goodbye 2008

Let's hope the new year is better.

Happy Hanukkah

Shock, Awe and Lies:
The Truth Behind the Israeli Attack on Gaza
Written by Chris Floyd
Monday, 29 December 2008
http://chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/3/1666-shock-awe-and-lies-the-truth-behind-the-israeli-attack-on-gaza.html

Here is a simple, stone cold fact. You cannot read or hear the truth about what is happening in Gaza from any corporate media in the United States. The only thing you will find there are regurgitations of Israeli spin, which are themselves only regurgitations of the kind of spin that American militarists have put on their own depredations -- for centuries now. Up and down the American media and political establishments, you will find nothing but bleatings about Israel being "forced" to launch its vicious blunderbuss attacks against heavily populated Gaza because of the "recent spate of Hamas bombings" since the end of a six-month ceasefire.

This is of course a damnable and deliberate lie. Papers in Israel -- in Israel, but not the United States -- are reporting the truth: the murderous assault on Gaza was planned not only before the six-month ceasefire ended -- it was planned before the cease-fire even took effect. Indeed, the cease-fire was part of the military plan to decimate the civilian areas of Gaza; it was a hoax, a scam, a deliberate feint to buy time for military preparations -- precisely the same strategy followed by the Bush Regime (and its bipartisan Establishment supporters) in "going to the UN" to seek a "peaceful solution" to the "Iraqi crisis" -- when the invasion was already in the works.

Haaretz reports on the Israel's deceit in the latest outrage, in the aptly titled piece, "Disinformation, secrecy and lies: How the Gaza offensive came about:

"Long-term preparation, careful gathering of information, secret discussions, operational deception and the misleading of the public - all these stood behind the Israel Defense Forces "Cast Lead" operation against Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip, which began Saturday morning. he disinformation effort, according to defense officials, took Hamas by surprise and served to significantly increase the number of its casualties in the strike.

Sources in the defense establishment said Defense Minister Ehud Barak instructed the Israel Defense Forces to prepare for the operation over six months ago, even as Israel was beginning to negotiate a ceasefire agreement with Hamas. According to the sources, Barak maintained that although the lull would allow Hamas to prepare for a showdown with Israel, the Israeli army needed time to prepare, as well.."

The story also notes that the recent racheting of tension was sparked, deliberately, by a heavy-handed Israeli incursion into Gaza:

"The plan of action that was implemented in Operation Cast Lead remained only a blueprint until a month ago, when tensions soared after the IDF carried out an incursion into Gaza during the ceasefire to take out a tunnel which the army said was intended to facilitate an attack by Palestinian militants on IDF troops...."

While Barak was working out the final details with the officers responsible for the operation, Livni went to Cairo to inform Egypt's president, Hosni Mubarak, that Israel had decided to strike at Hamas. In parallel, Israel continued to send out disinformation in announcing it would open the crossings to the Gaza Strip and that Olmert would decide whether to launch the strike following three more deliberations on Sunday - one day after the actual order to launch the operation was issued.

"Hamas evacuated all its headquarter personnel after the cabinet meeting on Wednesday," one defense official said, "but the organization sent its people back in when they heard that everything was put on hold until Sunday."

Not only did this deception lead Hamas to send its officials back to work -- it also meant that there was no general warning to the masses of civilians packed like sardines into Gaza's hellish confines. It meant that civilian casualties would be maximized -- especially when the initial assault was launched in the middle of the day, with thousands of schoolchildren out at their lesson.

As Glenn Greenwald notes, Israel's massive bombing of civilian areas -- even if couched in terms of "retaliation" for scattershot strikes on Israeli territory by a political faction -- constitutes "a clear violation of the Geneva Conventions." Greenwald also adroitly turns Barack Obama's campaign kowtowing to Israeli militarism on its head:

[Obama on the campaign trail]: "The first job of any nation state is to protect its citizens. And so I can assure you that if -- I don't even care if I was a politician -- if somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that. And I would expect Israelis to do the same thing."

Can't the exact same mentality be deployed to justify everything Hamas has done and is doing, to wit: "if a foreign power were brutally occupying my country for four decades -- or blockading my country and denying my children medical needs and nutrition and the ability even to exit -- I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that. And I would expect Palestinians to do the same thing"? But the last thing that our political class ever extends is reciprocal, two-sided analysis to this dispute.

What is the ultimate context of this carnage? The fact that the Arab inhabitants of Palestine had their land taken away from them by force -- not in some ancient, historic era, but within the lifetime of many thousands of Palestinians still living. I hold no brief for Hamas; like the Angry Arab, whose coverage of the conflict has been relentless and penetrating, I don't care for any party based on religious extremism. But as Greenwald notes, every action taken by Hamas and other Palestinian resistance groups could be characterized as "retaliation" for the theft of their land, not to mention the war crime of collective punishment and genocidal blockades visited upon the Occupied Territories for years.

But there is not a single peep of this perspective from America's ruling class and its media courtiers. Of course, it is a bit much to expect a nation which itself was built on land theft, repression and slaughter to see anything wrong or "disproportionate" in Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. What else are you supposed to do when those dang heathen savages come around with their war parties and tomahawks, trying to get back the land that God Almighty has granted to good white folk?

Meanwhile, here's what Israel's "Manifest Destiny" looks like on the ground in Gaza. From the Maan News Agency (via the Angry Arab, as was the photo above):

"Death shrouds the hallways of Gaza City's Ash-Shifa medical compound Saturday, its smell creeping in from all corners. Amputated bodies are strewn throughout hallways because morgues in the city can no longer accommodate the dead. In one corner a man stands with his seven year old son in a cardboard box because the hospital ran out of sheets to cover the dead with. This is how he will carry him home and bury him. Another man stands dazed, in shock after watching his son Mohammed killed during his graduation ceremony at the de facto police headquarters. The father of one of Mohammed's classmates stood next to his son as he was decapitated. The man is still screaming.

In the packed hospital waiting room a mother sits silently staring into the distance; her son was pronounced dead shortly after she brought him in... Forty-year-old mother Nawal Al-Lad'a did not find the bodies of her two sons in the medical compound, so she left to look amid the rubble.

Husam Farajallah, a university student, was at the hospital collecting the body of his relative. He called what happened in Gaza a "black day" in the lives of all Palestinians, and wondered how the world could watch and do nothing.

Medics in Gaza confirmed that the majority of those killed in the day's attacks were civilians, including men, women and children. Most were cut to pieces, making the job of doctors and medics difficult, and the task of giving bodies back to families painful and gruesome. The medics working in the field continue to dig up bodies from the densely populated urban areas of Gaza City.

The scenes remind many Palestinians of the images that came out of the Sabra and Shatila massacres from Beirut in 1982, when thousands of Palestinians were killed by the Lebanese Phalangist militia.

As the death toll climbs and no word on a halt to the attacks has come from Israel, Gazans fear for their lives and loved ones."

A New Wind Blowing

by Mary Pitt
12/22/08

The whole country is agog with the news of the Madoff Ponzi scheme and the billions he scammed from big investors, but nobody appears to realize that it is only the tip of a huge iceberg. There are other so-called legitimate institutions afloat in the private sector that are profiting from similar scams with the heartfelt approval of the raging capitalists in government as well as private individuals.

Foremost among these are the insurance companies as they have become established in America. Even the government social programs such as Medicare and Medicaid are administered by the accounting departments of insurance companies. The regulations regarding these programs were written in large part by the insurance companies and, as the result, even the very poor are not getting the services they need under their provisions.

Look at the case of a lady I will call Suzy, a middle-aged lady who, though mentally retarded, had worked as a bus person in a hospital cafeteria until her vision deteriorated so badly that she became qualified for Social Security Disability Support. Since she was not yet 65 years old, she was not initially eligible for Medicare and so became dependent on Medicaid for two years for her health care. At the age of forty years, she was found to have serious heart trouble and required a quadruple bypass surgery. Then she required a medical regimen that would last for all her life. Among the many medications upon which her life depended was the blood thinner, Coumadin, a patented and quite expensive tablet. She thrived amazingly well and recovered nicely.

Though her vision was her "primary disability", the coverage provided for her eyes was minimal and she struggled to pay for the necessary replacement of her lenses as that condition continued to progress. Eventually, a surgical procedure was developed which would help to recover a portion of her vision. She had become eligible for Medicare and the surgery was covered but the new lenses were something that she had to pay for herself from her limited income. Gone were the "Coke-bottle" glasses due to the addition of the implanted lenses. She could stop practicing with the white cane and see well enough to be able to cross a street without assistance.

