Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Finally
Just a little bit of justice...
Sad clown doesn't even realize it's all over...
Now if only they could tie the 'ho from Wasilla to the craven old bastard...
Sad clown doesn't even realize it's all over...
Now if only they could tie the 'ho from Wasilla to the craven old bastard...
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Friday, October 17, 2008
From the Minneapolis Star-Trib...
Get a lawn sign? Anti-McCain view expressed with dog poop
PAUL WALSH, Star Tribune
PAUL WALSH, Star Tribune
Just when you thought partisan politics couldn't smell any worse.
A 45-year-old Minnesotan who admits to hating Republican presidential candidate John McCain said he left small bags of dog feces in the back of a pickup truck sporting McCain-Sarah Palin stickers, police said today.
David Vanderlinden told police that he left his political contributions in his neighbor's the truck because "he hates McCain," police said.
He was caught after the truck owner's mother called police after seeing Vanderlinden placing the bags in the truck.
Vanderlinden's next contribution will be to the public coffers in the form of a $183 fine for littering/unlawful dumping.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
The debates are over
I hope we all feel better about things now.
While we've all been watching Palin and McCain flinging shit, the Bush Administration continues to duck responsibility for anything.
... and a quick nod to Joe the Plumber.
While we've all been watching Palin and McCain flinging shit, the Bush Administration continues to duck responsibility for anything.
... and a quick nod to Joe the Plumber.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Sunday, October 05, 2008
The War on the Economy...
I don’t claim to know much about the national economy, but I have been watching the Bush Administration for the past eight years and the financial crises of the “free market” for more than 20, and it looks to me like another theft of American treasure is underway.
From the S&L bailout in the 1980s, to the spectacular crashes of the Enrons and WorldComs, the pattern has been the same. First, regulation gets neutered and then the enforcement agencies are packed with insiders who come from the industries being “regulated.”
The resulting “free market” is then sold as the greatest thing since sliced bread and a handful of people make vast fortunes that exist largely on paper. Then one day, somebody realizes that a huge con game is being perpetrated and suddenly there is panic, then fear of collapse, followed by infusions of taxpayer dollars that end up in the coffers of the very people who created the “crisis.”
It’s a beautiful ponzi scheme and, willingly or not, we keep getting drawn in and then left holding the bag.
The Bush Administration, represented by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, has been pushing Congress to quickly pass a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry.
They were last seen warning the American public that letting the problems persist would have dire consequences for the national economy, and if they don’t act now the resulting meltdown could be catastrophic.
Additionally, they tell us, Paulson is the only one who can save us from the terrorists — oops, financial collapse — at the gate.
Under the proposed bailout, Paulson will be given dictatorial powers and none of his decisions will be subject to oversight.
Section 8 of the legislation states that, “Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
The White House wants its Secretary to have total power over $700 billion that will have to be borrowed and then paid back by generations of American taxpayers. This legislation will take the power of the purse away from Congress and keep it in the executive branch.
Doesn’t this sound familiar? How is it any different from the other power grabs the administration has accomplished? This is the Patriot Act and the authorization for the use of force in Iraq applied to the economy and they’re using the same scare tactics and “no one else can save you” rhetoric they’ve been using since 9/11 to cow the American public and Congress into complicity.
It’s easy to watch George Bush speak and think we’re being led by a bunch of really stupid people, but I think he’s just a sad distraction from the people doing the real work of a corrupt cabal of thieves who have managed to insinuate themselves into our government, and pseudo-free-marketize our financial institutions.
The problem with their brand of free market is that the profits are the only part of it that’s free, while the risk has been fully socialized with our hard-earned tax dollars.
In a real free market, the immoral people who have instigated this mess would have the decency to jump out of the windows of their plush offices, ala 1929.
Instead, the former leaders of Goldman Sachs, Bear Stearns, et al. get to drift away with hundreds of millions of dollars in golden parachutes that we get to pay for, and then they are rehired as “consultants.”
Welcome to another expensive war we have no chance of winning.
Maybe we should consolidate the two parties into one glorious party and call it the National Socialists in order to reflect the true government agenda.
I don’t have any useful answers to our leadership crisis that won’t get me tossed in a cell at Gitmo. I’m just mad as hell.
From the S&L bailout in the 1980s, to the spectacular crashes of the Enrons and WorldComs, the pattern has been the same. First, regulation gets neutered and then the enforcement agencies are packed with insiders who come from the industries being “regulated.”
The resulting “free market” is then sold as the greatest thing since sliced bread and a handful of people make vast fortunes that exist largely on paper. Then one day, somebody realizes that a huge con game is being perpetrated and suddenly there is panic, then fear of collapse, followed by infusions of taxpayer dollars that end up in the coffers of the very people who created the “crisis.”
It’s a beautiful ponzi scheme and, willingly or not, we keep getting drawn in and then left holding the bag.
The Bush Administration, represented by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, has been pushing Congress to quickly pass a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry.
They were last seen warning the American public that letting the problems persist would have dire consequences for the national economy, and if they don’t act now the resulting meltdown could be catastrophic.
Additionally, they tell us, Paulson is the only one who can save us from the terrorists — oops, financial collapse — at the gate.
Under the proposed bailout, Paulson will be given dictatorial powers and none of his decisions will be subject to oversight.
Section 8 of the legislation states that, “Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.”
The White House wants its Secretary to have total power over $700 billion that will have to be borrowed and then paid back by generations of American taxpayers. This legislation will take the power of the purse away from Congress and keep it in the executive branch.
Doesn’t this sound familiar? How is it any different from the other power grabs the administration has accomplished? This is the Patriot Act and the authorization for the use of force in Iraq applied to the economy and they’re using the same scare tactics and “no one else can save you” rhetoric they’ve been using since 9/11 to cow the American public and Congress into complicity.
It’s easy to watch George Bush speak and think we’re being led by a bunch of really stupid people, but I think he’s just a sad distraction from the people doing the real work of a corrupt cabal of thieves who have managed to insinuate themselves into our government, and pseudo-free-marketize our financial institutions.
The problem with their brand of free market is that the profits are the only part of it that’s free, while the risk has been fully socialized with our hard-earned tax dollars.
In a real free market, the immoral people who have instigated this mess would have the decency to jump out of the windows of their plush offices, ala 1929.
Instead, the former leaders of Goldman Sachs, Bear Stearns, et al. get to drift away with hundreds of millions of dollars in golden parachutes that we get to pay for, and then they are rehired as “consultants.”
Welcome to another expensive war we have no chance of winning.
Maybe we should consolidate the two parties into one glorious party and call it the National Socialists in order to reflect the true government agenda.
I don’t have any useful answers to our leadership crisis that won’t get me tossed in a cell at Gitmo. I’m just mad as hell.
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Some holiday joy for the New Year...
On the eve of the announcement of record holiday payouts to Wall Street investment firms, Governor Schwarzenegger announced a fiscal emergency and a 10 percent overall budget cut that he hopes will take place immediately. The slashing is the result of the faux-free market anti-tax political ideology that has firmly taken root in the American consciousness since the advent of Reaganomics along with the spinelessness and avarice of the so-called leaders of our once-great nation.
