Lets Give Credit, Where Credit is Due

George W Bush has many accomplishments under his wing. Unfortunately for Americans, those accomplishments have cost each one of us dearly. Nevertheless George W Bush is proud of his accomplishments. Therefore lets list some of these accomplishments, and Lets Give Credit, Where Credit Is Due.

•Bush spent the U.S. budget surplus and bankrupted the US Treasury, all in the name of conservatism.

•Bush broke the record for the biggest annual deficit in history.

•Bush set an economic record for the most personal bankruptcies filed in any 12 month period.

•Bush set all-time record for the biggest drop in the history of the stock market, and it is still falling.

•Bush set the all-time record for most days on vacation by any President in US history and this was in his first year in office.

•Bush presided over the worst security failure in US history. All this after taking the entire month of August off for vacation.

•Bush set the record for most campaign fund raising trips by any President in US history.

•Bush's first two years in office over 2 million Americans lost their jobs. That number has risen to 12 million and growing.

•Bush cut unemployment benefits for out-of-work Americans more than any other President in US history.

•Bush set the all-time record for most real estate foreclosures in a 12-month period. This record will be beaten again this year, due to Bush's economic mess.

•Bush presided over the biggest energy crises in US history and refused to intervene when corruption was revealed. Many of Bush's friends have faced indictment over this.

•Bush cut health care benefits for war veterans. Bush's lack of compassion for the veterans have resulted in 40% of all homeless males are veterans.

•Bush set the all-time record for most people worldwide to jointly take to the streets to protest his war and his policies (17 million people), shattering the record for protest against any person in the history.

•Bush dissolved more International treaties than any President in US history.

•Bush's Presidency is the most secretive and unaccountable of any in US history.

•Bush's cabinet members are the wealthiest of any administration in US history.

•Bush is the first President in US history to have all 50 states of the Union simultaneously face bankruptcy.

•Bush presided over the biggest corporate stock market fraud in any market in any country in the history of the world.

•Bush is the first President in US history to order a US attack and military occupation of a sovereign nation, and he did so against the will of the United Nations and the vast majority of the world.

•Bush created the largest government department bureaucracy in the history of the United States, called the "Bureau of Homeland Security

•Bush set the all-time record for biggest annual budget spending increases, more than any other President in US history.

•Bush is the first President in US history to compel the United Nations remove the US from the Human Rights Commission.

•Bush removed more checks and balances, and have the least amount of congressional oversight than any Presidential in US history.

•Bush called the entire United Nations irrelevant. Bush also withdrew from the World Court of Law.

•Bush refused to allow inspectors access to US prisoners of war and he no longer abides by the Geneva Conventions.

•Bush the first President in US history to refuse United Nations election inspectors access during the 2002 US elections.

•Bush holds the record for the most corporate campaign donations.

•Bush's largest all-time contributor was Ken Lay the embattled CEO of Enron.

•Bush is the first US President to establish a secret shadow government.

•Bush took the world's sympathy for the US after 9/11, and in less than a year made the US the most resented country in the world.

•Bush is the first US President in history to have a majority of the people of Europe (71%) view his Presidency as the biggest threat to world peace and stability.

•Bush changed US policy to allow convicted criminals to be awarded government contracts. Many are close political allies of Bush and his father.

•Bush has removed more freedoms and civil liberties for Americans than any other president in US history.

• Bush has at least one conviction for drunk driving in Maine.
(Texas driving record has been erased and is not available).

•Bush was AWOL from the National Guard and deserted the military during time of war.

•Bush refused to take a drug test or even answer any questions about drug use.

•Bush's records as Governor of Texas have been hidden in his father's library in a secret chamber.

•Bush's records of any SEC investigations into his insider trading or bankrupt companies are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

•The minutes of meetings of any public corporation for which Bush served on the board are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public view.

•The records or minutes from meetings Bush and Cheney attended regarding public energy policy are sealed in secrecy and unavailable for public review.

As America moves further into the pit of war, and into the twilight of economic despair, we should never forget where we once was as a nation, and we should not be afraid to look at where we are today.

The coming year will give opportunity to choose new leaders, and as we think of where we once was and where we are today, "Lets give credit, where credit is due."

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Listen in the archives to Lydia's interview with Charlie Savage, Pulitzer prize winning journalist from the Boston Globe, who broke the story on Bush's signing statements (usurping the Geneva Convention's torture ban, among other things.) Charlie’s new book is titled… "Takeover: The Return of the Imperial Presidency and the Subversion of American Democracy." NATIONAL REPORTING

Don't forget, Congressman and Democratic presidential contender DENNIS KUCINICH will be our guest on on Monday September 17!

The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 a.m. Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern). All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at BASHAM & CORNELL SHOW

ARMED MADHOUSE Take 2 * BOOB GATE

ARMED MADHOUSE Take Two ... NOW WE KNOW WHAT "CAGING VOTERS" MEANS... Greg Palast's bestseller is now out in paperback. It has vital new information and updates on the corruption in the administration.



SATURDAY MORNING TUNE IN LIVE FROM LAS VEGAS and LOS ANGELES to our show BASHAM AND CORNELL PROGRESSIVE TALK
from 9 - 10 a.m. We broadcast live -- or go to our website and click on the link to hear the entire show in the archives.
On Saturday June 9th, award-winning investigative journalist Greg Palast will be the guest on the Basham and Cornell Radio Show at 9 am PST on AM 1230 KLAV in Las Vegas.

Greg Palast is the author of the New York Times bestseller, “Armed Madhouse” (Penguin Paperback 2007). When Palast, an investigator of corporate fraud and racketeering, turned his skills to journalism, he was quickly recognized as, “The most important investigative reporter of our time” [Tribune Magazine] in Britain, where his first reports appeared on BBC television and in the Guardian newspapers.

Author of another New York Times bestseller, “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy,” Palast is best known in his native USA as the journalist who, for the Observer (UK), broke the story of how Jeb Bush purged thousands of Black Florida citizens from voter rolls before the 2000 election, thereby handing the White House to his brother George.

His reports on the theft of election 2004, the spike of the FBI investigations of the bin Ladens before September 11, the secret State Department documents planning the seizure of Iraq’s oil fields have won him a record six “Project Censored” awards for reporting the news American media doesn’t want you to hear. “The top investigative journalist in the United States is persona non grata in his own country’s media.” He returned to America to report for Harper’s Magazine.

Palast’s Sam Spade style television and print exposes about elections manipulations, War on Terror and globalization, have been seen on BBC ’s Newsnight.

Of Greg Palast, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said “Greg Palast is one of my heroes. The last investigative reporter in America. In Armed Madhouse he has the best inside story of the war inside the White House over the war in Iraq, the battle between the neo-cons and Big Oil.” The Baltimore Chronicle said “Greg Palast is investigative journalism at its best. No one has exposed more truth about the Bush Cartel and lived to tell the story.”


U.S. Attorney Tim Griffin, right hand man to Karl Rove, resigned Thursday after BBC Television reported that Congressman John Conyers requested the network’s evidence on Griffin’s involvement in ‘caging voters.’ Griffin, a former protege of Karl Rove, was formerly research director of the Republican National Committee. In 2004, BBC News published a report showing that Griffin led a “caging” scheme to suppress the votes of African-American service members in Florida. Over 70,000 black soldiers were on the list.

