Welcome to the Police State!

No sooner than the polls close and already we're getting a taste of things to come. We let this abuse of power go on for six years and now we're begining to feel its effects. Watch as the newly enriched corporate class dismantles this little experiment called Democracy in America. Yes, the 231 year young, attempt at liberty and justice for all... may be in the initial throws of the mortal wound it has suffered at the hand of King George the First and his new Corporate Aristocracy - Corpratocrisy.

On election night the LA Times Editor, Dean Baquet, was fired from his post for not parsing his staff down to increase profitability! He's the second Editor axed from a major news publicatioin for making a stand, upholding the basic principles of Journalism. For it is now the role of journalism to bring home a 30% ROI quarter over quarter for their shareholders? The role of Journalism is the 4th Branch of Government.... the responsiblilty to hold the government accountable to the people. Once we loose sight of that, we may as well give up all our rights. We've no longer the ability control our destiny.

With no ability for the citizens of a democratic society to accurately know what is happening in their society, how can they effectively participate in said democracy?

We all remember the picture portrayed of Soviet media... the journalists would go to the politbureau and be given the stories... no one questioned the accuracy of the accounts, they merely took the word and posted it. We all laughed at how naive those silly Russians were to not know the truth.

Well brothers and sisters, let the truth be told, the world is watching us now, because we are doing the same thing, but our citizens too numb to realize it! And we comically stand defiantly and sing the praises of our Democratic System...

A man lit himself on fire to protest the war in Iraq in downtown Chicago, with a note, a sign and a video camera recording it all live. This was three days before the election. The media refused to publish the story until after the election... and then it only reported it as a crazy man's suicide. Another news publication refused to publish the news it learned of illegal wiretapping being done by our government on a large scale... until after the 2004 presidential elections... a full year later!

Now yesterday a middle eastern student at UCLA was brutally abused by several "peace" officers in the UCLA library in plain view of perhaps 100 students. He was repeatedly tasered for not standing up! Yes several healthy strong law enforcement officers chose to torture his brown skinned body, rather than physically lifting him up and escorting him out of the library... all because he failed to comply when they asked him to show his ID! And it was all recorded on video by a student sitting elsewhere in the library. If not for the video, the real story never made the news... it was mentioned as an altercation at the UCLA library. Now the media is picking up on the story, but already spinning it into oblivion... read on and then watch the tape

This is how it happens, overwhelming acts of aggression frighten the masses into compliance. The news media whitewashes the story to keep conformity in the general public, and freedom and liberty is now a thing of the past.

George Bush said "let the history books decide if i was a good president" I think he knew exactly what he was saying... I write the books... let them eat cake!

And now ClearChannel is being bought by a private investor group... media consolidation now is taken off the corporate charter and given to the hands of private citizens... with the last six years of wealth redistribution and war profiteering, the overwhelming amount of riches in this country are skewed to a precious few people... they are so wealthy, they can purchase the largest monopoly of media stations in America... tell me we're not entering a dark age.

Simpsons Do Army Recruiting

- Episode 1805

Ultimate War Protest in Chicago

Everyone,

I've just read that a Chicago Activist/Musician, Malachi Ritscher set himself on fire as a suicide statement in protest of the war underneath the Millennium Flame along the Kennedy Expressway at 7am Friday Nov 3rd. 41 years and a day, from when Norman Morrison self-immolated in protest of the Vietnam war in front of Sec of Defense, Robert McNamara's Pentagon Office in Washington DC. Two others died in 1965 also of self-immolation in protest of the war. Only their deaths brought headlines and made news. The well-known jazz musician Malachi, with a politically-charged "Mission Statement" on his website and a video camera on a tripod to record the event, ten feet in front of his body.... didn't make the news!

If you think we are not living under fascist rules,
you may want to lookup the definition.
For what disparity it gives the oppressed,
and for the message it tells the rest!

Below is a linked statement he wrote, and below that is the first news article of his death. This is a major moment, in my opinion, in the chapter of what living under encroaching fascism can do to the soul,
and how the determination to stop it is deeply imbedded within the daily lives of so many of us at this time in American history.

I am shocked not just by this news, but by the lack of word anywhere about this other than the Chicago jazz+improv community. This was an act of protest via suicide, not simply an act of despondence.

There is a local twist that may shed more light on the story. Malachi mailed a package to a local Milwaukee club owner and friend... in it were his house keys, a will, his mission statement and additional instructions. Hopefully the police and media will be compelled to produce the tape, and report the event for what it really was, the ultimate personal statement against against a wrongful war.

( I may not agree with his action, but I acknowledge his intent.)

http://www.savagesound.com/gallery99.htm

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/123692,CST-NWS-bodyfire04.article

The Day YouTube Died

November 13, 2006

Republican funded PR firms crack YouTube to send propaganda to the "most viewed" section.... does the MSM report the crime? FOX attacks YouTube as being compliced... CNN reports the anomoly... but the hackers and their posts are still online!




Now it makes sense, YouTube was purchased today by Google- who is in bed (partnership) with AOL-TimeWarner and Murdochs, NewsCorp, owners of FOX. Say goodbye to freespeech on YouTube.

First sign of the death, the disappearance of Colbert, Stewart and Olberman from the Most.... lists. Then their disappearance entirely! The reason given... violation of copyright... supposedly having half a million people a day able to see show clips was hurting their viewership and profits... more likely the rapid increase in MSNBC's Olbermann over Fox's O'Reilly Factior was cutting into profits.... bring on Leno, Letterman and that dufus from downunder schleppin adverts and useless information.

Bye Bye new medium for public debate, hello corporate media... its a sad day. (Thanks for the catch antiklaus)

Welcome TheirTube! - newly renamed BoobTube!

RightWing Media Bias Exposed!

Please take a moment to view this news clip
If you don't have a YouTube account
It is free and easy to sign-up
just follow the prompts...

It's difficult to comprehend from this clip that we are talking about a person caught flirting with a MINOR! Not just any person, a Congressman! Not just any Congressman, but the one who heads up the Commission to protect MINORS FROM PEDOPHILES.

And not just any Minor, but a captive group of children sent to SERVE CONGRESS.... A group of children given a chance to learn how Congress works! Sent by their parents to get an up-close look at our 109th Congress -in action! What have they learned? What have we exposed them too? And now, how are the spokesmen of the GOP responding- just listen!

How can anyone align themselves with this kind of doctrine? It is inconceivable to think that anyone can pretend to claim any moral high ground on this issue... while behaving like this.

Steve Malzberg is a disgrace to journalism...

Again, we are talking about a Pedophile who has been essentially given the keys to the children's dormitory... by House Speaker Haskert and the GOP-run 109th Congress!

Haskert knew of Foley's penchant for little boys-PAGES-for 2 years! Because the GOP needed that Republican seat and it was more important than the children of parents from both sides of the aisle.

This has nothing to do about prior scandals,nothing to do with Democrats at all... but watch FOX network blatantly manipulate public perception with lies, unrelated distractions and bully tactics. Straight out of Rove's Handbook

Steve Malzberg has the privilege of being a radio talk-show host! He should be censored just like Foley should have been by Speaker Haskert. But the right wing media will look the other way just as the right wing government did with Foley. So who really thinks the media is left wing???

Time to take to the pen and write opinions... to friends, family, neighborhood papers....

FOX is blatantly abusing their privilege to broadcast on our airwaves! And since 1981, the FCC, our government's oversight commission has been systematically re-staffed by media-friendly and in many cases media owned personnel. Today the FCC is nothing more than a rubber stamp for this administration and its policy... favoring media consolidation.


The director, Kevin Martin, headed the Bush-Cheney transition team and is a radical right-wing media advocate, his predecessor Michael Powell blatantly served the interests of media corporations... no wonder it seems like this kind of conduct is okay!


The real question is How low will we let them go?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y1C-71ttn0&mode=related&search=

We go about our lives too busy to accept responsibility... We push aside our duty as citizens in a Democracy, our duty to be informed... to take action, to participate. We do so at our own peril, for this democracy is unraveling before our very eyes- whether we choose to look -or not, and when its gone, there is no "do-over button"

Make sure the 110th Congress does not become the second Rubberstamp of the New American Century... And keep the Rubberstamp Republicans like Green out of the Govenor's office. Lets not make our children pay in ways far worse than the Congressional Pages have paid.


