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Tuesday, March 25, 2008
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Spitzer investigation began with Republican operative's tip to FBI
 
Excerpt: Almost four months before Gov. Eliot Spitzer resigned in a sex scandal, a lawyer for Republican political operative Roger Stone sent a letter to the FBI alleging that Spitzer "used the services of high-priced call girls" while in Florida. ...

Stone, known for shutting down the 2000 presidential election recount effort in Miami-Dade County, is a longtime Spitzer nemesis whose political experience ranges from the Nixon White House to Al Sharpton's presidential campaign.

Spitzer got snagged by the fine print of the PATRIOT Act

Excerpt: The odd connection between the anti-terror law and Spitzer's trysts with call girls illustrates how laws enacted for one purpose often end up being used very differently once they're on the books.

Comment: Just goes to show that the PATRIOT Act was a phony. It was intended to be used in cases other than terrorism, so that the Constitution would be shut down and due process would be cast aside.   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

  Election 2008  

Telecom lobbyists tied to McCain
 
Excerpt: Republican presidential candidate John McCain has condemned the influence of "special interest lobbyists," yet dozens of lobbyists have political and financial ties to his presidential campaign - particularly from telecommunications companies, an industry he helps oversee in the Senate.

Of the 66 current or former lobbyists working for the Arizona senator or raising money for his presidential campaign, 23 have lobbied for telecommunications companies in the past decade, Senate lobbying disclosures show.

McCain sought nutball Hagee's endorsement
 
Excerpt: In an interview that will appear in this Sunday's New York Times Magazine, controversial televangelist Rev. John Hagee declares, "It's true that McCain's campaign sought my endorsement."

Hillary Clinton has lied about her Bosnia trip  VIDEO 
 
Comment: This is video of news coverage, from Mrs Clinton's Bosnia trip in 1996, showing utterly ordinary shots of Mrs Clinton meeting with Bosnia's acting President and a little girl for a photo op on the airport runway. Immediately thereafter, we see present-day footage of Sen Clinton describing a harrowing landing in Bosnia, with an evasive maneuver amidst gunfire, after which "there was no greeting ceremony and we basically were told to run to our cars." There's simply no way that Mrs Sen Clinton's account isn't a lie.   Mostrados    PERMANENT LINK 

Clinton is in a cult: That's why she hasn't pounced on Obama's "pastor problem"
 
Excerpt: "... through all of her years in Washington, [Hillary] Clinton has been an active participant in conservative Bible study and prayer circles that are part of a secretive Capitol Hill group known as "The "Fellowship," also known as The Family. ...

The Family's most visible activity is its blandly innocuous National Prayer Breakfast, held every February in Washington. But almost all its real work goes on behind the scenes -- knitting together international networks of right-wing leaders, most of them ostensibly Christian. In the 1940s, The Family reached out to former and not-so-former Nazis, and its fascination with that exemplary leader, Adolf Hitler, has continued, along with ties to a whole bestiary of murderous thugs.

Documents show Clinton lied repeatedly about not supporting NAFTA

McCain says Purim is the Jewish Halloween

McCain seems shaky on the basics of his Iraq lies
 
McCain compounds al Qaeda gaffe by repeating for a fourth time


Judge gives White House three days to explain why
it shouldn't have to copy its computer hard drives
 
Excerpt: E-mails by White House staff are considered part of the nation's historical record, and federal law requires they be preserved. The White House has admitted that potentially millions of e-mails from the past eight years have been erased, although it has provided conflicting accounts on how many may still exist on backup tapes.

The order, issued Tuesday morning by a federal magistrate judge in Washington, D.C., comes in a case brought against the Bush administration by the National Security Archive, a nonpartisan group affiliated with George Washington University.

Comment: As I read that, it means the White House has three more days to make sure everything they want scrubbed has been scrubbed. Except, of course, there's really no three day time limit, because there's no way in hell that this White House would abide by anything a federal judge ordered.   Willie K.    PERMANENT LINK 

Three days later:  Hard drives were destroyed, White House now says

Excerpt: "When workstations are at the end of their lifecycle and retired ... the hard drives are generally sent offsite to another government entity for physical destruction," the White House said in a sworn declaration filed with US Magistrate Judge John Facciola.

It has been the goal of a White House Office of Administration "refresh program" to replace one-third of its workstations every year in the Executive Office of the President, according to the declaration.

Comment: The criminality and arrogance is ... ordinary.   Scotch on the Rocks    PERMANENT LINK 

  The melting economy  

JPMorgan to buy (with Fed money) Bear Stearns for $2 a share
 
Excerpt: The Fed will provide special financing to JPMorgan Chase for the deal, JPMorgan Chase said. The central bank has agreed to fund up to $30 billion of Bear Stearns, less liquid assets.