Read the full story in Greg Palast’s Armed Madhouse: Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales from a White House Gone Wild. check out www.gregpalast.com

We hope to have Palast on the Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk Show this Saturday at 9:00 AM PST. Just click on to the show page at Basham & Cornell Progressive Talk

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BOOB GATE

Pink's new video is seductive but scary. I feel so sorry for young girls these days. I just watched the top 20 music videos on VH-1 where the message is, "It’s important to always look like a thin slut with big tits." No wonder ten-year-old girls are increasingly suffering from depression, eating disorders and suicide! Valued for nothing more than how "hot" they look, and how many pornographic poses they can strike, women today can't win.

Let me just get this out of the way: I’m in withdrawal from cleavage; it’s hard to quit cold turkey. I’m not spiritually evolved enough to stop dressing like a hooker, but at least I tried on a turtleneck the other day. Somehow wearing death-defying cleavage is supposed to make women more employable or marriageable. It’s hard to keep calm when you know there’s a government plot to keep us thin and insecure. Since the only valuable women in our society are teenage, wombless, buttless, mutants, you can’t get a job in Hollywood without “lap-dancer” on your resume. And I’m talking about the writers, nevermind the actors. So when the religious conservative movement wiped Howard Stern off the public airwaves, I was cheering.

I want to be a woman of substance — a deep intellectual like Ann Coulter — but I don't want to wear that black cocktail dress she always wears. But I might keep the cleavage awhile longer since the bigger the boobs look, the smaller the butt looks in proportion. Unless you’re completely buttless like Terry Hatcher.

Anyway, sex is sort of losing its appeal, don’t you think? I mean death is becoming sexier than sex lately. Not to be perverse, but there are a lot of things worse than death: — like performing standup comedy and forgetting all your jokes.


This is the hardest time for women. We’re supposed to casually accept multitudes of unfathomably gorgeous women everywhere, making out with each other, half-naked on TV and Yahoo and in magazines —and not feel inadequate. Women in a bikini lineup on a reality show smile as if nothing bothers them. If you leave them alone without the cameras on them, catfights would break out, men hope. What boggles the mind is the way women are letting themselves be depicted as money-grubbing gold diggers and shallow, slutty bitches. If I were one of preteen sons today, I’d run for the hills. I believe it’s a plot to distract us and dumb us down. Without trash-TV and porn, whom would religious right-wingers have to fight against? Nothing except liberal values like education, equal rights and health care. By the way, corporations are the ones who profit from all this soft-core mainstream porn. Not liberal intellectuals and environmentalists.

From the Christian Science Monitor: The religious right has long promoted criticism of "secular, liberal elites," whom they hold responsible for unbridled individualism and moral decline in schools and society. But there are critics who insist those positions hold dangerous contradictions. For example, while religious conservatives enthusiastically champion free-market capitalism and corporate tax cuts, such critics say, who is it that promotes the Hollywood values and pornography they so vehemently oppose? Not the liberal political leaders, but corporate interests most benefiting from those policies.

I shouldn’t complain; being a woman is wonderful if you’re lucky enough to thrive on humiliation. But it’s pretty hard to win a fight with your husband while he’s reading a Victoria’s Secret catalogue that pretends not to be soft porn! I was hoping we’d go back to covering up our ankles like Victorian piano legs.

Have you noticed more boobs in America lately? And I’m not just talking about our political leaders. But it does seem that the larger the boobs, the more narrow-minded the politicians. The two seem to go hand-in-hand. As the fixation with cartoon-blondes such as Anna Nicole Smith and Pamela Anderson proliferated — so did the number of conservatives in Washington. Could it be a plot to distract us?

I don’t mean to go on and on about this but the economics of the breast rules women today. Okay, so I may be able to give up under-wire bras, but the hardest thing to let go of is high-heels because they make you look taller and thinner. Do you know the historical purpose of high heels? To raise women up for easier insertion! It’s true. It started in the Middle Ages with Catherine de Medici. She was standing on a footstool on her wedding night, and as her husband was approaching her from behind, and she probably looked down and had an epiphany, "Hmm... this footstool would make a nice pair of shoes."

The world seems upside down, doesn’t it? I started dating this guy. We were on the couch kissing and suddenly he gropes my breast. He asks me: “Are your breasts real?”
I said proudly, “Yes.”
He gets this disappointed look on his face and says, “Oh. I like fake ones better, they feel more real.”

The other day I picked up a typical woman’s magazine with the headline: “How to get a smaller butt.” Another one had the title “Six Inspired Moves to a Better Butt.”

Would somebody tell me, whatever happened to the Feminist movement? You don’t see men’s magazines talking about their butts. My friend said to me, No, they’re talking about women’s butts.
No, actually they’re talking about little girl’s butts. Why can’t they fantasize about the butts we were born with?
Oh; those would be babies’ butts. Nevermind.

By the way, very intelligent people run this industry. If you give producers or casting directors an actor’s photograph, a “headshot”¬— and you are smiling in the photo, they usually think you can’t play a serious, dramatic role. If you give them a serious headshot, they think you can’t play comedy! That’s why whenever I go out in public, I wear the expression they are casting for. This makes for a very “other-centered” life.

I was on the set of Baywatch a few years ago. There was a beautiful girl in a bikini standing on the beach, looking out to sea, her back to the camera. She was built like a pencil. I could hear the producer screaming at the girl’s manager: “We can’t hire her unless she has a boob job!”

Then the manager screamed back: “But she’s only nine years old!”

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From the Christian Science Monitor: "There are profoundly important and precious values that liberals stand for that are central to the founding of this country - liberty, human rights, and human dignity."

Any values debate, he says, must involve Americans considering more deeply how values are reflected in the country's actions. "Abu Ghraib is a deep moral crisis. Some 100,000 civilians have died in Iraq - that's a profound moral crisis involving religious values," Wolfe adds. "That this doesn't register with so many Americans is disturbing and difficult to understand."

While Americans greatly differ over which values deserve priority, it's also true that societal values are continually shifting. Despite the overwhelming approval of marriage amendments in the states, 63 percent of Americans now support either civil unions or legalized gay marriage. In a Gallup poll this summer, 58 percent of conservatives said divorce is "morally acceptable." Divorce is as common among Evangelical Christians as among other faith groups.
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In my view, without often knowing it, Liberals actually advocate for all the things Christ cared about: peace, diplomacy, caring for the poor, tolerance for others, creating equitable solutions, caring for the environment. The religious right often talks non-stop about Christian values, but do not act on the values of Christ. - Lydia

Note: In her videos, Pink borrows heavily from the work of well-known New Zealand artist Martin Emond.

The single “U + Ur Hand”, to be released in Europe at the end of August, features Pink wearing clothing and posing as several of Emond’s characters, including BabyRedKnuckles, RockerBikergirl and HardCandy.

Memorial Day, Freedom and the Right Path

Memorial Day, Freedom and the Right Path
Guest Blog By Mike

This past weekend was Memorial Day Weekend, and I couldn't help thinking what Memorial Day meant to me as a child, as well as what it likely means today to both Children in America as well as children in other countries.

I think the main focus of Memorial Day is to honor the brave soldiers who gave their lives to protect our freedoms and liberties, I think the overwhelming majority of our country DOES honor and respect our soldiers and veterans, but I think Memorial day is also an occasion to remember the presidents who sent those soldiers to war -- and in some cases to their deaths. The majority were honorable men who sent our soldiers to war for honorable and legitimate reasons.

