Note from Helen & Harry --
We were off-line for almost two weeks due to a medical emergency, but we're doing better now. Our apologies if today's page seems a little stale to you -- a few of the items here are really old, but when you're stuck watching just TV news, almost everything is 'unknown news'. And we're still catching up on about a thousand emails in our in-boxes, so if your dialogue isn't included today it'll probably be in Monday's post. Peace on earth and prosecute Bush and Cheney, H&HH
The powers that be have reached a negotiated settlement that compels Karl Rove and Harriet Miers to testify under oath but in hearings closed to the public, regarding the politicization of the Justice Department. Any other American who's subpoenaed by the House Judiciary Committee would, of course, be expected to show up (Rove and Miers haven't, in the past) and any other American would
"We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it."
William Faulkner
have to testify in the open, not in secret, but Rove and Miers get this special treatment. There's a claim that the House Judiciary Committee might, at some future date, demand open testimony from Rove and Miers, but here in the real world I think we all know this is leading nowhere. This announced compromise regarding their testimony makes it pretty much impossible to hold out any hope that the criminals of the Bush-Cheney administration will face any punishment whatsoever.
[ McClatchy Newspapers ]
The Obama administration has told a federal judge that the hundreds of people held without charges in Afghanistan's infamous Bagram prison have no right to challenge their extended imprisonment there. This was the position of the Bush-Cheney administration, and now it's the position of the Obama administration. Also, there's reason to suspect that Bagram may be the next limbo for prisoners currently stored at Guantanamo.
[ New York Times ]
The New Jersey state Senate has passed a bill to legalize medical marijuana. One small step for mankind.
[ Star-Ledger (Newark, NJ) ]
Proposition 8, the initiative barring gays from marrying that passed in California last November, is now being pondered by the state's Supreme Court. Can a majority vote can take away the civil rights of a minority? That's the real question here.
[ Sacramento Bee ]
It made me stop and think
"I fear, after years of having every possible shred of hope dashed by a mindless cadre running a nation of sheep, to ask more of Mr. Obama than he, or anyone, can deliver. I understand, to a point, the necessities of political life. But I crave the beauty of a country whose soul awakens--a country that can, and will, take care of its own and take care of as many others as possible. But a nation that will deal harshly, but not inhumanely, with those who would make dark, painful marks on its national soul. With trepidation, then, I call for Mr. Obama to do something about the egregious disregard of American laws and American ideals by these faux Americans, these greed-driven, soul-dead husks that once ran this nation. I cannot see any ethical way around it, around at least hauling them in as statute allows, asking them questions as intelligence demands, and providing sanction as warranted."
[ Laura Harrison McBride ]
"Mr. Geithner wants to use taxpayer dollars to keep bankrupt banks in business. In effect, he wants to tax teachers, fire fighters, and Joe the Plumber to protect the wealth of the banks' shareholders and to pay high salaries to their top executives."
[ Dean Baker ]
Binyam Mohamed has been released from Guantanamo. A victim of America's torture and concentration camp policies and emaciated from his long hunger strike, Mohamed hopes he'll be allowed to remain in England. It remains to be seen whether there will be any investigation into the UK's complicity in his abduction, imprisonment, and abuse. It would be helpful, of course, if the Obama administration would stop threatening the UK with repercussions if the facts are revealed, and drop the Obama policy of stonewalling to keep information of Bush-Cheney era war crimes under wraps.
[ The Guardian ]
Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the former #3 man at the CIA, has been sentenced to three years in prison for his deep involvement in the bribery and influence-peddling scandals that put former Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-California) in prison.
[ Associated Press ]
Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) thinks it's "unacceptable" that the Fed (unlike the Treasury) won't even name the banks it's bailed out. Sanders says he'll introduce legislation that would require the Fed to announce who its loaning trillions to, but Sanders is the only Senator making a stink about this, so the bill would probably go nowhere.
[ Reuters News Agency ]
George Clooney was absent at the Oscarcast a few weekends ago because he was prepping for separate meetings with President Obama and Vice President Biden, not to talk show biz but to urge an American response to the ongoing hell in Sudan.
