Hot Potato Mash

VIDEO EXCLUSIVE: Dr. William Pepper on James Earl Ray's Innocence, Sirhan Sirhan's Innocence, 9/11 Truth and Prosecuting War Crimes

Dr. William F. Pepper is an internationally acclaimed lawyer who defended James Earl Ray in a 1999 civil trial (supported by Martin Luther King's family) where the jury found Ray not responsible for the MLK assassination. Now Pepper is defending Sirhan Sirhan for the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, a case he says is “an easier one than the assassination of Martin King and the innocence of James Earl Ray”.

Last Wednesday Pepper spoke about all of his projects, including 9/11 truth and prosecuting the Bush administration for war crimes, to a packed celebrity filled house in Los Angeles. Among those in attendance were Ed Asner, Gina Belafonte, Judd Nelson and 9/11 author Professor David Ray Griffin. Videos of his talk follow below... 

Part 1 (6:21) - Introduction 

In Part 1 Pepper talks about his background, childhood and motivation. He also speaks about the time he spent in Cuba playing baseball where he got to know Fidel Castro. According to Pepper, Castro foresaw much of what is happening in the United States today:

“When, in that massive country to the north, the masses of the people ever understand what it is that their ruling class has done to them and is doing to them, there will be such a torrent of opposition. They will rise like never before and then there will be the world’s greatest social revolution, the American second revolution.”

The video concludes with Pepper explaining how he came to work for Robert F. Kennedy and Martin King: 

 

Part 2 (5:36) - Martin Luther King, Jr. Assassination/James Earl Ray Innocence 

“Took me ten years to convince myself that [James Earl Ray] was an absolute patsy” - Dr. William Pepper 

In Part 2 Pepper begins with the Martin King assassination and explains how he became involved with James Earl Ray's defense some nine years later. He also goes into detail about the 30 day civil trial against Loyd Jowers, et al, where a jury found Ray not responsible for King's assassination after listening to 70 witnesses under oath. 

Pepper believes that Ray's civil trial should serve as a template for getting out the truth in a wide range of cover-ups including the Robert F. Kennedy assassination and 9/11. He thinks using the courts is an effective way to get the truth into the public record despite the efforts by the mainstream media to prevent its dissemination to the public.

 

Part 3 (9:56) - Robert F. Kennedy Assassination/Sirhan Sirhan Innocence 

“I found from just a preliminary examination of the record that [the Sirhan Sirhan case] on the law, on the facts of the case, was an easier one than the assassination of Martin King and the innocence of James Earl Ray” - Dr. William Pepper 

In the first half of Part 3 Pepper details the startling evidence that necessitates a second shooter in the assassination of Bobby Kennedy. For starters the medical examiner states that Kennedy was shot four times from the rear including one shot about an inch behind his right ear which conflicts with all the witness testimony that Sirhan was always three to five feet in front of the likely Democratic presidential nominee.

Secondly, the analysis of audio recordings from the assassination with formerly unavailable new technology has led to the determination that 13 shots were fired at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Sirhan's gun only held 8 bullets. In other words: 

“There had to be a second shooter there” - Dr. William Pepper

In the second half of Part 3 Pepper details the efforts taken by the prison and the Department of Corrections to prevent his legal team from psychoanalyzing Sirhan Sirhan.

Part 4 (4:59) - Robert F. Kennedy Assassination (Continued) 

In Part 4 Pepper continues the RFK assassination discussion and his efforts to clear Sirhan Sirhan whom he says is innocent:

“The problem we face is if we get our client clearly innocent of the killing of Bob Kennedy – which he is, clearly innocent of that killing – he has five other counts of attempted murder” - Dr. William Pepper

In addition to the belief in Sirhan's innocence Pepper believes the case is important because it is representative of a larger problem facing the country:

“Each of the things I’m talking about are symptomatic of a pervasive sickness in this country. This is not the country we were all led to believe it was or should have been. This is what has emerged because we have had a small group of criminals grab power over a period of time following the orders of the people in the shadows who really do dominate life and justice and the injustices that exist in the society.” - Dr. William Pepper

Part 5 (8:36) - 9/11 

“The 9/11 matter is, in my lifetime, the most traumatic assault on democracy and the safety of this Republic.” - Dr. William Pepper

Part 5 is dedicated to finding out the truth about 9/11. Pepper supports two different ways for accomplishing this goal. First, he backs an effort to create a new commission to investigate 9/11 by New York state referendum. Volunteers are currently trying to get the necessary 30,000 signatures from registered New York voters to get the measure on the ballot.

