LUST FOR WAR

THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE: Bush's approval rating is at 23%, the lowest of any president in history. And 80% of all Americans, want low-income children to have health coverage. But only one president and 14 Republicans with 14 votes stand in the way of the will of the people. What kind of man is President Bush?



Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA) was more than a little upset after the SCHIP veto override failed. The 18-term lawmaker, stirred the pot Thursday when he attacked President Bush and congressional Republicans for backing hundreds of billions of dollars for the Iraq war, but blocking a $35 billion expansion of a children's health insurance program.

"You're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement," Stark told Republicans on the floor of the House.

The remarks during the debate over Bush's veto of the children's health bill drew howls of outrage from House Republicans and conservative commentators. His words were replayed endlessly on cable news and talk radio. By Friday, even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi - who praised Stark for his leadership on the children's health bill a day earlier - was distancing herself from his comments.

What Pelosi also meant: Stark had handed Republicans an easy way to distract the public from what Democrats view as a winning stance on the popular children's health bill. Stark, 75, declined a request Friday for an interview.

He began: "First of all, I'm just amazed that the Republicans are worried that we can't pay for insuring an additional 10 million children. They sure don't care about finding $200 billion to fight the illegal war in Iraq. Where are you going to get that money? You are going to tell us lies like you're telling us today? Is that how you're going to fund the war?

"You don't have money to fund the war or children, but you're going to spend it to blow up innocent people if we can get enough kids to grow old enough for you to send to Iraq to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."
He went back to the same point moments later: "But President Bush's statements about children's health shouldn't be taken any more seriously than his lies about the war in Iraq. The truth is that Bush just likes to blow things up in Iraq, in the United States, and in Congress."

On the left, Stark's comments drew rave reviews. They were posted on the blog, DailyKos, stirring applause from the site's anti-war, anti-Bush readers: "Wow, this guy kicks ass" wrote one blogger.

But Rep. Kevin Brady, R-Texas, who followed Stark on the floor, said: "It is despicable to have a member of this Congress accuse this president, any president, of willfully blowing the heads, quote, blowing the heads off our young men and women over in Iraq and Afghanistan."

The GOP spin machine went into hyperdrive. House Republican Leader John Boehner's press aides alerted reporters to Stark's comments. The National Republican Campaign Committee issued a press release, titled: "Democrat Disgrace: Pete Stark Drags SCHIP Political Circus to All-Time Low."

But Stark continued: "What are you going to do for that 200 or 300 billion bucks, folks, that you're spending to kill these kids when they grow up? You can't answer that, can you? You look at your shoes, look up here, you don't know," he said.
"So you don't even want to talk about 200 or 300 billion bucks to kill innocent Iraqis and young men and women. There is no member of this House that has an enlisted child over there. There is no risk for you guys."

Republican tried unsuccessfully to have his words stricken from the official record.

***
From Arianna Huffington: At Wednesday's press conference, President Bush insisted that he is still "relevant." Normally, it's an immutable law of politics that if you have to say you're relevant, you're not. But in Bush's case, his role as the primary Decider on the war in Iraq is keeping him tragically relevant -- in the same way that the driver of a bus careening toward the edge of cliff is extremely relevant to his passengers. Okay, so Bush is relevant. And deeply deluded if he truly believes, as he also claimed, that he and Congressional Democrats are "finding common ground on Iraq." Beating your opponent into the ground with vetoes and filibuster threats is not the same as finding common ground.

* No Child Left Alone: 2-year-old S-CHIP recipient Bethany Wilkerson is new target of right-wingers.
* Mitch McConnell’s staff DID write emails interested in smearing the Frosts, and then lied about doing so.

My Letter to Congressman Pete Stark:

Thank you for standing up to Bush on his atrocious, un-Christian, warmongering behavior. Over 80% of the country agrees with you and believes Bush does not have his priorities straight. He cares about frozen fetal cells and the unborn, but cares nothing about real, live BREATHING CHILDREN! He cares nothing about the poor or "the least among us." Bush flies across the country in the middle of the night to intervene in the Terry Schiavo case, a private family matter, but sees no reason to help the low-income families and children of America — or the Katrina victims for that matter.

Many Americans believe George Bush is not only un-American, but is a war criminal. We also believe Bush, Cheney, Haliburton and Blackwater among others, are all guilty of war profiteering — a treasonous crime. They are guilty of dividing our country through politicizing this war, of breaking the Geneva Convention, of illegally wiretapping U.S. citizens and of violating our 2nd and 4th Amendment rights, and of myriad of other crimes including breaking the right to writ of Habeas Corpus.

You are right Congressman Stark — Bush should should apologize for lying in a rush to war, for violating our Constitution, and for never being honest about his reasons for this war.

Bush has also chipped away at our freedoms and the morale of our troops by hiring private mercenary armies like Blackwater — at taxpayer expense — whose only loyalty is to cash.

WE THE PEOPLE are horrified at what has become of our beautiful democracy.