Here's more...
videoclip one
videoclip two


Speak Truth to Power- Keep Democracy Alive!

I'm a Citizen, Reps read on

Ah yes and I was one too.... I voted for Bush in 2000. But if you take the time to really look into the Bush administration's motives, you'd see as many Americans are saying, that the policies and actions of Bush and his key advisors have led to nothing but corruption and destruction for the purpose of consolidating power to a few giants, and not the vast majority of American Citizens. This is not what Republicans, Conservatives or Morally Conscientious people stand for but with the power of several corrupt Industrial leaders in key sectors (energy, media, pharmaceutical, defense contracting and most important, Banking) this administration has been able to fool most Americans into thinking they have been Fiscally Conservative and Pro-America in their actions.

This administration and the 109th Congress, for those not paying attention, was neither Republican nor Democrat. Its corruption was unprecedented in modern history and it's sweeping mandates have led our nation into deep financial and moral debt while trickle-down tactics have given most of us the appearance of prosperity and righteousness... All this is being done by creating the largest debt in our nation's history and alienating us from more nations than in our 231 year history.

If you overdrew your credit card by $5,000,000,000 don't you think the bank might have cut you off? Not if the bank had something to gain by keeping you funded... So what this administration did was to reach out to everyone's greed... politicians, businessmen, contractors, lawyers, doctors, investors, and even you & me... They said here's $340 back from the government cuz we're cutting taxes... remember those checks? Then they gave out checks in the form of legislation to Congress... want to fund some pork in your State? no problem, belly up to the trough.... plenty of money for all.... just remember who gave you this when we call on you to pass some changes to our Constitution.

All that money they've been tossing round has made Americans forget our responsibility as Citizens in a democracy. We became preoccupied in other things, building a business, buying a house, participating in a multitude of diversionary spectacles like sports, entertainment, gambling, fashion, television, travel and investing.... each brought us comfort and the appearance of prosperity, but kept us from noticing what was happening to our government. Then 9/11 happened and our nation united against the terror of 9/11.... not the causes. Curious that we never really try to explain why Bin-Laden hated America? What, denied a VISA check card? Turned away at the Tilt-O-Whirl for height restrictions? Got a defective HamBurgular Action figure in his HappyMeal?

Regardless, we rallied together and listened to our leaders who pointed towards Bagdad and said... there, go get Saddham—er Afghanistan and Bin-Laden... Now with our nation seriously committed to a war on Terror, we feel obligated destroy sovereign nations, their leaders and their citizens in the name of Democracy. (thats called a Crusade)

Okay, which part of fiscal or conservative, or moral, or ethical, or family value, or business sense, or patriotic, or Constitutional does this direction from the Bush Administration take from the platform of the Republican Party? So you see, regardless of who controls the 110th Congress, what I celebrate is that Democracy has won the day, perhaps the new blood will bring about a higher appreciation to the fundamental principles our nation was founded on just a mere 231 years ago.

I believe in the same principles as you, I want a fair chance to make my own destiny in a nation that tries to treat all it's citizens with respect and dignity. I realize there is an obligation and responsibility I bear as citizen within this nation and I'm willing to make sacrifices to maintain the principles that founded it. I believe in upholding the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and will abide by rule of law - so long as it is just and equitable.

But I also recognize my role and responsibility to question the rules or rulers if i feel they do not live up to the founding principles of our nation. That is our duty. That is the thread the weaves together our Flag, a patchwork of diversity that this nation was founded upon.

We've been lacking as a nation of citizens, in our duties and obligations to hold our leadership accountable. I'm happy that Tuesday, Americans came out in large numbers and did their job. They stopped / or at least slowed an agenda that has disenfranchised our nation and its citizens from the very bounty that is ours— Life Liberty and Justice.

I will be as critical of the 110th Congress and no less vocal if they do not uphold the standards of our Republic. I apologize for the length of this reply but it is important to me that you understand where I'm coming from. I think we're more alike than different.


respectfully,

Charlie
just a citizen....

Celebration—across the lands!

Erection 2006

I am guardedly optimistic that tomorrow
will bring the reality that America came out
and voted against the most corrupt government
in our nation's history... for they certainly did
come out... but there is more than a few reasons
for concern... I still recall 2004 and all the work
i and many others did at several polling stations
and all the early signs that pointed to victory...
and the breathless tears of all the workers,
my friends with MoveOn, and all the others
gathered at Vivos, mouths agape at the news
that unfolded.... lets pray it doesn't happen
this time....


Remember, Its not the vote that counts,
so much as the one who counts the votes!

Vote Different.

I composited a video on YouTube that parodied the Apple Think Different Ads called Vote Different.... it was watched a thousand times in the week it was up. The following week the creators of the original requested I take my copy down... I had no trouble complying as it was their effort I was piggybacking. To see their originals... got to http:www.britethorn.com

October Suprise

God I hope this doesn't manifest itself,
but now is the time and the GOP certainly has set the stage....
Lets pray it doesn't come true....
but then how low does this administration go?

listen to Keith Olbermann speak of the failures... listen to him talk to the cowardly national ad that resurrects Bin-Laden... after even the pResident has written him off as no longer a concern.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WG7pcIpV10

But how low will these creatures go to march out their agenda of hegemony? How many more will they murder to keep the collective mindset of Americans in their grip? With less than two weeks til the election, it would play well from the Karl Rove handbook of Election Victories at Any Cost to pull the October Surprise.... like a bug listening on his campaign headquarters only days before incumbent Ann Richards was to sweep contender George W Bush by a wide margin. But the headline news of the wiretapping of campaign headquarters cast enough doubt to bring the the Goddess of Liberty atop the Austin Capitol building and the State of Texas... under Bush's control.

Days after the election, the truth of the "bug" broke, it has a battery life of 2 hrs, a range of 50 yards and was incorrectly setup. But the yet unknown Rove would tell you it worked just fine, for with that October surprise, his candidate took the office and the followup story never made it off an inset column on page 22 of section D.

Now the stakes are much higher... loss of the senate and house... leaving pResident Bush a complete lame duck... with several pieces to Cheny's political end-game yet to be played...

Now, the Bin-Laden ad, increased headlines of dirty bomb threats in stadiums and cities... Are we being tenderized for the real surprise? WIll this administration sink so low as to stage another terrorist act to stay in power? The stakes have never been higher... the pResident and his henchmen could still face prison if enough seats change.... would they bring down another building? Release a dirty bomb? Unleash a biological agent? ... or do they have an even better plan?

Diebold, ES&S and the voter machines... will all the elections return with 51 to 49 votes in favor of the Republicans? Will we again find out too late of the partisan crimes like Kathleen Harris (FL Sec of State 2000) now Congresswoman, who had 58,000 minority voters struck from the register because their surnames matched convicted people? Or Kenneth Blackwell (OH 2004 Sec of State) Head of elections commission and chair of Bush's re-election committee... who's now running for Governor! Blackwell who with Diebold President, "Deliver Ohio to the GOP"....

Yes perhaps there will be no October Surprise.... We can only Pray these Imperialistic Megalomaniacs in Washington do not murder more civilians on our own soil to swing the vote.... But will we have the November surprise when voters are once again, deceived by a privatized voting system that can swing digits to record victory of their choosing—and without paper to prove. Will we be one step closer to a reality we will wear in shame the rest of our lives?

Democracy is the will of the people, if we do nothing, our will be done.... we can stew in our own juices as the world returns to an awful chapter... when another megalomaniacal empire subjugated the masses... and trust me, we are all part of the masses.

Will it once again be the scrupulous work of investigative reporters to uncover the truth about the elections? Months and years later being able to connect the dots, get the story, find the truth... Or will our new laws restricting journalism, consolidating media ownership and control, and our new wiretapping freedoms empower this administration to see all, hear all, and arrest any who stand in their way.... or is that saved for 2008?

in prayers

Charlie Koenen
your wingnut prophet
with more ramblings
from the edge————|

The Unraveling

RightWing Media Pundits pull all the stops

It is hard to imagine this tactic is still employed by the Right Wing Media majors like FOX. But here we have it again, Right wing talkshow pundits on every podium they can summon, spewing the most audacious misdirection and spin ever perpetrated on the general public.