It is the job of the Legislative Analysis Office (LAO) to go over the governor’s budget proposal after its release in preparation for the “May revise.” When Schwarzenegger rolled out his budget plan for 2007, the LAO criticized it for rosy projections that depended on revenues which never materialized due to decades of tax cuts and a precipitous economic plunge.
It is the job of the Legislative Analysis Office (LAO) to go over the governor’s budget proposal after its release in preparation for the “May revise.” When Schwarzenegger rolled out his budget plan for 2007, the LAO criticized it for rosy projections that depended on revenues which never materialized due to decades of tax cuts and a precipitous economic plunge.
For anyone surprised by this, it would be instructive to remember the days of Enron and the “Dot-Bomb” era, where wildly positive fiscal predictions gave way to crisis and collapse. Millions of people lost retirement funds while the perpetrators of the crimes escaped unscathed with hundreds of million dollars in ill-gotten booty.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is not some kind of benevolent moderate, and anyone who believes that needs to drop the rose-colored bipartisan glasses. The Guvornator is pure free-market Conservative, even if he slips up and shows glimpses of a social conscience from time to time.
On May 24, 2001 as he was revving up for the recall election, Schwarzenegger met with the late former Enron Chairman Kenny-boy Lay, über-free-marketeer Richard Riordan, and corporate raider Michael “Greed is Good” Milken, who was touting a deregulation plan that purported to solve the state’s energy crisis, but was actually massive theft. From the beginning, he’s been surrounded by former governor Pete Wilson and his minions.
Schwarzenegger has been trying to privatize the public school system of
This is the real agenda for “free markets”: the transfer of wealth from the public into the private sector for the enrichment of a select few, including the politicians who enable the transactions. We’re going trillions of dollars in debt to fund tax cuts and war profiteers, yet we can’t — or won’t — spend the money necessary to fund our once-great system of public education.
We keep hearing the myth about the American Dream and upward mobility, but the facts on the ground belie that faded ideal. The wealth of our nation is being stolen by a handful of über-rich, modern day robber barons, even as our schools, health care, and infrastructure crumble around our ears.
On the upside, an ill-informed and uneducated populace is a lot easier to control.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Christ on Crutches
Has everyone noticed that it’s the most splendiferous time of the year, or that we are a nation of Christmas-lovin’ Americans? For those who have neglected to watch the annual Fox “News” “War on Christmas” extravaganza, our elected representatives have taken the time to remind the nonbelievers amongst us that yes, we are a nation of Christ, praise be.
Last week, just in time for the height of shopping season and in anticipation of the home stretch of a depressingly long election season, the people who make our laws busied themselves with House Resolution (HR) 847: Recognizing the importance of Christmas and the Christian faith.
HR 874 passed by a 372 to 9 vote, with 50 members of our esteemed representatives voting “present,” or not voting. On the “aye” side there were, 195 Democrats, and 177 Republicans, while all nine “nay” votes came from the few rational national Democrats. Kudos to Lynne Woolsey for being among the sane.
Many readers may think I’m just making this up. But seriously, on Dec. 10 the House of Representatives of the
The bill resolved that, “the Christian faith (is) one of the great religions of the world, acknowledges the international religious and historical importance of Christmas and the Christian faith,” and “acknowledges and supports the role played by Christians and Christianity in the founding of the
Excuse me while I swallow the bile that just rose in my throat.
We are not a “Christian nation.” We are a nation of Christians. And Muslims, and Deists, and Agnostics, and Atheists, with a few Wiccans thrown in for good measure. We even have room in the boat for Tom Cruise and the Scientologists.
I put this resolution up there with the investigation into steroid use in baseball. The people who wasted my tax dollars with this silly, yet dangerous bill are a bunch of wealthy mostly white people playing to the basest constituency, jerking each other while the rest of the world burns because of disastrous foreign and domestic policy.
We are facing crises of unprecedented scale on the home front and in the world. There’s a health care crisis, a financial crisis brought about by greed and hubris, and a multi-front war punctuated by waste, massive fraud, and the rise of private mercenary armies who will need something else to do once they desert the troops trapped in an unwinnable war. On top of this, the Justice Department has been turned into a political arm of the most crooked administration in the history of our nation.
The First Amendment to the Constitution states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” and Thomas Jefferson was in favor of “building a wall of separation between church and state.” The founders knew that religious fanaticism leads to slaughter and slavery, and engaged in a war of independence from the religious zealot King George in order to create a secular nation where people were free to worship as they saw fit, so long as they didn’t push their views onto others.
We have had Christianity pushed down our throats over the course of the past three decades, and HB 847 is continuing this dangerous trend.
I can’t help but remember the warning from philosopher George Santayana, that those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. The dog and pony show of our political process has turned into a nauseating race for the bottom, while high crimes and misdemeanors continue to go unpunished.
We’ve lost the war on Christmas, my fellow secular humanists. Go out and shop as if your life and liberty depended on it.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Shopping and a gentle reminder of the carnage of foreign military adventures
It seems as if a lot of people don't want to think about the war in Iraq or have anything to do with it on a visceral level. They don't read news accounts about death rates, troop levels, or the fiscal costs of the war. I suppose it may be the time of year. Everyone is preoccupied with thoughts of shopping and the annoying visits of unwanted guests, which precludes them from thinking about events of national and global import.
As a public service, I'd like to give a brief run-down of events in Iraq — as I see them — just to help the community through the stress, and the joys of stuffing our faces and buying stuff for secular holiday celebrations.
It's the least I can do to ease my readers — such as they are — into vacation mode.
There is no good news coming from Iraq. Things are deteriorating by the day. Violence is at an all-time high and we have lost control of this war of choice that was brought about by the cold warrior junta that has taken over our government. In reality, however, we never really had control in the first place.
The Bush administration is getting ready to ask for another $173 billion in order to fund a war that was supposed to cost around $17.30, and be fully funded by Iraqi oil sales.
It seems as if the only thing in Iraq that is self-supporting is the insurgency, and that is according to U.S. National Intelligence Director and merchant of Iran-Contra death, John Negroponte.
According to the United Nations, more than 7,000 Iraqi civilians were killed in September and October. Nearly 5,000 of those killings occurred in Baghdad.
In a series of coordinated bombings, more than 200 Iraqis were killed on Thanksgiving Day - the day before "Black Friday," our most sacred of holidays. Think of it this way; while we Americans were stuffing our faces - the thing we do best - some mother in Iraq was burying her children.
That just about sums up the war in one short paragraph. Innocent citizens of a country economically brutalized by world powers for its entire history are now being militarily brutalized by a country whose citizens are more interested in XBoxes and Wii.
It's not as if none of us are sacrificing for the cause though. The death toll of American troops has passed the 2,800 mark, and our military is being decimated by repeated deployments in a war that has lasted longer than our involvement in WWII. Additionally, equipment is wearing down to the tune of $8 billion a month, according to a report in USA Today.
