Bush's speech deconstructed....

An excellent critical analysis of Bush's Sunday speech. A must read, by Stephen Zunes, associate professor of Politics and chair of the Peace & Justice Studies Program at the University of San Francisco.

A sample:

...“We have learned that terrorist attacks are not caused by the use of strength; they are invited by the perception of weakness.”

Again, there are no doubts among extremists in the Middle East regarding America’s military strength. The perceived weakness is in regard to America’s moral strength. Millions of people in the Middle East and beyond believe that it is morally wrong for the United States to support Arab dictatorships and Israeli occupation forces. They believe it is morally wrong that the amount of U.S. military aid to the Middle East is six times that of its economic aid. They believe it is morally wrong that the #1 U.S. export to the region is not consumer goods, high-tech equipment or agricultural products, but armaments. They believe it is morally wrong that a powerful country from the other side of the world would invade a sovereign Arab nation and justify it by falsely claiming that its government currently had weapons of mass destruction and was supporting Al-Qaeda. They believe it is morally wrong that U.S. bombing and sanctions against Muslim countries has killed far more civilians than have the terrorists themselves.

The unfortunate reality is that the more the United States has militarized the Middle East, the less secure we have become.

“And the surest way to avoid attacks on our own people is to engage the enemy where he lives and plans. We are fighting that enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan today so that we do not meet him again on our own streets, in our own cities.”

It is absurd to believe that those Iraqis and Afghanis currently fighting U.S. occupation forces in their own countries actually want to somehow sneak into the United States to fight Americans here. Indeed, no Afghans or Iraqis are known to have ever committed an act of terrorism against Americans on American soil.

The president’s statement is essentially a retread of the line used by supporters of the Vietnam War that “If we don’t fight them over there, we will have to fight them here.” However, more than 28 years after the Communist victory in Vietnam, we are yet to fight the Vietnamese in our streets and there is no indication that we ever will. The Iraqis and Afghans, as were the Vietnamese, are fighting Americans because U.S. troops are in their country and, like the Vietnamese, will stop fighting Americans once U.S. troops leave their country.

Complete story here via Common Dreams

Every pol for himself....

FRESNO — In a significant shift of campaign strategy, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante on Sunday moved away from urging a "no" vote in the Oct. 7 recall election, abandoning Gov. Gray Davis to fight alone and focusing instead on the merits of his own candidacy.

This really doesn't surprise me, I have such low expectations of all professional politicians.

Yet it does repel me.

Let's just hope his political aspirations don't fatally fracture the Democratic vote and put The Terminator in office.

Complete story here.

Bitter pill, indeed....

We feel angry about the money--and justifiably so! But we still have it better than the Iraqis.

I just wish the members of Congress would grow a collective spine and stand up to the petulant bully in the Whitehouse.

WASHINGTON -- Members of Congress are preparing to swallow hard and approve the $87 billion President Bush has requested for U.S. operations in Iraq, but it will be a more bitter pill than earlier votes to authorize the war against Saddam Hussein and to begin funding the enterprise, legislators and political analysts said today.

In the year since Congress authorized the war and the six months since it passed the first, $79 billion installment of funding, the political and fiscal picture has changed significantly in a way that will prompt greater scrutiny on Capitol Hill.

The federal budget deficit has soared. Few allies have offered to help with postwar troops or funding. U.S. casualties have mounted. No caches of unconventional weapons have been found. Even some members of Bush's own party have openly complained that the administration had inadequately planned for the rebuilding of Iraq after an unexpectedly rapid military victory over Saddam Hussein. [Emphasis mine.]

What irritates me about the tone of this article is the sense of surprise. Like no one could have seen these developments coming. When, in fact, the situation in Iraq is unfolding just as many anti-war activists predicted.

Complete story here.

By the way...

That $87 billion is in addition to the $79 billion already approved for the war and occupation through September 30. (See it ticking way on the counter to the left?)

What's that add up to...$166 billion? And with no end in sight.

Just remember, that's yours and my tax dollars.

Think about that as our bridges crumble, our roads decay, our lights go out, our public schools get dingier and dingier and the only job you can find is toting an M-16 in Iraq or flipping burgers for McDonald's.

Unbelievable...!

The Bush administration plans to ask Congress for $87 billion in emergency spending for military and intelligence operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that Iraq had now become ``the central front'' in the war against terror.

Mr. Bush's request for $87 billion was on the high end of what Congress expected. In recent days, administration officials have said they anticipated asking Congress for an additional $60 billion to $80 billion for the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. The financing, if approved by Congress, would significantly add to the federal government's deficit, which is approaching $500 billion. Mr. Bush said that $66 billion would be for the next fiscal year. White House officials said tonight they could not specify how the $87 billion would be spent.

[...]

In his 15-minute speech, Mr. Bush did not specifically mention the searches for Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden, who have so far eluded American capture. He also did not mention the failure so far to find any weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the major stated reason that the United States went to war. Nor did Mr. Bush dwell on the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians, which he once predicted would abate if Mr. Hussein was ousted from power.

$87 billion...!

Complete story here.

Organ donors needed...



and these bighearted folks are tossing their helmets into the lottery to volunteer.

The "barbeque" was to celebrate the fact that state legislators have done their part by repealing Pennsylvania’s helmet law.

…Thursday was the first day that Pennsylvania's more than 750,000 motorcyclists could ride bareheaded in 35 years. This summer, the Legislature voted to repeal the helmet requirement by comfortable margins, after more than two decades of unsuccessful attempts by motorcycle groups to repeal the helmet law.

Statistics show that fatalities will rise. Even minor accidents can result in serious injuries when a motorcyclist isn't wearing a helmet.

Per mile traveled, motorcyclists are 16 times more likely than passenger car occupants to die in a traffic crash and about four times as likely to be injured. While only 20 percent of car crashes result in injury or death, that figure jumps to an astounding 80 percent for motorcycle crashes, according to the administration.

Complete story here.

This is Bush's war....

Farah Fadhil was only 18 when she was killed. An American soldier threw a grenade through the window of her apartment. Her death, early last Monday, was slow and agonising. Her legs had been shredded, her hands burnt and punctured by splinters of metal, suggesting that the bright high-school student had covered her face to shield it from the explosion.

She had been walking to the window to try to calm an escalating situation; to use her smattering of English to plead with the soldiers who were spraying her apartment building with bullets.

But then a grenade was thrown and Farah died. So did Marwan Hassan who, according to neighbours, was caught in the crossfire as he went looking for his brother when the shooting began.

What is perhaps most shocking about their deaths is that the coalition troops who killed them did not even bother to record details of the raid with the coalition military press office.

[...]

I stood inside and looked to where the [American soldiers] must have been standing, towards the apartment houses the other way. I could not find impacts on the concrete paths or on the facing walls that would suggest that there was a two-way firefight here. Whatever happened here was one-sided, a wall of fire unleashed at a building packed with sleeping families. Further examination shows powder burns where door locks had been shot off and splintered wood where the doors had been kicked in. All the evidence was that this was a raid that - like so many before it - went horribly wrong.

[...]

What happened at Mahmudiya would be disturbing enough if it was unique, but it is not. It is part of a pattern that points not to a deliberate policy but perhaps to something equally worrying, an institutional lack of care among many in the US military for whether civilians are killed in their operations. It is not enough to say, as some defenders of the US military in Iraq do, that its soldiers are tired, frightened and under pressure from the simmering guerrilla attacks directed against them. For it is the impression that the US military gives of not caring about those innocent Iraqis that they kill that is stoking resentment.

Complete story here.

No-fly lists....

I may be one of the last to know about this. My sweetie and I were talking on the phone last night about an anti-war activist we know who was hassled at an airport recently when trying to board his flight. The guy was still fuming days later, talking about lists of names of activists who can be kept from leaving the country at the whim of “Homeland Security.”

I decided to follow up and I found this story from The Oregonian. (The url links to a non-Oregonian page: the original article seems inaccessible on the newspaper’s site. I did confirm the authenticity of the piece on Lexus-Nexus.)

"There is a 'no-fly' list," [Nico Melendez, federal Transportation Security Administration spokesperson] says. "That's people who cannot fly, period," because they've been determined to be or are suspected of being "a threat to civil aviation or to national security."

Details about the list are "considered sensitive security information and cannot be released to the public," Nico says, but the Wall Street Journal suggests there are about 300 names on the "no-fly" list.

There's another list that Nico calls the "selectees list." Might as well call them "suspectees." This is a much larger list of names, accumulated, Nico says, from information obtained from intelligence agencies and the airlines. These folks may be allowed to fly but only after they're intensely scrutinized by airline, law enforcement and security personnel.

So the activist was not really exaggerating.