Step right up ladies and gentleman,, see GOP pundit, Steve Malzberg, lyve, and caged in a prison of his party's own making. A Pundit with an unparalleled ability to muckrake the most vile propaganda known to man,, step right up and see how they treat their voting constituants,, like, a ninth ward minority granny on her rooftop, in New Orleans... Yes thats right folks,
OOOoooooowwww! , Don't let the kids get too close!
He's liable to snatch em from your mitts and devour them like or dervs at a GOP fundraiser.

,Who wants to ask the first question? You, there in the back, what do you want to ask the pundit?

When did the speaker of the house first learn of the congressman's penchant for little boy pages?

rrrrrarrrreerrrooowww... it was clinton, I mean monica lewinski,er radical activist judges..er liberal, democrats and communists, siding with AlQida and passing secrets that threaten our nations security rrreereeroaaarrssssss.... WMD's WMD's BinLaden and Iraq, Saddham and 9/11... liberal flip-floppers, disgracing the military... stay the course, greeted as liberators, we are a friendly nation that seeks to help democracy flourish throughout the middle east..... err... cluster bombs.....hhaaaaa uum wiretaps,eenn umm no free speech, no journalism....embed, embedded...activist, sodham, illegal aleins, border fence...
what was the question? err about two years ago...

Excuse me? Two years ago? We are talking about a person caught flirting with a MINOR!

Not just any person, a Congressman! Not just any Congressman, but the one who heads up the Commission to protect MINORS FROM PEDOPHILES??? Right?

iiiieeeeaarrrrrighhhhtyroooski.... radical russians, communist threat, alquida, carbomb, oklahoma, mcVey.... Hinkley Shot Reagan, terror suspects held in detention facilities errrrrrraaarrrr

And not just any Minor, but a captive group of children sent to SERVE CONGRESS....
A group of children given a chance to learn how Congress works! Sent by their parents
to get an up-close look at our 109th Congress - in action!

heeeeerrrrraarrraayy,, muktada elsauder, briitish taliban..... rrrrryes aI guess thats what happened..... so????

What have they learned? hie children, What have we exposed them too?
And now, how are the leaders of the GOP responding?

Weeeellllllllleerrrrii'mmmmmaaaagggonnnatttteeellllyaaa the kids were never in harms way, and are safely in their pajamas in bed...eeerrrrrriIi knowwthis cuz I tuckked in a few of the cute liitle boys, myself..e..rrrrraaaaahhh. - jesus haters- liberal anarchists errraaahhh.... 9/11 stay the course errr ahh umm....


How can anyone align themselves with this kind of doctrine? It is inconceivable to think that anyone can pretend to claim any moral high ground on this issue... while behaving like this. Steve??

WWWOOOOdddeemeeellllloommaaahhhh gotta big fat check for my appearance errrannnddddddI can perhaps one day follow in the footsteps of my hero Tony Snowwwwwww activistjudges errrroowww abortion lovers, leavenochildbehinddddddefense strategy, operation stoploss...errrrrr wwwooowww

Steve Malzberg you're a disgrace to journalism...We're talking about a Pedophile who has been essentially given the keys to the children's dormitory... by House Speaker Haskert and the GOP-run 109th Congress!

Errrrrrrhheeyy,, hee gottt the keys???? nnnnnaaaaannooo fairrrrrr, whay doesnt the press corp get them too???? Weerrree alwaays the last ones to the party..errrrrr ummmm....


Haskert knew of Foley's penchant for little boys-pages-for 2 years! But because the GOP needed that Republican seat. it was more important than the children of parents from both sides of the aisle.

Errrruummmsseeeuuummmmerrrrepublicans are betterrrrr, higher morality and church light.... errravtivistjudges...err...an Democrats, flip floppers errrann hillary.errr barbara boxerrrrrrandddddennisconyerrrracist judges...... errr stay the course... plausable deniability, acceptable casualty...eeerrrrr... no on said freedom would be easy errrraaarrrgggg Rumsfelt denied any wrongdoing...errrr brownies doin a heck of a job errruummmm



This has nothing to do about prior scandals,
nothing to do with Democrats at all...
but watch FOX network blatantly manipulate
public perception with lies,
unrelated distractions and bully tactics.
Straight out of Rove's Handbook

Steve Malzberg has the privilege
of being a radio talk-show host!
He should be censored just like Foley
should have been by Speaker Haskert.

Time to take to the pen and write opinions...
to friends, family, neighborhood papers....

FOX is blatantly abusing their privilege
to broadcast on our airwaves! And since
1981, the FCC, our government's oversight
commission has been systematically re-staffed
by media-friendly and in many cases media
owned personnel. Today the FCC is nothing
more than a rubber stamp
for this administration and its policy...
favoring media consolidation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC

The director, Kevin Martin, headed the
Bush-Cheney transition team and is a radical
right-wing media advocate, his predecessor
Michael Powell blatantly served the interests
of media corporations... no wonder it seems
like this kind of conduct is okay!

The real question is How low
will we let them go?

We go about our lives too busy
to accept responsibility...
We push aside our duty as citizens
in a Democracy, our duty to be informed...
to take action, to participate.

We do so at our own peril,
for this democracy is unraveling
before our very eyes-
whether we choose to look
-or not, and when its gone,
there is no "do-over button"

Make sure the 110th Congress does not
become the second Rubberstamp of the
New American Century...

And keep the Rubberstamp Republicans
like Green out of the Govenor's office.
`
Lets not make our children pay
in ways far worse than the
Congressional Pages have paid.

End of Democracy!

What did you do yesterday?
My Mom turned 81... but that wasn't the most important event that occurred yesterday.

Yesterday America officially dismantled its very fabric. Bush and his rubberstamp Congress signed the 2006 Military Commission Act and officially made our existing form of government obsolete.... but for the figure head branches. Look Here



With the signing of this Bill, all the secret torture prisons this administration has built around the world are now legal. This Bill suspends Habeas Corpus for detainees ll, 4.5 acre big, Eisenhower, equipped with tactical military strike fighters and a barrage of surveillance and support aircraft, left Norfolk,VA on October 3rd with more than 5000 young sailors and air corps. The average age on board is 19 years so they are certainly able, but also impressionable.

As of tomorrow and certainly up through election time, the presence of this awesome arsenal will raise tension in an already tense area. Can you sat Tonkin Bay? How bout Pearl Harbor or September 11th... each of these events stuck fear and retribution throughout America. What will be this war's ignition incident? Will it happen next week or just before the election? Will you be drawn to fight back, or to look at the cause and effect scenario we have begun today?

This latest example of Bush Diplomacy... like Iraq, Afghanistan and the Lebennon/Palestine interventions before... should be a clear indicator of the agenda this administration has always had... even before 9/11. Regime Change is a clever word for Imperialism- the policy of extending the rule or authority of a nation over foreign countries.

As of today, he now has the authorization to do so.... where were you on October 17, 2006? This is a day will certainly live in infamy... perhaps even more-so than Dec 7th, 1941.

SmirkingChimp

Grieve for our nation and its inability to escape
the self-distractive stranglehold its media, military, industrialists and politicians have put us in....

Some may laugh at my "conspiracy" talk...
but pray I'm wrong as it will surely make you wish
you'd cared more about defending democracy
rather than watching CSI: or Survivor...

Yesterday, the real Crime Scene was Washington
The Survivors of this act will not be you, as of yesterday
your rights were voted off the island.

Best War Ever!

Left wing media bias my eye!

Please take a moment to view this news clip on YouTube. If you don't have an account, it's free and easy to sign-up, just follow the prompts...

It's difficult to comprehend from this clip that we are talking about a person caught flirting with a MINOR! Not just any person, a Congressman! Not just any Congressman, but the one who heads up the Commission to protect MINORS FROM PEDOPHILES.

And not just any Minor, but a captive group of children sent to SERVE CONGRESS.... A group of children given a chance to learn how Congress works! Sent by their parents to get an up-close look at our 109th Congress -in action! What have they learned? What have we exposed them too? And now, how are the spokesmen of the GOP responding- just listen!

How can anyone align themselves with this kind of doctrine? It is inconceivable to think that anyone can pretend to claim any moral high ground on this issue... while behaving like this.

Steve Malzberg is a disgrace to journalism...

Again, we are talking about a Pedophile who has been essentially given the keys to the children's dormitory... by House Speaker Haskert and the GOP-run 109th Congress!