Congressman Stark, though we may not have chosen the provocative words you chose, we applaud you for your strength in STANDING UP TO the CORRUPT, FRAUDULENT, UNCHRISTIAN BUSH ADMINISTRATION. Our war planes bombed small children in Iraq. Countless children are dead because of this "war on an abstract noun" the so-called 'war on terror.' Why are Iraqi children less valuable than American children? Why doesn't Bush care about human life?

ON WIRETAPPING:

A caller on Randi Rhodes show called in to say "if you're innocent, what does it matter if they wiretap you?" Randi let him have it. She said, "My father would roll over in his grave to hear you say he fought in vain. He fought in WWII, marching over Normandy to fight for our freedoms — for our Constitutional rights of privacy, freedom of speech, freedom to assemble, freedom to protest." My theory is this: who is to say they won't accuse you or take you away for "perceived liberal bias or treason in speaking out against our Fuhrer (Bush) one day, or misinterpret one of your phone calls? But all of our freedoms are being stripped away right now. We are no longer allowed to assemble except in organized "pens" far away from the object of our protest. We are afraid to speak out loud on the phone or in our homes for fear we will be misunderstood or taken as an enemy of the STate for disagreeing with this absurdly unAmerican president.

If Bush, Cheney and the NSA went to Qwest, Verizon and AT&T to put wiretapping in place seven months before 9/11 doesn't this mean they ied when they said they were wiretapping Americans to catch terrorists as a result of 9/11? Isn't this treason?

Thank you,
Lydia Cornell
www.LydiaCornell.com
www.Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk
www.BashamandCornell.com
The ONLY Progressive Talk show in Las Vegas, broadcasting live daily at 8 AM on KLAV 1230 AM.

***

As you know, media consolidation poses a tremendous threat to authentic journalism and diversity of opinion.

And it may soon be worse. At this very moment, the FCC is trying to pass new media ownership rules that will hand Big Media a Big Win. If the changes are approved, one company could own the major daily newspaper, eight radio stations and three television stations in the same market. Worse yet, once the digital television transition is completed in 2009 -- allowing stations to broadcast multiple signals - a single company could control up to 18 television channels in one market.

As it stands now, six huge conglomerates - whose combined 2006 revenues reached more than $293 billion - dominate media ownership.

You can bet those six companies are more interested in turning a profit than in publishing or broadcasting a diverse range of news and opinions. And the progressive viewpoint? Forget it!

That's why it's more important than ever for progressives to unite online. By harnessing the power of the Internet, we can share information and inspire each other to take action.

Unlike the General Electrics, the Viacoms, and the Walt Disneys of the world, CommonDreams.org isn't interested in making a profit.

God Bless you!

THE NEW ENLIGHTENMENT

Ann Coulter, a "Perfected Christian"

Ann Coulter's remark that Christians want Jews to be "perfected" proves she knows nothing about Christianity. Maybe she didn't mean it the way it sounded, but I have done enough research on Coulter to know she prefers a "cream-colored" ethnically cleansed population of "non-swarthy" types. Her comment that Jews need to be perfected is the kind of talk that sparked the Holocaust.

TOMORROW ON HBO: "RUN, GRANNY, RUN" follows the unique experience of 94-year-old Doris "Granny" D. Haddock as she runs for the U.S. Sentate in this inspirational documentary premiering tomorrow at 9 pm October 18 on HBO. Proving that age, sex, and social standing don’t necessarily determine political campaigns, "Run, Granny, Run" shows the “everyman” (woman) can make a difference when it debuts TOMORROW THURSDAY, OCT. 18 at 9:00 p.m. ET, exclusively on HBO. Check Granny D’s Official MySpace Page and see advanced clips from the film including what happens when Granny D tries to meet Howard Dean: http://www.myspace.com/rungrannyrun

Read the amazing new book "THE CONSERVATIVES HAVE NO CLOTHES: Why Right-Wing Ideas Keep Failing" by Greg Anrig, Vice President of Programs at the Century Foundation. We just interviewed him and you can listen in the archives at: Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk Radio The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 a.m. Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on AM 1230 KLAV in Las Vegas.



Three items to discuss:

1. Blackwater down: Is Blackwater prolonging the war in Iraq? Iraqis want them out of Iraq. Erik Prince's Blackwater Mercenery Army was paid over $300 million of our taxpayer dollars
2. Wiretapping set in place PRIOR to 9/11
3. Ann Coulter's remarks and her enablers in the media.

Blackwater is hurting our troops. From ThinkProgress.org: "Given the choice, the right-wingnuts always choose Blackwater over our own troops. They're not on the same side, and haven't been ever... The whole "screw them" thing four years ago was exactly that -- the wingers were more outraged over four Blackwater mercenaries killed than they were about the five Marines that had died that very same day... I was pissed that the sacrifice of those Marines merited less attention that those of a private, profit-motivated, unaccountable militia.

