperate plea for big bucks so they can flee the country and set up shop somewhere else?
You bet it does!
Dick Durbin asks for a financial audit and where do they go ? Iraq! Supposedly to "support" the troops but it sure looks like they're getting their tails out of the country before an indictment comes down......Weasels!

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

FIRST - We have been collecting thousands of dollars to put our anti-Dick Durbin "Tortured Words" television commercial back on the air. It looks like we will have enough money to be back up on the air starting Monday of next week (July 18, 2005). We are still $40,000 short to pay for our budgeted airtime. We NEED just 400 Americans to contribute $100 in the next 24-48 hours and we'll be back on the air starting Monday. Please - we NEED your contribution now: http://www.MoveAmericaForward.org/Contribution Even if you can only afford a contribution of $50 or $25 - it will be a big help. This is the ad you will be making an investment in: http://www.moveamericaforward.org/Video/MAFO-7449-HI.wmv Please, don't let us fall short - especially with Senator Durbin's threats of IRS Audits and his efforts to intimidate Illinois TV stations (to not play the ad). We would hate to end on a whimper, when we wish to end by making it clear that never again will conduct like Senator Durbin's be tolerated by the American public.

Jul 14, 2005

Climate Scientists See Intimidation in Letter from House Energy Chair

And while they're at it, what about assholes like this that seem to be taking their strategy right out of the Rove/DeLay playbook? Shouldn't they go too? Absolutely!
With any luck (or justice) the public will finally wake up from this 9/11-induced trance they're in and start demanding heads for that... Atrocity!.. that now resides in the White House. Hopefully, this will also include anybody or anything that even remotely resembles Rove. This guy certainly qualifies.....

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Climate Scientists See Intimidation in Letter from House Energy Chair

Texas Republican Rep. Joe Barton, powerful chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has created a stir among many of the nation's leading climate scientists over what they call an 'unprecedented' inquiry into their research.

In late June, Barton sent a letter to three scientists whose findings show that global temperatures have increased dramatically since 1900. [1] The letter calls on them to provide all the raw data that contributed to their research. Barton has also called on the National Science Foundation for a list of 'all grants and other funding' given for climate research.

Critics within the scientific community assert that Barton's request is a blatant political maneuver to discourage scientists from pursuing studies that might verify the link between global warming and human activity."
cont......

Tempest In a Teapot?

Hehehe...... Wonderful ! And yes, I believe this parsing and "It'll be over soon because nothing important really happened" is all alot of wishful thinking. There are most ceratinly a number of issues as yet to be resolved and any one of them could be explosive.

Among them is a distinct feeling I get that the CIA(at least some of the rank and file) have it in for this White House. Among several things that make it appear this way are that someone was able to tell Wilson that it was Rove who outed his wife. I base this on the fact that Wilson was able to say this shortly thereafter, knowing what the outcome would be, not only if he did it, but what a terrible fix he would be in if he was wrong.

This strongly suggests that he was basing the accusation on something more than a good guess about Roves track history of using this sort of "slash and burn" reprisal.

And there are other unusual things here, most notably the complete lack of any inquiry by the media, by the Dems.... by anybody. This again indicates that something extroaordinary is going on behind the scenes that we, the peasantry, just do not know enough about to be making these "fait accompli" statements with any authority. And why did Rove give Cooper permission to out him? That strongly suggests that there is far more to this picture than meets the eye. Miller? Who's she protecting now? Rove? Why? And why wouldn't he give Miller authority *if* that is indeed why Cooper now 'fess's up to who his source is?

No, the CIA has plenty to be pissed about with this administration, the least among them being the attempt to turn the analysts into Bolton-oid "Yes sir, No sir" jellyfish. You think their happy about be rolled into a ball with some other wingnuts down at Homeland Security? Tenet served his duty and was rewarded in fashion, but you note that he left his post as well. Perhaps both at his request? And lest anyone think that no-one would fight back against the Presidency out of matters like turf or pride, how quickly you forget about Mark Felt.

No, there may well be lots of extremely brilliant fireworks yet to come. To put it another way, "You ain't seen nothin' yet...."

Jul 13, 2005

True number of conflict deaths worldwide is vastly underreported, report says

And yert another reason why RightMarch and the other far-right wingnuts will be blaming the UN for all America's woes. They're coming after our guns !!

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
True number of conflict deaths worldwide is vastly underreported, report says

By Nick Wadhams
ASSOCIATED PRESS

6:50 p.m. July 11, 2005

UNITED NATIONS – Global estimates have routinely underestimated the true number of people killed in armed conflict, including during the war in Iraq, according to a report released Monday.

The annual Small Arms Survey coincided with the start of a week-long conference at the United Nations to discuss efforts to stop the illegal spread of small arms and light weapons"
Cont......