Haskert knew of Foley's penchant for little boys-PAGES-for 2 years! Because the GOP needed that Republican seat and it was more important than the children of parents from both sides of the aisle.

This has nothing to do about prior scandals,nothing to do with Democrats at all... but watch FOX network blatantly manipulate public perception with lies, unrelated distractions and bully tactics. Straight out of Rove's Handbook

Steve Malzberg has the privilege of being a radio talk-show host! He should be censored just like Foley should have been by Speaker Haskert. But the right wing media will look the other way just as the right wing government did with Foley. So who really thinks the media is left wing???

Time to take to the pen and write opinions... to friends, family, neighborhood papers....

FOX is blatantly abusing their privilege to broadcast on our airwaves! And since 1981, the FCC, our government's oversight commission has been systematically re-staffed by media-friendly and in many cases media owned personnel. Today the FCC is nothing more than a rubber stamp for this administration and its policy... favoring media consolidation.


The director, Kevin Martin, headed the Bush-Cheney transition team and is a radical
right-wing media advocate, his predecessor Michael Powell blatantly served the interests of media corporations... no wonder it seems like this kind of conduct is okay!


The real question is How low will we let them go?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y1C-71ttn0&mode=related&search=

We go about our lives too busy to accept responsibility... We push aside our duty as citizens in a Democracy, our duty to be informed... to take action, to participate. We do so at our own peril, for this democracy is unraveling before our very eyes- whether we choose to look -or not, and when its gone, there is no "do-over button"

Make sure the 110th Congress does not become the second Rubberstamp of the New American Century... And keep the Rubberstamp Republicans like Green out of the Govenor's office. Lets not make our children pay in ways far worse than the Congressional Pages have paid.


Here's more...
Views on Views
RightWing Propaganda


Speak Truth to Power- Keep Democracy Alive!

Lyrics: For What Its Worth

ARTIST: Buffalo Charlie
TITLE: For What It's Worth
Lyrics and Chords
__________________________

There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man been elected unfair
Telling me I got to beware
I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

/ E - A - / / / / E D A C /

There's battle lines being drawn
If you're not on the right then you really must be wrong
Good people not speaking their minds
Getting so much confusion as they're reading the signs
I think it's time we stop, hey, stand our ground
Everybody turn their tvs down

What a field-day on the streets
a thousand protesters on their feet
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, you're not on our side
It's time we stop, hey, wake this town
Everybody bring that white house down

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when they make you afraid
Change the laws, the man come take your freedoms away

We better stop, hey, look around
Everybody get our country found
Stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody turn your tv down
Stop, now, look what we found
Whole lotta lying going down
Stop, Bush and his crowd
Before they bring our nation down

People dying in Taqrit
Iraqi lives not worth more than meat
Our soldiers crossing the line
between whats right and what others want to find
Its time we stop leave that ground
no reason to tear that country down

Stop hey look around
no nuclear weapons to be found
yeah stop now look around
only corporations gaining ground
stop now before too late
lets fuck that bush and make our country great

we gotta join together with our friends
stretch out our arms tell them now its time to end
no more manipulation of the words
we stand for truth and it really must be heard

Its time to stop hey turn around
send our soldiers homeward bound
stop now listen round
burn a bush in washingtown
stop yeah whats that sound
everyone turn you tv down
stop hey wake this town
everyone tear the whitehouse down


ORIGINAL LYRICS
ARTIST: Buffalo Springfield
TITLE: For What It's Worth
Lyrics and Chords


There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear
There's a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware
I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

/ E - A - / / / / E D A C /

There's battle lines being drawn
Nobody's right if everybody's wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind
I think it's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

What a field-day for the heat
A thousand people in the street
Singing songs and carrying signs
Mostly say, hooray for our side
It's time we stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you're always afraid
You step out of line, the man come and take you away

We better stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down
Stop, hey, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down
Stop, now, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down
Stop, children, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down

7 deadly sins?

This administration has gone to great lengths to illuminate religious beliefs (Christianity) and nationalism (Patriotism) as the headlights shining forth from their vehicle of agenda. With God and Country as their justification, they seem to possess the fervor of the nation. Why is it that millions of good Christian citizens would rather accept the mere suggestion of piety and righteousness, than actually defend their beliefs?

For as the Bush administration uses the words of the faithful as a shield to advance a global dominion strategy and relgious belief as their richeous sword, they seem be able to break the very tenents that serve to define faith itself. Lets us examine one of the foundational teachings of Christianity to see how the neo-conservative strategy of corporate colonialism has hyjacked our morality and ethical foundation.

In Dante's Inferno, part one of the 11th century Florentine poet's The Divine Comedy, considered the greatest literary statement of middle ages Europe, he detailed the structure of the seven deadly sins. They represented the fixation on one's self over others—in order of severity, culminating in pride, the worst of all sins.

Lust - uncontrolled or illicit sexual desire or appetite, an overmastering desire or craving.
Gluttony - wasting of food and drink through overindulgence, hoarding, or as punishment
Greed - desire to possess more than one needs, or has need or use for.
Sloth - laziness, complacency or wastefulness - causing others to have to work harder
Wrath - inappropriate feelings of rage, revenge, denial or punitive desire that falls outside the justice system
Envy - jealousy - coveting - resentment of others for their possessions
Pride/Vanity - desire to hold ones self out of proper position toward God or others. Or desire for self importance or attractiveness in relation to others or to self. Or as Danté himself referred, "love of self perverted to hatred and contempt for one's neighbor"

Each sin is a particular way of failing to love the creator with all one's resources or to love others as much as self. Take a few moments to look into each deadly sin and ask yourself: How has my government, as an entity, respected or rejected these vices? How have most (not all) corporate citizens respected or rejected these vices? (enron, halliburton, general electric, exxon, oscar mayer, monsanto, conagra, bridgestone, sears, or walmart) Now the important one... just between you and whatever creator you respect. How have you respected or rejected these vices?


Lust- How is it that we condone our nation and its corporation's use of sex and coveting? How is it that our military regularly preys upon the religious fortitude of its detainees by using women interrogators who act suggestively, touch inappropriately and fake the smearing of menstrual blood on the faces and Korans of their captives? And why do we choose to defend these actions as free speech and our rights, rather than creating a climate where this behavior is not encouraged? Do we really need a law to tell us what is moral and immoral? Do we really need to better define Article Three of the Geneva Conventions?

Gluttony- How can there be no moral concern when as a nation we consume 80% of the planets resources yet constitute less than 8% of its population? How is it that we, the wealthest and most technologically adavanced nation on the Earth, allow gluttonous exploitation of our nation's underprivileged as well as those in developing nations round the world? Why is it that we turn our heads when it comes to holding our government or the corporations accountable for creating impoverished conditions throughout the world? Are our stock dividends worth our immortal souls?

We look away as our leaders force lesser nation's to turn on their own peoples rights, in order to finance debts incurred through intentional WTO lendings that served to help first-world corporations better extract their resources. Is it that we don't want our stock portfolios to suffer at the hands of true justice being served?

And how easily their agenda translates to the third deadly sin, Greed. Our insane quest for materialism and consumption is unparalleled in human history— Never before in the history of mankind have so many been marginalized to profit so few. Few of us are capable of distinguishing our roles as consumers from that of us trying to lead a good life. Our nation's willingness to break down trade barriers to enrich the corporations who's interest profits the shareholders rather than stakeholders, serves to disenfranchise the working and middle class in favor of the ultra-wealthy who benefit most by their stock holdings. But by giving the everyone a chance to benefit in shareholding, they make it increasingly hard for us to descern right from wrong.

We are victims of our own corporate creations-and we alone have the power to reign in the monster. But we feel powerless in the face of huge corporate interests. And how has our greed been further exacerbated by our society elevating material possessions and wealth generation to god-like levels-look at how our culture treats Donald Trump or Bill Gates, or Snoop Dog and Paris Hilton... look at your neighbors and their need to show wealth, perhaps even look in the mirror.

The very nature a corporation is to externalize costs and maximize profits.... and along the way make a product or service. Because publicly held corporations are beholden to shareholders first... their greed, their need for ROI is insatiable. If companies do not continually show profit, then heads roll. Job security is directly linked to the bottom line and the only goal is keeping it ever increasing. Greed set in motion by a political agenda that removes any oversight or governance to the corporations is the pandoras box of out times.