Comment: Up to $30 BILLION in "special" financing! $2 a share in stock. Must've taken a lot of number crunching to come up with a dollar amount for the totally useless piece of crap Bear Stearns had turned into: How 'bout $1 a share? Nah, makes it too obvious the stock is worthless. How 'bout $3? Nah, sounds like the company might actually be worth something. $2 it is! Who are these people kidding? This is a bank failure.

"Less liquid assets" = "assets worth somewhat less than a wooden nickel."   SirJ    PERMANENT LINK 

Big tomato grower shuts for lack of migrant workers
 
Excerpt: Saying the nation's immigration system is broken, Pennsylvania's largest grower of fresh-to-market tomatoes announced Monday he will no longer produce the crop because he can't find enough workers to harvest it.

Comment: Farmers can't pay US citizens enough to work for them and still show a profit. Shows that US agriculture is dependent on foreign slave labor.   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

Truck drivers stage protest about high gas prices

Russian steel company buys major US mill from Luxembourgian company

Wall Street may cut 20,000 jobs over 2 years


British court overrules
Venezuela asset freeze
 
Excerpt: In Britain, the Venezuelan government has scored a victory in its legal dispute with the oil giant ExxonMobil. On Tuesday, a British court overturned a ruling freezing $12 billion in Venezuelan assets.

Exxon had won the freeze as part of an attempt to recoup an investment in a nationalized Venezuelan oil project. But Venezuela says Exxon is trying to recover more than ten times what its investment was actually worth. In Caracas, Venezuela oil minister Rafael Ramirez hailed the ruling as a vindication.

Venezuela and Exxon remain in arbitration over the dispute.

  America's rigged elections  

New Jersey cancels
investigation of voting machines
 
Excerpt: New Jersey elections officials have scrapped plans to inspect electronic voting machines suspected of malfunctioning during the recent presidential primary election, following legal threats by their manufacturer, Sequoia Voting Systems.

Officials from New Jersey's Union County had requested the audit by Princeton University computer scientist Ed Felten after finding discrepancies that raised doubts about the accuracy of the results returned in the February election. Earlier this week, they reversed course after Sequoia threatened legal action if the county turned the machines over to Felten. The company's attorneys argued the independent review would violate its trade-secret rights.

Comment: Checking whether the machines work is a violation of Sequoia's proprietary rights? That's absolutely absurd.

I hope (but doubt) Union County is planning to print up paper ballots for November, and leave their Sequoia machines to gather dust. Any other plan would make Union County election officials knowingly complicit in an obvious crime. We've reached and passed the point -- years ago -- when any election official who's at all interested in honest elections has more than enough evidence to pull the plug. And yet, we're about to hold yet another national election on machines that cannot plausibly be deemed reliable. Infuriating.  Helen & Harry    PERMANENT LINK 

Sequoia website hacked

Voting machine maker Sequoia
says licensing agreement
prohibits independent testing


Ohio's voting machines are
now an official crime scene



  Iran: America's next war  

Petraeus says Iran is
'behind Green Zone attack'
 
Excerpt: "The rockets that were launched at the Green Zone yesterday, for example... were Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets," he said, adding that the groups that fired them were funded and trained by the Quds Force.

Comment: Gen Petraeus has made similar claims in the past, and been promptly debunked, so there's no reason to believe him today and every reason to assume he's lying. Show me the missile fragments, Gen Petraeus.   Randall T.    PERMANENT LINK 

VP Cheney's Middle East tour
sparks Iran war rumors
 
Excerpt: A senior aide to Mr Cheney was forced to deny that the nine-day trip to Turkey and the Middle East was part of a strategy by the vice-president to build support for military action against Iran.

Bush again lies -- this time to Iranians -- that Iran has announced intent to develop nuclear weapons

Cheney says Iran "may have"
resumed nuclear program


Bush says Iran's banking
practices are 'deceptive'
 
Comment: That's the kettle's cruel comment for the pot.   Helen & Harry    PERMANENT LINK 


  Torture is the American way  

Canadian Supreme Court
will consider Guantanamo
in light of international law
 
Excerpt: The Supreme Court of Canada has agreed to hear arguments about the legality of the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo, where Canadian Omar Khadr is being held.

The high court ruled yesterday that it could consider submissions on whether Guantanamo violates international law, dismissing the federal government's objections that the Canadian courts were not the place to examine the actions of the United States.