Unfortunately this president, George W Bush, has not; he has sent our soldiers to their deaths for a lie and caused much of the world to despise rather than respect our country and our soldiers. For that reason, although I greatly respect and honor our brave soldiers, (many of which are friends and co-workers of mine or relatives of the former) who are being sacrificed and used as cannon fodder for a self serving lie.....I choose to focus on our president since speaking out against a culture of corruption that CHOOSES to put our soldiers in harms way for no justifiable reason and with no finite plan for a solution is in my opinion one of the best ways to truly support our soldiers.

When I was a child, Memorial Day used to evoke images of both our brave soldiers who died to protect our freedom and liberties, as well as great presidents of the past who were great men, good men, wise men,respected by everyone; after much contemplation, I wondered how does the world look at Memorial Day now after 6 years of George W Bush's treasonous reign of evil.

Better yet how does the world look at America now?

America was always a bastion of goodness, a symbol of freedom, a land of opportunity, where hard work was rewarded.

What have we had under Bush's reign: we have become a world bully that attacks pre-emptively like a common street thug. We take what we want and do what is best for us without listening to other countries needs or wants. Diplomacy and peace have become a sign of weakness and a dirty word to the Bush Administration.

Obeying and defending the Constitution and protecting our cherished freedom and privacy has drawn scorn and derision from this Administration, freedom of speech is abhorred by the overwhelming majority of Republicans when it dissents from their talking points. They use fear and safety as talking points to destroy freedom, to undermine and destroy every bit of goodness that has been a symbol of our country and to seize more and more power and push their self serving agenda.

Our Country is slowly being transformed into an evil police state run by a cabal of megalomaniac dictators. The poor and middle class are losing more ground economically to the ultra-wealthy, good-paying middle class jobs are being outsourced overseas while the rich "robber barons" and white collar criminals manipulating the laws and our tax dollars to steal money from working class people become ever more rich and powerful — just as the "robber barons" like Jay Gould did in the Gilded Age.

What do kids think of now on Memorial Day? ("Hot dogs and hamburgers, says Lydia.") It's obvious they honor and respect our soldiers regardless of whether they believe in the soldiers mission, which is dictated by Bush and his cabal of Neo Con cronies, but I'm wondering when kids think of the Presidents behind the wars, do they think of good men like Lincoln and Washington, men they respect and aspire to emulate, or do kids today both in America and around the world associate it with evil men, Bush, Dick Cheney, Hitler etc.......

Hitler is the leader whom the Neo Cons have been emulating — from his rhetoric to instill fear in the masses, to discredit the opposition, to destroy freedom in the name of safety, to attack other countries preemptively, from his giving the masses a common enemy to fear and hate, and a patriotic cause to rally around etc...

I marvel at how in six short years the Republicans have turned Presidents Day into a dirty phrase, just as they have with America or the word Liberal, which are both symbols of freedom and goodness.........hopefully they have NOT done the same with Memorial Day which is a day to honor our dead soldiers, hopefully the world still honors and respects our soldiers as the overwhelming majority of our country does.

George W Bush NEEDS TO BE IMPEACHED AS SOON AS POSSIBLE before he can do anymore damage to this country or our soldiers.

But on a positive note, we can still turn things around. We need to work toward solutions instead of fear mongering and war mongering. We need to put aside partisanship and work together to create a better country and a better world, we need to put more effort into peace and diplomacy rather than war and hatred.

We have been on the the wrong path for most of the past three decades, we need to get on the right path, the last time we had Presidents work toward energy independence from the Middle East and diversification away from oil was in the 1970's and this is not, nor should it be a partisan issue. The ONLY two Presidents who did anything substantive to make us less dependent on foreign oil imports were Gerald Ford who mandated increased fuel economy in cars and Jimmy Carter, who promoted a variety of technologies to make us less dependent on Petroleum imports, Carter promoted solar, wind, nuclear, natural gas etc.....the sad thing is that the Presidents that followed did not emulate their forethought and long term thinking but instead fell victim to the group think and self serving interests of big oil. Jimmy Carter installed solar panels on the White House to symbolize his commitment to energy independence and his successor Ronald Reagan subsequently had them ripped off after ascending to the White House.

We need a President who is smart, who thinks strategically and longer term, rather than what is best for him politically, or what is more palatable at the moment, or how to best save face. We need a President who is selfless and puts the good of the country and the good of the many over the good of the powerful few. We need a President who is wise, and has character and integrity and honesty and speaks truthfully rather than promoting self serving agenda's or demonizing and smearing his opponents, or using fear and half truths to influence and deceive the weak minded and fearful.

The Founding Fathers and the Great Presidents of the past normally thought of on Memorial Day, believed in freedom and justice for all so vehemently that they were willing to die for it, to get back on the RIGHT PATH and become that shining symbol of freedom and land of opportunity the world has always associated with America, "The Land Of The Free and Home of The Brave", we need stop being ruled by fear and hatred and start acting like we value freedom and bravery, we need to remember and honor the great and brilliant men who fought for our freedom and liberties and wrote that timeless ageless symbol and protector of freedom the US Constitution, we need to hold the Constitution and the sacred freedom it symbolizes above ANY President or Any enacted legislation. Any President or any Legislation that defies, challenges or contradicts the Constitution needs to be repealed or impeached ASAP.

Our Founding Father's and our first President fought for our freedom from a King named George who was deemed insane, Once again we have a man named George who deems himself a king that many claim is insane and is the enemy of democracy and freedom.

To get back on the Right Path, we need to focus on freedom rather than fear, peace rather than war. We need to work to make the world a better place for the next generation, we need to take care of the least among us and, put the good of the many over the good of the few powerful wealthy elite!

(This guest post is by Mike.)

It's Those Little Things

by Larry Every relationship has its ups and downs. Every experience has been filled with a series of mishaps and milestones. It's those little things both good and bad that add up. Perhaps Bobby Goldsboro spoke best of love with these lyrics.

Little things that you do make me glad I'm in love with you.Little things that you say make me glad that I feel this way.The way you smile, the way you hold my hand,and when I'm down you always understand.You know I love those little things in my ear, that you say when there's no one near. Little things that you do, let me know that your love is true.

The way she cooks his favorite meal, the way she makes his dreams seem real, the way she makes a dollar last, the way she always forgets his past, it's those little things.

It could also be the way he ignores her every word, the way he makes her feel so hurt, the way he spends and never saves, the way he takes but has never gave, it's those little things.

As we live another day, we can always remember that those little things always add up, both good and bad. Some little things add up to make someone love their spouse even more. Other little things add up to make the spouse learn to abhor. There are little things in all walks of life.

The way he lied the country into war, the thousands of deaths, and there will be more, the massive debt that we now owe, that we will reap what he will sow, yes it's those little things.

The way he took away our rights, the executive orders signed into the night, the way he uses the fear of terror, the way he overlooks every Presidential error, it's those little things.

The millions of jobs he sent overseas, the millions of Iraqi's just wishing he would leave, The levels of corruption that lay at his desk, the hundreds who've been tortured simply at his bequest, it's those little things.

The way he overlooks each and every law, the lives he has left so torn and raw, the military funerals he refuses to attend, the Katrina victims stranded as help he will not send, it's those little things.

Yes Mr. Bush, everything that you do, it's never me but always you, you are never wrong but always right, you say we're weak since we won't fight, you wonder why your ratings are low, we want you out but you refuse to go, it's those little things.

