If every community in the United States embraced the No Kill philosophy, we would save 4.1 million dogs and cats who are scheduled to die in shelters this year, and the year after that. It is not an impossible dream. [more]

Happy New Year, it's gonna be a strange one...

Everyone has been on my ass about Global Orgasm Day, this December 22nd.

"Harrumph," I say - and no, that's not the sound of my climactic approach. Before I even clicked on the G.O. link and listened to the new age strums of the global orgasm guitar, I was already turned off.

How could I be such a curmudgeon? After all, I do want to "stop the war," and any moment dedicated to orgiastic pleasure and whirled peas can hardly be criticized.

It comes down to this: If I had a shred of evidence that my orgasm would force an immediate American withdrawal from Iraq, I'd be beating off furiously now.

The thing is, I'm more of a monkey-wrench masturbator. I'm one of those people who believe you have to throw your body on the cogs of the machine:

"There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part, you can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!"

Listening to Mario Savio's speech still gets me more choked up than any arguments from the global-O organizers.

I'm an atheist; that may be the culprit. When the power of prayer, even lustful, is called upon - to "change the energy fields - " I get a little tense. I want to do something that has a chance of working, that goes beyond a media stunt. But rather than be a complete Scrooge about it - because I do appreciate the intent, after all— I always hope the prayer/orgasm marathon will at least be public, and defiant.

I could so get into the Global Jill-Off if it was combined with a work stoppage. I'd like it, if on December 22nd, everyone called into the office and said, "I'm not coming in today - I'm wanking for peace instead." Booyah!

I seek something that disturbs, something a little rude. Even if you didn't want to go to jail, get fired - or, in the most common scenario, have everyone stare at you - there are still other risks one could take that chip away at the cement block of the military industrial complex. Like...

Among other predictions for the U.S. in 2007: One in four, 25 percent, anticipates the second coming of Jesus Christ. The telephone poll of 1,000 adults was conducted Dec. 12-14 by Ipsos, an international polling firm. The margin of sampling error was plus or minus three percentage points.

[One in four of the people I will see today believe that the Paul Bunyon of ancient Israel will drop out of the sky next year and use magic spells and monsters to set up a super-Disneyland for all the C-ticket holders. Gloom, doom in 2007 indeed.]

Saddam's execution will boost opposition to capital punishment worldwide, including the United States and the Middle East, "because it will be viewed as following a flawed, rushed trial that resulted in a penalty that is cruel and inhumane," said Zahir Janmohamed of Amnesty International, winner of the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.

More than half the world's countries -- 129 -- have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, according to Amnesty.

China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United States accounted for 94 percent of the executions recorded by Amnesty International in 2005. Of the known total, China had the lion's share with at least 1,770 while 60 were executed in the United States, Amnesty said.

Seventy-two percent of the 50 U.S. states had no executions in 2006, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

Most executions in 10 states are on hold as aspects of their capital-punishment laws are examined. Two states -- Illinois and New Jersey -- have a formal moratorium on all executions while their legislatures weigh the issues. [more]

Maybe we see so many pictures of the people Bush has killed for a simple reason: he's proud of it; it's the only thing he knows how to do.

Number one most popular video on CNN right now is "Hussein in hangman's noose": "Watch masked executioners place noose around the neck of Saddam Hussein."

I never tune in to the news on tv, but once in a while I do and it couldn't be more hideous, more obvious, more ugly: snuff porn and celebrations. No context such as this:

Man Hung for Killing 148 in Operation Which Killed 650,000+

Or, Iraq Torture 'Worse After Saddam', or "More than 90 per cent of Iraqis believe the country is worse off now than before the war in 2003" or Iraq: More Hellish Now Than Under Saddam. (This paragraph could go on forever - then follow the money.)

Instead the corporate machine has been propelled into motion to utter this line: Snuff Porn, and Celebrations.

This is the word. From the top two percent which own the world to you, the sorry proletariat.

Snuff Porn, and Celebrations

Eat it like the rest of the dog food they let you have. Eat it and like it.

