Wednesday, August 29, 2007

The Price For Exposing Corruption in Iraq




There are brave soldiers and Americans who step forward on occasion to report abuse, corruption, fraud and an assortment of other activities that would land most Americans in jail for their crimes.

There brave individuals are seldom rewarded for their honesty and loyalty to the country they serve. Instead many find themselves in more trouble than any criminal would ever go through.

Navy veteran Donald Vance says he was imprisoned by the American military in a security compound outside Baghdad and subjected to harsh interrogation methods. He was told very little about why he was there.

There were times, huddled on the floor in solitary confinement with that head-banging music blaring dawn to dusk and interrogators yelling the same questions over and over, that Vance began to wish he had just kept his mouth shut.

Vance thought he was doing his Patriotic duty when he started telling the FBI about the guns and the land mines and the rocket-launchers all of them being sold for cash, no receipts necessary, he said. He told a federal agent the buyers were Iraqi insurgents, American soldiers, State Department workers, and Iraqi embassy and ministry employees.

So Vance says he blew the whistle, supplying photos and documents and other intelligence to an FBI agent in his hometown of Chicago because he didn’t know whom to trust in Iraq.

For his efforts, he says, he got 97 days in Camp Cropper, an American military prison outside Baghdad that once held Saddam Hussein, and he was classified a security detainee.

Corruption has often occurred in Iraq reconstruction. Hundreds of projects will never be finished, including repairs to the country’s oil pipelines and electricity system. Congress gave more than $30 billion to rebuild Iraq, and at least $8.8 billion of it has disappeared, according to a government reconstruction audit.

The Project on Government Oversight says they will never find out what corruption is going on if people fail to come forward and reveal such abuses. The problem is the U.S government is sending a message to anyone involved, if you tell you will pay dearly.

The highest-ranking civilian contracting officer in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Bunny Greenhouse testified before a congressional committee in 2005 that she found widespread fraud in multi billion-dollar rebuilding contracts awarded to former Halliburton subsidiary KBR.

Greenhouse was quickly demoted after she told of her findings of corruption. She now sits isolated in a small area for a workstation waiting for the other shoe to drop, all because she revealed what any good American should if they found such illegalities.

Julie McBride worked as a “morale, welfare and recreation coordinator” at Camp Fallujah, she saw KBR inflate costs by double and triple counting the number of soldiers who used recreational facilities.She also said the company took supplies destined for a Super Bowl party for U.S. troops and instead used them to stage a celebration for themselves.

McBride voiced her concerns about what she believed to be accounting fraud, Halliburton placed her under guard and kept her in seclusion,” she told the committee. Her property was searched, and she was told that she was not allowed to speak to any member of the U.S. military. She remained under guard until she was flown out of the country. Halliburton and KBR denied her testimony in court.

The Bush administration was quick to give many no bid contracts to Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater and many other corporations loyal to the Bush/Cheney conglomerate of business elite.

The U.S government either fails or refuses to monitor where taxpayer dollars go involving the Iraqi reconstruction. Bush regularly seeks and receives billions of dollars from Congress to supposedly rebuild the country he has completely destroyed.

These are a few of the countless stories coming to light of what innocent people go through if they expose corruption inside George W Bush's war in Iraq. Each story is similar in nature and telling about why the U.S is really in Iraq.

As thousands of American and Iraqi lives are taken as a results of Bush's onslaught of destruction, the rebuilding is continually being delayed, more U.S funds are filtered into the hands of corporate allies of Bush.

How long will the war in Iraq last? It will last as long as Congress sits idly by and allows American citizens to be thrown in prison, demoted from their jobs and financially destroyed for doing what Congress should do.

If honest Americans are punished and abused for revealing massive corruption within the Bush administration and their corporate allies, what does that say about our government?


Image by Stephen Pitt Cartoons

324 comments:

  1. And there are more coming forward these days- at least more speaking out against the war (LIE) in general.

    These people are the true patriots. I think the ones that imprison them or bring charges on them are the ones that should be imprisoned.

    We are living in Bizzaro world. Up is down. Right is wrong. Freedom is slavery. And on and on...

    Good entry Larry. We need to keep putting the TRUTH out there as long as we can. How the crew that's running things is still in power is beyond me.

    This whole thing really is a nightmare. Assuming there is a future this whole era will be painted black. Or should I say red?

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  2. Thanks Chuck and when citizens are afraid to be true to their country, isn't that a modern day version of Hitler's rule!

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  3. WASHINGTON - President Bush plans to ask Congress next month for up to $50 billion in additional funding for the war in Iraq, a White House official said yesterday, a move that appears to reflect increasing administration confidence that it can fend off congressional calls for a rapid drawdown of U.S. forces.

    The request -- which would come on top of about $460 billion in the fiscal 2008 defense budget and $147 billion in a pending supplemental bill to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq -- is expected to be announced after congressional hearings scheduled for mid-September featuring the two top U.S. officials in Iraq. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker will assess the state of the war and the effect of the new strategy the U.S. military has pursued this year.

    Is this more money Halliburton can syphon before Bush leaves office?

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  4. "Several federal agencies are investigating a widening network of criminal cases involving the purchase and delivery of billions of dollars of weapons, supplies and other matériel to Iraqi and American forces, according to American officials," reports the New York Times.

    It looks like Blackwater may be needing weapons for their upcoming rogue movements. More corruption in Bush's war.

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  5. Baghdad - At least 31 Iraqis were killed and 179 wounded Tuesday when fresh clashes erupted in Karbala city between police and Shiite Mahdi Army militants.

    Casualty figures were expected to rise since ambulances were still collecting more dead and injured from the streets, local health department spokesman Selim Kazem told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

    More people die while Bush's corporate cronies reap more profits.

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  6. BAGHDAD, Aug. 29 -- Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki declared an indefinite curfew in the holy city of Karbala today following vicious riots that left at least 49 people dead.

    Were they rioting because the rebuilding Bush promised, has rebuilt the bank accounts of Halliburton?

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  7. Thank you Larry for posting this, and for all the good that you do.

    I received this article over a month ago, but it never made the mainstream media, of course.

    Today is my younger brother Paul's birthday. He died in 1995, and I am sending him prayers today.

    I had a dream a couple of months ago -- that my brother was totally healthy and healed and put back together. I remember saying to him -- "You're alive! Your heart is healed!" And he grinned at me and said, "Yeah, I'm fine now."
    He was glowing and seemed really alive.

    I've heard that when people have passed on and they visit you in your dreams, it's more than a dream.

    God Bless you Paul!

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  8. I read this over my morning coffee on Saturday and literally did a Danny Thomas spit take. "Land of the Free, home of the brave" my a$$. If we're not free to report corruption and if the bureaucrats aren't brave enough to take on the corporations and big money, where does that leave us?

    January 2009 seems such a long way off.

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    Thanks!

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  10. People like this and the MSM are what GWB's Executive Order enabling him to seize American citizens assets are aimed at, he wants to intimidate and cow peoplke into fealty and blind loyalty even if it is loyalty born out of fear and intimidation.

    These madmen need to be exposed and removed from the levers of power and the fabric of our society before they take things beyond the point of return and do irreparable damage to our country and to democracy itself.

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  11. Lydia -- I too am sending birthday prayers to your brother. Losing a beloved sibling is a forever heartbreak. How wonderful that he visits you in your dreams!
    God bless you,
    Victoria

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  12. Thank you Victoria! god Bless you.

    I am on the air live, right now.

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  13. Great post, Larry, as usual.

    I tend to believe the reason Congress refuses to do anything about this, is because they don't want the same thing happening to them! Professional politicians love their posh jobs, and will NOT take the chance of trading their opulent palaces for a cramped cell at Gitmo. The illegal wiretapping by the Bush Administration has been going on since the day he took office. And I should emphasize the word,'took'. Congress is allowed to make a little noise every now and then, but they better not take any action. Anyone who believes Congress, both the House and Senate, cannot be intimidated, does not remember the 48 year reign of J Edgar Hoover. The only one who had the balls to finally take him out of office, was the Grim Reaper.

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  14. Lydia--
    You are SO blessed to have Larry around. But then, you already knew that, right?;)

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  15. I defy anyone to read to the end of this excellent post without fury skittering through their minds.

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  16. Great minds, Larry. This is a lot like one I posted, based on the article. It says our government is Bushwhacked!

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  17. We know from the yellow-backed, brainless Chimpleton trolls that Chimpy and his minions despise due process, free speech, and equal opportunity. Chimpy (and by extension each and every one of his supporters, absolutely NO exceptions) are scum who have done more damage to this country than Hitler, Tojo, and Osama combined.

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  18. The mess in Katrina is two years old and instead of helping the thousands of homeless and hurting people, he extends the war for corporate profit.

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  19. Hi Victoria,

    Glad to see you here and I know Lydia is happy as well.

    You will hear from us soon.

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  20. Thanks Brother Tim, Tomcat, Mirth and Robert for the kind words, and also Jolly Roger who tells the truth about Bush in a unique way.

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  21. The Senate Republican leadership said in a statement Wednesday embattled Idaho Sen. Larry Craig has agreed to temporarily step down from his committee assignments:

    "Senator Larry Craig has agreed to comply with Leadership's request that he temporarily step down as the top Republican on the Veteran Affairs Committee, Appropriations Subcommittee on the Interior, and Energy and Natural Resources Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests.

    Would they call for his resignation if election season weren't around the corner?

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  22. Pay comparisons almost always leave someone feeling dwarfed, and none more so than the CEO-to-worker pay gap. But even CEOs have reason to feel seriously dwarfed these days, thanks to the outsized paychecks of private equity and hedge fund managers.

    The average CEO of a large U.S. company made roughly $10.8 million last year, or 364 times that of U.S. full-time and part-time workers, who made an average of $29,544, according to a joint analysis.

    This is the Bush Corporate Economy!

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  23. There's alot of money floating around. Anyone who tries to uncover the massive fraud going on is threatening that cash flow and BushCo for that matter.

    The GWOT is being run Mafia style.

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  24. I do have a question,

    Why are the reichwing GOP members in the US Senate willing to investigate "Senator Widestand" for his mensroom etiquette in Minnesota airports, but NOT willing to investigate "Senator Diapers" for the entertainment he illegally hires?

    Could it be because with a republican governour the senate seat in Idaho would remain in reichwing hands, but with a Democratic governour the seat from Louisiana could certainly switch

    So according to the reichwing it it us OK for a reichwing senator to break the LAW if their seat is in jeporday of falling into Democratic hands, but NOT OK if the seat could be retained by the party of pedophile protection, criminally oranized corruption and preverts abound.

    The hypocrissy is astounding, and NOT just by the perverts but by those whom cover for them at times.

    But we already knew that.....

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  25. Today are Military I'm very sorry to say is no longer one of Integrity or Honor.

    War Crimes were committed by members of our Military and they have not been given sentences commensurate with the same sentences we handed out to the German Soldiers guilty of similar crimes.

    Those in the upper ranks have not been charged or held accountable at all and those who were charged have been given basically a slap on the wrist.

    Just like that General who had a charge dropped for not controlling his troops at Abu Ghraib, but was sentenced for talking to the media {I believe} when he shouldn't have.

    And lets not forgot those in the Pentagon and DOD Civilian Leadership? Non of them have been held accountable for anything at all.

    Murder, rape, torture are all part of the Military code now. So what would you expect from those at the highest levels of our Government.

    Whistle blowers are destroyed just like Valerie Plame was. They think nothing about committing Treason and outing a NOC agent so what makes anyone believe that they give a damn about fraud and theft of millions of Taxpayers Dollars.

    We are in trouble and still the people sleep. Soon Der Fuhrer {Adolph} Bush will take us into World War III by attacking Iran or having Israel do it by proxy.

    We need to prepare for the worst as it now looks like we may see mushroom clouds over many of our cities.

    Welcome to America the Fourth Reich.

    God Bless.

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  26. The White House believes the spineless Democratic Congress won’t balk at the request for additional war funds after hearing the expected cheery assessments from Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker.

    After all, the assessments have already been written by the Bush administration and don't have a shred of fact or reality in them.

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  27. Breaking News! Breaking News!

    Rep. John Conyers declared House Speaker Nancy Pelosi could not stop him from beginning impeachment proceedings in the House Judiciary Committee against a 'long list of people'in the Bush administration, although he did not make a firm commitment to begin proceedings.

    "Nancy Pelosi has impeachment 'off the table,' but that's off her table, it is not off John Conyers' table," the Michigan Democrat said during a town hall meeting in his district Tuesday. "Nancy Pelosi, who I actually supported, cannot prevent me from introducing an impeachment resolution against, well I've got a long list of people who are eligible."

    Good for you Conyers, push Pelosi to the side and get rid of Bush!

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  28. Zero-interest financing, a familiar sales incentive at car dealerships and furniture stores, has found its way to another big-ticket consumer market: doctors’ and dentists’ offices.

    For $3,500 laser eye surgery, $6,000 ceramic tooth implants or other procedures not typically covered by insurance, millions of consumers have arranged financing through more than 100,000 doctors and dentists that offer a year or more of interest-free monthly payments.

    Of course, going into debt to pay for medical procedures is nothing new for many people. And this type of financing is still only a fraction of the nation’s $900 billion market for consumer revolving credit.

    But as the price of health care continues to rise and big lenders pursue new areas for growth, this type of medical financing has become one of the fastest-growing parts of consumer credit, led by lending giants like Capital One and Citigroup and the CareCredit unit of General Electric.

    This is a prime example of the Bush economy!

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  29. Larry,

    This is splendid news!

    Wait until Speaker Botox gets back from her shopping trip to Paris and hears about this.

    She'll begin to melt like the Wicked Witch of the West that she is.

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  30. Christopher:

    I hope Pelosi doesn't stop him, she is turning into the Lieberman in Congress.

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  31. One million killed in Iraq?
    Independent group uses Lancet study to project Iraq death toll

    2007-08-16

    Last year, the medical journal The Lancet published an estimate of 650,000 excess deaths in Iraq based on a demographic study conducted by field workers questioning people in clusters throughout Iraq.


    The group Just Foreign Policy has taken that number and projected it using Iraq Body Count, which tallies deaths reported by Western media sources. This leads to a rough estimate that one million Iraqis have now been killed in the conflict since the U.S.'s 2003 invasion and occupation.

    This is the real total Bush doesn't want to see.

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  32. Pelosi is on the payroll.

    She had no Constitutional authority to take impeachment off the table.

    There needs to be hearings into Pelosi's financial holdings and charges of war profiteering.

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  33. Don't forget Reid. He is in the gutter with Pelosi on protecting Bush.

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  34. It is way past time to look at "Pliant Pelosi" with a magnifying glass. There's some reason she refuses to do anything towards curbing the moronic monkey.

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  35. Good point Jolly, Bush has Pelosi as his prima lapdog.

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  36. There's some reason she refuses to do anything towards curbing the moronic monkey.

    It's her investment portfolio.

    She's heavily invested in the military industrial complex companies just as Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and these so-called "San Francisco liberals" are engaged in war profiteering.