The second approach is to once again file a lawsuit in the courts. Pepper is leading this effort on behalf of the Jersey Girls and plans to sue, among others, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, who is widely believed to have sent $100,000 to lead 9/11 hijacker, Mohammed Atta.

Part 6 (8:03) - War Crimes 

“I’m determined that what I saw in Vietnam and what is happening in Iraq will not go unpunished. Absolutely determined that that’s the case. What that means is this entire gang of war criminals in Washington are going to have to be prosecuted” - Dr. William Pepper

Part 6 covers what Pepper believes is his most important project -- the prosecution of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, David Addington, Doug Feith and Richard Pearl, et al, for war crimes.

Pepper plans to accomplish this monumental task by following the precedent set in the case of Chilean dictator General Augusto Pinochet. In that case, a Spanish judge issued an international arrest warrant for Pinochet whose charges including 94 counts of torture.

Ultimately Pepper hopes for a conviction in absentia of the American war criminals which would prevent the guilty from ever stepping foot outside of the United States.

NOTE: To order a DVD of the night's entire programming, which includes a lively Q & A session with Dr. William Pepper and a talk by Professor David Ray Griffin on new 9/11 evidence, please contact Kathleen at quantumysticKFR@gmail.com to request a copy.

“An Act of State: The Execution of Martin Luther King, New and Updated Edition” (William F. Pepper)

“Orders to Kill: The Truth Behind the Murder of Martin Luther King, Jr” (William F. Pepper)

Technorati Tags: 11, administration, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, Dr. WIlliam Pepper, Fidel Castro, George W. Bush, iraq, James Earl Ray, Jersey Girls, Martin Luther King Jr., puppy, Robert F. Kennedy, september11, Sirhan Sirhan, torture, war crimes

ENDGAME: Bush & Cheney's Desperate Measures

NYU professor and election integrity guru Mark Crispin Miller:

There's no doubt that the GOP is in big trouble, facing catastrophic losses in the House and Senate this November. But if you believe that Bush and Cheney will observe the law and honor the traditions of American democracy, and therefore let themselves be forced from power, you're living in a world of happy dreams.

The fact is that this criminal regime cannot afford to drop their guns and walk out here amongst the rest of us; and there's much evidence that they do not intend to let that happen--ever. So we had better face that evidence (i.e., unearth it, since the media has largely played it down, or tuned it out), and brace ourselves for a protracted fight; because those men are capable of anything that will maintain their death-grip on the US government.

In this new vlog, I talk about that evidence (or some of it), and what we may expect before Election Day. Here is Part One (7:51):

Part Two (7:02)

UPDATE: Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo has an excellent post on one way the GOP is gaming the system.

UPDATE II: And don't miss this despicable story from The Texas Observer.

"Loser Take All: Election Fraud and The Subversion of Democracy, 2000 - 2008" (Ig Publishing)

"Fooled Again: The Real Case for Electoral Reform" (Mark Crispin Miller)

Technorati Tags: Mark Crispin Miller

BUSH LEAGUE JUSTICE: Rep. Wexler: 'IT'S TIME FOR CONGRESS TO STAND UP AND GET ANSWERS'

Dan Abrams revisited the political prosecution of former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman in light of Karl Rove's refusal to testify before the House Judiciary Committee in an excellent segment last night with Gov. Siegelman and Florida Representative Robert Wexler.

Towards the end of the piece Gov. Siegelman gave an excellent summary of where we stand:

“Karl Rove and this administration have thumbed their nose at Congress. They have clearly engaged in systematic and calculated abuses of power relating not just to the abuse at the Department of Justice but to other areas of importance to the American people. And Congress, rightfully so, should press Karl Rove to come and testify under oath and answer these questions.”

And Rep. Wexler agreed by calling on the House Judiciary Committee to issue a subpoena to Rove:

“We need to literally uphold the checks and balances that this administration has so abused.” And, “no American citizen has the right to ignore a Congressional subpoena. Not Karl Rove. Not anyone else.”