Not mean-spirited, just "Texas-spirited."

Over the past 10 years, more than 50 people aged 30 and under were violently murdered by assailants who targeted them because they did not fit stereotypes for masculinity or femininity. The Gender Public Advocacy Coalition (GenderPAC) released the groundbreaking human rights report “50 Under 30: Masculinity and the War on America’s Youth” documenting this tide of murderous violence and the key demographics of its victims and their assailants. The report reveals a unique vulnerability at the intersection of age, race, and gender non-conformity that makes a fatal assault exponentially more likely.

“While many youth who don’t fit gender stereotypes for masculinity or femininity face harassment or bullying, when it comes to gender-based murder the victims are specific and consistent,” said Riki Wilchins, GenderPAC executive director. “These victims tended to share the same characteristics: they were mostly Black or Latina, were biologically male and presenting with some degree of femininity, and were killed by other young males in attacks of extraordinary and often multiple acts of violence.”

[Article continues at link. This has absolutely nothing, nothing whatsoever, to do with Leviticus 20:13 so don't even say that God commands Christians to kill gay and femmy men. And don't say that Jesus agreed that is the law, because Matthew 5:18-19 and Luke 16:17 don't exist.]

Today President Bush signed the H.R. 6407, the "Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. In doing so he added a few signing statements. One of them is particularly alarming, as it says that they can search our mail without a warrant.

Wikipedia Page for Saddam Hussein's Execution

Confirmation of Saddam's hanging went out about ____ minutes ago and this Wikipedia page is growing as the information is made public. Nice living case study on the growth of a Wikipedia page.


Looks like it made Al-Jazeera, too: Saddam hanged

Also see, Fisk: A dictator created then destroyed by America

Oh, and Thanks for the memories...

When George Bush banned funding [for research on human embryonic stem cell lines] he effectively put researchers into quarantine.

Who would have guessed the author of Jurassic Park would turn into such a rightwing nutter?

. . . via Spitting Image.

Interview with Professor Francis Boyle

WASHINGTON -- The armed forces, already struggling to meet recruiting goals, are considering expanding the number of noncitizens in the ranks -- including disputed proposals to open recruiting stations overseas and putting more immigrants on a faster track to US citizenship if they volunteer -- according to Pentagon officials.

Foreign citizens serving in the US military is a highly charged issue, which could expose the Pentagon to criticism that it is essentially using mercenaries to defend the country. Other analysts voice concern that a large contingent of noncitizens under arms could jeopardize national security or reflect badly on Americans' willingness to serve in uniform.

The idea of signing up foreigners who are seeking US citizenship is gaining traction as a way to address a critical need for the Pentagon, while fully absorbing some of the roughly one million immigrants that enter the United States legally each year.

The proposal to induct more noncitizens, which is still largely on the drawing board, has to clear a number of hurdles. So far, the Pentagon has been quiet about specifics -- including who would be eligible to join, where the recruiting stations would be, and what the minimum standards might involve, including English proficiency. In the meantime, the Pentagon and immigration authorities have expanded a program that accelerates citizenship for legal residents who volunteer for the military. (emp mine)

The Boston Globe

Steal this Disc

Covert Actions Against American Citizens Living in America

COINTELPRO never went away...

Watergate Scandal Escalates......Gerald Ford is named V.P.

Fuck Gerald R. Ford, never-elected president, Ford is the guy who pardoned the evil bastard Nixon he was on the Warren Commission, and his administration put Rumsfeld, Cheney and furthered Henry Kissinger into the top echelons of power. Please take a moment to fall down a flight of stairs in his memory.

As US troops battle Islamic extremists abroad, the Pentagon and the armed forces are reaching out to Muslims at home.

[Always stress the difference. Why, some of my best friends are non-Islamic extremist Muslims.]

An underlying goal is to interest more Muslims in the military, which needs officers and troops who can speak Arabic and other relevant languages and understand the culture of places like Iraq and Afghanistan.

[Maybe the military shouldn't have kicked out those six Arabic translators because they were gay.]