    If Pelosi ordered the Articles of Impeachment, the White House would leak Pelosi's financial holdings to the media.

    The Devil from Crawford and his brain, control her actions.

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  37. Pelosi has been quiet as of late about most anything, since she helped fund Bush's war for profit.

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  38. DaimlerChrysler said its profit fell 14 percent to $2.52 billion, or $2.36 per share, in the April-June period. Chrysler and its financial arm made a $549 million net profit in the second quarter but would have posted an operating loss were it not for accounting changes due to the sale of a majority stake in Chrysler to a private equity firm.

    It's more of the faltering Bush economy!

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  39. FRESNO, Calif. - Hundreds of people lined the streets Wednesday for a procession carrying the flag-draped casket of an Army corporal, the second son in his family killed in Iraq.

    Nathan Hubbard, 21, died Aug. 22 when his Black Hawk helicopter crashed in Multaka. A third brother, Jason Hubbard, was riding in another helicopter nearby and told his wife he had to search the wreckage, according to the family’s pastor.

    Nathan Hubbard’s remains arrived in an Army-chartered jet Wednesday at Fresno-Yosemite International Airport, where an honor guard carried the casket from the plane to a hearse. The family had a few moments alone with the casket, then led the procession to a funeral home.

    Hubbard enlisted at age 19 while still grieving for his older brother, Marine Lance Cpl. Jared Hubbard, who was killed at age 22 alongside his best friend by a roadside bomb in Ramadi in 2004.

    Jason Hubbard, 33, joined the Army at the same time Nathan did. At their request, the two were assigned to the same unit, the 3rd Brigade of the 25th Infantry Division based on Oahu.

    Jason accompanied his brother’s body on a flight out of Iraq and returned home to be with his family.

    Where was Bush in all this?

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  40. Former first lady Barbara Bush donated an undisclosed amount of money to the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund with specific instructions that the money be spent with an educational software company owned by her son Neil.

    Since then, the Ignite Learning program has been given to eight area schools that took in substantial numbers of Hurricane Katrina evacuees.

    “Mrs. Bush wanted to do something specifically for education and specifically for the thousands of students flooding into the Houston schools,” said Jean Becker, former President Bush’s chief of staff. “She knew that HISD was using this software program, and she’s very excited about this program, so she wanted to make it possible for them to expand the use of this program.”

    The former first lady plans to visit a Houston Independent School District campus using the Ignite program today to call on local business leaders to support schools and education.

    Typical Bush move: Make financial gain for one of their kind, at the expense of the poor and homeless.

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  41. Here is why we are still in Iraq:

    BAGHDAD — Iraq's deadly insurgent groups have financed their war against U.S. troops in part with hundreds of thousands of dollars in U.S. rebuilding funds that they've extorted from Iraqi contractors in Anbar province.

    The payments, in return for the insurgents' allowing supplies to move and construction work to begin, have taken place since the earliest projects in 2003, Iraqi contractors, politicians and interpreters involved with reconstruction efforts said.

    A fresh round of rebuilding spurred by the U.S. military's recent alliance with some Anbar tribes — 200 new projects are scheduled — provides another opportunity for militant groups such as al Qaeda in Iraq to siphon off more U.S. money, contractors and politicians warn.

    "Now we're back to the same old story in Anbar. The Americans are handing out contracts and jobs to terrorists, bandits and gangsters," said Sheik Ali Hatem Ali Suleiman, the deputy leader of the Dulaim, the largest and most powerful tribe in Anbar. He was involved in several U.S. rebuilding contracts in the early days of the war, but is now a harsh critic of the U.S. presence.

    The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad declined to provide anyone to discuss the allegations. An embassy spokesman, Noah Miller, said in an e-mailed statement that, "in terms of contracting practices, we have checks and balances in our contract awarding system to prevent any irregularities from occurring. Each contracted company is responsible for providing security for the project."

    Providing that security is the source of the extortion, Iraqi contractors say. A U.S. company with a reconstruction contract hires an Iraqi sub-contractor to haul supplies along insurgent-ridden roads. The Iraqi contractor sets his price at up to four times the going rate because he'll be forced to give 50 percent or more to gun-toting insurgents who demand cash payments in exchange for the supply convoys' safe passage.

    One Iraqi official said the arrangement makes sense for insurgents. By granting safe passage to a truck loaded with $10,000 in goods, they receive a "protection fee" that can buy more weapons and vehicles. Sometimes the insurgents take the goods, too.

    "The violence in Iraq has developed a political economy of its own that sustains it and keeps some of these terrorist groups afloat," said Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh, who recently asked the U.S.-led coalition to match the Iraqi government's pledge of $230 million for Anbar projects.

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  42. "Outsourcing" jobs overseas is only the tip of the iceberg. How about the CheneyBush Administration "outsourcing" our military, our intelligence-gathering, our nation's soul?

    Taking private enterprise way beyond what is reasonable, or desirable, or safe, the CheneyBush Administration has turned over a huge raft of national-security functions to those not adequately trained, not accountable to the public or the law, not showing up on the political radar.

    In short, CheneyBush have created what amounts to their own private legions -- soldiers, intelligence analysts, security guards, construction experts, supply specialists, et al. -- in effect, a "mercenary" force bought and paid for by the American taxpayer.

    That's why there will probably be no draft: There is no guarantee of loyalty from those dragooned into service. Besides, many draftees have politically-connected constituencies. But when one's mercenary "volunteer" forces are totally beholden to the paymaster for their livelihood and under-the-table payoffs, they will dance with them that brung 'em.

    These are no small numbers. It's estimated that in addition to the 160,000 regular troops in the field in Iraq, CheneyBush control anywhere from 60,000 to 100,000 private assets ("independent contractors"). Nobody's even sure under what "rules of engagement" these guys -- many in security and reconstruction fields -- operate, or whether they are accountable to anyone other than their corporate bosses' and the financial "bottom line."

    History shows us the dangers involved when leaders have large extra-institutional forces at their command, such as the Praetorian Guards and Legions of ancient Roman Caesars, Hitler's Brownshirts, Saddam's Republican Guards, the private militias of political and religious leaders today in Iraq, Blackwater forces in control of New Orleans after Katrina, etc. By and large, these mercenaries swear allegiance to their employer, not to the rule of law, not to any constitution. The catastrophic damage done to democracy by the existence, and power, of these private forces can't be over-stated.

    News flash: Blackwater, the huge corporation that CheneyBush rely on for most of the non-military functions in Iraq and elsewhere, is buying combat aircraft. Do we really want a private air force, effectively operating under the aegis of the Executive Branch, conducting secret ops in our names?

    Another reason the war in Iraq rages on!

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  43. What's wrong with this picture:

    In America's current case, there is also this ominous danger: Accurate intelligence is an absolute necessity in warfare and war-planning, but CheneyBush are increasingly going outside the usual intelligence channels and hiring private intel corporations. Even with the mass purgings in governmental intelligence agencies of those not sufficiently "Bush-loyal," Cheney in particular doesn't trust the CIA and the State Department's intel analysts, never has and never will. So we get this recent story from veteran Washington Post reporter Walter Pincus:

    "The Defense Intelligence Agency is preparing to pay private contractors up to $1 billion to conduct core intelligence tasks of analysis and collection over the next five years, an amount that would set a record in the outsourcing of such functions by the Pentagon's top spying agency.

    "The proposed contracts, outlined in a recent early notice of the DIA's plans, reflect a continuing expansion of the Defense Department's intelligence-related work and fit a well-established pattern of Bush administration transfers of government work to private contractors.

    ..."The DIA did not specify exactly what it wants the contractors to do but said it is seeking teams to fulfill 'operational and mission requirements' that include intelligence 'Gathering and Collection, Analysis, Utilization, and Strategy and Support'."

    By outsourcing, CheneyBush, of course, get the intelligence they pay for, rather than risking that some CIA or State Department analysts might tell them intel-truths they don't want to hear, as was the case with Iraq.

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  44. No wonder Bush is losing the war:

    How did CheneyBush begin to assemble their mercenary forces for the reckless misadventure in Iraq? At first, they started out with an all-"volunteer" army of sterling patriotic recruits, high school graduates, many from lower- and middle-middle circumstances, not well-connected politically, many underemployed and desirous of a stable career. But the brutality and criminality and constant fear of the Iraq War (never knowing for sure if civilians were good guys or bad guys, U.S. death rates going up, horrific injuries to body, brain and psyche) took their toll on the troops, suicide and post-traumatic rates mushroomed, and recruitment of top prospects plummeted.

    As a result, the U.S. military felt forced to relax its high standards in order to even come close to meeting its replacement quotas. High schoolers and dropouts were prime targets of unscrupulous recruiters. Don't have a high school diploma? Don't need one. Felony record? Don't worry about it; we've got "moral waivers" now. Poor physical health? Here, have some more pizza and desserts. A gang member on the streets of L.A.? Here's your assault rifle, soldier, and welcome to the brotherhood.

    And when lowering the standards still didn't yield the required numbers, the military went to simple bribery. Sign up now and get a $25,000 signing bonus. Not enough? How about $30K?

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  45. The Bush administration was quick to give many no bid contracts to Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater and many other corporations loyal to the Bush/Cheney conglomerate of business elite.
    --------
    This is why Cheney wanted to be President..
    Errr... I mean Vice President. He and his Halliburton buddies and the PNAC members must have been planning this for a very long time.

    Btw.. Great post Larry!

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  46. Lydia said...
    I had a dream a couple of months ago -- that my brother was totally healthy and healed and put back together. I remember saying to him -- "You're alive! Your heart is healed!" And he grinned at me and said, "Yeah, I'm fine now."
    He was glowing and seemed really alive.

    I've heard that when people have passed on and they visit you in your dreams, it's more than a dream.
    ----------------
    Lydia:

    I have heard that as well.

    God Bless You Lydia!

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  47. Yet another headline in the Washington Post screams what we already know: there's little progress to be shown for the thousands of dead Americans and hundreds of billions of dollars spent on the Iraq War. The Post snagged an early copy of the report:

    The strikingly negative GAO draft, which will be delivered to Congress in final form on Tuesday, comes as the White House prepares to deliver its own new benchmark report in the second week of September, along with congressional testimony from Iraq commander Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker. They are expected to describe significant security improvements and offer at least some promise for political reconciliation in Iraq.

    The draft provides a stark assessment of the tactical effects of the current U.S.-led counteroffensive to secure Baghdad. "While the Baghdad security plan was intended to reduce sectarian violence, U.S. agencies differ on whether such violence has been reduced," it states. While there have been fewer attacks against U.S. forces, it notes, the number of attacks against Iraqi civilians remains unchanged. It also finds that "the capabilities of Iraqi security forces have not improved."

    And Bush's war for profit is going great!

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  48. A growing clamor among rank-and-file Democrats to halt President Bush's most controversial tactics in the fight against terrorism has exposed deep divisions within the party, with many Democrats angry that they cannot defeat even a weakened president on issues that they believe should be front and center.

    The Democrats' failure to rein in wiretapping without warrants, close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay or restore basic legal rights such as habeas corpus for terrorism suspects has opened the party's leaders to criticism.

    Do your job Democrats!

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  49. Check out this excellent post by Sumo Merriment!

    Sumo Merriment

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  50. Hey guys how many times has George Bush asked for more money for the war but instead took the money for his own profit

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  51. Sumo - beautiful woman wrapped in the flag. What a sad post
    thank you

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  52. Suzie - thank you, so good to hear from you.
    Luv xo
    Lyd

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  53. Moral of the story: Never cut into Halliburton's profits.

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  54. Lydia,

    Your brother was blessed in his life to have you. No matter what else, he left this world in your glow. Never forget that.

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  55. You're welcome, Larry!

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  56. Time for Bush and Cheney to go.

    They must be impeached. If Speaker Botox refuses to do the deed, then she must be moved aside too.

    We can't sit by and allow this lawless, immoral administration to start a war in Iran or Pakistan. Enough people, Americans and others, have needlessly died since the 2000 election was stolen away from Al Gore and the American people.

    IMPEACH
    IMPEACH
    IMPEACH

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  57. Today is my younger brother Paul's birthday. He died in 1995, and I am sending him prayers today.

    I had a dream a couple of months ago -- that my brother was totally healthy and healed and put back together. I remember saying to him -- "You're alive! Your heart is healed!" And he grinned at me and said, "Yeah, I'm fine now."
    He was glowing and seemed really alive.

    I've heard that when people have passed on and they visit you in your dreams, it's more than a dream.

    God Bless you Paul!"

    Lydia I've heard that when you die your physical body dies but your spiritual essence goes to the spiritual plane, but can at times still communicate with loved ones on the astral plane of existence which is essentially half way between the physical plane of existence that we reside in and the spiritual plane of existence, its said we experience the astral plane when we dream when asleep.

    The type of dreams you are refering to seem to be called ADC or After Death Communications, and although similar to regular dreams they are distinctly different, from what i have read they appear to be far more vivid, coherent, and real than ordinary dreams, the deceased ones appear to be at peace and healed of any injuries, deformities, or illness's and happy happy and at peace and the dreamer senses a peacefulness and well being.

    here's a few examples i'll paste in
    After-Death Communications
    Bill and Judy Guggenheim's research
    An after-death communication is a spiritual experience that occurs when a person is contacted directly and spontaneously by a family member or friend who has died.There are many significant differences between an ordinary dream and a sleep-state ADC. A dream is generally fragmented, jumbled, filled with symbolism, and incomplete in various ways. Though some are very intense emotionally, they typically have a quality of unreality about them and are often soon forgotten.

    In contrast, sleep-state ADCs feel like actual face-to-face visits with deceased loved ones. They are much more orderly, colorful, vivid, and memorable than most dreams. In fact, some may be after-death visions that occur during sleep.

    The following reports are examples of sleep-state ADCs in which a deceased loved one broke into an ordinary dream. During their seven years of research, Bill and Judy Guggenheim collected more than 3,300 firsthand reports from people who believe they have been contacted by a deceased loved one. Their book, Hello From Heaven, documents many such experiences. The following are excerpts reprinted by permission from their wonderful book revealing some of these amazing after-death communications.

    Healing a Vengeful Heart

    Glen is a mail carrier in the Southwest. He had this spiritually transformative after-death communication with his son, Ron, age 21, who was murdered, and with Ron's mother, Helen, who had died of cancer 16 years earlier. The following is his description of the experience.

    My son, Ron, was killed on a Monday night, but I didn't find out about his death until Tuesday morning. The next day, because it was a homicide and I was the next of kin, I had to go down and identify his body.

    That's probably the hardest thing I ever did in my life. This image of him lying on the table in the morgue remained whenever I would think about my son. It would come speeding to the front of my consciousness, and that's all I could see - this ugly, dirty picture of my boy.

    On Thursday, I woke up about 4:00 in the morning and raised up and looked at the alarm clock. Suddenly, Ron was there standing in front of me! It was like there was a floodlight in back of him, but I could see all of him clearly. He was dressed in a T-shirt and blue jeans.

