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.

Black Friday!

U.S. Judge Dismisses Maher Arar Lawsuit

A U.S. federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by a Canadian citizen against the U.S. government for detaining him and sending him to Syria where he was jailed and tortured. Maher Arar was the first person to mount a civil suit challenging the U.S. government policy known as extraordinary rendition. In October 2002, he was detained at JFK airport while on a stopover in New York. He was then jailed and secretly deported to Syria. He was held for almost a year without charge in an underground cell not much larger than a grave. Charges were never filed against him. The federal judge, David Trager, said he could not interfere in the case because it involves crucial national security and foreign relations issues. In Canada, Arar called the decision "very disappointing [and] emotionally very hard to digest." Barbara Olshansky of the Center for Constitutional Rights said the law group would still try to proceed with the case. She said "How can this Administration argue before a Federal Court Judge that its practice of outsourcing for interrogation under torture constitutes a state secret? This is a dark day indeed."


Senate Republicans Block Investigation Into NSA Spying

This update on http://beta.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifthe controversy over President Bush's warrant-less domestic spying program - on Capitol Hill, Senate Republicans have blocked a proposed investigation into the operation. On Thursday, Republican Senator Pat Roberts, chair of the Intelligence Committee said, his panel decided not to conduct an investigation. Roberts said he reached an agreement with the White House to consider legislation and provide more information to Congress on the eavesdropping program. The ranking Democrat on the committee -- Sen. John Rockefeller -- said "Today, the Senate Intelligence Committee once again abdicated its responsibility to oversee the intelligence activities of the United States."


Abu Ghraib abuse far more pervasive than ever revealed!
Lyndi England wasn't the only one torturing prisioners as she claimed. 546 pictures of dead prisoners, 660 pornographic photos, 93 videos of abuse and 1,325 images of torture...


Bush tries to sneak the sale of six major US seaportsto the Arabs!
NEW YORK, PHILADELPHIA, NEW JERSEY, NEW ORLEANS, MIAMI & BALTIMORE
UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT.... the arabs! Sold to United Arab Emerites for a paultry $6.8 Billion?


I thought this land was our land.... did anyone get to vote on this sale???

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11404058/
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/021706O.shtml

Alito's Volkswagon

Samuel Alito’s interviews are nearly complete. He has shown us what nice person he is, and how intelligent he is. But so was serial-killer, Ted Bundy. Point being, we are nominating him to a lifetime position deciding the law of the land for the next several generations. While Ted Bundy was able to present himself as a friendly, intelligent person, enough to charm unsuspecting women into his Volkswagen Beetle, his views of right and wrong, were very different from those of the average citizen. So too, the next Supreme Court Justice must be more than just a nice person, they must have a clear and proven record of doing things favorable to the average citizen.

Samuel Alito's position on Corporate power and self-determination is his Bundy-like secret. In this age of unregulated corporate power and globalization, corporations like Enron and Tyco are permitted to grow without governance. Monopolies compete to own vast amounts of our nation's airwaves, information and resources. Corporate lobbyists like Jack Abermoff buy off politicians with little oversight. Corporations who make billions on war profits also own the major news media outlets that ordinary citizens watch to make their opinions about the war. We badly need a judicial branch that treats corporate entities with the same objectivity it treats a person.

But since most justices, and ordinary citizens, own stock in these "Corporation-people", it becomes harder to be objective, or trace a conflict of interest. Could a Justice preside over a case involving someone that owed him money? Would we tolerate a Justice deciding a precedent that while not directly affecting a friend or relative, a precedent that would enrich his friends and family? We are no longer talking about the fate of one person... In 1980, when General Electric and Dr Chakrabarty petitioned the Supreme Court to allow for the patenting of a synthesized life-form (bacteria) that was believed to eat oil, the 5 to 4 decision also opened the door to patenting life itself. These are the "incidental" repercussions that will occur more frequently with a corporate-leaning court.