This feeds into my greatest paranoia. Which is that when the next terrorist strike occurs on U.S. soil (I say when because most “anti-terrorist” measures are ineffectual and Bush’s “war on terrorism” is akin to throwing petrol on a raging fire), Bush will declare martial law and suspend civil liberties and the freedom to travel. Then Ashcroft will begin rounding up leftists, anti-war activists, non-born-again Christians, and others.

We’ve already done those things to non-U.S. citizens. I don't know about you, but my citizenship seems a rather thin shield to stand between me and this out-of-control fascist government.

Watch the ticker to the left....

...The White House has informed congressional leaders that it is preparing a new budget request for between $60 billion and $70 billion to help cover the mounting costs of the reconstruction and military occupation of Iraq, sources on Capitol Hill said last night.

The planned request -- which congressional budget analysts said will be nearly double what Congress expected -- reflects the deepening cost of the five-month-old U.S. occupation and serves as an acknowledgement by the administration that it vastly underestimated the cost of restoring order in Iraq and rebuilding the country's infrastructure.[Emphasis mine.]

The article goes on to talk of Bush’s appeal to the U.N. for help in rebuilding and administering Iraq and to say that the president is trying to resolve "festering disputes" over his Iraq policies before they turn into political liabilities.

Before?! I don't understand why Bush is not mired to his pointy little head in political shit already! He has been given the freest ticket to ride of any president I’ve ever known.

To the U.N. I say, tell Bush to take a flying folkdance, especially as long as he insists on all authority residing with the U.S.

Complete story here.

Religion trumps art in Russia....

I almost missed this story. Seems Russia has its own homegrown variety of religious fanatic.

MOSCOW, Sept. 1 — It was provocative, as modern art often is. But few of those involved could have foreseen just how provocative it would become when the Sakharov Museum here opened an exhibition of paintings and sculptures in January under the title "Caution! Religion."

Four days after the Jan. 14 opening, six men from a Russian Orthodox church came to the museum's exhibition hall and sacked it, defacing many of the 45 works with spray paint and destroying others. "Sacrilege," one of them scrawled on the wall.

The police came and quickly arrested the men, but their actions — described either as heroism or hooliganism — began a highly charged debate not only over the state of freedom of expression in Russia today but also over the ever-growing influence of the Orthodox Church.

Priests have denounced the museum, the lower house of Parliament has passed a resolution condemning it, criminal charges against four of the six men were dropped for lack of evidence — even though they were arrested inside the museum—and a court threw out charges against the others, saying they had been unlawfully prosecuted. Meanwhile, the exhibition's curator has gone into hiding.

One question: if religious believers have faith in God’s omnipotence, why don’t they just leave it to Her to punish immoral artists, abortionists and assorted evil-doers?

To me, their actions speak of a deep insecurity.

Complete story here.

Elevated to martyr status....

STARKE, Fla., Sept. 3 — Nine years after he calmly shot and killed an abortion doctor and his volunteer escort outside a Pensacola clinic, Paul Jennings Hill died by lethal injection here today as his supporters declared him a martyr and warned that his actions might be replicated.

Mr. Hill, a former Presbyterian minister, is the first killer of an abortion provider to be executed in the United States. He had not tried to prevent his death, which took place at Florida State Prison, just after 6 p.m. as lightning jagged across a nearly black sky. But abortion rights advocates fear what Mr. Hill's followers have hinted for months: that his death will cause a new wave of violence against abortion clinics, many of which have operated in relative peace over the last few years.

Among the highly disturbing details associated with this story is the following:

...Most of the roughly 50 supporters of Mr. Hill were white men, some kneeling and praying, others singing "How Great Thou Art..."

What's with that? The most extreme opponents of abortion are men! Is it a control issue? Womb-envy? Issues with their mothers? Small dicks?

Jeeze....

Here are some quotes:

Dan Holman, who said he drove here from Keokuk, Iowa, said Mr. Hill had "raised the standard" for anti-abortion protesters.

"Some day, I hope I will have the courage to be as much as a man as he was," said Mr. Holman, who carried a sign that said: "Dead Doctors Can't Kill."

Other signs read, "Killing Baby Killers Is Justifiable Homicide," and "Extremism in Defense of Life Is Not Extreme."

Yep, nothing like murder to prove you're a man.

Be warned, Hill's cold-blooded account of his actions that day are chilling to read. Complete story here.

Why'd he do it...?

HOUSTON, Sept. 3 — And then there were 10.

With the crucial defection of a leading Texas lawmaker, the defiant band of Democratic state senators holed up in New Mexico since July 28 has lost its ability to deny Gov. Rick Perry the quorum he needs to push through a hotly disputed Republican redistricting plan.

The surprising reappearance in Houston Tuesday night of a prize holdout, Senator John Whitmire, who, with 30 years in the State House and Senate is the dean of the Legislature, threw Texas politics into a new tizzy.

If Mr. Perry calls a highly unusual third special legislative session, as is widely expected, Mr. Whitmire, 54, known as Boogie from his avid partying in younger years, could be required to attend or be arrested and dragooned into the chamber.

"I don't perceive what I'm doing as caving," Mr. Whitmire said in an interview in his Houston district office as the phones rang incessantly. "I'm pursuing a different strategy."

But his colleagues in Albuquerque were incensed, members of the delegation said. One staff member sobbed.

Complete story here.

Bush on the couch....


I started to read this psychoanalysis of Bush in the Guardian for a laugh, but it actually makes some interesting points.

...His deepest beliefs amount to superstition. "Life takes its own turns," [Bush] says, "writes its own story and along the way we start to realise that we are not the author." God's will, not his own, explains his life.

Most fundamentalist Christians have authoritarian personalities. Two core beliefs separate fundamentalists from mere evangelists ("happy-clappy" Christians) or the mainstream Presbyterians among whom Bush first learned religion every Sunday with his parents: fundamentalists take the Bible absolutely literally as the word of God and believe that human history will come to an end in the near future, preceded by a terrible, apocaplytic [sic] battle on Earth between the forces of good and evil, which only the righteous shall survive. According to Frum when Bush talks of an "axis of evil" he is identifying his enemies as literally satanic, possessed by the devil. Whether he specifically sees the battle with Iraq and other "evil" nations as being part of the end-time, the apocalypse preceding the day of judgment, is not known. Nor is it known whether Tony Blair shares these particular religious ideas.

However, it is certain that however much Bush may sometimes seem like a buffoon, he is also powered by massive, suppressed anger towards anyone who challenges the extreme, fanatical beliefs shared by him and a significant slice of his citizens - in surveys, half of them also agree with the statement "the Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally, word for word".

Bush's deep hatred, as well as love, for both his parents explains how he became a reckless rebel with a death wish. He hated his father for putting his whole life in the shade and for emotionally blackmailing him. He hated his mother for physically and mentally badgering him to fulfil her wishes. But the hatred also explains his radical transformation into an authoritarian fundamentalist. By totally identifying with an extreme version of their strict, religion-fuelled beliefs, he jailed his rebellious self. From now on, his unconscious hatred for them was channelled into a fanatical moral crusade to rid the world of evil...

Complete story here.

Shame on them...!

Researchers at the Center for Public and Nonprofit Leadership at the Georgetown Public Policy Institute have found that charitable foundations are paying outrageous fees to their wealthy trustees.

-- Fourteen of the large foundations paid their trustees more than $100,000 each. The largest amounts went to two trustees of the Kimbell Art Foundation ($750,000 and $747,000) and to Walter Annenberg of the Annenberg Foundation ($500,000). Three large foundations paid between $90,000 and $100,000 to each of their board members, 27 paid $50,000 or more, and 56 paid $25,000 or more.

-- Five of the smaller foundations paid their trustees more than $100,000 each in fees. The highest fee, $232,619, was paid by the Ira and Doris Kukin Foundation. Four smaller institutions paid between $90,000 and $100,000 each to their board members, 16 paid $50,000 or more, and 31, or 50 percent, paid $25,000 or more.

-- Based on the 990-PF's and our follow-up phone calls, we found that, with a number of notable exceptions, trustees in general spent little time on foundation business.

I am the only person in my immediate family to graduate from college. I have worked since age 13 at an hourly job, attending school, or raising my daughter. Now, with a master's degree from a pestigious public university, I still have never taken home more than $30,000 a year, if that.

And these rich folks are making $25,000, $50,00, or sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars for doing practically nothing!

Complete story here, via Common Dreams.

No kidding...!

JERUSALEM, Sept. 1 — Finding a pattern of government "prejudice and neglect" toward Israel's Arab minority, a landmark Israeli commission of inquiry today accused the police of using excessive force three years ago to combat riots that it said had resulted from simmering, overlooked anger. [Which has only gotten only worse in the past three years.]

