Oooooh! Bama

Ah yes, the Democratic politicians are falling all over themselves to support one of the worst human rights violators in the world. This time it is Barak Obama.
Here's an exerpt from the Israeli Daily Haaretz

WASHINGTON - United States Senator Barack Obama, a Democrat from Illinois who is competing for his party's presidential nomination, told Haaretz on Thursday that the United States should help protect Israel from its "dangerous" enemies.
"My view is that the United States' special relationship with Israel obligates us to be helpful to them in the search for credible partners with whom they can make peace, while also supporting Israel in defending itself against enemies sworn to its destruction," he said.
"Israelis want more than anything to live in peace with their neighbors, but Israel also has real - and very dangerous - enemies," Obama said.

Mr. Obama please sit down and have a smoke. Collect your thoughts. You will not get the Jewish dollars for your campaign because yoou can never be as tough as Hillary is on Arabs.
First off, Why should the U.S. protect Israel, the strongest military in the region with hundreds of Nuclear weapons, when it obviously can protect itself. I thought the point of the Western world possessing nuclear weapons was as a detterent.
Second, what is this special relationship that America has with Israel and what do we get out of it? THe only special relationship we have with Israel is our blocking of any meaningful peace process and vetoing any resolution critical of Israel at the UN. America hasn't and will not search for credible partners with whom they can make peace. We never had. Remember Arafat couldn't be talked to. Now Hamas is in charge and all of a sudden the US backs Arafat's Fatah party, which before wasn't a partner for peace. We are told that Hamas must recognize Israel's right to exist yet no Israeli politicians has ever said that the Palestinians have a right to exist.
THird, if Israel really wanted to live at peace with their neighbors they would get the hell out of the West Bank and pull back to the pre-67 borders.
Again this just shows how powerful the Israel Lobby is. In order for any Democratic candidate to be viable they must come out in favor of Israel's terrible human rights record and against the Arabs. Fuck, Obama is probably the only person on the globe who has Hussein in their name who doesn't support the Palestinians.

YouTube Videos of the Week

First off we have the "straight talk express" barrelling down the tracks. Oh crap that train derailed.


DO NOT WATCH UNLESS YOU CAN HANDLE GRAPHIC PICTURES OF WAR DEAD


Here is one of the best journalists in US history, Bill Moyers. THere is a movement starting in the hopes of getting BIll Moyers to run for President on the Democratic ticket. Draft Bill Moyers

At least some musicians care enough about the poor to talk about it. Thank you Immortal Technique.

Why things are the way they are.

Today in Wisconsin it is unreasonably, no insanely, fucking cold. We are talking 10 below air temp. and 30 below wind chill. Yes it is stupid cold here. As a result of the cold weather the city shut down the schools. Therefore I had many children today in the grocery store with their parents.
In case you don't know, I live in a pretty yuppie neighborhood. It is very European, whereas it is a walking community, it has a large Jewish and Russian population and is overall pretty upper middle class. From where I stand politically, I believe that it is the middle class that truly is responsible for the state of our country. These are the people who go to the polls, they write letters, they are in the P.T.A, and they basically decide the fate of our country. I may be wrong but I would I love for someone to tell me why. Either way the middle class is in control whether they know it or not. So my encounter with a upper middle class soccer mom was very informative and a little saddening.
I look up from my work and there is a white lady standing at the counter. IN the shopping cart there is a boy, maybe twelve, the new thing today is to have you children sit in the large part of the shopping cart along with you grocerys. I approach the customers and make some small talk.
Justin: So no school today, eh?
UpperMiddleClassWhiteLady(UMCWL): Ya, I was surprised.
Justin: Well it is just too cold out and the sad thing is that some kids get sent to school without gloves, and you just can't have that. SO the city did what it had to and shut down the schools.
UMCWL: Ya, I was watching the news today and they were at the Salvation Army. They didn't have enough beds so they were handing out gloves and hats. Imagine, these people don't even have gloves.
Justin: Ya I just watched a special on PBS, last week, about the homeless in Milwaukee. Did you know that there are 12,000 homeless people in Milwaukee.
UMCWL: (Gasp)
Justin: That is like a small city
UMCWL: Some of them sleep along the bike path, sometimes I see their little camps in the woods.
Justin: It is terrible, where do these people go in this weather.
UMCWL: It just makes you wonder, what you can't get a job at McDonalds?
Justin: Most of them are too mentally ill to hold down a job.
UMCWL: You know I never thought about that. Hmmm.
Justin: Well ya, you'd have to be crazy to want to live on the streets.
UMCWL: Ya that makes sense, and the drugs.
Justin: Well the drugs are really just a way for the mentally ill to self medicate themselves.
UMCWL: Or the drugs made them that way
Justin:(Hiding his total disgust and tryinf to find a way to end this conversation and not explode) Ya, I guess there are no simple answers. (A total lie in my mind. I am actually surprised at how simple the answers are)
SO here we have a white upper middle class voting citizen who doesn't realize that homeless people are mentally ill. No wonder absolutely nothing gets done that is good for the poor, ill and old. FOr her it was a question of laziness until she met me.
This whole time I thought this was all Ralph NAder's fault.

Molly Ivins 1944-2007 R.I.P.

Last night America lost a great voice of Progress. I can't really do any justice to her by trying to tell you about her. THerefore I will link an article by someone who can do her just.

Here is some video

One of Two Rejected Columns

Last summer I tried to get a position as one of the Journal Sentinel's community columnists. Here is one of the two essays I submitted to the paper. Unfortunately I wasn't good enough to make the cut. Instead they chose a person who, in his essay on the death penalty, claimed that people who would be qualified for death are actually getting out of jail. Of course, we all know that people who the death penalty, especially in Wisconsin, is being suggested for will not get out of jail. Yet the Journal printed his crap. Maybe I shouldn't have called myself a Marxist Socialist in my cover letter. Oh well.



How is it that at a time when the entire world is moving in more humane directions Wisconsin has decided to join the ranks of countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, China, Egypt, Sudan and Afghanistan? How has it come that keeping criminals locked up for good is no longer good enough? With everything facing us in the world today why are people clamoring to bring back the death penalty? Unless people see it as some sort of deterent there is no logic in bringing it back. The only problem is it isn’t a deterent.
The law that this referendum proposes we enact would require DNA evidence to support the conviction in order for the death penalty to be administered. Why is that? It is because both the authors of this bill, and the voting public, know that far too many people have been let off of death row due to DNA evidence. So by putting it into the bill they are admitting that in the past the death penalty had some major problems but this will “correct” those flaws. They also should have set it up in a way so that it wouldn’t be used against minorities in a disproportional way that it has been used in the past.
The law would be set up so only the vilest of murderers would be killed. The type of person who commits the crimes necessary of this threshold doesn’t think of anything reality based. It is ridiculous to think that someone who is getting ready to go out and act in such horrendous way thinks beforehand. The people who commit these hideous crimes don’t sit down before and make a pro and cons list. This law is designed for people who don’t think about consequences. So where is the deterent?
In the last several years we have seen a nationwide switch on the death penalty. Say what you want about Former Illinios Governor George Ryan but even he, a Republican, put a moratorium on the use of the death penalty because so many death row inmates had been exonerated. The Supreme Court has dealt with a number of cases involving the adminstration of the death penalty when the crime was committed by a child or of some one who is mentally handicapped. In both instance they sided with life.
On my walk home from work one day I saw a bumper sticker that stuck with me, it said, “Our Government kills people who kill people to show it is wrong to kill people.” That pretty much sums up the logic behind the death penalty. What really is the benefit of having the state kill some of the worst murderers, who obviously the death penalty was no deterrent, instead of keep them behind bars for life?
Often the same people who advocate using the state to kill people are the same ones who oppose allowing a person near death from taking their own life and/or believe aborting a zygote is murder. Many of them use the Bible as their moral justification by going back to Exodus, Leviticus or Duetoronomy, the law books, yet they do so in a disingenuous self-serving way. These people are called Christians presumably because they follow the teachings of Christ. Christ never called for this type of punishment to be handed out. He asked for the opposite. While it may be impossible to “turn the other cheek” with murderers like these, once they are locked up behind bars they no longer are a threat to humanity.
So if the death penalty doesn’t serve as a detterent and locking up people makes them no longer a threat to society then why the need to kill these people? It must be that they feel murdering a murderer is a just punishment. Murder is wrong plain and simple. Being a resident of Wisconsin I would feel more comfortable knowing my state isn’t taking part in the killing of another human being no matter how terrible.

Iran War Watch 1/30/07

Everyday the war drums seem to be getting louder and louder. Here is just a brief look into the stories of today.
US rejects call for timeout in Iran crisis
Bush 'spoiling for a fight' with Iran
Bush warns Iran against action in Iraq
We're on the edge of the abyss....

And then to top it all off, here we have Israeli apologist, plagerizer and Harvard Professor Dershowitz. You just have to watch to see whose interest he has at heart.

I Really Am Nervous or I.R.A.N.