Sloth means taking the easy way out. Got a remote? Got a microwave? instant coffee, tv dinner? While it may seem these items help us stay "on-the-go", they rob us from the ability to take refuge in the simple pleasures of the mundane. While we're busy flip-pin channels and pop-pin pizza rolls in the micro for the kids. We're actually getting less pleasure from each event in and of itself. We no longer enjoy the pleasure of making a meal, of grinding the coffee or brewing it up... we can cram seven actions into any given moment... when we should really be assessing why our society demands so much of us every day? Sloth can be read two ways, just being lazy, but also being fixated on gadgets that are a means not and end.

Wrath- is like shoot-in fish in a barrel... oops ... how wrathful of me! Road Rage, gang violence, hostile take-overs, hostile workplaces, domestic violence, all shown on prime time television with our babies staring wide-eyed into the set... studies show a child born in 1990 will have seen more the 18,000 acts of violence And then there's our DOD and government. Yes we elect new politicians periodically... but we don't elect our military leaders do we? We may choose to listen to them or not, but they are doing their jobs every day... and they have a vested interest as does anyone working- to insure viability and fruitfulness for their chosen career- don't they? hmmm.... should make you wonder.

And what about us, we don't like terrorists, or russians, or hmong or liberals or republicans we don't take direct action for our hatred, but we do tend to look away or marginalize an incident or action taken against one of those demographics.... they deserved it, serves em right... gotta break a few eggs to make an omelet...

Look at this administration and its press to allow for torture by our forces. Even one act of torture is heinous, that's why it is illegal by the Geneva Convention and countless UN sanctions—but not the US— we're the 800lb gorilla yet we need to commit torture to keep our freedom? Careful how you answer that one.

Envy... gee, who's oil is it anyways? for that matter who's everything is it anyways? Our nation assassinates leaders it doesn't do not like, it kills thousands of civilians who don't think its right to allow our corporations to descend on their lands exploit them of everything down to the water they drink and the air they breathe... and somehow we're considered the ones being hurt by policy? We train hundreds of soldiers out of Ft Benning in the School of the Americas to become government sponsored terrorists... enforcing martial law over anyone trying to organize the peoples to resist our corporate domination.... no coveting here, right?

How bout at home, we are being conditioned to covet and envy? Every prime time show pits people against each-other to outdo the other and win something. We envy the winners, we envy the apprentices and fantasize how we'd do much better if in their shoes... Soap operas teach us all about hypocrisy and envy. Erika Kane has won how many daytime emmys for being the ultimate bitch... or was that Joan Collins an Dallas????

The last and worst of all deadly sins, pride. It is pride that emboldens a nation to become wrathful,jealous, greedy or vane. And I know from my studies in spirituality, regardless of the flavor, every religion asks you to let go of your ego to embrace the universal truth... or something like that. What does the military do to condition recruits in boot-camp? Break their spirit and they become like putty. Then you reshape them into your ideal. Same with prisoners, break their pride and they become like sheep. How have we been flaunting our pride? How is it that we have to be important, have to be noticed, have to attract attention?

Take a moment to reflect on these teachings, how is it we can allow such violations to mankink, both at home, and abroad?

Listen to Dante's description of our fate


THIE INFERNO
The Inferno begins on Holy Thursday of the year 1300, a significant holiday, "In the middle of our life's journey". Dante is thirty-five years old, half of the biblically alloted age of 70, lost in a dark wood (allegorically, contemplating suicide), assailed by beasts (sins) he cannot evade, and unable to find the "straight way" to salvation. Conscious that he is ruining himself, that he is falling into a "deep place" where the sun is silent, Dante is at last rescued by Virgil after his love Beatrice intercedes on his behalf, and he and Virgil begin their journey to the underworld.

Dante and Virgil enter the Gate of Hell, on which is inscribed the famous phrase "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here" Virgil guides Dante through the nine circles of Hell. The circles are concentric, each new one representing further and further evil, culminating in the center of the earth, where Satan is held, bound. Each circle's sin is punished in an appropriately revengeful way to fit the crime. The nine circles are:

Circle 1. Limbo-the unbaptized and virtuous pagans, who did not accept Christ. They are unable to reach Heaven and denied God's presence for eternity.
Circle 2. Lust, depicted by the lovers in an embrace, never to touch each other again.
Circle 3. Gluttons, face-down in the mud and gnawed apart by a monster.
Circle 4. The greedy and indulgent, forced to push giant rocks in opposite directions.
Circle 5. The wrathful, fighting each other in the swamp-like water of the river Styx, and the slothful, trapped beneath the water.

The lower parts of hell are contained within the walls a city surrounded by the river Styx. These are the active (rather than passive) sins; first are the sins of violence:

Circle 6. Heretics, trapped in flaming tombs.
Circle 7. The violent. These are divided into three rings:
Outer ring: The violent against people and property, in a river of boiling blood.
Middle ring: The violent against themselves—suicides —turned into thorny black trees [Uniquely among the dead, they will not be bodily reincarnated after the final judgment. Where others will continue to occupy Hell (and Heaven) in corporeal (rather than merely spiritual) form, suicides—because they alienated themselves from their own bodies—spend eternity in the body of a tree, their own corpses hanging from the limbs.] Also punished in this circle are profligates, chased perpetually through the trees by ferocious dogs. They are held here with the suicides because, during Dante's time, one's property is seen as an extension of one's physical body. Hence, doing violence to one's property is kin to suicide.
Inner ring: The violent against God, art, and nature—blasphemers, sodomites, and usurers—in a desert of flaming sand where fire rains from the sky (Cantos 14 through 17).
The last two circles of Hell punish sins of malice, or sins of the intellect; that is, sins involving conscious fraud or treachery, and can only be reached by descending a vast cliff into the "pit" of Hell:

Circle 8 The fraudulent—those guilty of deliberate, knowing evil—are located in a circle named Malebolge. This is divided into ten ditches:

Ditch 1: Panderers and seducers, running forever in opposite directions, whipped by demons.
Ditch 2: Flatterers, steeped in human excrement.
Ditch 3: Faith Preachers, placed head-first in holes, flames burning on the soles of their feet.
Ditch 4: False prophets, their heads on backwards so they can only see what is behind them.
Ditch 5: Corrupt politicians, trapped in a lake of burning pitch.
Ditch 6: Hypocrites, made to wear brightly painted lead cloaks.
Ditch 7: Thieves, chased by venomous snakes, who after being bitten, turn into snakes themselves.
Ditch 8: Fraudulent advisors, trapped in flames.
Ditch 9: Sowers of discord, whose bodies are ripped apart, then heal, only to be attacked again.
Ditch 10: Falsifiers, counterfeiters, perjurers, and impersonators. Each group is punished by being afflicted with a different type of disease.


The passage to the ninth circle contains classical and Biblical giants.

Circle 9. Traitors, distinguished from the "merely" fraudulent, in that their acts involve knowingly and deliberately betraying others, are frozen in a lake of ice. Each group of traitors is encased in ice to a different height, ranging from only the waist down to complete immersion.

This is divided into four concentric zones:
zone 1 (Caïna): Traitors to their kindred. Named for Cain.
Zone 2 (Antenora): Traitors to political entities, such as party, city, or country
Zone 3 (Ptolomæa): Traitors to their guests. Named for Ptolemy, captain of Jericho, who invited Simon the High Priest and his sons to a banquet and there killed them.
zone 4 (Judecca): Traitors to their lords and benefactors. This is the harshest section of Hell, containing Satan, who is eternally consuming the bodies of Brutus and Cassius for assassinating Julius Caesar, and the head of Judas Iscariot for betraying Jesus, after whom this zone is named.This is where Satan is trapped in the frozen central zone.I wonder where Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz will end up?

Rambo Coast Guards!

News broke of a story today that the Coast Guard has been quietly preparing for creating 34 live-weapon shooting zones along the coastlines of the Great Lakes without public participation!

Seems they plan to replace life rafts with 50cal machine guns on our Coast Guard cutters and helicopters as their mission under the Bush administration (and the post-9/11 era) has transformed from one of search and rescue to hunt and kill. After all, we all know Canadian terrorists, like AlQaeda, hate our freedom and wish to harm our boaters and beachgoers.