Beyond agreeing on the need to subpoena Karl Rove all three men also agreed that the Siegelman case is much bigger than about the innocence of one man. Here's Rep. Wexler on the bigger picture:

“What we are witnessing is a pattern of abuse of power by the Bush administration. It happened when they fired several US Attorneys for political reasons and Mr. Bolton and Ms. Miers refused to testify before Congress. It now is happening with the issue of torture. We have asked, subpoenaed, the Vice President's Chief of Staff to come before Congress and answer whether or not the administration illegally ordered the use of torture. It's time for Congress to stand up and get answers”.

And speaking of the bigger picture, you will note that I get almost 4 seconds of air time beginning at the 2:05 mark! 

Technorati Tags: Dan Abrams, Don Siegelman, Karl Rove, MSNBC, Bush League Justice, Robert Wexler

Universal Health Care For Iraq War Mercenaries - No Joke

Bhc explains the curious arrangement between the Department of Defense and its contractors:

Since contractors are not covered by the VA, they had to buy insurance for their employees. These employees would be in Iraq, and this did not sit well with the insurance companies. Nonetheless, the insurance was bought, but because it was too expensive, the US government paid the premiums for the contractor. But it gets worse.

Or better, depending upon one's perspective. There existed some “fine print” in those insurance policies, explicitly stating that injuries due to “hostile action” would not be covered. Hardly appropriate insurance for any American going to Iraq, let alone those jackasses from Blackwater. And so the US government stepped in to spare the struggling defense contractor from those onerous insurance premiums. Hmmm, maybe that free market ain't so great.

Ahh, but it is! Because that free market can somehow convince the government to pay for the free market insurance for the free market contractor. And that demonstrates just how awesome the free market is; getting the taxpayer to pay for what would normally be considered the costs of doing business. Because it's all about the short term.

So, what we have here is the US government outsourcing to private mercenary contractors, paying their insurance premiums for coverage that doesn't exist. And then the US government will pay for the treatment of those injured and maimed contractors because the insurance they paid for Blackwater security guards in Iraq does not cover injuries due to “hostile actions.” That is what is called, “externalizing costs.” That's efficient.

Read the entire post at SHOCKFRONT.ORG

UPDATE: Much more info on the Defense Base Act Insurance (h/t Marcie Hascall Clark)

UPDATE: Still more valuable info at the Defense Base Act Blog

“Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army” (Jeremy Scahill)

Technorati Tags: Blackwater, Mercenaries, Universal Health Care

The President Is A Fugitive From Justice - Why Eliot Spitzer Was Taken Down

Simply not to be missed!

Technorati Tags: Greg Palast

'60 Minutes' Expose On The Malicious Prosecution Of Former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman

FASCISM ALERT/UPDATE: This astonishing investigative report was BLACKED OUT in parts of Alabama and New York!

UPDATE: Scott Horton's must read on the 60 Minutes piece

Part 1 (9:52)

Part 2 (3:57)

Cross-posted at Brad Blog.

60 Minutes To Air Don Siegelman Report This Sunday!

ALERT: Set your TIVO/VCR to record “60 Minutes” this Sunday (opposite the Academy Awards)!

The MSM is finally taking up the egregious case of former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman who is literally an American political prisoner thanks in no small part to Karl Rove.

For much more on this shocking case check out Scott Horton's great work at Harper's and the Don Siegelman website.

UDPDATE: How is Karl Rove not in prison?

Technorati Tags: 60 Minutes, Don Siegelman, Karl Rove

Bonus 'Bush League Justice' Segment On Tanner Resignation

Former DoJ attorney David Becker and The Washington Post's Dana Milbank joined Dan Abrams on MSNBC to discuss the resignation of John Tanner as chief of the voting section of the Civil Rights Division at the Justice Department. Throughout their conversation all three repeatedly credit Tanner's ridiculous comments at the National Latino Congreso, which I caught on video and reported about with Brad Friedman at The Brad Blog, for his downfall:

Milbank: “This guy simply became too difficult to handle, not  necessarily because of the policies you've been talking about, but because of that one line.”

Milbank: “Let's remember, he was sort of abused before this committee in the House, they wanted him to come before this committee to explain his record, to explain the Georgia Voter ID law. The Justice Department wasn't letting him go. Then he let his mouth slip. Then they let him go. They weren't apologizing for the record here, they were saying, well, we're gonna have to cut him loose because of this one bad line.”