Samuel Alito's record shows clearly his stance on cases favoring Corporate rights over that of the individual. If we accept Alito to replace the former moderate, swing-voting Sandra Day O'Connor, we will be authorizing a Supreme Court who's balance is decidedly in favor of Corporations. The facts prove it, the political ties re-enforce it, and in a time of great corruption of the highest branches of government, are we sure we want this choice, a court with a Bundy-like secret? The sooner we demand our majority leadership question his behavior, his record, and not his outward appearance, the sooner we may avoid giving our nation to a Supreme Court with a Corporate agenda.


What we need to fear is not whether Roe v Wade is overturned, but what rights will be given to the already omnipotent Corporations? Will this justice suddenly have an epiphany and decide giving corporations immunity from prosecution for their actions is not in the best interest of the average citizen? Or will we jump in the Volkswagen Beetle with him and go for what might be the ride of our life?

2000 Dead

PeaceAction-WI organized a candle light vigil to commemorate the 2000th soldier to die in Iraq. Hundreds of people lined Lincoln Memorial Drive holding candles and carrying signs. Cars beeped their horns in support, some voiced their disdain for the message. Police on horseback stood watch on the perimeter and a few television crews were on hand collecting file footage.

Several leaders spoke at the event including myself. Here is the speech I gave at the rally in Milwaukee Wisconsin USA.

Thanks George welcome everyone,
I'm Charlie Koenen and I've prepared something for today,
Peace Action and United for Peace and Justice also prepared for this day... Cindy Sheehan prepared for this day.... People in cities across the nation have prepared for this day...

Unfortunately, another family of an American soldier has to make real the preparation for this day.

And now we gather to send out a message locally and to join people in cities nationally— to SPEAK TRUTH TO POWER- to say BRING OUR TROOPS HOME NOW!

We stand here today to tell the Bush Administration that a WAR BASED ON LIES will never succeed... That A WAR BASED ON LIES that sends our troops out to kill and destroy nations based on false fears and forced sense of duty... will not be tolerated.

We stand united with our soldiers in the knowledge that their duty and devotion to the founding principles of our great nation IS worth fighting and dying for!

But we also must stand together in our outrage against a system of corruption and manipulation that has misled our nation into acts of hideous aggression against people of other nations.

We must stand united in our sense of duty and patriotism to speak truth to power. To risk alienation, persecution and discrimination in order to end this unjust occupation.

We honor our soldiers and their role as defenders of freedom and liberty. We realize that their duty and honor is preserved by their strength and allegiance.

This strength and allegiance is also why so many families seem to object to our actions. For in battle they are trained to not ask why, but rather to do or die. Unfortunately for the families of the 2000 soldiers, this duty has become forever real.

But if their duty is to hold rank and follow command, then what is our role as citizens in this democracy? Are we not the conscience of our governing body? Do not we have the duty to question our leadership?

Our obligation to this great nation is not merely to march to the polls every two or four years to choose a leader--- to read a few talking points or sound bites and then pull a lever or pencil out a spot on a ballot card...

No our obligation is to put in office, leadership that we think will help advance our nation and be true to our sense of place in the world, AND to hold that leadership accountable for the trust and allegiance we granted them through our democratic election process.

It seems to clear that we as a nation have lax in our duty to hold leadership accountable. We are so busy trying to carve out a niche in this world for ourselves and our families... that we have slackened our duty to the Democratic process we so enjoy and defend.

But today we stand united, and today we are beginning to see once again that there is hope- That we the people will again hold our democratic process high and see that liberty and justice prevail over the abuse and greed, of the fear and contempt, that seems to have taken control while many of us were busy with our lives.

Today we mark a milestone, and today as further revelations unfold and incriminate the leadership of our great nation, we have the chance to take back our democracy,
to see that questioning authority, and speaking truth to power can bring about change.... can make right the wrongs, and can make us strong and sensible once again.

We are but one planet, with one people.... the sooner we realize this...the sooner we find the true way to end terror

through love and by peace.

thank you and keep growing the effort....
Patriotism is a duty not an elective.

Come out tonight- Bring forth your light -
Share in our plight - Keep real the fight....
to Make Peace our Right!

Bring them home now!