    He looked solid, he looked real! When he smiled at me, I knew he was in perfect health. His teeth were all beautifully formed and totally white. Before he was killed his teeth were chipped and discolored.

    Then he brought his mother, Helen, to me. When I buried her body sixteen years earlier, I buried her in my mind too. I didn't believe in God, and I didn't believe in an afterlife or heaven. I didn't believe in anything except this life.

    Ron and Helen were holding hands. She looked perfectly healthy with all of her hair. She had lost her hair to chemo and radiation treatments. Now she looked like I remembered her when we were first married. She was in a flowing dress and looked very pretty.

    I said, "Helen, I'm sorry. I forgot..."

    And she said to me, "I understand, Glen."

    She understood that I had forgotten about her. Then she was gone, and I could hear myself sobbing.

    Ron smiled again, and I realized that my son was in heaven or that he was going to go to heaven. I filled up with a glow - I've never known a feeling like that before. I felt like I was going to bust all over - I felt so good!

    All of a sudden, I believed! I knew that God, Jesus, the Holy Ghost, the saints, and everything that I had been taught was true! I just knew it!

    Then Ron said, "No hatred, no anger, Dad," and he repeated it, "No hatred, no anger."

    I think he was trying to tell me he didn't hate anybody and wasn't angry with anybody. And he didn't want me to hate or be angry with anybody either.

    Ron also said, "Don't worry about me. I'm happy."

    That made me feel good, and I asked him if he would be there to meet me when I die.

    He said, "Hey, Dad, I'm just a rookie here. I don't know!"

    Then my present wife, Linda, who was sleeping beside me, woke up and touched my arm. That ended my experience with Ron. Even though I could no longer see or communicate with my son, I felt so euphoric, so at peace.

    A month or so later, I thought, "What if it was the devil that did all this?"

    Then I kind of slapped myself in the face and said, "Hey stupid, why would the devil do something like that to turn you away from him?"

    Satan had me in his grasp for about forty years. Now I know that God is a lot stronger than the devil.

    After Ron was murdered, I was going to terminate the man that killed him. I was going to make sure that man's life was ended. Now I don't feel that way anymore. I feel sorry for him because he has to live every waking minute with the fact he murdered my boy.

    You can't believe how happy I am that my son is in heaven with his mother! This experience changed my life. It opened my eyes. It made me know that there is a God and there is a heaven and he created all of us.

    heres another one:

    Robin is the director of a child care center in Florida. She had this timely visit from her grandfather several years after he died of a heart attack in his 70's.

    I was in my first year at college, sleeping in my dorm room. I was dreaming about something when Grandpa broke into my dream! He was right there, and I could smell his cologne and tobacco and feel his warmth.

    He seemed concerned and protective.

    He said, "Lock the windows! Lock the windows! You're supposed to remember to take care of yourself! Lock the windows!"

    It was a definite warning.

    I woke up startled and sat up and looked around. My room had one set of windows that looked out onto a courtyard and another set over by the fire escape. So I got up and locked all the windows.

    About half an hour later, there was a scream from the girl in the room down the hall. A man had come up the fire escape and apparently had tried my windows, and then he had gone on to hers. Later he was caught!

    Grandpa appeared when support was obviously needed. He proved that he would be with me forever.

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  58. BTW, that was a great article Larry, isnt it Bizzaire and sickening that you dont hear a peep of this from the MSM............we have a bunch of treasous thugs running this country and the Media seems to be their partners in crime.........or in Rove's case partners in slime!

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  59. This kind of intimidation and treason NEEDS to be circulated on all the blogs so people become aware of it and the MSM is forced to cover it.

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  60. Larry said...
    WASHINGTON - President Bush plans to ask Congress next month for up to $50 billion in additional funding for the war in Iraq, a White House official said yesterday, a move that appears to reflect increasing administration confidence that it can fend off congressional calls for a rapid drawdown of U.S. forces.

    The request -- which would come on top of about $460 billion in the fiscal 2008 defense budget and $147 billion in a pending supplemental bill to fund the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq -- is expected to be announced after congressional hearings scheduled for mid-September featuring the two top U.S. officials in Iraq. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker will assess the state of the war and the effect of the new strategy the U.S. military has pursued this year.

    Is this more money Halliburton can syphon before Bush leaves office?"

    If the Democrats give this tyranical idiot MORE money to murder and destabilize the world and destroy democracy they need to be impeached and /or we need to get viable candidates to run AGAINST them.......Pelosi and her enablers and Lemmings prove more and more that the democrats are more part of the problem than the solution.

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  61. Larry said...
    "Several federal agencies are investigating a widening network of criminal cases involving the purchase and delivery of billions of dollars of weapons, supplies and other matériel to Iraqi and American forces, according to American officials," reports the New York Times.

    It looks like Blackwater may be needing weapons for their upcoming rogue movements. More corruption in Bush's war."

    Yeah Larry..........ANOTHER story the MSM fails to discuss, apparently Linsey Lohan or Britney Spears is more important than our government treasonously supporting insurgents that are murdering our soldiers.........so much for supporting the soldiers.

    And I also feel uneasy about Bush's Blackwater brownshirts.........I think they should be scattered to the winds.

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  62. Robert Rouse said...
    I read this over my morning coffee on Saturday and literally did a Danny Thomas spit take. "Land of the Free, home of the brave" my a$$. If we're not free to report corruption and if the bureaucrats aren't brave enough to take on the corporations and big money, where does that leave us?

    January 2009 seems such a long way off."

    It seems like our "so called" democracy is a sham and pretense Robert............I sincerely HOPE 2009 makes a difference, however the way things are looking now the elections may not be a factor.

    The same pack of fools that lied and manipulated us into attacking Iraq based on lies are playing the same ole song and dance trying to get us to attack iran and Congress doesnt seem to be challenging them or even ATTEMPTING to stop them its like history has repeated itself and we have learned NOTHING from it.

    Bush and his thugs have shown theyre hand its clear he wants to declare martial law after either a false flag phony terrorist attack or attack Iran and use the financial chaos to declare martial law and seize power and Congress does NOTHING to oppose this Idiot!

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  63. Congress has failed to stop Bush from spying, has failed to restore Habeous corpus, has failed to challenge Bush's Executive Orders to seize people assets, imprison them or declare martial, Failed to repeal the Patriot Act and failed to end the war...............in fact on many of those instances they havent even tried or have caved in like a bunch of cowards.........as far as i'm concerned they are a disgrace that has achieved NOTHING in the last year except getting subpoena power to investigate and even that they havent used effectively as Rove, Miers etc......should be sitting in jail for contempt.

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  64. Christopher said...
    There's some reason she refuses to do anything towards curbing the moronic monkey.

    It's her investment portfolio.

    She's heavily invested in the military industrial complex companies just as Sen. Dianne Feinstein, and these so-called "San Francisco liberals" are engaged in war profiteering.

    If Pelosi ordered the Articles of Impeachment, the White House would leak Pelosi's financial holdings to the media.

    The Devil from Crawford and his brain, control her actions."


    I think Congress is afraid of Bush and Cheney............possibly afraid of being killed or imprisoned.........if they are that afraid about losing the election because they dont appear "nice" they arent competent enough to lead our country.

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  65. Heres a great article from Antiwar.com

    June 20, 2007
    Nihilism and Neoconservatism
    Brothers under the skin
    The idea that we invaded and occupied Iraq and launched a bid to "transform" the Middle East because we wanted to install liberal, democratic societies in the region is just not believable on many levels, and certainly recent headlines about the Palestinian coup by Fatah against Hamas – and the president's endorsement of the Abbas putsch – underscore this point. One year after Hamas soundly defeated the old, corrupt Fatah movement at the polls, the former has been expelled from the government by the unilateral action of "President" Abbas and is outlawed in the West Bank – where the Fatah-Bush theory of the "unitary presidency" apparently holds sway.

    "Democracy" in the Middle East marches on!

    Elections in the Middle East are like those in the European Union – if the Powers-That-Be don't get the result they want, then the results are overturned and a new election is held… a process that continues until the people learn their lesson, i.e., that resistance is futile, and ratify what has already been decided.

    From the occupied territories to the war-torn cities of Iraq, what was sold as an effort to export "democracy" has instead turned into an effort to import chaos, death, and universal destruction. The "liberation" of Iraq hasn't let the democratic genie out of the bottle, but it has unleashed sectarian demons that have engulfed the country in a vicious civil war. In Lebanon, our effort to aid the Sunnis as a counterbalance to the Shi'ite Hezbollah has boomeranged, with the Fatah al-Islam group rising up against the U.S.-supported government. In Afghanistan, the regime of "President" Karzai can barely claim control of the capital city of Kabul, while in Pakistan, our biggest and most important ally in the Muslim world, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, is being buffeted by the tides of pro-Islamic, anti-American public opinion, and is not expected to last much longer.

    By any rational measure, the results of our Middle Eastern policy of regime-change in Iraq and bullying intervention throughout the region have been an abysmal failure from beginning to end. By neoconservative Bizarro World standards, however, what we are witnessing is a smashing success.

    Because, you see, smashing up the Middle East was and is the whole point. Every new day's headlines reminds me of a prescient piece by Joshua Marshall, published in the April 2003 issue of The Washington Monthly, entitled "Practice to Deceive," the subtitle of which was "Chaos in the Middle East is not the Bush hawks' nightmare scenario – it's their plan." Marshall pointed to:

    "[T]he curious fact that much of what could go awry with their plan will also serve to advance it. A full-scale confrontation between the United States and political Islam, they believe, is inevitable, so why not have it now, on our terms, rather than later, on theirs? Actually, there are plenty of good reasons not to purposely provoke a series of crises in the Middle East. But that's what the hawks are setting in motion, partly on the theory that the worse things get, the more their approach becomes the only plausible solution."

    Marshall's piece is a masterful analysis and refutation of the ostensible reasons we got into Iraq because it goes beyond the exoteric rationales and penetrates the esoteric, or inner, significance of the invasion and occupation. In the process, he gives us a concise history of the neocons and an account of their methodology, which, he rightly avers, is centered around the practice of deception. "Democracy," "weapons of mass destruction," Saddam's nonexistent "links" to al-Qaeda and the 9/11 attacks – this was just the window dressing that lured us into the store, where we bought the Iraq war narrative, at least initially. Now that we're in so deep, with little hope of digging ourselves out, the real neocon agenda is becoming all too apparent. Iraq was only the dress rehearsal for a general conflagration that will replicate the Iraqi civil war on a regional level. Seymour Hersh wrote about some of the strategic implications of this in "The Redirection," and I've consistently warned in this space over the years that in getting involved in Iraq we were getting on the Middle East escalator and not stopping until we reached a whole new level of warfare – a conflict that could comfortably fit within the parameters of a new world war.

    As the neocons marched America to war against Iraq, Marshall surveyed the tragic scene and foretold World War IV:

    "The great majority of the American people have no concept of what kind of conflict the president is leading them into. The White House has presented this as a war to depose Saddam Hussein in order to keep him from acquiring weapons of mass destruction – a goal that the majority of Americans support. But the White House really has in mind an enterprise of a scale, cost, and scope that would be almost impossible to sell to the American public. The White House knows that. So it hasn't even tried. Instead, it's focused on getting us into Iraq with the hope of setting off a sequence of events that will draw us inexorably towards the agenda they have in mind."

    Few liberals had the presence of mind at the time to see the larger picture and warn us of the impending disaster: almost none had a sense of the true significance of the decision to go to war, or any real inkling of the War Party's true agenda. Nowadays, at least some of Marshall's fellow liberals and "progressives" are waking up – now that it may be too late…

    Iran is the next target on the neocons' timetable for regime-change in the Middle East, and growing indications that an attack is in the offing before President Bush's term of office ends underscore Marshall's point, which is that the worse things get the more the neocons revel in it. Theirs is a Bizarro World "morality," where evil is good, universal destruction is global peace, and a turn for the worse is, in effect, a turn for the better. Every "crisis" – various run-ins with the Iranians in the Gulf and on the Iraq-Iran border, Lebanon's refusal to surrender its sovereignty to a UN "tribunal," U.S. covert operations inside Iran – threatens to become the spark that sets the entire Middle East aflame.

    Where will it all end? The goal of the neocons is a U.S.-Israeli-dominated region, patrolled by U.S. troops and divided into a large number of much smaller statelets. With both Iraq and Iran broken down into their constituent ethno-religious parts, the Middle East becomes Lebanon writ large: weak, vulnerable to attack, and easy to control.

    A central premise of the "realist" critique of the neoconservative agenda is that it promotes a dangerous instability, which shows that the realists just don't get what neoconservatism in the foreign policy realm – and particularly when it comes to the Middle East – is all about. The idea is to create – and preside over – a condition of permanent instability. There is no better way to justify the permanent presence of U.S. troops and plenty of aid to U.S.-backed authoritarian regimes.

    Nihilism and neoconservatism are brothers under the skin, and nothing illustrates this more starkly than the horror unfolding presently in Iraq. It is a war we were lured into by means of a massive and quite artful deception, and its true purpose remains hidden beneath layers of presidential rhetoric and "patriotic" posturing. Yet a big problem for the neocons is that the closer they get to achieving their objective, the more their real agenda is exposed to the light of day – and they run the risk of a major backlash, one that could take an unexpected – and quite ugly – turn. Quite ugly for them, that is, and quite a relief to the rest of us…

    In the end, the War Party's foreign policy objectives are inextricably intertwined with their domestic agenda, which is authoritarianism, pure and simple. The red-state fascist mentality that promotes the doctrine of the "unitary presidency," i.e., the cult of the Leader, and seeks to establish a surveillance state in place of our constitutional form of government, is today the animating spirit of the GOP. As personified by Benito Giuliani, the Republican form of the new authoritarianism is no scarier, however, than the threat posed by Hillary Clinton, who, asked if online speech required regulation, proclaimed:

    "Without any kind of editing function or gate-keeping function, what does it mean to have the right to defend your reputation? I don't have any clue about what we're going to do legally, regulatorily, technologically – I don't have a clue. But I do think we always have to keep competing interests in balance. I'm a big pro-balance person. … Anytime an individual or an institution or an invention leaps so far out ahead of that balance and throws a system, whatever it might be – political, economic, technological – out of balance, you've got a problem, because then it can lead to the oppression [of] people's rights, it can lead to the manipulation of information, it can lead to all kinds of bad outcomes which we have seen historically. So we're going to have to deal with that."

    Known for her vengefulness, Hillary, I'm sure, will know just how to "deal with" her online critics. The Republicans who voted for the PATRIOT Act, the Military Commissions Act [.pdf], and all the other licenses granted by a compliant Congress to spy on and harass American citizens engaged in peaceful, legal conduct will live to regret their hasty ratification of a police state. With Hillary at the helm of the U.S. government, you can bet that the secret police agencies will be run efficiently – while the war in the Middle East rages on without respite.