Charles Rangel (D-NY) was excoriated recently for suggesting a return to the draft. His reasoning is that if the draft were reinstated, more U.S. citizens would actually have to share in the sacrifices being made by a very tiny number of brave people. This in turn would reduce support for the war because people would have to take part in the carnage instead of watching Ted Koppel's hairpiece recount brieft snipets of the day's bloodshed.
It's not to be though, at least for now, because we are not interested in the suffering of others - even our fellow citizens - especially when there is a dyn-o-mite sale going on at the mall, and there are so many good things to watch on the teevee.
As I sit on my fat ass prognosticating on the stupidity of U.S. policy in the Middle East, our people in uniform continue to die alongside innumerable Iraqi civilians.
When I look out of my window and see the gaudy Christmas lights and the big plastic Santa on the neighbor's house, I often wonder how many innocent lives were destroyed in some oil-rich, war-torn corner of the globe so that he could mindlessly waste the 24-hour electricity that we all take for granted.
There are about five such houses within my range of vision.
We are not sacrificing anything directly for this phony "War on Terror," but the payment will be deferred to future generations. We'll go off to the malls over the course of the next few weeks and buy cheap stuff made in China - even as we borrow more money from the Chinese government to fund the "war effort," and tax cuts - and not even think of the people who will really pay for this atrocity.
Please spare me the bullshit about fighting them over there so that we don't have to fight them over here. Al Qaeda has very little control in Iraq. Any influence they have can be attributed to the U. S. military presence there and our successful destruction of Iraqi civil structure. It doesn't really matter who's doing the killing anyway. The dead are dead.
As an aside to my readers who may wish to waste time sending me venomous e-mails about my "dangerous" ideology, do something brave for once and join the Army or Marines over the holiday break. Stop the hypocrisy. For everyone else out there, happy holidays.
As a public service, I'd like to give a brief run-down of events in Iraq — as I see them — just to help the community through the stress, and the joys of stuffing our faces and buying stuff for secular holiday celebrations.
It's the least I can do to ease my readers — such as they are — into vacation mode.
There is no good news coming from Iraq. Things are deteriorating by the day. Violence is at an all-time high and we have lost control of this war of choice that was brought about by the cold warrior junta that has taken over our government. In reality, however, we never really had control in the first place.
The Bush administration is getting ready to ask for another $173 billion in order to fund a war that was supposed to cost around $17.30, and be fully funded by Iraqi oil sales.
It seems as if the only thing in Iraq that is self-supporting is the insurgency, and that is according to U.S. National Intelligence Director and merchant of Iran-Contra death, John Negroponte.
According to the United Nations, more than 7,000 Iraqi civilians were killed in September and October. Nearly 5,000 of those killings occurred in Baghdad.
In a series of coordinated bombings, more than 200 Iraqis were killed on Thanksgiving Day - the day before "Black Friday," our most sacred of holidays. Think of it this way; while we Americans were stuffing our faces - the thing we do best - some mother in Iraq was burying her children.
That just about sums up the war in one short paragraph. Innocent citizens of a country economically brutalized by world powers for its entire history are now being militarily brutalized by a country whose citizens are more interested in XBoxes and Wii.
It's not as if none of us are sacrificing for the cause though. The death toll of American troops has passed the 2,800 mark, and our military is being decimated by repeated deployments in a war that has lasted longer than our involvement in WWII. Additionally, equipment is wearing down to the tune of $8 billion a month, according to a report in USA Today.
Charles Rangel (D-NY) was excoriated recently for suggesting a return to the draft. His reasoning is that if the draft were reinstated, more U.S. citizens would actually have to share in the sacrifices being made by a very tiny number of brave people. This in turn would reduce support for the war because people would have to take part in the carnage instead of watching Ted Koppel's hairpiece recount brieft snipets of the day's bloodshed.
It's not to be though, at least for now, because we are not interested in the suffering of others - even our fellow citizens - especially when there is a dyn-o-mite sale going on at the mall, and there are so many good things to watch on the teevee.
As I sit on my fat ass prognosticating on the stupidity of U.S. policy in the Middle East, our people in uniform continue to die alongside innumerable Iraqi civilians.
When I look out of my window and see the gaudy Christmas lights and the big plastic Santa on the neighbor's house, I often wonder how many innocent lives were destroyed in some oil-rich, war-torn corner of the globe so that he could mindlessly waste the 24-hour electricity that we all take for granted.
There are about five such houses within my range of vision.
We are not sacrificing anything directly for this phony "War on Terror," but the payment will be deferred to future generations. We'll go off to the malls over the course of the next few weeks and buy cheap stuff made in China - even as we borrow more money from the Chinese government to fund the "war effort," and tax cuts - and not even think of the people who will really pay for this atrocity.
Please spare me the bullshit about fighting them over there so that we don't have to fight them over here. Al Qaeda has very little control in Iraq. Any influence they have can be attributed to the U. S. military presence there and our successful destruction of Iraqi civil structure. It doesn't really matter who's doing the killing anyway. The dead are dead.
As an aside to my readers who may wish to waste time sending me venomous e-mails about my "dangerous" ideology, do something brave for once and join the Army or Marines over the holiday break. Stop the hypocrisy. For everyone else out there, happy holidays.
Monday, November 13, 2006
Electoral process gives brief respite from utter hopelessness
Sometimes the little things in life give us the most pleasure. Take, for instance, the election last week. Diminutive Nancy Pelosi, representing a political party many had written off forever, became Speaker of the House in one of the most stunning electoral victories since Arnold Schwarzenegger was re-elected as Govornator of California.
It was a pleasure to hear the punditocracy backpedal from its derision of the former minority party and jump on the Democratic bandwagon.
Even the detestable and drug-addled Rush Limbaugh distanced himself from his thuggish handlers, claiming that he felt "liberated" by Democratic victories in the House and Senate because he is "no longer going to have to carry the water for people (he doesn't) think deserve having their water carried." He also claimed that the Republican Congress has produced legislation "that (he has) just cringed at, and it has been difficult (for him) coming in here, trying to make the case for it when the people who are supposedly in favor of it can't even make the case themselves."
I'll pause now for a moment to relish in delicious reflection at the end of six years of political misery, and give in for just a moment to the sweet odor of hope.
In the wake of a major "thumpin'" — to quote the president himself — Howard Dean is being hailed as a genius. Of course, there are those who thought that back in 2003 when the same brilliant bunch of talking heads — the Wolf Blitzers and the Tucker Carlsons of the political world — painted him as angry and crazy.
The point that they missed was that a large portion of Americans were pissed off about our tragic societal tailspin, and now the larger American public has finally caught on and joined those who were already sick of the BushCo cabal and the one-party state.
Hopefully, a new era of accountability will be ushered in with this obvious message from the American public.
Many political wonks and wannabes council caution to the newly-elected Democratic majority, but I think the Democrats should take on the scorched-earth policy of the Republicans, and get this country back on track as soon as possible.