Holy fuck!!!
I swear I just read in the paper that the US has authorized the military to kill Iranians. At first I thought I was just seeing things but no. Then I heard it reported on the nightly news, top story. A few days back we had former NATO Supreme COmmander Gen. Wesley Clark say that he believed that the US was looking for a confrontation with Iran. Slowly we have been moving more and more warships into the Persian Gulf. IT is rumored we now have Nuclear Subs in the Gulf. My god these people are insane.
NOw today according to the Jerusalem Post, a right wing Israeli paper, is claiming that Iran is bringing in 3000 more centrifuges for their nuclear program. It has been reported much in the Israeli press their desire to have Iran confronted. We had the former Prime Minister of Israel, Netanyhu, sayinig we need to convince America of the threat. There was just a meeting in Israel with some former US officials where RIchard Perle, one of the cheif architechs of this latest war, was saying that the US will take military action to not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons.
This is just the shit I pulled out of my head without going back and doing even the most basic of research. I can remember many other pronouncements that soound a lot like war posturing but I can't remember them well enough to put them in. So I guess I will need to go back and find more.
From now on I will be on Iran War Watch. I will be reporting and repeating all the stories I see from the mainstream press that indicate a inevitable war. There has been a lot of propaganda lately and I will try to compile more.

The Restrictions Remain

There is still a lot of hoopla concerning Jimmy Carter's latest book, Palestine:Peace not Apartheid. Tomorrow he should be in the news again because he is slated to speak at Brandeis University about his book. Brandeis is a traditionally Jewish school founded by a group of mostly secular Jews. He was invited to speak but was told as a condition he would have to debate the plagerizer Alan Dershowitz, notice I will give credit to the author I reprinted. He said he wouldn't. A former President writes a book and in order to talk he must debate a plagerist from Harvard. Why not invite Prof. Chomsky everytime a Pro-Israel speaker comes to speak at Brandies? It would be a short trip for him.
The main crux of real, not fabricated, complaint is his use of the term apartheid in describing Israel's treatment of the Palestinians in the Occupied Territories, to say nothing of Israel proper. Many, only in America, are offended by the comparison. They claim that it isn't true and that it is an attempt to isolate them in the international community. If anyone is of interest in this debate you know that much is being made of the use of Apartheid. The Israelis could care less about the word because their major newspapers and various peace groups use the term frequently.
I have reprinted an article that I found reprinted on CounterPunch's web site. It is from an actual Israeli and not just some American Jew who lives in the comfort of their home in Brooklyn or Mequon.
Now just imagine readinig this in any american newspaper. You won't.

Life Under Prohibition in Palestine
By AMIRA HASS

All the promises to relax restrictions in the West Bank have obscured the true picture. A few roadblocks have been removed, but the following prohibitions have remained in place. (This information was gathered by Haaretz, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs and Machsom Watch)

Standing prohibitions
* Palestinians from the Gaza Strip are forbidden to stay in the West Bank.
* Palestinians are forbidden to enter East Jerusalem.
* West Bank Palestinians are forbidden to enter the Gaza Strip through the Erez crossing.
* Palestinians are forbidden to enter the Jordan Valley.
* Palestinians are forbidden to enter villages, lands, towns and neighborhoods along the "seam line" between the separation fence and the Green Line (some 10 percent of the West Bank).
* Palestinians who are not residents of the villages Beit Furik and Beit Dajan in the Nablus area, and Ramadin, south of Hebron, are forbidden entry.
* Palestinians are forbidden to enter the settlements' area (even if their lands are inside the settlements' built area).
* Palestinians are forbidden to enter Nablus in a vehicle.
* Palestinian residents of Jerusalem are forbidden to enter area A (Palestinian towns in the West Bank).
* Gaza Strip residents are forbidden to enter the West Bank via the Allenby crossing.
* Palestinians are forbidden to travel abroad via Ben-Gurion Airport.
* Children under age 16 are forbidden to leave Nablus without an original birth certificate and parental escort.
* Palestinians with permits to enter Israel are forbidden to enter through the crossings used by Israelis and tourists.
* Gaza residents are forbidden to establish residency in the West Bank.
* West Bank residents are forbidden to establish residency in the Jordan valley, seam line communities or the villages of Beit Furik and Beit Dajan.
* Palestinians are forbidden to transfer merchandise and cargo through internal West Bank checkpoints.

Periodic prohibitions

* Residents of certain parts of the West Bank are forbidden to travel to the rest of the West Bank.
* People of a certain age group - mainly men from the age of 16 to 30, 35 or 40 - are forbidden to leave the areas where they reside (usually Nablus and other cities in the northern West Bank).
* Private cars may not pass the Swahara-Abu Dis checkpoint (which separates the northern and southern West Bank). This was cancelled for the first time two weeks ago under the easing of restrictions.


Travel permits required

* A magnetic card (intended for entrance to Israel, but eases the passage through checkpoints within the West Bank).
* A work permit for Israel (the employer must come to the civil administration offices and apply for one).
* A permit for medical treatment in Israel and Palestinian hospitals in East Jerusalem (The applicant must produce an invitation from the hospital, his complete medical background and proof that the treatment he is seeking cannot be provided in the occupied territories).
* A travel permit to pass through Jordan valley checkpoints.
* A merchant's permit to transfer goods.
* A permit to farm along the seam line requires a form from the land registry office, a title deed, and proof of first-degree relations to the registered property owner.
* Entry permit for the seam line (for relatives, medical teams, construction workers, etc. Those with permits must enter and leave via the same crossing even if it is far away or closing early).
* Permits to pass from Gaza, through Israel to the West Bank.
* A birth certificate for children under 16.
* A long-standing resident identity card for those who live in seam-line enclaves.

Checkpoints and barriers
* There were 75 manned checkpoints in the West Bank as of January 9, 2007.
* There are on average 150 mobile checkpoints a week (as of September 2006).
* There are 446 obstacles placed between roads and villages, including concrete cubes, earth ramparts, 88 iron gates and 74 kilometers of fences along main roads.
* There are 83 iron gates along the separation fence, dividing lands from their owners. Only 25 of the gates open occasionally.

Amira Hass writes for Ha'aretz. She is the author of Drinking the Sea at Gaza

Surge Protector

Okay so the President has come out and said we need more troops sent into Baghdad. He is calling it a surge, which implies that it will be a short-lived increase, which it won’t be. The Democrats have come out against this intentionally misnamed “surge” and have been calling it an “escalation”. Escalation is the correct term for what the President and the media are calling for. Yet their own Presidential candidate was proposing an escalation of the War in Iraq during his run up to the Presidential election. When I would refer to Kerry’s plan as an escalation, and would instead argue for troop removal, I was met with all these altruistic reasons why we should send more troops. Again this is another example of the bullshit of partisanship. In other words, “Its okay when my guy suggests it but not when the other side does because they are just plain evil.” Unfortunately both sides have been and are wrong about sending more troops into Baghdad.
The President has been saying for years now that this war must be won. He is using terrifying rhetoric about the fate of world resting on the outcome of this war. He talks about how if we fail the forces of evil will haunt us forever. Evil and good make sense in children’s books and the Bible but not in intelligent debate. Killing 3000 innocent civilians or killing 650,000 innocent civilians, which is evil? If one is the other certainly is.
So here we have the President claiming that we cannot lose this war. If we do, basically, our existence as a nation is threatened. Lets just say that he believes what he says and, lets go a step further, actually is right. So we have established for the sake of argument that Bush truly wants to win the war. Fine. If Bush truly wants to win this war, it begs to ask, ‘Why isn’t he fighting it to win?” Generals told him, that in order to win this war and keep the peace, since it is easy to destroy stuff but hard to stop anarchy, we would need hundreds of thousands of troops on the ground. Yet he chose not to listen and now we have utter chaos in Iraq, which is leading to the civil war and disintegration of the country.
So if we are to believe that if we don’t win this war, when we don’t even know what that means, that our country is in danger of being wiped off the face of the map, then why isn’t he trying to “win”. Why isn’t he bringing in the Turks, Iranians and Syrians? If this war is so important for the future of our country then why the hell isn’t he sending 100,000 more troops to Baghdad. Instead he is sending in 20,000 of which maybe 7000 are combat troops.
Another question is why the use of the term “surge”. We all know now that the Right is very careful about the words they use and try to use words to change the debate. For instance, the estate tax, which affects a tiny group of the ultra rich families in this country, is now the “death tax”. Why, because poor people die too and they don’t want to be taxed. Dilation and Extraction abortion becomes “partial birth abortion”. Just image that whore of a women, because women who get abortions are all whores who need to punished by bearing a child, grunting, breathing and pushing in the delivery room. Suddenly the doctor says, “Oh here comes the head,” and the women saying all of a sudden “quick Doc, I changed my mind. Please chop off the baby’s head.”
So why surge? Because a surge is short and escalation reminds people of Vietnam and the lasts election showed that Americans want out of Iraq not more Iraq. Of course, escalating the war was right when John Kerry proposed it last Presidential election; of course he too chose not to use the term “escalation.” The Democrats all went along with it, for one, because they fell into the “anybody but Bush” crowd, and two, because those poor Iraqis need our help to form a country. Which was nothing short of a modern day “white man’s burden”.
Even though the American public wants out and Bush knew that his plan would be unpopular, he still is going ahead with it. This leads me to believe that he really thinks that he is doing the right thing. Of course, the cynical side of me says that he wants the Democrats to be the ones tarnished with the accusation that they lost the war and be able to say that at least he tried. Obviously the architects of the war, the Neo-Conservatives, will be able to claim that they suggested far more troops and the President didn’t listen to them, so then they can try to wipe their hands clean of the whole thing.
In the end though the US will leave Iraq. It may be able to find some face saving measure like having the Iraqi government to ask us to leave or it will start to blame the Iraqis for their problems as if those problems are completely unrelated to the fact that we blew up their country into little pieces. Either way Bush is escalating the war and/or, my biggest fear, he is ramping up for some confrontation with Iran (see my first post on Iran). We are truly in trouble. If we are lucky we will have Ann Coulter around to tell us how the Democrats are to blame for Iraq and how they hate Jesus.