This negates a 200 year old treaty with Canada raising tension with our neighbor to the north and puts boaters and citizens in harms way. Is this the "New American Century" you voted for in 2000 and 2004?

Here the red areas denote where live-fire exercizes are to be held throughout the year. Citizens are somehow going to be notified to avoid these areas while or brave lifeguards learn how to use eco-friendly hot lead to "save" victims.




Now our Coast Guard most often thought of as lifeguards with serious toys.... David Hasselhofs with a flying "Kits" are being trained to be executioners from the skies! The NeoCon global war on terror has come home and lets hope they never have orders to shoot civilians.... but how far away are we from that???


Particularly if you pay attention to the immigration strategy the Bush Administration is executing... Do you know who is and who is not an American? These days the definition is under debate. During Rumsfeld's 2005 BRAC Plan (Base Re Alignment and Closure) hundreds of military bases are being disarmed and/or closed... oddly too, they seem to be the ones concentrated closer to urban centers -typically in Blue States. While this may not seem important, think of the job loss and economic trouble closings of this magnitude bring... and oddly, all the Bases being fortified are in Red States bringing jobs and further partisan afiliation by constituants.

Now understand too, many of these closed bases have plans to convert them to prisons and detention centers.... by Halliburton subsidiary KBR(Kellogg Brown and Root) who won no-bid contracts from Homeland Security worth millions. So gigantic prisons are being built outside urban population centers whos lower income citizens will suffer most by the loss of jobs related to the military.. not many rich kids are in the army... But when poor people don't have jobs, they usually get into trouble don't they?

Here's the deal, Bush alienates and impoverish's Blue State urban centers, imprisons blue voters as they become further economically strapped, enriches and alligns red state support and moves weapons away from citizens, concentrating them in privatized bunkers in only a few locations in the country. Gee, if the citizens ever felt a need to rise up against a tyrannical leader, they'd have no means to do it now wouldn't they? And now the Coast Guard would be waiting at the shoreline to gundown these citizen terrorists... hmm go George!

eVote Machines are Hacked!

This unedited testimony under oath deserves to be seen in its entirety. Right till the end it only gets more outrageous. Will somebody please explain why this is not on every news show and why no one has been indicted. The election is only weeks away. Voters who see this might want to order an absentee ballot and "cross their fingers?"

Retroactive Immunity

Here at least some newscasters in mainstream media are able to pierce the bubble of silence that surrounds the insane GOP takeover of our government.Bush, flanked by his partners in crime, Senate leader Bill Frist and House head Haskert, ramrod a bill through Congress that renders them immune from any prosecution for war crimes back-dated to 9/11/2001!

Sounds like their lawyers informed them that the recent judgement by the Supreme Court upholding the Geneva Convention Rules puts them squarely at risk of being tried as the War Criminals they are!

At least Nixon had the decency to have President Ford do his dirty work!

Though it popped up this once the big screen it is hardly making a wave in the rest of the news media.

Americo® The Bounty's Full

America the Beautiful. School teacher, Katharine Lee Bates, wrote this historic anthem in 1893. She wrote a second version in 1904 and her final version in 1913. It remained in tact until in 2004 when a majority of American voters were again exploited for their beliefs. A corrupt administration had devisively used religious, moral and free speech issues–once held sacred from partisanism by our forefathers–to swing an election and keep them in power. With a “majority” mandate, they engaged their directives and began systematically dismantlng America’s Bounty.

A disillusioned American Patriot rewrote the verse to instill the thirst– To regain the nation’s life, liberty and pursuit of true free-market Democracy–from the devisive forces intent on conquest and imbalance under the guise of freedom and democracy. The following is the rewritten version from Charlie Koenen and then final draft of Katherine Lee Bates Anthem.

For since 2000, and substantially more since the 2004 election, laws and constitutional ammendments are being rewritten like this anthem, to tell a different story. Regain you thirst for Liberty and Justice for All the world.















Our precious flag should fly overturned, above our country in disarray.
–to symbolize the battlecry - let TRUE Liberty Justice and Freedom Reign.


AmeriCo® the Bounty’s-Full 2004

O beautiful for acid skies,
For bioengineered waves of grain,
For purple mountaintop strip mines
Whose wastestreams foul our plains!
America! America!
God’s mandate’s charged to thee
And crown the Hoods to destroy the good
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for corporate greed
Whose motives hide from us
A thoroughfare for capital
To pave the wilderness!
American! American’t!
God rewrite every law,
Confirm thy goal is no self-control,
Class separation for all!
O beautiful more nations to free from strife.
Who’s resources we herd without a word
Their existence not considered life!
AmeriCo®! Halliburtono!
May God permit our course
Till all the death is nobleness
Net profits gain divine!
O beautiful the Patriot Act
That sees inside our souls
With reams of Rights to vanquish whole
Unstopped by human fears!
Amerikan! Amerikan’t!
God’s righteousness unweilds
And jail our Just, conceal the trust
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for righteous cries,
For pockets lined with gold,
While interest groups jump through the hoops
Above the law –free reign!
Americo! WeOwnTheOil!
God shed his grace on thee
Till souls we tax for earth and air
No music-without a fee!
O beautiful for pilgrims feet,
Whose stern impassioned stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America ! America !
God shed his grace on thee
Till paths be wrought through
Wilds of thought
By pilgrim foot and knee!
O beautiful for glory-tale
Of liberating strife
When once and twice,
for man's avail
Men lavished precious life !
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
Till selfish gain no longer stain
The banner of the free!
O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
Till nobler men keep once again
Thy whiter jubilee!
–Katharine Lee Bates 1913
O beautiful for workers feet,
Who’s production hours we increase
A thoroughfare for profit beat
Less benefits let them reap!
Amarikar ! AmeriCo® !
Thy love of God makes blind your free
Confused by Hoods
Vote against what’s good
And in the end you’ll see!
Once beautiful our glory assailed
Terror resides in us
With twisted vice,
From down on high
Our leaders have their way
Amerigas! Monsanto!
God forgive us for our deeds
Till selfish gain no longer stain
The banner of the free!
O beautiful recaptured dream
Reclaim our solemn States
We’ll rid the scene
Of these foul machines
With a renewed refocused faith!
America! America!
God may we one day smile again
When nobler men keep once again
Truth, Justice and Liberty!
–Charlie Koenen 2004

No greater a call for patriotism has been made in generations.
Our enemy is within us- our ignorance and alienation of one another.
UNITED WE STAND–DIVIDED WE FALL


America the Beautiful - 1913

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern, impassioned stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness!
America! America!
God mend thine every flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law!
O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife.
Who more than self the country loved
And mercy more than life!
America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness
And every gain divine!
O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!
O beautiful for halcyon skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the enameled plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
Till souls wax fair as earth and air
And music-hearted sea!

Colbert-Truth to Power!

This year's White House Correspondent's Dinner had the greatest roast of a standing administration in history. Steven Colbert stood a mere meter from pResident Bush as he spoke truth to power in a way only Colbert could do. Faces in the crowd, the most influental newsmakers on earth, sat with their mouths agasp, blank stares as they witnessed a defiancy never before seen to standing power.



Several of Bush's aides and supporters walked out during Colbert's speech, and one former aide said that the President had "that look that he's ready to blow."

Prior to Colbert, Bush mocked himself with the help of a celebrity impersonator, Steve Bridges. Many bloggers would criticize the fact that most news sources focused on Bush and his impersonator, and devoted little space to Colbert, sometimes not even mentioning him at all.

Truly the greatest day for America's true patriots.

Helen's Question

Helen Thomas, the "First Lady" of the press corps who's covered every President since JFK has been silent in the Bush Administration.... until now. pResident Bush decided to field one question from her and she didn't waste the moment.




A beleagered Bush fumbled for his correct soundbite, and clearly messed up.

But what is really interesting beyond the fact that pResident Bush has no concept of what his Administration has him doing, is the way he will fight like a caged animal to defend whatever it was they told him he was doing. Listen to his intensity as he defends his righteousness.

Now that should scare even the most ideologically challenged of his constituants...shouldn't it?

Habeas Schmabeas

Today, Arlen Spector did a 180, now supporting Unitary Executive Privilege! Now he says FISA laws are antiquated...who's been over to pay him a visit? Bush speaks about Iraq... says the tv lies... don't believe your eyes... believe my lies! This must be what it was like to be a Jew in 1932 Germany.... difference being that Hitler WAS elected.


