Topics covered include: restoring representative democracy, big money and lobbyists, FDR, Gore Vidal's grandfather and his first experience with racism.
Part 2
Topics covered include: Missouri Compromise, Missouri Senator Jim Reed, Missouri's penchant for picking the president, DeLear's endorsement of Barack Obama, the Missouri primary, gerrymandering, the need for Democrats to become the values party in opposition to the GOP money party.
Everyone is abuzz about the NY Times McCain philandering/ethics story but for the wrong reasons. The most troubling aspect of this story is its timing as the Times sat on the story since before the Iowa caucuses. Why run it now a day after the Wisconsin primary and once John McCain has all but wrapped up the GOP nomination?
The answer is what happened in the Wisconsin primary -- that Barack Obama creamed Hillary Clinton and all but assured himself the Democratic nomination for the general election. This was and is horrible news for John McCain and Republican hopes for recapturing the White House in November. As I blogged about here and here, Barack Obama matches up far better than Hillary Clinton against John McCain. This is why we recently found everyone from President Bush to Fox “News'” jumping on the Hillary bandwagon while simultaneously attacking Obama at every opportunity.
Once Obama essentially wrapped up the nomination last night, it became abundantly clear that Republicans needed a Plan D (Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson representing Plans A and B to the McCain Plan C). That Republicans are so willing to throw McCain under the bus is hardly surprising considering he fell into the nomination based more on his supposed opponent (Hillary) and the failure of the other Republican presidential hopefuls rather than based on anything he brought to the table. Once coroneted, McCain still failed to win the hearts of the hardcore CPAC haters or the evangelical base and he continues to struggle against Mike Huckabee despite a full-court press by the GOP establishment.
Clearly the Republican elite saw the Wisconsin results as the last straw. They know that McCain cannot beat Obama no matter how much they rely on the Southern Strategy and stealing elections (which need to be relatively close). The fact is that there is not one significant area where McCain is superior to Obama:
Old vs. Young
Old vs. New
Old vs. Good looking
Anti-hope vs. Hope
Plain spoken vs. Articulate
Uninspiring vs. Inspiring
Another 100 years in Iraq vs. Against the war from the start
Terrible fundraiser vs. Great fundraiser
Lousy campaigner vs. Crazy good campaigner
So while we are going to hear conservative talk radio and Fox “News” rail against the bias of the New York Times in the coming days, it would be wise to withhold judgment until the newspaper clarifies why it held the story until now. Did a GOP insider or a former McCain underling finally corroborate parts of the story? If so, it's safe to assume that those orders came from Republican higher-ups since it would otherwise be career suicide.
And if that is the case, just what is Plan E? Jeb? Cheney? Romney? Newt? Perhaps only Bush's Brain knows...
Excellent piece on the legendary dirty election campaigning South Carolina is known for. The Republican primary in South Carolina is on January 19th while the Democratic primary is on January 26th.
DISCLOSURE: The producer of this NOW on PBS story is a relative.
Start Loving is a peaces activist and humanitarian who finds the spread of empire through the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq immoral. As such, he feels a duty to wake the conscience of the American people. And in an effort to draw more attention to his cause, Start Loving is now camping out 24/7 in front of the House Office Buildings across the street from the Capitol. When I interviewed him on October 22, 2007, Start Loving was three weeks into a hunger strike.
Part 1 (1:49)
Start Loving: “There needs to be a shift on Capitol Hill from a focus on stuff to a focus on people. We in these Houses [Congress] couldn't really care less about the 50,000 lives of our children of the United States that have been destroyed in Iraq so far. I mean some tiny sliver of each of the Congressmen cares but it is certainly not at the forefront of their minds and that's a crime of humanity. The two million people in Iraq that have been killed, before the war and after the war, should be central to our agenda -- figuring out how to ameliorate that, but it's sideline. So, I'm here to be a vote that our priorities need to shift from stuff, careers, corporate profits to a focus on what's priceless which is human life.”