"The most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietman, if it's carried out!"

I was about to write about the President's plan for Iraq and the rest but instead stumbled upon Mr. Cockburn's analysis. It is reprinted here in full. The orginal can be seen at CounterPunch's Web Site

Nomads Beware!

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN

A make-or-break speech by a beleagured American president is usually preceded by a demonstration of American might somewhere on the planet and the run-up to Bush’s address Wednesday night was no exception. The AC-130 U.S. gunship that massacred a convoy of fleeing Islamists on Somalia’s southwestern border, apparently along with dozens of nomads, their families and livestock, was deployed on its mission on Sunday, to make timely newspaper headlines indicative of Bush’s determination to strike at terror wherever it may lurk. Moral to nomads: when the US president schedules a speech, don’t herd, don’t go to wedding parties, head for the nearest cave.

President Bush stuck to his expected script and said he plans to boost America’s forces in Iraq by 4,000 Marines to Anbar province and 5 combat brigades -- 17,500 troops -- to Baghdad, in a new scheme to regain control of the city. Past strategies to do this had failed, Bush explained, because of insufficient numbers. He added ominously, “Also, there were too many restrictions on the troops we did have.”

In other words, the gloves will now be off in the impending onslaught on the areas of Baghdad controlled by Muktada al Sadr and his Mehdi army. In urban counter-insurgency – the specialty of the politically agile and ambitious new US commander Gen. David Petraeus – the unrestricted U.S. response to a sniper attack or a street corner ambush will be to level the block and if necessary, the entire neighborhood, in a reprise of the destruction of much of Fallujah at the end of 2004.

But Baghdad is a vast city, and the actual fighting component of the beefed up US force in the whole of Iraq won’t be more than 30,000 – and probably less, so it’s impossible to see the new plan as anything other than stupid and cruel, destined only to deepen sectarian hatreds, and to kill, wound and render homeless very large numbers of Iraqis crammed in the slum areas -- i.e., very crowded houses -- which are Muktada’s base.

Within ten minutes of Bush’s half-hour address, Democratic Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois made an unusually spirited rebuttal on behalf of his party, (far better than the usual slither from Obama ) saying military strategies had failed, and that it was time to bring the troops home and tell the Iraqis to figure it out for themselves. But such bluntness won’t translate into the only way the Democrats could end the war, which is to refuse to okay the money to pay for it. This is something the Democrats could do, since they now control Congress.

But despite the urgings of Senator Ted Kennedy, Rep. Jack Murtha and some others, they shirk the opportunity the voters gave them last November 7. Although heavily pressured by their constituents, a majority of the Democrats in Congress dread White House accusations that to nix the funds would be to leave US troops in Iraq defenseless. So instead they will contrive symbolic votes in protest against Bush’s escalation, okay the money and then spend the run-up to the presidential election in 2008, piously saying “We told you so” as the bad news and the bodies come home from Iraq.

Hagel says Can't

Seeking to explain why the Democrats wouldn’t do anything so bold as to seriously try to stop the war, one Democrat on TV said smugly to an incredulous Pat Buchanan, that after all it was a Republican war, “they started it”. Is there a more ludicrous simulacrum of inanity and misplaced self-conceit than Senator Joe Biden, the new chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee? Questioning Condoleezza Rice Biden rambled through a thicket of platitudes, leaving the perennially silly Secretary of State unscathed.

She got far rougher treatment from the lion of Nebraska, Senator Chuck Hagel as well as other Republicans like George Voinovich. Hagel: “You cannot sit here today -- not because you're dishonest or you don't understand -- but no one in our government can sit here today and tell Americans that we won't engage the Iranians and the Syrians cross-border. Some of us remember 1970, Madam Secretary, and that was Cambodia. And when our government lied to the American people and said, ‘We didn't cross the border going into Cambodia,’ in fact, we did. I happen to know something about that, as do some on this committee. So, Madam Secretary, when you set in motion the kind of policy that the president is talking about here, it's very, very dangerous. As a matter of fact, I have to say, Madam Secretary, that I think this speech given last night by this president represents the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it's carried out. I will resist it.”

"I don't see it, and the President doesn't see it, as an escalation," Rice stuttered. "Would you call it a decrease?" asked Hagel . "I would call it, Senator, an augmentation."

At least a dozen Republican senators, some of them expecting tight races in 2008, like Senator Norman Coleman of Minnesota, were denouncing Bush’s plan even before he stepped in front of the cameras to announce it.

At least Senator Russ Feingold brought up the obvious object lesson, regarding what Congress can do, namely the Boland Amendment, passed by Democrats back in Reagan time, forbidding the administration to send material support to the Nicaraguan Contras. Efforts by the Reagan administration to circumvent this law – organized in part by the present Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, led to the Iran-Contra scandal, which badly dented Reagan in his final years.But Feingold got not support on a new Boland Amendment from his Democratic colleagues.

Some 80 per cent of Americans think Bush has made a hash of things in Iraq and it’s a fair bet to say that the President’s speech won’t have done much to reverse that assessment. Perhaps it was the shift of setting for his broadcast to the nation to the White House library that made the president seem uncomfortable. With the exception of Laura, the former librarian, the Bush clan are not a bookish lot. The late Brendan Gill reported that having stayed at the Bush family compound in Kennebunkport, Maine, he scoured the premises late one night in search of something with which to read himself to asleep and could only find “The Fart Book”.

If Bush did like to get his nose into a book instead of over the handlebars of his mountain bike he could glance at Sun Tzu who, (as Chuck Spinney reminded us recently on this site) , said, Avoid protracted war and attack cities as a last resort.

After the speech Frank Bardacke wrote to me from Watsonville:

“Alex, One good thing about the surge that I haven't seen or heard anyone say (not that I've searched) is that it will ruin McCain's chance at the Presidency. It in't gonna work, and it will make it impossible to run for President on a slogan of more troops to Iraq. So maybe when more troops just means more bloodshed the whole adventure will have to be called off. The next President will close it out, it will be historically summed up as the Boy Emperor's War, and most folks here will do their very best to forget the whole damn thing.”

I wrote back: “Good point. I thought McCain looked very groggy in the post speech analysis. But can they call it all off? I mean, at what point did a Roman emperor say, "Screw it, give them goddam Dacia. We don't need it. Parthia too." No, never. It was surge surge surge until finally the overtaxed citizenry of the Roman Empire hung out signs saying "Goths Welcome! 15 per cent off for Parthians!" The Brits were still battling for south Yemen in the 1960s when they hadn't a dime in the bank. In those days Aden was a "crucial entrepot", now days, it's a "backwater", just like Grenada which, when the New Jewel movement briefly gleamed, was "athwart our vital sea lanes".

Final word from Frank: “The Romans built aqueducts, law, peace,you know, the Life of Brian list. What do we build? Nothing. Here is the way I have been putting it to my dog Nellie as we walk along the levy: We have the power to destroy everything, and the authority to build nothing.”

Apartheid in Israel? "The lady doth protest....."

Wow. Jimmy Carter the Antisemite. Look at the wrath his book has conjured. Why, I wonder?


Christ, Even Bill O'Reilly defended him.


Here is a Jewish American defending Carter.


What it is about this book that upsets everyone so much?


Here we have Trent Lott telling us that he's been to the territories and it isn't, oh wait, he's only been to illegal Jewish settlements. Man they are coming out of the woodwork.


This is what your tax dollars pay for. Ya, this isn't aparthied. My ass. Look it up.


I have to say that this seems very much like what one sees in Palestine. Both Israel and South Africa were founded in 1948. One of them had a much better lobbying.


Oh man I totally forgot about this one. I wish that today artists would speak up against injustice, oh well.

Gerald Ford

As you watch the reports about the Greatness of President Ford there is one little fact that will not be present. In December of 1975 Gerald FOrd and Henry Kissinger met with Indonesian Dictator Suharto. IN that meeting Ford gave Suharto the green light to invade the country of East Timor. As a result of that invasion an estimated 300,000 people were slaughtered. The reason Ford supported the invasion of East Timor and it subsequent slaughter. These bastards were communists. Yes I said communists. These TImorese needed to be massacred for the belief that the people should have a fair and equal distribution of wealth and power. How dare they not embrace free market economics and the rape of their resources.
See you in hell President FOrd.