The commission said insensitivity by the Israeli "establishment" permitted widespread discrimination against Israeli Arabs and the buildup of a "combustible atmosphere," as, it said, a politicized Islam began to radicalize the population.

The three-member commission was charged with investigating the deaths of 13 people from police fire in October 2000, when thousands of Israeli Arabs choked streets and threw stones in solidarity with Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, who just had just begun their uprising against Israel. A Jewish motorist was also killed, by a stone-thrower.

Criticizing police tactics that included the use of sniper fire to disperse crowds, the report concluded that Israel "must educate its police that the Arab public is not the enemy, and should not be treated as such..."

I remind readers that this report is referring to the more than 1 million of Israel's 6.6 million citizens who are Arabs, and not to the roughly 4 million Palestinians living in the Occupied Territories.

While Israel is to be commended for investigating police violence toward Arabs, many Arabs feel the investigation did not go nearly far enough.

Walid Ghanaym, 37, whose brother Emad, 25, was killed, said: "If the police killed 13 Jews, what would they do? That's why we're third class."

Complete story here.

Unscheduled hiatus....

I've spent the past week working on an op-ed submission I'm optimistically pitching to some mainstream publications. (I'll keep you posted if anyone picks it up!) As there are only so many hours in a day, and I am compelled to devote an inordinate number of them to putting food on the table and paying the rent, I have been forced to neglect Krieg9.

Unfortunately, the neglect will continue for a few more days. My sweetie flies into town from the East Coast tomorrow, so I will be engaged in much pleasanter pursuits than keeping up with the most recent bad news.

Tune in next Tuesday, though...I'll be back!

MoveOn appeal.…

The Republican-controlled Texas Legislature is still trying to gerrymander the state's 32 Congressional districts to consolidate their party’s hold on power in Washington. Democratic congressmen have once again fled across state lines to subvert the formation of a quorum, necessary to pass the redistricting legislation.

Help MoveOn publicize what the Republicans are doing to Texan voters and the nation.

More information here.

Donate here.

Modern slavery flourishes....

There are more slaves today than were seized from Africa in four centuries of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. The modern commerce in humans rivals illegal drug trafficking in its global reach—and in the destruction of lives.

National Geographic is to be commended for taking this on. You have to purchase the magazine to read the complete story, but an excerpt (here) gives you a bitter taste.

The world's foremost anti-slavery activist makes an eloquent case here that we can end this odious practice of trafficking in human beings.

While the 27 million people enslaved today are the largest number of slaves alive at any time in human history, they are also the smallest proportion of the world population to ever be held in slavery. No one wants to live in a world with slavery. Today the slaveholders are weaker than they have ever been, and there is universal agreement that slavery must end. In South Asia whole villages come to freedom when others help them form institutions such as small credit unions, inform them of their rights, and show them how to organize to fight for them. Slaves everywhere outnumber their masters. When we all stand with the slaves, their masters cannot keep them in bondage. It is true that criminal mafias control some of the traffic in people, and they will be difficult to root out. But slavery will end if corruption is tackled, victims are treated with respect, and those of us who are free decide to support all those who help others to freedom.

Go here to see what you can do to free the slaves!

Bush blinks....

WASHINGTON, Aug. 20 — The Bush administration, seizing on the bomb attack on the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad, is preparing a new Security Council resolution that would urge other nations to send troops and aid to secure Iraq, administration officials said today.

[...]

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, speaking in Honduras, said that despite the bombing in Iraq, he saw no need to increase troop levels, at least for now. "At the moment, the conclusion of the responsible military officials is that the force levels are where they should be," he said.

But the diplomatic maneuvering today suggested that some officials in the administration, particularly in the State Department, believe that the bombing demonstrates that military reinforcements are needed. There are now 139,000 American troops in Iraq and 21,700 troops from other countries, half from Britain.

Some experts say it is unrealistic to think that Iraq can be secured with troops at the current level. A debate over this subject flared in May, when Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, then the Army chief of staff, said hundreds of thousands would be needed to secure Iraq after the war.

James F. Dobbins, an expert in peacekeeping operations who was the Bush administration's special envoy to Afghanistan, said in an interview today that the United States might need 300,000 to 500,000 troops to maintain stability in the country.

Complete story here.

Good...!

So rarely do I read a news story lately in which the establishment decides "my way."

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court refused Wednesday to block a federal judge's ruling that a Ten Commandments monument be removed from the rotunda of Alabama's state Judicial Building in Montgomery.

The one-line order dismissing an emergency appeal from Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore came hours before a midnight deadline set by U.S. District Judge Myron H. Thompson for removing the 4-foot-tall, 5,300-pound monument. If officials do not remove it, the state faces a $5,000-a-day fine for defying the judge's order.

To remind readers, the First Amendment states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion..."

Complete story here.

Get out your telescopes...!

On Aug. 27, Mars will be closer to Earth than it has been in nearly 59,619 years! That long ago, the Neanderthals still had Europe to themselves and anatomically modern Homo sapiens remained mostly in Africa.

On the 27th, the two planets will be only 34,646,418 miles apart--about five times closer than only six months ago.

Complete story here.

And in Israel....

JERUSALEM (AP) -- A suicide bomber blew himself up Tuesday on a packed bus on a main thoroughfare in Jerusalem, killing at least 20 people, Israel Army Radio said.

The militant Islamic Jihad group claimed responsibility in a call to the Lebanese TV station Al Manar. The attack killed three children and wounded at least 100 more.

The blast on the extra long bus, which had two passenger sections that were full, went off shortly after 9 p.m. Another bus nearby also was hit by the explosion.

It's horrible. Absolutely shocking and sickening.

How can any of these so-called religious extremists--be they Christian, like Bush; Islamic, like the perpetrators of this bombing; or Jewish, like the settlers who bomb Islamic schools--claim their actions are moral?!

Lest you object to my inclusion of Bush in that group, consider the “collateral damage” in Baghdad and Iraq from our missiles and bombs. At Bush's orders, our military intentionally rained down ordinance on cities, knowing hundreds of innocent civilians would "accidentally" be killed.

And don't try to defend his actions by saying he weighed the costs against the lives to be saved. NO weapons of mass destruction have been found. In the end, Bush's ill-conceived war has made the entire population of the world less safe, as we are seeing every day.

Complete story here.

The death toll rises in Baghdad....

BAGHDAD -- The United Nations' chief official in Iraq died today along with at least 14 others when a suicide bomber struck a hotel serving as the headquarters for the U.N., injuring about 100 people.

Sergio Vieira de Mello, who was working in his second-floor office when the explosion occurred, was trapped in the rubble of the Canal Hotel after the blast. Despite rescuers' attempts to pull him free, the U.N. confirmed in a statement that he died.

The blast, occurring about 4:30 p.m. local time, caused part of the hotel to collapse, and thick, black smoke rose above the rubble. The explosion, which was believed to be caused by a vehicle bomb, jolted Baghdad up to a mile away.

At least 14 people are known dead, with the death toll expected to rise.

Right below this story on the L.A. Times website is one about a suicide-bomber attack on a Jerusalem bus that just killed at least five people.

Tell me again, how are we "winning the war on terrorism?"

I will say it again: you cannot "defeat" terrorism with force, no matter how overwhelming. Did we not learn that in Vietnam?

Moreover, if Israel--with the finest military, police and intelligence forces in the world, operating in a tiny country with a small population--cannot prevent terrorists acts through force, what makes us think we can?

I only wish that the people suffering from these terrorist strikes were the ones driving our insane foreign policy, like Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, et. al, and not innocent bystanders.

Complete story here.

Bush in San Diego....

President Bush yesterday thanked military personnel in San Diego for helping the United States toward winning the war against terrorism as he steered clear of the California political spectacle that is overshadowing even his own re-election campaign.

The president raised more than $1 million for that campaign last night at the San Diego Convention Center, telling supporters, "You're laying the groundwork for what will be a great victory in 2004."

[...]

Last week, when Arnold Schwarzenegger declared his candidacy to replace Davis, Bush's remark that the actor would make a "good governor" was widely interpreted as a veiled endorsement.

The day before leaving his Texas ranch for California, Bush amended the comment to say, "He would be a good governor, as would others running for governor of California."

"I'm going to campaign for George W.," he said.

And indeed he is! Raising more than $1 million at a single fundraiser.

I couldn't find any mention in a quick scan of the major papers of Bush addressing the blackout....When he spoke at his fundraiser or elsewhere, did he make any mention of the fact that the entire northeastern United States was without power?

Local story of his speech here.

Isn't it ironic...?

...White House officials were monitoring the blackout from Washington and from San Diego, where President Bush addressed troops at midday.[Emphasis mine.]