[ TV Guide ]
President Obama has nominated Kathleen A. Merrigan, the woman behind national organic food standards, as Deputy Secretary of the USDA. Once in a while, Obama really gets something right.
[ Daily Kos ]
Joseph Hazelwood, captain of the Exxon-Valdez as it ran aground in 1989, has offered what's called a "heartfelt apology" a few weeks shy of the disaster's twentieth anniversary.
[ Anchorage Daily News ]
Please send your news tips, comments, and criticisms to <unknownnews at inbox.com>. If that address ever fails, check our contact page for our alternate email addresses.
Excerpt: In the goofiest waste of law enforcement time we've seen in weeks, an on-campus police officer for a Florida middle school is facing a criminal investigation over his MySpace account. Why? It turns out one of the people on his friends list had a link on his or her profile to an internet porn site.
OK, I know we often go after some bed cops but this guy is NOT one and is getting the shaft in a big way.
Diesel
Certainly sounds like classic "protect the children" hysteria.
Excerpt: The shadow foreign secretary, William Hague, said it was "high time the government asked the new US administration for permission" to release information relating to Mohamed's case. Edward Davey, the Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman, said the government was now "out of excuses for delaying a full inquiry" which Amnesty International also pressed for.
Don't hold your breath waiting. Obama has already followed in Bush's "national security" footsteps regarding detainees rights.
Excerpt: And so it is then that Israel is delegitimized, if not demonized, by the ascription to it of the two most scurrilous indictments of 20th-century racism -- Nazism and apartheid -- the embodiment of all evil. These very labels of Zionism and Israel as "racist, apartheid and Nazi" supply the criminal indictment. No further debate is required. The conviction that this triple racism warrants the dismantling of Israel as a moral obligation has been secured. For who would deny that a "racist, apartheid, Nazi" state should not have any right to exist today? What is more, this characterization allows for terrorist "resistance" to be deemed justifiable - after all, such a situation is portrayed as nothing other than occupation et resistance, where resistance against a racist, apartheid, Nazi occupying state is legitimate, if not mandatory.
Israeli actions speak for themselves. The adoption of the Bush Doctrine by Israel speaks for itself. The pot calling the kettle black speaks loud and clear for itself.
Although Israel may be guilty as sin, Iran is hardly the right point man at this time. The possibility of the Obama administration making a rapprochement in diplomatic activity will be bushwhacked by this action. The Israeli lobby in the US will be frothing at the mouth and Congress will be out on the Capitol steps shaking their collective fist at Iran.
Wig
#
Re Bobby Jindal's principles, like Jon Stewart said on the brilliant Daily Show, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal has decided that out of 3.8-billion dollars of the stimulus set aside for Louisiana, he's only willing to accept $3.79-billion. And that's a Republican with a hell of a lot more principle than most.
Michael Bonghuffer
#
It's a narrow bridge that Obama has to pass over, old and half-rotten and half-supported by all the trolls beneath clamoring for his head.
And the Loony Right is for now a disarrayed pathetic mess. If their time is to come it will be in a decade. We have been false to see in Dubya a possible 4th Reich. Dubya was Kaiser Wilhelm colossally entitled over-reaching moron. Obama represent the dawn of the Wiemar Republic. Whether or not we get our 4th Reich and all that loveliness depends very very much on the decisions he makes over the next 2-4 years, I feel.
Excerpt: President Barack Obama plans to announce Monday a former Secret Service agent who helped expose lobbyists' corruption at the Interior Department as his pick to oversee the $787 billion economic stimulus plan.
Curious if this nurtures any optimism in yez guys.
The Blue Rajah
Earl Devaney. I've never heard of him before, but he was Inspector General of the Interior Department while some serious corruption was uncovered. Seems perfectly qualified to me. Of course, it would be a lot easier to take the Obama administration seriously on issues of watchdoggery and alleged integrity if they'd show some friggin' integrity by not actively blocking investigations and lawsuits over the Bush-Cheney administration's eight years of criminality.
Helen & Harry Highwater
#3/7/2009:
He addressed your concern tonight. He said "we can't govern out of anger."