Then Medicare Part D was instituted and she had to look to an insurance company for the medications. This became a near disaster which was to threaten her life. The insurance company would pay only for generic medications and so she had to exchange the highly successful regimen of Coumadin for the generic Warfarin, commonly known for its primary use as a rat poison. As her pharmacist later explained, Warfarin is not "dosage stable", meaning that the strength is known to vary from batch to batch and she was receiving a "bad batch"! She became covered with black-and-blue patches as the capillaries leaked under her skin and a medical examination disclosed the fact that she was also bleeding internally.

The Warfarin dosage was adjusted but, as she improved, she still complained of "floaties" in her vision. The ophthalmologic surgeons found that she had bled inside her eyes and the "floaties" were specks of blood and it would take time for them to resorb. Eventually this occurred. However, the implanted lenses had become permanently clouded and so a second surgery was necessary to replace them, and of course, new glasses were necessary since there was additional permanent damage to her vision. It makes one wonder whether the money saved by "buying generics" was equal to the cost of the second surgery and the after-care, not to mention the added suffering of the patient and the sacrifices for her to have to pay for the second pair of glasses.

This is typical of the quality of care that is provided by Medicare, which is merely a copy of the insurance company standards. The health of the patient takes a back seat to the pennies which are saved by the mandatory designation of which meds are covered. Suzy is not an anomaly but merely an example of the many shortcomings that are occurring on a daily basis. None of the plans are adequate to the needs. Mothers of young children who become ill are forced to wait until they have the money for the "co-payment" before taking them to the doctor. People who have survived surgery for life-threatening conditions are forced to delay or cancel appointments for after-care because they cannot afford the co-payments. The result is that they wait and become more ill, requiring more care than if they had been able to have their care directed by their physician rather than by an insurance clerk or by their need to pay their rent and utilities.

On the other hand, the insurance companies become more prosperous and even more greedy. They live by the bottom line, some even consolidating into "investment groups" that can later be saved from their own folly by government bailouts. One company had a CEO who embezzled a couple of million dollars but the newspapers have not carried a story about his punishment, if any. Perhaps they consider that the loss of his cushy, high-dollar job was sufficient. They live in an entirely different world from those for whose health they have assumed responsibility and about whose welfare they couldn't care less. It's all about the bottom line to them.

Now we are promised "change" which will "reform" the health care system. What we see discussed is a further subsidy to insurance companies or a plan to "assist" poor people in the payment of their premiums, all of which will only aggravate the problem. Even the computerizing of all medical records and the facilitation of their more rapid sharing will not cut much from the cost of health care delivery. It is only by the removal of power over our most personal care from the hands of the money-grubbing "private enterprise" that this can be accomplished. It is not "socialist" to propose a single-payer plan. The government would not own the hospitals and doctors would not be government employees. They would continue to do business as usual and they and the patients would still make decisions as to the necessary care and procedures. And they would save money by being able to follow a simpler billing procedure.

As the old war-protest song told us, "The answer is written in the wind". There is no way to remedy the problem of public health and its burgeoning costs other than to accept it as a public problem. The cost of health care is threatening all of America's industrial base, though the workers have the ever-increasing premiums withheld from their paychecks in varying percentages and still must cope with the omni-present "deductibles and co-payments". If the same amounts were withheld and paid into a public fund, health care would improve and the cost could be contained. Even those who presently carry individual health insurance would find the costs to be even less than they are currently paying. Physicians' costs would drop due to the lack of necessity to bill various companies and to comply with the pertinent and diverse forms and regulations of those companies. And, incidentally, the corporations would be relieved of the burgeoning costs of providing health care for employees and retirees.

A wise man, Henry Kaiser, once said, "It costs less to keep people healthy than to make them well." It is time for us, as a nation, to recognize that wisdom and to turn our attention to the provision of all types of health care to all our citizens, not just those who can afford to carry insurance or have the few dollars in their pockets to get past the front desk to obtain the care that they need. The dyed-in-the-wool capitalists will bellow that we would be killing the insurance companies. We can only reply that they are killing us, may they rest in peace. Our out-going President touts "responsibility" and indicates that "it is every man for himself". We see no acceptance of responsibility from the insurance companies and we are determined to defend ourselves from the many-tentacled monster that has us by the throat.

The citizens of the United States need universal health care and they need it now. What they do NOT need is yet another commission" of very important people who will sit around for a year or two listening to lectures and instruction by a crew of insurance company officials and announce at last another plan to lubricate those same insurance companies with more of the taxpayers' money. The predictable result would be to throw still more stumbling blocks between the American citizen and his physician.

We must allow the new wind to blow away the cobwebs of complacency and allow our leaders to consider the common sense in moving health care from the profit-making industries and place it where it belongs, in the hands of the health care professionals and the scientific community. Only with a realistic assessment from this point of view can we understand and find the best answer to the problem. We must allow no more low-income workers to fall through the huge cracks in our medical system and no more children to depend on the skillful manipulation of the family budge to provide the care that they need. No more must our elderly be required to subsist on meager rations in order to pay for their medications, becoming ever more frail as they march to a hospice. Only when these problems are faced head-on can the American Dream get back on the road to reality.

We have a nation that must be rebuilt; we have a democracy to be set back on the right track; we have a national debt that will be with us for generations, and an economy that is depleted of resources. This cannot be accomplished by a nation of ill, handicapped people with neglected children and working adults who are needlessly worried about the welfare of their families. For our nation and our own future, we must correct this situation and we must do it now.

The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".

Fearing the Frightful Filibuster

by Mary Pitt
Tuesday, December 16, 2008

The Republicans are already indicating their intent to use the same tactics that they used in the past two years in the minority to block many of the programs that are vital to the plans of President-elect Obama. They cling to the "sixty-vote cloture" rule as if it were the Holy Grail and intend to exercise it at every turn in the deliberations of the upcoming Congressional session.

Let them!

Let them filibuster! That can be done by refusing to sit back and whimper as has the past Congress under the leadership of Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid. The Legislature can pass all the programs of the President but the Democrats in the Senate need to grow a spine and stand up to the filibuster threat by pushing those programs despite them. What's the worst that could happen?

Under the rules of the filibuster, one speaker must continue to argue until the opposition surrenders and decides to let the bill in question die. This becomes a mental and physical marathon and I don't believe there is an orator in today's Senate who can sustain it. Over the years past, some very colorful characters have arisen who used the filibuster successfully and provided much entertainment for the public in the process. Some have collapsed in the attempt to block a vote but many have succeeded in continuing for a number of days and nights in standing on their feet and keeping up the flow of words. If the opposition surrenders, they are henceforth known as heroes but, if they fail, the bill goes to a vote and may become law.

Now, in a filibuster, it simply doesn't matter what the Senator says so long as he continues talking. History is replete with examples of these legendary orators who gave their all for the party. Senator Robert Byrd was noted for reading the Constitution aloud, over...and over...and over, until the opposition folded. Senator Everett Dirkson, he of the silver tongue, was an inspiration as he spoke about the values or lack thereof of the motion in question. However, I think it is time to discover whether there are any current Senators who are truly willing and able to engage in such physically and mentally grueling exercise in support of their political opinion.

During the last Congressional session, all the Republicans had to do was to threaten filibuster and Speaker Pelosi would not even allow a vote in the House because the Senate could not muster the required sixty-vote majority for cloture. She would announce that, "We just don't have the votes in the Senate", roll over like a spanked puppy, and pee on the floor!

It's time to call their bluff. We all know that Republicans are bullies and will use any minor advantage they can find in order to advance their own agenda or to stymie that of their opponents. If they want to filibuster, let them! When their champion tires and falls over, they can then resume business as usual and vote on the measure in question. It is long and tiring but it is still possible and "possible" is what America needs at this time. The voters are tired of their very lifeblood being drained by the machinations of bullies and we should allow no more of it.

If the current occupants of the chairs in the Senate have not the courage and determination to stand up for us, then perhaps those chairs should be occupied by people with more of what we Americans call "guts". President Obama has been charged with performing nothing less than a series of miracles in order to restore democracy but he cannot do it alone. The Congress is going to have to reach deep down and discover the strength and the courage that is necessary to accomplish any of them. If they do not, the United States is doomed to become just another historic legend along with Athens and Rome.

The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".

more from Redneck City

I'm tellin' ya. Livin' here's a trip.

Hendry Sheriff Sells Car To Georgia Town
Transferring Assets To Keep New Sheriff From Getting Them Says Story
Don Browne
Thursday, November 27, 2008
http://swflorida.blogspot.com:80/2008/11/hendry-sheriff-sells-car-to-georgia.html

LABELLE, FL. -- A news story in the Cordele Dispatch in Georgia says Hendry County Sheriff Ronnie Lee is selling his 2007 Dodge Charger police cruiser to a Vienna, Georgia Police Department to keep Sheriff-Elect Steve Whidden from getting it. The issue came to light according to the story when the Vienna Mayor questioned the purchase at a city council meeting Monday.