I don't know why, but it seems ironic to me that he's in the city where I live when this goes down in the city where I want' to be.

The LA Times and other news outlets are reporting that the blackout has stranded commuters in New York in the subways underground. Yikes!

Complete story here.

New York blacked-out...!

As of around 4:30 p.m. today, New York city is without power. The NYT says the area without electricity extends along the east coast south to Maryland, north to Toronto and west to Cleveland and Detroit. No other details yet.

Ashcroft goes after Voices in the Wilderness...!

The Department of Justice is suing VitW seeking $20,000 for violations of the Iraqi Sanction Regulations. VitW, which solicits funds for humanitarian aid to Iraq, says it will not pay the fine. Instead, it vows to continue its work organizing delegations to Iraq composed of teachers, veterans, social workers, artists, health care professionals and others with the aim of educating the world about the deadly effects of the US bombing and embargo of Iraq.

View the summons.
Participate in the campaign against the summons.

Aren't Christians supposed to be generous....?

Just when I start thinking we're making progress, I'm reminded how bigoted, selfish and narrow-minded many Americans remain.

A strong majority of the public disapproves of the Episcopal Church's decision to recognize the blessing of same-sex unions, and a larger share of churchgoing Americans would object if their own faith adopted a similar practice, according to a new Washington Post poll.

So broad and deep is this opposition that half of all Americans who regularly attend worship services say they would leave their current church if their minister blessed gay couples -- even if their denomination officially approved those ceremonies.

The poll also found that public acceptance of same-sex civil unions is falling. Fewer than four in 10 polled said they would support a law allowing gay men and lesbians to form civil unions that would provide some of the rights and legal protections of marriage.

How bighearted of them.

Naturally, opposition was strongest among evangelical Christians—those charitable folk who believe the Bible is the literal word of God. Eight of 10 polled rejected gay unions, and two of three said they would abandon their home church if it began performing commitment ceremonies for gays.

One was quoted, "It's against the word of God. . . . The Lord didn't make these rules to be mean to us. We will find our greatest amount of health and peace by following his [sic] law."

Well, I am sure relieved to hear that God isn’t mean! It’s a little hard to tell, looking around at the suffering in the world. Suffering that God, being omnipotent, as you believe, could alleviate in the blink of an eye. If he deigned.

As for following “His law,” the Bible also says don’t eat pork or shellfish, don’t mix meat and milk in the same meal and don’t ever have (heterosexual) sex when a woman is on her period.

On the other hand, slavery and polygamy are fine.

I respect people who, without trying to foist their belief system onto others, follow an ethical code of living for the value and meaning it instills into everyday life—whether or not they consider the code divinely-ordained. I practiced orthodox Judaism in that manner for a brief period when I was young.

As for the Evangelicals, who preach “family values” but forbid two men or two women who love each other to consecrate their lives together, I'd rather roast in hell than spend eternity surrounded by the hypocritical, selfish, holier-than-thou likes of you!

Complete story here.

Not the way to gain the people's trust....

BAGHDAD -- American troops shot dead two members of the new Iraqi police force and beat up a third, Iraqi police officers said yesterday, in a development that has aggravated already stressed relations between US troops and the Iraqi people.

[...]

The driver, whom police said was interviewed yesterday by US investigators, offered the following account, according to [Iraqi Police Captain Alaa] Isamil:

The police were trying to apprehend alleged car thieves, who shot at the police car. Iraqi police returned fire, and American soldiers -- apparently hearing the shots -- arrived on the scene. But the troops shot at the Iraqi police car, hitting the officer in the back seat, Isamil said.

The lieutenant in the front seat stumbled out of the car with his hands up, wearing his black and white Iraqi Police arm band and shouting that he was a police officer. A soldier then shot the lieutenant between the eyes. The driver, who had been crouched down in the front seat and waving his badge, was kicked and beaten by US troops.

US military officials earlier told reporters that US forces had "engaged" Iraqi police. But when pressed yesterday about how the two Iraqi police officers died, they said the incident was under investigation.

The image of the lieutenant, shot dead with his hands up, is shocking. Even if he had been a thief, since when is it legal under the Geneva Convention--or any system of law--to kill someone holding their empty hands in the air?

Complete story here.

Dare we hope…?

Thousands of US physicians have endorsed a broad proposal that would abolish for-profit hospitals and insurers and transfer all Americans into an expanded and improved Medicare program for all ages, reigniting the debate over universal health care a decade after President Clinton's failed plan.

While the four physicians who wrote the plan -- three of whom are affiliated with Harvard Medical School -- are members of a nonprofit organization that has long pushed for universal health coverage, the new proposal is important for two reasons: It was published today in one of the country's most prestigious and its most widely circulated medical journal, the Journal of the American Medical Association, and because of the large number of doctors -- nearly 8,000, including two former surgeons general -- who endorsed it.

AMA officials said it is unusual for the journal, which has a circulation of about 700,000 worldwide, to publish an article endorsed by such a large number of physicians. JAMA's editor, Dr. Catherine DeAngelis, said that an editorial accompanying the article represents the journal's viewpoint that it is time for the country to grapple more seriously with major problems in the health-care system.

Here’s the good part: private insurance companies would be virtually eliminated! Considering how many politicians are in the pockets of the insurance companies, this factor alone probably insures the plan's defeat.

But look how great it would be!

The physicians estimate that the country would save $200 billion annually by eliminating profits of investor-owned hospitals and insurance companies and by reducing administrative costs for hospitals and doctors who must bill dozens of different insurance companies. Private health insurers now consume 12 percent of premiums for overhead, while Medicare and the Canadian national health insurance system have overhead costs below 3.2 percent, the doctors reported.

Taxes, the doctors said, would increase. But except for the very wealthy, higher taxes would be offset by the elimination of insurance premiums and out-of-pocket copayments and deductibles, they argued.

Yeah!

Complete story here.

A rose by any other name....

Have we ever had an administration more into couching the truth in incomprehensible, flowery language?

WASHINGTON, Aug. 13 — The Pentagon said today that about 200 more United States troops could soon go ashore in Liberia — but officials emphasized that their mission was not peacekeeping in the usual sense.

Rather, their purpose will be "to achieve a stable environment so that humanitarian assistance can be provided to the people of Liberia, and also to facilitate the transition to a U.N.-led international peacekeeping operation," Maj. Gen. Norton Schwartz said...

And check this out:

…When a questioner suggested that the Americans' mission could potentially put them in combat, General Schwartz said, "There is a reaction capability, should something unexpected occur."

Jeeze, among other crimes, try these morons for butchering the English language!

As for committing troops to Morovia, I actually think using U.S. troops to help stabilize a worn-torn region and protect civilians is a legitimate operation, although I’d like to have the U.N. in charge as soon as possible.

Complete story here.

Here's the war America should be fighting....

For more than a decade, health workers in Africa have been sounding the alarm about the growing numbers of orphans, left on their own after AIDS kills their parents. Imagine what America could be doing with the $68 billion-plus we’ve squandered to invade Iraq, a country that was in no way a threat to us, if we spent that money Kenya, where $300 represents a family’s annual income.

LOOK what they are enduring:

…In East Kagan, a sprawling village of 3,000, one in every three people has the disease and there are more than 400 orphans, many struggling to survive on their own. Tucked into a trail of knobby grass and mud footpaths, the village is made up largely of the Luo tribe, the second-biggest ethnic group in Kenya.

The village is in one of Kenya's poorest districts. Mud huts with thatched roofs sit in clusters of three or four in the scrappy, flat fields. Small sprouts of wilting maize cover fields that are gray and dry from the hot sun and lack of rain.

A few men herd cattle. A few children lead donkeys to carry water and firewood. Like many rural communities in Africa, the village has no cars, no electricity and no running water.

Parents who are dying of AIDS linger at the village's one-room health clinic, looking weak and begging for aspirin to ease their pain. No one here can afford the life-saving drugs available in the West.

Parents are dying so quickly that they don't have time to ask relatives if they can take in their children…

While dying parents are begging for aspirins, starving children are eating grass. Grass!

I am ashamed. How can we in the developed world go about our daily routines in face of such appalling suffering and injustice?!

Story here.

Washington Post on the prelude to the Iraq war....

...The new information indicates a pattern in which President Bush, Vice President Cheney and their subordinates -- in public and behind the scenes -- made allegations depicting Iraq's nuclear weapons program as more active, more certain and more imminent in its threat than the data they had would support. On occasion administration advocates withheld evidence that did not conform to their views. The White House seldom corrected misstatements or acknowledged loss of confidence in information upon which it had previously relied...