Abrams: “Right. And this is the line about saying, ”white people tend to live longer“.

Abrams: ”The bottom line is that it is this comment in conjunction with the fact that everything they have done in the voting rights section is consistent with a guy who says things like, “white people live longer”, and that's the reason this is significant.“

Becker: ”Yeah, it's nice that they are now, once they get caught, concerned about the feelings of voters whose feelings they might hurt...

Well thank you very much!

Bush League Justice Series

MSNBC's Live With Dan Abrams ran a four-part series this week titled, “Bush League Justice”, which investigated the administration's abuse of the Department of Justice to expand its power.

Day 1 - Bush Administration's Use Of The DoJ To Expand Its Own Power

The series began with a look into the “department's almost unrecognizable Civil Rights Division” and even includes a snippet of my infamous John Tanner video (without credit!) first posted and reported about on The Brad Blog.

Day 2 - Bush Administration's 'Unprecedented Use' of Signing Statements To Subvert The Law

A signing statement is a president's written interpretation of legislation passed by congress which accompanies his signature when he signs a bill into law. Bush has used signing statements almost twice as much as all the presidents that preceded him combined and has often done so to circumvent the law.

For example, in 2005 congress voted overwhelmingly to ban torture which Bush signed into law. However, Bush also included a signing statement which basically allowed him to ignore the new law.

Day 3 - Partisan Investigations and Prosecutions

Despite the overwhelming criminality of Republicans since Bush was gift wrapped the White House by the Supreme Court, Democrats have been investigated and prosecuted at nearly six times the rate of Republicans at the federal level.

Day 4 - The Controversial Prosecution Of Former Democratic Alabama Governor Don Siegelman

Evidence suggests that Siegelman, who remains in prison, was wrongly prosecuted by prominent Alabama Republicans with the help of Karl Rove.

Dan Abrams concludes the series by stating, “Now while this was the last episode of this series, our ”Bush League“ investigations are far from over. A new Attorney General has taken over. We are going to be watching very closely. The days of Justice Department malfeasance remaining under the mainstream media radar are over. You are on notice.”

The Great Iraq Swindle

Please do yourself a favor and read this Rolling Stone article:

How is it done? How do you screw the taxpayer for millions, get away with it and then ride off into the sunset with one middle finger extended, the other wrapped around a chilled martini? Ask Earnest O. Robbins -- he knows all about being a successful contractor in Iraq.

You start off as a well-connected bureaucrat: in this case, as an Air Force civil engineer, a post from which Robbins was responsible for overseeing 70,000 servicemen and contractors, with an annual budget of $8 billion. You serve with distinction for thirty-four years, becoming such a military all-star that the Air Force frequently sends you to the Hill to testify before Congress -- until one day in the summer of 2003, when you retire to take a job as an executive for Parsons, a private construction company looking to do work in Iraq.

Now you can finally move out of your dull government housing on Bolling Air Force Base and get your wife that dream home you've been promising her all these years. The place on Park Street in Dunn Loring, Virginia, looks pretty good -- four bedrooms, fireplace, garage, 2,900 square feet, a nice starter home in a high-end neighborhood full of spooks, think-tankers and ex-apparatchiks moved on to the nest-egg phase of their faceless careers. On October 20th, 2003, you close the deal for $775,000 and start living that private-sector good life.

A few months later, in March 2004, your company magically wins a contract from the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq to design and build the Baghdad Police College, a facility that's supposed to house and train at least 4,000 police recruits. But two years and $72 million later, you deliver not a functioning police academy but one of the great engineering clusterfucks of all time, a practically useless pile of rubble so badly constructed that its walls and ceilings are literally caked in shit and piss, a result of subpar plumbing in the upper floors.

You've done such a terrible job, in fact, that when auditors from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction visit the college in the summer of 2006, their report sounds like something out of one of the Saw movies: “We witnessed a light fixture so full of diluted urine and feces that it would not operate,” they write, adding that “the urine was so pervasive that it had permanently stained the ceiling tiles” and that “during our visit, a substance dripped from the ceiling onto an assessment team member's shirt.” The final report helpfully includes a photo of a sloppy brown splotch on the outstretched arm of the unlucky auditor.