According to the story Vienna Police Chief Jamey Reed bought the vehicle without notifying the Mayor. According to the story "Reed said a sheriff in Hendry County, Fla. had lost his bid for re-election and had a black 2007 Dodge Charger he did not want the new sheriff to get."

The Vienna Mayor was disappointed that he wasn't notified of the deal made by the Vienna Police Chief.

"Reed said the total price for the Charger was $18,950. He informed council that he had a quote, also from Brannen, on a new Crown Victoria like the ones currently in use by the department. The quote for the Crown Victoria was $28,285. The purchase of the Charger saves taxpayers almost $10,000 and payment for the vehicle is not due until January 2009 when it was originally approved for, Reed said."

The cruiser is already fully equipped with lights, siren, and radio and had been traded to Brannen Motor Company in Unadilla, according to the story. Although it is unknown from where the Dodge Charger police vehicle was purchased originally, Sheriff Lee's son Ronnie Jr. worked for a local LaBelle Dodge dealer. Nearly all of the other Hendry Sheriff's department vehicles are Fords.

more at: http://www.cordeledispatch.com/archivesearch/local_story_330203043.html

Through A Hole In The Air...

By Sheila Samples
11/28/08

Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State!
Sail on, O Union, strong and great!
Humanity with all its fears,
With all the hopes of future years,
Is hanging breathless on thy fate!
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The recent blowout election that gave us President Barack Obama resulted in a flood of emotion that engulfed both parties. The one thing they had in common was that neither party could believe it. Political comedian Mort Sahl once said, "Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve everything they've stolen." If we have learned nothing else about Republicans, it's that, with few exceptions, they are vindictive, immoral, blood-thirsty, and just plain power-mad. Republicans are so much better at destroying things than Democrats are. They say and do whatever it takes to win. And if that doesn't work -- they seize it anyway.

So we were braced for another disappointment -- not because we didn't share Obama's vision of change and his hope for a better life for all Americans, but because voting machines were frantically flip-flopping votes from Obama to John McCain, minority voters were purged, telephones jangling with robocalls smeared Obama as an alien terrorist -- and John King over at CNN kept ramming solid red "magic" maps in our faces as proof that McCain could not lose.

So, what happened?

We woke up. After snoozing through massive homicide, refusing to confront genocide, ignoring fratracide and the hopelessness that has driven an alarming number of our military to commit suicide...we woke up. We stood united against a national addiction to chaos, bloodshed and corruption. We voted for a leader who promised to break that addiction, and to heal this nation in the name of the people. By election night, we were giddy with relief. We clambered aboard that ship of state and rode the wave of long-lost hope -- free at last. Obama's win ripped a hole in the political air, and millions of us stood weeping as the blissful sound of Democracy wafted through every nook and cranny to swirl around this magnificent moment in our history.

But that was election night. Republicans, terrified of change, were in shock -- in total disarray. But the next morning, they were out in force -- maggots streaming from rotten turds whose blossoms had been stomped on. The Heritage Foundation warned against the danger of the Left's "radical agenda" of health care, education and energy. House majority leader John Boehner was either drunk or stupidly arrogant, or both, when he maintained that Obama may have won, but his "far-left agenda" was out of step with the majority of Americans. Boehner did concede, however, that House Republicans might work with Obama "when it is in the best interest of our nation," and only when it promoted "superior Republican alternatives..."

Boehner's predecessor, Dick Armey, was quick to point out that Obama didn't win -- Republicans lost. And they lost because they were just too damned compassionate. Armey is chairman of FreedomWorks, which advocates scrapping the Federal Income Tax, kicking older folks out of Social Security to keep from overburdening the young, and of course freedom -- such as that of network carriers to manage and control Internet content. According to Armey, Republicans have simply forgotten their principles.

Richard Haass, Council on Foreign Relations president, hissed, "The one thing I'm sure of is, events will test him. ...There will be coups. ...There will be genocide. ... There will be terrorism." Gee, Bush hasn't completed his sprint to the finish line yet, and those like Haass are already waxing nostalgic for the Bush Doctrine.

Georgia Congressman Paul Broun called Obama a "Marxist" who was determined to set up a jack-booted Gestapo civilian security force to use against citizens -- an ominious tactic taken right out of Hitler's playbook. In the ensuing flap, Broun refused to apologize, or to acknowledge that the "civilian national security force" proposed by Obama is, in reality, a two-year-old pilot program -- The Civilian Response Corps of the United States of America trained and equipped to "deploy rapidly to countries in crisis or emerging from conflict, in order to provide reconstruction and stabilization assistance." The State Department has already deployed members to Sudan, Chad, Haiti, Lebanon, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Intolerance, hate -- racism -- runs deep within the heart of this country. It's easy not to be racist, to support civil rights, equality -- but when confronted by a change so abrupt, so momentous as the election of an African-American president, many white Americans have problems calming their inner beast. William Ferris, senior associate director of the Center for the Study of the American South at the University of North Carolina, said when discussing the hundreds of threats against Obama since Nov. 4, that the election of a black president is "the most profound change in the field of race this country has experienced since the Civil War. Racism is like cancer," Ferris said, "It's never totally wiped out, it's in remission."

Remission? Perhaps, except for those like the feral, all-knowing, all-caring, all-sensing, all-feeling, all-concerned -- pretty much all-everything -- "Maha Rushie" Limbaugh, who has been in shrieking racist meltdown since the day Obama announced his candidacy. Referring to Barack Hussein Obama early and often, Limbaugh stoked racist fear by warning millions of Dittodeadheads they were being taken over by a "half-minority." In April 2007, he aired an insulting Paul Shanklin parody, "Barack The Magic Negro," and went from that to trying to whip up murderous riots at the Democratic National Convention.

Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and their gang of slimy supremacist clones inflame the fires of fear and hate on a daily -- hourly -- basis. They know exactly what they're doing. "The economic mess Bush has gotten us into is all Obama's fault! The Obama recession is in full swing! We will soon be in the throes of an Obama depression! Obama's going to raise our taxes! Obama's coming after our 401k retirement checks! Millions more will lose their jobs! Quick -- burn a cross -- hang a noose in your tree before it's too late!"

And Michael Savage warns that Blacks don't want just a foot in the door; they are poised to take over the entire nation. On his Nov. 18 broadcast, Savage said, "I am telling you that there's gonna be a wholesale firing of competent white men in the United States government up and down the line, in police departments, in fire departments. Everywhere in America, you're going to see an exchange that you've never seen in history..."

If that's not enough to send us screaming into the night, our knees hitting our chins, Lisa Miller, former front-page religious writer for the Wall Street Journal, now Newsweek's Society/Religion editor, asks, in a shameful, code-word-laden piece -- "Is Obama the Antichrist?" Miller quotes several right-wing evangelicals, and she says conservative Christians believe a great battle is imminent. "After years of tribulation -- natural disasters, other cataclysms (such as the collapse of financial markets) -- God's armies will vanquish armies led by the Antichrist himself. He will be a sweet-talking world leader who gathers governments and economies under his command to further his own evil agenda." Miller says, given Obama's liberal positions on abortion and traditional marriage, it's no wonder that "Obama triggers such fear in the hearts of America's millennialist Christians." And, if we want proof -- one of the winning lottery numbers in Obama's home state of Illinois was 666 -- which Miller says everyone knows is the sign of the Beast, or the Antichrist.

The fascist lies and smears of Republicans and their doppleganger radio creeps should come as no surprise to those paying attention. However, the ripples of uneasiness and fear surging through Democratic ranks as a result of these assaults is a bit puzzling. Perhaps it's because after eight years of covering -- and uncovering -- deceit, lies, and monstrous war crimes perpetrated by George Bush, they are hesitant to trust another president regardless of his party affiliation. Or, perhaps they're afraid to have hope because they believe George Orwell's flat, no-wiggle-room assertion that -- "All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia."

Whatever the reason, each day brings a new rash of criticism about Obama's choices for his transition team, his economic team, his foreign policy team. His selection of Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff, probable selection of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, and his decision to keep Robert Gates as Defense Secretary for at least a year resulted in cries of betrayal throughout the left-wing blogosphere. For two Democrats to agree on any one thing would indeed be change. Everybody has his/her own views as to who should make up the cabinet. And, since I'm the most liberal Democrat I know, it seems obvious that Obama should have put the environment into the hands of the award-winning former vice president Al Gore, justice into the hands of Constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley, and Defense into the hands of former Supreme Allied Commander General Wesley Clark.