Part 2 (4:54)
Start Loving: The third unmentioned party is the group that I think are the true patriots of this country, the men and women in uniform, that have been brainwashed into thinking that they're fighting for freedom and democracy in Iran and all they are fighting for are corporate profits for Cheney, Bush and their cronies. My proof of that is who would doubt that if people on Capitol Hill, to keep the war going, had to send their children to the war, it would stop in a nanosecond. Or, the other proof, I think, most people would agree if they thought about it, if the war corporations were told they could continue supplying armaments but there would be no profit - all their profit would be stopped - it would stop in a heartbeat. This is not a patriotic war, this is a war of profit and greed.“
Part 3 (3:09)
Why does Congress care so little about our troops in Iraq?
Start Loving: ”Whereas nobody understands the phenomenon exactly, it's fair to say the human being can become intoxicated on things other than substances. That the spirit of empire, the spirit of power, the sense of power, the sense of power over others, is tremendously intoxicating and like any intoxication it changes your mind. It disables certain parts of your nervous system and empowers other parts. It disables conscience, humanity, heart, compassion and it empowers self-engrandizement, and lust, and desire for more more more. It really dehumanizes us, the spirit that dehumanizes us. Our culture is optimized for that because that is how you get people to buy stuff, by ignoring people in need benignly, of course, thinking that we are great people. But, in fact, ignoring people in need and more and more looking out for me and hiding behind the rationale that I'm taking care of my biological children. But that's really just license to ignore everybody else.
And it took me a long time to understand this about people like Dr. King. He was always as pained about the agony of the oppressor as of the oppressed. And if they ever woke up, he seemed to think and realize, to their inhumanity, they would be horrified and they would never want to be that way. Well, that's how I think it is with Congress.“
Part 4 (1:58)
Why haven't the American people galvanized to put a stop to the Iraq war?
Start Loving: ”The analogy of how fire starts. It starts with a match but it can become a huge blaze. And to start that blaze you need dry wood. I think that the American populous may be going from being really wet wood, just totally in the grip of empire and selfishness, may be drying out a little bit. With the issues that are confronting them.“
Part 5 (3:05)
Would you label yourself an optimist or a pessimist?
Start Loving: ”Facing the truth of your current situation, and if it's a horrible truth facing that squarely, and at the same time developing a vision of how things should be and need to be. And if you can hold both of those within you, it is the ultimate release of energy, and power, courage, commitment.
I neither try to see things worse than they are or better. I want to see the truth of how they are so that I can mobilize myself appropriately. And it's a horrible phenomenon, I was just talking to my friend Rick about how I used to be a devotee of NPR, I can barely stand listening to them anymore. The poor guys have been destroyed by right wing elements I think. But all they want to talk about is pablum and they want to talk everything in cheery voices and how nice everything is... Well, it's not nice. Half the world is living on a dollar day. People in Palestine have been in basically concentration camp conditions for thirty-forty years. Four million people killed in Congo so that we can have cheap electronic parts. You know, Haiti, just a horror. And on and on and on and on. I don't suspect I come across as being depressive. I'm not, I'm very much alive. And that life comes from this needn't be, this shouldn't be. And I want to pay whatever price I can with my life to wake us up. Because none of us want it to be this way. None of us, if we could be awakened from our inhumanity.“
Part 6 (5:41)
What is the significance of the three crosses on your head?
Start Loving: ”The cross in the middle is the name I've adopted because nothing else I could call myself is relevant, which is 'Start Loving'. And the two on either side are 'stop starving' - and it's the active verb - it's starving others of AIDs drugs, of education, I mean, how do we have our military today? We starve these poor and middle class children of the opportunity to go to college, of decent education, so that there only option to climb is to go into the military. We've starved people around the world of AIDs drugs and other basic resources. And when that doesn't work we kill them. So the other one says 'stop killing.'“
Part 7 (1:47)
How long will you continue with the hunger strike?