US interrogator gets immunity
in exchange for cooperation
in his own victim's trial
 
Excerpt: The US military has given an interrogator immunity for possible abuses against a prisoner now held at Guantanamo Bay in exchange for his cooperation with prosecutors against the detainee in a war-crimes trial. The interrogator was previously convicted of assaulting another detainee in Afghanistan.

Jumana Musa, advocacy director for Amnesty International USA, said the arrangement raises doubts about the reliability of statements taken by the interrogator.

"If you're talking about getting immunity for actions you have taken against the person you're testifying against, there's no way to look at that and not wonder if that implicates how you got the statements," she said.

Comment: What better way to have a culture of torture than to protect the torturer who tortured out the information?   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

Italian judge clears way
for CIA "rendition" trial
 
Excerpt: The trial in absentia against 26 Americans -- almost all believed to be CIA agents -- is the first anywhere over the US practice of "extraordinary rendition," whereby terrorism suspects are secretly transferred to third countries.


Reebok is fined record $1 million for
lead bracelets that killed 4-year-old
 
Excerpt: This fine is the largest ever imposed for a violation of the Federal Hazardous Substances Act. In agreeing to settle the matter, Reebok denies that it violated federal law.
 
Lightning round news
Iraq occupation protesters
mark slaughter's anniversary


Pre-collapse photos show
bends on Minnesota bridge


Inspector faces charges for faking
paperwork at crane site disaster


  Cops you won't see  
        on TV's COPS  

Cops bust teens' root beer kegger

Chicago man tasered to death by police

Cop with record of brutality is charged in DJ's death

Cop shoots woman and child in parking lot

Man rushing for medical help is
arrested, jailed, denied medical care


South Carolina troopers use
police cars to ram suspects



  Corporate citizenship  

Canteloupe imported from
Honduras with salmonella


Pension funds used for retirement offers
 
Comment: The auto companies are offering to buy out workers with the worker's own money. How neat and tidy for the companies. What a rip-off for the workers.   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

Starbucks must pay after ripping off baristas' tips

Sony charges $50 extra for laptop without crapware


  Destroying civil liberties  
        is like letting  
             the terrorists win  

Officers will go door to door asking residents
for permission to search their homes


Passengers fingerprinted at Heathrow

State Department illegally peeks at files
of all three presidential hopefuls


Air safety proposal: shock-bracelets
controlled by flight attendants


British writer is denied entry
to US over "moral turpitude"


FBI posts fake hyperlinks
to snare child porn suspects


San Francisco's video cameras
don't deter crime, study shows


Justice Dept audit:
"Terror watch list" is riddled with errors



  Corruption, incompetence,  
       and cover-ups  

White House Spokeswoman Perino lies
about what Bush said earlier the same day


After closing public corruption unit, US Attorney's office threatened staff who spoke out

Scooter Libby loses his law license

Cheney again lies that Saddam
and Iraq had something to do with 9/11


Bush trumpets parade of lies to mark
five-year anniversary of Iraq attack


Cheney’s mendacity knows no bounds

Asked about two thirds of Americans'
opposition to war, Cheney says, 'So?'


Bush on lost lives in Iraq:
"Those costs are necessary"


FEMA demands $209K to let newspaper
see public records on toxic trailers



  Liars in mainstream media  

Corporate cheerleader from hell:
CNBC's Erin Burnett


Neo-Nazi Hal Turner confirms
friendship with Fox's Sean Hannity


Constitution-trasher John Yoo -- who
OK'd torture and warrantless wiretaps
-- writes for Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal


Pat Buchanan says "America has been
the best country on earth for black folks"


Fox News anchor walks off set, Wallace
rails at network for "Obama-bashing"


New York Times doesn't challenge lie that
McCain "doesn't talk about" POW experience


Politifact says "maybe [McCain] was
confused just for a moment", though he
made the same misstatement numerous times
 
Ignoring similar statements in the past,
Fox News' Smith asserted McCain's
Al Qaeda-Iran gaffe was a "slip-up"


Citing his experience, Fox News panelists
excuse McCain's Al Qaeda-Iran gaffe
, while
Matthews panel on MSNBC says McCain
"shows off his foreign policy credentials," and doesn't even mention McCain's screw-ups

CNN's Dobbs lies that Obama and
Clinton are "not for border security"


On Iraq war fifth anniversary, media again
doesn't mention that Bush's original
justifications for war have been debunked


Limbaugh says "Obama has disowned his
white half ... to go all in on the black side"