Do our Morals need a Brake Job?

Insulated by our ready-to-wear materialistic surroundings its easy to loose track of the moral backbone that used to define our nation as the pinnacle of the success of Mankind... Especially when all the typical touchstones to judge our moral barometer have been hijacked and used to support that materialism and moral recklessness.

It is easy to just maintain course, its almost like we keep the cruise control set on "numb", and carry on with life as we know it to be... we don't even notice the changes. We head off to work every morning after getting the kids off to school, we shuttle them from one event to another while finding time to meet with friends or office buddies. On Wed nights we head out for volleyball league... We catch the news on the 24hr news channels when we can... grab a paper to confirm the "facts" - and if we really want to be "involved" - we might even grab a second paper, or watch another news station so we can feel as though we've done our civic duty to fact-check the news views. But for the most part, as long as nothing jars our immediate surroundings, we aren't really concerned about noticing as things change around us—subtle changes by themselves—but collectively they represent a substantial shift in the world around us... and again, as long as it doesn't jar our immediate world... we are too busy to observe them... we've got housework to do, a halloween costume to make, the car to fix, a new television to save for and buy... we keep our moral barometer close to our chest... we've not done anything wrong to speak of... most of our friends seem to be okay too... good enough.

Well what if good enough wasn't good enough? What if by focusing on the immediate and up-close, we failed to see the forest for the trees... we failed to see the big picture because we're busy with our little corner. When's the last time you had the brakes replaced on your car? You've been driving it for years and never thought about brakes... you perform maintenance as the manufacturer directs... but one day the service technician calls to say your brakes are nearly gone and need to be replaced. You approve of course... and they repair the brakes... replacing the worn out pads and bleeding the hydraulic system. You pay the mechanic, jump into your car and head out onto the road.... at the edge of the service station's driveway you go to step on the brakes and screech the tires, nearly causing the car behind you to collide into your car! What happened? You've grown to accustomed to your brake pedal engaging so far down that now the newly restored pedal is pushed to lock-up in a fraction of what you were accustomed to... has that ever happened? You been driving for years and never noticed the subtle degradation of your brake pedal... until someone brings it to your attention.

The same can be said for our brake pedal of morality... slowly over time it has begun to degrade. Almost imperceivably it becomes less critical of transgression, of impropriety, misconduct and corruption. It becomes unaware of immoral behavior and injustice unless they jump in front of us and require us to slam on the brakes to avoid contact.

What does this mean? How does realizing this help you? It's time to take our moral code in for a "brake job". Time to accept responsibility for our deteriorating ethical and moral standards before they fail and involve us in a tragic accident.

Today our collective moral fiber is becoming like a brake without pads. Soon we will be running metal on metal, scraping deep gouges into the wheels and becoming unable to avoid obstacles. If we do not correct the problem, we will meet with catastrophe. And just like the inconvenience and hardship we must endure as the brakes are repaired, we will be required to endure hardship to fix our moral brake pads. We have to seek alternative modes of transportation and adjust our lifestyle as the car's brakes are fixed... So too will we have to consider alternatives and adjust our lifestyle as we attempt to fix our moral brakes.

As we allow ourselves to question our sense of morality, our very way of life comes into question. Have we been riding the brakes? have we driven our car too hard? Have we loaded it too full and caused the brakes to work beyond tolerance? We need to look at our world and see where we have let slacken our moral fabric.

First we need to open our hearts (and minds) to the possibility that many things that make secure our lifestyle, could possibly also have side-effects that keep us comfortable and numb to to truth. We have to temporarily suspend the structures we have grown to depend on to hold our world together... life is terribly busy as it is... but we need to be able to question the things that seem to support the busy chaos we face daily- and call life. Just like it was a good thing for the mechanic to tell us to question our seemingly safe and secure car's brakes because upon closer inspection, they were teetering on the brink of failure... We need to give heed to the social mechanics who are warning of our moral brakes nearing catastrophic failure.