Those on the left who complain that Obama is "loading up his administration with Clintonites" should pause and take a deep breath. Anybody old enough to serve -- who has the experience to serve -- would necessarily come from either the Clinton or the Bush era. Which would you prefer? We should remember it is Obama's policies, not theirs, that will be put into effect. Obama promised change -- to be honest and up-front with all the people. He is keeping that promise.

Last week, in three days Obama held three press conferences wherein he outlined policies that reach far beyond the immediate crisis, such as his plan to boost the economy by creating 2.5 million jobs. "We’ll put people back to work rebuilding our crumbling roads and bridges, modernizing schools that are failing our children," he said, "and building wind farms and solar panels; fuel-efficient cars and the alternative energy technologies that can free us from our dependence on foreign oil and keep our economy competitive in the years ahead."

Millions of us who voted for Obama are weary of fighting our way through the tangles of an Orwellian world. We yearn to live in a Wellstonian world, one where "...politics is not about observations or predictions. Politics is what we create by what we do, what we hope for, and what we dare to imagine."

Obama is not perfect. The problems Bush is only too happy to dump on him are almost insurmountable and getting worse by the day. Obama will make mistakes, but he has promised that, with our help, the hopes of all Americans can be realized. Together -- we can change the direction of the country.

We will not jump ship. Come hate or high water -- we can do it.

Yes. We. Can.

Sheila Samples http://sheilastuff.blogspot.com/ is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites. Contact her at rsamples@wichitaonline.net

Veterans Day

SockMonkey concedes.

Well, Johnny, (I can call you Johnny, right?) Anyway, don’t feel too bad. I got danced on Election Day too. You and Sarah (I can call you Sarah, right?) should do what me and Lumpy did.

We looked at each other at 3am, and said, “Well, that’s it. Let’s go get a banana”

And we did. Then we fell asleep on the pillow. And when we woke up, it was another day.

We’d like to congratulate President-elect Barack Obama on his historic victory, and remind him that we will always be available to help. We’d also like to congratulate the American people for their obvious wisdom and courage.

Oh yeah. We concede.

SockMonkey and Lumpy
http://tmars.iwarp.com/sockmonkey08/index.html

paid for by money we found in the sofa cushions

November 5, 2008

:-)

and, as they say, the rest is history

Worm's-Eye View of the Debate

by Mary Pitt

The most memorable points made in the McCain/Obama debate, from my lowly viewpoint, was the plight of poor old Joe, the Plumber The story was that Joe has worked for a plumbing company for twelve years, 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Now he wants to buy the company and "give jobs" to other men. He is worried that, should he do well and earn over a quarter of a mil a year, he may have to pay a higher rate of taxes then he would now.

Having some experience in running a small business and having employed up to seven people at any given time, the efforts of both my husband and me never came close to turning that much profit in a year. For that matter, we never, by each holding separate jobs at the same time, our individual wages never matched the figure that Joe has been earning for the past twelve years. Let's do some math:

If Joe has truly worked twelve hours a day for seven days a week, if he was earning union wages, let's say conservatively, $25.00 per hour. Forty hours a week at that rate would garner a gross of $1,000 per week. The additional 44 hours per week would be paid at the overtime rate of $37.50 per hour for an additional $1,650, bringing the total to $2650 per week. Let's say the poor man became so exhausted with that pace that he took a liberal vacation, say four weeks a year, leaving him with 48 weeks per year for an annual gross of $127,200. Not bad, even after deductions for taxes and contributions to the medical plan, (the bulk of which would have been paid by the employer), and, oh yes, let's not forget the onerous Social Security contributions that would have ceased at about the $95,000 mark. Those of us at the bottom of the scale would tend to agree with Senator McCain when he said, "Congratulations, Joe, you're rich!"

But Joe is an ambitious man and he wants to buy the business and give jobs to people. I would suggest that he first consult with a good accountant who can explain to him the business facts of life. He will learn that all the wages he pays will be deductible, including any health insurance he provides for his employees as a perk of the job. Of course, he will be required to pay the Employer's tax for Social Security and other taxes and licenses but those are a part of the cost of doing business and are also deductible.. (Should he opt to forego employee health insurance, those same employees are not allowed to deduct the cost of the plan they will have to carry privately.)

At the end of the year, after the aforesaid accountant closes the books, making all adjustments to the books to be sure Joe gets all the deductions for depreciation on plant and equipment, as well as the rolling stock and finds all the loopholes that are legally allowed, the resultant figure will be the one on which Joe will pay income tax, under the Obama plan and assuming that he clears the magic figure of $250,000 a year, at about the same rate he is paying now on the lesser present-day income. It may compute to a slightly large amount than he is paying today but he would have double the income and could well afford to pay it.

Of course, all this is contingent upon his knowing more about the business than simply how to do the work he is performing now. Many a hard-working, ambitious man in the home service business has done well, decided to own his own business and failed miserably within the first seven years. Let's hope that Joe is not one of them.

But from the worm's-eye view of a worn-out old lady, Joe's attitude simply does not make sense. First, it appears to be stupid to deliberately earn less money because a higher income would result in more income taxes. You see, I am from the generation that learned early in life that being honest and paying taxes is the price for the privilege of living in a nation that allows one the freedom to gain wealth and to better the living standard for one's family. It is a matter of the ultimate expression of patriotism that one does one's duty to one's country whether that duty be serving in the military or simply paying the necessary taxes to sustain a free and democratic government. (Republicans are very big on patriotism these days but it does not extend to taxes.)

If Warren Buffet sees fit to complain that his tax rate is too low for all the privileges that he has enjoyed and the prosperity that he has had the opportunity to earn, surely old Joe the Plumber would be able to do the same. We can only hope that he will then be prepared to pay the proper homage to the nation that provided him with the chance to become truly wealthy and that his mindset can mature to the point that he will do it proudly.

The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".

reading comprehension

Let’s take a look at this two clips, shall we? And then we’ll have a quiz.

Congressman asks Justice Dept. about Qwest wiretap charges
By John Godfrey
Last update: 6:45 p.m. EDT Oct. 15, 2007
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/congressman-asks-justice-dept-about/story.aspx?guid=%7BE944A27D-75C3-4D12-8CA4-2C22302AB947%7D

[…]
Once-classified documents that were unveiled in the insider-trading case of Nacchio also suggest the U.S. government didn't offer lucrative contracts to the company after Nacchio refused to cooperate with what the documents call "improper government requests" in February 2001.

The documents, submitted as part of Nacchio's defense in the insider-trading case, don't elaborate on the government requests. Nacchio has said in the past he didn't comply when asked by the National Security Agency, which heads up U.S. electronic surveillance, for access to the private phone records of Qwest customers.

[…]
Speaking from the White House lawn Oct. 10, Bush said Congress must grant liability protection to telephone companies being sued "only because they are believed to have assisted in the efforts to defend our nation following the 9/11 attacks."
[…]


Republicans wire Xcel Center for political convention
September 2, 2008 7:00 AM PDT
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-10029750-38.html

[…]
Qwest Communications, the official communications provider, has laid the groundwork for wireline voice and data services in the Xcel Center. The aggregate data capacity of Qwest's network is about 50 billion bits per second--fast enough to transmit an entire HD movie in just a few seconds.

Though the eight-year-old Xcel Center is modern, as Everett said, Qwest overlaid 100 percent of the wiring in the building. Trent Clausen, Qwest's director of network operations for the RNC, said that the building's age made the transition to Qwest's network "pretty seamless."
[…]


So. Qwest Communications refused to turn over customer records to the bush administration. And bush has said how imperative it is for telecommunication companies to assist “in the efforts to defend our nation”. So, obviously, by implication, Qwest was against the US, because as the bush has said “You’re either with us, or you are against us” That’s pretty plain speaking there.

So then, even though Qwest is totally unrepentent over its attempt to undermine our American values, the republican party hires them to set up the network for their convention. Giving money to those who would undermine our values because they obviously “hate our freedoms.”

And now the quiz.

Doesn’t this mean that mccain and palin are not only “palling around with, not some “old used up terrorist”, but an active terrorist organization, but also funneling money to them so that it can continue its nefarious activities?

The God That Failed

The 30-Year Lie of the Market Cult
Written by Chris Floyd
http://www.chris-floyd.com/component/content/article/3/1627-the-god-that-failed-the-30-year-lie-of-the-market-cult.html

Perhaps the most striking fact revealed by the global financial crash -- or rather, by the reaction to it -- is the staggering, astonishing, gargantuan amount of money that the governments of the world have at their command.