EXPOSÉ: THE “CHRISTIAN” MAFIA

Well, well, well, lets see if this bit of silliness can at least get some traction. Fool fools with more foolishness I always say......

Mycos

EXPOSÉ: THE “CHRISTIAN” MAFIA

Where Those Who Now Run the U.S. Government Came From and Where They Are Taking Us

By Wayne Madsen

Part I

After several months of in-depth research and, at first, seemingly unrelated conversations with former high-level intelligence officials, lawyers, politicians, religious figures, other investigative journalists, and researchers, I can now report on a criminal conspiracy so vast and monstrous it defies imagination. Using “Christian” groups as tax-exempt and cleverly camouflaged covers, wealthy right-wing businessmen and “clergy” have now assumed firm control over the biggest prize of all – the government of the United States of America. First, some housekeeping is in order. My use of the term “Christian” is merely to clearly identify the criminal conspirators who have chosen to misuse their self-avowed devotion to Jesus Christ to advance a very un-Christian agenda. The term “Christian Mafia” is what several Washington politicians have termed the major conspirators and it is not intended to debase Christians or infer that they are criminals . I will also use the term Nazi – not for shock value – but to properly tag the political affiliations of the early founders of the so-called “Christian” power cult called the Fellowship. The most important element of this story is that a destructive religious movement has now achieved almost total control over the machinery of government of the United States – its executive, its legislature, several state governments, and soon, the federal judiciary, including the U.S. Supreme Court."

cont....

Jul 12, 2005

Big Balls, Big Mouth

Mehlmans mouth. If it's moving, it's lying. And what a show he's making now, as I sit and watch him try to deflect any talk of Karl Rove's judgement in the Plame affair back onto Joe Wilson, Hillary Clinton.... anybody who crosses his furiously thinking little mind. Hehehe...it's bloody hilarious! He's now trying to pretend that this is all just a smear campaign against Rove! The Balls!! Man this guy has biguns'. I'm reminded of ...who was it...Goebbels..or Hitler himself who said that the bigger the lie, the more likely it is to be believed? That's certainly a lesson that the Rove School of Partisan Politics bestows on it's graduates. Wow!

Counterpoint: Forget Confidentiality, Out Rove

Counterpoint: Forget Confidentiality, Out Rove

By Bill Israel

07/06/05 'Editor & Publisher' - - In 99.9 percent of cases I know, journalists must not break the bonds of appropriate confidentiality, to protect their ability to report, and to defend the First Amendment. I've testified in court to that end, and would do so again. But the Valerie Plame-CIA case that threatens jail time for reporters from Time and The New York Times this week is the exception that shatters the rule. In this case, journalists as a community have been played for patsies by the president's chief strategist, Karl Rove, and are enabling him to abuse the First Amendment, by their invoking it."
cont......

Wingnut Watch...RightMarch ( again...)

Trying to equate poor Christians who haven' two nickels to rub together; people who are simply looking to shine the shoes of some fat-cat US employers, with the billionaire Osama bin Laden and his followers is getting pretty desperate. Either that or they believe they are talking to mindless fools who'll believe anything. OTOH, I'm sure that's how they got this way themselves....being mindless fools who'll believe anything. Mycos ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As Michelle Malkin has written, "Remember: More than half of the 48 Islamic radicals convicted or tied to recent terrorist plots in the United States over the past decade either were themselves illegal aliens or relied on illegals to get fake IDs. Illegals participated in the first attack on the World Trade Center, the Los Angeles Millennium bombing plot and the New York subway bombing conspiracy. Three of the 9/11 hijackers were here illegally; two had previous immigration violations." Over FOUR THOUSAND illegal immigrants pour across America's borders EVERY SINGLE DAY. It is conservatively estimated that there are 10-12 MILLION illegal immigrants living in this country RIGHT NOW. And there's no way to tell who among them is a relatively "peaceful" lawbreaker... or a murderous Islamic terrorist, ready to inflict the next 9/11 or 7/7.

Jul 11, 2005

Statement of Joseph Wilson on the sentencing of New York Times Reporter Judith Miller:

The sentencing of Judith Miller to jail for refusing to disclose her sources is the direct result of the culture of unaccountability that infects the Bush White House from top to bottom. President Bush's refusal to enforce his own call for full cooperation with the Special Counsel has brought us to this point. Clearly, the conspiracy to cover up the web of lies that underpinned the invasion of Iraq is more important to the White House than coming clean on a serious breach of national security. Thus has Ms Miller joined my wife, Valerie, and her twenty years of service to this nation as collateral damage in the smear campaign launched when I had the temerity to challenge the President on his assertion that Iraq had attempted to purchase uranium yellowcake from Africa.

The real victims of this cover-up, which may have turned criminal, are the Congress, the Constitution and, most tragically, the Americans and Iraqis who have paid the ultimate price for Bush's folly."