At Fox News, it's funny that
Starbucks ripped off its employees


ABC News wallows in Bill Clinton's
sexcapades all over again


Fox News hypes phony Obama-
Black Panther connection


CNN's Beck lets Blackwell lie
about Obama, unchallenged


McCain-loving ABC News falsely
claims McCain has released his taxes


MSNBC's Gregory lets Republican
strategist lie about Obama, unchallenged


ABC News and Fox falsely claim
that Obama contradicted himself


Fox's Sullivan predicts African-American
"riots in the streets" if Obama isn't President


CNN's Blitzer aired spliced video
to cover for McCain's gaffe


Disney's Savage says Obama was "hand-picked
by some very powerful forces ... to drag this country
into a hell that it has not seen since the Civil War"


Limbaugh repeats Judicial Watch
smear falsely linking Obama to FARC


A week before Bear Stearns collapse,
CNBC 'expert' Cramer offered reassurance,
"Bear Stearns is not in trouble"


Fox's O'Reilly sics ambush
producer on Arianna Huffington



  Trashing the planet  

Bush administration guts enforcement
of Endangered Species Act


Thickest, oldest Arctic ice is melting


 
Comment: A million dollar fine, and that's the biggest fine ever levied. Are you impressed? I'm not.

I Googled around for a moment, and found this financial report from a few weeks ago -- Adidas, which owns Reebok, had $15.6-billion in sales in 2007, and made a profit of $837.9 million. Check my math, but it I've done the calculation correctly a $1-million fine, measured against income of $15.6-billion, is about the same rate as a $19 fine for someone making $30,000 per year. That's the company's punishment, for illegally using lead to make their trinkets, and killing at least one small child. And of course, nobody's going to jail, and the company doesn't even admit breaking the law.

This is, effectively, no punishment at all -- it's letting a giant corporation get away with murder, plain and simple.   Helen & Harry    PERMANENT LINK 

  Totalitarian Olympics  

China joins proud tradition of brutal pre-Olympic oppression
 
Excerpt: The brutal crackdown by Chinese authorities against Tibetan independence protesters ahead of the opening of the Summer Olympics in Beijing August 8 carries with it a terrible echo from the past.

Even after decades of occupation, the ruthlessness of the crackdown has shocked much of the world. It happens the week after the US State Department removed China from its list of the world's worst human rights offenders.

Yet the concern expressed by world leaders has seemed less for the people of Tibet than the fate of the Summer Games, with Olympic cash deemed more precious than Tibetan blood.

China deploys 80 truckloads of troops to Tibet

Chinese police keep killing Tibetan protesters

Chinese police open fire on Tibetan monks, nuns, and other locals

China bans Tiananmen Square live shots during Olympics
 
Excerpt: A ban on live broadcasts would disrupt the plans of NBC and other major international networks, who have paid hundreds of millions of dollars to broadcast the Aug. 8-24 games and are counting on eye-pleasing live shots from the iconic square.

Comment: Pity poor NBC/GE, as they were looking forward to pretty "eye-pleasing" shots from the site of the 1989 anti-freedom massacre, Tiananmen Square. Here, try this eye-pleasing shot of me flipping NBC the bird.

I'm as much a sports fan as your average America, but I'm a much bigger fan of freedom -- and I've never understood why the Olympics are being staged in a totalitarian state, and why NBC/GE is willing to give that totalitarian state billions of dollars for "broadcast rights". It's just billions of dollars to support the enemy of freedom (but in another oddity, the enemy of freedom is an "ally" and a good "trading partner" to present-day American leadership).   Neutron Gun    PERMANENT LINK 


  Life in liberated Afghanistan & Iraq  

Have you heard US soldiers speak out about the horrors?
 
Excerpt: Hart Viges was with the 82nd Airborne, part of the invasion in March 2003. He described a house raid where they arrested the wrong men: "We never went on a raid where we got the right house, much less the right person. Not once. I looked at my sergeant, and I was like, 'Sergeant, these aren't the men that we're looking for.' And he told me, 'Don't worry. I'm sure they would have done something anyways.'

"And this mother, all the while, is crying in my face, trying to kiss my feet. And, you know, I can't speak Arabic. I can speak human. She was saying, 'Please, why are you taking my sons? They have done nothing wrong.' And that made me feel very powerless. You know, 82nd Airborne Division, Infantry, with Apache helicopters, Bradley fighting vehicles and armor and my M4 -- I was powerless. I was powerless to help her."

More from Winter Soldier 2008

Electrocutions kill at least 12 soldiers, Marines in Iraq
 
Excerpt: Houston-based KBR -- which builds bases and maintains housing for US troops in Iraq -- is at the center of the inquiry, with questions being raised about its responsibility to repair known wiring problems.