The effort is also part of a larger outreach. Pentagon officials say they are striving for mutual understanding with Muslims at home and abroad and to win their support for US war aims.

[And where I say 'mutual understanding,' I mean 'lip service to superstitious morons so we can make use of them.' We conned the Christians to get their votes, now let's work on the Muslims. Allah forbid that any understanding of Islam be based on reading the Quran.]

Among the efforts to attract and retain Muslim cadets:

• West Point and the other service academies have opened Muslim prayer rooms, as have military installations.

[You know, they didn't really mean it when whoever those guys were wrote the United States government would not establish a state religion, using tax dollars to fund someone else's superstition. Fucking First Ammendment of the fucking United States Constitution.]

• Imams serve full- and part-time as chaplains at the academies and some bases.

[Now now, why stop there? We need representatives of every major and minor and current and historic religion at the academies and bases. Just in case.]

• Top non-Muslim officers and Pentagon officials have taken to celebrating religious events with Muslims overseas and here in the US.

[Isn't that kind of like saying DURKA DURKA DURKA JIHAD except instead of being wooden puppets in a satirical movie, you're putting on supernatural blackface to trick Muslims into... fighting Muslims?]

"There is a message here, and that is that Muslims and the Islamic religion are totally compatible with Western values," says Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England in an interview.

[Secretary England went on to announce the end of banking, democracy, and several other entirely trivial and optional Western values.]

[Article continues at link. Accomodating superstition in tax-funded venues is always and forever a mistake.]

More on BearingPoint Inc. from my below post: Old Iraq Strategy Lives On In Weekly Progress Reports

Antonia Juhasz* has been all over this, showing that BearingPoint Inc is nothing more than another Enron/Arthur Andersen like accounting firm.

And its running not only the State Department in the USA but the governments of Iraq and Afghanistan.

BearingPoint has worked extensively on homeland security matters over the last two years, including with the Transportation Security Administration on airport security and the Defense Department on identification card technology. BearingPoint also worked with then-Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, now director of Homeland Security, to develop the Justice Network, a Web-based crime fighting system that links Pennsylvania's criminal justice agencies and offices with federal agencies.

In October 2002, KPMG Consulting Inc. changed its name to BearingPoint Inc. KPMG Consulting was formed in 1997 as the consulting division of accounting firm KPMG LLP. An initial public offering on Feb. 8, 2001, marked the official separation of KPMG Consulting from KPMG LLP. BearingPoint was the first of the Big Five consulting firms to separate from its audit and tax parent and become an independent, publicly traded company. The crisis that engulfed the accounting profession in the wake of the Enron/Arthur Andersen scandal later that year hastened the company's decision to change its name in 2002. Under the leadership of current Chairman and CEO Randolph Blazer, BearingPoint underwent a dramatic expansion by acquiring most of Arthur Andersen's worldwide consulting operations.

Clients include nine of the top 10 global wireless carriers, all software, electronics and pharmaceutical companies in the Fortune 100, six of the world's top 10 manufacturing companies, and all 14 Cabinet-level departments of the U.S. government. BearingPoint reported $2.4 billion in net revenue for FY 2003 and has a workforce of approximately 16,000 people in 39 countries.

In March 2002, Richard Roberts (Johnson's successor), testified before the House Subcommittee on Technology and Procurement Policy in support of another bill sponsored by Rep. Davis, the Services Acquisition Reform Act of 2002, a bill designed to streamline the process by which the government purchases information technology services. Roberts was testifying on behalf of the Information Technology Association of America, a trade group of which BearingPoint is a member. BearingPoint Senior Vice President Dave Sanders sits on the ITAA's board of directors. The ITAA helped the House subcommittee draft the legislation.

In 2001, BearingPoint spent $60,000 to lobby on homeland security issues and matters pertaining to the accounting industry. In 2002, BearingPoint spent $420,000 to lobby on information technology procurement and homeland security, among other issues.