In just a matter of days, we have seen literally trillions of dollars offered to the financial services sector by national treasuries and central banks across the globe. Britain alone has put $1 trillion at the disposal of the bankers, traders, lenders and speculators; and this has been surpassed by the total package of public money that Washington is shoveling into the financial furnaces of Wall Street and the banks. These radical efforts are being replicated on a slightly smaller scale in France, Germany, Italy, Russia and many other countries.

The effectiveness of this unprecedented transfer of wealth from ordinary citizens to the top tiers of the business world remains to be seen. It will certainly insulate the very rich from the consequences of their own greed and folly and fraud; but it is not at all clear how much these measures will shield the vast majority of people from the catastrophe that has been visited upon them by the elite.

But putting aside for a moment the actual intent, details and results of the global bailout offers, it is their very extent that shocks, and shows -- in a stark, harsh, all-revealing light -- the brutal disdain with which the national governments of the world's "leading democracies" have treated their own citizens for decades.

Beginning with Margaret Thatcher's election in 1979, government after government -- and party after party -- fell to the onslaught of an extremist faith: the narrow, blinkered fundamentalism of the "Chicago School." Epitomized by its patron saint, Milton Friedman, the rigid doctrine held that an unregulated market would always "correct" itself, because its workings are based on entirely rational and quantifiable principles. This was of course an absurdly reductive and savagely ignorant view of history, money and human nature; but because it flattered the rich and powerful, offering an "intellectual" justification for rapacious greed and ever-widening economic and social inequality, it was adopted as holy writ by the elite and promulgated as public policy.

This radical cult -- a kind of Bolshevism from above -- took its strongest hold in the United States and Britain, and was then imposed on many weaker nations through the IMF-led "Washington Consensus" (more aptly named by Naomi Klein as the "Shock Doctrine"), with devastating and deadly results. (As in Yeltsin's Russia, for example, where life expectancy dropped precipitously and millions of people died premature deaths from poverty, illness, and despair.)

According to the cult, not only were markets to be freed from the constraints placed on them after the world-shattering effects of the Great Depression, but all public spending was to be slashed ruthlessly to the bone. (Although exceptions were always made for the Pentagon war machine.) After all, every dollar spent by a public entity on public services and amenities was a dollar taken away from the private wheeler-dealers who could more usefully employ it in increasing the wealth of the elite -- who would then allow some of their vast profits to "trickle down" to the lower orders.

This was the cult that captured the governments of the United States and Britain (among others), as well as the Republican and Democratic parties, and the Conservative and Labour parties as well. And for almost thirty years, its ruthless doctrines have been put into practice. Regulation and oversight of financial markets were systematically stripped away or rendered toothless. Essential public services were sold off, for chump change, to corporate interests. Public spending on anything other than making war, threatening war and profiting from war was pared back or eliminated. Such public spending that did remain was forever under threat and derided, like the remnants of some pagan faith surviving in isolated backwaters.

Year after year, the ordinary citizens were told by their governments: we have no money to spend on your needs, on your communities, on your infrastructure, on your health, on your children, on your environment, on your quality of life. We can't do those kinds of things any more.

Of course, when talking amongst themselves, or with the believers in the think tanks, boardrooms -- and editorial offices -- the cultists would speak more plainly: we don't do those things anymore because we shouldn't do them, we don't want to do them, they are wrong, they are evil, they are outside the faith. But for the hoi polloi, the line was usually something like this: Budgets are tight, we must balance them (for a "balanced budget" is a core doctrine of the cult), we just can't afford all these luxuries, sorry about that.

But now, as the emptiness and falsity of the Chicago cargo cult stands nakedly revealed, even to some of its most faithful and fanatical adherents, we can see that this 30-year mantra by our governments has been a deliberate and outright lie. The money was there -- billions and billions and billions of dollars of it, trillions of dollars of it. We can see it before our very eyes today -- being whisked away from our public treasuries and showered upon the banks and the brokerages.

Let's say it again: The money was there all along.

Money to build and generously equip thousands and thousands of new schools, with well-paid, exquisitely trained teachers, small teacher-pupil ratios, a full range of enriching and inspiring programs.

Money to revitalize the nation's crumbling inner cities, making them safe and vibrant places for businesses and families and communities to grow.

Money to provide decent, affordable and accessible health care to every citizen, to provide dignity and comfort to the elderly, and protection and humane treatment for the mentally ill.

Money to provide affordable higher education to everyone who wanted it and could qualify for it. Money to help establish and sustain local businesses and family farms, centered in and on the local community, driven by the needs and knowledge of the people in the area, and not by the dictates of distant corporations.

Money to strengthen crumbling infrastructure, to repair bridges, shore up levies, maintain roads and electric grids and sewage systems.

Money for affordable, workable public transport systems, for the pursuit of alternative sources of energy, for sustainable, sensible development, for environmental restoration.

Money to support free inquiry in science, technology, health and other areas -- research unfettered from the war machine and the drive for corporate profit, and instead devoted to the betterment of human life.

Money to support culture, learning, continuing education, libraries, theater, music and the endless manifestations of the human quest to gain more meaning, more understanding, more enlightenment, a deeper, spiritually richer life.

The money for all of this -- and much, much more -- was there, all along. When they said we couldn't have these things, they were lying -- or else allowing themselves to be profitably duped by the high priests of the market cult. When they wanted a trillion dollars -- or three trillion dollars -- to wage a war of aggression in Iraq, they found it. Now, when they want trillions of dollars to save the speculators, fraudsters and profiteers of greed in the global market, they suddenly have it.

Who then can believe that these governments could not have found the money for good schools, health care, and all the rest, that they could not have enhanced the well-being and livelihood of millions of ordinary citizens, and helped create a more just and equitable and stable world -- if they had wanted to?

This is one of the main facts that ordinary citizens around the world should take away from this crisis: the money to maintain, secure and improve the lives of their families and communities was always there -- but their governments, and their political parties, made a deliberate, unforced choice not to use it for the common good. Instead, they subjugated the well-being of the world to the dictates of an extremist cult. A cult of greed and privilege, that preached iron discipline to the poor and the middle-class, but released the rich and powerful from all restrictions, and all responsibility for their actions.

This should be a constant -- and galvanizing -- thought in the minds of the public in the months and years to come. Remember what you could have had, and how it was denied you by the lies and delusions of a powerful elite and their bought-off factotums in government. Remember the trillions of dollars that suddenly appeared when the wheeler-dealers needed money to cover their own greed and stupidity.

Let these thoughts guide you as you weigh the promises and actions of politicians and candidates, and as you assess the "expert analysis" on economic and domestic policy offered by the corporate media and the corporate-bankrolled think tanks and academics.

And above all, let these thoughts be foremost in your mind when you hear -- as you certainly will hear, when (and if) the markets are finally stabilized (at whatever gigantic cost in human suffering) -- the adherents of the market cult emerge once more and call for "deregulation" and "untying the hands of business" and all the other ritual incantations of their false and savage fundamentalist faith.

For although the market cult has suffered a cataclysmic defeat in the last few weeks, it is by no means dead. It has 30 years of entrenchment in power to fall back on. And the leader of every major political party in the West has spent their entire political career within the cult's confines. It has been the atmosphere they breathed, it has been the sole ladder by which they have climbed to prominence. They will be loath to abandon it, once the immediate crisis is past; most will not be able to.

So remember well the lessons of this new October crash: The money to make a better life, to serve the common good, has always been there. But it has been kept from you by deceit, by dogma, by greed, and by the ambition of those who have sold their souls, and betrayed their brothers and sisters, their fellow human creatures, for the sake of privilege and power.

View of the Debate From the Great Flyover

by Mary Pitt
10/08/08

I was watching the candidates as they deplaned for the debate. First, Obama skipped down the steps alone and galloped over to shake the hands of the flight crew. When the McCains arrived, Cindy walked down the steps first. Only the polite thing to do but something looked different. She walked slowly with her back against him and her hands braced on the rails as if to prevent his pitching forward. Once on the ground, she fell back to walk behind him but she walked very closely with her hand behind his back as if to steady him These little "tells" may not be noticeable to just everyone but, since I so recently was responsible for an elderly, unsteady man, it appeared obvious to me that this campaign has taken a toll on John's strength and they are being very careful to hide that fact from the public. I think you can sometimes tell more about a man's physical health by the solicitude or lack thereof on the part of his wife and the actions of Cindy McCain, millionairess or not, tells me that he is not well.