Start Loving: ”Things will only change in this country when the populous stands up. If there is an honest history in the future, if we have a future, it will not blame congress and it will not blame Bush and Cheney for what's going on. It will blame the American people for being so apathetic at such a horrible time of need.“
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!!!!!
*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.
*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?
*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.
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.
I am dumb. I thought that the 2006 election was a make it or break it election for the country. If the Democrats could not manage to win the House and God willing, the Senate, it would surely have been the nail in the coffin for the Republic. With the Republican led Congress refusing to perform its Constitutional duty of oversight and Republican partisans in the Supreme Court, it would be impossible to stop the criminal Bush administration from completing its goal of permanent Republican rule. But, lo and behold, the stars aligned perfectly, Democrats won both houses, and I began to believe in miracles again.
And I was a fool. That is, Harry and Nancy and the rest of the Congressional Democrats played me for a fool. They told us they would lead us out of Iraq and instead we got a “Surge”. It wasn't their fault, they cried, because they didn't have enough votes to override a presidential veto. But what good was the election victory if Democrats remained impotent? At least the Democrats were not the evil Republicans, I consoled myself, who were destroying the Constitution by advocating torture, suspending the Writ of Habeas Corpus and attempting to subvert our democracy.
I was a fool. Here we are more than a half year after Democrats took control of Congress and we still torture, Habeas Corpus has not been reinstated and the White House continues to lie and obstruct Congressional efforts to investigate the US attorney scandal which, ultimately, is about stealing elections. Seriously, how is it possible that Habeas Corpus has not been restored after all this time? Yeah, I know, it's because Democrats don't have a veto proof majority. Thankfully, we were still better off with Dems than Republicans.
A fool, I was. Then yesterday I read the following headline in the NY Times, “Democrats Scrambling to Expand Eavesdropping” and I felt as if I had the wind knocked out of me. It was one thing to claim that the President and slim majorities prevented Democrats from ending the war and restoring our Constitutional rights and quite another to conspire with Bush to take away our rights. This was disgraceful and went beyond the pale.
According to James Risen, without whom we might not know about illegal spying on Americans by the Bush administration, “Democrats appear to be worried that if they block such legislation, the White House will depict them as being weak on terrorism.” News flash, by capitulating on this issue Democrats will insure that those worries are realized.
Political weakness means not being able to get things done. When Democrats hold a majority in both Houses and cannot start a troop withdrawal from Iraq, stop a surge, restore Habeas Corpus, prevent torture and stop the government from spying on Americans, they are the definition of weak. Meanwhile, George W. Bush is a lame duck president, who is universally despised with approval ratings worse than Nixon's, whose minority party barely supports him and yet, he can seemingly get Democrats to agree to allow the most untrustworthy administration ever to spy on Americans without a warrant.
Believe it or not, it's far worse for Democrats than it appears. Because not only are the Democrats proving themselves impotent, but they are empowering a president who has shown nothing but contempt for Congress. See video below for a couple examples of this contempt:
To summarize, the Bush administration stonewalls Congress at every turn. It claims executive privilege for everyone and anyone and even in the case of a deceased soldier. The president refuses to replace the nation's chief law enforcement official who has repeatedly lied to Congress. The White House impedes Congressional attempts at oversight by refusing to turn over documents and emails necessary to investigations. And Bush has literally made an end run around Congress by way of Presidential signing statements.
And despite it all Democrats are willing to work with the President? That is insane! Have you no self-respect? How many times will you let someone punch you in the face until you say enough? Well, I have finally reached that point and I am saying enough. I will no longer play the fool. And I will no longer support the Democratic party until they start acting like the majority and representing their party. And that begins with telling the president to fuck off when it comes to spying on Americans.
And if Harry and Nancy continue to capitulate to this lawless president you can damn well bet that Democrats and progressives will be telling them to fuck off too in November 2008.
The 104-acre $592 million US Embassy in Iraq will staff more than 1,000 people and cost $1.2 billion per year to operate.