When Congress gets wind of the fias co, a few members on the House Oversight Committee demand a hearing. To placate them, your company decides to send you to the Hill -- after all, you're a former Air Force major general who used to oversee this kind of contracting operation for the government. So you take your twenty-minute ride in from the suburbs, sit down before the learned gentlemen of the committee and promptly get asked by an irritatingly eager Maryland congressman named Chris Van Hollen how you managed to spend $72 million on a pile of shit.

You blink. Fuck if you know. “I have some conjecture, but that's all it would be” is your deadpan answer.

The room twitters in amazement. It's hard not to applaud the balls of a man who walks into Congress short $72 million in taxpayer money and offers to guess where it all might have gone.

Next thing you know, the congressman is asking you about your company's compensation. Touchy subject -- you've got a “cost-plus” contract, which means you're guaranteed a base-line profit of three percent of your total costs on the deal. The more you spend, the more you make -- and you certainly spent a hell of a lot. But before this milk-faced congressman can even think about suggesting that you give these millions back, you've got to cut him off. “So you won't voluntarily look at this,” Van Hollen is mumbling, “and say, given what has happened in this project . . . ”

“No, sir, I will not,” you snap.

“. . . 'We will return the profits.' . . .”

“No, sir, I will not,” you repeat.

Your testimony over, you wait out the rest of the hearing, go home, take a bath in one of your four bathrooms, jump into bed with the little woman. . . . A year later, Iraq is still in flames, and your president's administration is safely focused on reclaiming $485 million in aid money from a bunch of toothless black survivors of Hurricane Katrina. But the house you bought for $775K is now assessed at $929,974, and you're sure as hell not giving it back to anyone.

“Yeah, I don't know what I expected him to say,” Van Hollen says now about the way Robbins responded to being asked to give the money back. “It just shows the contempt they have for us, for the taxpayer, for everything.”

Operation Iraqi Freedom, it turns out, was never a war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. It was an invasion of the federal budget, and no occupying force in history has ever been this efficient. George W. Bush's war in the Mesopotamian desert was an experiment of sorts, a crude first take at his vision of a fully privatized American government. In Iraq the lines between essential government services and for-profit enterprises have been blurred to the point of absurdity -- to the point where wounded soldiers have to pay retail prices for fresh underwear, where modern-day chattel are imported from the Third World at slave wages to peel the potatoes we once assigned to grunts in KP, where private companies are guaranteed huge profits no matter how badly they fuck things up.

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SILENCE IS BETRAYAL!

One hopes that with all the money the wealthiest 0.6% of Americans - who received 75% of $92 Billion in savings from Bush's generous tax policies on capital gains and dividends in 2005 - were able to get themselves a sweet second or third yacht. Of course, this is a double whammy for the other 99.4% of us who not only didn't see much benefit from Bush's tax cuts but now share in the responsibility of making up those lost revenues to the government. Some more fun stats from Citizens for Tax Justice:

*Half of all tax filers (67 million Americans) reported an adjusted gross income of less than $30,000 and received virtually NONE of the benefits from the tax cuts.

*0.6% reported incomes greater than $500,000 and received tax deductions averaging $81,204 and accounted for 73.4% of the total tax savings.

*13,776 tax filers with gross incomes greater than $10 million or 0.1% of all filers, received 28.2% of the total benefits averaging $1,876,280 each!!!!!

Read the two page report from CTJ (PDF)

Meanwhile,

*The number of Americans living in extreme poverty has grown 26% since 2000. In all, 37 million Americans, or about 12% of the country, now live with “low food security,” uh, poverty.

*2 out of 5 elderly Americans live on less than $18,000 a year including social security.

*Low income Americans with disabilities experienced 50% cuts in their housing programs.

*Half of all IRS audits are now conducted on Americans making less than $25,000 per year.

For more dismal statistics on the rich poor divide see one of my earlier BRAD BLOG posts.

Thankfully Bush recognizes a problem when he sees it and before leaving on his month long vacation stressed that we need a new round of corporate tax cuts to make sure US corporations stay competitive!

In all fairness, it takes huge balls and a lot of propaganda to convince anyone that what the country needs is more corporate giveaways to the rich. That is a tall order that will require great effort by Bush. And it will be essential for him to recharge his batteries over a long vacation before the big sell. And if it means that he crushes Ronald Reagan's two term vacation record with 17 months to go in office, so be it.