President Carter

So it seems President Carter has caused a little stir in America. It turns out he has written a book critical of Israeli policies towards the Palestinians. As a result he has had at least one prior engagement canceled. He was to give a talk at Brandeis University but was told that he would have to debate the ravenous plagerizer Alan Dershowitz. Carter refused saying something to the effect that Dershowitz doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about.
The book hadn't even been released and the Israeli Lobby was already in full swing. We had Speaker-elect of the House condemn Carter's use of the term apartheid. Ironically or maybe not Israel blocked Rev. Desmond Tutu from going to Palestine on a fact finding mission. From where I sit it seems as if the Lobby has done it job, for the most part. They are trying so hard not to allow the term apartheid from being used. I had a letter to the editor printed in the Journal Sentinel calling Israel an aprtheid regime and was surprised that there was no response.
Is apartheid a legitimate word for what is happening in the Occupied Territories? I would have to say of course. There are roads that only Israelis are allowed to travel on. They criss cross the West Bank in an attempt to grab more and more land while relegated the Palestinians to little Bantustans or "homelands" like they had in SOuth Africa. People are given certain rights in the Occupied Territories due to their ethnicity. There are Palestinians without enough water yet the settlers have swimming pools. THough, what I just read in Haaretz(Israel's New York TImes) is that the government has passed a law making it illegal for an Israelis to drive a non-Israeli in their car. No shit. It will be against the law in January for an Israeli citizen to transport a Palestinian or any human rights worker. Now if that isn't apartheid I don't know what is.
Now just imagine for a moment what the US press would say if Iran made it illegal for an Iranian to transport a Jew in an Iranian car. Better yet, imagine the what the press would have had to say if the Soviets made it illegal to transport a Jew in a Soviet car. There would be outrage. Not in this case though. Business as usual. Fuck the Palestinians. Thank Speaker Pelosi.

Haaretz Article. If you don't believe me.

Iraq Study Group Pt.I

So the much-anticipated Iraq Study Group has published it finding and printed out copies for us all to read. Of course, I went and got my copy the day they were released and boy what exciting reading. Most of it had already been leaked to the press so there really wasn’t a whole hell of a lot of new stuff for a discerning news junkie like myself. Still I read it anyways just so that I would know what was actually in it. This way when the “free” press reports on it I will be able to sift through the disinformation and see which parts they leave out of their reporting. Mostly three things, one of which surprised me, not because it made sense but because it was even mentioned in America, interested me. The other two weren’t surprises just a reaffirmation of what I already truly believe.
I won’t start with the surprise but instead on of the things that least surprised me. Upon reading this, one thing stood out at me immediately and reminded me of why things get done the way they do. It came to my attention that we could gather ten politically intelligent people, I’m not talking Poly-Sci grads just people who pay real attention to the world, set up a committee and that group of ten people could have written this report. First off the writing is below the level that newspapers are written in. It seems like it is written so that even a child could be able to read it.
The recommendations that the panel came up with are also very, very weak intellectually. I swear that we could grab ten people off the bus, random people, and they would have come up with basically the same ideas. Here is just one example of what the Washington Brain Trust came up with. “Recommendation 77: The Director of National Intelligence and the Secretary Of Defense should devote significantly greater analytic resources to the task of understanding the threats and sources of violence in Iraq.” No really this is what the great and revered Statespeople and “realists” were able to come up with. Basically the government should try to find out why and where violence is coming from. This is what they suggested. What is funny is that the press did their part to tell us how this panel was going to come up with great ideas and they fell all over themselves to praise the members.
Virtually every recommendation is obvious. For instance, #40 “The United States should not make an open-ended commitment to keep large numbers of American troops deployed in Iraq.” Basically, we should not occupy the country for ever or let the Iraqi government think we will provide for the security of the State of Iraq, which is, of course, our duty due to international law.
As a kid, I used to think that our leaders/rulers were smarter than us or me. I used to think that in order to be Secretary of State, Supreme Court Justice or Secretary of Defense one had to be intelligent. As I slowly got older I began to realize that these leaders may be marginally more intelligent then the average American. The last six years have proven to me that not only does one not have to be intelligent to be in government but also it may actually be a hindrance to one’s career. How Americans could ever accept leaders of this poor quality is truly depressing. Luckily for me like the rest of America, I have “must see T.V.” that can distract me from the real world.

My letter to the editor 12/1/06

U.S. must find a way to get out of Iraq
-title theirs not mine-

Thank you for printing Sen. Chuck Hagel's thoughtful analysis of the Iraq war ("How U.S. must exit Iraq," Perspectives, Nov. 28). It is crucial for our politicians to find a way out of Iraq.
Many pundits claimed that the Democratic victory in November was a referendum on the war. Yet almost the next day, Democrats assured the country that they weren't going to do anything to speed our exit from this disaster.
As a member of the so-called left, I find it humorous that I may have a choice in the 2008 presidential election between a Republican who is against the war, Hagel, and a Democrat, Sen. Hillary Clinton, who is for the war. If it truly comes down to that, I know which side I will be voting for. Some things are far more important than party affiliation.
Justin Loper
Shorewood
Journal Sentinel

Iran, Iran so far away.

In the paper today I read about a letter that the President of Iran wrote to the American public. What I found most interesting is that the paper didn’t print it. Nor did it print even any excerpts. To many this might not seem strange but then again 30% believe Bush was responsible for 9/11. Something that has been bothering me for sometime is how can a designated enemy of the US write a letter to its people and no media reprints it?
How can a people make informed decisions in respect to elections if they are uninformed? How can a real democracy function without information? It can’t. This is one of many reasons why I don’t believe America is a Democracy. Oh ya, people vote but that doesn’t make it a democracy. People used to vote in Saddam’s Iraq and no one would have called that a Democracy. If you have one candidate or two clones there is no choice. If you don’t have a grasp of the issues how can you choose wisely? Why is it that people don’t have a grasp of the issues? Because the American media is total garbage that sucks up to power.
Whenever Osama Bin Laden releases an audio tape our press talks about it. They don’t replay the entire broadcast or even a major segment of it. You can’t find it reprinted in your newspaper either. At best they reprint a line or two out of context. So we are led to believe that we must launch wars all around the globe to fight this shadowy figure but are not allowed to read what he says. We are all supposed to go along with the “War On Terror” yet we’re not given the information about our enemy. So we are just to believe what out trusted leaders tell us. If history proves anything it is that you should never trust your leaders yet that is exactly what the sheep of America do.
I decided years a few years ago to find Bin Laden’s speeches and read them. In order for me to do so I had to go to the British Broadcast Company’s web site. It turns out that the English are more democratic and less fearful of their population then America is. We are not to be allowed to read about what bin Laden says. Maybe this difference between the two nations is why the majority of Brits were against the war whereas 70% of Americans were for it. It must be said that our news media did everything in their power to link Saddam to 9/11 even though the facts showed something totally different.
Now our government is revving up for a confrontation with Iran under the guise of Nuclear Weapons and their threat to the nation of Israel. Remember that the Iranians have no missile that can reach the States yet we must be kept scared. If anyone has been paying attention this all revolves around the protection of Israel who already has hundreds of nuclear weapons, with our Government’s tactic approval. Part of the disinformation campaign, the majority of news we get is really disinformation, is that the President of Iran, Ahmadinejad, is in control of the Islamic Republic of Iran. What our worthless media conveniently forgets to mention is how Iran is truly ruled by a bunch of unelected clerics. The media had no trouble reminding us when the last leader Khatami, the reformer, was in power. When the kids rose up a few years ago the clerics came in with their proxies and beat the shit out of the protestors. The media was certain to inform us then that Khatami really wasn’t in power it was the clerics who ruled. Nowadays though it would seem as if a major shift in control has happened in Iran and no one noticed.
As far as nuclear weapons are concerned, it is wholly hypocritical for us to decide that other nations are not allowed to possess them. It can be argued that according to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Iran is not to build nuclear weapons and this would be correct. What most people don’t know, and the media does it job not to tell us, is that America is supposed to be getting rid of their nukes. That bit of information is not relevant according to our free press. What the media also refuses to mention is that Israel is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons but I guess that too is not relevant. Sure some may argue that Israel’s nuclear weapons may have started an arms race in the Middle East but of course, that would go against the media’s narrative of Israel the innocent perpetual victim. Actually maybe what is needed in the Middle East is some good old-fashioned Mutual Assured Destruction. Maybe just maybe the Israelis would be forced to take their boot off the neck of the Palestinians since they are getting terribly close to being asphyxiated.
So as our leaders openly threaten Iran with the use of force it is important that the American public get informed. (If you think that war with Iran is possible read my first entry on this blog.) The sad thing is that people won’t be informed unless somehow the writers of Lost or Desperate Housewives can somehow slip it into their scripts. Our country was led into a disastrous war with Iraq because the media forced us to. The media had at its disposal all the information that the alternative press had yet refused to give it airtime. Instead the media amplified the lie filled rhetoric of our government as it fulfilled its role as mouthpiece for the corporate controlled government and its minions. I have no reason to believe the same thing won’t happen again, even with what we know now.
Amhaminejad's Letter to the U.S. People

This is liberation.