No White House, Pentagon or State Department policymaker would speak on the record to the Post about the administration's nuclear case. The official line remains that the regime was pursuing nuclear weapons, that it had biological and chemical weapons and that it intended to use them, even though there is absolutely no proof to support the allegations. In fact, mounting evidence contradicts them.

They lied to coerce this country into an unprovoked war that has cost U.S. taxpayers between $68 and $76 billion to date, and killed more than 300 coalition troops, 10,200 Iraqi soldiers and 6200 Iraqi civilians.

And it's not over yet.

Long and very comprehensive story here.

The Terminator falters out of the gate….

Arnold Schwarzenegger's transition from movie star to gubernatorial candidate hit its first rough patch Friday as he ducked questions about the state's fiscal crisis, gay marriage and workplace benefits.

[...]

Asked on ABC's "Good Morning America" about gay marriage, he replied: "I don't want to get into that right now."

Asked about a news report quoting aides saying he was open to tax increases, Schwarzenegger said: "I can't imagine anyone on my team said that." He said that his solution was not raising taxes or cutting programs, but to "bring businesses back to California." But Schwarzenegger offered no strategy for attracting business. In fact, he has argued for reversing an increase in the car tax — which would cost the state treasury billions — even as he has advocated for more spending on school buildings and teacher hiring.

[...]

On NBC's "Today Show," interviewer Matt Lauer pressed him. "You talk about the budget deficit. You talk about the energy crisis, the slumping economy, people leaving California. Give me some specifics, Arnold. How are you going to turn it around?"

Schwarzenegger offered no details, focusing his answer on the governor:

"Well, I think the first and most important thing is to know that it takes leadership, because Gray Davis is saying he has the experience and all of those things. We have seen now what happens. He has sold himself as the man that has experience you cannot buy. What happened with all his experience? Look at the situation we're in right now."

Asked later in the same interview whether he would disclose his tax returns, as candidates for high office typically do, Schwarzenegger fiddled with his earpiece and said he could not hear the question. (In an appearance in Bellflower later Friday, Schwarzenegger said he would make disclosure but did not say when. "Absolutely. I have nothing to hide," he said.)

This man is as competent to govern the State of California as the sad-sack eldest son of a well-heeled New England political dynasty is to govern America.

I guess we should thank our lucky stars that, under the U.S. Constitution, a foreign-born naturalized citizen can’t be elected president.

Of course, Bush wasn’t elected, was he? So ultimately, a constitutional amendment could put anything up for grabs along with the governor’s office of the most-populous state of the union.

Jeeze, I wish I had confidence that California voters will reject this inarticulate, overblown Hollywood buffoon. But Minnesota voters put Jesse Ventura into the governor's mansion. And look how many people actually did vote for Bush!

Speaking of which, Bush endorsed Arnold today, elevating the political discourse in his inimitable fashion.

"Yes, I think he'd be a good governor," Bush said. The president did not say if he would campaign for Schwarzenegger.

A lighthearted Bush added: "I will never arm wrestle Arnold Schwarzenegger No matter how hard I try, I'll never lift as much weight as he does."

Awwww, shucks....

Complete story here.

California's next governor...?

TERMINATED TAKE: Arnold Schwarzenegger has some big ideas when it comes to running for governor -- but he was definitely thinking small when it came to shooting that bathroom dunking scene for his new action flick, "Terminator 3."

"I saw this toilet bowl," Schwarzenegger told Entertainment Weekly in its July 11 edition. "How many times do you get away with this -- to take a woman, grab her upside down, and bury her face in a toilet bowl?"

But, the Mighty Terminator adds: "I wanted to have something floating there."

Ughhh.

"The thing is, you can do it," Arnold argued, "because in the end, I didn't do it to a woman -- she's a machine! We could get away with it without being crucified by who-knows-what group."

Maybe -- but in the end, the "floating" idea was itself terminated.

"They thought it was my typical Schwarzenegger overboard."

From here.

Join Stop Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The violence in Iraq is escalating....

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 7 — A car bomb exploded today outside the Jordanian Embassy here, killing 11 people and wounding at least 65, in the bloodiest day since the Bush administration declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq on May 1.

The bomb exploded at 11 a.m., as many Iraqis stood about the entrance waiting to apply for visas. The force of the explosion blew a 30-foot-wide hole in the wall that separates the embassy from the street, hurling bodies and shrapnel and debris hundreds of yards. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

In addition,

Unidentified militants detonated a bomb on an American Humvee shortly after the car bombing, opening a ferocious, two-hour gun battle in the heart of one of Baghdad's most prosperous neighborhoods. Three soldiers were wounded in the firefight, officials said, while witnesses said two soldiers in the vehicle had been wounded as well.

Late Wednesday, two American soldiers died when they drove into an ambush in central Baghdad, the Central Command said.

I have so much to say about this, and yet it seems so futile. I’ve said it before, as have many anti-war activists. Indeed, as have wise persons throughout history: Violence begets violence.

What scares me is that it’s just a matter of time until the car bombs and martyrs start exploding on U.S. soil as well.

Complete story here.

Jerry Springer will not run for the Senate....

in Ohio so he can declare for the governor's race in California.

JUST KIDDING!

Although at this point, nothing would surprise me about the California recall.

OHIO: JERRY SPRINGER IS NOT A CANDIDATE To the relief of some national Democrats, Jerry Springer said that he would not run for the United States Senate in Ohio because he could not escape "the clutter" of his television show, where guests often brawl. Mr. Springer, a former Democratic mayor of Cincinnati, had hired a team of consultants and had traveled the state widely for months, testing the waters for a 2004 campaign against the Republican incumbent, George V. Voinovich. In a news conference, Mr. Springer said he thought voters were receptive to his populist message, but he said he was "not the perfect messenger," acknowledging high negative ratings in some polls.    James Dao (NYT)

That he would consider running for any political office is an indication of how low this country has sunk.

Complete story here.

Must see to believe....

Thanks to This Modern World, for the link to this limited-edition, 12- inch figure of George Bush in a naval aviator flight uniform. It's a "meticulous 1:6 scale recreation of the Commander-in-Chief's appearance during his historic Aircraft Carrier landing" on May 1, 2003. I kid you not.

I can think of a few fun things to do with this "fully poseable [sic] figure"...

Was this the plan all along...?

If so, I never saw it coming!

SAN DIEGO – Republican Congressman Darrell Issa, who bankrolled the effort to recall Gov. Gray Davis and was one of the first to say he wanted to replace him, tearfully said he will not run in the Oct. 7 election.

His announcement comes a day after actor and fellow Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger entered the race.

The congressman from Vista had gone to the San Diego County Registrar of Voters office in Kearny Mesa ostensibly to join the race officially.

But as his supporters stood around him holding posters touting his candidacy, Issa became the latest to reassess his or her aspirations in light of the breathtaking changes threatening to reshape California's political landscape.

Other declared candidates are independent Arianna Huffington, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante, and state Insurance Commissioner John Garamendi (the latter two both Democrats). With until Saturday to declare, political analysts are forecasting a field of hundreds. One analyst, on NPR this morning, predicted 400.

And remember, all you need is a majority of those who bother to vote to win.

Complete story here.

Hasta la vista, Davis....

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 6 — The recall election on Gov. Gray Davis of California took stunning turns today, as one of the state's most respected elected officials, Senator Dianne Feinstein, announced that she would not run to replace Mr. Davis, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, a politically untested movie star, announced that he would.

As extraordinary bookends on a day of fast-moving events, the two decisions could not have been more dissimilar in style and substance. Public opinion polls have identified Ms. Feinstein, a Democrat, and Mr. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, as among the most popular alternatives to Mr. Davis, who faces a recall vote on Oct. 7.

I thought Arnold's recent disavowals were purely strategic, designed to give this evening’s announcement even more punch.

If Feinstein persists in staying out of the race, I fear Schwarzenegger will be the state’s next governor.

If the stakes weren’t so incredibly high, this circus would be hilarious.

Complete story here.

Very troubling....

One of Europe's leading scientists yesterday raised the possibility that the extreme heatwave now settled over at least 30 countries in the northern hemisphere could signal that man-made climate change is accelerating.

"The present heatwave across the northern hemisphere is worrying. There is the small probability that man-made climate change is proceeding much faster and stronger than expected," said Professor John Schellnhuber, former chief scientific adviser to the German government and now head of the UK's leading group of climate scientists at the Tyndall center.

Prof Schellnhuber said "the parching heat experienced now" could be consistent "with a worst-case scenario [of global warming] that nobody wants to come true". He warned that several months' research would be needed to analyze data from around the world before scientists could say why the heatwaves are so intense this year.