Joseph Wilson
July 6/2005

Bush's Culture of Unaccountability

And here's something more that needs to be said, but in the mainstream press for chrissakes!

Mycos
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Bush's Culture of Unaccountability
A BuzzFlash Interview Posted July 11, 2005.

Ambassador Joseph Wilson discusses Judith Miller, the 'outing' of his wife as a CIA operative, and his opinion that the Bush Administration committed treason."
cont......

Bush said he 'preciates folks dyin' for the cause.

On Memorial Day, George W. Bush, the world's most bloodthirsty and deceitful man strutted to the podium at our National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, to once again regurgitate his woefully shallow and inappropriate stump speech -- 'Across the globe (sly smile), our military is standing directly between our people and the worst dangers in the world (pause, smirk)...the war on terror has brought great costs (no-nonsense head bob)...two terror regimes are gone forever (narrowed eyes darting nervously back and forth across the crowd), freedom is on the march (leaning forward earnestly), and America is more secure.'

cont....... "

Just Rove? Or A "White House" Conspiracy?

Finally, here's an analysis of the situation that displays an ability to look at the big picture, instaed of getting lost in the small world of one-liners, sound-bites and easy to understand matters of criminal behaviour that the media persistently push, here's somebody with an opinion worth watching. Read on. Follow the link in the story as well. Well worth the read as it contains a picture taken from an objective distance that will give a person an overall "of course!" paradigm in which to fit those pesky, previously unexplainable little factoids.

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Rove's Leak Points to Bush Conspiracy
By Robert Parry
July 11, 2005

A key national security principle for dealing with top-secret information, such as the identity of undercover CIA officers, is strict compartmentalization, often called “the need to know” – which raises the question why George W. Bush’s chief political adviser Karl Rove would know anything about the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame."
cont.........

Jul 10, 2005

The ghost at Gleneagles

As usual, the real news was'nt covered by the corporate media. After all, they played an essential part in convincing the rest of us that Bush/Blair knob-bobbing twins were doing things for altruistuic reasons, whereas this forum shows how very little, if any was done without an eye to personal wealth or power.

Mycos~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Paymasters Of Carnage The ghost at Gleneagles By John Pilger 07/09/05 'New Statesman' - - In the orgy of summit coverage something has been overlooked: the two men at the heart of it, telling us how the world should be run, are the men responsible for Fallujah and Abu Ghraib. Over the past two weeks, the contrast between two related 'global' events has been salutary. The first was the World Tribunal on Iraq, held in Istanbul; the second the G8 meeting in Scotland and the Make Poverty History campaign. Reading the papers and watching television in Britain, you would know nothing about the Istanbul meetings, which produced the most searing evidence to date of the greatest political scandal of modern times: the attack on a defenceless Iraq by America and Britain. The tribunal is a serious international public inquiry into the invasion and occupation, the kind governments dare not hold. 'We are here,' said the author Arundhati Roy in Istanbul, 'to examine a vast spectrum of evidence [about the war] that has been deliberately marginalised and suppressed - its legality, the role of international institutions and major corporations in the occupation; the role of the media, the impact of weapons such as depleted-uranium munitions, napalm and cluster bombs, the use and legitimation of torture . . . This tribunal is an attempt to correct the record: to document the history of the war not from the point of view of the victors but of the temporarily vanquished.' 'Temporarily vanquished' implies that, even faced with such rampant power, the Iraqi people will recover. You certainly need this sense of hope when reading the eyewitness testimonies, which demonstrate, as Roy pointed out, 'that even those of us who have tried to follow the war closely are not aware of a fraction of the horrors that have been unleashed in Iraq'.
cont........ "

Bush Pre-senile Dementia Video

And lets be honest. This video montage goes easy on him!

"Bush Pre-senile Dementia Video

The big story - 'a striking decline in his sentence-by-sentence speaking skills.' The reason? One doctor says 'pre-senile dementia' a catch-all term for earlier-than-normal cognitive declines (probably 'dry-drunk syndrome'). This video intercuts footage from 10 years ago with recent footage - the difference is dramatic and disturbing. And obvious."

Video here

Double the Reported Casualties?

Not sure of the veracity of the report, but in keeping with my preceding piece, it wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Official US. government reports on soldiers under US command killed in Iraq are so fragmented that they account for less than half of the total number, according to information uncovered as part of an inquiry by the Government of Puerto Rico regarding the total number of Puerto Rican war casualties. This analysis was confirmed by El Diario/La Prensa's review of multiple documents, including official reports issued by the US Department of Defense, the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior and more than 230 battlefront reports, which reveal that more than 4,076 troops under US command have been killed in 799 days of battle.