During the entire debate, the whole performance of McCain was a bit off and off-putting. He behaved like nothing but a churlish old man, insisting that his way is the only way and you young whipper-snappers had better accept his wisdom, based on his vast experiences from fifty years ago. He has been there and he knows what he is doing, whether you like it or not! Strutting around on-stage, flapping his arms like an aquarium seal and giving a performance that brought to mind a frenetic wind-up Mini-Me on meth. From his "new idea" of buying the risky loans from the financial companies and re-writing them so that owners can afford their mortgage payments. (haven't we heard that somewhere before?) to having a "secret plan" to defeat Al Qaida but he's not gonna tell us, we oldsters could only hearken back to Richard Nixon's "secret plan" to end the Vietnam War. (By the way, that really worked, didn't it?)

When we add to this his assessment of the reasons for the growth of terrorism coming out of Afghanistan, he was simply from outer space, He said that, after the Afghan Freedom Fighters had defeated Russian forces and forced them out of the country, we abandoned that nation and they did resent that. In fact he was almost half right. He neglected to recognize that, for all those grueling years, the Taliban were the Freedom Fighters who kicked Russia from their country but he is right that they resented our abandonment of their country. At the time, our concern was not the nation of Afghanistan but their strategic physical position relative to our struggle against Russia. We trained and helped to fund the Al Qaida troops from Saudi Arabia and sent them in to help the Afghan forces. When they succeeded in the tasks to which we had assigned them, they were discarded like used Kleenex. I wonder why they hate us with such intensity............

On the other hand, the attitude of Obama was all but dismissive. He would lounge atop his stool and smile indulgently as McCain spouted his almost-inane opinions and grandiose proposals, an act of which we all have been guilty when a beloved, belligerent old uncle invokes the Good Ole Days when he was in his prime, the while boring the socks of the youngsters in the room whose reluctant brains are unable to comprehend the society in which the old man insists on living. This assessment may not be so far off the mark, however. Just when I had almost convinced myself that the signs that I had seen of possible physical debilitation or fatigue had possibly led me to an erroneous assumption, the debate ended. Barack and Michelle Obama waded into the audience, shaking hands and posing for candid photos as if that were what they really came to do and the debate was only a delay in the beginning of the festivities.

Cindy McCain collected her husband from the stage and they quietly left the building. How sad that nobody seemed to miss them. It reminded me in a painful way of the quote by General MacArthur, "old soldiers never die, they just fade away." I mourn the fading into irrelevance of all the old soldiers, sailors, and other heroes of my day and the loss of their influence on our lives, political, social, and personal, and especially the little old ladies sitting in the corner and smiling at the antics of the youngsters as they fumble, fail, and eventually find their own new ways of life. If only the old men could develop such an attitude........

The author is a very "with-it" old lady who aspires to bring a bit of truth, justice, and common sense to a nation that has lost touch with its humanity in the search for "societal perfection".

issues and slime

Sure, Barack Obama knows somebody who was a radical 40 years ago when Obama was 8. We all do, even you, john. But, you, john, were a traitor during that time. Remember those anti-American propaganda movies you made for the Vietnamese while you were a POW? Hey, don’t give me any crap about being tortured. There were a whole lot more of your fellow POW’s who stayed true to their country, while undergoing far worse torture than you did.

and, sarah, how’s about we talk about the traitor you sleep with, and allegedly had children by? You know about the Alaska Independent Party’s hatred of America, and it’s desire to secede. You should, you and your husband are involved with it.

Well, listen.
The DOW is down 24% since Jan 1.
270 more US military were killed in Iraq since Jan 1.
2.2 million more American workers have lost their jobs since Jan 1.
Factories are closing, people are losing their homes, their savings, their health insurance.
Our country’s infrastructure is falling apart, and so are our schools.

We don’t have time for any more of your bullshit.

well, as long as palin wants to bring it up...

Palin hits Obama for 'terrorist' connection
10/4/08
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/04/palin.obama/index.html

ENGLEWOOD, Colorado (CNN) -- Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin on Saturday slammed Sen. Barack Obama's political relationship with a former anti-war radical, accusing him of associating "with terrorists who targeted their own country."

Palin's attack delivered on the McCain campaign's announcement that it would step up attacks on the Democratic presidential candidate with just a month left before the November general election.

"We see America as the greatest force for good in this world," Palin said at a fund-raising event in Colorado, adding, "Our opponent though, is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he's palling around with terrorists who would target their own country."

Palin made similar comments later at a rally in Carson, California.
[...]


With friends like these ...
McCain finds his own radical friend
Steve Chapman
May 4, 2008
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-oped0504chapmanmay04,0,6061828.column

Can a presidential candidate justify a long and friendly relationship with someone who, back in the 1970s, extolled violence and committed crimes in the name of a radical ideology -- and who has never shown remorse or admitted error? When the candidate in question is Barack Obama, John McCain says no. But when the candidate in question is John McCain, he's not so sure.

Obama has been justly criticized for his ties to former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers, who in 1995 hosted a campaign event for Obama and in 2001 gave him a $200 contribution. The two have also served together on the board of a foundation. When their connection became known, McCain minced no words: "I think not only a repudiation but an apology for ever having anything to do with an unrepentant terrorist is due the American people."What McCain didn't mention is that he has his own Bill Ayers -- in the form of G. Gordon Liddy. Now a conservative radio talk-show host, Liddy spent more than 4 years in prison for his role in the 1972 Watergate burglary. That was just one element of what Liddy did, and proposed to do, in a secret White House effort to subvert the Constitution. Far from repudiating him, McCain has embraced him.

How close are McCain and Liddy? At least as close as Obama and Ayers appear to be. In 1998, Liddy's home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Over the years, he has made at least four contributions totaling $5,000 to the senator's campaigns -- including $1,000 this year.

Last November, McCain went on his radio show. Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain sounded like one. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family," he gushed. "It's always a pleasure for me to come on your program, Gordon, and congratulations on your continued success and adherence to the principles and philosophies that keep our nation great."

Which principles would those be? The ones that told Liddy it was fine to break into the office of the Democratic National Committee to plant bugs and photograph documents? The ones that made him propose to kidnap anti-war activists so they couldn't disrupt the 1972 Republican National Convention? The ones that inspired him to plan the murder (never carried out) of an unfriendly newspaper columnist?

Liddy was in the thick of the biggest political scandal in American history -- and one of the greatest threats to the rule of law. He has said he has no regrets about what he did, insisting that he went to jail as "a prisoner of war."

All this may sound like ancient history. But it's from the same era as the bombings Ayers helped carry out as a member of the Weather Underground. And Liddy's penchant for extreme solutions has not abated.

In 1994, after the disastrous federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, he gave some advice to his listeners: "Now if the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms comes to disarm you and they are bearing arms, resist them with arms. Go for a head shot; they're going to be wearing bulletproof vests. ... Kill the sons of bitches."

He later backed off, saying he meant merely that people should defend themselves if federal agents came with guns blazing. But his amended guidance was not exactly conciliatory: Liddy also said he should have recommended shots to the groin instead of the head. If that wasn't enough to inflame any nut cases, he mentioned labeling targets "Bill" and "Hillary" when he practiced shooting.

Given Liddy's record, it's hard to see why McCain would touch him with a 10-foot pole. On the contrary, he should be returning his donations and shunning his show. Yet the senator shows no qualms about associating with Liddy -- or celebrating his service to their common cause.

How does McCain explain his howling hypocrisy on the subject? He doesn't. I made repeated inquiries to his campaign aides, which they refused to acknowledge, much less answer. On this topic, the pilot of the Straight Talk Express would rather stay parked in the garage.

That's an odd policy for someone who is so forthright about his rival's responsibility. McCain thinks Obama should apologize for associating with a criminal extremist. To which Obama might reply: After you.

Where Is Justice?

by Mary Pitt
Friday, October 03, 2008 11:18 PM

As a small voice from the back of the room, I have one question regarding the discovery of the illiquidity of all the huge corporate conglomerates who have taken over the finances of this ostensibly democratic nation. When is somebody going to jail?

Now, I don't profess to truly understand the ins and outs of our financial system and I have absolutely no concept of anything over a million of anything. I think I am in good company as you would be safe in assuming that the majority of the American people are in the same boat as I. However, those of us with intact brain cells do remember the Enron fiasco when Congressional hearings were held which exposed the various forms of chicanery which had been perpetrated by the corporate moguls and their compliant accountants. It seems that they had engaged in what they termed "creative accounting" in order to induce pigeons, (pardon me, investors), to continue to trust them with trust funds and other forms of financial donations. We watched with a sense of irony as first one and then another of the perpetrators were marched off to the Federal Country Clubs. (But our money was still gone.)