In July 2003, USAID awarded BearingPoint a $9 million initial award to facilitate Iraq's economic recovery. According to USAID, the contract, which can be renewed annually for a maximum of two more years, is worth $79,583,885. According to the contract, the estimated value, including the two option years, is $240,162,668. The contract was bid on by 10 companies with existing indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contracts, according to USAID. Under the contract, BearingPoint will support the provisional government's efforts to facilitate Iraq's regional and international economic integration, stimulate trade, increase employment, and create a competitive private sector, according to USAID. BearingPoint will examine Iraq's current laws and policies regulating trade, commerce and investment and provide support to the central bank and the ministries of finance, trade, commerce and industry. BearingPoint might also undertake specific initiatives relating to "credit, micro-finance and small business loans."

In March 2003, USAID awarded BearingPoint a three-year, $39.9 million contract to help rebuild the country's economic infrastructure. That agreement includes an option to extend the contract for another two years, bringing the total amount of the award to $64.1 million. Under the contract, BearingPoint will work with the government in developing and repairing most of the key areas of Afghanistan's economy: tax policy, budget planning, banking, trade policy, commercial law and private sector development. After winning the contract, BearingPoint announced it was sending 30 employees to Afghanistan and hiring 30 more Kabul residents, adding to the 50 residents already employed.

Takes War Profiteering to a whole 'nother level. Build trap doors to governments from the inside when you build the government itself!

I wonder if they wrote the legal underpinning for all the "help" that the ISG envisioned for the oil sector in Iraq? D'ya think?

Further, Prior to the invasion, as we have seen Bearing Point received a $250 million contract from US AID to develop a blueprint for the remaking of Iraq's economy into a 'free-market' economy friendly to U.S. corporate interests. Bremer's job was to implement the Bearing Point plan. Juhasz points out that while there may have been an inadequate military plan, there was in fact a plan for the takeover and remaking of the economy of Iraq. Bremer had the power to create laws by issuing "binding instructions or directives." Bremer issued 100 Orders, Juhasz in 2005 interview describes some of the key orders:

"Order No. 39 allows for: (1) privatization of Iraq's 200 state-owned enterprises; (2) 100% foreign ownership of Iraqi businesses; (3) "national treatment" — which means no preferences for local over foreign businesses; (4) unrestricted, tax-free remittance of all profits and other funds; and (5) 40-year ownership licenses.

"Thus, it forbids Iraqis from receiving preference in the reconstruction while allowing foreign corporations — Halliburton and Bechtel, for example — to buy up Iraqi businesses, do all of the work and send all of their money home. They cannot be required to hire Iraqis or to reinvest their money in the Iraqi economy. They can take out their investments at any time and in any amount.

"Orders No. 57 and No. 77 ensure the implementation of the orders by placing U.S.-appointed auditors and inspector generals in every government ministry, with five-year terms and with sweeping authority over contracts, programs, employees and regulations.

"Order No. 17 grants foreign contractors, including private security firms, full immunity from Iraq's laws. Even if they, say, kill someone or cause an environmental disaster, the injured party cannot turn to the Iraqi legal system. Rather, the charges must be brought to U.S. courts.

"Order No. 40 allows foreign banks to purchase up to 50% of Iraqi banks.

"Order No. 49 drops the tax rate on corporations from a high of 40% to a flat 15%. The income tax rate is also capped at 15%.

"Order No. 12 (renewed on Feb. 24) suspends "all tariffs, customs duties, import taxes, licensing fees and similar surcharges for goods entering or leaving Iraq." This led to an immediate and dramatic inflow of cheap foreign consumer products — devastating local producers and sellers who were thoroughly unprepared to meet the challenge of their mammoth global competitors."

The Democracy Rising Interview: Antonia Juhasz

Finally, from above, BearingPoint Clients include nine of the top 10 global wireless carriers, all software, electronics and pharmaceutical companies in the Fortune 100, six of the world's top 10 manufacturing companies, and all 14 Cabinet-level departments of the U.S. government.

Can we say embedded?