Norman Solomon writes at AlterNet that no major presidential candidate for either party is seriously speaking about getting our military out of Iraq. Instead, we are witnessing a replay of the same lies designed to placate the populous about an eventual pullout, all the while a military buildup is in the works. Solomon writes:
Scratch the surface of current media scenarios for a U.S. pullout from Iraq, and you're left with little more than speculation -- fueled by giant dollops of political manipulation. In fact, strategic leaks and un-attributed claims about U.S. plans for withdrawal have emerged periodically to release some steam from domestic antiwar pressures.
This is the same playbook, according to Solomon, followed by the Bush administration before the 2004 election:
Nearly three years ago -- with discontent over the war threatening to undermine President Bush's prospects for a second term -- the White House ally Robert Novak floated a rosy scenario in his nationally syndicated column that appeared on Sept. 20, 2004. “Inside the Bush administration policy-making apparatus, there is strong feeling that U.S. troops must leave Iraq next year,” he wrote. “This determination is not predicated on success in implanting Iraqi democracy and internal stability. Rather, the officials are saying: Ready or not, here we go.”
The embassy will be 6 times larger than the United Nations compound in New York
The hype about leaving Iraq was b.s. then as it is now. What's of particular interest is what Solomon writes is the reason behind the half-hearted calls for withdrawal by Democratic candidates:
Those candidates know that powerful elites in this country just don't want to give up the leverage of an ongoing U.S. military presence in Iraq, with its enormous reserves of oil and geopolitical value. It's a good bet that American media and political powerhouses would fix the wagon of any presidential campaign that truly advocated an end to the U.S. war in -- and on -- Iraq.
The nearly completed US embassy monstrosity.
What this all means for Iraq and our troops in Iraq, in the run-up to the 2008 election, depends on where you sit:
The disconnect between public opinion and elite opinion has led to reverse perceptions of a crisis of democracy. As war continues, some are appalled at the absence of democracy while others are frightened by the potential of it. From the grassroots, the scarcity of democracy is transparent and outrageous. For elites, unleashed democracy could jeopardize the priorities of the military-industrial-media complex.
Unfortunately, the odds of winning the struggle for an Iraq pullout and winning back our democracy are equally bad. See the stolen elections of 2000, 2002, 2004 and 2006. Thus, instead of listening to the political rhetoric and media propaganda it is imperative to look at the facts, including:
1. JOINT CAMPAIGN PLAN: recently leaked classified plan which calls for a significant American role in Iraq until at least 2009.
2. KOREA MODEL: Bush has referred to the Korea Model on multiple occasions over the last couple of months. The US has a significant military force in Korea for more than a half century.
3. PERMANENT MILITARY BASES: Despite the recent House Bill banning permanent bases in Iraq, the US continues to build huge multi-billion dollar bases. First, the House Bill only bans new bases which should hardly be a problem since the permanent bases have long been under construction. Second, if need be, the military need only call the bases, some of which are the size of small towns, “enduring” bases.
6. THE OIL: We are not going anywhere until the oil issue is settled. In other words, not until the Iraq legislators we installed feel sufficiently bribed or threatened enough to hand over the vast oil resources of their country to Exxon.
7. THE BUSH LEGACY: Sure it is a joke. Everything the Bushies have touched over the last 6 1/2 years have gone the same way as Iraq. His so-called greatest achievement, No Child Left Behind, has been disastrous for education. Hurricane Katrina. Squandering the surplus and creating a ginormous deficit. Turning world opinion against Americans. Dividing the country. Torture. Corporate giveaways. Extraordinary rendition. Gitmo. Habeas Corpus. 9/11. Osama. The point being, that Bush will go down as the worst president ever even if we were to find some face saving way out of Iraq.
But, because everyone says his legacy depends on Iraq and he clearly believes the same, what incentive does he have to throw in the towel? There might be a few people in the world willing to sacrifice their own legacy for the greater good of humanity, but Bush ain't one of them. Hell, it took the mightiest of efforts to get W. to sacrifice a single day of vacation to conduct a fly-over of the gulf region days after Hurricane Katrina hit.