Now we learn that the same sort of underhanded and blatantly dishonest business practices had brought down many of those companies who had been entrusted with the very lifeblood of our capitalist financial and political system. They had created false balance sheets which listed the packages of home, auto, small business, and miscellaneous loans which had been issued to patently and obviously poor credit risks at their face value rather than discounting them due to the likelihood that a large percentage of them would default. This created the false image of a company in robust health and highly eligible for the consideration by potential investors.

The only reason we have heard advanced as to the reasons for this perfidy have to do with the eligibility of the corporate officers to draw bonuses, raises, and parachutes with a higher carat of gold content. which only further drained the corporate coffers and caused the business foundation to shake still more. It was only when the whole house of cards was preparing to come down around the ears of the entire system was this condition uncovered by the oblivious souls who were in the position of guardians of the public good, who had been blithely watching the stock market go up and up.

We have been told that it is our fault for borrowing or buying things we could not afford. Shame on us that, if we were searching for a new home with a limited budget, that the fast-talking sales person told us that they had access to “creative financing” which would allow us to pay the interest only for the first two years to allow us time to get our feet under us before having to start paying on the principle. Or shame on us when we went shopping for a used car to replace the old one that had just gasped its last and the slick salesman said that, by the same method, we could afford to drive away in “this little baby right here”. And shame on us when our bank told us that Adjustable Rate Loan was the newest thing and had many advantages. Double-shame that we fell for the easy credit card approvals that appeared in our mail regularly. Well, now we have to pay for those mistakes, in spades!

Rather than to risk the collapse from spreading to the international market with the dollar sinking into oblivion, we were told that it would be necessary to obligate the American taxpayers for generations to come for buying out those worthless loans and putting right the condition of these companies. Now, I could be wrong and I readily admit to naiveté in these matters, but I felt it would have been as productive and more fair to the American people if the government were to take them into Federal receivership, terminate without severance pay all the people involved in the conspiracy to defraud, and set the firms on the right path before releasing them back to the control of the shareholders.

However, we must assume that Congress knows best and chose to take another path and the American people will have the opportunity to judge their actions in the upcoming election. While the Congresspersons are at home campaigning, perhaps we will be able to ask them to further account for their reasoning and explain their actions. There are many questions that the wage slaves and others who feel disconnected from the nuts and bolts of managing our futures would like answered if answers there be. Among them are:

Why, when we lose our jobs or have a medical catastrophe do we not receive any assistance from the government until our resources are so depleted that we qualify for welfare?

Why was it necessary to make the bankruptcy court so restrictive that relief was all but unavailable through that action?

And, oh, so many more questions why we, the people, are treated so much less generously than the multi-billion dollar corporations. If we make a simple mistake on our income taxes, the vaunted accountants from the Internal Revenue Service fall upon us like so many fire ants and we pay up or go to jail and they will follow us to the ends of the earth to collect every penny, costing us out job or profession and ruining our families forever after. Yet, those who are engaged in such corporate criminality are allowed to float away in their golden parachutes and dwell forever after on the Riviera.

Again, I can only ask, when is somebody going to jail for this?

hanky panky

Paulson's Reasons for Delaying Day of Reckoning
by Jonathan Weil
10/3/08
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_weil&sid=aMaWyNFImi4o

Oct. 2 (Bloomberg) -- If you think this bailout is expensive, just wait until you see the next one.

The $700 billion rescue plan approved by the U.S. Senate won't fix the core problem with the nation's ailing financial institutions. And it almost guarantees that you and I will have to pony up for an even costlier bailout someday, maybe soon, if the House of Representatives passes it tomorrow.

Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson has correctly identified the quandary: Lots of shaky banks and insurance companies are showing strangely high values for assets that aren't worth squat in the market. Many need more capital and can't raise it. And he's right in saying the outlook is grim if we don't get this fixed.

What's stunning is how little the taxpayers would get in return for their money under Paulson's package, and how illusory much of the banks' newly minted capital would be.

Under the plan, Treasury would buy some companies' troubled assets at above-market values. To boost their capital, Paulson would have to pay the companies more than what their balance sheets say the assets are worth. Then other companies would use the rigged prices to write up, or avoid writing down, the values of similar holdings on their own books.

So, the taxpayers get hosed on the asset purchases. Other banks use the trumped-up prices to cook their books. And investor confidence supposedly is restored.

That brings us to this question: Why would a smart guy like Hank Paulson -- the former boss of Goldman Sachs -- advance such a dumb, shady plan? Let us count the reasons:

No. 1: It delays our national reckoning until after the presidential election.

Paulson first floated a bailout Sept. 18, at the very hour when shares of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Morgan Stanley looked like they might go into a death spiral. It's not so much a bailout, as it is a timeout. He had to follow up with something, anything, to stop the freefall from resuming. It didn't have to make sense.

So it doesn't. The plan is about creating the illusion of stronger financial institutions, not strengthening them.

The banks know this. Otherwise, they would have stopped charging each other near-record rates for three-month loans by now. The reason they haven't is because they're still afraid their customers -- other banks -- might go broke.

No. 2: The reckoning will be worse than you can imagine.

If Paulson were serious about recapitalizing rickety U.S. banks, he would infuse them with hundreds of billions of dollars of fresh government money, in exchange for ownership stakes. And if he wanted to create market liquidity for all those troubled assets on their books, he would be ordering banks to disclose everything there is to know about them, so Mr. Market could figure out their present value.

He can't let that happen. Not now. If everyone could see how much the toxic waste is worth, the writedowns would be so huge that many banks would have to be declared insolvent.

Better to let the next administration deal with the clean- up. The trouble is, the longer the government waits to address the banks' lack of capital, the worse it gets, barring a miracle.

No. 3: He's helping his friends.

Is there any doubt? Let's see.

As of yesterday, Morgan Stanley Chief Executive John Mack owned 2.75 million shares of his company's stock, valued at about $67 million. If Mack can get Morgan Stanley to trade reams of sketchy paper for billions of dollars of our Treasury's cash, without diluting any of his stake in the company, who benefits?

Paulson would have us believe it's you.

No. 4: There's an excellent chance the Congress will pass it. Leave someone else to figure out the costs another day.

madman

the debate warm-up

The Peter Principle Playoffs

By Sheila Samples
9/26/08

We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men ~~ George Orwell

So here we sit, our heads jerking back and forth so rapidly most of us are suffering severe whiplash. Will the US attack Iran? Will Israel attack Iran? Or will the two war-mongering bullies join forces and "bomb, bomb, bomb" that belligerent twit-nation into subservience?

It's a great game. A deadly game. The momentum to attack Iran has been building for so long that we're conditioned to watching it like some grotesque international tennis competition. It's the Peter Principle Playoffs, with neoconsters and ziomonsters out on the court milling around, working at their highest "levels of incompetence," feverishly plotting Iran's destruction. Foul lines mean nothing to them. There are no rules, no officials, no scores, no accountability.

Bolton's Law

Immediately before Bush invaded Iraq, the criminally insane John Bolton, then Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security, made a personal trip to Israel to assure Prime Minister Ariel Sharon that as soon as we destroyed Iraq, we'd "deal with threats" from Syria, Iran and North Korea. However, it's obvious Iran has always been at the top of the list.

Since 2003, both US and Israeli governments, the corporate media, especially Fox News, and the US Congress have been unrelenting in their campaign to convince the world that Iran is an immediate nuclear threat, although Iran insists it is seeking nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. In August 2003, the UK Guardian's Simon Tisdall wrote, "They call it a trap. But we call it Bolton's first law of international power politics; keep the other guy guessing; wear him down. When he gives a little, demand a whole lot more. Then zap him anyway."

Bolton's Law: Make wild accusations. Escalate terror and confusion. Kill. Repeat.

It's no laughing matter, but the sight of this tousle-headed, "got milk?" maniac running in circles, warning of -- demanding -- a nuclear holocaust is good for a grin, albeit a grim one. Even as he was being forced onto the United Nations over national and international objections, Bolton was hot on Iran's trail. He insisted that Iran is the most dangerous critter out there -- harboring terrorists, arming terrorists, training terrorists -- sending bombs, IEDs, weapons to Iraq to kill Americans. If it weren't for Iran, there would have been no 9-11 attack because Iran provided safe haven for the box-cutting killers headed our way. Bolton warned if Iran managed to produce a single nuclear weapon, Israel, the United States -- the world -- was toast. He promised that Iran will come after us. "That's the threat," Bolton barked, "that's the reality whether you like it or not. And it will be just like Sept. 11, only with nuclear weapons this time."