"What we are seeing is absolutely unusual," said Prof Schellnhuber. "We know that global warming is proceeding apace, but most of us were thinking that in 20-30 years time we would be seeing hot spells [like this]. But it's happening now. Clearly extreme weather events will increase." [asides are in the original]

While Europe burns and 1,500 people die from heat prostration in India, President Bush continues to scoff at global warming and Republicans blocked efforts last week by Senators John McCain and Joseph Leiberman to force a vote on their bill limiting greenhouse gas emissions. (The vote has been postponed until the fall.)

As that famous margarine commercial used to exclaim—was it in the 1970’s?—“You can’t fool Mother Nature.” We’re risking not only rising sea-levels, but large-scale agricultural failures, droughts and ensuing famines that could make those the world has already experienced pale in comparison.

On the other hand, some scientist fear that the rising temperatures could trigger the next ice-age, which—according to ice-cores in Antarctica and the Arctic—is about due anyway.

What are you doing to help? I’ve traded my gas-guzzling clunker (the only kind of automobile I can afford) for a bicycle. That’s right: I actually live and work in Southern California and do not own a car. It can be done.

Stories here and here.

I expected more….

Terry Gross just interviewed Bill Maher on Fresh Air. You know, he's not as radical as I'd expected. He said he was only “40-60” against the Iraq war, and he added that even if you were against the war, you should “support the plan now because it may have been Bush's war, but it's America's peace."

I don’t understand that logic. If the invasion of Iraq was morally wrong, fiscally indefensible and logistically unwise, what makes the occupation any different?

One glaring difference is Americans keep dying almost everyday. That ups the potential political cost for Bush and his Neocon cronies. They will never quit Iraq due to morality, fiscal considerations or because the occupation actually increases the risk of terrorist attacks at home. But they might leave if the U.S. body count grows too high.

How sad.

The best we can do now, it seems, is invite in the United Nations and hope—hope!—they don’t rebuff the overture on account of the way Bush spurned them prior to the war.

I was really disappointed in Maher.

Not sure how I feel about this....

New York City officials said yesterday that they planned to systematically review biological evidence from hundreds of unsolved sex crimes, with the goal of indicting the unidentified attackers based on their DNA profiles before the 10-year statute of limitations runs out.

Under the initiative, called the John Doe Indictment Project, prosecutors, investigators and scientists will seek to tie the most serious unsolved sex crimes to specific DNA profiles, then file charges even before they have linked a name to the DNA or have arrested a suspect.

Complete story here.

The beginning of a trend...?

For the first time since the government started keeping statistics, California has lost more residents to other states than it gained.

WASHINGTON — Although the state's population continues to grow because of immigration, more people left California in the last half of the 1990s than moved in from other states, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released today.

More than 1.4 million people in the U.S. migrated to California from 1995 to 2000, while 2.2 million left — the highest migration numbers in the country. That exodus is "unprecedented," said Hans P. Johnson, a demographer with the Public Policy Institute of California, an independent San Francisco research organization.

Even so, the state's estimated population was still a whopping 35.1 million in 2002.

The article says a big reason people are moving is the cost of housing, and I can vouch for that. I saw a sign yesterday advertising a two-bedroom house for rent in my neighborhood for $2,200/month!

Complete story here.

Victory for transgendered rights....

I almost missed this, it slipped by so quietly. From what I can gather, it wasn't even mentioned in the L.A. Times.

CALIFORNIA: NEW BAN ON BIAS Gov. Gray Davis has signed a bill banning housing and job discrimination against transgender people, making the state the fourth to extend such protections. The measure, signed on Saturday, will take effect on Jan. 1. The new law prohibits discrimination against people whose "perceived gender characteristics are different from those traditionally associated with the individual's sex at birth."  (AP)

Complete story here.

Congratulations...!

It's about time!

MINNEAPOLIS - The Episcopal church made history today when it elevated an openly gay priest to bishop, ending months of bitter dispute that culminated in 11th-hour accusations about Rev. Canon V. Gene Robinson's character.

Robinson, a 56-year-old divorced man with two adult children, has lived with his partner, Mark Andrew, for 13 years. He was elected bishop this summer by the priests and lay leaders of the Diocese of New Hampshire, and secured the backing of priests and lay deputies for his election on Sunday.

Today a majority of the nation's dioceses - 62 out of 107 - approved his election at the church's national General Convention in Minneapolis, a church spokesperson said this evening, making Robinson the first openly gay man to be approved as a bishop in the church's history.

Complete story here.

Chaos in Iraq....

Anne Garrels’ from Baghdad this morning on NPR described 120-degree heat, traffic-clogged streets, rampant unemployment, intermittent electricity, alcohol and pornography on open display and violent crime.

That's liberation for ya!

The L.A. Times put a face on the story:

BAGHDAD -- A man walked into Dr. Mohammed Alrawi's private clinic in an upscale part of the capital last Sunday moaning and complaining so loudly of kidney pain that he was ushered straight past waiting patients.

Inside, the "patient" immediately pulled out a pistol and shot the doctor through his right eye, killing him.

As the gunman dashed out, he passed Alrawi's wife, Bushra, who also practices medicine at the clinic. "I looked at his face. I will never forget that face," she recalled.

"I went to my husband. I saw him collapsed in his chair. I hugged him while his blood covered the floor."

Murder is stalking this city. In the aftermath of the U.S. campaign to oust Saddam Hussein, residents who have no memory of violent street crime during his iron-fisted rule are now being terrorized by killers — not to mention thieves and vandals — whose motives range from retribution to rapaciousness. The crime wave poses a challenge for the U.S.-led occupation as it grapples with a multitude of problems — electricity shortages, joblessness and a guerrilla campaign among them — that have destabilized this shattered country. Iraqi police have started to work, but ineffectually. They defer to the U.S. soldiers, who often have no clue about what is going on in the streets and alleys around them.

Alrawi, 52, was a former dean of Baghdad University, physician to Hussein and chairman of the Iraqi Physicians Syndicate. His family believes he is a victim of reprisal killings aimed at members of Hussein's government.

Why isn’t the American public demanding Bush's impeachment for this monumental squandering of lives and taxpayers’ money?

Complete story here.

"Hunting for Bambi...."

Apparently, a couple of weeks ago a story broke in Las Vegas about an alleged local business, called “Hunting for Bambi, that sold men the opportunity to hunt nude women with paint-balls. Whether or not the business exists remains to be seen, but violence against women is real. This op-ed on Common Dreams makes the point that the light-hearted media banter about HFB is indicative of the denial and ignorance that perpetuates domestic violence.

...To expose the invisibility of the cultural acceptance of violence against women in an “easier” way, just ask the following question: Would the opening question on the site have been the same if the video had been titled, "Hunting for Muslims?" Or how about, “Hunting for Jews?” or “Hunting for African-Americans?” Or, Hunting for _____________ (insert the name of your favorite minority group). Would it still be depicted as a “big put-on” if named any of these and if it was “only” a video? No outrage? No condemnation? Hardly, there would be collective national and possibly even international outrage if this had been the case. This is not hard to see. Seeing how the same should apply to women, however, reveals the invisibility and unacknowledged cultural acceptance of VAW [violence against women].

[...]

When hearing about someone being abused by a partner, the first question usually asked is, “Well, hell, why doesn’t she just leave?” Well, she doesn't “just leave” for some very good reasons. Reasons, in fact, that reflect her being in her “right mind.” For instance, she will be homeless, she will have no financial resources, her children will have no home, their school will be disrupted, she will be seen as "breaking up the family," she may be threatened with deportation, she might be reported to child protective services, her family of origin will disown her, her church group will shun her, she will be "sinning," etc.

[...]

Actually, the question of “Why doesn’t she just leave?” is the entirely wrong question to ask. The real question is, "Why isn't the abuser held accountable?" Why does everyone expect the victim of the abuse to do something about it? When it comes to other violent crimes, do we expect the victim to do something about it? Imagine someone having just been assaulted in their home during a burglary and the police saying to the victim, "Sorry, Mr. Smith, you have to leave your home now because you have been assaulted and your home has been burglarized." Huh? Or what about a neighbor, after finding out that someone down the street had his car stolen, asking the question, “Good lord, we all know that this is a high crime area, why doesn’t John just move?”

Go read the full story here.

For shame...!

Israel's Parliament has passed a law preventing Palestinians who marry Israelis from living in Israel. The move was denounced by human rights organizations as racist, undemocratic and discriminatory.

Under the new law, rushed through yesterday, Palestinians alone will be excluded from obtaining citizenship or residency. Anyone else who marries an Israeli will be entitled to Israeli citizenship.

Now Israeli Arabs who marry Palestinians from the West Bank or Gaza Strip will either have to move to the occupied territories, or live apart from their husband or wife. Their children will be affected too: from the age of 12 they will be denied citizenship or residency and forced to move out of Israel.