It's always been clear where the US military has stood in regards to the mercenaries. Soldiers complain about them:

"They act like they're God's gift to combat operations" complained one soldier to me, "Swanning around with weapons and equipment every bit as powerful as anything in our armoury, but without any of the legal framework that we have to work within. They're rude, aggressive and to be honest, their attitudes piss us guys off so I dread to think how the Iraqis view them".

The top brass have been complaining about their ill effect for years:

In the post-9/11 world, demand for the commandos is not only soaring within the military. Private firms and government organizations - including the CIA - are luring away troops with bigger salaries. "It is a very lucrative opportunity right now for special operations folks to get out and take very high-paying jobs" with private security firms, says General Brown. A 20-year veteran leaving Special Operations receives about $23,000 in retirement pay, but can earn $100,000 to $200,000 in private industry, military officials say.

With no end to the demand in sight, the military must carefully allocate SOF while increasing their ranks. To fill the current gap, it is accepting added risks with less experienced forces.

Blackwater in Iraq: Killing for Profit By Saul Landau

The words "Support Our Troops" stain the rear bumpers of thousands of cars. The slogan, however, conceals a more pernicious demand: "Support Our Mercenaries." Yes, in Iraq, the mercenaries--euphemistically called "paid contractors"--outnumber US troops, 180,000 to 160,000. These contractors do more than provide armed security for US personnel. They do chores that previously belonged to regular army staff.

Private security companies employ for high pay former US soldiers, ex-kidnappers and torturers from Pinochet's secret police, death squad heavies from a variety of Central and South American countries and a few leftover South African apartheid thugs as well. The companies collect billions from US taxpayers. A typical U.S. soldier serving in Iraq makes about: $57 a day. The estimated daily take for a Blackwater security guard there runs between $500- $600. (FACING SOUTH A News and Politics Report Sept. 26, 2007)

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From Lydia: There was a time when I was a Republican, but that was before I got sober. It was when I was in my ego stage: very self-centered and full of myself. And in fear of losing what I had or not getting what I wanted. As we shed our ego, we become more compassionate toward others, more concerned about social justice and saving our earth and helping other flawed humans — not judging them, but helping them.

I am reprinting this letter from Dennis Taylor of Phoenix, Arizona. I think this man is very intuitive — which we are all capable of being when we open our minds.

"Dear Lydia, I have to share something that my wife said after reading your blog. Without sounding flakey…I’m convinced that my wife is correct and that this goes hand in hand with your statement regarding the next frontier being the center or the middle. We both have a strong internal sense of something impending that is difficult to explain. A feeling that many of us are going to be called to stand out for what is right and rescue the Constitution of the USA so that the country can get back to being a democracy. It seems like while America slept, we were slowly and silently robbed of Democracy. The irony is the fact that so many people who call themselves Christian as well as conservative played a big role in America silently surrendering Democracy to those who regard the constitution as a mere technicality to work around in order to promote their self-serving agendas.
Respectfully, Dennis Taylor


Tribal divisions and ethnic chauvinism seem so primitive. We can't survive without each other. It's also pretty clear that storing up material treasures on earth is useless. We are learning not to depend on material sustenance, but to depend on charity. Love for our fellow man -- there is nothing else worth talking about. And that is why the Gate is narrow: it's hard to love your enemies -- and I'm not just talking about terrorists. It's hard to love people you can't stand to be in the same room with. With my relatives this weekend, I kept asking myself: "How can I be of love and service to people who are incredibly annoying?" Very few will make it through this gate of loving their enemies, not fighting, and embracing those morally bankrupt people who disgust, offend and threaten them. But that's what we are called to do, and that's why the Way is narrow.

I want to start focusing on all the good we can do. Look at this incredible universe – it would take a blind slug not to see God everywhere. This is heaven and it is here now, if we choose to see it. I was at a peacock farm with my kids, chasing peacocks all over the place -- and in the design of a peacock's feathers, you see God’s artistry. In the calligraphy of a Monarch butterfly you see perfection. And in a baby's face, you see heaven. Why do people debate whether or not God exists when God is simply love? Who can argue with love, kindness, compassion? Asking to prove the existence of God is like asking to prove you love your kids. I actually believe that Einstein was on the cusp of proving God through science, for he said that 'goodness, truth and beauty are laws of the universe'; hence God and science are not mutually exclusive.

I also love Wayne Dyer's statement that "you'll see it when you BELIEVE it" and "the antidote to depression is kindness". One act of kindness to another human being is an anti-depressant; it actually raises your Serotonin levels. An observer of an act of kindness also gets a Serotonin boost. If everyone in America was engaged in volunteering, in "love and service" work, we wouldn't be thinking about ourselves or what we lack -- and we wouldn't be depressed. Depression is an epidemic in this country and the pharmaceutical companies love promoting our fears & obsessions. Getting out of our self-centered fear by helping others works every time.