Bush should be impeached for dragging us into a foolish political war that we have lost and will continue to lose until a few remaining American citizens are plucked off the roof of Baghdad's Green Zone 10 years from now, alá Saigon on April 29, 1975.
The U.S. of A. is lucky that I don't hold a position of power, because I'd immediately bring on a constitutional crisis by frog-marching the whole lot of these bastards straight to the nearest international criminal court—although to be fair, Rumsfeld already appears to be on his way. After being canned by Bush, he is about to face repercussions for his involvement in the "war on Terr'r," as Germany's top prosecutor will seek a criminal investigation and prosecution of Rumsfeld. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former CIA director George Tenet, and other senior U.S. civilians and military officers will also be charged for their alleged roles in abuses committed at Abu Ghraib and the detention center at Guantanamo Bay.
The case will likely be symbolic at best, as our government will harbor these criminals and protect them from prosecution. Rummy will probably even get a Medal of Freedom out of the deal, not to mention the millions of dollars in profit he's received from steering tax dollars into the coffers of American defense contractors.
The other war profiteers, and their enablers in Congress, should be dragged off in chains for real jail terms, although realistically I know that won't happen, since many Democrats are equally guilty in this nasty episode in American history.
For the past 12 years — since Newt Gingrich and the dawn of the Republican Revolution — the Neocons, Theocons, and fringe rightwing radicals of the Republican Party have done everything they can to bring our country to its knees, from the trumped-up impeachment of Bill Clinton to the suspension of habeas corpus.
Don't get me wrong. I have no particular love for Clinton, although at least he was articulate and a much better representative of our country than our current imbecilic president. He's done more for the Neocons than Ronald Reagan ever did. When I think of stuff I would have impeached Clinton for, NAFTA and the Telecommunications Deregulation Act of 1996 are the first things that come to my mind.
He has also provided a handy target — along with Hillary — and a useful "straw man" that the mainstream press has happily perpetuated as a target of blame for Republican f--- ups.
I don't expect Democratic power to be the magic elixir that suddenly makes the world a better place. They are politicians after all, so the powerful elites of the "Iron Triangle" will get away with their ill-gotten booty, and Bush's cabal will likely get away unscathed. But at least it appears as if Bush will get his comeuppance in the annals of history as the worst president ever.
If nothing else, the election proves that maybe our electoral process is not beyond redemption after all.
It was a pleasure to hear the punditocracy backpedal from its derision of the former minority party and jump on the Democratic bandwagon.
Even the detestable and drug-addled Rush Limbaugh distanced himself from his thuggish handlers, claiming that he felt "liberated" by Democratic victories in the House and Senate because he is "no longer going to have to carry the water for people (he doesn't) think deserve having their water carried." He also claimed that the Republican Congress has produced legislation "that (he has) just cringed at, and it has been difficult (for him) coming in here, trying to make the case for it when the people who are supposedly in favor of it can't even make the case themselves."
I'll pause now for a moment to relish in delicious reflection at the end of six years of political misery, and give in for just a moment to the sweet odor of hope.
In the wake of a major "thumpin'" — to quote the president himself — Howard Dean is being hailed as a genius. Of course, there are those who thought that back in 2003 when the same brilliant bunch of talking heads — the Wolf Blitzers and the Tucker Carlsons of the political world — painted him as angry and crazy.
The point that they missed was that a large portion of Americans were pissed off about our tragic societal tailspin, and now the larger American public has finally caught on and joined those who were already sick of the BushCo cabal and the one-party state.
Hopefully, a new era of accountability will be ushered in with this obvious message from the American public.
Many political wonks and wannabes council caution to the newly-elected Democratic majority, but I think the Democrats should take on the scorched-earth policy of the Republicans, and get this country back on track as soon as possible.
Bush should be impeached for dragging us into a foolish political war that we have lost and will continue to lose until a few remaining American citizens are plucked off the roof of Baghdad's Green Zone 10 years from now, alá Saigon on April 29, 1975.
The U.S. of A. is lucky that I don't hold a position of power, because I'd immediately bring on a constitutional crisis by frog-marching the whole lot of these bastards straight to the nearest international criminal court—although to be fair, Rumsfeld already appears to be on his way. After being canned by Bush, he is about to face repercussions for his involvement in the "war on Terr'r," as Germany's top prosecutor will seek a criminal investigation and prosecution of Rumsfeld. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former CIA director George Tenet, and other senior U.S. civilians and military officers will also be charged for their alleged roles in abuses committed at Abu Ghraib and the detention center at Guantanamo Bay.
The case will likely be symbolic at best, as our government will harbor these criminals and protect them from prosecution. Rummy will probably even get a Medal of Freedom out of the deal, not to mention the millions of dollars in profit he's received from steering tax dollars into the coffers of American defense contractors.
The other war profiteers, and their enablers in Congress, should be dragged off in chains for real jail terms, although realistically I know that won't happen, since many Democrats are equally guilty in this nasty episode in American history.
For the past 12 years — since Newt Gingrich and the dawn of the Republican Revolution — the Neocons, Theocons, and fringe rightwing radicals of the Republican Party have done everything they can to bring our country to its knees, from the trumped-up impeachment of Bill Clinton to the suspension of habeas corpus.
Don't get me wrong. I have no particular love for Clinton, although at least he was articulate and a much better representative of our country than our current imbecilic president. He's done more for the Neocons than Ronald Reagan ever did. When I think of stuff I would have impeached Clinton for, NAFTA and the Telecommunications Deregulation Act of 1996 are the first things that come to my mind.
He has also provided a handy target — along with Hillary — and a useful "straw man" that the mainstream press has happily perpetuated as a target of blame for Republican f--- ups.
I don't expect Democratic power to be the magic elixir that suddenly makes the world a better place. They are politicians after all, so the powerful elites of the "Iron Triangle" will get away with their ill-gotten booty, and Bush's cabal will likely get away unscathed. But at least it appears as if Bush will get his comeuppance in the annals of history as the worst president ever.
If nothing else, the election proves that maybe our electoral process is not beyond redemption after all.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
The state of political discourse and the cost of empire
The specter of another day of voting is rapidly approaching, and the rhetoric has become particularly vile. Even our great "Uniter" George W. Bush came out less than a month after telling the country that we must work together "to meet the test that history has given us," and intimated that anyone who disagrees with his policies or doubts his wisdom is a traitor of the highest order. Of course, that includes anyone who is not fully invested in perpetual military folly.
The Republicans have been in charge for nearly six years, and despite all the scary rhetoric coming from the Republican National Committee, there is no threat to security if non-Republicans somehow wrestle a branch of government away this November. On the contrary, if the Democrats somehow win the House there may still be hope to turn the ship of state around, even if that hope only exists in the Republican-lite 21st century version of the Democratic party.
Republican political strategists are lying when they say that Democrats are soft on national security. After 9/11, no one will ever be soft on national security again, even if it means destroying our democracy out of a paranoid sense of fear.