I think John Kerry was right about a lack of education and one's chances of ending up in Iraq. This is what we have our troops doing. Real classy. What a bunch of good patriots.

It is pretty obvious we studied Israel's behaviour towards Arabs.
No wonder they want to kill us.

Another Fucking Racist

What the fuck is terrorism.

Terrorism is a term thrown around a lot lately due to the fact that the U.S. was attacked on Sept. 11th 2001. Everyone can agree, besides those 30% who believe Bush was behind the attacks, that those attacks were terrorism. It fits the most basic definition of terrorism, which is basically, the use of force against a civilian population with the goal of changing the policies of that people’s government. That seems simple enough and as a result should be applied broadly but never seems to be. As it turns out, it is never terrorism if you are the one terrorizing. In order for something to be considered terrorism it must be received never handed out. For instance, a Palestinian blowing themselves up at a bus stop full of soldiers and some civilians is terrorism. This is simple enough and everyone agrees with that. What people seem unable to grasp is that if the US drops a bomb on a water treatment facility, a television station or in a neighborhood that too is terrorism. 9/11 was a terrible day for the people in the buildings, on the planes and their loved ones. No one deserves to be killed for the actions of their government regardless of what those actions are. The innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq do not deserve to die because of the dictatorships that led their respective countries just like average Israelis who were being killed also deserve to live. Still one is terrorism and one is “defense”. In other terms terrorism is used by the weak “defense” is used by the strong. “Israel has a right to defend itself” but the Palestinians don’t?
If an alien people invaded America and kicked us out of our homes, would we have the right to resist or would that be terrorism? If that same alien people were dropping bombs on apartment buildings and continuously launching artillery at us would we call it their “defense”? Was George Washington a terrorist? Probably to the British he was. Was he right to kill the British or should he and the rest just lived as subjects? Were the Contras in Nicaragua terrorists or freedom fighters? Depends who you ask.
The beauty of the word terrorism is that it is meant to apply only to the weak. If the Palestinians were launching artillery shells into Israel and “accidentally” killing civilians would it be considered terrorism or “defense”? Is the accidental slaughter of over 45,000 Iraqi civilians by US war toys terrorism? Can any innocent civilian death be an accident when every war planner knows full well that civilians will die as a result of military action. Of course, these dead are euphemistically called “collateral damage”. That makes it seem okay. “The war was noble and these people had to die ‘accidentally’, overall though it was worth it”, that is what “collateral” damage means.
If it is morally wrong for a “terrorist” to knowingly kill civilians in an attempt to change the actions of a hostile government than it is equally immoral to knowingly kill civilians through the use of guided missiles. In both instances the planners knew that their actions would kill civilians in advanced. For once our people were at the receiving end of violence and we freaked out and killed at least 60,000 civilians as a response. That is twenty times the number killed in America. Since virtually everyone thought that attacking the people of Afghanistan was the right thing to do, it begs the question. Would it be okay for the Afghan people to come back and kill 300,000 Americans? Of course not. So it only makes sense that the most powerful nations, who have the means to kills millions, have a bigger responsibility to not respond the way they do. Violence is violence. If it okay for us then it is okay for them. If it wrong for them it is wrong for us. No one has the right to kill another person unless we all have that right.

The Democrats Don't Care

Screw the Palestinians, Full Steam Ahead

By KATHLEEN and BILL CHRISTISON

At a panel on the defense and foreign policy impact of the midterm election, sponsored two days after the election by Congressional Quarterly, Steven Simon, late of the Clinton administration and still a member of the Democratic, pro-Zionist mainstream at the Council on Foreign Relations, pronounced on prospects for Palestinian-Israeli peace and essentially declared it not worth anyone's effort. Using words, a tone, and a body language that clearly betrayed his own disinterest, he said that Hamas is "there" (exaggerated shrug), that the Israeli government is in turmoil after its Lebanon "contretemps" (dismissive wave of the hand), that both sides are incapable of significant movement, and that therefore there is no incentive for anyone, Democrat or Republican, to intervene (casual frown indicating an unfortunate reality about which serious people need not concern themselves). There is simply no prospect for more unilateral Israeli withdrawals and therefore for any progress toward peace, Simon said in conclusion -- signaling not only a total lack of concern but an utter ignorance of just what it is that might bring progress, as if Israeli unilateralism were truly the ticket to peace.

Thus spake the Democratic oracle. Not that anyone who knows the Palestinian-Israeli situation from other than the selective focus of the Zionist perspective had any expectations in the first place. No one ever thought the new Democratic Congress would hop to and put pressure on Israel to make peace. Just remember John Kerry and Hillary Clinton, to say nothing of Bill Clinton, when any question of the Democrats' stance arises. And don't forget Nancy Pelosi, who rushed to condemn Jimmy Carter for using the word "apartheid" in the title of his new book and for whom, according to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency profile, support for Israel is personal and "heartfelt." One Jewish activist and long-time friend described her as "incredibly loyal" (interesting term) and as feeling Jewish and Israeli issues "in her soul."

But Simon's brief disquisition on the futility of even making an effort was particularly striking for its profound dismissiveness and its profound blindness to what is and has been going on on the ground. Simon's "contretemps" in Lebanon was no mere embarrassing misstep but a murderous rampage that killed 1,300 innocent Lebanese and dropped over a million cluster bomblets in villages across the south, left to be discovered by returning residents. But the Democrats don't care, and Steven Simon considers this hardly worth a second thought. Israel gets itself in trouble, showing its true brutal nature in the process, and this gives Simon and the Democrats a handy excuse to avoid doing anything.

Eighteen Palestinian innocents in Beit Hanoun in the northern Gaza Strip were murdered while sleeping in their beds a day before Simon spoke, killed by Israeli shellfire, round after round fired at a residential housing complex -- 16 members of one extended family and two others who came to help them after the first round exploded. The Democrats don't care. Steven Simon considers this not worth a mention.

In the six days preceding this incident, Israel assaulted Beit Hanoun the way it assaulted Jenin and Nablus and other West Bank cities in 2002 -- a murderous assault reminiscent of Nazi sieges or of the Russian siege of Chechnya, in which in these six days 57 Palestinians were killed, to one Israeli soldier. The dead include Palestinian fighters and a large number of civilians, including children and including two women shot down in the street while attempting to lift the Israeli siege of a mosque. The mosque was leveled. The Democrats don't care. Steven Simon considers this not worth a mention.

In the four months preceding this six-day siege, the Israelis killed 247 Palestinians in a prolonged attack on Gaza. Of the dead, two-thirds are civilians, 20 percent children. Of nearly 1,000 injured, one-third are children. The Democrats don't care. Steven Simon considers this not worth a mention.

Israel is planning a larger siege of Gaza, concentrating not just on Beit Hanoun in the north but on Rafah in the south, ostensibly to unearth arms-smuggling tunnels. This has been going on for years; Rafah has been the scene of Israel's murderous pummeling periodically since the intifada began -- in 2003 when Rachel Corrie was killed trying to protect the home of an innocent family from demolition, in 2004 when hundreds of homes were demolished in multiple sieges and a peaceful protest demonstration was strafed from the air. But the Democrats don't care. Steven Simon considers this not worth a mention.

Gaza, of course, is not the only Palestinian territory being raped and pillaged. Its 1.4 million residents are the most distraught -- living imprisoned in a territory with the highest population density in the world, walled in with no exit except as Israel sporadically allows, being deliberately starved by the official policy of Israel, which dictates to the U.S., which dictates to Europe, vulnerable to constant Israeli assault. But the West Bank's 2.5 million Palestinians are not much better off. They continue to be killed by Israelis and squeezed by Israel's separation wall, by settlement expansion, by movement restrictions, by theft of agricultural land, by diminishing economic opportunity, and by massive Israeli-fostered unemployment. Their death toll is only minimally less than Gaza's.

This obscenity of oppression and murder does not faze the Democrats or any of Israel's Zionist supporters in the U.S. Whatever Israel wants is all right with the Democrats. The 110th Congress will screw the Palestinians just the way the Republican 109th did.

Kathleen Christison is a former CIA political analyst and has worked on Middle East issues for 30 years. She is the author of Perceptions of Palestine and The Wound of Dispossession.

Bill Christison was a senior official of the CIA. He served as a National Intelligence Officer and as Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis. They spent October 2006 in Palestine and on a speaking tour of Ireland sponsored by the Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign

Pete Seeger

This is what our government supports.

It is finally over!!!!