My brilliant friend Chaz and I were discussing how the world has changed and how odd it is that something we thought was a given, makes so much sense to us, but make so little sense to right-wingers, and he said that if we weren't saying the truth, it wouldn't upset so many people. Kind of like the film "Good Night and Good Luck" about Edward R. Murrow's battle with McCarthy. He also said that "a frog never jumps out of a pan if you turn the heat up slowly." Which is what the people in power are doing to middle-class Americans: turning the heat up and taking away our earnings, choices and freedoms in such gradual degrees that we barely notice until it's too late.

Another letter from a fan: "I am convinced that if Jesus Christ almighty were to come pay us a visit incarnate today, he would have one thing to say to many of the religious right-wing and republican party as well as a result of the mess they have made. He would call them a 'brood of vipers,' which is what he called the Pharisees of his time. These very same people who did everything in their power to rake Bill Clinton over the coals for an indiscretion with a Whitehouse Intern seem to have absolutely no problem with telling lies, half truths and hiding Bush’s sins and crimes. It’s a sad but true statement when ya consider the fact that Nixon got impeached for things far less offensive then the crimes that Bush is flat out guilty of both locally and internationally..."

"I’m concerned about the future of this country as a result of the dangerous trend of growing lies and deception that the Bush administration and vicious mouthpieces like Ann Coulter and Bill O’ Reilly. Over the course of the last five years, people like this have effectively redefined the word “liberal” to mean a lot of things that it simply is not and never was. Liberal is actually a very positive and progressive term when examined under the light of honesty. However, in the hands of corrupt people like Bush, O’ Reilly and Coulter, it has been used to mislead the American public. Regretfully, they have used the stupidity of most Americans to believe that liberal is something bad, immoral, baby murdering and anti-Christian."

EARLY HALLOWEEN PHOTO:

GOOD CONSERVATIVES ARE LIBERALS AT HEART

October 10, 2007 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Basham and Cornell Radio Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 a.m. Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on AM 1230 KLAV in Las Vegas. All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at BASHAM & CORNELL RADIO
Email: show@bashamandcornell.com

On Thursday October 11, 2007, former Nixon counsel, John Dean will make his 3rd appearance on the Basham and Cornell Radio Show at 8 am Pacific Time on AM 1230 KLAV in Las Vegas. And we have him for the entire hour. First time he was with us, we discussed his then new book “Worse Than Watergate: The Secret Presidency of George W. Bush.” Second appearance - his new book was titled “Conservatives Without Conscience.”

When he makes his 3rd appearance with us, we will be discussing his latest book, “Broken Government: How Republican Rule Destroyed the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Branches.”

John Dean has become one of the most trenchant and respected commentators on the current state of American politics and one of the most outspoken and perceptive critics of the administration of George W. Bush in his New York Times bestsellers Conservatives Without Conscience and Worse Than Watergate.

In his eighth book, Dean takes the broadest and deepest view yet of the dysfunctional chaos and institutional damage that the Republican Party and its core conservatives have inflicted on the federal government. He assesses the state of all three branches of government, tracing their decline through the presidencies of Nixon, Ford, Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II.

Unlike most political commentary, which is concerned with policy, Dean looks instead at process— making the case that the 2008 presidential race must confront these fundamental problems as well. Finally, he addresses the question that he is so often asked at his speaking engagements: What, if anything, can and should politically moderate citizens do to combat the extremism, authoritarianism, incompetence, and increasing focus on divisive wedge issues of so many of today’s conservative politicians?

With the Democrats now in control of both the House and Senate, the stakes for the 2008 presidential election have never been higher. This is a book for anyone who wants to return government to the spirit of the Constitution.




Several points I want to bring up:

1. Iraqi PM's Office finds that Blackwater Committed "Deliberate Murder" in spraying bullets at civllians and killing a mother and child, among eleven others.

2. Bruce Springsteen on 60 Minutes, said silence is unpatriotic — it is unpatriotic NOT to speak out against the Bush administration forits ruinous policies such as illegal wiretapping, torture, voter suppression, and the immoral Iraq war.

3. I believe conservatism as an ideology is over — or at least unraveling. I don't see how any true Christian can ever vote Republican again, at least in the Party’s current “neo-incarnation,” with sociopaths running the asylum.
But still, I have hope that the good conservatives will wake up. This is an article I wrote for a magazine:

Good Conservatives are Liberals at Heart

One of the definitions of ‘liberal’ in the dictionary is “not conservative”. The word liberal also has several other definitions, all including similar qualities, including “marked by generosity and open-handedness, bounteous, broad-minded, unbigoted, tolerant.” Those qualities sound like the kind of qualities most of us would like to see in our children. Now, I wonder which of these qualities Coulter objects to? Does she dislike “generosity” or open-handedness — or is it the broad-minded part that bothers her? Of is it the “tolerance” concept to which she objects?