Victims' families turn down Blackwater hush money
 
Excerpt: At least two Iraqi families of victims killed by Blackwater security guards in September say they have refused compensation offered by the company.

The father of a 9-year-old boy, who says his son was one of the 17 civilians killed when Blackwater guards, escorting a diplomatic convoy, opened fire at Baghdad's Nisour Square on Sept. 16, says he is trying to file a lawsuit against the company. He says that Blackwater offered him $20,000 through an Iraqi prosecutor, but he refused the money.

Cheney, on 4000th US military death in Iraq:
They volunteered, and the biggest burden is carried by President Bush
 
Excerpt: Noting the burden placed on military families, the vice president said the biggest burden is carried by President George W. Bush, who made the decision to commit US troops to war, and reminded the public that US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan volunteered for duty.

Iraqis celebrate Easter with numerous attacks inside US-protected Green Zone

Cheney, on un-announced visit to Baghdad, cites
"phenomenal" Iraqi security progress as bombing kills 40


US soldier may have killed herself after objecting to torture techniques

Iraq effort "well worth the effort", says Cheney


24 retired police convicted of human rights violations in Chile
 
Excerpt: Two dozen retired police officers were convicted Wednesday of human rights violations linked to the 1973 massacre of 30 political prisoners -- the biggest group of defendants ever sentenced in such a trial in Chile.

Judge Emma Diaz convicted the former officers on charges involving the detention, torture and shooting of 31 leftists whose bodies were dumped in a fast-flowing river days after Chile's military coup. One woman survived to testify about the incident.

Comment: And the CIA, who was behind it all, gets away Scot free.   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

In Canada, deserters find an uncertain haven, and aid from an earlier generation that fled
 
Excerpt: Across Canada, the remnants of a lost counterculture are rising up again as hundreds of aging draft dodgers reluctantly leave the quiet comforts of their anonymous lives to help an estimated 200 Iraq war deserters who fled north with no promise of asylum.

In truth, they share little beyond the difficult choice they made to forsake their citizenship, and the timeless debate whether theirs was an act of courage or cowardice. What they believe, where they came from, and how they ended up here are as different as 1968 and 2008.

Montana is granted "extension" for Real ID compliance -- though state hasn't
asked for extension, and Governor has emphatically said Montana won't cooperate
 
Excerpt: But on Friday, the agency granted Montana an extension even though state officials did not ask for one and insist they will not follow the law. Gov. Brian Schweitzer, D-Mont., told The Associated Press that administration officials "painted themselves in a corner."

Chertoff has offered to phase in requirements over about 10 years. But with President Bush leaving office in January, a decision to move ahead with Chertoff's plan will rest with the next administration.

Revived SDS joins anti-war protest
 
Excerpt: A revolutionary student organization that died nearly four decades ago returned to Cleveland Thursday on the Shaker rapid.

About 50 members of the Students for a Democratic Society club at Shaker Heights High School poured out of Terminal Tower and joined another 30 students already at the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument. Thursday's protest against the war was the first for the "new" SDS in Cleveland.

This is not your grandfather's SDS from the '60s -- but it kind of looked like it.

Comment: All they need is to bring back the draft, and then it will really look like it.   Marshall S.    PERMANENT LINK 

Chat with the McClatchy gang, the only mainstream reporters who got Iraq right
 
Excerpt: I think we approached this by asking the question every time the administration made an allegation "is this true?" "Is this true" is the basic question any journalist must ask any time a government, any government, makes an assertion. Governments do things for their own reasons depending on what the administration is. There could be altruistic reasons. But particularly a government that is politicized as the Bush Administration, one has to ask that question even more intensely. So we were doing that. We were also listening to people who were coming to us and saying "we don't think this is right. We don't believe that the intelligence is as strong as the administration is making it out to be." And indeed you saw that in open source reports. I'm referring to the unclassified version of the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction which everyone had available to it, including members of congress.

Pentagon rules out Fallon testimony
 
Excerpt: In declaring that Fallon would not join Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker as witnesses before Congress next month, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell said the decision had nothing to do with Fallon's views on Iran or the reasons for his unexpected resignation and retirement.

Comment: Um, is the military officially running the country now? I don't think Fallon has anything pertinent to add to Congressional testimony about Iraq, but my understanding is that (Miers and Bolten notwithstanding) Congress has the power to subpoena witnesses.   Angry Annie    PERMANENT LINK 

Newspaper circulation is about to skyrocket (as rules for counting readership are rescinded)
 
Excerpt: An agreed proposal at [Audit Bureau of Circulations]'s March meeting means that publishers can now charge as little as 1¢ for their newspaper and still count them towards paid circulation. And they can opt in weekend subscribers to the daily edition without permission, as long as there is some way to opt out if the householder actually doesn't want it (how thoughtful!). Previously anything less than 25% of a declared full price just didn't count and subscribers had to actually want more newspapers in order to receive them. With newspapers thus able to distribute at an effectively free price (from next April), the value of a paid copy versus a free copy just disappeared. And with it so did the point of the ABC.