Bolton keeps showing up for work even though his paycheck is now signed by the second most powerful Israeli Lobby, the American Enterprise Institute . He's determined that Iran is going down and, if he can't goad the US into action, he will whip Israel into a frenzy. Like the Batman's Joker, Bolton leaps from the pages of the Wall Street Journal in catastrophic convulsions on a regular basis. On July 15, Bolton insisted "we should be intensively considering what cooperation the U.S. will extend to Israel before, during and after a strike on Iran. We will be blamed for the strike anyway," Bolton reasoned, "...so there is compelling logic to make it as successful as possible. At a minimum, we should place no obstacles in Israel's path, and facilitate its efforts where we can."

Who's On First?

Bolton is surrounded by fellow psychopaths like Norman Podhoretz who insists our only choice is to bomb Iran before Iran gets the bomb and bombs us. Podhoretz is a key figure in the Playoffs with his constant drumbeat that Iran is the "leading sponsor of terrorism in the world," and once it achieves nuclear technology, we're all gonna die!

And National Review's Larry Kudlow, who swooned ecstatically when Israel cluster-bombed Lebanon two years ago. Israel was "doing the Lord's work," defending freedom against the "Iranian cat's-paw" of terrorism. Kudlow says Israel must not stop, but furiously attack "all the terrorist sanctuaries, training camps, weapons caches, and missile systems it can find." Scary Larry enthusiastically supports at least half of Bolton's Law -- the last half.

Others joining Bolton for whom the destruction of Iran is a political game include Bill Kristol, virtuous "bookie" Bill Bennett, Joe Lieberman, and Daniel Pipes, whose harsh and raucous predictions center around whether Bush will attack Iran before or after the upcoming election. If McCain wins, most say that Bush will pass the nuclear baton to him while sprinting to the finish line to pardon his fellow war criminals. However, if McCain should lose, they agree that Bush will get his war on and leave the mess for Obama to clean up.

Those who continue to beat the drums of war trust that we will believe what they say without considering the obvious. Just last week, to coincide with President Ahmadi-Nejad's visit to the UN, former UN ambassador Richard Holbrooke, former CIA director James Woolsey, former Clinton Middle East coordinator Dennis Ross, and former UN representative for management and reform Mark Wallace wrote an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal regurgitating rigid neoconservative talking points.

Channeling Cheney, they wrote that we shouldn't believe Iran when it says it "needs nuclear energy and is enriching nuclear materials for strictly peaceful purposes." Hey, Iran has "vast supplies of inexpensive oil and natural gas," so there's no "legitimate economic reason for Iran to pursue nuclear energy."

Then, unable to resist an unsubstantiated "Bushism" or two, these heavy hitters warned that "Iran is a deadly and irresponsible world actor," and should it get the bomb, Iran would "sponsor terror, threaten our allies, and support the most deadly elements of the Iraqi insurgency."

Finally, they whipped out Bolton's Law with the wild -- and discredited -- accusation that "President Ahmadinejad specifically calls for Israel to be 'wiped from the map,' while seeking the weapons to do so."

The constant discordant barrage of accusations and demands is so outrageous we attempt to shrug it off as mostly ideological clatter-babble, yet we sit paralyzed with fear. We are unable to recognize the real danger that looms just beyond the shadows.

But we know he's there. When Dick Cheney emerges, we are bewitched by the horror he evokes as he piles lie upon bloody lie about Iran's nuclear activities -- in spite of international findings and US intelligence lack of evidence. He accuses Iran of smuggling weapons of mass destruction into Iraq to kill Americans. Iran is training insurgents, is joined at the hip with Al-Qaeda, is the world's most dangerous sponsor of terrorism, and if it can get its hands on just one nuclear weapon, it will immediately lob it in Israel's direction.

In 2005, Cheney instructed the Pentagon to draw up a plan for a nuclear attack on Iran should another 9-11-type terrorist attack on the U.S. occur, even if Iran had nothing to do with it. To provoke a war, Cheney suggested dressing up Navy Seals as Iranians, putting them on fake Iranian speedboats, and shooting at them. Murdering Americans in cold blood, exterminating 60-70 million innocent Iranians and contaminating millions more throughout the region is a small price for Cheney to pay. Iran must face the consequences for having the audacity to possess two-thirds of the world's oil.

Bad, Bad Ahmadi-Nejad

Since being elected in June 2005 as Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad has rhetorically stepped in it and tracked it all over the Persian rug. Scarcely in office four months, he gave a speech in which he quoted the Ayatollah Khomeini who had said years earlier -- "This regime occupying Jerusalem (een rezhim-e ishghalgar-e qods) must [vanish from] from the page of time (bayad az safheh-ye ruzgar mahv shavad)." That comment was transcribed as Ahmadi-Nejad threatening to wipe Israel off the map, and despite repeated efforts to get the correct translation out, the world's media went into a shrieking frenzy that has yet to abate.

Ahmadi-Nejad has made numerous public and private diplomatic overtures to the United States in the last three years, and all have been rejected -- with insults, sneers, and threats. It is critical to the outcome of the Playoffs that spectators see Ahmadi-Nejad as a criminally insane killer who is a threat to the entire world. He is sort of cocky, and his arrogance at insisting that Iran has the same rights and privileges under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as the other members, that Iran has the right to pursue nuclear power for peaceful purposes, and that George Bush is not Iran's "Decider" is driving guys like Bolton over the edge.
Which -- when you think about it -- is not necessarily a bad thing...

So, who is this guy? Few know that Ahmadi-Nejad is an Engineer with a Ph.D on transportation engineering, a university professor, a working member on the Iran Civil Engineering Society, and the Islamic Association of Students in the Science and Technology University, as well as others. He is an accomplished journalist and former managing director of the Hamshahri newspaper. He was the mayor of Tehran before running for president. Even fewer know that, in reality, he wields no power other than that allotted to him by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader. He's deeply religious, stubborn and reckless. He's unpredictable and, at times, dangerous. Ohmigod -- when you think about it -- Ahmadi-Nejad is "Bush with Brains!"

Should We Fear Iran?

Iran's nuclear ambitions for other than peaceful purposes are as elusive as Iraq's WMD, which defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld said were "in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat." Yet we are in danger of being swept up in the propaganda catapulted by the Bush administration and the corporate media once again. Perhaps we should take a deep breath and apply a bit of logic here, pay close attention to the obvious. If Iran is truly a threat to the entire world, then we should be afraid. However, demanding that Iran either prove a negative or face extermination of millions of its citizens does not, and should not, pass the terror smell test.

It is obvious that, in this unstable era, we should be aware of, and even fear, those countries bristling with nukes. For starters, the United States has more nuclear weapons than any other nation. Then there's Russia, China, France, Britain, India, Pakistan, North Korea and...shhhhh...Israel. Currently, Pakistan is in turmoil and threatening to shoot down US planes that fly across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and kill civilians, Russia refuses to back off from its Georgia stance no matter how vigorously Condi Rice wags her finger in its face, China has abruptly cut off financial deals with the US because of the plummeting dollar, and North Korea is restarting its Yongbyon nuclear reactor because Bush broke his promise to remove it from Washington's list of state sponsors of terror.

Yet, amidst all this fury and instability, we are obsessed with destroying Iran -- a nation that, in modern history, has never attacked another country -- and which has repeatedly maintained it seeks nuclear power primarily for generating electricity for its growing population. In 2005, Ayatollah Khamenei issued a Fatwa that "the production, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons are forbidden under Islam and that Iran shall never acquire these weapons."

What is obvious to anyone familiar with the timeline of Iran's nuclear program from the 1950s is that Iran has never sought nuclear energy for anything other than peaceful purposes. In 1957, the Shah opened the American Atoms for Peace in Tehran, and signed an agreement with the US for cooperation in research on peaceful uses of nuclear technology. And, in 1968, Iran signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty on the first day it opened for signature. In the late 70's, the US supplied Iran with two nuclear power reactors and enriched uranium fuel, and granted Iran the "most favored nation" status so it would not be discriminated against when seeking permission to reprocess US-origin fuel.

To restate the obvious -- if we are to fear Iran, it is not because, as Bush said in June -- "They refuse to abandon their desires to develop the know-how which could lead to a nuclear weapon" -- it is because Iran threatens to defend itself if attacked. It is because other nations, such as Russia, refuse to stand idly by as Iran is "wiped off the map."

We need to get our minds around who is the aggressor here. Because if we continue to passively watch the evil unfold; if Dick Cheney wins the behind-the-scenes, off-court power struggle, the Peter Principle Playoffs will be over and the entire Middle East will explode in nuclear flames.

Sheila Samples http://sheilastuff.blogspot.com/ is an Oklahoma writer and a former civilian US Army Public Information Officer. She is a regular contributor for a variety of Internet sites. Contact her at rsamples@wichitaonline.net