Look around and begin to ask the big questions... what are we doing as America, the leader of the known world— an international world that grows closer and more similar every day? What are the logical outcomes of the lifestyles we lead as they relate to the rest of the world we are so intrinsically involved with?

We might give pause to ponder just that... How has our lifestyle become directly intertwined with the entire planet?... because it is—and we really need to give time to ponder what that means.

What is our lifestyle? How does it come to be? Who do we look to -to create the lifestyle we call our own? TV shows, famous people, nameless people who parade across magazines, television, websites and papers that show us what the "good life" looks like... we go to malls, big box retailers, to stores and online to obtain material possessions that help us define comfort as we are told it is... but what are they? How did they get here? Who was involved in the creation, production, delivery, showcasing and sales of these possessions? Who was behind the making of our desire to covet these items? Who marketed them, who brought the message before us - in print, pixel, proximity, or perception? What was their gain and motivation? More importantly, what was lost in the process??? Dignity, family, community, economy, rights, healthcare, freedoms, will, morality, sense of self... Yes there are many who seem to gain at the process of getting us more material possessions... but i think if we look closer, we'd find the gains for a few, far overshadow the gains of the many and overall, the system itself fails.... if we're looking at the forest—not simply the trees.

How is that possible? How can we find a real understanding of the human condition when many of the very doors of our perception are built to numb our views? Yes- it is said we have a liberal media.... who exactly is saying that? ... conservative talk show hosts, right-wing pundits? our leadership in this administration? ... the media corporations who've been purchased any company with enough money and connections to power? Multinational Corporations who's holdings are as far-flung as toilet paper and machine gun bullets? Recently these Corporations have been allowed -nay- encouraged to swallow up entire sectors of mass communication creating monopolies and changing news into views, reporting into propaganda, and communication into coercion— don't believe it?

Explain the 2002 news media outlets "reporting" of Iraq's WMDs and connections to AlQueada- effectively verifying the Bush administrations need for war. Explain Judith Miller and Michael Gordon breaking story after story on the front pages of the Times after talking with Cheney and Bush aides-then the bush administration taking to the Sunday talk show circuit using the very story they leaked to the times as the justification for their actions! Explain how the outing of Valerie Plame, a CIA operative who happens to be the wife of Joe Wilson the very ambassador who days before had publicly attacked the credibility of the entire Bush administration's case for war... Explain how "propagandist" Judith Miller an operative for the pentagon with close ties to Cheney and Rumsfelt could have unfettered access to the front page of the newspaper without fact checking.... not because people with the paper weren't doing their jobs... but because the editors in charge... who answer directly to the ownership, carried out policy... Explain how a "reporter" who has repeatedly manipulated information in leading news stories, still holds her job... while a scandal of miniature proportion is blown to national attention with the revelation that Jason Blair had fabricated some facts in his stories... Blair is fired, while Miller serves time in jail and comes out to win a 1st amendment award for protecting journalistic rights! Why? Because the media outlets have become propaganda tools for the government.... Miller works for the administration... A government who desperately wanted to create support for a military aggression with Iraq— an effort with tremendous benefit to the owners many multinational corporations and executives with holdings in these multinational corporations. Don't believe it? Time to make an effort to look into who owns the media outlets, and what other outlets these outlets own... what executives run these media monopolies and what interests have they served prior to heading these media outlets... Since 1996 went the Communications Act was passed allowing for Media Monopoly ownership and government oversight of public airwaves.... nothing has been furth from the truth about liberal media.... except that the media tries to sell us that they are still biased... allowing them to put more right wing shows on air... and cancel the remaining real news programs- like Bill Moyers.

How does this matter to us and our little tree in the forest? What's that got to do with our moral brake pads? Well if we don't begin to look beyond our corner of the forest, if we don't listen to the social mechanics telling us our brakes are near failing.... when it comes time to stop these transgressions, our infrastructure will fail us and we'll careen out of control into catastrophe.... our tree and surrounding trees will be no match- no matter how well we pruned and tended them- no match to the corporate machine that will overrun our part of the forest... and our refusal to look to the forest for larger signals or signs, will be our own undoing when the trees nearby begin to fall.