Complete story here via Common Dreams.

Liberation...but only if you've got a penis....

NAJAF, Iraq, July 30 — The United States Marine colonel supervising the reconstruction of this Shiite holy city's government indefinitely postponed the swearing in of its first-ever female judge today after her appointment provoked a wave of resentment, including fatwas from senior Islamic clerics and heated protests by the city's lawyers.

Protestors, some of them women, accused Americans of invading Iraq in order to undermine Islam. (Actually, that's more plausible than Bush's claim of WMD.)

According to the NYT, the 45-year-old lawyer who was to be nominated, Nidal Nasser Hussein, has a history of setting precedents. She was the first female lawyer to work in Najaf when she started 16 years ago--now there are 50.

"There were demonstrations against the first elementary schools for women, too, but everything needs a beginning," she said to the colonel. "Don't just talk to the people who are shouting, talk to sensible people."

One female protestor insisted that a woman cannot be a judge because "women are always ruled by their emotions."

So, tell me, who would you prefer sitting in legal judgment over you?

One of these "unemotional" men, observing a religious holiday in the city of Karbala, Iraq, in late April of this year? (Those are self-inflicted scimitar wounds, by the way.) Story here.)



Or, Nidal Nasser Hussein?




Complete story here.

Poindexter is out....

WASHINGTON, July 31 — The Pentagon official who oversaw the development of a plan for the military to operate a terrorist futures-trading market is resigning under pressure, a senior defense official said today.

John M. Poindexter, a retired rear admiral who was President Ronald Reagan's national security adviser, is stepping down "in the next few weeks," the official said, following disclosure of a proposal that outraged lawmakers and embarrassed senior Pentagon officials. The plan was to create in essence an online betting parlor that would have rewarded investors who forecast terrorist attacks, assassinations and coups.

As if there weren't quite a few other--better--reasons to oust the guy. Or never appoint him in the first place. Like, duh, he's a felon! In 1988, he was convicted of conspiracy, obstruction of Congress and making false statements, all in connection to Iran-Contra. The convictions were reversed on a technicality in 1991.

Of course, our current head-of-state is a military deserter who actually lost the election....

I'm glad Poindexter's out. Now, when are we going to impeach Bush?

Complete story here.

Divine intervention in Iraq…?   

This Aussie columnist argues convincingly that for Bush and others like him, a belief in divine election has been conflated with the idea that America itself is a God-directed project, placing the rest of the world in grave danger.

...What is lacking in the Pentagon and the White House is not intelligence (or not, at any rate, of the kind we are considering here), but receptivity. Theirs is not a failure of information, but a failure of ideology.

To understand why this failure persists, we must first grasp a reality which has seldom been discussed in print. The US is no longer just a nation. It is now a religion. Its soldiers have entered Iraq to liberate its people not only from their dictator, their oil and their sovereignty, but also from their darkness.

As Bush told his troops on the day he announced victory: "Wherever you go, you carry a message of hope - a message that is ancient and ever new. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, 'To the captives, come out, and to those in darkness, be free."'

So US soldiers are no longer merely terrestrial combatants; they have become missionaries. They are no longer simply killing enemies; they are casting out demons.

Similarly, he says, the presidency is turning into a priesthood.

So those who question Bush's foreign policy are no longer merely critics; they are blasphemers, or "anti-Americans". Those foreign states which seek to change this policy are wasting their time: you can negotiate with politicians; you cannot negotiate with priests. The US has a divine mission, as Bush suggested in January: "to defend ... the hopes of all mankind".

Check it out here. (Thanks, Emily, for the heads-up!)

Why are they so scared...?

WASHINGTON -- President Bush said Wednesday he has government lawyers working on a law that would define marriage as a union between a woman and a man, casting aside calls to legalize gay marriages.

"I believe marriage is between a man and a woman and I believe we ought to codify that one way or the other and we have lawyers looking at the best way to do that," the president said a wide-ranging news conference at the White House Rose Garden.

Bush also urged, however, that America remain a "welcoming country" -- not polarized on the issue of homosexuality.

"I am mindful that we're all sinners and I caution those who may try to take a speck out of the neighbor's eye when they got a log in their own," the president said. "I think it is important for our society to respect each individual, to welcome those with good hearts."

"On the other hand, that does not mean that someone like me needs to compromise on the issue of marriage," he added.

When he says "someone like me," does he mean a callous, vain, holier-than-thou, devious and hypocritical charlatan?

And, for the record, in September, 1996, President Clinton signed the misleadingly-named "Defense of Marriage Act," that requires the federal government to ignore legal marriages between same-sex couples and allows states to do likewise. What Bush is talking about here is an amendment to the Constitution stipulating the same thing.

Complete story here.

California has a budget...!

Capping the lengthiest legislative session in state history, the Assembly on Tuesday approved a $100 billion spending plan and sent it to Gov. Gray Davis.

[...]

While the new plan closes a $38.2 billion shortfall through a combination of borrowing, tax shifts, fees and spending cuts, lawmakers acknowledged it will also leave California with an $8 billion gap between income and spending in the next fiscal year.

"Make no mistake, this is a budget that will, in fact, hurt people," said Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson, D-Culver City, who kept sleep-deprived lawmakers in the building all night, refusing to let them leave without a deal.

Wesson actually "locked down" the chambers to force lawmakers to come to a deal. Any legislator who tried to leave could be arrested by the sergeant at arms!

Complete story here.

"Living the American dream...."

It seems that the conservative Republican from north San Diego county, who single-handedly financed the campaign to put the recall of Governor Gray Davis on the California ballot, has been a bit loose and careless with the facts regarding his youth, military-service record and business career.

...In his short political career, Issa — so far the only declared Republican candidate for governor in the special election this fall — has faced both small and large questions about his record in business and the military and his brushes with the law. Republican and Democratic opponents have accused him of concealing arrests as a youth and embellishing his personal story.

The [L.A.] Times examined Issa's statements and campaign literature over the past 13 years and compared them with military records and other public documents. The review reveals a number of claims contradicted or were unsupported by records and verifiable facts.

Like Bush, not only has Issa frequently embellished his credentials and life-story, but when confronted with the facts, he follows the time-tested strategy that the best defense is a strong offense:

Issa now attributes some of these discrepancies to misunderstandings or omissions from his Army records. He blames Gov. Gray Davis for the questions about his resume, some of which were first raised by fellow Republicans in his 1998 run for the U.S. Senate.[Emphasis mine.]

"Gray's job is to get you to ask 30-year-old questions," he angrily told a Times reporter Saturday at a Sacramento rally, where he accused Davis of "felony behavior."

"If you want to be a shill for Gray Davis' opposition questions, go ahead. We've moved on."

Even Issa’s whiny petulance is reminiscent of Bush.

Well, lying has worked incredibly well so far for the president, so why shouldn’t Issa go for it?

Check out the real story behind the guy whose efforts to wrest office from a duly-elected governor is going to force Californian taxpayers to foot a $30 to $60 million bill for a recall election here.

Why not...?

It's like this in Canada and most of western Europe. Why not here?

...So-called healthy competition can only be possible in an environment where healthcare workers have strong unions and patients have strong consumer advocates fighting for their interests. Unions and advocacy groups are crucial to the American way of life. But currently, the situation in healthcare is different. HMOs all look the same, they all offer similar inefficient, ineffective, insincere products at a premium cost to the patients. To be sure, they are constantly decreasing what they pay to providers, but the savings goes into their own pockets, not back into the system. The term for this uniformly poor product is not competition but collusion. Expanding this private system to include the elderly and the infirm would be to expand the problem, not its solution.

The solution is to centralize healthcare under governmental control, where there is at least a basic health insurance available for all. The government bureaucracy may have many inefficiencies, but it nonetheless better serves the public than a corporation motivated strictly by profit. Patients are a large constituency and can, and should, influence re-election if the system is not going well.

Second: Prescription drugs should be covered for all elderly, but the first question that must be addressed is, At what cost? Many of these drugs are overpriced duplicates of one another. The government should not be asked to swallow these prices but should use the entire group of elderly as a cohort to force lower, more reasonable prices. This is the current system throughout much of Western Europe, and one of the main reasons drug prices are so much lower there.

I know this has been said before, but Dr. Marc Siegel, at The Nation, said it so passionately and articulately that I got all inspired again!

Complete column here.

Why don't they just become Republicans...?

PHILADELPHIA, July 28 — The moderate Democratic group that helped elect Bill Clinton to the White House in 1992 warned today that Democrats were headed for defeat if they presented themselves as an angry "far left" party fighting tax cuts and opposing the war in Iraq.