Well the election is finally over. No more commercials telling us how terrible the candidates are. I really wish that we lived in a society that one; cared about politics vs. the politician’s character and two; actually knew history. Instead we live in a civilization where the past has been deleted from our memory and people don’t care about politics. We are often told that we aren’t supposed to talk about politics; religion and I’ll add class. This is probably why we live in a society where religion decides our policies, no one knows what goes on and we have the most uneven wealth distribution in the western world. If we don’t talk about these things, why should we expect anything to get better?
Last night the people of Wisconsin went to the polls to enshrine discrimination into our Constitution. The only way for such a hate filled amendment to pass was for the twenty- somethings to decide that they don’t need to vote. Had the echo boomers, Gen-Yers, or the millennials come out to vote they could have swayed the election. Instead they sat at home and allowed a bunch of fucks to decide that I shouldn’t have the right to see my girlfriend in the I.C.U. The funny thing is that the younger people bitch about Bush and have no right to. Television is far more interesting than human rights. In an attempt to find a silver lining in such a travesty of humanity, I think I may have found one. The Republican hate mongers used up one of their last nasty ploys to get elected and it didn’t even work for them. Now next election they might have to run on their platform, which will never get them elected. So they shot their load and they still lost. Unfortunately homosexuals were the victims. God I hope they fight back! I am extremely angry that our state is filled with so many stupid wacko religious people. This is another product of our societies refusal to discuss politics, religion and class.
While we are on the topic of stupid religious wackos lets not forget the death penalty initiative. This one I can’t blame on World of Warcraft. Even if Generation Y had voted this one would have still passed. Too many people are fill with vengeance to see that murder is wrong in all cases. This referendum was what pushed me to vote for Governor Doyle. I had no plans on voting for him but once I got my ballot I had to rethink. Doyle is the only thing stopping our state from re-instating the death penalty. I hate the death penalty more than Democratic Politicians so I had to hold my nose and vote for Doyle. I had to do it. Executing people is what Saddam was just convicted of.
So the Democrats won the House and look poised to take the Senate. If this happens Bush will have dust off his veto pen. Remember that Bush only vetoed one bill, the one banning torture. Classy. If the Democrats are what the electorate thinks they are then they should start sending bills to Bush that help the average people for him to veto. Imagine him vetoing a raise in the minimum wage. I, of course, expect that the Democrats will just take their position in between the Republicans and the center.
I hope that the take over of Congress by the Democrats might slow down our shitty government. Maybe the Government will stop handing all our wealth to a tiny minority of obscenely rich white guys. I know I am calling for a redistribution of wealth but what do you expect from a Marxist. Only in a society ruled by the rich can the term “wealth redistribution” be a dirty word whereas “wealth concentration” is never even spoken in public.
We must start talking about class, religion and politics; our society needs us to. If we as Americans actually started talking about these issues the world, not just America, would end up a much better place. Our citizens would end up educated on issues that affect everyone. No longer could our rulers say things like, “The terrorists hate our freedom.” The people would be too educated and would respond with things like, “Don’t the Muslims hate us for what we have done to them over the decades? From our support of some of the most egregious human rights violations from Israel to Saudi Arabia, to the overthrow of democratically elected governments like Iran.” Until we get to the point where people get educated about politics we will continue to be ruled over by a tiny group of the ultra-rich who care solely about themselves and their wealth.
As that terrible human being, Ralph Nader once said, “You better get turned on to politics otherwise politics will turn on you.” I hate him so much, stupid seat belts and the Freedom of Information Act. What a bastard.

The Death of Saddam

The verdict of death by hanging for Saddam is a travesty. Not because he was innocent but because it was victor’s justice at its worst. How can an occupied country hold a fair trial? Everyone knows that Saddam is guilty of horrendous crimes against humanity. That fact is in no way in doubt. What is in doubt is if a person can get a fair trial when the judges are seen as nothing other than puppets.
First off, Iraq is not free. Iraq’s judiciary is not free due to the country’s status as being occupied. Iraq’s criminal justice system is not theirs but ours. America has decided what their laws will be, more accurately L. Paul Bremer. Why couldn’t we have done this in a more transparent or neutral site? There is no reason why we couldn’t have held this trial at The Hague in Holland like we have with Milosevic and the butchers of Rwanda. What was the reason for such a hasty trial in such a troubled country? The government wasn’t even able to protect the lives of Saddam’s defense lawyers. Yet this is supposedly the best environment to hold a landmark trial.
One of the main reasons that the U.S and its Iraqi puppets didn’t want this trial held in Holland is the death penalty. The US government wanted Saddam put to death, as did their Iraqi puppets. The desire of his victims for his life is understandable but ours is not. It is well known that the Europeans would not sentence a human being to death because, as enlightened people, they view the death penalty as inhumane. Of course, the killing of humans is the reason Saddam was being tried. So it is interesting to murder him. Before anyone mentions the Old Testament remember that the root word for Christianity is Christ, not Moses. Christ taught to turn the other cheek but very few Christians follow this part of the doctrine.
Another main reason, the US feared trying Saddam at the International Criminal Court at The Hague, is that the US cannot control it. For instance, during the trial of Milosevic, Gen. Wesley Clark was summoned to testify by the defense. I cannot remember anyone, of any significance, being called by Saddam’s defense team. This seems interesting due to the US government’s support for Hussein during his most vicious human rights violations. If I were trying to defend myself from the US, I would call people like George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, Don Rumsfeld or James Baker. Instead none of these people were forced to testify. Therefore, US support for Saddam’s terrible crimes, was sent down the memory hole.
I truly believe that Saddam should be held responsible for his crimes. He committed some hideous acts on fellow humans or allowed his subordinates to do so, we all know about his son’s sadism. I wish that the US could have done the right thing for once. They could have taken the moral high ground and either sent him to The Hague or waited until the Iraqis were controlling Iraq. Instead they wanted a quick trial and a death penalty. It is amazing how our leaders, who profess to be such moral Christians, don’t follow any of Jesus’ teachings.

Why the Democrats don’t deserve to win but why I hope they will.

With the election less than a week to go, we are all being bombarded with political bullshit. The media keep telling us what the polls are saying and what the trends are. Every move is overanalyzed to the point where it has no meaning. We are told about George Allen using a racial slur but not about his politics. So this will be my only entry about the elections until after because I am getting sick of the bullshit coverage.
Right now the polls show that a large majority, 2 to 1, say the war in Iraq is a disaster. What is the Democratic Party’s plan for Iraq? They don’t have one. Instead you have Hillary saying we need to stay the course, Joe Biden saying we should split the country into three parts, John Murtha saying we should move our troops to Kuwait and then you have Kerry/Feingold who are saying we need to get out. Why won’t anyone say what is obvious and morally right? We should ask the Iraqi people what they want us to do. It is their country, not ours. Many say that we have to stay otherwise the place would descend into civil war. This is just a revamped version of the “white man’s burden” but 21st century style. We, white America, are the smart ones who should take care of the Iraqis because, as brown people, they are unable to take care of themselves. Is it even possible to doubt that the reason we can’t leave is because we want control over their oil resources?
It is obvious that the Democrats agree that we must control Iraq otherwise they would launch a campaign aimed at the large majority of us who are now against the war. They aren’t though. They are so scared of the Republicans that they refuse to go on the offensive. Instead we hear people say that the Democrats don’t want to look weak on National Security. Of course, the Democrats are weak on National Security because they are weak on everything. They decided years ago that they were too scared to not have super cushy jobs and that in order to keep those jobs they would have to suck the corporate tit. So a party that once claimed to be the party of the people is now just the party for the corporations. As a result they have been unable to champion a populist agenda because it goes against what a tiny minority of rich white assholes want.
What is the platform of the Democrats? In 1994 when the approval rating of Congress was near rock bottom, the Republicans didn’t run on “We aren’t the Democrats”, they ran on what they claimed to believe. Instead of biting their tongues, in hope that the Democrats might lose, they went on the offensive. They created a simple little document called the Contract With America. Newt Gingrich and the other white men gave the public a list of what they wanted to accomplish. (Don’t forget about Newt in 2008) Years later they have abandoned it but it got them elected and they kept power for twelve years before their corruption finally bubbled to the surface. Why can’t the Democrats offer a list of what they want to accomplish? Because they have no such list or idea for that matter and they still fear any idea put forth will be attacked by the opposition and their corporate donors.
The polls show that a majority of the US population thinks that our country should have some form of universal health care coverage. The last number I saw was an ABC poll that put the number at 61%. Here is a winning issue but the Democrats can’t put forth the idea because they are weak. They are so afraid of being called a socialist, a title I where with pride, that they refuse to make it part of their platform. Then there is the cost of prescription drugs, what are the Democrats planning on doing about that? Then there is our environment; poor Democrats don’t want to piss off their toxic creating donors so that issue is off the table. Then there are unfair payroll taxes, can’t touch that because that would piss off too many rich white assholes. Then there is the Israeli/Palestinian conflict the main reason Arabs hate our government and the main recruiting tool for “terrorists”. In this case the Democrats fall over themselves attempting to show who really supports the horrendous Israeli war crimes more. You’ve got Howard Dean calling the Iraqi Prime Minister an anti-Semite for showing his support for Hezbollah, the Democrats in Congress voting to stand by Israel even while they littered Southern Lebanon with over a million cluster bombs (war crime) and used chemical and radioactive weapons (war crime) and we’ve got Hillary saying that the illegal wall, Israel is building to confiscate as much land as possible, only hurts the “terrorists”.
There is nothing the Democrats stand for. They are a bunch of wishy-washy power seekers. We are always told that the Democratic candidate is only sounding more moderate to win an election yet once they are elected they actually get even more right wing. There is little that the Democrats have done in the last twenty years, on a national level, which has been good for anyone. They haven’t helped the poor or people of color. They haven’t stood up for human rights anywhere. They haven’t attempted to slow the pollution of our planet. They haven’t stopped corporations from harming us. They haven’t stood for peace. What really have they done?
Even with all that I still hope that the Democrats win at least one house of Congress. I don’t have any hope that Democrats will help the people of the country besides those who are in the country club. They won’t stand tough for a measly minimum wage increase to 1970’s levels. They won’t stand up against the polluters who pay for them to be elected. They won’t stop Israel’s ethnic cleansing of its indigenous population. They won’t get us out of Iraq. The one thing they may do is slow down the American Empire just a little bit. If this is the case, that alone is a reason for hope. Maybe just maybe our country will end up in a gridlock and we will stop harming the people of the world all just to make the tiny white rich assholes obscenely richer at the expense of real human beings, no matter if they are brown or white.