Our government-led by Democrats and Republicans-has turned our tax dollars into a slush fund for the Department of Defense, and the Military Industrial Complex that Dwight Eisenhower warned against in 1961 as he handed the presidency over to John F. Kennedy.
"We yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment," Ike said.
Our folly in Iraq is but the latest example of the way in which we have wasted our material progress on vague foreign military adventures that serve merely to redistribute the wealth of the nation into the coffers of the über-rich. War profiteers and Bush administration corporate cronies have used the war as a vehicle for theft, leaving generations of American children with the butcher's bill and the debt payment.There is no interest in world peace or human betterment, only empty patriotic rhetoric and fear of vague and shadowy threats to our stuff.
Under the "leadership" of the Republican Party in the past five years, our national debt has ballooned to $8.5 trillion dollars-that's trillion, with a "T"-and every man, woman, and child in this country owes $28,531.74 as of Oct. 15. Military spending has ballooned from $296.8 billion to $401 billion since the Bush cabal took over in 2001, and that doesn't even include the $300 billion that has evaporated in Iraq. The lion's share of that rise in defense costs has not gone to "supporting the troops," but to Research and Development which means defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin or Halliburton. To all the young Republicans out there who fear that there may not be enough debt and death if the Democrats somehow manage to take a sliver of power away from the corrupt and bloated GOP, fear not. There will be plenty to go around for you, your children, and your grandchildren. It is unfortunate that the rest of us will have to pay as well.
It will be easy for those who disagree with me to reduce my argument to partisan hackery, but the constitutional crisis we face today is no longer a partisan issue.
Please, spare me the letters about how it's all Clinton's fault or, "Time of war…etc." Terrorism may be real, but the "war on terr'" is a political strategist's creation used to divide this nation and justify the incremental theft of our civil rights, as the treasury is plundered in the name of national security.
The Constitution is under attack and the Executive Branch has made an unprecedented power grab that is threatening our stability as a nation. If we continue on our present course, we will become as fiscally impoverished as we have become morally bankrupt under a single-party system.
To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, we are stuck with our existing political parties, comprised of moneyed elites who ultimately only care about reelection. It seems as if the only reason the Democratic Party is in existence anymore is to preserve the power of the Republicans and to provide an additional bogeyman to the dual threat of terrorism.
"As we peer into society's future, we-you and I, and our government-must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow," Ike continued on that long-ago January day.
"We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow."
It is long past the time for the adults to take back our government. I wonder if there are any left anywhere who may be able to save us.
The Republicans have been in charge for nearly six years, and despite all the scary rhetoric coming from the Republican National Committee, there is no threat to security if non-Republicans somehow wrestle a branch of government away this November. On the contrary, if the Democrats somehow win the House there may still be hope to turn the ship of state around, even if that hope only exists in the Republican-lite 21st century version of the Democratic party.
Republican political strategists are lying when they say that Democrats are soft on national security. After 9/11, no one will ever be soft on national security again, even if it means destroying our democracy out of a paranoid sense of fear.
Our government-led by Democrats and Republicans-has turned our tax dollars into a slush fund for the Department of Defense, and the Military Industrial Complex that Dwight Eisenhower warned against in 1961 as he handed the presidency over to John F. Kennedy.
"We yet realize that America's leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment," Ike said.
Our folly in Iraq is but the latest example of the way in which we have wasted our material progress on vague foreign military adventures that serve merely to redistribute the wealth of the nation into the coffers of the über-rich. War profiteers and Bush administration corporate cronies have used the war as a vehicle for theft, leaving generations of American children with the butcher's bill and the debt payment.There is no interest in world peace or human betterment, only empty patriotic rhetoric and fear of vague and shadowy threats to our stuff.
Under the "leadership" of the Republican Party in the past five years, our national debt has ballooned to $8.5 trillion dollars-that's trillion, with a "T"-and every man, woman, and child in this country owes $28,531.74 as of Oct. 15. Military spending has ballooned from $296.8 billion to $401 billion since the Bush cabal took over in 2001, and that doesn't even include the $300 billion that has evaporated in Iraq. The lion's share of that rise in defense costs has not gone to "supporting the troops," but to Research and Development which means defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin or Halliburton. To all the young Republicans out there who fear that there may not be enough debt and death if the Democrats somehow manage to take a sliver of power away from the corrupt and bloated GOP, fear not. There will be plenty to go around for you, your children, and your grandchildren. It is unfortunate that the rest of us will have to pay as well.
It will be easy for those who disagree with me to reduce my argument to partisan hackery, but the constitutional crisis we face today is no longer a partisan issue.
Please, spare me the letters about how it's all Clinton's fault or, "Time of war…etc." Terrorism may be real, but the "war on terr'" is a political strategist's creation used to divide this nation and justify the incremental theft of our civil rights, as the treasury is plundered in the name of national security.
The Constitution is under attack and the Executive Branch has made an unprecedented power grab that is threatening our stability as a nation. If we continue on our present course, we will become as fiscally impoverished as we have become morally bankrupt under a single-party system.
To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, we are stuck with our existing political parties, comprised of moneyed elites who ultimately only care about reelection. It seems as if the only reason the Democratic Party is in existence anymore is to preserve the power of the Republicans and to provide an additional bogeyman to the dual threat of terrorism.
"As we peer into society's future, we-you and I, and our government-must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow," Ike continued on that long-ago January day.
"We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow."
It is long past the time for the adults to take back our government. I wonder if there are any left anywhere who may be able to save us.
Monday, October 16, 2006
Corporate hubris, BALCO, and the repeal of Magna Carta
Funny how things seem to come together every week to give me fodder for another column. Thus far, in my columned tenure, topics have been exclusive to the CSU system-but this week I'm on to bigger, better, more global issues. I'm sure that a lot of people will be happy to hear that I'm thinking more "globally."
One of the big stories going on in the Bay Area press is the fiasco that is eating up the administration of Hewlett-Packard. It seems as if former chairwoman Patricia Dunn and the rest of the HP leadership are in a bit of trouble after an internal investigation into boardroom leaks went awry and turned into a scandal that has thrown the organization into chaos.
The leaders of HP hired investigators who used techniques such as spying on directors, planting monitoring software in e-mail correspondences with journalists, and even a bizarre plan to infiltrate Silicon Valley newsrooms disguised as cleaners in order to justify rifling through garbage.
They also used a technique called "pretexting"-a colloquialism for "lying"-in order to get private records from phone companies.
So far, four executives have been ousted-including Dunn and HP general council Ann Baskins-and at least 10 witnesses have plead the fifth rather than testify in front of a House of Representatives commerce committee.
The matter is under investigation by the California Attorney General's office and is a fine example of a modern corporate boardroom acting as if it is above and beyond the law.
Dunn does not accept responsibility for a situation that, in the words of Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), looks like "a plumbers' operation that would make Richard Nixon blush."
In a rather amusing side development, Dunn recently received a "hall of fame" leadership award from a regional business lobbying and networking group known as the Bay Area Council, after she was forced to resign.