Following the dictionary definition of liberal as “not conservative,” in other words, the opposite — then it seems a liberal is marked by generosity and a conservative is marked by stinginess. If a liberal is broad-minded, it follows that a conservative is narrow-minded. If it is liberal to be tolerant, then it must be conservative to be intolerant.
Going by the dictionary definitions of these words, I would like for my family to be known as liberals, and surely not the opposite. The dictionary definition of conservative is basically “disposed to maintaining existing views” which is why conservatives of long ago were opposed to freeing the slaves, the right of women to vote or to become lawyers and professionals — as well as the rights of Blacks to vote and the Civil Rights Act.

I’ve always been taught that Jesus was generous, tolerant and broad-minded, which fits the definition of liberal. He washed the feet of the lepers, hung out with the moral outcasts and sinners — who were so transformed by his loving acceptance, they desired to "sin no more." In summing up, based on those qualities of character, it seems to me undeniably that Jesus was a bleeding heart liberal.

My conservative friends may disagree with the label, but not the spirit. We must never allow words to get in the way of communication.

Again, I would like to believe that good conservatives are really liberals at heart. To paraphrase Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, “Hath not a conservative eyes, hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Are they not fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer that a liberal is? If you prick them, do they not bleed? If you tickle them, do they not laugh? If you poison them, do they not die? If you wrong them, shall they not revenge? If we are like you and the rest, we will resemble you in that.”

We are not children of a lesser God; we are all children of the same God.

*********

America has an embarrassing history of dropping bombs on people, but always assuming everyone knows we’re really still the good guys. This is how an abusive lover acts. We should play hard to get with Iraq. When in a love-hate relationship, it often takes leaving to really win. Unless we leave Iraq, we don’t give the Iraqis a chance to miss us, to pick up the pieces, to take responsibility, to grow up and to solve their own problems. It’s a basic spiritual law, an unflinching principle that when you let go of pushing too hard, the very thing you want comes to you. It’s arrogant to think the Iraqis don’t have their own higher power and their own ability to find their way.

This is how I used to act with an ex-boyfriend. I’d try to control him like a dictator, but secretly the guy thought I was a wacko. I only pushed him away. Trying to control people never works because it’s fear-based behavior. People are never interested when you push yourselves on them. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. Staying in Iraq is causing nothing but an increase in grenades and bombs being lobbed at us. We are the problem. We are the common denominator in all this chaos. We must remove ourselves. Of course our President may have ulterior motives. He’s not telling us why we’re really there. There’s no transparency in this administration.

But I really believe in a power greater than ourselves and I know we're going to be all right. God did not give us a spirit of fear. Thank God for the Twelve Steps, where I learned to at least see my part in a conflict and to say I’m sorry. In the words of Stuart Smalley, “It's easier to wear slippers than to carpet the whole world.”

*************
"No problem can be solved at the same level it was created on." – Albert Einstein

What I've discovered is that the solution to any material problem is never at the level of the problem. It is always above the problem or challenge. It is always by “letting go” and looking away from the problem, never by fighting it on its level. It is always a spiritual solution.

No human power can relieve alcoholism. More alcohol cannot cure it. Nor can therapy, psychoanalysis or dissecting the brain heal the "dis-ease" of alcoholism.

No military power can solve this conflict in Iraq. We can’t fight fire with fire; we need to go above the problem and approach it from a diplomatic or spiritual solution. This is what Bush doesn’t understand. Fighting ones enemies never resolves anything, as the Great Peacemaker said. More military might only escalates the conflict. All great spiritual leaders know that what Christ taught creates peace: a soft answer turns away wrath. Withdraw our energy from the situation and the situation will solve itself. We must take care of our own side of the street.

From my friend Carl's blog at wwwsimplyleftbehind.blogspot.com:

"Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things – every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘Liberal,’ as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, Senator, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor." -- Matt Santos, The West Wing

NO WAR WITH IRAN * THOMAS JEFFERSON

“It is not that Christianity has been tried and failed. It is that it has never been tried.” G. K. Chesterton

On Saturday, I ran into Ed Begley Jr. who has a great 'green' show called "Living With Ed" on the Home and Garden Network. I also ran into Anson Williams of Happy Days' fame. He's one of my favorite people and it was so good to see him. We had co-hosted Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve Special years ago. Anson not only looks great but is the father of five daughters, ages one to eighteen! He is a director and owner of a national brand, StarMakerProducts.com which I'll talk more about in future posts. Anyway, Anson and I got to talking about the world, and he turned me onto a letter on 'Equality' from Thomas Jefferson to John Quincy Adams, which is fascinating. Anson is quite an evolved thinker and scholar now, with a special interest in our Founding Fathers.

It's always good to be reminded of what our nation stands for. In the Preamble to his original draft of the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson wrote:

"We hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men are created equal & independant, that from that equal creation they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government shall become destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, & to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles & organising its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety & happiness."

Time Magazine: "His complete, uncompromising, and abiding commitment to the principle of human equality [is what I admire most about Jefferson]. This idea remains as radical today as it was when Jefferson first gave expression to it over two centuries ago. The idea of equality was in the air at the time, but Jefferson, a magnificent stylist, was able to bring it to life by expressing it clearly, simply, eloquently. And he connected equality to other ideas that remain equally compelling: liberty, self-government, freedom of religion.