Propaganda?

Wanting it Both Ways

Politics is sad. Or maybe, American politics is sad. Our citizens continue to elect total nimcompoops who are only self-interested. Yes, there are always exceptions but for the most part they are all full of shit.
One day I thought about making a list of right wing rhetoric and how they want "it both ways". Take the "sanctity of life" and the bombs we drop. The bullshit from Bush about not wanting to take human life to save other human life but that was the exact purpose of our invasion of Iraq.
So I thought maybe some others out there could help me fill up a good list that we all can use against right wing nonsense.

First off there is Democracy. The RW, NeoCOns and Bush speak glowingly about the spread of Democracy and its great benefits. While at the same time supporting autocrats and dictators world wide. Hugo Chavez is a dictator and the Sauds are our moderate allies.
They claim to be the ones who truly love the country and the left is treasonous yet they do everything in their power to not to pay taxes to fund the country they purport to love.
They are fiscally more responsible then the Democrats. This one I don't need to even expand on.
Reagan gets the credit for bankrupting the Soviets but the Democrats were in control of Congress yet when you bring up the huge deficits created by Reagan then it becomes the Democratic Controlled Congress's fault.
Claim to be for the "Free Market" but they are for subsidizing industry, allowing tax dollars to be spent on pollution clean-up left by industry, want to protect certain American industries, and on.....
They want us to believe that supercomputers and 1500 scientists can't predict future weather patterns but want us to believe their predictions for Social Security.
Republicans were whining about giving Bush nominees for Federal Judges an "up or down vote" but refused to allow Clinton nominees the chance to get a vote at all.
The Right claims to be against regulations unless it is regulating sex, euthanasia, drug use, reproduction, art and on and on...
Tout adoption as the alternative to abortion unless you are a gay couple.
They claim to be strong on defense but always show so much fear and weakness by being "terrified" by weak tin pot dictators without weapons.
They say people should be held responsible for their actions unless it is something like Abu Ghraib, "bad intelligence", after war planning, Sept. 11 etc
Claim the UN is useless until it is needed.
They tell us that the Treasury Bonds backing Social Security are just "pieces of paper" but they wouldn't say that to Japan, Saudi Arabia or China.
Criticism is unpatriotic unless they are the ones criticizing.
They continue to spew nonsense about "our dependence on foreign oil" yet don't fund real alternatives.
One standard right wing complaint is that Government is intruding into our lives but they did everything in their power to try keep Terry Schiavo alive.
Against special treatment for certain groups in regards to college admission unless they are the rich white kids of Alum.
For State's Rights unless they control the Federal Government.
The pretend to be champions of the Constitution but don't believe a jury of ones peers is capable of hearing malpractice cases.
For open markets for American products only.
Claim the Democrats are a hazard to our safety all the while they outted a CIA agent.
Claim to support Religious peoples abd family values unless of course you are a mexican immigrant.
Claim market forces rule except when it comes to labor following capital.
That is my incomplete list. I'm sorry if it isn't the easiest read, I have drank way too much coffee this morning so there may be some typos. I look forward to everyones additions.

Great Political Commercial

Hurricane Hugo

Why does Washington fear the Venezuelan President so much? Why is Washington working so hard, actually bribing and threatening nations, to get other countries to vote with them to put Guatemala on the UN Security Council instead of Venezuela. It isn't as if the Venezuelans would have veto power like the world's rulers deserve. In fact they would have very little power since the world has decided that the US, Russia, England, China and France are the only important countries of the world and has granted them veto power. What’s even more wonderous are the attacks against Hugo Chavez by Democrats like Chuck Rangel and Nancy Pelosi. Is it the man we fear or his message? This is the real question.
As we speak the US is bullying countries into voting with them to put Guatemala on the Security Council. John, I can't get confirmed to the UN, Bolton is telling Venezuela to back down and give up on their attempt to get a seat on the Security Council. Never you mind that Guatemala, the lesser of two evils in our Empire's eyes, is systematically slaughtering street kids. Also forget that like most of the Third World, Guatemala's elites are enriching themselves at the expense of the poor in their nation. As usual, these are all good things in Washington's eyes.
The easily elected leader of Venezuela is a dictator our sheepish media tell us. He is a "thug" according to Nancy Pelosi. Christ, Nancy Pelosi wouldn't ever call our President a thug even though the description fits him much better. Both Bush and Chavez came to power around the same time and guess who is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands. Not Hugo. Yet it is Hugo who is the thug. Even though our President has just been given the power, by Congress, to indefinitely hold prisoners without the right to a trial yet it is Hugo who is becoming Authoritarian.
There are two main reasons our Empire is fearful of Hugo. Today I will only address one of the two. The main reason that Washington, both parties, fears the Venezuelan President is because he offers a different view of the world. One that is not supposed to be voiced and when it is, in our country, we can count on the obiedient media to refer to those suggestions as crackpot or utopian. National healthcare is some pie in the sky idea that isn't feasible unless of course you are one of those uncompetitive utopian nations like Canada, England, France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Italy, Austria, or Switzerland. When was the last time you bought something from Sweden(Erickson phones) or Finland(Nokia). Better yet, we are told how much better our for-profit healthcare system is. Still where is the political movement in any European country to institute for-profit American style healthcare? It doesn't exist because the concept is so widely popular that only a fool would advocate some change.
Just imagine if Venezuela had been on the Security Council during the lead up to our invasion and occupation of Iraq. They would have had the lap dog, Mexico's, seat. If my memory serves me right the Mexicans didn't support our illegal and immoral invasion but they weren't vocal critics and did nothing to stave off the tragedy. Had the Venezuelans been on the Council we would have seen the them using the forum to show how illegal and unnecessary this war was. They may have even sponsored envoys which would have really pissed of our Empire.
If anyone had the chance to see Hugo Chavez's over the top performance at the UN last month, they can understand why the US is scared of their message, "Another world is possible." My main disappointment about the speech was Chavez's reference to Bush being the devil. I had really hoped that Chavez would have turned out to be an atheist but oh well. I can overlook it though, since he follows Christ's teachings teachings far closer than our holier than thou born again fake. Still it was a little disappointing to see him use such infantile, Bush-esque, rhetoric.
I agree that his rhetoric was over the top and may have done himself more damage than good but why, one must ask, does he have such strong feelings. It could be that the CIA attempted to overthrow him in April 2002. The CIA involvement was obvious, to anyone who knows even a basic history of Latin America, because the only country in the Western Hemisphere that didn't condemn the coup was the US. While the rest of the Americas were calling for the Democratic will of the Venezuelans to be respected the Bush Administration called for the opposite but with the same terminology. The outrageous level of rhetoric that goes unchallenged by our media should be frightening to any and all American whom are not members of the ruling elite. It doesn't matter what the facts are because the media create the true facts. Remember how Saddam was responsible for 9/11.
Again this shows how weak our country really is. Greedy oligarchs who are terrified of ideas entering the lexicon of the world hold up our whole society. They do not want to be removed from their undeserving position of world rulers. They understand that their hold is flimsy once exposed to light so they send out faithful Democrats to use harsher words for a populist than that of a man who is responsible for the deaths of 655,000 people. Who the fuck are the real thugs? Us!

At least some newsman cares.