Please listen to this broadcast of This American Life with Ira Glass....search for Episode #310 Habeas Schmabeas 3/10/06 in the 2006 archive.

Tune to the audio story that discusses Habeaus Corpus. It is very interesting. The right of habeas corpus has been a part of this country's legal tradition longer than we've actually been a country. It means the government has to explain why it's holding a person in custody. But now, the war on terror has nixed many of the rules we used to think of as fundamental. At Guantanamo Bay, our government initially claimed that the prisoners should not be covered by habeas – or even by the Geneva Conventions – because they're the most fearsome terrorist enemies we have. But is that true? Is it a camp full of terrorists, or a camp full of our mistakes?

Who are the terrorists now?

PS. When Seton Hall Professor Baher Azmy discusses the classified file of his client, Murat Kurnaz, in ActOne, he is referring to information that had previously been made public and published in the Washington Post. That material has subsequently been reclassified.

Happy Mothers Day

Julia Ward Howe, founder of Mother's Day, author of the Mother's Day Proclamation in 1870 following the Civil War, called for peace and disarmament.

An excerpt follows:

From the voice of a devastated Earth
a voice goes up with our own.
It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
at the summons of war,

Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women,
to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel
with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...






Today we celebrate her courage and efforts... by screening the film The Promise of America.

Bush erasing access to history

The Bush Administration has been secretly reclassifying thousands of documents in a clandestine Review Process away from scrutiny. This administration is covering its tracks and erasing history. Can you spell Fascism?

read it


In a seven-year-old secret program at the National Archives, intelligence agencies have been removing from public access thousands of historical documents that were available for years. Because the reclassification program is itself shrouded in secrecy - governed by a still-classified memorandum that prohibits the National Archives even from saying which agencies are involved - it continued virtually without outside notice until December 2005.

Now if a history professor, a writer, or a citizen is in possession of information formerly declassified but now considered secret—they can be arrested and convicted.

The most secret administration in US history... with most of its advisors having served for Nixon and during the Iran-Contra scandals.... now they are covering up history.


got an opinion, share it. its a free country
................ for now!

Torture Followup

In mid-2003, when the Iraqi resistance erupted, the United States found it had no intelligence assets; it had no way to contain the insurgency, and they -- the U.S. military was in a state of panic. And at that moment, they began sweeping across Iraq, rounding up thousands of Iraqi suspects, putting many of them in Abu Ghraib
prison. At that point, in late August 2003, General Miller was sent from Guantanamo to "Gitmo-ize" Abu Ghraib. He brought his techniques with him, the manual of his techniques. He gave them to the M.P. officers, the Military Intelligence officers and to General Ricardo Sanchez, the U.S. Commander in Iraq.

In September of 2003, General Sanchez issued orders, detailed orders, for expanded interrogation techniques beyond those allowed in the U.S. Army Field Manual 3452. He orders in essence, a combination of self-inflicted pain, stress positions, sensory disorientation, cultural attacks and the use of BISCUIT teams with psychologists.

And it was Rumsfeld in the margins of a memo he wrote, "I stand at my desk eight hours a day." he has a specially made podium desk,"How come we're limiting these stress techniques to four hours?"An with that... our Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld opened the door to the hideous torture images we again see today.

Of course he is not liable and as his ministers of propaganda all say "The bad apples have been brought to justice.... America should not be subjected to seeing these aggredious images... they only serve to stir discontent." But in April 2004 when the photos first went public CBS news and the Times wrote this was the work of creeps, just abuse by a few people on the night shift. “Recycled hillbillies from Cumberland, Maryland.” In other words, we could blame these bad apples. But these photos clearly show all the textbook trademarked and newly revised C.I.A. psychological interrogation techniques: self-inflicted pain, sensory disorientation,and cultural psyche attacks.


You might be interested to know only seven low-ranking soldiers have been charged and found guilty of these acts. Lindy Englund and Charles Grainer will serve less than ten years in prison for their roles in this scandal. The latest release of photos show thousands of examples of abuse and torture.... not just a few bad apples.

And just last week, while American peace activist Teresa Grady and four others, known as the St. Patricks Four, were sentenced to four months in prison each for spilling their own human blood at a military recruiting station in upstate New York to protest
the Iraq war, a military jury in Colorado decided not to jail an Army interrogator even though he was found guilty of negligent homicide in the torturing and killing of an Iraqi detainee.

Today's news reported that a judge has thrown out the case against Maher Arar, the Canadian-Syrian who was arrested while on lay-over at JFK airport. Who became our first case of known "extraordinary rendition" a man who was secretly flown to Syria, kept in an under-ground “grave-like” cell, subject to sensory disorientation for almost a year. Clearly,this administration is laying the groundwork for a system that operates above the law and without regulation. From torture to invasion of privacy. Now that the highest court in the land has been seeded with justices that have proven records against civil rights in favor or corporate or government rule, we can expect to see many more such abuses to human rights.



"Torture is an extraordinarily dangerous thing. There's an absolute ban on torture for a very good reason. Torture taps into the deepest recesses, unexplored recesses of human consciousness, where creation and destruction coexist, where the infinite human capacity for kindness and infinite human capacity for cruelty coexist, and it has a powerful perverse appeal, and once it starts, both the perpetrators and the powerful who order them, let it spread, and it spreads out of control."—Alfred McCoy


When the Bush administration gave those orders for, basically, techniques tantamount to torture at the start of the war on terror, one could only hope it was their intention that these be limited to top al-Qaeda suspects. But within months, we were torturing hundreds of Afghanis at Bagram near Kabul, and a few months later in 2003, through these techniques, we were torturing literally thousands of Iraqis. And you can see in those photos, beyond the details of the techniques that have been described, you can see how once it starts, it becomes this Dantesque Hell, this kind of play-palace of the darkest recesses of human consciousness.

That’s why it’s necessary to maintain a no-torture policy. There is no such thing as a little bit of torture. The whole myth of scientific surgical torture, that torture advocates, academic advocates in this country came up with, that's impossible. That cannot operate. It will inevitably spread.

But, one of the problems of talking about this topic in the US, is that we've been conditioned to regard all of this as “torture light,”— not really torture. And we're the only country in the world that does that. The U.N. Anti-Torture Convention defines torture as the infliction of severe psychological or physical pain. The U.N. convention in 1994 banning torture gave equal weight to psychological and physical techniques. But we alone, as a society, somehow exempt all of the psychological techniques.

The reasons date back to the way we ratified the U.N. convention in the first place, and who did the drafting.Back in the early 1990s, when the US was emerging from the Cold War, we began a process of disarming ourselves and getting beyond all of these cold war techniques, trying to sort of bring ourselves in line with rest of the international community. When President Clinton sent the U.N. Anti-Torture Convention to the U.S. Congress for ratification in 1994, he included four detailed paragraphs of reservations that had, in fact, been drafted by the Reagan administration, and when he adopted them without so much as changing a semicolon. He basically outlawed only physical torture. The reservations were carefully written by then Department of Defense Secretary Dick Cheney, to avoid one word —in the 26 printed pages. The word, "mental" was exempted allowing psychological torture.


Now, another problem for the United States, as well, was when the U.S. Army, again under the watchful eyes of Dick Cheney, re-wrote the Army Field Manual in 1992, with the intention of strictly observing the letter and the spirit of the U.N. Anti-Torture Convention and other similar treaties.

So what happened is that when the Defense Department gave orders for extreme techniques, when General Sanchez gave orders for his techniques beyond the Army Field Manual, what that meant is when the soldiers like Grainer, were actually investigated, they had committed crimes under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. They were prosecuted, and sent to jail. No ties up the ladder... except to Cheney?

Most Americans think that it's over, that in last year, December 2005, the U.S. Congress passed the McCain Torture Ban (Detainee Treatment Act), barring all inhumane or cruel treatment. Written, at least the first draft, by Sen John McCain who endured torture while a POW in Korea. Most people think that’s it, that it’s over, right?


In reality, the Bush administration fought that amendment tooth and nail; they fought it with loopholes. Vice President Dick Cheney went to Senator McCain and asked for a specific exemption for the C.I.A. McCain refused. The National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, went to McCain and asked for certain kinds of exemptions for the C.I.A. Again, he refused. So they started amending it introducing loopholes.