There is simply no way to spin this other than the complete rape of a country, plain and simple. Rape is in fact far too benign a word. Dismemberment is more like it; What these laws describe is the dismemberment and dismantling of a country.

Oh, one last thing... take a wild guess who got many no bid contracts for undisclosed amounts to clean up New Orleans from the Katrina disaster (e.g. relief operation)... did you guess BearingPoint Inc.?

McLean, Va.-based BearingPoint Inc (formerly KPMG Consulting )is also involved in Homeland Security contracts, Border Security contracts, EzGov software sevice contracts, Physical Infrastructure Protection, and Immigration Law; of course most of this imformation is behind subscription and pay walls websites and the average person would never know.

"Everything in this room is eatable. In fact even I am eatable, but that is called canabalism my dear children and is frowned upon in most civilizations."~Willy Wonka, from the movie 'Charlie and the Chocolate Factory'

*Interestingly enough, I have posted about Antonia Juhasz and her work maybe three or four times here on Amsam.org, however, plug that name into the search eng to the right and you get nothing.

Schoolgirls as young as 12 are to be vaccinated against a sexually transmitted disease linked to cervical cancer, under controversial plans being drawn up by the Department of Health. [...] This summer Hollie Anderson, 13, became the first British girl to get the vaccine privately. Hollie's grandmother died of cervical cancer and her mother, Lisa Anderson, said she believed every mother and daughter should have the jab. She said: 'I've seen how awful the disease can be. I saw it as my role to protect Hollie.' The main obstacle for the government could be financial - three doses cost the NHS £241.50, although there would be a discount for a universal programme and savings on treating the 2,800 women annually diagnosed with cervical cancer could be significant.

[Ooops, that should have gone in British Samizdat. Here in the American Samizdat, it's virginity or death.]

The State Department continues every Wednesday to issue a 30-page public report that details exactly how the U.S. government is meeting the goals set forth in the president's now-abandoned plan. The report frames the data around Bush's storied eight pillars, which include such goals as "Defeat the Terrorists and Neutralize the Insurgents" (Pillar 1) and "Increase International Support for Iraq" (Pillar 7).
...
The report is prepared not by State Department officials but by a team of about 10 people hired by a management consulting firm. The firm, BearingPoint, has a $2 million contract to produce the report and to manage the process of running Iraq policy in the administration, the State Department official said.

Below the level of the top policymakers, working groups from across the government implement Iraq policy day by day. The BearingPoint employees, who work out of offices in the State Department, arrange the meetings, set the agendas, take notes and provide summaries of the discussions, the official said. They also maintain the Web site of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad.
...
The report seemed uncertain how to treat the release of a report by the Iraq Study Group, the independent bipartisan panel that criticized the administration's policy and spurred the White House to come up with a new plan. The earliest mention of the study group's report, in the Dec. 13 edition, came under Pillar 3, "Help Iraqis to Forge a National Compact for Democratic Government."

The headline said it all: "Iraqi Leaders Blast Iraq Study Group's Report." The State Department, perhaps in an effort to demonstrate the unity of Iraqi leaders, then devoted a whole page to negative quotes about the panel's recommendations.

The Dec. 20 report featured one curious item. Under the rubric of increasing international support, the report highlighted a visit to Damascus, Syria, by Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) and Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.). The senators "arrived in Syria December 19 to discuss how Damascus could help bring stability and security in Iraq," the report said, noting that another senator, Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), met with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in early December.

The State Department had strongly discouraged the trips, saying Syria is a key source of problems in Iraq.

Also see, It looks like the oil men are going to carry the day in Iraq

While President Bush offered a variety of reasons for invading Iraq, to find weapons of mass destruction or to spread democracy, he has been quite steadfast regarding the role of Iraqi oil. As late as this summer President Bush declared, “The oil belongs to the Iraqi people. It’s their asset.” A wonderful sentiment, though the Iraqi people view this a bit differently.