8. THE EMBASSY: Like the permanent bases, the new half billion dollar plus, gigantic, architectural disgrace of an embassy (seen in the three photos above) will cost more than a billion dollars a year to run.
Thus, the evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the White House plans are to continue full speed ahead in Iraq no matter what General Petraeus September progress report brings. And the lame attempts by the leading Democratic presidential candidates to put a stop to the Iraq war does suggest that, as Solomon writes, they fear what upsetting the media and elite power brokers would do to their candidacy and thus will continue to not rock the Iraq boat.
In other words, don't believe the hype heard throughout the mainstream media concerning a troop withdrawal or pullout. Because it's pure and simple propaganda.
UPDATE: Bhc has a must read post on how the Bushies are using the “liberal” media to manufacture the consent necessary for the long term presence of significant American troops in Iraq. While the entire read is a must, I particularly loved this paragraph:
Yes, this is a victorious day for the truth-seekers at Powerline and Captain's Quarters. Michele Malkin is moist. For not only has the truth about Iraq won out, it has done so by the fey hand of “liberals,” from the “liberal” Brookings Institute, and been doled out on the pages of the “liberal” New York Times, sure to be sopped up with gusto by those northeast, latte-slurping liberals. This is good, you see, because liberals run everything, which is why the US is fighting two failing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, agitating and arming for a third with Iran, sending missile defenses to Europe to piss off the Russians in the hopes of ramping up a new cold war, sending arms to Saudi Arabia, backing the brutal actions of Ethiopian government troops in Ethiopia and Somolia, and arming rebels in Darfur. If liberals weren't in charge, why, imagine the bliss. But I digress.
UPDATE II: Pentagon Announces 20,000 more troops headed to Iraq
Nearly 20,000 U.S. troops based in the United States will begin departing for Iraq in December as part of the regular rotation of combat forces there, the Defense Department announced Tuesday. These Army and Marine Corps units are not related to the buildup of American troops announced by President Bush in January, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.
Now that I have your attention, click your way over to Anything They Say, where Bhc has returned after a short hiatus with a powerful sweeping piece, PIPELINES AND IMPERIAL MISSIONS, on the Bushies and the Middle East that will take your breath away. I cannot remember an article so breathtaking in its scope and I read Harper's!
Bhc covers all the well-known angles and facts, starting with the now familiar 1992 Defense Planning Guide which outlines the case for American empire. Additionally, he pulls in his unparalleled knowledge of all things oil, from pipelines to the Iraqi Oil Law, which are key to understanding the Bushies foreign policy. And before all is said and done, Bhc takes readers on a tour de force of the ever important currency and commodity markets and the actions and reasoning behind moves from recently emerging powers Russia, China and Iran. And this is but a cursory view of the subjects covered in the post. Like I said, it is truly sweeping.
But, don't let the scope and length of the article scare you away. Where Bhc shines, and has always shined, is in tying so many seemingly disparate facts into one wholly readable story. By the end, what now appears to be a tangled web of unrelated stories, propaganda and political maneuvering, is unraveled into a perfect web that is supported by the facts and common sense. All of which makes it odd that this story will be entirely new to many, if not, most.
With the above in mind, those who get their news solely from the mainstream media are advised to proceed cautiously and prepare themselves to be shocked by the truth. Of course, we Americans don't much like the truth. “We'd rather be lied to about war and then get pissed about the lie than admit to why we really went there.”
Brian Ross has historically been one of the best investigative reporters in the mainstream media -- the key word being “historically”. More recently he has been at the forefront of a couple of stories that not only bring his credibility into question, but make him appear to be nothing more than a corporate and government toady or hack.
First, back in September 2006, Ross was spreading a bunch of b.s. about Khalid Shaikh Mohammed at the same time that the Bush administration was trying to get its pro-torture legislation through Congress. See the video mashup above I made to evidence the ridiculous claims he was making which could have been debunked merely by visiting Wikipedia. Certainly having Ross on the case helped the Bushies get their law passed.