    It's true that the more radical wing of the War Party currently favors the Republicans, but that could change in an instant, especially if the Democrats get on board the let's-attack-Iran bandwagon. As it is, the major Democratic presidential candidates have all refused to take war with Iran "off the table," and Hillary the Hawk, now and perhaps forever the front-runner for the nomination, is relentless on this score.

    It's heads the War Party wins, tails the Peace Party loses. That's what "democracy" in America is all about.

    The permanent crisis of perpetual war abroad and a state of siege on the home front – that's the neocon utopia, in a nutshell. Tragically, both parties seem irrevocably committed to this program, at least at the leadership level. Whatever opposition arises from the grassroots is quickly neutralized by big money, stacked primaries, and a media campaign that marginalizes mavericks like Ron Paul and anyone else who challenges the basic premise of our bipartisan foreign policy – which is the near-divinely inspired rightness of global intervention on the part of the U.S. government.

    To question this is heresy, yet when asked what kind of foreign policy they would prefer, Americans answered that we ought to start minding our own business. That was a couple of years ago, and one imagines this tendency toward "isolationism," to use the neocon-inspired scare word, is even more pronounced these days, when the hard lessons of our Iraq misadventure are being absorbed by a war-weary public.

    The ruling elites, however, have a different point of view, one shaped by their own Washington-centered perspective. They like to believe that they really are running the world, no matter what party they belong to, and they – the elites in government, media, and the corporate world – act accordingly. As for the American public at large – they are like children who can be manipulated this way and that according to the convenience of the moment. Ordinary Americans may be unruly at times, but, ultimately they can be controlled – or so the elites believe and hope. In their hubris, the War Party embarked on a large-scale military campaign in the Middle East, without considering the power and scope of the possible "blowback" – up to and including the political blowback here in the U.S.

    With the presidential primaries of both parties effectively rigged against the possibility of a credible antiwar candidate arising to wrest the nomination from the pro-war front-runners, and the War Party's propaganda machine revving up its motors for another go, this time at Iran, we are in for a very explosive next couple of years. The reason is because the political system lacks any effective safety valves: there is no way for ordinary people to have any real impact, and therefore the special interests – and the War Party is just a collection of very special ideological and corporate interests – have taken over. That's why a radically unpopular war not only continues but is now being escalated in a "surge" of air strikes and major movements on the ground. We had an election in which the "antiwar" party won – and that's when the war got hotter, more violent, and started to spread. While it may be somewhat of an exaggeration to say that we no more have "democracy" here than the Palestinians have it in the West Bank and Gaza, it isn't all that much of one.

    While we are not quite reduced to fighting it out in the streets, Palestinian-style, for the first time since the Civil War that possibility no longer seems quite so far-fetched. And if that doesn't scare you, then you'll do well in the dark age to come.

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  66. "We" may not be fighting it out, but someone's going to. I just hope the chaos is short-lived as the US breaks up and realigns itself.

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  67. if they are that afraid about losing the election because they dont appear "nice" they arent competent enough to lead our country.

    Ka-Ching!

    This gang is totally inept and certainly not capable of leading the country.

    Check it out, Mike.

    Bush will ask for an additional $50 billion for his beloved Iraq war. This raises the total to more than $600 billion dollars.

    Expect the Dumbocrats to fall in line behind General George with Speaker Botox and Harry the Limp Noodle saying, "We won't abandon the troops!"

    Meanwhile, Cheney is jones-in for war with Iran. They want to invade Iran while they're still in office.

    Do you think any of these morons will stand up to Bush or Cheney and tell them "No?" Ain't gonna' happen. The Dumbocrats are cowards and terrified of appearing weak on Bush's wur own turrism.

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  68. Christopher, I always wondered how the Germans could have LET Hitler come to power...........I see now how it must have happened if the opposition party and branches were as spineless and gutless as the Democrats are now and much of the population were lemmings it must have happened VERY much like what is happening right now with Bush and Cheney.

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  69. Mike,

    There's a splendid book on that very subject titled:

    Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen

    It's a terribly important, if difficult book to read and I highly recommend it to you. I think you could get a cheap paperback copy on eBay by now.

    Essentially, Goldhagen's thesis argues that the popular belief of the SS carrying out the genocide of Jews, gypsies and gays is false and ordinary German men and women signed on to the fun and made Hitler's nightmare a reality.

    I usually read quickly but this book was not an easy or entertaining experience for me. I had to put it down many times and I had bad dreams.

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  70. Did anyone see Tom Delay on all the morning shows defending the "stall crawler" for his bathroom antics?

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  71. Saying the coming weeks will be "one of the last opportunities" to alter the course of the war, Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said he is now willing to compromise with Republicans to find ways to limit troop deployments in Iraq.

    Reid acknowledged that his previous firm demand for a spring withdrawal deadline had become an obstacle for a small but growing number of Republicans who have said they want to end the war but have been unwilling to.

    Why is Reid giving in to the Repugs on the war again?

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  72. “Naturally the common people don't want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
    santiz
    Hermann Goering

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  73. “Education is dangerous - Every educated person is a future enemy”
    Hermann Goering

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  74. “Of course people don’t want war. Why should a poor slob on a farm want to risk his life in a war when the best thing he can get out of it is to come back to his farm in one piece?”
    Hermann Goering

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  75. “The best political weapon is the weapon of terror. Cruelty commands respect. Men may hate us. But, we don't ask for their love; only for their fear.”
    Heinrich Himmler

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  76. Thanks Christopher, i'll try to see if I can find that book you recommended.

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  77. Pelosi and Reed are a disgrace..........I hope some chooses to run AGAINST them because we need them OUT of the Democratic party.

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  78. Pentagon: Please rewrite Iraq report John Byrne
    Published: Thursday August 30, 2007






    Print This Email This



    It's a sad day at the Defense Department when Congress' General Accountability Office declares that the military has missed 13 out of 18 benchmarks set by Congress to judge the Iraqi government's performance.

    That's a success rate of 28%, or, in educational terms, an 'F.'

    A frustrated Pentagon is appealing to the teacher for a better grade.

    According to AP, "Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said Thursday that after reviewing a draft of the Government Accountability Office report — which has not yet been made public — policy officials 'made some factual corrections' and 'offered some suggestions on a few of the actual grades' assigned by the GAO."

    "We have provided the GAO with information which we believe will lead them to conclude that a few of the benchmark grades should be upgraded from not met' tomet,'" Morrell told reporters.

    He declined to elaborate.

    Another Bush war lie in the making!

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  79. Plastic Pelosi is the Lieberman in a skirt!

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  80. It's that Bush Homeland Security at Work:

    About 146,000 people using a jobs Web site sponsored by the U.S. government have had their personal information stolen by hackers who broke into computers at Monster Worldwide Inc, a government spokesman said on Thursday.

    The theft on the USAjobs.gov site, which has about 2 million total users, was part of the hacking operation that Monster disclosed last week, according to Peter Graves, a spokesman for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

    Monster runs the site on behalf of the government.

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  81. I just got off the phone with a contact in Idaho state government and he told me Sen. Larry Craig will resign this weekend.

    Craig will be replaced by AG Lawrence Wasden. Wadsen is a Republican, a social conservative and, a Mormon.

    We'll have to see if it's true.

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  82. Announcement comes three days after A.G.’s resignation

    WASHINGTON - The Justice Department said Thursday it is investigating whether resigning Attorney General Alberto Gonzales lied or otherwise mislead Congress last month in sworn testimony about the Bush administration’s domestic terrorist spying program.

    The inquiry, confirmed by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine, comes three days after Gonzales abruptly announced he was stepping down despite months of vowing he would remain on the job.

    In a letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, who two weeks ago asked for the inquiry, Fine said his investigators believe they “will be able to assess most of the issues that you raise in your letter.”

    Leahy had also asked Fine to look into whether Gonzales gave inaccurate testimony about the firings of several U.S. attorneys last year.

    Does anyone believe Bush's Justice Dept. will find anything wrong with Gonzo?

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  83. I hope your contact is right Christopher.

    Did you hear the "stall crawler's" tape of his arrest?

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  84. Some facilities that handle the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile misplaced classified bomb components under their care, according to an Energy Department audit.

    The department’s Inspector General also found there was confusion at the facilities over who was responsible for keeping track of weapons parts and recommended changes in how to better safeguard the parts.

    John Broehm, a spokesman for the department’s National Nuclear Security Administration that oversees the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, said his agency disagreed with the recommendations.

    He said the parts, which he declined to identify, were later found.

    A summary of the IG’s audit — a little-noticed two-page document released in late July — found that two of the three sites reviewed did not track “many” classified weapons parts in their custody.

    The facilities “could not readily account for or locate some of the items included in our inventory sample,” the IG summary said.

    Which is more dangerous: Bush and his incompetence or the terrorists?

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  85. WASHINGTON — In a sign that top commanders are divided over what course to pursue in Iraq, the Pentagon said Wednesday that it won't make a single, unified recommendation to President Bush during next month's strategy assessment, but instead will allow top commanders to make individual presentations.

    "Consensus is not the goal of the process," Geoff Morrell, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters. "If there are differences, the president will hear them."

    Military analysts called the move unusual for an institution that ordinarily does not air its differences in public, especially while its troops are deployed in combat.

    "The professional military guys are going to the non-professional military guys and saying 'Resolve this,'" said Jeffrey White, a military analyst for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "That's what it sounds like.

    But will they really speak up!

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  86. WASHINGTON, Aug. 30 (AP) — A military cargo plane carrying three senators and a House member was forced to take evasive maneuvers and dispatch flares to avoid ground fire after taking off from Baghdad on Thursday night.

    Skip to next paragraph
    The Reach of War
    Go to Complete Coverage » The lawmakers said their plane, a C-130, was under fire from three rocket-propelled grenades over the course of several minutes as they left for Jordan.

    “It was a scary moment,” said Senator Mel Martinez, Republican of Florida, who said he had just taken off his body armor when he saw a flash outside the window. “Our pilots were terrific. They banked in one direction and then banked the other direction, and they set off the flares.”

    He was traveling with Senators Richard C. Shelby, Republican of Alabama, and James M. Inhofe, Republican of Oklahoma, as well as Representative Robert E. Cramer, Democrat of Alabama.

    Crew members apparently communicated to the pilots as they saw the initial rocket-propelled grenades fired from the ground, Mr. Cramer said. After the first burst, the pilots maneuvered aggressively and set off flares used for drawing incoming fire away from aircraft.

    These scared war lovers all support Bush's war.

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  87. WASHINGTON - An independent commission established by Congress to assess Iraq's security forces will recommend remaking the 26,000-member national police force to purge it of corrupt officers and Shiite militants suspected of complicity in sectarian killings, Bush administration and military officials said Thursday.

    The commission, headed by Gen. James L. Jones, the former top U.S. commander in Europe, concludes that the rampant sectarianism that has existed since the formation of the police force requires that its current units "be scrapped" and reshaped into a smaller, more elite organization, according to one senior official familiar with the findings. It recommends that "we should start over," the official said.

    The report, which will be presented to Congress next week, is among a slew of new Iraq assessments - including a national intelligence estimate and a General Accountability Office report - that awaits lawmakers when they return from summer recess.

    I thought Bush said these Iraqi's were ready for battle?

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  88. Reuters - A suicide bomber detonated a car packed with explosives near an entrance to the Afghan capital's airport early on Friday, killing at least one Afghan and wounding several other people, police and witnesses said.

    It's that Bush war again!

    ReplyDelete
  89. (Reuters) - Freddie Mac the nation's second-largest source of home loan funding, said on Thursday its second-quarter net income fell 45 percent from a year earlier as more borrowers defaulted on their loans.

    Freddie Mac buys mortgages that banks extend to the highest quality homeowners and the spike in failed loans indicates defaults are spreading well beyond the riskiest subprime borrowers. Its shares suffered their biggest one-day loss in four years.

    The $764 million in net income fell sharply from the $1.4 billion last year.

    It's the faltering Bush economy!

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  90. (Reuters) - The U.S. troop surge in Iraq has thrown al Qaeda off balance and led to a reduction in sectarian violence and bombings, the U.S. commander in Iraq was quoted on Friday by an Australian newspaper as saying.

    "We say we have achieved progress, and we are obviously going to do everything we can to build on that progress and we believe al Qaeda is off balance at the very least," General David Petraeus told the Australian in an interview after briefing Australia's defense minister, Brendan Nelson, in Baghdad.

    Bush's newest liar getting his story prepared.

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  91. The Official George W. Bush
    "Days Left In Office"
    Countdown:

    507 DAYS
    22 Hrs 56 Min 46.1 Sec

    Will this day ever come?

    ReplyDelete
  92. Hi guys Christopher I hope you are correct on the resignation of this pedophile he needs to be taken away

    ReplyDelete
  93. Senator John McCain, R-AZ, may be the one of the only presidential candidates to serve in the United States military. He may also be the most dogmatic of the dwindling group of Iraq war proponents. But among veterans -- a constituency that would seem naturally inclined to such a record -- McCain is dragging behind his three main rivals for the Republican presidential nomination.

    According to a recently released Gallup Poll, Republican-leaning veterans prefer both former New York City mayor Rudy Guiliani.

    The big war loving hero can't get a veteran to vote for him.

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  94. ORLANDO, Fla. -- Some outraged motorists have scrawled warning messages and curse words on gas pumps after paying up to $4.50 for a gallon for gasoline at a station near Orlando International Airport.

    It's the Bush economy!

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  95. A US Marine was ordered to execute a room full of Iraqi women and children during an alleged massacre in Haditha that left 24 people dead, a military court heard Thursday.

    The testimony came in the opening of a preliminary hearing for Marine Sergeant Frank Wuterich, who faces 17 counts of murder over the Haditha killings, the most serious war crimes allegations faced by US troops in Iraq.

    Is this being "compassionate" Bush!

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  96. I still think the Hitler analogy is flawed, and only applicable to a certain demographic.

    This country already has fewer than half its citizens participating in the process. Those citizens will be the ones to go violent, and there are too many of them to apply German "solutions" to. I'd bet the farm on it.

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  97. Freedom Rider: John Conyers and the Bush Dictatorship
    U.S. Politics - The National Security State
    Wednesday, 06 June 2007
    by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

    Hardly anyone in the corporate media seemed to notice when, last month, George Bush gave himself the power to run the government all by himself in situations of "catastrophic emergency." It would also be up to Bush to decide just what constitutes such an emergency - natural disaster, economic dislocation, or even launching of another of Bush's premeditated wars, who knows? Democratic leadership remained silent as Bush set the stage for dictatorship-at-will. It's past time for Rep. John Conyers to put impeachment back "on the table" - before it's too late.

    Freedom Rider: John Conyers and the Bush Dictatorship

    by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

    "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I'm the dictator." - George W. Bush

    According to an old saying, many a truth is often said in jest. Not enough people took notice on December 18, 2000 when George W. Bush said those awful words. On that date the president-elect went to Capital Hill for a get acquainted session with Congressional leaders. He emerged from that meeting with his well known smirk, and gave Congress and the American people the finger. No one should be shocked when a man who tells jokes about dictatorship turns into a dictator.