In a poll sponsored by the University of Michigan this summer, Iraqis gave as the reason behind the United States’ invasion as 1) To control Iraqi oil (76 percent), 2) To build military bases (41 percent) 3) To help Israel (32 percent). Only 2 percent of Iraqis thought we were coming to spread democracy. Politicians might offer benign statements, but the reality is on, or in, the ground. Very shortly we shall see who shall define the reality, and it sure looks like the oil men shall carry the day, at the expense of democracy and economic fairness.

While President Bush proclaims the oil belongs to the Iraqis, it turns out the U.S. State Department proposed the use of Production Sharing Agreements (PSAs) for Iraq even before we invaded Iraq in 2003. Since then, the Coalition Provisional Authority, and the various interim Iraqi governments, all heavily influenced by the U.S., have sought to implement this type of agreement. In late summer it was reported “the administration and major oil companies reviewed and commented on a new law governing Iraq’s crucial oil sector, before it has even been seen by the Iraqi parliament.” Corporate lawyers and the oil industry are writing laws for the Iraqi government. The process is skewed to favor the oil industry and unfair to the Iraqi people. snip

Back in 1953 the United States and Great Britain sent Kermit Roosevelt to overthrow the democratically-elected government of Iran.

Why?

Because Iran’s Prime Minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, had the audacity to nationalize Iranian oil supplies, potentially threatening our energy security. Operation Ajax, as this illegal and covert CIA operation was known, cost less than $500,000, while setting the tone for a generation of subsequent covert operations. This time, a manipulative president deceived a pliant Congress and a gullible American public. In an illusionary grasp at energy security Iraq suffered a ‘shock and awe’ treatment.

This letter demonstrates that Vatican City, by way of the Roman Catholic Church, has systematically sheltered child abusers for decades. Were these actions carried out by a secular government, I have no doubt that Amnesty International would not hesitate to speak out against such a government. Were these actions carried out by an Islamic government, I have no doubt that Amnesty International would not hesitate to speak out against such a government (as has been the case in 'honor killings'). I suggest it is appropriate for Amnesty International to issue a statement condemning the actions of Vatican City. Is Vatican City an appropriate subject for criticism by Amnesty International? Because Vatican City is a country, and because Amnesty International addresses criminal and immoral behavior in countries, the answer is yes. This open letter to Amnesty International will demonstrate that Vatican City is a country, that Vatican City is responsible for systematic child abuse around the world, and that it is appropriate for Amnesty International to hold Vatican City accountable for this abuse.

[Letter continues at link. This letter has gone unanswered for one year.]

The US is insolvent. There is simply no way for our national bills to be paid under current levels of taxation and promised benefits. Our combined federal deficits now total more than 400% of GDP. That is the conclusion of a recent Treasury/OMB report entitled Financial Report of the United States Government [PDF] that was quietly slipped out on a Friday (12/15/06), deep in the holiday season, with little fanfare. Sometimes I wonder why the Treasury Department doesn’t just pay somebody to come in at 4:30 am Christmas morning to release the report. Additionally, I’ve yet to read a single account of this report in any of the major news media outlets but that is another matter. But, hey, I understand. A report is this bad requires all the muffling it can get.

Despite improvement in both the fiscal year 2006 reported net operating cost and the cash-based budget deficit, the U.S. government’s total reported liabilities, net social insurance commitments, and other fiscal exposures continue to grow and now total approximately $50 trillion, representing approximately four times the Nation’s total output (GDP) in fiscal year 2006, up from about $20 trillion, or two times GDP in fiscal year 2000. As this long-term fiscal imbalance continues to grow, the retirement of the “baby boom” generation is closer to becoming a reality with the first wave of boomers eligible for early retirement under Social Security in 2008. Given these and other factors, it seems clear that the nation’s current fiscal path is unsustainable and that tough choices by the President and the Congress are necessary in order to address the nation’s large and growing long-term fiscal imbalance.