More recently, Ross was set to reveal the blockbuster names on the DC Madam's phone bill but seemed to get cold feet at the last minute despite endless teasers advertising the blockbuster 20/20 News report all week long. The actual video that aired can be found at right after following the link. But the report came and went with a thud with Ross even stating at one point that, “there were no members of Congress that we could find on these phone records.”
But today the DC Madam posted her phone bills online (see here and here) and already Senator David Vitter (R-LA) has been linked (admitted) to using the DC Madam's services. Thus, it appears that Ross was, once again, less than truthful.
This is oh so strange. You might recall the case of the D.C. Madame who threatened to release the phone numbers of all her clients which was said to include some rather prominent members of the D.C. establishment. Then Brian Ross of ABC News was given the list and was going to reveal some of the blockbuster names in a Friday show. But the outrage from Fox “News” and others - how could ABC destroy so many families? - seemed to get to Ross whose blockbuster airing came and went with a whimper as he revealed no new names.
Now it turns out “The Government has twice applied to this Court ex parte for Temporary Restraining Orders (”TROs“) preventing Defendant from selling the List or from distributing copies for free.” You may be asking, as I am asking, what the hell is the Government doing getting involved in this case apart from the regular prosecution of Palfrey and why do they give a crap about her list? Actually, the judge wanted to know the same thing:
At oral argument, the Government was asked whether the List contained the telephone numbers of unindicted co-conspirators. After a significant silence, Government counsel agreed that the answer to the Court's question was “yes.” One cannot help wondering why the Government has exhibited such a strong interest in protecting a list containing the telephone numbers of unindicted co-conspirators, i.e., the women who the Government alleges provided the illegal sexual services and the men who the Government alleges sought and obtained such illegal sexual services.
As the Government was unable to answer this question and kept changing its legal argument for why the judge should keep the list under seal, the judge ruled in favor of the Defendant's request to quash the TROs. Surely, she threw the Government a bone by publicizing her ruling on July 5, during the holiday week. Still, now Palfrey is free to make the lists public.
Hence, the only remaining question is how many days it takes the prosecution to make her case go away. As there is no way the Government goes to all the trouble it did, inventing phony arguments and all, if it were not protecting someone of significant import. And the Dick Cheney in me says that it would just be easier to make the whole case disappear.
Do yourself a favor and watch all of these videos. Then do the country a favor and forward them to everyone you know. The first video begins with investigative reporter Greg Palast who explains the entire US Attorney scandal so that anyone can understand. He also explains how John Kerry defeated Bush in 2004, how Bush stole the election and how the Republicans plan to steal the election in 2008. Palast also reveals that he has 500 of the “missing” Karl Rove emails which he obtained when Bushies sent email to a bush .org account instead of .com. Palast is great and you will definitely understand the Bush administration a lot better having watched.
But as good as Palast is, RFK Jr. is just incredible. I've never seen him speak so well. While he uses a conversational style, I felt he gave one of the better speech/talks I've heard in many moons. His deep understanding of almost every issue across the board was reminiscent of Bill Clinton. And, perhaps most impressive was the moral authority and leadership qualities RFK has aplenty. And I could not help but think of his father.
Part 1
Part 2: Some Karl Rove E-mails even included caging lists which the GOP illegally used to deprive minorities and the military from voting. Over 3 million votes in 2004 were not counted.
Part 3: Iraq plan about oil with goal of raising oil prices. Oil profits have skyrocketed. Patriot Act.
Part 4: Greg Palast announces that he put his book in the public domain so that it can be spread around at little cost. Education is the key.
Part 5 - ABSOLUTELY MUST WATCH!!! RFK begins by blowing up the myth that the Bush administration is conservative. The only thing conservative about Bush, et al
Part 6 -Two big failures of our Democracy are the corporate money that goes into elections and the failure of the media. The beginning of the end for the media was Reagan's abolition of the Fairness Doctrine in 1988.