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Haven't we had
enough of this?



     
 This week's commentary 

Come the revolution
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: Modern technology has armed the forces of oppression to degrees that surpass understanding. But be reassured. With every increased measure of oppression, the pressure for change grows exponentially in reaction. Have faith that the rear guard actions of the system will eventually cause it to crumble in a sudden and spectacular ways.

Blood-sucking Wall Street parasites
by Leon Fisher, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: If we reject the idea of being exploited by some Wall Street moneychanger who compares our existence upon the face of this Earth to some commodity like toilet paper or garbage bags, then it is time to begin the process of removing their poison from our economic and our political body.

Ass-clowns in Wonderland
by Hazel Burke, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: Is it really good public policy to have millions of people homeless, without jobs or healthcare while homes sit empty and work remains undone?

The color of global oppression is in shades of white
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: Racism is a very personal issue and needs our personal ground truth involvement to beat it back. To the extent that we are willing to be fully human, we need to accept the realities of the suffering of all our brothers and sisters. Love thy neighbor as thyself.

Trillions of reasons to be optimistic
by Hazel Burke, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: At the end of all this, Americans will be hungry and organized, which is a scary combination! I think this is inevitable, because we will have oodles of Experience. We will have seen the worst, most depraved atrocities of the people in government and on Wall Street, and we will be highly motivated to reclaim what is ours -- not just our freedom, wealth, privacy and self-respect, but our country! Maybe even the stars.

On the up side of this disaster
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: Vision is important. No vision, no future. Realism is also important. No realism, no survival.

A modest proposal for the immodest problem of a failing health care system
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: We have a choice. We can wait for politics to reform itself and solve the problem of declining access to our current system of health care and its declining quality, or we can get to work introducing practical solutions on the community level. I submit that waiting for the political system to reform itself is an untenable approach. My proposal, or some other proposal that links patients and providers in a mutually beneficial and ethical way, will be needed to circumvent our current paralysis.

Iraq: Five years of war ...and the media are still M.I.A.
by Punditman
 
Excerpt: In June 2007, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees published a study that estimated that 2.2 million Iraqis had been displaced to neighboring countries, another 2 million were displaced internally and 40% of Iraq's middle class is believed to have fled the country.

Meanwhile, in the seven months preceding the end of May, 2007, a mere 69 Iraqis were given refugee status in the United States. Good luck to the Iraqi refugee trying to flee to America! And yet his or her plight is the direct result of the violence and chaos brought about by this horrific war -- a war initiated by the United States, a war that was unnecessary, unprovoked, and illegal -- and a war that has made conditions much worse in the region and, in many ways, much worse for America itself.

Is Bush the worst US president ever?
by Thomas Walkom, Toronto Star
 
Excerpt: Whether Bush is more of a warmonger than James Polk, who in 1846 manufactured a crisis with Mexico in order to seize what is now California, more tolerant of cronyism than poker-playing Warren Harding, or more unlucky than William Harrison (he died after catching cold at his 1841 inauguration) is interesting but irrelevant. What we do know is that this president, this "decider" (to use his favored term), decided his way into a war that has destroyed the nation he was allegedly trying to free, destabilized further an already rickety Middle East and given Islamic terrorism a whole new raison d'etre.

 Previous commentary 

One last heads-up on the US economy
by Mr. Chuckles, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: The fate of Western Civilization is at stake, and it is reasonable to suppose that Europe, and Japan at least, will come to our aid in this time of crisis. But the President has burned every bridge, and there are valid reasons to suppose that right-thinking allies see this as a perfect time to de-fang and defenestrate a hyper-powerful country that has turned fascist and gone horribly wrong!

America's just desserts
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: When, as shortly will be demonstrated, America lapses into a condition of abject suffering, similar to what our government has helped impose on so many people of the world, no tears will be shed by the rest of the world in the telling of the tale.

We will be seen as suffering our just desserts -- first living high on crime and then reduced to the gutter by our excesses.

We will be lucky if we can scrape together the price of the drugs we feel we will need, to continue to self-treat our despair.