This week in the forest:

Bankruptcy Law went into effect... the law helping the billion dollar credit card corporations from being on the hook for people who are cooerced into massive debt by lending agents. Now folks who get in trouble or lose their jobs, will also lose their homes and possessions to pay back the ultra-rich credit card corporations.

The Leave no Oilman behind bill was passed by a two vote margin. This Bill Actually had members of the house of representative chant "SHAME, SHAME, SHAME" on the house floor as the vote was read.... yes after coming up short in the vote because some members of the republican congress actually stood up against a bad bill... Republican leaders and the now criminal Tom Delay extended the vote an extra 40 minutes while they roamed the room looking to squeeze republicans who voted with their conscience- not their loyalty cards.... they found the two they needed and closed the vote... 210-212 in favor of a bill giving billions in concessions to energy companies- but far worse... worded in the bill is a clause that forces any community or group who objects to an energy company wanting to build or expand a refinery in their community... to pay the energy company's legal fees-regardless if they win or lose!!!

Medical Malpractice Caps were signed into law- limiting the exposure multinational corporations and their doctors can be held liable for wrongdoing.... who else benefitted?? Insurance companies!

The Arctic National Wildlife Reserve ANWAR drilling rights was up for a vote today...
Congress- under pressure from an awoken public and misled by a media that wants to profit from its opening has voted to begin drilling in the disputed AREA 1002... The truth is the oil from ANWAR will not be used in America... it is well documented that it will go to asia because the cost of transporting is much less than sending it to the lower 48. SO while Exxon reports a 4.5 million dollar PER HOUR profit, we are giving them access to and ownership of our natural resources... not even the oil- so much as the wildlife refuge... Truth be told that the 1002 area is the one grazing area for ALL the caribou of the 100 million acre arctic region... its fragile meadows bloom and produce for precisely 1 month every year... the one month that dozens of animals come to sire their young on the lush vegetation... the remaining 11 months of the year... the area is mostly baron... but the very existence of several species of arctic animals depend on that land for that one crucial month per year...

Also today in the forest, Texas Strongman Tom DeLay had a warrant served for his arrest. The once undisputed heavyweight of the House of Representatives now faces multiple charges for corruption, money laundering and fraud. Senate Heavyweight Bill Frist is under scrutiny as well as top whitehouse advisors Karl Rove and Scooter Libby.... rumors point all the way to to Pres and vp in the outing of CIA operative Valerie Plame.

Harriet Miers moves closer to becoming another presidential crony appointed to a job they have no qualifications to head up... 250 million people in america and the best choice Bush could find was his own lawyer!!! She is on track to become the next Supreme Court Justice... SHAME SHAME SHAME!!!

Saddham went on trial today... in an interesting spectacle of a trial.... only one reporter Dan Murphy from the Christian Science Monitor was allowed into the courtroom... cameras showed the ruler on a 20 minute delay in case he said something america didn't like.

Also the Steroid abuse trial that former Atty General Ashcroft said would be punished to the full extent of the law for their involvement in national sports doping.... were sentenced today to a whopping 4 months in jail.... kids selling grass get more time than that... well it sounded good when Ashcroft spoke to the nation... now little or no press covers the results.

Meanwhile we quickly approach 2000 dead american soldiers in the "skirmish" in Iraq. Condi Rice testified in front of Congress today... saying the war is going along as planned.... but refusing to tell congress what that plan was.... Once again she lies to protect the president and his desire to conquer the oil fields... just as she did countless times in the ramp-up to the invasion of iraq... proof positive of WMD's, Proof of chem/biologic weapons, proof of links to AlQueada and 9/11—yes the Millionaire Condi Rice DID have a supertanker named after her... no conflict of interest here.... business as usual.