This information contrasts markedly with the limited information on casualties generally issued by US military authorities, which focus only on US uniformed troops. These total 1,649. Military affairs expert JosŽ Rodr’guez Beruff from the University of Puerto Rico said that the figures showing more than 4,000 dead indicate that, far from winning the war in Iraq, 'what is happening is that the troops are being worn down.' He said that traditional theorists calculate that for an armed invading force to win a guerrilla war, its casualties should be one to ten of its enemy's. In this case, that would require 40,000 casualties among the insurgents.

In addition, Rodr’guez Reduff warned that the reports should be reviewed on an ongoing basis, as he suspects that the number of casualties is even higher. "
cont......

Rove's lawyer acknowledges he was Time reporter's source

So "The Littlest Weasel" did it. There's now no doubt. At least this should make for a most interesting news run for the next little while, or at least for those of us who are fascinated at they way the White House and the media seem to be locked in thier incestous dance. Surely, like a brother/sister embrace, they both know it's wrong, yet the convenience of the affair, the guilty pleasure of fooling so many people so much of the time, and of course the money and power that's at stake all make for a remarkably interesting spectacle. Unfortunately, it is a dance not unlike St. Vitus' or the Tarentella. But this dance that predicts the death of the American Constitution.

The Rove White House is a remarkably irresponsible one, perhaps hinted at by the pure audaciousness of the dirty tricks that were implemented in order to bring this lot of rabble into power. Surely some of those tricks required a xcertain amount of "devil may care" brashness bordering on irresponsibility. The fallout if caught would have been horrific to any careers found to be in the general proximity of the guy. Also on that, I have heard too many pundits describe Rove as a genius for this little coup. Perhaps. Or perhaps it is just thart no-one could have foreseen, and thereby guarded against, the level of pure sleaze, the outright degeneracy of someone like a Karl Rove. When someone has no reason to suspect that another person has anything to gain by lying to them, it is no great achievement to fool or be fooled. There's no genius in that. And this man lies! He lies constantly!. These men have no moral compass whatsoever. I look at the history of the Bush family, the trading with Nazi Germany, the father who is a professional paranoic, and as such he finds a job at the top of the CIA. There the man uses his paranoia and information to get behind the curtain of the Reagan administration, and he comes out of Iran/Contra relatively unscathed. Now, you take this this line of genes and theb disdain for the poor into a package and call it George Bush Jr...... and you get a psychopath. His tenure as Texas Governor should have made that plain to most anybody with eyes as yet unblinded by the folks whose job it is to constantly wave them in the face of the independant thinkers and to constantly question their patriotism.

Now put that together with a moral degenerate like Karl Rove and you get exactly what you got. The death of the Constitution, of US sons and daughters, the outraqous pilfering of the public dollar by a an unrepentant and totally irredeemable Dick Cheney (C,mon! The man will do anything for a dollar. He is the corporate pyche come to life in the body of a man. He is the closest you will see to some kind of living undead creature).

No. Not until Bush and crew are removed.... not only from the White House, but from access to any of the levers of power whatsoever, America and the world at large will not be safe. It really would not surprise me to find out that Rove is, right now, trying to implement that will get him out of the public eye. Something really explosive! Something like nuclear war. Anything to save his ass. After all, that is the miond of the psychopath. Self-gratification purely. Nothing else is of consequence

Mycos
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
WASHINGTON (AFP) - Top White House aide Karl Rove discussed a former US ambassador and his CIA agent wife with a Time magazine reporter, according to a report. The Newsweek weekly quoted Rove lawyer Robert Luskin as confirming that Rove was the source who gave information to Time reporter Matt Cooper under a pledge of confidentiality, and last week released him to testify about that conversation to a grand jury."

cont......

London Bombs Seen as Crude:

.....yet at the same time seen as the work of international terrorist mastermind, OBL.

So they think that these folks who have been waiting, in readiness and anticipation for years now, have suddenly come out with a crude bomb. They've had years now to prepare this attack, mind you. Does that fit the "crude" bomber theory ? What it does fit is a bunch of people who have seen what is going on in Iraq recently and decided that they think it's an atrocity worth fighting against.
But Nahhhh! That would be too obvious. But more importantly, it doesn't fit in with the "justification for war" propoganda..errr.. excuses..errr.......uh...

London Bombs Seen as Crude; Death Toll Rises to 49 - New York Times: "LONDON, July 8 - Investigators have concluded that the bombs that ripped through three subway trains and a bus on Thursday were relatively crude devices containing less than 10 pounds of explosives each. That finding supports a theory gaining momentum among the authorities that the plot was carried out by a sleeper cell of homegrown extremists rather than highly trained terrorists exported to Britain."

Shit!!. How are the neocons going to counter that one?
They will! Don't leave the edge of your seats children. They'll have another episode shortly.....

Mycos