People have just stopped giving a damn
by Chris D., Unknown News
 
Excerpt: From what I've witnessed, people have come to accept almost anything one human being says or does to another as normal behavior at first glance, and are too wrapped up in our own lives to stop and take another look.

You see people arguing, it's normal. Even as they start uttering threats, it's just a couple of people yelling at each other. It's normal.

Liar, liar
by Don Nash, Unknown News

The fear card never goes away
by Rude One, The Rude Pundit
 
Excerpt: And then, eyes spinning in his head, pulling from random shit that he's said a thousand times before, the President went off the rails: "This war against these extremists and radicals who would do us harm is the great ideological struggle of our time. We're in a battle with evil men -- I call them evil because if you murder the innocent to achieve a political objective, you're evil. (Applause.) These folks have beliefs. They despise freedom. They despise the right for people to worship an Almighty the way he or she sees fit. They desire to subject millions to their brutal rule. Our enemies oppose every principle of humanity and decency that we hold dear. They kill innocent men and women all the time." You gotta love that applause there. Imagine it: an auditorium full of presumptive grownups clapping when another presumptive grownup says, more or less, "Mean people suck."

Dragon-free and peaceful
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: In a galaxy far, far away there was a nation that used some pet dragons to win a great war with evil. They pampered and fed these dragons in perpetual gratefulness for their survival. The dragons grew and multiplied until the upkeep of the dragons sapped the strength of that nation ...

This train's called Economic Disaster
and it has no brakes

by Leon Fisher, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: After the smoke of the economic train wreck clears, we will see our hard fought for standard of living considerably diminished.

On the verge of utter economic collapse:
A suspicion, a guess, a fear,
a hope and an idea

by Mr. Chuckles, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: There will be blood on the streets as millionaires push and shove through the crowd to the dollar exit doors. There will probably be one final insane selling climax and then Fox/CNBC/MSNBC will shout "Fire!" That will be the sign that the rich people will soon be reversing the money flows to buy up US properties on the cheap -- like real estate, bonds and stocks that were abandoned during the hysterical rush to flee the burning theater. Naturally, Joe-Sixpack will be selling dollars at the precise, multi-decade bottom -- and will then hold fast waiting for a final collapse, which will not be allowed to occur by The Powers That Be.

Conspiracies, secrecy, and radical honesty
by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News
 
Excerpt: In today's world, the rational person is forced to fly blind most of the time, and can have very little confidence in their perceptions of the day as they will likely be shown to be in error in light of future revelations. Consequently I believe with certainty very little of what I see, and not very much of what I think.


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Vatican ordered bishops worldwide to cover up priests' sex abuses
 •   Benedict XVI: A Pope to be ashamed of
•   He's guilty as sin, but ...
Texas court dismisses child-rape conspiracy lawsuit against Pope

Company fined $6,000 for answering customer's question:
"Is any of this stuff made in Israel?"


Before 9/11, "threat assessment" keeps Ashcroft off commercial air flights
 •   San Francisco Mayor says he was warned not to fly on 9/11
•    US, Germany, Japan investigate unusual trading before attack
 •   Two years later, the other shoe drops:
Investigation shows no evidence of Sept. 11 profiteering
•    US rejects Taliban's requests for bin Laden evidence
•    Pentagon officials canceled travel plans on Sept. 10 due to "security concerns"
•    One of Osama bin Laden's many siblings
helped found Texas oil business with President

•    Bush administration says it will release evidence linking bin Laden to 9/11
•    Osama bin Laden denies involvement in 9/11 attacks
•    Bush was told of bin Laden plot to hijack airliners
•    Britain warned US to expect September 11 al-Qaeda hijackings
•    Plans for Iraq attack began on 9/11
•    Cheney instrumental in blocking independent Sept. 11 commission
•    9/11 investigation gets less than half the budget of JFK's Warren Commission
•    9/11 victim's wife asks uncomfortable questions
•    White House ordered 9/11 EPA lies
•    White House OK'd flight home for bin Laden family in Sept. 11 aftermath
•    Bush administration "withholding evidence" from Sept. 11 investigation
•    White House seizes notes from 9/11 Commission
•    Without taking oath, Bush & Cheney testify together for 9/11 investigation
•    FAA manager destroyed 9/11 tapes
•    9/11 panelists bewildered by what Bush
administration calls “classified information”

•    Ground Zero workers say they found 9/11 'black boxes'
•    FBI office in Saudi Arabia shredded 9/11 investigation documents
•    Judge Judy, George Bush, and nineteen nutballs with box-cutters
•    9/11 'investigators' knew they were being lied to, said nothing about it
•    Two months before 9/11, an urgent warning to Rice ... and 9/11 'investigation' wasn't told about it
•    France infiltrated terror network, told CIA
about plans to hijack planes prior to 9/11