It's almost funny how shameless and unintentionally ironic modern business leaders can be. It brought to mind the Barry Munitz saga, but that's not really what I'm writing about this week.
The thing that struck me about this sick comedy is the way in which HP's leaders thought that it was okay to break the law in order to stop leaks to the press.
As I have followed the HP story over the course of the past two weeks, I can't help but think of the parallels to the BALCO story, in which two San Francisco Chronicle reporters have been sentenced to 18 months in jail for refusing to divulge the source of their information for a series of articles on the baseball/steroids issue.
The reporters-Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada-refused to give the names of their sources from a grand jury testimony leak and will sit in jail unless they agree to divulge the information. As they pay an unacceptable toll for doing their jobs well, scummy hacks like Bob Novak-a real threat to national security-walk amongst us, free to spew the corporate line.
Both of these stories represent a very real and looming threat to public access to information. In the HP case, corporate leaders felt comfortable enough in the current political climate to break the law in order to stop the leak of information. BALCO has shown us that the imprisonment of journalists has become an all too acceptable practice in the post-9/11 world.
For those of us with a scorecard, this should be a very troubling turn of events. Real journalists reporting news from around the world are being jailed, censored, and/or murdered for reporting uncomfortable or dangerous truths, while the flacks of the powerful continue to spread lies and misinformation unencumbered by accountability to the people.
Access to vital information about the way in which members of the business elite or elected officials behave is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain. Whistleblower protections are eroding, and if we are not careful, soon the only information available to us will be happy press releases written by PR flunkies who assure us that everything is okay, and every decision is the right one.
That type of "reporting" has become a hallmark of modern information dissemination. Statistics that back happy claims, written by minor bureaucrats are presented as fact, even though events on the ground belie the pretty numbers. What used to be called "fuzzy math," now goes by the names of "justification for war," or "growth projections," or even "necessary capital project."
While the bean counters walk around trying to convince everyone that things are all right, people continue to die, tax dollars are funneled into crony coffers, or the massive growth in the economy goes to the top 1 percent of the population while the taxpayers get stuck paying for missed projections.
The targeting of journalists and whistleblowers has become even more disturbing in light of the recent actions by the Bush administration, particularly in regards to detainee rights in the "war on terr'r."
Over the course of the past week, our government has passed legislation that flouts the Geneva Conventions as well as the tenets of the Magna Carta, all in one fell swoop. There is now a vehicle in place to deny American citizens the right to defend themselves in a court of law.
Our government is now free to unaccountably engage in torture-which will surely come back to haunt our men and women in uniform-and the rights of human beings now exist at the whim of the president of the United States.
Add to that $800 million worth of "detention centers" that Halliburton has been contracted to build, and the shiny new "fence" that is going up on the Mexican border, and we suddenly have what looks like a great big prison where a once-mighty nation stood. If you are not with us, don't bother trying to escape.
Hang on to your free speech zone, people. We're in for a long and scary ride to the lowest common denominator of humanity, thanks to the corporate failures that run our government.
I think that next week I'm going to return to covering CSU happenings. Thinking "globally" gives me the willies.
Published October 4, 1006, SSU Star
One of the big stories going on in the Bay Area press is the fiasco that is eating up the administration of Hewlett-Packard. It seems as if former chairwoman Patricia Dunn and the rest of the HP leadership are in a bit of trouble after an internal investigation into boardroom leaks went awry and turned into a scandal that has thrown the organization into chaos.
The leaders of HP hired investigators who used techniques such as spying on directors, planting monitoring software in e-mail correspondences with journalists, and even a bizarre plan to infiltrate Silicon Valley newsrooms disguised as cleaners in order to justify rifling through garbage.
They also used a technique called "pretexting"-a colloquialism for "lying"-in order to get private records from phone companies.
So far, four executives have been ousted-including Dunn and HP general council Ann Baskins-and at least 10 witnesses have plead the fifth rather than testify in front of a House of Representatives commerce committee.
The matter is under investigation by the California Attorney General's office and is a fine example of a modern corporate boardroom acting as if it is above and beyond the law.
Dunn does not accept responsibility for a situation that, in the words of Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), looks like "a plumbers' operation that would make Richard Nixon blush."
In a rather amusing side development, Dunn recently received a "hall of fame" leadership award from a regional business lobbying and networking group known as the Bay Area Council, after she was forced to resign.
It's almost funny how shameless and unintentionally ironic modern business leaders can be. It brought to mind the Barry Munitz saga, but that's not really what I'm writing about this week.
The thing that struck me about this sick comedy is the way in which HP's leaders thought that it was okay to break the law in order to stop leaks to the press.
As I have followed the HP story over the course of the past two weeks, I can't help but think of the parallels to the BALCO story, in which two San Francisco Chronicle reporters have been sentenced to 18 months in jail for refusing to divulge the source of their information for a series of articles on the baseball/steroids issue.
The reporters-Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada-refused to give the names of their sources from a grand jury testimony leak and will sit in jail unless they agree to divulge the information. As they pay an unacceptable toll for doing their jobs well, scummy hacks like Bob Novak-a real threat to national security-walk amongst us, free to spew the corporate line.
Both of these stories represent a very real and looming threat to public access to information. In the HP case, corporate leaders felt comfortable enough in the current political climate to break the law in order to stop the leak of information. BALCO has shown us that the imprisonment of journalists has become an all too acceptable practice in the post-9/11 world.
For those of us with a scorecard, this should be a very troubling turn of events. Real journalists reporting news from around the world are being jailed, censored, and/or murdered for reporting uncomfortable or dangerous truths, while the flacks of the powerful continue to spread lies and misinformation unencumbered by accountability to the people.
Access to vital information about the way in which members of the business elite or elected officials behave is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain. Whistleblower protections are eroding, and if we are not careful, soon the only information available to us will be happy press releases written by PR flunkies who assure us that everything is okay, and every decision is the right one.
That type of "reporting" has become a hallmark of modern information dissemination. Statistics that back happy claims, written by minor bureaucrats are presented as fact, even though events on the ground belie the pretty numbers. What used to be called "fuzzy math," now goes by the names of "justification for war," or "growth projections," or even "necessary capital project."
While the bean counters walk around trying to convince everyone that things are all right, people continue to die, tax dollars are funneled into crony coffers, or the massive growth in the economy goes to the top 1 percent of the population while the taxpayers get stuck paying for missed projections.
The targeting of journalists and whistleblowers has become even more disturbing in light of the recent actions by the Bush administration, particularly in regards to detainee rights in the "war on terr'r."
Over the course of the past week, our government has passed legislation that flouts the Geneva Conventions as well as the tenets of the Magna Carta, all in one fell swoop. There is now a vehicle in place to deny American citizens the right to defend themselves in a court of law.
Our government is now free to unaccountably engage in torture-which will surely come back to haunt our men and women in uniform-and the rights of human beings now exist at the whim of the president of the United States.