The ideals of equality, freedom, and freedom of religion are indispensible, now more than ever. It would be instructive, for example, for both those who authorized the torture at Abu Ghraib and those who fight crusades and jihads and do unspeakable things in the name of God to read Jefferson's observations about the futility of torture, the utter ineffectiveness of coercion. "What has been the effect of coercion?" he asked. "To make one half the world fools, and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error all over the earth."

More on Jefferson and slavery below, but first, PLEASE READ THIS from Wayne Dyer:

"We’re told by those who represent us that the insurgents and the average Iraqi and Middle Easterner hate us because we stand for freedom and democracy. It’s my contention that we have it backwards. We’re hated because we fail to stand for freedom and democracy. In fact, what we do stand for is whatever is best for American financial interests. Under the Shah of Iran, freedom and democracy didn’t exist, yet we supported that regime. The Saudi royal family certainly doesn’t stand for freedom and democracy, yet we have no quarrel with them. The Emir of Kuwait is not about freedom and democracy, and he has our dying loyalty.

The average person on the streets of Iraq isn’t fooled by our occupation of their country. They hate us throughout the Middle East and the Moslem world because we care most about how to make money in foreign lands. They know it and we should know it. But we’re told that it’s our freedom and democracy that engenders this animosity toward us. Residents of Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, Syria, and other countries throughout the Middle East hate us vehemently because they believe that Americans simply can’t figure out how all that American oil got under their sand. They believe that we’re acting in our own self-interest and that we justify destroying their villages and killing insurgents by convincing ourselves that it’s in the name of freedom and democracy.

If all of this is blatantly untrue, and we have no monetary motives in our continual clean-up campaigns that are leaving corpses and severely wounded people by the hundreds of thousands, then let’s make an effort to communicate with those whom we’re now aimlessly killing. I ask each and every person who conducts this war under the guise of Christian principles to answer this question: How much time have you spent praying for your enemy today? Read Jesus in Matthew 5:43-44: You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you."

Continued... JEFFERSON and SLAVERY

Don't expect history to offer us simple lessons or perfect heroes. "The most problematic thing about him was his lifelong ownership of slaves and his inability to extricate either himself or his nation from the institution of slavery. Early in his life, Jefferson opposed slavery, writing, famously, "I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just." But as he aged, his optimism waned, and he came to fear emancipation even more than God's wrath. Committed to equality in principle, Jefferson's practice was compromised by his racism, which is so distasteful, so repugnant to us today...This is the contrast in Jefferson, and his legacy: Words about human equality and freedom that are as fresh today as the day he wrote them, and words about racial inferiority that are so jarring that we can't read them today without feeling a profound sense of shame.

The standards by which we judge Jefferson are the ones he bequeathed us. We judge him harshly because he kept men and women in slavery, knowing that it was wrong — but it was Jefferson who told us that all people are equal, and that everyone is entitled to liberty and to human happiness. Don't expect history to offer us simple lessons or perfect heroes.

To his white family, Jefferson was both loving and manipulative. He gave them love to last a lifetime, and he left them impoverished. To his black family, he was remote but not unkind. He never acknowledged his black children, but he gave them their freedom, which is the greatest legacy that anyone born a slave ever wished for."

(The above is from Jan Lewis, Professor of History, Rutgers University, Newark, New Jersey)

John Edwards gives Hillary a "Sense of the Senate"

This week we watched a vote pass on the Lieberman/Kyl "Sense of the Senate" bill which is essentially giving Bush authorization to attack Iran without Congressional approval.

Although a "Sense of the "Senate bill has no legal authorization, it does give Bush and those desiring a war with Iran a wink of approval once he makes that move. This bill wasn't even debated, but swiftly introduced and voted on.

What is interesting to note that one of the Democrats voting in support of this bill was Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. Hillary has often said she will end the war in Iraq if she is elected President. Her vote on this "Sense of the Senate" bill tells otherwise.

During the Democratic debate this week the vote on Iran was a hot topic. John Edwards stood out of the mix by taking Hillary on for her vote on this issue. This response gives clear reason why Edwards should be heavily considered;

I voted for this war in Iraq, and I was wrong to vote for this war. And I accept responsibility for that. Senator Clinton also voted for this war.

We learned a very different lesson from that. I have no intention of giving George Bush the authority to take the first step on a road to war with Iran.

And I think that vote today, which Senator Biden and Senator Dodd voted against, and they were correct to vote against it, is a clear indication of the approach that all of us would take with the situation in Iran because what I learned in my vote on Iraq was you cannot give this president the authority and you can't even give him the first step in that authority because he cannot be trusted.

Edwards articulated an important difference he has with Clinton, and it's a difference that all voters, not just Democrats, should grasp. This commanding debate performance and that answer in particular, Edwards solidified his status as Clinton's main challenger.