    Without fanfare, or announcement of any kind, the president recently signed a directive which states that in case of a "catastrophic emergency" the "President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government." What is a catastrophic emergency? Well, it is anything that Bush says it is.

    "The president can usurp the constitutionally guaranteed powers of Congress and the judiciary because of an attack on Iran or a surge of casualties in Iraq."

    The document, National Continuity Policy, was signed by the president on May 9, 2007 and unceremoniously posted on the White House website. It defines catastrophic emergency as "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government function."

    That language describes hurricanes, earthquakes, black outs, flu epidemics, terror attacks, or mass demonstrations. If location doesn't matter, the president can usurp the constitutionally guaranteed powers of Congress and the judiciary because of an attack on Iran or a surge of casualties in Iraq. L'etat c'est Bush.

    The president announced that he is crowning himself king and thereby making his sick wishes come true. What should be a headline in every major newspaper in the nation has been covered only by the Boston Globe. None of the television networks have said a word nor has a peep been heard from Congress.

    This announcement is consistent with other Bush administration actions. In 2006 the federal government awarded a contract to KBR, a subsidiary of Cheney's Halliburton, to build "detention centers" in case of a national immigration emergency. Homeland Security has already established an immigrant detention facility in Texas, the T. Don Hutto center, that has incarcerated entire families, including children. When U.N. human rights investigator Jorge Bustamante showed up for a pre-arranged visit he was refused entry and turned away.

    "None of the television networks have said a word nor has a peep been heard from Congress."

    Congress has also been silent about this blatant power grab and usurpation of its authority. The National Emergencies Act gives Congress the right to prevent open ended declarations of states of emergency, but that act's existence is not very comforting. If Congress won't even speak up about the National Continuity Policy, why would they speak up if Bush declared an emergency and told them to go to hell? Congressional Democratic leaders Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi would once again go along to get along as the Bushites began a reign of terror against democracy.

    Reid and Pelosi have their own little reign of terror in Washington. They have cracked the whip and told progressives to shut up and toe the party line. John Conyers is one of their victims. He has been in Congress longer than all but a few of his colleagues and has been called the conscience of the Congressional Black Caucus. He now serves as Chairman of the House Judiciary committee. Ever since the Republican victory in 1994, progressives have hoped for a return to Democratic control and with it the return of stalwarts like John Conyers to committee chairmanships.

    While Democrats were in the wilderness, Conyers spoke often about impeachment and unequivocally stated that he intended to hold hearings as soon as he had the opportunity. In 2005 Judiciary Committee staff issued a report recommending that Congress establish a select committee to investigate whether or not the President Bush and Vice President Cheney had committed impeachable offenses.

    Once Conyers had that power, he refused to use it. He was forced into silence by Pelosi, who said that impeachment is "off the table." Conyers had a strange defense. He called himself a liar:

    "In this campaign, there was an orchestrated right-wing effort to distort my position on impeachment. The incoming speaker has said that impeachment is off the table. I am in total agreement with her on this issue: Impeachment is off the table." Just to make certain he wasn't misunderstood, Conyers added, "Impeachment would not be good for the American people. The country does not want or need any more paralyzed partisan government."

    It is time to stop letting Conyers and the rest of his colleagues off the hook. They too are complicit in the ever increasing erosion of our civil rights and civil liberties. A coordinated impeachment effort might slow down or even stop the Bush coronation.

    "Once Conyers had that power, he refused to use it."

    The long years of waiting for Conyers, a committed progressive for decades, to chair the House Judiciary Committee were wasted. His most recent statement is not much better than his self-repudiation after the November 2006 election. He now claims to have "been supportive of that movement (for impeachment). I encourage that nationwide." Well, that is awfully big of him.

    The next round of demonstrations in Washington should be directed at the Democrats, including members of the Congressional Black Caucus. Democratic timidity only encourages the Republicans. When a hurricane, terror plot or bird flu pandemic begins, we may as well pack our bags and join immigrants at the Hutto detention center. Immigrants were just used for practice. Bush is preparing for the real thing and there isn't anyone in a position to stop him who is willing to do it.

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  98. WASHINGTON, Aug. 30 — The Bush administration is signaling that it plans to turn again to a legal tool, the “state secrets” privilege, to try to stop a suit against a Belgian banking cooperative that secretly supplied millions of private financial records to the United States government, court documents show.

    Skip to next paragraph
    Threats & Responses
    Go to Complete Coverage » The suit against the consortium, known as Swift, threatens to disrupt the operations of a vital national security program and to disclose “highly classified information” if it continues, the Justice Department has said in court filings.

    The Bush Administration: Full of Secrets.

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  99. A May survey of Army soldiers in Iraq showed 45 percent with “low” morale compared with 19 percent who said their morale was “high.” The percentage of West Point graduates who quit the Army after their five-year obligation has more than doubled since the Iraq war began in 2003.

    More and more, a vocal minority is also speaking out publicly – a far cry from the World War II era when, in order to keep his political conscience clear, Gen. George C. Marshall never even voted.

    Earlier this year, Army Lt. Col. Paul Yingling challenged his superiors head-on in an article in Armed Forces Journal.

    The Vietnam and Iraq “debacles are not attributable to individual failures, but rather to a crisis in an entire institution: America’s general officer corps,” wrote the former West Point instructor and Iraq veteran who recently took command of a battalion. “In both conflicts, the general officer corps designed to advise policymakers, prepare forces and conduct operations failed to perform its intended function.

    Even the troops know it's a failure.

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  100. The California Supreme Court handed workers a major victory Thursday, allowing them to bring class-action lawsuits alleging labor code violations even if they had signed agreements with their employers requiring them to arbitrate such disputes.

    By letting workers bypass these now-ubiquitous arbitration clauses, the ruling probably will add to the high volume of back-pay and overtime class-action cases already on court dockets, experts say, and will probably set a standard for courts in other states to follow.

    "For many workers, class-action lawsuits are the only type of lawsuits they can bring against their employer" because attorneys are reluctant to take on individual suits in which the potential awards are small, said Michael Rubin, a San Francisco lawyer who represented a former Circuit City worker in the case that went to the state Supreme Court.

    "Today's decision prevents employers from continuing this divide-and-conquer approach and reinstitutes the worker's rights to join with their fellow workers to sue for common violations of statutory rights," Rubin said.

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  101. It seems that some are waking up and finding out that Bush and his administrationhas taken over this country in every way.
    We have companies in Iraq that is using slave labor and constantly cheat America out of their tax dollars. Then we have our troops their staying longer than it was ever meant for troops to stay in a combat zone, simply because this President does not care and he is to dumb to realize this.

    Our MSM has been in this sleep and is slowly awakening, but still somewhat afraid to challenge this President as we all see what he did to Dan Rather and Bill Maher and their television lives.

    You have the Republican party that continues to support this nut and help in the take over of our rights in this country.

    We have the Democrats trying to decide to grow some balls to challenge this man, but still waiting for the next elections to do anything, because they are to worried about their own seats.

    What a country we are in now and what a bunch of Democrats we have become, not being able to protest the correct way to get things done, because we are too busy living our life or afraid our life will fall apart because of the conditions this President has us in.

    ReplyDelete
  102. The Blog World Report Awards have been announced and you are a winner!

    ReplyDelete
  103. PLEASE listen this morning to Basham And Cornell Progressive Talk

    www.bashamandcornell.com

    Listen live in Las Vegas on 1230 A.M. at 8 AM PST (right now!) or in the archives later.

    We discuss some riveting Iraq items, as well as the sex scandals.

    ReplyDelete
  104. What benefit do you think would ensue if these so-called whistleblowers were heeded? Deception is the lifeblood of the state. I frankly don't understand your obsession with Iraq, but am gratified that it exists. As long as you focus on Iraq, you will be less inclined to focus on the next phases of this global strategy, as well as those operations which are running concurrently with Iraq.

    The fact of the matter is that the plan outlined in Rebuilding America's Defenses has been successful: Homeland Security, multiple simultaneous wars, constabulary duties, and the Revolution in Military Affairs. The other goals mentioned: controlling the commons of space and the internet are in the final phases.

    There has been a great deal of delay, but that is coming to an end rather soon I should think judging by the recent declaration against Quds forces, and when it does what will you do?--Still focus on Iraq? You've already almost forgotten Afghanistan.

    Thankfully your whimperings will soon become moot.

    ReplyDelete
  105. THANK YOU ROBERT!! CONGRATULATIONS LARRY!!

    ReplyDelete
  106. Go fu#k yourself Sauros you Reich Wing Fascist SOB.

    cockroachs like you who loathe freedom and democracy and desire fascism and dictatorship dont deserve a voice you deserve to be stepped on like the insects and vermin you truly are.

    Much evil would have been averted if THOSE WHISTLE BLOWERS had been heeded...........Deception is ONLY the lifeblood of the state when it is being run by evil authoritarian fascist bastards like we have now...........and the mindless minions that follow them like YOU are part of the problem .................people like YOU and Conservatism is a plaugue you losers are a bunch of genocidal fascist pedophiles.

    ReplyDelete
  107. poor gutless little Reich Wing fascists have only grown more evil and anti freedom since vietnam.............apparently the only thing you idiots learned from vietnam was to be MORE evil and corupt and somewhere along the line you idiots stumbled across Hitlers gameplan and embraced it as your own.

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  108. Isnt it about time for you to cry and whine how hateful those mean liberals are you gutless punk, interesting how all you big tough guys thump your chest about how big and tough you are getting us into wars and torturing people while others die FOR YOU, yet you piss and whine like a little girl when anyone challenges you and opposes what you are doing and forces you to actually defend your insane position.

    why dont you go have yourself a good cry punk, because while you fascists are killing, torturing and spying on people and attempting to destroy democracy in my name you will get no quarter from me you conservotards are the disease and i'm the cure..........i loathed you and opposed you during Vietnam and I loathe you fascists idiots far more now because you are far more dangerous now.

    ReplyDelete
  109. Sauros said...
    What benefit do you think would ensue if these so-called whistleblowers were heeded? Deception is the lifeblood of the state. I frankly don't understand your obsession with Iraq, but am gratified that it exists. As long as you focus on Iraq, you will be less inclined to focus on the next phases of this global strategy, as well as those operations which are running concurrently with Iraq.


    Jeez, you're boring!

    ReplyDelete
  110. I see one of the trolls is back, that idiots post doesnt even merit a response............i've got better things to do on my birthday than argue with a moron.

    Time is too valuable to waste........had the week off and its just about over.

    ReplyDelete
  111. Happy Birthday Mike!

    ReplyDelete
  112. Congratulations on the World Blog Awards you won Lydia at Robert's

    Left of Centrist site!

    ReplyDelete
  113. WASHINGTON - Tony Snow, the highly visible White House press secretary, will leave his job on Sept. 14 and be replaced by his deputy, Dana Perino, an administration official said Friday.

    Nobody will miss Tony the Liar Snow.

    ReplyDelete
  114. Finally The Truth From a Republican:

    President Bush's apparent plans for a preemptive nuclear strike on Iran will only add to the civilian death toll as a result of US intervention that has placed the president "high on the list of mass murders of all time," a former aide in President Ronald Reagan's administration known for strident anti-Bush rhetoric said Friday.

    "Bush is too self-righteous to see the dark humor in his denunciations of Iran for threatening 'the security of nations everywhere' and of the Iraqi resistance for 'a vision that rejects tolerance, crushes all dissent, and justifies the murder of innocent men, women, and children in the pursuit of political power,'" writes Paul Craig Roberts, a former assistant secretary of the Treasury. "Those are precisely the words that most of the world applies to Bush and his Brownshirt administration."

    Roberts, who has emerged as a fierce critic of Bush's war policies, accused the president of ignoring habeas corpus and the Geneva Conventions, justifying torture and demonizing critics as anti-American.

    "Bush ... is responsible, according to Information Clearing House, for over one million deaths of Iraqi civilians, which puts Bush high on the list of mass murderers of all time," Roberts writes in a column published Friday on antiwar.com. "The vast majority of 'kills' by the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan are civilians."

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  115. Ten civilians were killed when Taliban rebels fired rockets at a US base in eastern Afghanistan Friday, while two Afghan soldiers died in a suicide bombing outside Kabul airport.

    The attacks were the latest in the war-torn country that have targeted international troops combating the Al-Qaeda-linked Islamist movement but ended up claiming the lives of Afghans instead.

    The 10 civilians died and another five were wounded when militants fired rockets at the US-led coalition base in eastern Kunar province's Chawkai district which hit a nearby village, police and officials said.

    Bush just loves the smell of death!

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  116. Virginia Sen. John Warner (R) said Friday that he will not seek reelection.

    Warner, 80, long a Capitol Hill power as a result of his post as chairman of the Armed Services committee when Republicans controlled the Senate, said of his five terms: "I have done my best" and closed with a quote from Thomas Jefferson on the historic campus of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. He said he'd made the decision in the "last day or two" and had wanted to first make one final trip to Iraq.

    Another war lover bites the dust!

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  117. That's great, Larry. In that case, his opposition may be genuine.

    ReplyDelete
  118. Sauros said

    What benefit do you think would ensue if these so-called whistleblowers were heeded

    The law would be enforced, which means the constitution works, and millions of soldiers didn't die in vain defending the United States Constitution, only to have a reichwing idiot, and his minons destroy it.

    Deception is the lifeblood of the state.

    No son deception is the life blood of those who think they need to FOOL people to achieve their illegal or immoral aims....

    thank you for showing what you really think of the Bush-Cheney lead administration.....

    I frankly don't understand your obsession with Iraq, but am gratified that it exists.

    One million dead Iraqi civilans, up to four million refugees, millions of other Iraqis wounded, and a semi modern middle eastern country destroyed so badly it has essentially returned to living in pre-WW1 modes in Baghdad.

    Almost 4000 US troops deaths, over 1000 civilian deaths, including the black water-KBR mercenaries, almost 30,000 US troops wounded... and you think it is NOT worthy of introspection and ending before MORE people are killed for lies and greed?

    Thank you for showing the REAL values of the reichwing.

    Not to mention the $500,000,000,000 wasted on this illegal immoral war, whch means we have NO money left to rebuild New Orleans, bridges and other infrastructure that needs it, furthrer mine safety so more miners won't end up like they did in Sago and Utah, fund health care for the children who need it, provide a proper education FOR all children. That is not to mention the up to 2 trillion dollars we will need for medical care for all the wounded vets, and rebuilding of the equipment destroyed or worn out in Iraq. All this money is being borrowed from places like Red China, and the Saudis (who BTW also fund al quada and the sunni insurgency in Iraq) thanks to STUPID reichwing immoral tax policies which places the burden for PAYING the real BILL long after the current crop of reichwingers have passed from the worlds stage, exactly the plan Ronald Reagan must have had, because HE started the borrow and spend with NO plan to repay the bills....(and the reichwing still has NO plan to pay for reagan or the Bush's brrowing but pass the buck to future generations) real reichwing of you fooles to hand unborn a debt they might not be able to shoulder with all the US industrial base and innovation outsourced to places like China

    As long as you focus on Iraq, you will be less inclined to focus on the next phases of this global strategy, as well as those operations which are running concurrently with Iraq.