The warning, by the Democratic Leadership Council, an organization of moderate [sic] Democrats that helped move the party to the center 10 years ago, was largely a response to the popularity enjoyed in early presidential primary states by Howard Dean, the former governor of Vermont.

Dr. Dean has attracted wide notice for his criticism of the Democratic Party for supporting the Iraq war and some of President Bush's tax cuts. [emphasis mine]

This story lays bare the true heart of the modern Democratic Party. Mark J. Penn, a Democratic pollster who worked for Mr. Clinton and now advises Senator Lieberman, is quoted, "We're at a postwar historic low of Democratic Party membership." The conclusion he and other DNC loyalists draw, however, is that the Democratic Party must move even further right.

Why don't they get it?! In historic numbers, voters are opting out precisely because the Democrats' Republican-Lite fare repels them. If they're as conservative as the DLC, they can vote Republican, for crissakes! Whereas, we leftists can only turn to underdogs, like Kucinich.

As for Dean, he doesn’t deserve the moniker of “liberal.” He’s pro-gun, pro-death-penalty and fiscally conservative. Twenty years ago, his stands would have made him a Republican!

Complete story here.

Bush fights former P.O.W.'s over Iraqi money....

When 21 freed American P.O.W.'s returned home from the Persian Gulf war in March 1991, Dick Cheney, then secretary of defense, welcomed them at Andrews Air Force Base, Md.

"Every man and woman who cares for freedom," Mr. Cheney said, "owes you a very special measure of gratitude."

Of those 21 former prisoners of war, 17, who had been tortured by their Iraqi captors, would like something more tangible. This month they won a court award of almost $1 billion against Iraq, and a federal law says they may be paid from frozen Iraqi funds.

The Bush administration has expressed sympathy for the plaintiffs over what they endured but is fighting them about the money, saying it is urgently needed to rebuild Iraq.

The government is citing "foreign policy interests in ensuring a safe and successful transition in Iraq," as justification for trying to stiff the P.O.W.'s out of their money.

Whenever the Bush administration starts saying how grateful they are, grab hold of your wallets!

Complete story here.

Stranger than fiction....

WASHINGTON, July 29 - The Pentagon office that proposed spying electronically on Americans to monitor potential terrorists has quickly abandoned an idea in which anonymous speculators would have bet on forecasting terrorist attacks, assassinations and coups in an online futures market.

[...]

Under the discarded plan, traders bullish on a biological attack on Israel, say, or bearish on the chances of a North Korean missile strike would have had the opportunity to bet on the likelihood of such events on a new Internet site established by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

The Pentagon called its latest idea a new way of predicting events and part of its search for the ``broadest possible set of new ways to prevent terrorist attacks.'' But two Democratic senators who disclosed the plan on Monday called it morally repugnant and grotesque. The senators said the program fell under the control of Adm. John M. Poindexter, President Ronald Reagan's national security adviser.

One of the two senators, Byron L. Dorgan of North Dakota, said the idea seemed so preposterous that he had trouble persuading people it was not a hoax. ``Can you imagine,'' Mr. Dorgan asked, ``if another country set up a betting parlor so that people could go in - and is sponsored by the government itself - people could go in and bet on the assassination of an American political figure?''

After Mr. Dorgan and his fellow critic, Ron Wyden of Oregon, spoke out, the Pentagon sought to play down the importance of a program for which the Bush administration has sought $8 million through 2005. The White House also altered the Web site so that the potential events to be considered by the market that were visible earlier in the day at www.policyanalysismarket.org could no longer be seen.

Oddly enough, the principle behind this actually works. Markets have been amazingly successful at predicting seemingly random events, because they are effective tools at collecting dispersed and even hidden information on a grand scale.

That said, betting on the potential assassination of a foreign leader or the likelihood of a deadly hijacking is, to say the least, ethically questionable and morally offensive. I don't know how the White House or the Pentagon could have thought this program, euphemistically called the "Policy Analysis Market," and intended to start registering traders on Friday--would fly politically. Especially with John Poindexter, of Iran-Contra infamy, in charge!

Complete story here.

And this is not...!

VATICAN CITY (AP) -- The Vatican hopes to rally public opposition to gay marriages in a worldwide campaign spurred by its alarm over growing legal acceptance of same-sex unions in Europe and North America.

Pope John Paul II has been speaking out for months against legislative proposals to legalize same-sex marriages. But instructions to be released this week go a step further by outlining a course of action for politicians and other lay people to oppose extending the rights accorded to traditional couples, Vatican officials told The Associated Press.

This makes me so angry! Any group purporting to be in favor of "family values," should welcome gay marriage as it increases the potential for more stable families.

Moreover, if the Catholic hierarchy devoted even a fraction of the hypocritical attention they waste opposing gay rights to protecting children from sexually-predatory priests, the world would be a safer and happier place for all.

The article states that the Vatican is concerned about "the waning influence of the church in Europe." If so, the Pope and his hidebound clerics should remove their collective heads from the sands of medieval denial and join the 21st Century!

Complete story here.

This is so cool...!

After 70 years of helping brides walk down the aisle, Condé Nast's Bride's magazine has crossed a threshold of its own. Its September-October issue, on newsstands now, contains a full-page article on same-sex weddings. This is the first time that any of the five top-selling bridal magazines has published such a feature.

Okay, I know it's profit-driven, but still!

Complete story here.

Saudi cakewalk….

Think this has anything to do with the U.S. Congressional report on the intelligence failures related to 9/11, critical of the Saudis, released here last week?

JIDDAH, Saudi Arabia -- Six suspected militants were killed Monday in a firefight with Saudi police, who raided a farm where they were hiding out. Two police also were killed.

The shootout, which came amid an anti-terror crackdown in the kingdom, took place in al-Qassim, 220 miles north of the capital, Riyadh, state-run TV quoted a Ministry of Interior statement as saying.

The article later suggests as much. (Check out the quote from the defense minister! Isn't he as much as saying that the Saudis have gotten a free pass from the Bush family?)

A U.S. Congress report on Sept. 11 released last week accused Saudi Arabia of not doing enough to counter terrorism.

The unclassified version of the report also said that one suspected organizer still at large paid many of the expenses of two Sept. 11 hijackers and "had access to seemingly unlimited funding from Saudi Arabia." It did not say if Saudi government funds were involved.

Saudi officials have rejected those conclusions.

"We are confident about ourselves and it is just a matter of mere talk," Defense Minister Prince Sultan was quoted by the official Saudi Press Agency as saying Sunday night. "The American administration under the leadership of Bush has declared officially that the kingdom is not a party in these issues."

Complete story here.

Time to bring up 9/11....

Bush’s slipping popularity, the MIA WMDs in Iraq, and the rising numbers of Americans coming home in body-bags seems to be spooking Bush and his minions. So, in true NeoCon fashion, they’re stoking the fires of fear.

WASHINGTON, July 27 — Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz, defending the Bush administration's justification of the Iraq war, said today that intelligence on terrorism is by its nature "murky," and that the United States may have little choice in the future but to "act on the basis of murky intelligence" if terror attacks are to be prevented.

Mr. Wolfowitz appeared on three television programs today, carrying a message about the progress [???]he had witnessed on a recent tour of Iraq. But he was pressed on each to defend the intelligence that portrayed Iraq as holding banned weapons that posed an imminent threat — weapons that have yet to be found.

"I think the lesson of 9/11 is that if you're not prepared to act on the basis of murky intelligence, then you're going to have to act after the fact, and after the fact now means after horrendous things have happened to this country," Mr. Wolfowitz said on "Fox News Sunday," referring to the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks on the United States.

One implication of Wolfowitz's statement is that Americans are safer from terrorist attacks now than we were before the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan: an assertion I strongly challenge.

Also, when will Americans balk at the hypocritical and cynical use of the innocent deaths on 9/11 to advance a political agenda on the books of the Project for the New American Century long before the 9/11 attacks?

We are currently squandering $5 billion a month of taxpayers money on military costs alone in Iraq and Afghanistan. That sum doesn’t begin to tally the costs of infrastructure repair—money also flowing from taxpayers’ wallets into the pockets of the business associates of George Bush Sr. and Jr., Dick Cheney and assorted other administration officials and hangers-on.

In the same NY Times article, Senator Richard Lugar, Republican of Indiana and the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is said to have called on the administration for a budget plan for security, aid and reconstruction costs that would cover four years. Do the math: that’s $240 billion dollars, over the next four years for the military costs alone. Consider what that will do to our domestic budget.

Of course, we may pull out of Afghanistan, which could save $1 billion/year. Then again, we may invade Iran, Syria, North Korea or the Philippines. With the fanatics currently in control of the White House, who knows? Especially if it looks like Bush might lose the 2004 election.

Complete story here.