Maybe soon we'll have our say, that you'll be impeached everyday we pray, for all our freedoms that we have lost, those who have died at wars great cost, as we add our losses this we know, It's those little things, Mr. Bush, that make America detest you so.

FORGOTTEN VICTIMS OF WAR

FORGOTTEN VICTIMS OF WAR: THE CHILDREN
There have been many innocent victims resulting from George W Bush's war on Iraq. The U.S troops are obvious victims, as were the brave U.S troops who lost their lives in Iraq. The thousands of Iraqi's who have been killed since Bush's invasion, are all victims of this senseless war, as are the remaining Iraqi people.

One group of victims that are seldom noticed are the children. The children's agency of the U.N better known as UNICEF says that insecurity in Baghdad and other parts have caused schools to close, and left hospitals and clinics nearly impossible to gain access to.

UNICEF reports that only 30% of Iraqi children have safe drinking water as damaged sanitation systems increase the threat of diseases such as cholera and diarrhoea, which is the second highest cause of childhood death in Iraq.

The constant bombings and kidnappings have claimed the lives of many Iraqi parents leaving the children susceptible to abuse and exploitation. Iraqi children seldom receive the help and support they need to cope with such anxiety and fear.

Of the four million Iraqi's who have fled their homes since Bush invaded Iraq in 2003, one million of those are children. Some two million of those Iraqi's who have fled have remained in Iraq. The remaining two million have fled to Jordan, Syria and other countries in the region, where they live in extreme poverty.

The Iraqi children are not alone. Thousands of U.S children whose parent have been assigned to the war lines of Iraq are also in need. Many military spouses live in poverty as the spouse is left to help make ends meet and raise their children.

Those thousands of U.S soldiers who were killed in Iraq and Afghanistan left spouses and children behind to cope with grief and life. This has brought added stress on an already heavily troubled life of a child.

It is of great question as to whether or not the Bush administration has taken into consideration how their actions have affected the children in the U.S and in Iraq. One has to wonder if the emotional devastation of a child's life was ever even a forethought.

As George W Bush shouts the servitude of sporadic altruism, he heartlessly ignores the effects of his military actions on the children of this war. Mr. Bush has decided to remake the world in his image, the very image of a man the world has grown to abhor. The life of a child is priceless, and the desires of madman are worthless. You Mr. Bush have proven to be worthless.

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

George Bernard Shaw

Gas Wars

Kucinich to Speak for Full Hour on House Floor on Iraq Oil LawMay 22nd, 2007

May 22nd, 2007
We encourage you to comment on this press release, and the impact this may have on the presidential race for 2008. This is the first time Congress has had a full discussion on the privatization of Iraq’s oil since the beginning of the war. http://blog.pdamerica.org/?p=1117
WASHINGTON DC - WEDNESDAY, MAY 23, 2007 - At approximately 11:00 a.m. today, Congressman Dennis Kucinich will invoke a rarely used procedure to offer a privileged motion claiming one hour of time to speak on the floor of the House of Representatives about current legislative plans to privatize Iraq’s oil.
This will be the first time in Congress that there has been a full discussion of the covert efforts to accomplish privatization of Iraq’s oil through the supplemental spending bill.
Kucinich has alerted his colleagues to this concern in the past. Today he will do so on the floor of the House.
Kucinich argued against invading Iraq prior to the 2003 vote that authorized it. He published his case against it and helped persuade many of his colleagues to vote No. Kucinich challenged the legality of the war in court in an effort to prevent it. He proposed a detailed plan to end the occupation of Iraq over three years ago. His current plan is found in his bill HR 1234, which includes these findings:
“Any attempt to sell Iraqi oil assets during the United States occupation will be a significant stumbling block to peaceful resolution. There must be fairness in the distribution of oil resources in Iraq.”
Kucinich has voted against every new funding bill for the occupation, including the recent Supplemental. He supports using the power of the purse to end the war. He opposes any attack on Iran and proposes formally forswearing the use of so-called preventive war. He has proposed the creation of a Department of Peace to address international and domestic violence.
As with all House sessions, this speech will be televised on C-Span.

The increase in gas prices has cost U.S consumers an extra twenty billion dollars so far this year according to the Government Accountability Office. This added cost has taken money out of the economy that normally would have been spent on consumer products.

The GAO told Congress that a large amount of oil refining capacity and lower inventories have led to the rise in gas prices. Many feel the Iraq war has caused oil to be withheld from U.S consumers. Gas prices have risen $1.05 since early February. U.S gas prices are at an all time high and getting higher.

The Energy Departments reports that gasoline prices have risen 50% since January, which ranks as one of the largest ongoing increases recorded in U.S history. The high price of gasoline has hurt retail as sales have fallen 1.5% week by week.

Many are calling for the breaking up of oil companies and undoing the mega-mergers which may bring about more competition within the industry. Calls from consumers and business alike have fallen on deaf ears in the Bush administration.

Americans have watched oil prices rise as the Texas Oil Man became President. They have watched Exxon and Chevron rake in record profits while gasoline prices continue to rise. They have seen the economy increasingly slow to a limp, while U.S Corporations continue to flourish.

One of the many promises the Bush administration made when they overtly invaded Iraq, was that gas prices in the U.S would be much lower. These promises along with many other insincere boasts have never stimulated into truth.

If gasoline prices are to ever return to affordable levels, Congress must stop the Iraq war, force U.S oil companies to lower prices and limit profits that oil companies can make without major relief to the consumer.

The most crucial thing Americans can do to bring gas prices down rapidly is to simply remove the current "Commander In Chief and his catalog of corruption from office. The final step will be to keep oil men from residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

THE CRIME BENEATH THE CRIME

"Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen."
Bobby - age 7 (Wow!)

"If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate,"
Nikka - age 6
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Stephen Pitt Political Cartoons

Before we get into the truth behind Gonzo-Gate, POTENTIALLY HABITABLE PLANET FOUND!! THIS IS EXCITING!!
By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

WASHINGTON - For the first time astronomers have discovered a planet outside our solar system that is potentially habitable, with Earth-like temperatures, a find researchers described Tuesday as a big step in the search for "life in the universe."

The planet is just the right size, might have water in liquid form, and in galactic terms is relatively nearby at 120 trillion miles away. But the star it closely orbits, known as a "red dwarf," is much smaller, dimmer and cooler than our sun.
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070425/ap_on_sc/habitable_planet_5

Did the most powerful Republicans in America have the computer capacity, software skills and electronic infrastructure in place on election night 2004 to tamper with the Ohio results to ensure George W. Bush's re-election?

The answer appears to be yes.

On Election Night 2004, the Republican Party not only controlled the vote-counting process in Ohio, the final presidential swing state, through a secretary of state who was a co-chair of the Bush campaign, but it also controlled the technology that allowed the tally of the vote in Ohio's 88 counties to be reported to the media and voters.

Privatizing elections and allowing known partisans to run a key presidential vote count is troubling enough. But the reason Congress must investigate these high-tech ties is there is abundant evidence that Republicans could have used this computing network to delay announcing the winner of Ohio's 2004 election while tinkering with the results.

Read more below, but first an editorial comment:

Because we love America, love our freedoms, love our constitution and despise lies, war, death and destruction... and because we cherish our troops and want to bring them safely home, we must continue to hold these criminals in the Bush administration accountable. We must hold their feet to the fire, or else we are being un-American. These people do not seem to have America's best interests at heart. We are Americans and deserve honest, ethical leaders who work for the people. After all, the United States is unique in all the world as government BY THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE AND OF THE PEOPLE.