    Sorry BOZO, but if you think we can run much deeper in the quagmire in the middle east with out totally destroying the US military and bankrpting the country you a bigger foole then you have shown here son.

    More ill advised agressive miliary adventures are guarenteed to totally undermine our soldiers and ability to raise the capial upon which all these stupid moves by Bush and Cheney are based and financed.

    This is also NOT to mention the fact we are running short on ammunition both over there, and here at some as police agencies have attested to. See son your stupid ideas of world conquest are running into the same logistical roadblcks that both Napoleon and Hitler ran into. In the end they didn't have enough men or resources to rule the world, and neither do we.

    BTW widdle boy why aren'tOU in uniform and serving there instead of pouding the keyboard from momm's basement?

    You remind me of another foole who used to post stupid dlusional rants ...

    Gay-dalf this ain't really you in another sock puppet disgiuse is it?

    The fact of the matter is that the plan outlined in Rebuilding America's Defenses has been successful:

    Funny how you define success son;

    Homeland Security,

    The most beaurocratic incompetent and illogical US agency ever formed, Hell they can't even control the borders or ports, let alone find out HOW bad a hurricane is even though the MSM is broadcasting up to the minute stories and videos 24-7 during the catastrophe....

    multiple simultaneous wars,

    Incompetently managed, planned and logistically equipped, which both have continued to deteriorate into a quagmre Iraq, hell son, even Bush thinks Iraq is as bad as Vietnam, (other wise why would he call for comparisons?) and a loomimg Fiasco in Afghanistan, which is causing the british and other NATO allies to raise alarms for the last couple of years,

    BTW got Ossama yet?

    NO? ... well I'm not surprised son, given HOW poorly everything else you clowns have planned have turned out ....

    constabulary duties, and the Revolution in Military Affairs.

    The only "revolution" you clowns have achieved was to take the greatest military force this planet has ever seen, and reduced it to a collapsing over streached hollow shell of it's former self.....

    The other goals mentioned: controlling the commons of space and the internet are in the final phases.

    Right son, if you fooles are as incompetent there as you have been else where, we have little to worry about except for the tubes filling with water like New Orleans did.

    There has been a great deal of delay,

    No son Tom Delay has been given the BOOT from washington also for his illegal activities....

    but that is coming to an end rather soon I should think judging by the recent declaration against Quds forces, and when it does what will you do?--Still focus on Iraq?

    Well son you gutless reichwing chicken hawks TALK big from mommy's basement don't ya son? Too bad that the US has little miliary ability to do MUCH from the air, except for attack infrastructure, and if Iraq is any guide, that will NOT slow down the Quds force in Iran any more than it has slowed the Sunni Insurgents or Shiite Militias in Iraq,AND FORGET ANY THOUGHTS OF USING GROUND FORCES SON ... (unless you and the other gutless reichwing college republicans are willing to sign up and serve) keep dreaming things which have little coorelation to reality, it is what you fooles do the best, ask KKKarl how well that turned out last november.....

    Oh that's right he and gonzo are cutting and running as the heat in washington gets near them.


    You've already almost forgotten Afghanistan.

    No foole WE haven't forgotten Afghanistan, either your a bald faced LIAR or you haven't read this blog long, beause we have raised the loomng fiasco of Afghanistan for the last couple of years widdle boy. It has been the reichwing gutless chicken hawk trolls(like YOU)who have ignored amd pooh poohed the worsening fiasco there son.

    Thankfully your whimperings will soon become moot.

    But the knashing of teeth and wailing of the reichwing will be with us for years after they get the permanent BOOT from washinton for a couple of decades, at least.

    Funny son the worse it gets for you reichwing BOZOs the more loney your posts become.....

    Are they upping the kool-aid dosages to keep you fooles in line, or are the only people left the truly delusional and deranged?

    ReplyDelete
  119. Larry said...

    Happy Birthday Mike!
    -------------------
    Yes, Mike..

    Have a very Happy Birthday! :)

    ReplyDelete
  120. Congratulations to Lydia and Larry for the Awards from Robert's blog!

    :)

    ReplyDelete
  121. Yes! Second Suzie.

    CONRATULATIONS to all of you guys on The Blog World Awards! :)

    ReplyDelete
  122. Oh & yes, HAPPY BIRTHAY! Mike!!!

    ReplyDelete
  123. (CNN) Karl Rove was nearly overcome with emotion Friday as colleagues privately paid tribute to the political adviser as he leaves the White House, senior officials say.

    At the closed-door senior staff meeting at 7:30 a.m. in the Roosevelt Room, Rove was surprised with a slide show of photos chronicling his nearly seven years at President Bush's side, through good times and bad.

    This wonderful slide show chronicled 7 years of destroying lives in the U.S and throughout the world.

    That's something for the Bushites to celebrate.

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  124. While forces on both sides of the political divide are pushing for Idaho Senator Larry Craig's resignation after Minneapolis-St. Paul airport police accused him of soliciting sex in a public toilet, there is no indication to date that the National Rifle Association will ask the Republican Senator to step down from its board of directors.

    The National Rifle Association: Another virtuous organization of hate.

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  125. Well, gang, as I reported on my blog yesterday, Sen. Larry Craig will make an "announcement" about his future in the Congress tomorrow.

    My sources continue to insist he will resign.

    The only change is the governor's choice of replacement. It's been bumped down a notch from AG to Assistant AG. I'm hearing he's a Mormon too.

    Fingers crossed. I hope this homophobic, GOP hypocrite is really biting the dust.

    ReplyDelete
  126. Here is how Bush is lying to the troops:

    The sheets of paper seemed to be everywhere the lawmakers went in the Green Zone, distributed to Iraqi officials, U.S. officials and uniformed military of no particular rank. So when Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.) asked a soldier last weekend just what he was holding, the congressman was taken aback to find out.

    In the soldier's hand was a thumbnail biography, distributed before each of the congressmen's meetings in Baghdad, which let meeting participants such as that soldier know where each of the lawmakers stands on the war. "Moran on Iraq policy," read one section, going on to cite some the congressman's most incendiary statements, such as, "This has been the worst foreign policy fiasco in American history."

    The bio of Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Calif.) -- "TAU (rhymes with 'now')-sher," the bio helpfully relates -- was no less pointed, even if she once supported the war and has taken heat from liberal Bay Area constituents who remain wary of her position. "Our forces are caught in the middle of an escalating sectarian conflict in Iraq, with no end in sight," the bio quotes.

    "This is beyond parsing. This is being slimed in the Green Zone," Tauscher said of her bio.

    More than two dozen House members and senators have used the August recess to travel to Iraq in the hope of getting a firsthand view of the war ahead of commanding Gen. David H. Petraeus's progress report in two weeks on Capitol Hill. But it appears that the trips have been as much about Iraqi and U.S. officials sizing up Congress as the members of Congress sizing up the war.

    Brief, choreographed and carefully controlled, the codels (short for congressional delegations) often have showed only what the Pentagon and the Bush administration have wanted the lawmakers to see. At one point, as Moran, Tauscher and Rep. Jon Porter (R-Nev.) were heading to lunch in the fortified Green Zone, an American urgently tried to get their attention, apparently to voice concerns about the war effort, the participants said. Security whisked the man away before he could make his point.

    Tauscher called it "the Green Zone fog."

    "Spin City," Moran grumbled. "The Iraqis and the Americans were all singing from the same song sheet, and it was deliberately manipulated."

    But even such tight control could not always filter out the bizarre world inside the barricades. At one point, the three were trying to discuss the state of Iraqi security forces with Iraq's national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie, but the large, flat-panel television set facing the official proved to be a distraction. Rubaie was watching children's cartoons.

    When Moran asked him to turn it off, Rubaie protested with a laugh and said, "But this is my favorite television show," Moran recalled.

    Porter confirmed the incident, although he tried to paint the scene in the best light, noting that at least they had electricity.

    "I don't disagree it was an odd moment, but I did take a deep breath and say, 'Wait a minute, at least they are using the latest technology, and they are monitoring the world,' " Porter said. "But, yes, it was pretty annoying."

    It was the bio sheets that seemed to annoy the members of Congress the most. Just who assembled them is not clear. E-mails to U.S. Central Command's public affairs office in Baghdad this week went unanswered.

    "I had never seen that in the past. That's new," said Porter, who was on his fourth trip to Iraq. "Now I want to see what they're saying about me," he added, when he learned of the contents of his travel companions' rap sheets.

    For one, the quotations appeared to be selected to divide the visitors into those who are with the war effort and those who are against. For another, they were not exactly accurate. Under "latest Iraq vote," Tauscher's bio noted that she had voted in favor of legislation requiring the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq within 120 days of the bill's enactment.

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  127. It looks like you called it right Christopher.

    Have you seen Pat Buchanan on MSNBC defending Craig all day?

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  128. Hi Larry,

    Just got home so I haven't had any TV on. I'm slugging through the day's email and trying to post here and there.

    Buchanan is such a lunatic!

    ReplyDelete
  129. Christopher:

    Buchanan thinks Craig has done nothing wrong.

    ReplyDelete
  130. Two U.S soldiers were killed in Iraq today.

    Are you happy now Bush!

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  131. Buchanan thinks Craig has done nothing wrong.

    Didn't Buchanan think Clinton "did something wrong" with Monica in the Oval Office?

    Why is Pat Buchanan the "go to" talkinghead for the MSM when they want the perspective of the rightwing?

    He was part of uber-GOPer Nixon's administration for goddness sake!

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  132. Buchanan is supposedly conservative, and conservatives oppose anything that goes against their version of morality.

    ReplyDelete
  133. One thing about Capitalist, they have no shame:

    Lehman taps Jeb Bush for private equity

    by, Nicolette Davey

    Lehman Brothers has appointed Jeb Bush to its private equity advisory board in the latest attempt by a buyout group to influence Capitol Hill.

    Lehman's move to hire the former Governor of Florida and brother of President Bush follows buyout giant Kohlberg Kravis Roberts hiring two former White House aides to lobby the US federal government on tax and regulatory matters affecting private equity.

    US Congress is currently reviewing measures to raise taxes paid by local private equity firms and proposing fund manager’s bonuses are classed as ordinary income instead of capital gains, which would result in the tax rate increasing from 15% to 35%.

    According to reports filed with the US Senate, private equity firms spent $1.4m (€1m) on lobbying in 2006. In the first half of this year, the figure has almost quadrupled to about $5.5m, according to a Bloomberg report.

    Data from Thomson Financial’s peHub.com showed over 254 contributions from partners at private equity firms have been made during the US presidential campaign including Apollo Management, Bain Capital, The Blackstone Group and The Carlyle Group.

    Mitt Romney, founder of US group Bain Capital, has raised over $326,200 for his US presidential campaign, the most popular candidate among buyout houses, according to peHub.com.

    Bush, the younger brother of current US President George W Bush and tipped to be a future presidential candidate, was the 43rd Governor of Florida, holding the post for eight years until January. In April he joined the board of the largest US publicly owned hospital operator Tenet Healthcare.

    In May last year Lehman appointed Bush’s cousin, George Walker, to head up the bank’s asset management division after recruiting him from Goldman Sachs where he was co-head of the bank’s hedge fund strategies group.

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  134. Has anyone ever seen Pat and Bey Buchanan in the room at the same time?

    Hmmmmmmmmmmm? LOL!

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  135. I never thought about that Christopher.

    ReplyDelete
  136. LOOMING FOOD CRISIS -

    The surge in demand for agrofuels such as ethanol is hitting the poor and the environment. A "perfect storm" of ecological and social factors appears to be gathering force, threatening vast numbers of people with food shortages and price rises. The era of cheap food is over. World commodity prices of sugar, milk and cocoa have all surged, prompting the BIGGEST INCREASE IN RETAIL FOOD PRICES IN THREE DECADES in some countries. "Meat, too, will cost more because chicken and pigs are fed largely on grain." The world price [of maize] has doubled. 850m people around the world are already undernourished. There will soon be more because the price of food aid has increased 20% in just a year. In the US, where nearly 40 million people are below the official poverty line, the Department of Agriculture recently predicted a 10% rise in the price of chicken. The prices of bread, beef, eggs and milk rose 7.5 % in July, the HIGHEST MONTHLY RISE IN 25 YEARS. Reports suggest that one-third of ocean fisheries are in collapse, two-thirds will be in collapse by 2025, and all major ocean fisheries may be virtually gone by 2048. 15% of the world's present food supplies, on which 160 million people depend, are being grown with water drawn from rapidly depleting underground sources or from rivers that are drying up. In large areas of China and India, the water table has fallen catastrophically. In Britain, the recent floods will result in a shortage of vegetables such as potatoes and peas, and cereals such as wheat. This comes on top of a 4.9% rise in food prices in the year to May and a 9.6% hike in vegetable prices. Rain-dependent agriculture could be cut in half by 2020 as a result of climate change. "Anything even close to a 50% reduction in yields would obviously pose huge problems." "The competition for grain between the world's 800 million motorists, who want to maintain their mobility, and its two billion poorest people, who are simply trying to survive, is emerging as an epic issue." It is not going to get any better. The UN's World Food Organisation predicts that demand for biofuels will grow by 170% in the next three years. A separate report from the OECD, the club of the world's 30 richest countries, suggested food-price rises of between 20% and 50% over the next decade. This time last year, there were fewer than 100 ethanol plants in the whole United States, with a combined production capacity of 5bn gallons. There are now at least 50 more new plants being built and over 300 more are planned. If even half of them are finished, they will help to rewrite the politics of global food.

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  137. CNN is reporting that Larry Craig will announce he will resign effective Sept 30th....

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  138. Clif,

    Soreass is hardly worth getting up to fact check.

    ReplyDelete
  139. It's the same rhetoric he spews on his other blog that only Worf comments on Carl.

    ReplyDelete
  140. Hi guys its really great that you won the blog award Lydia and Mike I hope you had a nice birthday

    ReplyDelete
  141. Cliff:
    The law would be enforced, which means the constitution works....

    S:
    That's a quaint ideal. The only problem is the Constitution is an anachronism. We are moving towards a much worthier goal, which undoubtedly a man of your rabid intellect can't fathom.

    Cliff:
    No son deception is the life blood of those who think they need to FOOL people to achieve their illegal or immoral aims....

    S:
    What is illegal and/or immoral from your perspective may be necessary, hence just from someone else's. You are in the old paradigm of good and evil, concepts which have no place in this new age.

    Cliff:
    thank you for showing what you really think of the Bush-Cheney lead administration.....

    S:
    You're quite welcome. Thank you for taking the time to at least attempt some kind of response, albeit a limited and misguided one.

    Cliff:
    One million dead Iraqi civilans, up to four million refugees, millions of other Iraqis wounded, and a semi modern middle eastern country destroyed....