One of the most important things in life is to learn from our mistakes and strive to not make them again. Hillary has shown by her "Sense of the Senate" vote that she took no lesson from the Iraq war.

I voted for this war in Iraq, and I was wrong to vote for this war. And I accept responsibility for that. Senator Clinton also voted for this war.

We learned a very different lesson from that. I have no intention of giving George Bush the authority to take the first step on a road to war with Iran.

John Edwards
September 26, 2007

John Edwards learned that lesson and the mark of a great leader is to not repeat the same disastrous mistakes over again. John Edwards gave Hillary and the world a real "Sense of the Senate" with his stance on Iran.

BLACKWATER TAKES TAXPAYER MONEY

Upcoming: Obama and Hilary on BASHAM and CORNELL RADIO Reecently we've had Democratic Presidential candidates John Edwards, Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel on our show as well as Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage and several Congressmen. If you missed any of these shows, check out the archives. The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific AM 1230 KLAV in Las Vegas. All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at BASHAM AND CORNELL.COM



Blackwater CEO and founder Erik Prince


Best selling author John Grisham is finally speaking out. He said the current administration is built around "bad people with evil intent" and contends President Bush played politics as thousands died in Iraq.

Between 75-100 coalition forces (mainly Americans) die every month in Iraq.

Blackwater's Prince Has GOP, Fundamentalist "Christian" Group Ties (the "quotes" are mine)
by Corey Flintoff

With more than $800 million in contracts, Blackwater USA, led by Erik Prince, is among the biggest companies providing armed guards for U.S. officials and government contractors in Iraq.

Prince, the heir to a Michigan auto-parts fortune, has close ties to the Republican Party and conservative Christian groups. He began his career with a stint as an officer in the U.S. Navy SEALs, and co-founded Blackwater in 1997 with other former commandos. His family's wealth made it possible for the then 27-year-old Prince to fund the Blackwater start-up with his own money.

Prince and his firm have drawn scrutiny from members of Congress after Blackwater guards were accused of opening fire on civilians in Baghdad in an incident that left at least nine people dead.

Blackwater has said that its employees were defending a State Department convoy and denied that they had done anything improper, though Prince has made no public statement on the issue. The Iraqi government threatened to expel the company from the country, but after four days, Blackwater was allowed to resume its activities guarding State Department personnel.

Republican, Christian Ties

Prince grew up in Holland, Mich., where his father, Edgar Prince, built Prince Corporation, an auto-parts company that based its success on novel products, such as the lighted vanity mirror for car window visors. The elder Prince was a close friend and supporter of Christian evangelists, such as James Dobson of Focus on the Family, as well as a contributor to the Republican Party. He was an early benefactor of the Family Research Council.

Residents of the Tiny Town of Potrero, California - East of City of San Diego
Need Your Help to Stop Blackwater West!

As US Congress and Iraqi government officials probe recent killings of civilians by the notorious private contractors in Baghdad, join local residents to the expansion of Blackwater USA at a major rally and encampment at the gates of the proposed “Blackwater West” site in Potrero, a tiny town in east San Diego county on Saturday, October 6th - Sunday, October, 7th. Events planned for just days after Blackwater founder Erik Prince is scheduled to testify before the US Congress.

STOP BLACKWATER WEST CAMP, RALLY AND WALK!
Saturday, October 6th and Sunday, October, 7th Two day Educational Encampment and Walk to Stop Blackwater West in
Potrero, California - East of City of San Diego

Join us, Saturday, October 6 and Sunday, October 7, 2007 to:

MARCH TO THE GATES OF THE PLANNED BLACKWATER WEST
800 ACRE MERCENARY TRAINING FACILITY IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

--SAY NO TO THE DESTRUCTION OF OUR ENVIRONMENT
--SAY NO TO WAR PROFITEERS
--SAY YES TO KEEPING POTRERO A SAFE, LIVABLE COMMUNITY

As Blackwater USA Comes Under Increasing Fire for Actions in Iraq,
Turn Up the Heat to Stop Blackwater West ! Join Local Residents for the Largest Protest to Date
at the Gates of Planned Blackwater West Site Near Tiny Border Town

**************************

Some things to think about:

Why is the Republican party pushing Hilary to be the candidate? Newt Gingrich started pushing this plot, and if he's behind something you know it has to have a sinister design. I like Hilary and think she'd be a terrific president — as would Obama, Kucinich, Edwards, Gravel, Richardson, Biden -- but there must be a reason Bush and Rove want Hilary to be the nominee. What is up there sleeve? I think it's this: they do not believe the majority of men and women in the United States could stomach voting for a woman. I think they're counting on this archaic, mysoginistic view that the neocons share.

THE BLACKWATER CHARADE * KENT STATE SHOOTINGS

Lately there have been serious civil rights violations — reminiscent of Kent State in 1970 when four students were killed by our National Guard simply for protesting the Vietnam War. A college student was Tasered by police for simply asking too long a question, several people were arrested for wearing ‘Peace’ t-shirts, and a minister was tackled outside the Petraeus hearing ostensibly for wearing an “I love the Iraqi People” button while black. Our fragile democracy is at stake.