Regular viewers of mainstream news, and especially Fox News are never told the whole truth. With smoke and mirrors, they distract us from the truth; they obfuscate. In the Alberto Gonzales hearings, what is the crime beneath the outer crime of lying and "I can't remember?" Is it obstruction of justice? What is Gonzo-Gate really all about? Why is Congress so interested in getting to the bottom of why these attorneys were fired? Brad Friedman of BradBlog.com, who has worked tirelessly for three years to uncover shocking evidence of GOP ELECTION FRAUD, CORRUPTOIN AND ELECTION THEFT, exposes it and so does Bob Fritakis.

GOP's Cyber Election Hit Squad Exposed
Steven Rosenfeld and Bob Fitrakis
April 24, 2007

Bob Fitrakis is a political science professor and attorney in the King Lincoln Bronzeville civil rights lawsuit against Ken Blackwell. Fitrakis, Rosenfeld and Harvey Wasserman are authors of What Happened in Ohio? A documentary record of theft and fraud in the 2004 election.

Did the most powerful Republicans in America have the computer capacity, software skills and electronic infrastructure in place on election night 2004 to tamper with the Ohio results to ensure George W. Bush's re-election?

The answer appears to be yes. There is more than ample documentation to show that on Election Night 2004 , Ohio's "official" Secretary of State website—which gave the world the presidential election results—was redirected from an Ohio government server to a group of servers that contain scores of Republican web sites, including the secret White House e-mail accounts that have emerged in the scandal surrounding Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’s firing of eight federal prosecutors.

Recent revelations have documented that the Republican National Committee (RNC) ran a secret White House e-mail system for Karl Rove and dozens of White House staffers. This high-tech system used to count and report the 2004 presidential vote—from server-hosting contracts, to software-writing services, to remote-access capability, to the actual server usage logs themselves—must be added to the growing congressional investigations.

Numerous tech-savvy bloggers, starting with the online investigative consortium epluribusmedia.org and their November 2006 article cross-posted by contributor luaptifer to Dailykos , and Joseph Cannon's blog at Cannonfire.blogspot.com, outed the RNC tech network. That web-hosting firm is SMARTech Corp. of Chattanooga, TN, operating out of the basement in the old Pioneer Bank building. The firm hosts scores of Republican websites, including georgewbush.com, gop.com and rnc.org.

The software created for the Ohio secretary of state’s Election Night 2004 website was created by GovTech Solutions, a firm co-founded by longtime GOP computing guru Mike Connell. He also redesigned the Bush campaign's website in 2000 and told Inside Business magazine in 1999, "I wouldn't be where I am today without the Bush campaign and the Bush family because the Bushes truly are about family and I’m loyal to my network."

Ohio's Cedarville University, a Christian school with 3,100 students, issued a press release on January 13, 2005 describing how faculty member Dr. Alan Dillman’s computing company Government Consulting Resources, Ltd, worked with these Republican-connected companies to tally the vote on Election Night 2004.

"Dillman personally led the effort from the GCR side, teaming with key members of Blackwell's staff," the release said. "GCR teamed with several other firms—including key players such as GovTech Solutions, which performed the software development—to deliver the end result. SMARTech provided the backup and additional system capacity, and Mercury Interactive performed the stress testing."

On Election Night 2004, the Republican Party not only controlled the vote-counting process in Ohio, the final presidential swing state, through a secretary of state who was a co-chair of the Bush campaign, but it also controlled the technology that allowed the tally of the vote in Ohio's 88 counties to be reported to the media and voters.

Privatizing elections and allowing known partisans to run a key presidential vote count is troubling enough. But the reason Congress must investigate these high-tech ties is there is abundant evidence that Republicans could have used this computing network to delay announcing the winner of Ohio's 2004 election while tinkering with the results.

Did Ohio Republican Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell or other GOP operatives inflate the president's vote totals to secure George W. Bush's margin of victory? On Election Night 2004, many of the totals reported by the secretary of state were based on local precinct results that were impossible. In Clyde, Ohio, a Republican haven, Bush won big after 131 percent voter turnout. In Republican Perry County, two precincts came in at 124 percent and 120 percent respectively. In Gahanna Ward 1, precinct B, Bush received 4,258 votes despite the fact that only 638 people voted for president. In Concord Southwest in Miami County, the certified election results proudly proclaimed at 679 out of 689 registered voters cast ballots, a 98.55 percent turnout. FreePress.org later found that only 547 voters had signed in.

These strange election results were routed by county election officials through Ohio's Secretary of State's office, through partisan IT providers and software, and the final results were hosted out of a computer based in Tennessee announcing the winner. The Cedarville University releases boasted the system "was running like a champ." It said, "The system kept running through the early morning hours as users from around the world looked to Ohio for their election results."
(read more at www.tompaine.com)

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THE UNDERLYING CRIME: White House Interference into a U.S. Attorney's Criminal Investigation in Missouri

High-Level White House, DoJ, Rove Operatives Went to Work While now-Fired Prosecutor Bud Cummins Was Building a Case Against Missouri Governor Matt Blunt and the WH Connected MO Law Firm Lathrope & Gage...

"You have to firewall politics out of the Department of Justice. Because once it gets in, people question every decision you make," the former U.S. Attorney from Arkansas, Bud Cummins, told the Los Angeles Times in March. "Now I keep asking myself: 'What about the Blunt deal?'"

What about the Blunt deal, indeed.

Last Thursday we began piecing together a few previously unconnected dots in the firing of Cummins. The dots connected appear to lay out a fairly straight arrow into the the highest levels of the White House. At least if you're familiar with some of the players, whom they know, and what they do for a living....
Click Here for the rest of the story: http://bradblog.com/

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TASERS: GUN ALTERNATIVE * SAVAGE WINS PULITZER PRIZE

"Love one another."


GUN CONTROL: A LOGICAL ALTERNATIVE

Imagine this: every kid and teacher in that school has a gun. Someone is out in the hallway waving a gun around in the air. Everyone rushes out from classrooms to the hallway, waving their guns. WHO IS THE ORIGINAL GUNMAN? If everyone has a gun, who's the bad guy?

To the NRA and opponents of gun control: what's wrong with Tasers instead of guns? If you really are in fear and need to protect yourself, then have a taser handy.  This way it's not permanent.

Americans should have to pass eye tests, firearms classes, and metamphetamine tests, blood tests, even psychological testing (and see if they're on medications for depression or using psychotropic drugs) and be licensed BEFORE they can buy a gun.

It probably would not hurt at all to also have every applicant interviewed by someone trained to spot personality disorders, such as the kind that were so obvious to anyone who knew the mass murderer to be at Virginia Tech. The faculty there had already reported him to local police as a possible lunatic. And yet he was allowed to just walk into a gun store, where other murder weapons had been purchased, and walk out with a gun. There is something very broken about a system that failed to stop this.


For God's sake and for our children's sake, there have only been 24 justified shootings in America - versus THOUSANDS of "accidental" and rampage shootings, as a result of our lax gun laws.

In every other country where they have strict gun control, gun deaths are down.