The Bush ordered torture right at the start of the War On Terror... President Bush said right on September 11, 2001, when he addressed the nation saying, “I don't care what the international lawyers say. We’re going to kick some ass.” Those were his words, and then it was up to his legal advisors in the White House and the Justice Department to translate his otherwise unlawful orders into legal directives, and they did it by crafting three very controversial legal principles.

One, the President, as Commander-in-Chief, could override laws and treaties. —The Unitary Executive Theory.

Two, plausible defenses for C.I.A. interrogators who engage in torture. There were two, first they played around with the word "severe," that torture is the infliction of severe pain. That's when Jay Bybee, who was Assistant Attorney General, wrote that memo in which he said, “’severe’ means equivalent to organ failure,” in other words, right up to the point of death. The other, was that they came up with the idea of intentionality. If a C.I.A. interrogator tortured, but the aim was information, not pain, then he could say that he was not guilty.

The third principle, which was crafted by John Yoo, was Guantanamo is not part of the United States; it is exempt from the writ of U.S. courts.

Now, in the process of passing the McCain torture prohibition, the White House has cleverly twisted the legislation to re-establish these three key principles. In his signing statement on December 30, President Bush said “I reserve the right, as Commander-in-Chief and as head of the unitary executive, to do what I need to do
to defend America.”

The next thing that happened is that McCain, as a compromise, inserted into the legislation a provision that if a C.I.A. operative engages in inhumane treatment or torture but believes that he or she was following a lawful order, then that's a defense. So they got the second principle, defense for C.I.A. torturers.

The third principle was – is that the White House had Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina amend McCain’s amendment by inserting language into it, saying that for the purposes of this act, the U.S. Navy base at Guantanamo Bay is not on U.S. territory,

and last month -- the Bush administration has gone to federal courts and said, “Drop all of your habeas corpus suits from Guantanamo.” There are 160 of them. They've gone to the Supreme Court and said, “Drop your Guantanamo case.”

They have, in fact, used that law to quash legal oversight of their actions.Just like that shown by Canadian Citizen, Maher Arar, wrongfully imprisoned for a year in a secret Syrian torture prison, subjected to textbook C.I.A. counterintelligence techniques, and now, powerless to do anything about it.

Welcome to the new United States of America.

CIA Torture Techniques

What lies behind the shocking images of torture at Abu Ghraib? Lets look at the history of the CIA and torture techniques. The International Committee of the Red Cross, Amnesty International and other human rights groups say the recently released images of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib show a clear violation of international humanitarian law. The U.S. made a pledge against torture when Congress ratified the UN Convention Against Torture in 1994 - but it was ratified with reservations that exempted the CIA’s psychological torture method.

A new expose gives an account of the CIA’s secret efforts to develop new forms of torture spanning fifty years. It reveals how the CIA perfected its methods, distributing them across the world from Vietnam to Iran to Central America, uncovering the roots of the Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo torture scandals. The book, written by UW-Madison history professor, Alfred McCoy is titled "A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, From the Cold War to the War on Terror." He also authored “The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade.”



If you look at the most famous of photographs from Abu Ghraib, of the Iraqi standing on the box, arms extended with a hood over his head and the fake electrical wires from his arms, you can see the entire 50-year history of C.I.A. torture. It's very simple. He's hooded for sensory disorientation, and his arms are extended for self-inflicted pain.




And those are the two very simple fundamental C.I.A. techniques, developed at enormous cost. From 1950 to 1962, the C.I.A. ran a massive research project, a veritable Manhattan Project of the mind, resulting in the creation of the 1963 C.I.A. Counterintelligence Manual called Kubark. Spending over $1 billion a year they tried to crack the code of human consciousness, from both mass-persuasion and the use of coercion in individual interrogation. And what they discovered -- they tried LSD, they tried mescaline, they tried all kinds of drugs, they tried electroshock, truth serum, sodium pentathol. None of it worked.

What worked was very simple behavioral findings, outsourced to our leading universities -- Harvard, Princeton, Yale and McGill. The first breakthrough came at McGill. Dr. Donald O. Hebb of McGill University, a brilliant psychologist, had a contract from the Canadian Defense Research Board, which was a partner with the C.I.A. in this research, and he found that he could induce a state of psychosis in an individual within 48 hours. It didn't take electroshock, truth serum, beating or pain.

All he did was have student volunteers sit in a cubicle with goggles, gloves and headphones, earmuffs, so that they were cut off from their senses, and within 48 hours, denied sensory stimulation, they would suffer, first hallucinations, then ultimately a breakdown. And if you look at many of those photographs, what do they show? They show people with bags over their heads. If you look at the photographs of the Guantanamo detainees even today, they look exactly like those student volunteers in Dr. Hebb’s original cubicle.

The second major C.I.A. breakthrough came in New York City at Cornell University Medical Center, where two eminent neurologists under contract from the C.I.A. studied Soviet K.G.B. torture techniques, and they found that the most effective K.G.B. technique was self-inflicted pain. You simply make somebody stand for a day or two. And as they stand -- okay, you're not beating them, they have no resentment -- you tell them, “You're doing this to yourself. Cooperate with us, and you can sit down.” And so, as they stand, what happens is the fluids flow down to the legs, the legs swell, lesions form, they erupt, they separate, hallucinations start, and the kidneys shut down.

The C.I.A. incorporated this at the Technical Services Division. Most of the in-house research involved drugs and all of the LSD experiments that we heard about for years, but ultimately those gave a negative result. All the drugs didn’t work. They caused disorientation and hallucinations, the information gleened through interrogation couldn't be trusted. But, what did work was this: Sensory Disorientation and Self-Inflicted Pain.

And in 1963, the C.I.A. codified these results in the so-called KUBARK Counterintelligence Manual. If you just type the word “KUBARK” into Google, you will get the manual, an actual copy of it, on your computer screen, and you can read the techniques. Read the report. But also read the footnotes, because that's where the behavioral research is. These findings produced a distinctively American form of torture, the first real revolution in the cruel science of pain in centuries, psychological torture, and it's the one that's with us today, and it's proved to be a very resilient, quite adaptable, and an enormously destructive paradigm. Let’s make one thing clear. Americans refer to this often times in common parlance as “torture light.” Psychological Torture, people who are involved in treatment tell us it’s far more destructive, does far more lasting damage to the human psyche than does physical torture. As Senator McCain said, himself, last year when he was debating his torture prohibition, faced with a choice between being beaten and psychologically tortured, I'd rather be beaten. Okay? It does far more lasting damage. It is far crueler than physical torture. This is something that we don't realize in this country. Now, another thing we see is those photographs is the psychological techniques, but the initial research basically developed techniques for attacking universal human sensory receptors: sight, sound, heat, cold, sense of time. That's why all of the detainees describe being put in dark rooms, being subjected to strobe lights, loud music, okay? That’s sensory deprivation or sensory assault. Okay, that was sort of the phase one of the C.I.A. research. But the paradigm has proved to be quite adaptable.

One of the things that Donald Rumsfeld did, right at the start of the war of terror, in late 2002, was to appoint General Geoffrey Miller to be chief at Guantanamo because the previous commanders were too soft on the detainees. General Miller turned Guantanamo into a de facto behavioral research laboratory, a kind of torture research laboratory. And under General Miller at Guantanamo, they perfected the C.I.A. torture paradigm. They added two key techniques. They went beyond the universal sensory receptors of the original research. They added to it an attack on cultural sensitivity, particularly Arab male sensitivity to issues of gender and sexual identity.

And then they went further still. Under General Miller, they created these things called “Biscuit” teams, behavioral science consultation teams, and they actually had qualified military psychologists participating in the ongoing interrogation, and these psychologists would identify individual phobias, like fear of dark or attachment to mother, and by the time we're done, by 2003, under General Miller, Guantanamo had perfected the C.I.A. paradigm, and it had a three-fold total assault on the human psyche: sensory receptors, self-inflicted pain, cultural sensitivity, and individual fears and phobia.

Now armed with these techniques, andthe Bush "Unitary Exuective Theory" the administration will be able to renegotiate the interpretation the Geneva Convention. Showing they will not physically harm prisoners... but will attain their objectives through much crueler methods, PsyOps.