From Wikipedia: The Kent State shootings, also known as the May 4 massacre or Kent State massacre, occurred at Kent State University in the city of Kent, Ohio, and involved the shooting of students by members of the Ohio National Guard on Monday, May 4, 1970. Four students were killed and nine others wounded, one of whom suffered permanent paralysis.

Some of the students who were shot were protesting the American invasion of Cambodia, which President Richard Nixon announced in a television address on April 30. However, other students who were shot were merely walking nearby or observing the protest at a distance.

There was a significant national response to the shootings: hundreds of universities, colleges, high schools, and even middle schools closed throughout the United States due to a student strike of eight million students, and the event further divided the country along political lines.

Now Blackwater is trying to open a camp in San Diego at the Mexican border...

THE BLACKWATER CHARADE by Larry




There are approximately 163,100 U.S troops in Iraq while at the same time there are more than 180,000 private security forces in Iraq, most of them employed by Blackwater USA.

The heavy reliance on contractors in a war zone is partly the result of a post-Cold War shrinking of the armed forces and the Bush administration's preference for contracting out government functions to the corporate world.

While having contractors on and around the battlefield is not new, the situation in Iraq raises questions about whether U.S. troops have become so dependent on contract help they could not function properly in their absence.

The presence of thousands of private sector security guards adds another component to the debate. Employees for Blackwater and other companies are engaging the enemy in combat.

As the military leans on the private sector, there's a push to hold contract employees to the same legal standards as military personnel. It appears Blackwater USA security forces have less strenuous rules and laws that apply to them, than do U.S troops.

A 2004 regulation issued by the U.S. occupation authority granted security contractors full immunity from prosecution under Iraqi law. Unlike American military personnel, the civilian contractors are also not subject to U.S. military law either

It is suspious that contractors are being used to mask the true extent of our involvement in Iraq,What other way can you interpret it when the number of contractors exceeds the number of troops?

A July report from the Congressional Research Service said the State Department has hired over 2,600 private guards to protect U.S. diplomatic personnel and to guard the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad as well as other key sites inside the city's "Green Zone.

They are private security in the same make believe sense that our uniformed military is a “volunteer” force, since both are lured by the dollars offered by the same paymaster, the U.S. government. Contractors earn substantially more, despite $20,000 to $150,000 signing bonuses and an all-time-high average annual cost of $100,000 per person for the uniformed military.

The U.S. government purchases whatever army it needs, which has led to the dependence upon private contract firms like Blackwater USA, with its $300-million-plus contract to protect U.S. State Department personnel in Iraq.

The fact that Blackwater USA gets almost all of its revenue from the U.S. government—much of it in no-bid contracts aided, no doubt, by the lavish contributions to the Republican Party made by company founder Erik Prince and his billionaire parents—its operations remain largely beyond public scrutiny.

Blackwater and others in this international security business operate as independent states of their own, subject neither to the rules of Iraq nor the ones that the U.S. government applies to its own uniformed forces. “We are not simply a ‘private security company,’ ” Blackwater claims on its corporate website. “We are a professional military, law enforcement, security, peacekeeping, and stability operations firm.

Blackwater USA is not licensed to operate in Iraq, but that didn't stop George W Bush from using them anyway. In fact the Iraqi government that Bush installed are demanding Blackwater leave Iraq after Blackwater troops fired on civilians killing 20.

The United States on Tuesday suspended all land travel by U.S. diplomats and other civilian officials in Iraq outside Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, amid mounting public outrage over the alleged killing of civilians by the U.S. Embassy’s security provider Blackwater USA.

Blackwater and other private "security" outfits are known to be involved in "secret" government operations. Taxpayers pay their salaries but lack the ability to know what these "private security" forces are doing.

In that regard Americans and Iraqis find themselves in a similar situation. Blackwater has more than $500 million in U.S. government contracts, and that does not include the "black" budget operations.

Columnist Joseph Palermo said the recent incident also raises the question: What are the trained squads of right-wing mercenaries from Blackwater, Triple Canopy, and Dyncorp going to do when they come home from Iraq?

They will probably fulfill a role similar to the one played by the Pinkerton Detective Agency in the late-19th and early-20th centuries. The Pinkertons specialized in breaking strikes and repressing labor union organizing, as well as intimidating progressives in general with violence. Blackwater and its ilk can easily become the new Pinkertons, as they apparently already have in New Orleans.

It seems the wealthy have sealed themselves away in gaited neighborhoods while they espouse policies that strip the public of needed services and starve the faltering middle and lower income groups.

There is quickly coming a time when repressing public resistance to these economic changes will produce a booming market for companies specializing in the violent repression of dissent.

In their gated neighborhoods, the ruling elite will not have to worry about local law enforcement hedging on police repression, they can just hire their own Blackwater Security Force to do their aggression for them.


Image Design by Stephen Pitt Cartoons