Every day they try to fill us with fear. "The terrorists are coming over here to get us," they say. And why WOULDN'T the terrorists want to come to Virginia, for example? Why they've got some of the most lax gun laws anywhere, where even a deranged non-citizen can freely buy a high-powered assault weapon. And its not just people from overseas, criminals from all over the eastern seaboard come to Virginia in particular to buy their guns, so they can go commit crimes in other states.

The blood had not even dried on the classroom floors of Virginia Tech before the NRA launched its own offensive, in the media and in email blasts, to argue that what we really need to do is turn all our teachers into pistol packing sheriffs, and our colleges into something out of the wild west. There are only two categories of people who oppose any kind of gun regulation, lobbyists for the gun manufactures themselves, and people with personal Rambo fantasies. And the latter are possibly the LAST people who should be armed with deadly force.

The fact is that for every private citizen with the skill and JUDGEMENT to effectively intervene against someone else shooting a gun, there are many more Rambos in their own mind who would end up getting even more people killed including themselves. For every gun in a home used for successful defense against an attacker, there are many, many more used in suicides, or killing by accident, or end up stolen. Those are the statistics and they don't lie. You remember Marvin Gaye, don't you? He was killed in a family argument by his own father with a gun he bought for his father's protection.

It has never been enough to be a law-abiding citizen to be armed with a lethal weapon. With gun rights come gun responsibilities. You must be trained to use a weapon responsibly. And nobody should be able to purchase such a weapon unless they can first demonstrate this, any more than someone should be allowed to drive a car without at least first passing a driving test, together with an eye exam and a written test. They passed a law in the last Congress that said you were required to attend a special class before you could declare bankruptcy. Why not also to own a gun?

Having more guns in this country in the hands of people who can't handle them doesn't make us more safe. It makes us all LESS safe. Many of the guns already in the hands of criminals were originally sold legally (though perhaps under the most feeble of laws), and the more our society is awash with guns, the more guns criminals will get, to steal if they have to. The more guns the NRA can sell us, the more they will tell us we need to buy to "protect" ourselves from the ones already sold. What a deadly, murderous racket. Read more and take action at: http://www.peaceteam.net/gun_regulation.php TELL CONGRESS WE NEED STRONGER FEDERAL GUN REGULATIONS

No laymen, except the VERY INSECURE weaklings, need a gun that can kill people. Tasers stun the criminal and stop him in his tracks. Then you can take him to court and find out why he's doing what he's doing.

WE need to disarm all the criminals. In this day and age, with the stress of our society, the traffic, the job insecurity, the machines we're plugged into, the fear-mongering, the pharmaceutical drugs people are popping -- NOW MORE THAN EVER I DO NOT WANT NERVOUS PEOPLE TO HAVE GUNS IN THEIR HANDS.

The ENLIGHTENED, HARMONIOUS, long view is to work together to heal the ills of our society, tone down the desperation and the attraction to violence, and help us understand each other's tragedy. Truly damaged people should not be able to buy guns.

This kid was a ticking time bomb; his English teacher knew it. Why didn't someone put out an alert via his Driver's license, warning gun shop owners not to sell this kid GUNS!

People should prove why they need a gun; hunting licenses aside, they should be tested thoroughly before owning a weapon that can kill a human being.



2007 NATIONAL REPORTING

For a distinguished example of reporting on national affairs Awarded to Charlie Savage of The Boston Globe for his revelations that President Bush often used "signing statements" to assert his controversial right to bypass provisions of new laws.

The most heinous instance of a law Bush usurped was the Geneva Convention's ban on torture of human beings. Bush secretly signed his "right to torture" thereby breaking the Geneva Convention.

Bush could bypass new torture ban: Waiver right is reserved
By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff | January 4, 2006

WASHINGTON -- When President Bush last week signed the bill outlawing the torture of detainees, he quietly reserved the right to bypass the law under his powers as commander in chief...

David Golove, a New York University law professor who specializes in executive power issues, said that the signing statement means that Bush believes he can still authorize harsh interrogation tactics when he sees fit. 'The signing statement is saying 'I will only comply with this law when I want to, and if something arises in the war on terrorism where I think it's important to torture or engage in cruel, inhuman, and degrading conduct, I have the authority to do so and nothing in this law is going to stop me,' " he said. ''They don't want to come out and say it directly because it doesn't sound very nice, but it's unmistakable to anyone who has been following what's going on."
www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/ articles/2006/01/04/bush_could_bypass_new_torture_ban/

Also nominated as finalists in this category were: Maurice Possley and Steve Mills of the Chicago Tribune for their investigation of a 1989 execution in Texas that strongly suggests an innocent man was killed by lethal injection, and Les Zaitz, Jeff Kosseff and Bryan Denson of The Oregonian, Portland, for their disclosure of mismanagement and other abuses in federally-subsidized programs for disabled workers, stirring congressional action.

Other items of interest coming up:

On our show this week we are having Mike Weinstein, author of "WITH GOD ON OUR SIDE: One Man's War Against an Evangelical Coup in America's Military"

Check out internationally renowned architect William McDonough and his vision of the future:
"BUILDINGS LIKE TREES, CITIES LIKE FORESTS" http://www.mcdonough.com/writings/buildings_like_trees.htm

Analysis of the Left Behind Books and their anti-Christian message

WHY WE'RE ANGRY

Just got this letter from John Conley, the Marine combat Vet (who sent me his Purple Heart, God bless him!)

Dear Lyd,

What Imus said was inexcusable and deserving of decisive punishment, but more inexcusable to me is the ongoing urgency to completely destroy his life and the very positive things he and his wife have built to help kids fight cancer. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have both needed forgiveness in the past for racial slurs and incidents (Jackson with his anti-semitic "Hymietown" remark in describing New York City and Sharpton with the Tawana Brawley myth he rushed into and helped perpetuate.)........both incidents just as inciteful, if not more, than anything Don Imus has said or done.

In this case not only is there no forgiveness, but the punishment grossly outweighs the offense and a feeding frenzy has developed among bored journalists trying to uncover new excuses to hammer Imus even harder. The theory seems to be that If you want to prove you're not a racist, then step up and take your pound of flesh from Don Imus. I fear the pendulum is now swinging a little too far the other way.

John
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Part of being a public figure or celebrity means dealing with unsolicited opinions about yourself. On this blog as well as on others, I have been stung and hurt to the core by cruel, sexist comments. The first time it happened, my cheeks stung and I burst into tears, feeling lower than I had in my entire life. I can't imagine what these young Rutgers women must have felt like after working hard to get to college, to earn their place on the Rutgers team, to make it to the finals — only to be dismissed as whores (no matter the catchy slang, "ho's" means one thing and applies to the worst thing men can call women.) Black women have it harder than any other group; they have been marginalized, forsaken, forgotten and maligned and yet they have such dignity and innate beauty in the face of unbearable hardship.

Imus lost his MSNBC show, a signal that sexist, racist hate-speak will not be tolerated on the public airwaves. But much worse than Imus on any given day, are Glen Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage — who also have their own shows. They systematically engage in hate-speak and Nationally syndicated Clear Channel radio host Glen Beck has actually sent out screaming death wishes to certain Democrats he hates. He called hurricane survivors in New Orleans "scumbags," and said he "hates" 9-11 families: "I didn't think I could hate victims faster than the 9-11 victims. (More below, but first this...)

Please Go back and listen to Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly's shows. Every single day, they provoke people to hate their fellow man, to hate anyone who is not pro-Bush, pro-war labeling peacemakers as traitors. Every other word out of their mouths conveys their disgust for perceived liberal bias, for human rights groups, environmentalists, liberals, gays, Muslims, women's groups, feminists, "Hollywood" Democracts and their fellow man.