Add to that $800 million worth of "detention centers" that Halliburton has been contracted to build, and the shiny new "fence" that is going up on the Mexican border, and we suddenly have what looks like a great big prison where a once-mighty nation stood. If you are not with us, don't bother trying to escape.
Hang on to your free speech zone, people. We're in for a long and scary ride to the lowest common denominator of humanity, thanks to the corporate failures that run our government.
I think that next week I'm going to return to covering CSU happenings. Thinking "globally" gives me the willies.
Published October 4, 1006, SSU Star
A tale of two perverts: Fiddling (with children) while the world burns
I am going to post my editorials from the archives of the SSU Star. I'm the Editor in Chief, so I can do that, right?
For fans of the trials, tribulations and public humiliation of sexual predators, last week represented something of a bellwether in the world of pedophilia. Between the story of a sad, middle-aged Republican House member's attempted peccadilloes with hot young pages, and the release of John Mark Karr - the man who did not murder Jon Benet Ramsey - there was a little something for everyone, both on the national and local stages.
The dominant story in the mainstream press last week was that of Representative Mark Foley, R-Fla., and his alleged taste for the tender flesh of underage males.
It appears that the man appointed as chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children - who introduced H.R. 3132, the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act of 2005, intended to crack down on Internet stalking and made into law as the Adam Walsh Child Protection Act of 2006 - was using the Internet and his access to nubile young congressional employees to satisfy his predilections for teenage boys.
Foley's participation on the committee follows the logic of Bush administration appointments, as a pedophile was put in charge of the office charged with cracking down on pedophiles. The story brought to mind oil companies in charge of energy policy, or drug manufacturers creating a Medicare drug plan that has siphoned billions of taxpayer dollars into their own coffers. This might be a good place for a gag about "insider's knowledge," but I'll refrain out of a sense of propriety.
A series of e-mail and instant messages between the Foley and some of the boys became public last week, and were plastered all over the newspapers and teevee news shows. There was even a dryly amusing, if disturbing, reading of a few of them on ABC news by Brian Ross, who would be well-advised to stick with reading the news, as he would never make it as a phone sex operator. (Thank you John Stewert).
House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other top Republican leaders spent the week scurrying around pointing fingers and playing the "blame game" in an attempt to deflect criticism to the pages, the Democrats, or anywhere else but the pedophilic Republican, or his prevaricating enablers. I'll forego the sordid details here, as I'm sure that unless my reading audience has been holed up in a cave in Afghanistan or detained somewhere without a warrant, we are all familiar with them in repulsive detail.
In a story that's closer to home here in Sonoma County, the dismissal of child pornography charges against the man who did not murder Jon Benet filled the empty space left over from reportage of the Foley circus.
As we all should know by now, Karr was arrested in Colorado on Aug. 17 for allegedly murdering the little girl the day after Christmas in 1996. There were many questions about the veracity of his guilt, and massive holes in the case against him, but the story took over the front pages of every newspaper in the Western Hemisphere.
Karr's embarrassing debacle made the Sonoma County District Attorney's office look incompetent when it became clear that he was not involved in the Ramsey murder, and the evidence for the child pornography case turned out to be highly suspect, if not nonexistent.
The bigger story, though, was not what was trumpeted on the front pages during the course of the week, but what was not. The same week the Foley story blew up to epic proportions, a new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) informed us we are losing the war on terr'.
The NIE lays out the case that Iraq has become a training ground - and the Iraq war a recruiting tool - for a fresh-faced batch new-generation Jihadists. The Foley scandal also helped obscure the fact that the situation on the ground in Iraq is deteriorating by the day.
The Bush administration's new torture policy - which reinterprets the Geneva Conventions - and the rollback of habeas corpus for anyone deemed an "enemy combatant" by the president, were stories of equal if not more import.
Additionally, the Karr arrest made the headlines on the same day that a federal judge in Detroit ruled the NSA wiretap program unconstitutional and illegal.
Much like Orange Alerts, or the "number two man in Al Qaida," Karr and Foley appear to have served to obscure the fact that the trillions of dollars we've spent fighting terr'rists have for the most part been wasted.
I'm not saying that it's unimportant for pedophilic leaders of the Republican Party to be held accountable for their actions, or that these stories aren't really news. The point is, there's a lot of obfuscation going on in the halls of our government, and Karr and Foley were offered up as sacrificial lambs on the altar of misinformation.
For fans of the trials, tribulations and public humiliation of sexual predators, last week represented something of a bellwether in the world of pedophilia. Between the story of a sad, middle-aged Republican House member's attempted peccadilloes with hot young pages, and the release of John Mark Karr - the man who did not murder Jon Benet Ramsey - there was a little something for everyone, both on the national and local stages.
The dominant story in the mainstream press last week was that of Representative Mark Foley, R-Fla., and his alleged taste for the tender flesh of underage males.
It appears that the man appointed as chairman of the House Caucus on Missing and Exploited Children - who introduced H.R. 3132, the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act of 2005, intended to crack down on Internet stalking and made into law as the Adam Walsh Child Protection Act of 2006 - was using the Internet and his access to nubile young congressional employees to satisfy his predilections for teenage boys.
Foley's participation on the committee follows the logic of Bush administration appointments, as a pedophile was put in charge of the office charged with cracking down on pedophiles. The story brought to mind oil companies in charge of energy policy, or drug manufacturers creating a Medicare drug plan that has siphoned billions of taxpayer dollars into their own coffers. This might be a good place for a gag about "insider's knowledge," but I'll refrain out of a sense of propriety.
A series of e-mail and instant messages between the Foley and some of the boys became public last week, and were plastered all over the newspapers and teevee news shows. There was even a dryly amusing, if disturbing, reading of a few of them on ABC news by Brian Ross, who would be well-advised to stick with reading the news, as he would never make it as a phone sex operator. (Thank you John Stewert).
House Speaker Dennis Hastert and other top Republican leaders spent the week scurrying around pointing fingers and playing the "blame game" in an attempt to deflect criticism to the pages, the Democrats, or anywhere else but the pedophilic Republican, or his prevaricating enablers. I'll forego the sordid details here, as I'm sure that unless my reading audience has been holed up in a cave in Afghanistan or detained somewhere without a warrant, we are all familiar with them in repulsive detail.
In a story that's closer to home here in Sonoma County, the dismissal of child pornography charges against the man who did not murder Jon Benet filled the empty space left over from reportage of the Foley circus.
As we all should know by now, Karr was arrested in Colorado on Aug. 17 for allegedly murdering the little girl the day after Christmas in 1996. There were many questions about the veracity of his guilt, and massive holes in the case against him, but the story took over the front pages of every newspaper in the Western Hemisphere.
Karr's embarrassing debacle made the Sonoma County District Attorney's office look incompetent when it became clear that he was not involved in the Ramsey murder, and the evidence for the child pornography case turned out to be highly suspect, if not nonexistent.
The bigger story, though, was not what was trumpeted on the front pages during the course of the week, but what was not. The same week the Foley story blew up to epic proportions, a new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) informed us we are losing the war on terr'.