    S:
    It's worth it. Think outside the box for a change. You don't even know the deceased Iraqis. How can your heart bleed for strangers?

    Cliff
    Thank you for showing the REAL values of the reichwing.

    S:
    These are the real values of Power: utility, pragmatism, force, prudence, cunning, deception. Put aside your provincial political viewpoints for a moment and consider that. If you want to talk candidates, Hillary will make a fantastic President as I said before: she will be cool under pressure and will always have the sage advice of her partner who happens to be well practiced at statecraft.

    Cliff
    Not to mention the $500,000,000,000 wasted....All this money is being borrowed....NO plan to repay the bills....pass the buck to future generations) real reichwing of you fooles to hand unborn a debt they might not be able to shoulder....

    S:
    My, how you do rant. After the economy is restructured, those concerns will become moot. There is a noble process at work which you neglect: globalization. It solves every petty argument you ranted about and many others you can't even conceive at present. Present petty suffering makes it all the more worthwhile in the end. Moreover, you have neglected the burden the lesser classes are on the planet, like a festering sore--it's called overpopulation and thankfully it will be dealt with whether you like it or not.

    Cliff:
    Sorry BOZO, but if you think we can run much deeper in the quagmire in the middle east with out totally destroying the US military and bankrpting the country....

    S:
    Again globalization and economic restructuring presently underway make those points moot. Have you forgotten the UN and NATO, to say nothing of European forces? Global integration solves your small minded conceptions of problems.

    Cliff:
    More ill advised agressive miliary adventures are guarenteed to totally undermine our soldiers and ability to raise the capial....

    S:
    You aren't thinking globally. In the long range scheme of things, the US military will have to be merged into a greater global constabulary force. In the future, financing won't be limited by archaic notions of national sovereignty either--they basically already aren't, though there are still a few hurdles left.

    Cliff:
    This is also NOT to mention the fact we are running short on ammunition both over there, and here at some as police agencies.... roadblcks that both Napoleon and Hitler ran into.

    S:
    You actually believe that nonsense? There is plenty of ammo for those who truly need it. You have no real idea of what's really happening, do you?

    Cliff:
    BTW widdle boy why aren'tOU in uniform and serving there instead of pouding the keyboard from momm's basement?

    S:
    There is a place for grunts, and then there is a place for idea men. That's what I meant by QUANTITY AND QUALITY--it obviously flew over your pointy top.

    Cliff:
    Gay-dalf this ain't really you in another sock puppet disgiuse is it?

    S:
    Never heard of him.

    Cliff:
    Funny how you define success son;

    S:
    Undoubtedly for someone without vision it is.

    Cliff:
    The most beaurocratic incompetent and illogical US agency ever formed, Hell they can't even control the borders or ports, let alone find out HOW bad a hurricane is even though the MSM is broadcasting up to the minute stories and videos 24-7 during the catastrophe....

    S:
    The borders don't need "protecting" in the way you think--yet another misconception made moot by current economic restructuring and hemispheric integration. No great loss has occurred that I'm aware of from any hurricane, let alone due to the fault of DHS. Any losses were merely examples of survival of the fittest. The weak sabotage themselves while the strong (smart) succeed.

    Cliff:
    Incompetently managed, planned and logistically equipped, which both have continued to deteriorate into a quagmre Iraq...loomimg Fiasco in Afghanistan, which is causing the british and other NATO allies to raise alarms for the last couple of years,

    S:
    You make me laugh with your utter lack of understanding regarding global geopolitical strategy. Iraq had to be smashed this way, you dullard. For forward bases, to break the country up into at least three manageable sectarian regions, to allow the chaos to bubble up in a sublime act of creative destruction--all these things and more you can't possibly understand no matter how superbly they are explained in documents such as Rebuilding America's Defenses (which you've undoubtedly not bothered to read).

    Cliff:
    BTW got Ossama yet?

    S:
    As far as anyone knows, he died of kidney failure about 5 years ago.

    Cliff:
    The only "revolution" you clowns have achieved was to take the greatest military force this planet has ever seen, and reduced it to a collapsing over streached hollow shell of it's former self.....

    S:
    Again, you have no understanding of real politics. Thankfully it doesn't matter what you think. Better minds are in charge.

    It appears the rest of your post descended into a conniption fit of dereistic vituperation, so I shall now bid you good day.

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  142. WASHINGTON — The Bush administration wants the power to grant legal immunity to telecommunications companies that are slapped with privacy suits for cooperating with the White House's controversial warrantless eavesdropping program.

    The authority would effectively shut down dozens of lawsuits filed against telecommunications companies accused of helping set up the program.

    Free all the Bush lawbreakers: That's the Bush way!

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  143. Yesterday, the Washington Post reported that President Bush will soon request an additional $50 billion from Congress for the war in Iraq. The request, which is expected to be made after Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testify to Congress about Iraq, “appears to reflect the view in the administration” that Bush’s escalation strategy “will last into the spring of 2008 and will not be shortened by Congress.”

    On Fox News’ Special Report last night, host Brit Hume revealed that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was unaware of the White House’s plans. “A Pentagon spokesman said Defense Secretary Gates saw the published report this morning and said, quote, ‘this is news to me,’”

    Now Bush is cutting out his little lapdog from his share of taxpayer dollars filtered through the Iraq war.

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  144. Is Bush starting a War in Latin America:

    Two soldiers in Paraguay stand in front of a camera. One of them holds an automatic weapon. John Lennon's "Imagine" plays in the background. This Orwellian juxtaposition of war and peace is from a new video posted online by U.S. soldiers stationed in Paraguay. The video footage and other military activity in this heart of the continent represent a new wave of U.S.-backed militarism in Latin America.

    It's a reprise of a familiar tune. In the 1970s and 1980s, Paraguay's longtime dictator, Gen. Alfredo Stroessner, collaborated with the region's other dictators through Operation Condor, which used kidnapping, torture and murder to squash dissent and political opponents. Stroessner's human rights record was so bad that even Ronald Reagan distanced himself from the leader. Carrying on this infamous legacy, Paraguay now illustrates four new characteristics of Latin America's right-wing militarism: joint exercises with the U.S. military in counterinsurgency training, monitoring potential dissidents and social organizations, the use of private mercenaries for security and the criminalization of social protest through "anti-terrorism" tactics and legislation.

    In May of 2005, the Paraguayan Senate voted to allow U.S. troops to operate in Paraguay with total immunity. Washington had threatened to cut off millions in aid to the country if Paraguay did not grant the U.S. troops entry. In July of 2005 hundreds of U.S. soldiers arrived in the country, and Washington's funding for counterterrorism efforts in Paraguay doubled. The U.S. troops conducted various operations and joint training exercises with Paraguayan forces, including so-called Medical Readiness Training Exercises (MEDRETEs). Orlando Castillo, a military policy expert at the human rights rights organization Servicio, Paz y Justicia in Asunción, Paraguay, says the MEDRETEs were "observation" operations aimed at developing "a type of map that identifies not just the natural resources in the area, but also the social organizations and leaders of different communities."

    Castillo, in his cool Asunción office, with the standard Paraguayan herbal tea, tereré in his hand, said these operations marked a shift in U.S. military strategy. "The kind of training that used to just happen at the School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia, is now decentralized," he explained. "The U.S. military is now establishing new mechanisms of cooperation and training with armed forces." Combined efforts, such as MEDRETEs, are part of this agenda. "It is a way to remain present, while maintaining a broad reach throughout the Americas." Castillo said this new wave of militarism is aimed at considering internal populations as potential enemies and preventing insurgent leftists from coming to power.

    Bruce Kleiner of the U.S. Embassy in Paraguay said that the MEDRETEs "provide humanitarian service to some of Paraguay's most disadvantaged citizens." But this video by Captain William Johnson shows that there's more to the MEDRETE operations, with local Paraguayans being questioned as they receive treatment, as well as events and ceremonies aimed at strengthening ties between the military personnel of both countries. Often, heavily armed men are seen walking past lines of local families while they wait for medicine and questions. The lighthearted depiction of these joint military operations seen in the video is in sharp contrast with reports from local citizens.

    How many wars will they let this maniac start?

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  145. High-quality health care for all Americans moved closer to reality this Labor Day with the 13-million-member AFL-CIO unveiling a major drive to achieve universal health care by 2009.

    “The out-of-control cost of health care is crippling American families and American businesses,” AFL-CIO President John Sweeney told reporters at the federation’s annual briefing Aug. 29. “Labor’s campaign is based on the simple premise that no one in America should go without health care, and we’re going to make sure candidates and elected leaders understand that the people will accept nothing less.”

    The AFL-CIO launched a drive that it says will result, by 2009, in all Americans being able to benefit from a health insurance system that:

    • controls rising and irrational costs,

    • provides comprehensive, high-quality health care to all,

    • gives every family the opportunity for preventive care,

    • preserves the ability to choose doctors,

    • has government controlling costs, guaranteeing fairness and efficiency, and eliminating private insurer greed and incompetence,

    • lowers employer costs,

    • builds on positive elements of programs like Medicare and draws upon experiences that work in other countries.

    Some AFL-CIO unions back HR 676, the bill introduced by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) that would institute single-payer, national health care for all and eliminate the private insurance companies altogether. Asked if he supports HR 676, Sweeney said, “The Conyers bill is in line with our vision for secure, high-quality health care for all Americans.” He added, “Rather than wedding ourselves to one bill at this time, we are building grassroots support for health care reform and plan to work with a worker-friendly president and Congress to enact meaningful reform after the 2008 elections.”

    Sweeney declared, “There is no real chance that meaningful health care reform will be enacted while this president is still in office. Rather than fight a losing battle, we are building a 1-million-member mobilization team of activists and working with a broad group of allies to keep comprehensive health care reform at the top of the political agenda in 2008 and to ensure that the real work of fixing the health care sytem actually gets done after the elections.”

    Bush and the Repugs will stop this action to help the working poor.

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  146. What a coincidence: Bush's Iraqi government is corrupt like his U.S administration:

    As Congress prepares to receive reports on Iraq from General David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker and readies for a debate on George W. Bush's latest funding request of $50 billion for the Iraq war, the performance of the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has become a central and contentious issue. But according to the working draft of a secret document prepared by the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, the Maliki government has failed in one significant area: corruption. Maliki's government is "not capable of even rudimentary enforcement of anticorruption laws," the report says, and, perhaps worse, the report notes that Maliki's office has impeded investigations of fraud and crime within the government.

    The draft--over 70 pages long--was obtained by The Nation, and it reviews the work (or attempted work) of the Commission on Public Integrity (CPI), an independent Iraqi institution, and other anticorruption agencies within the Iraqi government. Labeled "SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED/Not for distribution to personnel outside of the US Embassy in Baghdad," the study details a situation in which there is little, if any, prosecution of government theft and sleaze. Moreover, it concludes that corruption is "the norm in many ministries."

    The report depicts the Iraqi government as riddled with corruption and criminals-and beyond the reach of anticorruption investigators. It also maintains that the extensive corruption within the Iraqi government has strategic consequences by decreasing public support for the U.S.-backed government and by providing a source of funding for Iraqi insurgents and militias.

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  147. Gen. David Petraeus, who is scheduled to brief Congress in two weeks on the progress in Iraq, assured lawmakers this week that the administration is not involved in the writing of his report, according to a lawmaker who has recently returned from the region.

    Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-Fla.), told reporters Thursday that Petraeus said he and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker had briefed the administration on the situation in Iraq, but added that “as far as [Petraeus] is concerned … he is writing his recommendations of that report and testimony.”

    I believe Petraeus: He doesn't need Bush to tell him how to lie. He does that well on his own!

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  148. Ford and General Motors have threatened to leave Detroit and take their car manufacturing operations overseas if unions do not agree to a massive pay cut for hourly paid workers.
    The threat to quit the city they call Motown because of its rich automotive heritage would be a crippling blow to Detroit, which is suffering amid a prolonged economic downturn and has been hit by the sub-prime mortgage crisis.

    Ford and GM are in the thick of negotiations with the United Auto Workers union, the most powerful labour group in the industry. The car makers maintain they must dramatically reduce manufacturing costs if they are to survive in today's global economy.

    Their biggest burden is the current labour cost per vehicle - an estimated $71 (around £35) per man hour. Workers earn about $27 an hour with the remainder made up of overheads such as pensions and healthcare costs for the thousands of retirees on their books.

    Ford and GM have made it clear that they expect to reduce the hourly cost from $71 to about $50 - a cut of about 30 per cent. The companies are keen not to cut workers' hourly pay, but they insist that other overheads must be reduced.

    If a deal cannot be reached, Ford and GM negotiators have said the companies will have no choice but to move their North American operations to countries in Latin America and Asia where manufacturing costs are cheaper.

    The current credit crisis is not helping the ailing US car manufacturers to reverse their fortunes. Many senior figures in the industry are calling for action from the Federal Reserve to spur markets and the economy. Bob Nardelli, the new Chrysler CEO, has been most vocal in calling for an interest rate cut to help boost consumer activity.

    Alan Mulally, the Ford chief executive, said last week that economic conditions were proving to be a 'big headwind' working against the company's turnaround plan. He stopped short of calling for an interest rate cut but stressed the importance of 'focusing on economic growth'.

    A GM spokesman said: 'From a GM perspective, the focus of the talks is on closing the competitive gaps and building a viable long-term future for the company and our people.'

    Sources close to senior GM executives confirmed that the prospect of shifting operations away from North America was very real. 'We have seen it in every other industry,' one said. 'There are no sacred cows today. Globalisation means just that, it's a worldwide playing field.'

    This is Bush's idea of Corporate America at it's best!

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  149. I never thought I’d say this, I never thought I could let go of my own judgments about the closeted right-wing hypocrites who bash gays, but I feel so sorry for Senator Larry Craig from Idaho.

    I’m praying that he doesn’t kill himself out of shame. No one deserves to be convicted like this in the media. Bill Clinton didn’t deserve it either.

    ReplyDelete
  150. I have just got to recommend a great post I saw over at Mad Mike's America tonight.

    Ladies with a negligible sense of humor are advised to steer clear. Lydia, though, will get a kick out of it :)

    ReplyDelete
  151. Lydia said,

    I’m praying that he doesn’t kill himself out of shame. No one deserves to be convicted like this in the media. Bill Clinton didn’t deserve it either.


    I wish I could agree with you. But I don't.

    This guy made his political bones on demonizing the very people he was seeking out in those bathrooms, and I remember all too well what he had to say about Clinton. We should all remember that Clinton never, ever pretended to be some kind of a saint. Craig was in the pack of witch-hunters, and therefore made his own activities open to scrutiny. And ridicule, if he was found wanting. He was, of course, found wanting, and I really don't give a damn what happens to him. His kind have been merciless in their destruction of civility and decency in America.

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  152. Lydia, I think all right-wing holier-than-thou Redumblicans should be required to read your post about feeling sorry for Craig. Perhaps then they will learn how a true Christian is supposed to act and feel.

    Me, I'm not sure I'm a true Christian anymore so ... Ha Ha, Craig!