Is this kind of hate-mongering good for America? Is the politics of personal destruction good for America? Does anyone know the truth about the "Swift Boat Veterans" who ruined John Kerry? Did the media ever get the word out that the man behind this campaign was a completely deranged individual who was caught lying and posting threats on blogs -- and had no credibility whatsoever? I will post the truth you missed in my next thread.

On all these political talk shows, every single pundit, except for Keith Olbermann — are raving right wingers. Chris Matthews aside, there are no other intelligent, Progressive or Democrat-leaning talk show pundits with thoughtful, reasoned voices -- such as Paul Waldman or Scott Ritter or Robert Dreyfuss or Arianna Huffington. The list is endless. We have so many wonderfully intelligent people that could be talk show hosts, yet we get these sinister loud-mouths who dumb America down such as Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh.. and of course Bill O'Reilly, one of the most hateful hypocrites on the public airwaves. Why are they still on the air? They take glee in stirring up hatred. What a tragedy for America. We need to become a softer, kinder nation. We need to come together and see each other with fresh eyes. We are all one race, and we are all flawed.

BUSH LIED, THOUSANDS DIED and are dying ....WHY?
In case you didn't know the reasons most Americans are so upset with Bush, here is a brilliant article that describes how we feel. This is an an article by Paul Waldman, Senior Fellow at Media Matters and author of "It's Not Enough to Be Right: What Progressives Must Learn From Conservative Success." We had him on our show a few weeks ago. Don't forget, this Saturday morning at 9 AM PST we're honored to have Congressman Charlie Rangle, who has been serving America for over 30 years. He's a great wit, and a man with such a keen eye and big heart. He's on CNN and MSNBC almost every week.

ALL THE RAGE
There's No Denying it, we Progressives are Angry
by Paul Waldman

We can’t deny it any longer. There’s no point in hiding it, no point in trying to explain it away. Yes, it’s true: We progressives are angry. And we no longer care if the centrist, moderate guardians of the establishment scold us for it.

Our anger is not just some vague feeling whose source we can’t put our finger on. It isn’t based on absurd conspiracy theories and it isn’t illogical.

We’re angry because of what has happened to our country, because of how we’ve been treated, and because of the innumerable crimes the conservatives have committed. We’re angry at the president, we’re angry at the Congress, we’re angry at the news media. And we have every right to be.

Yes, we’re angry at George W. Bush. We’re not angry at him because of who he sleeps with, and we’re not angry at him because we think he represents some socio-cultural movement we didn’t like 40 years ago, or because he hung out with a different crowd than we did in high school. We’re angry at him because of what he’s done.

It’s true, we don’t like the fact that the most powerful human being on the planet is such a ridiculous buffoon that he can’t put two coherent sentences together without beginning to giggle and shimmy his shoulders. But we’re not angry because we think he’s stupid, we’re angry because he treats us as though we’re stupid. We’re angry that he lied to us, and lied to us and lied to us again. We’re angry that when he lies to us it isn’t because he’s caught up in scandal or got caught doing something he shouldn’t have, it’s part of a carefully constructed plan to fool the public.

Yes, we’re angry about Iraq, and we may be for the rest of our lives. We get angry every day when we open our newspapers and see the photo of another young soldier who died for this, another one maimed for life, another one with a tormented and broken soul. We’re angry about the couple of trillion dollars this war will cost. We’re angry about the thousands of young men around the world have been driven into the arms of al Qaeda, who have decided to devote their lives to killing Americans because of this war. We’re angry about the thousands upon thousands of Iraqis who have died in the orgy of bloodshed we unleashed, and the living too, those whom we said we were coming to “liberate,” but who now find themselves in a suffocating, endless miasma of fear and misery and death.

We’re angry that when we talk about ending this monstrous war, the soulless hypocrites who are glad to send more and more men and women to be scarred and maimed and killed in Iraq have the gall to accuse us of not “supporting the troops.” We’re angry that people whose actions exhibit nothing but contempt for freedom and liberty and justice, who wouldn’t know real patriotism if it came up and smacked them across the face, pin a little flag on their lapel and say that we’re the ones who hate America.

We’re angry because people who said the Iraqis would greet us as liberators, who said Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were good buddies, who said this nightmare of a war would bring a flowering of democracy across the Middle East—this band of idiots, the Kristols and the Krauthammers and the Kagans and the Kondrackes, is treated as “serious” and “credible” on matters of national security, while those of us who were right about the war are dismissed as some sort of fringe whose ideas are too silly to listen to.

We’re angry that America may now be the only country in the world in which torture is an officially sanctioned policy, proclaimed proudly in public. We’re angry that in our name prisoners are subjected to sleep deprivation, water boarding and other forms of psychological torture to the point where they are literally driven mad. We’re angry that the president has decided, over 750 times, that if Congress passes a law and he doesn’t like it, he’ll just ignore it. We’re angry that this administration has argued over and over, in public and in court, that if the president does it, it’s not illegal. We’re angry that they tell us we have to shred our freedoms in order to be safe, and that so many of our fellow citizens shrug their shoulders and think it’s no big deal.

And we’re angry that Bush has made our nation so hated around the world. We’re angry that the next time a Democrat gets elected, most of their time will be spent cleaning up the god-awful mess Bush has made of everything.

We’re angry that we and our children and our grandchildren will have to keep paying off the nation’s debt, which now stands at nearly $9 trillion. We’re angry because every other industrialized country in the world has a single-payer health care system that works, and we pay more for ours than any of them, yet we have 45 million people with no health insurance. We’re angry that the insurance companies have convinced their obedient servants in Congress that the Rube Goldberg perpetual paperwork machine we have now is somehow “the best health care in the world” and preferable to a system in which you go to your doctor, get treated and go home, without having to fill out 10 forms and get down on your knees before the gods of the HMO bureaucracy to get a partial repayment minus your deductible and your co-pay.

We’re angry that the federal government is brimming with people fundamentally opposed to the mission of the agencies over which they preside, the anti-environmentalists who run the Interior department, the mining company lobbyists in charge of mine safety and the union-busters in charge of worker safety. We’re still angry about Hurricane Katrina, that our government left thousands of its citizens stranded to suffer and die, while the president thought that the guy presiding over the disastrous failure was doing a heckuva job. We’re angry that our government sends religious fundamentalists around the world to discourage condom use, thus condemning untold numbers of people to unwanted pregnancy, disease and death.

We’re angry that forty years after the Voting Rights Act, the Republican Party continues to exploit racism and do everything in its power to stop black people from voting in each and every election. We’re angry that in the richest country in the world we can’t seem to find our way to a system in which you go to the polls, cast your ballot and know that it will be counted. And yes, we’re still angry about what happened in Florida in 2000, that through lying and cheating and pure luck the Republicans were able to steal a presidential election, and five unprincipled partisans on the Supreme Court helped them do it. We’re angry that every time we look at Al Gore all that pain and frustration and outrage comes bubbling up through our guts no matter how hard we try to “get over it.”