Quick Rant

I was going to apologize for not writing lately, due to my working on the third shift, but I realized that there is no one there.
Two things
First why can't North Korea build nuclear weapons? WHy do we, America, have the right to keep tens of thousands of nuclear weapons but North Korea is not allowed to have one? When was the last time North Korea used a Weapon of Mass Destruction? When was the last time Americans did? Some could argue that the sanctions applied to Iraq by both Bush I and the great liberal Clinton were form of weapons of mass destruction. Sure it wasn't all spectacular with big explosions but nontheless the sanctions killed at least half a million children alone. When Madeleine Albright was asked by Leslie Stahl, on 60 minutes, about the half a million dead kids, she didn't deny it, instead she said that they thought the price was worth it. How fucking sick. Here we have all these fake liberals crying about the war in Iraq yet where were they when Clinton was slaughtering them? They didn't care, plain and simple. It wasn't until lives that count, American lives, began to be lost that these pseudo-liberals began to talk about how bad Bush is.
When Clinton was forced to stop the "genocide" in Kosovo, many of us argued that invading non-nuclear states would increase the need for them to acquire the weapons. Of course, we were wrong. Genocide was being committed. Sure if you go and look at the numbers that claim doesn't stand up to the scrutiny. First off 2000 dead rebels is not genocide any more than Israel's overreaction to the Hizzbollah was genocide. If we look at the numbers, the Israelis are more guilty of genocide in Palestine then the Serbs were. Yet when will any American administration stand up to the "Israeli Lobby". We would rather piss of the entire Arab world then make the Israelis play nice. Nobody wants to be called an antisemite do they?
The second bit is that our Dear Leader has signed into law the suspension of Habeus Crpus and the right to torture people. Finally we can ram metal rods, retroactively, into the rectums of our prisoners. It is sick that Americans want to torture other humans so bad they split hairs when it comes to the Geneva Conventions. They say things like, "Well they aren't fighting for a foreign army so therefore the ban on torture shouldn't apply." THis shows the immense desire to attach electrical currents to mens testicles. We are truly a sick nation. 3000 people die and we instantly start to figure out how to legally force our captors to perform oral sex on other inmates. If you don't believe that we have, I will send you the photos, not to mention the raping of women. This is all legal now, in retrospect. We have given immunity to torturers because we are so terrified of a scattered group of Arabs who have killed less Americans then our roads have in the last month. Yet there is no war on car accidents. Americans have a, what many see as, a legimate racism towards Muslims. SO now it just makes sense that we smear human feces on them.
For all the weapons we have, we are a bunch of pussies. It is amazing. We have slaughtered millions over the last few decades and know we are led to believe that there is no legitimate right to fight back even though that is exactly what we would do. We actually invaded an entire country without a single piece of evidence and now we are torturing people under the guise of a threat for which they can not present a piece of evidence. Hey but at least the masochistic can get there kicks.

Noam

Holy Shit!

New figures have come out from the Johns Hopkins University about the numbers of Iraqis that have died as a result of our illegal invasion and continued occupation of Iraq. In our attempt to rid Saddam of Weapons of Mass Destruction, or wait to liberate Iraq, no, I mean bring Democracy to the Middle East, over 650,000 Iraqis have died. In three years the actions of our government have killed 655,000 people. In about one years time from now the number will top one million. We are truly a sick country.
As soon as this study came out our science friendly president said it was flawed. Remember that this is printed in the Lancet Medical Journal, Europe’s most prestigious medical magazine, which is peer reviewed. Also remember too, that Bush was a C student who has said he doesn’t read. Bush, who is nothing but an enemy of science, is going to tell us that this survey is flawed? C’mon you have got to be kidding me. The man is an idiot plain and simple and the people who he is surrounded by are a bunch of idiots as well. These are the same people who told us that the Iraqis would greet us as liberators. They were so certain that this would be the case that Cheney refused to answer a hypothetical question posed to him by Tim Russert about what may happen if we are viewed as occupiers and not liberators. Cheney told him that simply wasn’t going to be the case so there was no reason to even answer the hypothetical. This asshole is going to tell us that the Doctors at Johns Hopkins have a flawed study.
George Bush says that the survey is flawed. This is the same guy who stood on an Air Craft Carrier and told us that major combat operations in Iraq are over and he removed an ally of Al Queda. Yet the vast majority of all of the US causalities have resulted after Bush’s staged photo op. Did you know the Navy had to turn the ship around so the cameras wouldn’t be able to see San Diego on the Horizon? As far as an ally of Al Queda being removed, even he now claims that he never said Saddam was in cahoots with Saddam. Yet he is going to tell us that this study is flawed.
The great thing about our totally worthless media is that this number and this story will be sent down the memory hole. Bush doesn’t need to explain how the study is flawed because, one, he can’t and two, it couldn’t be explained away with a ten second sound bite in between the really important stuff, the commercials. What is truly scary is that many Americans will take Bush at his word not because he is intelligent or has a grasp of science but because they are sheep. They really believe that our government is always acting with the bests intentions and not malicious or evil, to use the fairy tale terminology so favored by Bush and his little mind. “We didn’t kill 655,000 people just so we could control the Middle East’s oil. We were trying to help people.” Luckily for the ruling elite the American public’s attention span is about as long as a ten second sound bite or a thirty second commercial. You ever wonder why the commercials are only thirty seconds?
So lets review, Johns Hopkins puts out a study in a peer reviewed medical journal after surveying thousands of households across Iraq. They interview people and are shown death certificates by most of the interviewees. They use the same techniques that they used in Kosovo and the People’s Republic of Congo that were widely accepted by the Western World, England and America included.
George Bush and his moronic crew told us so many fanciful stories. They told us of tens of thousands of gallons of mustard gas. They told us of mobile weapons labs, which were actually given to them by the British to produce hydrogen for weather balloons. They told us that Saddam was a grave threat to our existence. Rumsfeld told a press conference that he knew where the weapons were. Cheney refused to even toy with the idea that the Iraqis would resist American occupation because it wasn’t going to happen he reassured us. He also told us half a year ago that the insurgency, I believe he referred to them as terrorists, were in their last throes. So who are the ones that are flawed?

Good-Bye, Habeas corpus!

Our government has finally rid them of that little inconvenience that is the right to challenge one’s detention. It goes back to 1215 and was a check on the power of the English King John. Yet today, after those 3000 people died, we now must throw it out in our attempt to create our own King. “We live in dangerous times unlike any time since 1215. These are different times.” Talk about a bunch of bullshit. We are slowly creating an elected Emperor who can do as he so chooses. If the President wants to use a Mexican-American to distract attention from his own failed policy and hold him indefinitely that’s fine. We can’t have that pesky Supreme Court deciding what is legal or not. We are now led to believe that Bush is so extremely competent, except on 9/11, that he can read the Geneva Conventions and interpret them, when I doubt he can find Geneva on a map.
Here are two good pieces of bullshit rhetoric.
The first is the idea that the Democrats can’t stand up to the President for fear of being labeled weak and losing the election. This latest law should have been filibustered but the Democrats are more concerned about being re-elected to Congress, because they have the easiest job in the world with automatic pay increases, then protecting the Constitution they vowed to uphold. Instead we are told that this election is too important which sounds very familiar.
During the 2004 election, us Nader voters were told the election was far too important to vote for someone who stands with you. Instead we were told we must vote for a guy who wants to increase troop levels and escalate an immoral and illegal war. This was a life or death situation we were told. Yet when numerous Democrats knew, prior to the election, that the President was secretly listening to our telephone calls, they said nothing. Sure maybe disclosing that information could have swung the election towards the Democrats but they, knowing how extremely important this election was, chose to do nothing. So was the election really that important?
Now we have the Democrats voting to get rid of Habeas Corpus under the guise that they must not lose the next election because abortion on demand is far more important than the right to challenge one’s detention by the State. All of our elected rulers are tools especially the Democrats. I hold the Democrats to task because Republicans are only concerned about not paying taxes. When one falls for the root of all evil, even when their supposed holy book warns them, why should we expect them to have morals. If this election, or any other, truly mattered then the Democrats would fight accordingly. Instead, all they do is remind us of how important this election is. Refusing to mention that it is important only for them.
The next piece of bullshit rhetoric is the one being spewed by Bush and his posse. They keep claiming that we must win this war otherwise we are all screwed. Of course they need to tie the illegal aggressive war, the crimes of Nuremberg, to the war against resistance towards our Empire. Instead of forcing the Israelis out of the Palestinian Occupied Territories, which is the moral thing to do, they invade and occupy another Muslim nation. Neither parties want to force Israel to get out of the Occupied Territories because they are beholden to the "Israeli Lobby and fear being labeled an Anti-Semite.
So if this aggressive war is necessary for the Empire to win then why not fight it as if you wanted to win. Why not call a draft in order to have enough troops to win? Why not get rid of the tax cuts for the extremely wealthy, since they are the ones reaping the benefits of the Empire and its illegal war? Why not? Because this war is in no way important to America, outside of the ruling classes and the oil barons. The Empire doesn’t want to steal the oil but control it. If you don’t believe me, wait, I will be writing a column like this in a decade when a Democratic leader tells us we need to send troops to Columbia or Central Asia to fight drugs. I’m certain, if this administration wasn’t filled with people who have a dual loyalty to the state of Israel we would be in Venezuela right now.
Habeas Corpus has been the basis for humane law for centuries and we have now rid ourselves of it. Three thousand people die, the same amount that die every month on the roads, and we decide to give the President powers that he should never have. To all those who think that, “Well when we get a Democrat in office they will reverse this.” When in history has a ruler given up their power? We shouldn’t believe any of their bullshit rhetoric because there is no truth in it. If we do fall for it we have only ourselves to blame. Unfortunately, since 9/11, we have become complete dipshits, from the conspiracy that Bush, the genius, orchestrated 9/11 to the idea that terrorists hate our freedoms shows that many have drank the kool-aid.