The NIE lays out the case that Iraq has become a training ground - and the Iraq war a recruiting tool - for a fresh-faced batch new-generation Jihadists. The Foley scandal also helped obscure the fact that the situation on the ground in Iraq is deteriorating by the day.
The Bush administration's new torture policy - which reinterprets the Geneva Conventions - and the rollback of habeas corpus for anyone deemed an "enemy combatant" by the president, were stories of equal if not more import.
Additionally, the Karr arrest made the headlines on the same day that a federal judge in Detroit ruled the NSA wiretap program unconstitutional and illegal.
Much like Orange Alerts, or the "number two man in Al Qaida," Karr and Foley appear to have served to obscure the fact that the trillions of dollars we've spent fighting terr'rists have for the most part been wasted.
I'm not saying that it's unimportant for pedophilic leaders of the Republican Party to be held accountable for their actions, or that these stories aren't really news. The point is, there's a lot of obfuscation going on in the halls of our government, and Karr and Foley were offered up as sacrificial lambs on the altar of misinformation.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
A Guest Rant from Raelayna....
I heard a story on the radio on Tuesday that can't pass without comment. An eleven-year-old girl was raped by 10 men on a football team. What kind of sick shit is this?! When you see the state of society today, do you really think that humanity is capable of this kind of insanity? I cannot fathom why one man would even deign to think that raping a child is okay, let alone 10 of them! Okay, okay, if I have to be the one to say it, then I guess I will. Society, we are absolutely doing the wrong thing these days. I think that whatever parents have been teaching their children really needs to change, because if an entire flock of men think it is okay to rape an eleven-year-old, what we’ve been doing is obviously not working.
And my first reaction is always, “God I hope someone kills that poor girl.” I’m sorry if that sounds cruel but I am a firm believer in allowing people to end their misery. Just think of what that poor girl will go through the rest of her life. Wouldn’t it be a mercy in the end? How would it feel, in the real world, to be that girl who was raped by 10 men? What kind of relationships will someone like that have with people? I believe this child will most likely have at least two children by 16 purely because she’ll feel like she isn’t worth more than to be a feedbag for some calf. Imagine what it would be like to wake up every day with that knowledge. Of being forced to have sex with 10 strange men. To be a cum sack for some dude with no face. Would one be okay living with that feeling, the fact that those same men most likely walked within 14 months? Could you get out of bed every day knowing that no matter what you do, there will always be that one scar, you know that one that throbs during your period, the one from that guy that shoved a pipe in your vagina? How is a person supposed to live with that? What do you expect a person to do, just ignore the memory of some man standing over you, laughing at your tears, telling you to shut the fuck up and take it? Can we really expect someone to live with that and the nightmares that someday their own child will meet him, or his son, and live the life that you dread, the sound of existence making you want to vomit every day you wake? Could you really push that same exisitnance on someone else, perhaps someone you love? How would that feel, waking at night to hear them crying in their hands, for no reason other than they’re “really sad”? How much could my son pay to not hear me weep for the innocence lost? How many men would a father destroy to keep his eleven-year-old daughter from believing that everyone in her life wants to use and abuse her?
I once heard someone say “There is no wrong, there is no right.” Let me ask something. Does the fact that a nine-month-old baby was raped to death because the man that accosted her was convinced that her virgin blood would heal his AIDs, a neutral thing? Would that be wrong? Sorry baby, I happen to believe in people accepting responsibility for themselves and their offense is what keeps us monkeys from annihilating each other. There is wrong. Raping babies is WRONG!!!!! Raping people is WRONG!!!!! And so is try to justify it by saying these men thought it was right or funny. I can tell you that the pain caused by this action is so intense, so severe that even an imbecile could grasp the simplcity of the concept. What the hell is wrong with the mental capacity of these people? Where did they come up with the idea that raping an eleven-year-old would be cool?
Okay, parents, its time to be responsible. Okay? Its time to say no. No, you can’t have that. No, you can’t keep that. No, you can’t DO that. Where the hell is the sanity in this world? Have we really come to the point where a team of football players can rape a CHILD and get a guffaw from the president? Doesn’t he worry about this? I know I do. I really wish that little girl some peace from her suffering, even if it means death. I may not know what you are going through exactly daughter, but I know some of how you feel. Someday they will grovel at our feet and they will know punishment. Let us only hope.
I’m out. R
And my first reaction is always, “God I hope someone kills that poor girl.” I’m sorry if that sounds cruel but I am a firm believer in allowing people to end their misery. Just think of what that poor girl will go through the rest of her life. Wouldn’t it be a mercy in the end? How would it feel, in the real world, to be that girl who was raped by 10 men? What kind of relationships will someone like that have with people? I believe this child will most likely have at least two children by 16 purely because she’ll feel like she isn’t worth more than to be a feedbag for some calf. Imagine what it would be like to wake up every day with that knowledge. Of being forced to have sex with 10 strange men. To be a cum sack for some dude with no face. Would one be okay living with that feeling, the fact that those same men most likely walked within 14 months? Could you get out of bed every day knowing that no matter what you do, there will always be that one scar, you know that one that throbs during your period, the one from that guy that shoved a pipe in your vagina? How is a person supposed to live with that? What do you expect a person to do, just ignore the memory of some man standing over you, laughing at your tears, telling you to shut the fuck up and take it? Can we really expect someone to live with that and the nightmares that someday their own child will meet him, or his son, and live the life that you dread, the sound of existence making you want to vomit every day you wake? Could you really push that same exisitnance on someone else, perhaps someone you love? How would that feel, waking at night to hear them crying in their hands, for no reason other than they’re “really sad”? How much could my son pay to not hear me weep for the innocence lost? How many men would a father destroy to keep his eleven-year-old daughter from believing that everyone in her life wants to use and abuse her?
I once heard someone say “There is no wrong, there is no right.” Let me ask something. Does the fact that a nine-month-old baby was raped to death because the man that accosted her was convinced that her virgin blood would heal his AIDs, a neutral thing? Would that be wrong? Sorry baby, I happen to believe in people accepting responsibility for themselves and their offense is what keeps us monkeys from annihilating each other. There is wrong. Raping babies is WRONG!!!!! Raping people is WRONG!!!!! And so is try to justify it by saying these men thought it was right or funny. I can tell you that the pain caused by this action is so intense, so severe that even an imbecile could grasp the simplcity of the concept. What the hell is wrong with the mental capacity of these people? Where did they come up with the idea that raping an eleven-year-old would be cool?
Okay, parents, its time to be responsible. Okay? Its time to say no. No, you can’t have that. No, you can’t keep that. No, you can’t DO that. Where the hell is the sanity in this world? Have we really come to the point where a team of football players can rape a CHILD and get a guffaw from the president? Doesn’t he worry about this? I know I do. I really wish that little girl some peace from her suffering, even if it means death. I may not know what you are going through exactly daughter, but I know some of how you feel. Someday they will grovel at our feet and they will know punishment. Let us only hope.
I’m out. R
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