Plus, nobody wants to be in the Capital during the God awful month of August when temperatures regularly hit a humid 100 degrees. Perhaps it was the heat that allowed Congressional Democrats to pass the new FISA law - which seems to get worse and worse by the day - before leaving on vacation. But Washington heat ain't nothing compared to Baghdad heat, huh, Tony Snow:

“You know, it's 130 degrees in Baghdad in August.”

Which helps explain why the Iraqi parliament is taking the month off as well. Surely our troops, a record 162,000 strong in Iraq, will get the month off too, right?  I mean, one suspects that with all their gear, outdoor work and combat, the misery index (weather, though both work) would be worse for our troops than say an air-conditioned Oval Office, uh, speed boat.

Actually, while George W. Bush smashes records for vacation days our troops are getting tours of duty extended from a year to 15 months. And it is a bit odd that Bush would take off so much time right before the crucial General Petreaus report on Iraq. Especially since we are amidst:

“the inescapable calling of our generation”

Oh, I almost forgot that the greater troop levels were the result of Bush's January “Surge” plan. You might recall that the new plan came after great deliberation and partying during which time hundreds of our troops lost their lives:

Ultimately Bush decided upon following neocon Fred Kagan's (fresh off a “very cool” chinook helicopter ride over the Potomac) “Surge” plan which called for an additional 50,000 troops, uh, 35,000, no, 30,000, wait, 50,000, no, 30,000, hold on,  31,500, stop, 20,000, then 35,000, oh, let's just say more troops.

But here's the thing, while Bush and the lawmakers are getting much needed R&R, our depleted troops are dying in the heat of the Iraqi desert by the droves.  Long time reporters in Iraq write about the grim picture. According to our own ambassador in Iraq, electricity in Baghdad can be counted on for “an hour or two a day” which is down from six hours earlier in the year and 16-24 hours under Saddam. Even the Brits admit the Surge will not succeed.

But none of this or the rising troop deaths can dissuade the Bushies who have already kicked up the propaganda so many notches that Emeril Lagasse must be envious. Sadly, the American people continue to buy into it. And the real big propaganda push will not hit until September.

Sadly, the truth is that there is nothing that Petraeus could say that would change the course of the war. As Eugene Robinson wrote in the Washington Post:

But if you think Bush is going to care what Petraeus's report says in September, get out of the sun immediately and drink lots of water. You're delirious.

Clearly Bush will continue this unjust, horrific war until the end of his presidency. And nothing from escalating American and Iraqi body counts to American geopolitical strategy can change his decision which was made long ago. W. has even stated that his presidency will be judged on the long term outcome of Iraq. And since pulling out or significantly reducing troops is akin to failure, Bush ain't budging. In other words, he's passing the buck to the next president. 

This alone is immoral and it is patently absurd that a decision of this magnitude should rest with a man with such an obvious conflict of interest. And since everyone knows this, it is also immoral for the American people to standby and leave the decision to Bush.

And that would be true even if Bush were a moral person. The fact that he is not just makes the situation that much clearer. Lest we forget that he:

*Continues to push legislation to further enrich the super wealthy at the expense of the most needy in society.

*Imposes anti-condom policies throughout Africa which has led to a remarkable rise in HIV/AIDS.

*Ordered the use of grotesque torture methods capable of causing severe psychological impairment on terror suspects.

*Signed a secret executive order authorizing the policy of “extraordinary rendition” which allows the CIA to kidnap any terror suspect from anywhere in the world and transfers them to prisons to be tortured and sometimes killed in countries like Uzbekistan and Egypt.

*Invades countries under false pretenses to further enrich the military industrial complex and his corporatist cronies.

Sick. Martin Luther King Jr. had it right when he said that “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.” How can anyone read that short list of transgressions above and not believe that time is now?

 

More pertinent words of wisdom from Martin Luther King Jr.:

*In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

*When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

*Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

*Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

*The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

We Americans like to think ourselves noble and a country that has done great things for the world. We stopped Hitler for crying out loud. Yes, but that was a couple of generations ago. And by remaining silent, this generation is burying the memory of the “Greatest Generation.”  And our lack of action, for whatever reason, is as immoral as George W. Bush's action.

It is imperative that we wake-up to our faults and correct them before it is too late. For example, a glance at the two pictures below describe a world turned upside down by American military spending and penchant for war and killing:

Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Martin Luther King Jr.