We had 8 years to slam Bush/Cheney. They're gone. Revenge is for suckers. But I'm quite sure that those guys will get theirs anyway. There's too much bilge down there to stay. It's gonna come up like New Orleans sewers.
Man's got to try and save a nation, y'all.
It sucks. But look here: right now, live on TV, Cheney is eating Valium to keep from having a heart attack listening to Obama beat the pulpit with his legacy, and Bush is doing something similar to drown his shame.
Don't be the man's enemy while he tries to keep live livable in our land.
We believe in liberty and justice for all, so of course, we oppose many US government policies. This doesn't mean we're anti-American, redneck scum, pinko commies, militia members, or terrorist-sympathizers. It means we believe in freedom, as more than merely a cliché.
We believe you have the right to live your own life as you choose, and others have the equal right to live their lives as they choose. It's not complicated.
We believe freedom leads to peace, progress, and prosperity, while its opposite -- oppression -- leads to war, terrorism, poverty, and misery.
We believe it's preposterously stupid to hate people because of their appearance, their race or nationality, their religion or lack of religion, how they have sex with other consenting adults, etc. There are far more apropos reasons to hate most people.
We believe in questioning ourselves, our assumptions, each other -- and we especially believe in questioning authority (the more authority, the more questions). We believe obedience is a fine quality in dogs and young children, but not in adults.
Like America's right-wingers, we believe in
individual responsibility,
hard work to get ahead,
and stern punishment for serious crimes.
We believe big government should not be blindly trusted.
But unlike most right-wing leaders, we mean it.
Like America's left-wingers, we believe in
equal treatment under law,
war as a last (not first) resort,
and sensible stewardship of natural resources.
We believe big business should not be blindly trusted.
But unlike most left-wing leaders, we mean it.
Like libertarians, we believe it's wrong and reprehensible to arrest people for what they think, believe, look like, wear, eat, smoke, drink, inhale, inject, or otherwise do to themselves.
But unlike many libertarians, we're not obsessed with the gold standard, we don't believe incorporation is humanity's highest achievement, and we don't believe everything in life comes down to dollars and cents. We've read and enjoyed Ayn Rand's novels, but we understand that they're works of fiction.
We're skeptical, and we're sick of so-called 'journalists' who aren't skeptical at all.
A reader asks, what are our solutions?
We propose no solutions except common sense, which is never common. We like the principles of democracy, and the ideals broadly described as 'American'. The US Constitution is a fine and workable framework for solutions, when it's actually read and thoughtfully understood by intelligent statesmen and women. So, no manifestos from us. We don't dream that big, and if there's one thing the world doesn't need it's yet another manifesto.
Our suggestion is: think.
A fact-based instead of faith-based approach leads to solutions for most of the recurring issues of our time, from abortion to global climate change, pollution to universal health care, careful but real regulation of industry and economy, hunger, war, terror, human rights for humans not for corporations, science not religious doctrine in public schools, equal protection and prosecution under law, etc. Approach problems without glorifying stupidity, without demonizing intelligence, and answers usually come into focus.
These pages are published by Harry and Helen Highwater, happily married low-income nom de plumes and rabble-rousers from Madison, Wisconsin (with a few friends scattered around the world helping out).
We try to spotlight news that hasn't gotten enough (or appropriate) attention in American media, along with our opinions and yours.
We bang our keyboards against the wall, because it doesn't hurt as much as banging our heads.
Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-nine. The Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution expressed a desire in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several states as Amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all or any of which articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the said Constitution. viz: Articles in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress and Ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution. The First Amendment
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
The Second Amendment
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
The Third Amendment
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
The Fourth Amendment
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
The Fifth Amendment
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
The Sixth Amendment
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
The Seventh Amendment
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
The Eighth Amendment
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
The Ninth Amendment
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
The Tenth Amendment
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
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"A mind-blowing mix of fact and fantasy, hard science and well-grounded speculation, with
concrete how-to info to top it all off -- resulting in some of the best and strangest stuff
on Earth..."
Of course not. Nobody will know the answers until there's an open and honest investigation.
But anyone courageous enough to think can see that the pertinent questions for any serious "investigation" were never asked, let alone answered, by the official investigators.