Time is running out to wake up and fix those moral brakes... if we truly do believe in god -more than the president does... then we might want to consider our actions here on earth and their repercussions in the afterlife... eternity is much longer than the run time of Friends.... and the almighty is no judge wabner, for (s)he can see through our thinly veiled attempt at looking pious as we feed off the desecration of others... as we profit from others misfortune, as we buy stock in the companies who exploit for riches rather than help for redemption. Jesus ran through the temple overturning the tables of the money-changers.... watch that that doesn't happen to your portfolio. As we ignore the health of the forest, our trees will surely die and no one will be there to help us when the wrecking crew arrives. Look at the cause of our insulated lives, see through the efforts to preoccupy us as all our freedoms are stripped away... fight now to regain our self-determination from the tyrannical corruption of our government leadership and the corporations who hope to win independence from US rule with every new law and judicial appointment.

Corporate Attack of Organic Standards

Hi,
I checked the fraud site and this seems legitimate... and unfortunately it also sounds very plausible. As Americans are/have become the most overweight and obese nation on the planet (yeah I know)... and as the expensive addictive pharmaceutical dietary and health pills are being paraded across television sets around the country... there is a growing movement towards organic foods and local produce as a better way to good health... it seems too big an "opportunity" for the super stores not to want in....and unfortunately the growth, care and most important, distribution methods of local organic food runs counter to the profit-centric mindset of the corporate monopolies who stand to lose market-share as the local organic movement strengthens—taking dollars from their pockets and customers from their shelves... that is unless they can manipulate the organic food standards... weaken the definition of what is organic, to allow them to infiltrate the market.

I don't think you need to play partisanship politics on this one folks... its just as bad for republicans as for democrats... liberals as conservatives, though an argument can be made that the organic standards were established by people other than the current administration and their emboldened masses in tow... it is those masses that need to motivate and join with the movement towards organic foods, if they care about the quality and availability of good wholesome, organically grown, pesticide-free, local nutrient-rich produce— and the struggling farmers who have taken the harder road to agriculture production by refusing to subscribe to the agribusiness model for cash-farming.

Please read on and sign this... share it with your email book and show our leadership that, like public television, some things are better left pure and strong not tainted to allow exploitation.
thanks


BEGIN FORWARD>>>

The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) needs your immediate help to stop Congress and the Bush administration from seriously degrading organic standards. After 35 years of hard work, the U.S. organic community has built up a multi-billion dollar alternative to industrial agriculture, based upon strict organic standards and organic community control over modification to these standards.

Now, large corporations such as Kraft, Wal-Mart, & Dean Foods--aided and abetted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) are moving to lower organic standards by allowing a Bush appointee to create a list of synthetic ingredients that would be allowed organic production. Even worse these proposed regulatory changes will reduce future public discussion and input and take away the National Organic Standards Board's (NOSB) traditional lead jurisdiction in setting standards. What this means, in blunt terms. is that USDA bureaucrats and industry lobbyists, not consumers, will now have more control over what can go into organic foods and products.

Tomorrow, Tuesday, Sept. 20, acting in haste and near-total secrecy, the U.S. Senate will vote on a "rider" to the 2006 Agriculture Appropriations Bill that will reduce control over organic standards from the National Standards Board and put this control in the hands of federal bureaucrats in the USDA (remember the USDA proposal in 1997-98 that said that genetic engineering, toxic sludge, and food irradiation would be OK on organic farms, or USDA suggestions in 2004 that heretofore banned pesticides, hormones, tainted feeds, and animal drugs would be OK?).

For the past week in Washington, OCA has been urging members of the Senate not to reopen and subvert the federal statute that governs U.S. Organic standards (the Organic Food Production Act - OFPA), but rather to let the organic community and the National Organic Standards resolve our differences over issues like synthetics and animal feed internally, and then proceed to a open public comment period. Unfortunately most Senators seem to be listening to industry lobbyists more closely than to us. We need to raise our voices.

In the past, grassroots mobilization and mass pressure by organic consumers have been able to stop the USDA and Congress from degrading organic standards. This time Washington insiders tell us that the "fix is is already in." So we must take decisive action now. We need you to call your U.S. Senators today. We need you to sign the following petition and send it to everyone you know. We also desperately need funds to head off this attack in the weeks and months to come. Thank you for your support. Together we will take back citizen control over organic standards and preserve organic integrity.