More on these at Paulitics

We Americans seem to be the only ones oblivious to our faults. The entire world has been telling us we are ill for some time. The general consensus around the globe is that the US is a greater threat to world peace than even Iran and North Korea! And our best friends, the Brits, believe that only Osama bin Laden is a greater threat to world peace than the United States.

We are a sick country whose leaders continue to exploit our weakness. And our continued silence is immoral. We sit silently while our government exchanged our leader of the free world status with leader of rogue nations lambast. And if the people will not stand up united and force our leaders to listen to our will, we will become the “infamous generation” whose silence enabled George W. Bush and the corporate elite to destroy the Republic.

“Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed” (Jared Diamond)

“The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers” (Paul Kennedy)

*Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.“ --Martin Luther King Jr.

STOP THE SILENCE! SPEAK OUT NOW!

CEO Speaks Truth To Power

I have a new respect for Overstock CEO Patrick M. Byrne:

In all fairness I should exclude a small number of the Wall Street financial media from the charge of being hand-puppets for financial elites. Barron's is nothing but marketing literature for about 8 hedge funds, the Wall Street Journal is to Wall Street as Sports Illustrated is to sports, Fortune is People Magazine for capitalists, and The New York Post is for people who move their lips when they read People. But the same New York Times which employs Establishment-defending hacks like Floyd Norris and Joe Nocera also employs Gretchen Morgenson, who has integrity. Forbes reporters doing highly-credible jobs on these and related issues include Liz Moyer and Nathan Vardi, while Bloomberg has explored it through the superb investigative stories of Bob Drummond, and broadcast a shocking 25 minute Bloomberg Special Report by Gary Matsumoto. In addition, PBS gave fair treatment to Aguirre. In the same vein, I believe there are honest SEC Commissions (e.g., Cox and Atkins), and that the rank-and-file of the SEC are straight-shooters as well: it is the upper echelons that have lost track of for whom they work. In short, these systems are not monolithic.

Read a lot more at Overstock

(h/t Liz)

My Dog Ate The 2004 Election Results

While most Americans readily admit today that Al Gore won the 2000 election (which was also verified by national media recount of Florida ballots) and that our election system is broken, far fewer believe John Kerry won the 2004 election. This flies in the face of common sense when one considers the criminal proclivity of the Bush administration along with the four years it had to prepare for the '04 election theft from the inside. And it also runs counter to the facts. Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman have the latest in a Free Press article titled, “The criminal cover-up of Ohio's stolen 2004 election sinks to the fraudulent, the absurd, the pathetic”:

The illegal destruction of federally protected 2004 election materials by 56 of 88 Ohio counties has become a fraudulent “dog ate my homework” farce of absurd justifications and criminal coverups.

How absurd? Well, here's one of the many many good explanations for the illegal destruction of Ohio ballots:

“a shelving unit collapsed in the Board of Elections storeroom on the morning of Friday, April 7, 2006. That shelving unit held the voted ballots, stubs, soiled and defaced ballot envelopes, and ballot accounting charts from the 2004 General Election. The shelves and stored items collapsed onto a side table holding a working coffee maker. The carafe on the coffee maker was full at the time of the incident. Many of the stored items had to be destroyed due to the broken glass and hot coffee. The ballot pages and unused ballots were stored on a neighboring shelf and were not damaged.”

That from a county whose “unprecedented massive turnout of homophobic old order Amish voted for Bush and against gay marriage” according to Karl Rove despite fact that the Amish rarely vote. Another county made the unfortunate mistake of putting the ballots on the floor (because they needed the shelf space) in an area that had flooded six straight years. The ballots were destroyed after suffering water damage. There are 56 such stories leading Fitrakis and Harvey to conclude the obvious:

Overall this blatant destruction of evidence only reinforces the widespread belief that the 2004 election was stolen. The loss of ballot materials in a few isolated counties might be an understandable random event. But for more than 60% of the state's BOEs to have destroyed ballots or ballot materials amidst a series of bizarre, absurd explanations is a joke.

A joke indeed. Just not a very funny one. Especially if you are among the 90% or so of Americans being screwed by Bush's policies or the 25 million Iraqis now living in hell.