We’re angry that some of the most powerful people in America see nothing wrong with getting down on their knees to kiss the rings of radical clerics espousing a theology as maniacal as any on earth. We’re angry that we have to endure lecture after lecture on “family values” from people who rush from their pulpits, whether in church or in Congress or on cable chat shows, to a motel room to give in to their desires and revel in their transgression before rushing back to those pulpits to wag a finger in all our faces with talk of sin. We’re angry that people whose souls are so twisted by hate and shame they make John Winthrop look like Wavy Gravy have the nerve to tell us how to live “moral” lives.

We’re angry that when some pompous fool who less than a decade ago demanded that Bill Clinton be impeached in order to demonstrate our fealty to the “rule of law” comes on television to explain how Scooter Libby’s perjury and obstruction of justice mean nothing and he must immediately be pardoned, Wolf Blitzer doesn’t say, “Get out of this studio, you contemptible hypocrite, and don’t ever come back.”

We’re angry because a repellent ghoul like Ann Coulter can regularly advocate the murder of people with whom she has political differences, yet continue to get invited on the Today Show. We’re angry that journalists who ought to know better tut-tut progressive bloggers for using dirty words but don’t blink an eye when conservatives spew forth the most abominable hatred and calls for violence that one could imagine.

We’re angry that there is not a single show on cable news in which a progressive is given an hour to spout off his or her opinions, but that privilege is given to the likes of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck and John Gibson and Tucker Carlson and Joe Scarborough and all the other two-bit electronic hucksters of phony aggrievement.

We’re angry because snake-oil salesmen like William Donohue— despite being an anti-Semitic homophobe —can issue a press release expressing patently phony outrage about something somebody said, and get the mainstream press to jump like trained dogs. We’re angry because a band of liars like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth can hoodwink the media into doing their dirty work for them. We’re angry because every despicable Republican attack gets recycled as knowing, arched-eyebrow commentary by “mainstream” commentators.

Those are a few of the things we’re angry about, and yes, that’s a lot of anger. But you know what? There’s nothing wrong with being angry. Anger is the appropriate reaction to moral outrages, to crimes against our common humanity, to the actions of those who would turn our country into something twisted and ugly.

Paul Waldman is a senior fellow at Media Matters for America and the author of the new book, "Being Right is Not Enough: What Progressives Can Learn From Conservative Success."
© 2007 TomPaine.com

From Lydia: I struggle with my anger toward Bush and I pray for him to gain wisdom, compassion and to truly understand the Christ Truth. As a mother of young sons, I feel such agony over the deaths of our soldiers — young kids barely out of high school — and I am so horrified at Bush's arrogance, that he doesn't seem to care about human life. I am most upset that Bush proclaims he's a Christian, yet persists in doing the exact opposite of the Great Peacemaker's teachings. The "anti-Christ" means "evil in the mind of man; evil in human thought." I do not believe in a physical "anti-Christ" but Bush and the pro-war politicians, including misguided evangelical leaders such as John Hagee, Tim LaHaye and Pat Robertson represent the anti-Christ thought on earth right now; of this I have no doubt. Research how they are connected to White Supremacists. Jesus himself called the religious leaders, the pharisees a "brood of vipers" and got very angry with them. We are angry with Bush for his wanton destruction of lives and our democracy.

But I know that thinking the worst of Bush, or anyone, never helps them. We have to send love to those who are in the dark, that have lost their way. We need to see the good in people, even those we think are evil, becaues there is no power in evil except that which we give it with our thoughts. This is prayer: seeing the good in others so overwhelmingly that our vision of them actually changes the situation. Even with terrorists, dictators, "deciders" — and in the environment, world affairs, financial crises — it works for our worst enemies. It's written in the New Testament, in red lettering.

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY * MARCH FOR PEACE!

Today is St. Patrick's Day! Thanks for wearing green and listening to our show BASHAM AND CORNELL PROGRESSIVE TALK
from 9 - 10 a.m. We broadcast live from Las Vegas and Los Angeles -- or go to our website and click on the link to hear the entire show in the archives.



Upcoming: Congressman Charles Rangel will be our guest April 14. He will discuss his 30-year Congressional career and his new book, "And I Haven't Had a Bad Day Since: From the Streets of Harlem to the Halls of Congress." And next week, we'll have Eric Boehlert, author of LAPDOGS: "How the Press Rolled Over for Bush." Last week we had Mark Green, one of the new owners of Air America, founder of New Democracy Project and author of "Losing Our Democracy." We've had some amazing guests the past 3 weeks: former federal prosecutor Elizabeth de la Vega, author of "U.S. vs BUSH" which is going to be a movie, a courtroom drama on the Bush Impeachment. We also had Media Matters' Paul Waldman, author of "Being Right is Not Enough".

The OFFICE is my favorite show. Here is The Oval Office, a great parody with Bush playing the Steve Carell character.

TODAY on BASHAM AND CORNELL PROGRESSIVE TALK CALL IN and discuss whatever is on your mind. Today, Saturday, Doug and I decided not to have a guest, so we can discuss all the current headlines in depth and take calls from listeners -- that's YOU! Please call in and talk about whatever bugs you the most: the Valerie Plame scandal, the firing of federal prosecutors, Rove's hand in both of these scandals, Alberto Gonzales, our veterans, Walter Reed Medical Center, Westhusing's suicide, Ann Coulter, Bill O'Reilly... and impeachment. We have some breaking news regarding mental illness in our returning vets. This is not to be missed.

Bestselling authors, Senators and political leaders coming up on our show. Check out upcoming guests, leave comments on our blog or listen to the archives at: BASHAM AND CORNELL PROGRESSIVE TALK

After the show, MARCH FOR PEACE in your city! We will be at Hollywood and Vine here in Los Angeles. Check out peace activities where you live. And if you're in Washington, please take a picture of yourself in front of the Pentagon and send it to us!

PETRAEUS LINKED TO SUICIDE IN IRAQ
EVERYONE: PLEASE READ THE ARTICLE BELOW ABOUT NEW EVIDENCE THAT CAME TO LIGHT SURROUNDING COL WESTHUSING'S SUICIDE. NOW IS THE TIME. THE CRIMINALS MUST GO.
This says it all: the anti-Christian greed and evil of the Bush administration, the corruption of the generals whom Bush put in place of the REAL generals who told him this war was a disaster.

All morning I've been praying for the world: for our troops' children and Iraqi children who have lost their fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters; for our precious, barely-out-of-high school troops; for the Iraqi people, for all suffering people of the world. Today will be a day of light and a new beginning. We can only go forward. But now is the time, the criminals must go. They have no place in this new world we are creating. The selfish, fundamentalist, divisive mindset of "neoconservatism" is a blight on mankind.

I've also been praying for our administration and our Congress to see the light. We can stop this war, stop this insanity, impeach Bush & Cheney & Rove, get rid of the debauched, corrupt, heinous neo-conservative mindset, which is truly anti-Christian.

NOW IS THE TIME. THE CRIMINALS MUST GO.

Gen. Petraeus Linked To High-Profile Suicide in Iraq

Col. Ted Westhusing, a West Point scholar, put a bullet in his head in Iraq after reporting widespread corruption. His suicide note -- complaining about human rights abuses and other crimes -- was addressed to his two commanders, including Gen. David Petraeus, now leader of the U.S. "surge" effort in Iraq. It urged them to "Reevaluate yourselves....You are not what you think you are and I know it."

Petraeus Linked To High-Profile Suicide in Iraq
Submitted by Clif

READ THIS ONE TOO. THIS WILL BLOW YOUR MIND: SECRETS ABOUT BLOOD MONEY IN IRAQ

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