Part 7 - Americans most entertained and least informed in the world. Studies show that Republicans have a huge information deficit the result of watching Fox “News” and listening to conservative talk radio.
Part 8 - Heads of Departments throughout the government are all former lobbyist. Corporations are running the American government. Capitalism is very different than crony capitalism. Corporations, by law, must plunder. Many famous Americans, ex-president's have warmed that corporations and fascism could be our downfall.
Woman are dumb and need to be told what to do. Here is how that came to be:
George and Barbara Bush begot
who tried very hard to fix the 2000 presidential election for his brother by, among other things, purging the voter rolls of tens of thousands of minorities whose names were similar to convicted felons.
Yet, despite Jeb's efforts, Bush would also need help from
and
and
who took 95,000 votes from Al Gore in Florida alone, creating a statistical dead heat. That problem was temporarily fixed when 16,000 votes were flipped from Gore to Bush in Volusia County which used
Global Election Systems was later acquired by the now infamous voting machine manufacturer - Diebold . Although still a statistical dead heat, John Ellis "Jeb" Bush - a freelance political advisor hired by Fox News to head their election night coverage - calculated that Bush won which was quickly broadcast by
The other networks quickly followed W's cousin's lead and declared him the winner as well. But, Gore refused to concede and the recounts were trending heavily in the Vice President's favor so someone had to step in and put a stop to the counting.
Violating 200+ years of election law precedent, common sense, decency and their own stated judicial philosophy, five conservative Justices on the US Supreme Court stopped the vote recount and later handed Bush the election when there was not enough time left to finish the recount.
At an election night party, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's ailing husband said that his wife would be reluctant to retire if a Democrat (Gore) in office. This might explain why she sold her soul and forever tainted her legacy as the first female Justice. Then when O'Connor retired,
and other evangelical leaders were rewarded by Bush for getting out the evangelical vote with
and shortly thereafter
I mean
Thus, the Supreme Court was packed with five conservative Justices, four of which are ideologues. Together, they handed down a ruling in a partial birth abortion case writing:
"Respect for human life finds an ultimate expression in the bond of love the mother has for her child. The Act recognizes this reality as well." Whether to have an abortion requires a difficult and painful moral decision. . . . While we find no reliable data to measure the phenomenon, it seems unexceptionable to conclude some women come to regret their choice to abort the infant life they once created and sustained. See Brief for Sandra Cano et al. as Amici Curiae in No. 05–380, pp. 22–24. Severe depression and loss of esteem can follow. See ibid.
Isn't that special! Five old, rich, white (with all apologies to Clarence Thomas), Jesus fearing/loving men have decided that they know what's best for women who otherwise may come to regret their choices in life and suffer depression. In other words, women are dumb and need men to tell them what to do. Interestingly, the Paternal Five are not troubled by the lack of reliable evidence supporting their position because it seems unexceptional to themselves. Or, who needs evidence when something is so plain to the eye (of at least 55% of Supreme Court Justices). Ladies and gentlemen, announcing the arrival of the faith based Supreme Court!
Which appears to use the same kind of reasoning (none) that enables
and the Taliban to force women to wear
And this is Sandra Day O'Connor's legacy. Few women have ever had the power she wielded to advance women's rights and few, if any, have done more to curtail those rights. Maybe it was all those years that Scalia, Thomas and Kennedy worked with O'Connor that they realized women were dumb and needed guidance. If that's the case, it's hard to find fault with the three. Few knew Thomas and Scalia's radicalness as well as O'Connor, who also knew that Scalia would be Bush's role model for finding a replacement for her and others. That she stilled followed along in Bush v. Gore and then resigned, keenly aware of where the country was headed -- how could they not conclude she was dumb or crazy? At least according to themselves.
But O'Connor need not fret. With the faith-based precedent set, the Courts will now be playing catch up with the Bush administration and 200+ years of law will need to be revisited. Meanwhile, we are told that the threat of the radical Christian right is waning.