IMPEACHMENT FRIDAY: THE GOP 2004 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION CRIMINAL CONSPIRACY UNRAVELING

Talk about your smoking gun documents! Truthout has the details in a preview of tomorrow night's “Voter Caging” segment airing on NOW (Check your local PBS listing). What is vote caging? Well, according to the truthout article:

Vote caging is an illegal tactic to suppress minorities from voting by having their names purged from voter rolls when they fail to respond to registered mail sent to their homes. The Republican National Committee signed a consent decree in 1986 stating they would not engage in the practice after they were caught suppressing votes in 1981 and 1986.

And vote caging was one tactic, albeit a large one, used by the GOP to steal Ohio and the 2004 presidential election. And it was a massive conspiracy perpetrated by the George W. Bush reelection campaign and the Republican party. Want proof, check out the damning emails below, many of which carry the subject line, “Voter Reg Fraud Strategy conference calls.”

Want more proof? Why might have the perpetrators have been worried about leaving GOP fingerprints? Perhaps because their effort were highly illegal. Not to mention the general public frowns upon stealing elections and then launching and perpetuating unwanted wars.

 

Note the email domains include both “georgewbush.com” and “rnchq.org” (Republican National Committee Headquarters) and that they are still worried about leaving “fingerprints”. 

 

Finally, it is worth pointing out some of the famous names in these emails. First we have ringleader, former interim US attorney for Arkansas (until the White House got worried that his confirmation hearings would bring up his role in minority voter suppression seen here), Karl Rove protege and crybaby, Tim Griffin!

Second, I am proud to introduce Terry Nelson, who was implicated in a New Hampshire election day phone jamming scheme that helped the GOP steal a 2002 Senate election and led to criminal convictions of many of Nelson's colleagues as well as the New Hampshire Republican State Committee settling a lawsuit brought by state Democrats for $125,000.  Having this kind of blight on your resume is exactly the kind of thing that gets you named Political Director for the Bush-Cheney 2004 reelection campaign. In addition to the dirty work seen here and his ties to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, Nelson was responsible for the 2006 race-baiting ad against Congressman Harold Ford Jr. that got much national exposure and lost his firm an account with Walmart. Finally, Nelson has ties to the Tom DeLay scandal.  All of which made him the #1 campaign guy to get for 2008 which is exactly what frontrunner (at the time), John McCain did, naming Nelson his campaign chief in December 2006.

Also in on the emails according to the truthout article was “Coddy Johnson, the national field director of Bush's 2004 campaign and former associate director of political affairs, working under Karl Rove. Johnson's father was Bush's college roommate at Yale.”

And “Jennifer Millerwise, a former deputy communications director for the Bush-Cheney 2004 re-election campaign and a former spokesperson for Vice President Cheney. Millerwise was interviewed by Patrick Fitzgerald during the federal investigation into the leak of covert CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson.”

Mark “Thor” Hearne made the emails and conference call as well. For the most comprehensive coverage on the web of this shady GOP political operative, see this rather large BRAD BLOG archive.

While this damning evidence does not prove that Bush stole the 2004 election (in addition to the 2000 election), it does prove that his team tried to steal the election which is illegal. By the way, there is mountains of 2004 election evidence that suggests that Kerry did win and rather scant evidence (read almost none) that would indicate a Bush victory. See The Free Press, BRAD BLOG, Mark Crispin Miller, Black Box Voting, the Brennan Center and RFK Jr., among the many election integrity websites, to see for yourself.

Finally, kudos to NOW for covering the story. Perhaps the mainstream media will finally figure out what the US attorney scandal is all about and report it. Ha. Just kidding. That's not gonna happen.

To read more about the specific issues involved in the US attorney scandal and voter caging check out Greg Palast (and here and here), Brad Friedman of BRAD BLOG (and here), The Free Press and Democracy Now.

So the Bush administration has never won an election. They are criminals. Nobody wants them around anymore, not even most Republicans. And we can't impeach why?

MICHAEL MOORE vs. CNN VIDEO EXTRAVAGANZA

Michael Moore vs. Wolf Blitzer Part 1

Michael Moore vs. Wolf Blitzer Part 2

Michael Moore vs. Dr. Sanjay Gupta Part 1
 
Michael Moore vs. Dr. Sanjay Gupta Part 2

Michael Moore vs. Dr. Sanjay Gupta Part 3

Michael Moore's website