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  153. Looks like "sauros" makes even Moo Moo look sane.....

    He believes the collapsing US economy and infrastructure with it's declining industrial base will be capable of overcomng historical forces which has plagued every other empire in decline.

    And he believes other nations want to submit to Bush-Cheney ET Al, Now that is way too funny but delightfully delusional in his tinking his illogical delusional rants have any connection to reality.

    Especially the parts about using genetic mutations and new nano technology to make a 1984 world for a very few wealthy elite where every one else subsists to prefom the necessary work to keep the elite living lives of luxary.

    Well certain people tried the very same social structure he advocates in the 1930's-1940's, but the rest of the planet rejected their immoral illogical approach, just as his stupd ideas will be trown on the dust heap of storyright afer his ilk are sent packing in a year.

    He honestly thinks the Europeans are willing to go down the path he lays out afer WW2?

    Looks like he really knows very lttle about the history of that continent, and what most peoplethink abot peoplelike him who advcates areturn to the social structures which have been totally rejected.

    But he probably knows little but what he reads in books or on the tubes, after all what 23 year old has done much after all.

    ReplyDelete
  154. Clif he is upset because Worf hasn't posted on one of his other blogs lately.

    ReplyDelete
  155. Bill Mayer is on shortly and he will no doubt have things to say about "Stall Crawler" Craig.

    ReplyDelete
  156. Chimpy is sort of obligated to try to keep Paraguay in the wingnut camp. He's gonna need that ranch to run to.

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  157. Cliff, as usual you've got everything distorted.

    It isn't the US that will lead the world, but Europe. For now, the US military machine serves a purpose. In the future utopia which I described and which you so vulgarly took out of context, it shall be submerged into a global peace keeping force led by Europe. You really are clueless about the world you live in, aren't you? Age is irrelevant, what counts is IQ.

    ReplyDelete
  158. Worf please post on one of his other worthless blogs. He obviously wants to hear from you.

    ReplyDelete
  159. sauros defecated,

    You really are clueless about the world you live in, aren't you? Age is irrelevant, what counts is IQ.


    Couldn't have put it better myself.

    Every indicator there is, from economic activity to environmental pressure, indicates that the world as a whole is about to metaphorically fly apart. The post-Roman world has far more clues within it as to what we are facing than your sci-fi fantasy one does. Like any other ideologue, however, you are so wedded to your ideology that facts will not stand in the way of your vision.

    Your kind comes and goes, while the more pragmatic among us get on with figuring out how to survive.

    ReplyDelete
  160. Jolly Roger--thankfully your survival isn't an issue.

    Larry--Who the hell is Worf? A Vision For The Future is my first blog at blogger.com, albeit copied from one I previously posted at my new MySpace page. Those two blog sites constitute the present totality of my blog activity.

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  161. Sorry Bozo find me ten Americans (not counting yourself)who will submit to europe leading this country, especially when the economic center has already moved to Asia, your a lttle ignorat about that also.

    Sorry son you would be much better advised to reframe your weak argument and place a Russian Chinese cooperation in ruling the planet, as Russia has the resources and still a formatable military, and China has the industrial might, and man power to fill the ranks of the grunts you seem to despise.

    The nano techology and placing sensors in the sewers to hunt down drug abusers was funny thought son.

    You should write comedy, oh thats right you already do, but you don't realize it do you?

    ReplyDelete
  162. How his speedo comments mirror those of the other mindless blogs that Worf commented on a few months ago, to run his feeble count up.

    ReplyDelete
  163. Oh look one of the wannabe smartguy trolls is back.........Clif, Thu and JR should have fun with this idiot!

    ReplyDelete
  164. Lydia Cornell said...
    I never thought I’d say this, I never thought I could let go of my own judgments about the closeted right-wing hypocrites who bash gays, but I feel so sorry for Senator Larry Craig from Idaho.

    I’m praying that he doesn’t kill himself out of shame. No one deserves to be convicted like this in the media. Bill Clinton didn’t deserve it either."

    Well Lydia, while I certainly hope he doesnt kill him self, what him and Clinton did were VERY different...........Clinton didnt go around claiming the moral high ground and bashing gays and adulterers then do the very thing he decries............let me ask you, would you prefer the MSM to sweep it under the rug like the do almost all the other Reich Wing BS.

    ReplyDelete
  165. Mike he is craving Worf's attention on one of those mini blogs he quickly threw together.

    ReplyDelete
  166. BTW, Clif "LIKE" Moo Moo may not be quite right.............no one else can be this delusional although Troll Tex comes close..........I think this clown probably is Moo Moo..........if not theres alot of really scewed up delusioal morons on there.

    ReplyDelete
  167. The Reich wing must be breeding these losers to dumb down the gene pool.

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  168. Mike you know where that one "Secret" blog is that he has, that shows his true self.

    ReplyDelete
  169. Americans, like all other mental deficients, will submit to anything if it's packaged properly. Besides, Americans have no choice in the matter.

    The Sino-Russian alliance is beneficial to globalization. Who did you think founded modern Russia and China? When George C Marshall ousted peanut head Chiang Kai Shek, did you think that was an accident? You dopes probably have no idea what the Special Administrative Regions are all about, so what arrogant stupidity is it that compels you to draw conclusions about the Sino-Russian alliance?

    Europe has the true wealth of the world, attaining a monopoly of global resources is only a matter of business--gentlemen and ladies meeting and working their differences out in a rational manner. It is only the lesser classes which will have to be dealt with as those in Power throughout the globe are reasonable men and women who know how to get results--and they know that competition is a sin.

    If you wish to believe in the completely erroneous conflation that I am someone else who some "Worf" used to banter with, so be it. I care not what any of you benighted mutants misperceive.

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  170. Did you see Adolph Bush wishing Tony "the liar" Snow farewell.

    How crushingly touching.

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  171. Mike if you want a REAL laugh, try reading his blog, it's as funny as the articles from the fifties about what the world would be like today, too bad he is as wrong as they were back then....

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  172. It looks like that one blog he has that nobody visits.

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  173. I did read the idiots blog briefly Clif and Larry.................this reject is like a cross between Moo Moo, FF, Hitler and GWB............he's so pathetic its almost laughable.........did any of you guys hear Basham hang up on him after he said our government NEEDS to lie to us..........he's a Simple Simon that thinks he's smarter than the average bear just like the Fool!

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  174. Did his fake truck lose a wheel?

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  175. He seems to want to believe that europe which is almost totally dependant on the russians and saudis for their oil requirements, with Russia squeezing tighter each day, will some how over come their lack of raw materials and resources(let alone historical animosities) to control the entire planet NOW, even though they couldn't when they had a much larger advanage both in miltary and industrial developement, in the 15-19 centuries......

    He is as delusional as crusty was claiming the economy was going gonzo and all was well....

    And writes in broad generalisations like gay-dalf did, but with the insanity only shown by Moo moo himself...

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  176. Clif, he wants to believe that Bush and Cheney are creating some sort of global fascist utopia where there rich will get ever richer and the poor will just die off..........too bad for them there delusional incompetence has allowed them to succeed at very little except ruining our country as well as Iraq.

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  177. Why would he want the poor to die off, he is dirt poor himself.

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  178. Dirt poor Larry............but in his delusional mind he is Elmer Fudd a "pretend" tough guy who owns a mansion and a yacht.................BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

    Stupid little troll!

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  179. Mike, I wonder what his therapist thinks about the delusions he claims to "see" in the future?

    Cause if he isn't seeing one, he is depriving somebody of the next break thru in abnormal psychology....

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  180. I bet he is a "stall crawler" like his Republican heroes.

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  181. Did you see Lydia actually commented on his blog.........LOL!

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  182. if you can actually call it a blog............i actually like the other troll blog better!

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  183. Lydia probably wanted to give the troll a comment since it sits bare, much like Worf was doing.

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  184. Actually, I'm with Lydia on this. It's not that I didn't get a kick out of Craig's misfortune at first, but we shouldn't drag ourselves down to the level of the GOP during the Clinton persecution. We want the US to set a good example and stop torture and secret prisons. I've always felt that Liberals were the true compassionates. We don't have to like the hypocrisy of Craig's actions - before he was caught - but we can be better human beings by taking a step back and ask if we would want to be treated like that. I would indeed to hear that Craig had committed suicide over his shame. I would feel even worse if we were to discover later that it was the over saturation of the media surrounding the case that was the proverbial straw.

    But if he does make it through this, I'll still snicker at his hypocrisy.

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  185. larry and lydia congrats on your Blog Award.

    God Bless.

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  186. Thank you Anon-Paranoid your comments on Lydia's blog are appreciated anytime.

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  187. Robert:

    I understand where you are coming from, I guess it is hard to forget all the interviews Craig has done, where he spewed his virtuous morals that were supposedly better than anyone else.

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  188. Check out Jolly Roger's post on a war with Iran:

    Reconstitution

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  189. I can't help it, suddenly I just felt sorry for him. Believe me, it wasn't a choice. I mean all week I was delighted with the whole bizarro zaniness and poetic justice of all the Republican hypocrites that are being caught in their own web

    But I was writing a chapter on Christ, I suddenly started crying and was overcome with compassion for him.

    I guess it's his shame. Anyone who is so deeply closeted is deeply guilt-ridden and he must have had a horrible childhood. It's so perverse what he has done to others, in his self-loathing. Gay people today are feeling like outcasts because of this type of person.

    No one chooses to be gay. He has projected all his self-hatred onto all gays, and yet has a compulsiont that is twisted into a taboo, etc.

    I just know how it feels to have screwed up and have no one on your side, and feel unredeemable.

    But as Christians, we are all redeemable. I feel sad for prisoners who are punished much worse than they deserve.

    I mean didn't Moses kill a man?

    Anyway, any one of us can make a horrible mistake at any time. We have to remember that it's best not to cast stones, even when it feels so good.

    Look at how Larry Craig's own words about Clinton came back to haunt him!

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  190. And I don't mean only "Christians" are redeemable. Everyone is, no matter what religion or tribe.

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  191. Weakness in the U.S. housing market could trigger an international slide in home prices that depresses the sector for years, a top housing specialist warned central bankers.

    All because of the Bush economy!

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  192. BAGHDAD - Civilian deaths rose slightly in August as a huge suicide attack in the north two weeks ago offset security gains elsewhere, making it the second deadliest month for Iraqis since the U.S. troop buildup began, according to figures compiled Saturday by The Associated Press.

    U.S. deaths remained well below figures from last winter when the U.S began dispatching 30,000 additional troops to Iraq.

    At least 1,809 civilians were killed in the month, compared to 1,760 in July, based on figures compiled by the AP from official Iraqi reports. That brings to 27,564 the number of Iraqi civilians killed since AP began collecting data on April 28, 2005.

    This is a count Bush doesn't care about!

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  193. SALT LAKE CITY - Federal officials have indefinitely suspended efforts to find six men trapped for nearly four weeks inside a coal mine after a robotic camera failed to provide any useful information, an attorney for the men’s families said Friday.

    “They said, ’We’ve exhausted the options that we know about,”’ said Colin King, an attorney serving as a spokesman for all six families.

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  194. Nobody wants Poor Condi:

    On May 25, Stanford University’s student newspaper, The Stanford Daily, devoted the bulk of its front page to the university’s former provost, who is on leave while she serves out her term as secretary of state. “Condi Eyes Return,” read the headline, “but in What Role?”

    Within hours, the letters to the editor started coming in. “Condoleezza Rice serves an administration that has trashed the basic values of academia: reason, science, expertise, and honesty. Stanford should not welcome her back,” wrote Don Ornstein, identified by the newspaper as an emeritus professor of mathematics in a letter published May 31.

    Online comments on the newspaper’s Web site were even harsher, a veritable stream of vitriol. One of the milder posts came from Jon Wu, who did not give an affiliation: “Please go away, Rice. We don’t want someone who is responsible for the slaughter of an entire nation teaching at our school.”

    There was a time when, perhaps more than Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barack Obama, Condoleezza Rice seemed to have the best shot at becoming the first woman or the first African-American to be president. But that was before she sounded public alarms based on faulty intelligence to justify the Iraq war, telling CNN, “We don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.” It was before a former top Bush administration colleague, David Kay, charged with finding unconventional weapons after the Iraq invasion, referred to Ms. Rice in Bob Woodward’s “State of Denial” as “probably the worst national security adviser since the office was created.”

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  195. The main reason for the upsurge in uninsured Americans is that employment-based coverage continued to deteriorate. Indeed, the number of full-time workers without health insurance rose from 20.8 million in 2005 to 22.0 million in 2006, presumably because either the employers or the workers or both found it too costly.

    Sadly, the one area where the nation had made progress — reducing the number of uninsured children — took a turn for the worse…. last year the number of uninsured children jumped more than 600,000 to reach 8.6 million. The main reason, advocacy groups say, is that access and funding for the low-income programs became tighter while employer coverage for dependents eroded.

    This is Bush's America!

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  196. Lydia's troll came to visit ME! I am so honored to have the same delusional tripe as the famous and admired entertainer and talk-show host!

    I tried to read his tripe at his own blog, but it was so out of thie world I got a headache and quit.

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  197. If you have not seen the fantastic Jimmy Breslin's latest column, you should go have a look at it now. This guy was, and still is, the best of the best.

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  198. Russia To Deploy New Intercontinental Missiles

    The 22-metre Topol-M is an intercontinental ballistic missile carrying a single warhead. It was first developed during the 1990s after the collapse of the Soviet Union and was later upgraded. It can be launched either from silos or from mobile launchers which can be camouflaged and hidden in forests.
    Along with the multiple-warhead RS-24, to be deployed in the next few years, it will form the backbone of Russia’s nuclear armoury and help bolster armed forces eroded over years of post-Soviet decline.


    Reagan was able to stop the insanity of building larger and more dangerous nuclear weapons on both sides, and set both countries to lowering the number of weapons and begin a return from the horrors of nuclear armageddon,

    Now thanks to Bush-Cheney, they have convinced Putin that he needs to restart that horrible path.

    Instead of a better future with out Nuclear destruction hanging over their heads, Bush-Cheney are handing future generations a return to the past, where school children hide under their school deaks from the Mushroom clouds, which grow over their cities, thanks to the insanity which was the Bush-Cheney foreign policy.

    Heck of a job Morons...

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  199. What are the lessons that should be learned from the David Viter and Larry Craig scandals?

    The Big Picture

    It's always good to seek out the larger lesson behind a political scandal. So in this case, it seems to be, If you're a Republican and you want to misbehave sexually, make sure it's with a chick.

    Late Update: Also, make sure you've got a Democratic governor.

    --Josh Marshall


    Hypocrissy, thy name is republican....

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  200. Larry,

    Remember this name: Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC)

    He's the next closet queen and GOP hypocrite whose name will drop in the MSM.

    McHenry has ties to the triple murder/suicide of Republican political consultant Ralph Gonzales earlier this year in Orlando, FL.

    I have to say, the GOP really makes my job as a liberal blogger so easy. The stories write themselves!

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