•    Hijackers' lost luggage conveniently solves so many 9/11 mysteries
•    Much more about 9/11

Bush "abstinence only" program lies to kids about sex, HIV dangers

Mexican President will sign bill legalizing marijuana, cocaine, heroin and other drugs for personal use
 •   Amid US pressure, Mexican president backs off drug decriminalization bill

Bin Laden expert skeptical about latest purported bin Laden tape
 •   Bin Laden tapes are as phony as Sept. 11's connection to Islam

US official said it was "patently false," but US forces did use napalm in Iraq

US officials are still lying about suicide attempts at Guantanamo prison

Promise to investigate war bombing of Baghdad market was a lie

  US pays 70,000 "former insurgents"
in Iraq $10 per day to not be violent


Study claiming 151,000 Iraqi deaths
counts only "violent deaths"


Princeton scientists hack
Diebold voting machine demo


Bush poo-poos consensus of American intelligence agencies on Iran

US corporate elite fear candidate Edwards

Sibel Edmonds makes case for insider
treason on the front page (in the UK)


Bush signing statement instantly
undoes new Sudan divestment law


Huckabee would criminalize
abortion and punish doctors


As primaries begin, the FEC will shut down

Justice Dept impeded investigation of Republican vote blocking in New Hampshire

Harry Reid (D-MyAss) bends Senate
rules to protect criminal telecoms


CIA lied to Congress, 9/11 investigation,
about existence of torture tapes


Bush planned illegal domestic
spying months before 9/11


FCC votes to allow even more
corporate control of media


Conyers protects Cheney;
won't allow impeachment hearings


Bush seeks to politicize military JAG lawyers

US intel report: Iran stopped
nuclear weapons program in 2003


Bush, Cheney have long known
that Iran poses no threat


Bush-Maliki agreement for "long term US presence" defies US laws, Iraqi Parliament

Bush says feds can open mail without warrant

Nevada prison officials let inmate rot to death without medical care

Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman's prosecution and imprisonment appears to be purely political
 •   Rove implicated in Democrat's political imprisonment

Secret Justice Dept memos authorized specific, horrific forms of torture
 •   American citizen was tortured under Rumsfeld's orders

NeoCon-controlled US Supreme Court OK's battering-ram home invasions
 •   Supreme Court silences 9/11 whistleblower
•   No challenges to "faith-based" government allowed, says Supreme Court
•   Supreme Court strikes down free speech for students while upholding First Amendment rights for corporations
•   Supreme Court OKs warrantless searches of poor peoples' homes
•   Supreme Court broadens immunity for federal officers who lose or steal citizens' property

Dead soldier had warned family she might be murdered for uncovering fraud

FCC won't probe giant phone companies for giving phone records to NSA without warrants

Republicans plan change in electoral rules to steal California in 2008
 •   US Attorney was targeted for firing after standing up for minority voting rights
•   What the heck is vote caging, and why should we care?

America spends record half-trillion on defense ... BEFORE you start counting the wars

Corrupt US Attorney General Gonzales visits Iraq to help shape its legal system

Justice Department lies, whitewashes administration's failure to comply with FOIA

Cover-up alleged in 1988 Lockerbie Pan Am bombing

CIA & Mafia worked together to try to kill Fidel Castro

"Mission accomplished" for FEMA in New Orleans
 •    As New Orleans waits, FEMA sends firefighters to seminar, assigns them to hand out fliers
•    Police lied to survivors, blocked escape from city
•    FEMA's top-level management stacked with Bush's cronies
•    Bush signs executive order lowering wages across Katrina-devastated areas
•    FEMA head specifically ordered lackadaisical response to "near catastrophic" Hurricane Katrina
•    Prisoners, including juveniles, drowned in flooded jails
•    Chertoff delayed federal response to Katrina disaster, memo shows
•    Homeowners' guns confiscated in New Orleans
•    Doctor says FEMA ordered him to stop treating hurricane victims
•    Drug Enforcement Agency plays key role in door-to-door searches of New Orleans homes
•    Police helped loot New Orleans, and they're still at it, say witnesses
•    FEMA turned away thousands of rescue workers from other government agencies as Katrina victims drowned
•    Fleet of rescue boats was ready to rescue New Orleans residents, but no-one at FEMA could "authorize it"
•    $3.6-billion in Katrina contracts went to questionable companies, Republican cronies
•    Hundreds of millions of dollars in Katrina aid from overseas unclaimed, unspent
•    Much more about Hurricane Katrina