From $20 trillion in fiscal exposures in 2000 to over $50 trillion in only six years? What shall we do for an encore… shoot for $100 trillion? And how about the fact that boomers begin retiring in 2008… that always seemed to be waaaay out in the future. However, beginning January 1st we can start referring to 2008 as ‘next year’ instead of ‘some point in the future too distant to get concerned about now’. Our economic problems need to be classified as growing, imminent, and unsustainable. And let me clarify something. The $53 trillion shortfall is expressed as a ‘net present value’. That means that in order to make the shortfall disappear we’d have to have that amount of cash in the bank – today - earning interest (the GAO uses 5.7% & 5.8% as the assumed long-term rate of return). I’ll say it again - $53 trillion, in the bank, today.

[Article continues at link. See also this list of countries by current account balance. The CIA World Book states the USA is number one in debt to other countries to the tune of $8.837 trillion. When the world is ready to reign in a superpower gone wild, just present the bill.]

A militant animal rights group claims to have poisoned bottles of POM Wonderful juices in several retail chains on the East Coast to protest animal testing.

A communique from the Animal Rights Militia (ARM), which was posted on the North American Animal Liberation Press Office Web site, reads: "Those who drink the contaminated juice won’t die like the animals in pom labs, but the diarrhea, vomiting and headaches will hopefully send a strong message that people will no longer allow innocent defenseless animals to be tormented and killed for a health juice." The validity of the claim has not been verified.

The communique goes on to say, "more and more activists like us will choose to retreat into the shadows and fight for the animals underground since the government is making it impossible to do the kinds of things that those who came before us did to oppose injustice, oppression and exploitation."

[Article continues at link. Portland Oregon's own animal rights superstar, Craig Rosebraugh, wrote extensively about the abolition of capitalism. Then he opened an upscale (vegan) restaurant, and when the IWW came to set up a union there he threatened them with the police.]

A UN gift to our new boy King!

Following two months of debate, the UN Security Council voted unanimously on Saturday to impose sanctions against Iran for its nuclear program.

Julian Glover and Alexandra Topping: Religion does more harm than good. "More people in Britain think religion causes harm than believe it does good, according to a Guardian/ICM poll published today. It shows that an overwhelming majority see religion as a cause of division and tension - greatly outnumbering the smaller majority who also believe that it can be a force for good. The poll also reveals that non-believers outnumber believers in Britain by almost two to one. It paints a picture of a sceptical nation with massive doubts about the effect religion has on society: 82% of those questioned say they see religion as a cause of division and tension between people. Only 16% disagree. The findings are at odds with attempts by some religious leaders to define the country as one made up of many faith communities."

Eva-Marie Ayala: "Women said peer was 'demonically oppressed.' "Two women fired from UT-Arlington told supervisors that they prayed and rubbed religious oils on a co-worker's cubicle because they believed she was 'demonically oppressed,' according to personnel records the university released Friday. In an e-mail to supervisors, [a] male co-worker said he was invited to witness the praying and cleansing but became uncomfortable when Shatkin began to chant loudly and rub perfumed oil on the absent co-worker's cubicle wall. The man quoted Shatkin as praying, 'You vicious evil dogs. Get the hell out of here in the name of Jesus. ... I command you to leave.'"

Looking for a DVD for a Christmas Gift perhaps??

A former US policeman and undercover drug agent has appalled narcotics officials by introducing a Christmas video for drug users on how to avoid arrest and fool the police.

Barry Cooper, who is described by former colleagues as perhaps the best drug- enforcement officer in America, will next week begin marketing Never Get Busted Again, which will show viewers how to “conceal their stash, avoid narcotics profiling and fool canines every time”.

retired Colonel Sam Gardiner said in an interview this week that he sees several signs that the United States is in fact moving on a warpath to Iran. He suggested that the talk of sending additional troops to Iraq could actually be about Iran, and said he is also seeing signs that the administration “is beginning to develop the strategic communications message. It is about Iran more and more that you hear people talking …The evidence suggests the White House put an embargo on talking about Iran beginning the second week in October…” That embargo now appears to have been lifted, Gardiner says. “A story” -- an Iran narrative -- “is being put together.”

Six years ago, the Boy Scouts convinced the U.S. Supreme Court that their deep-seated principles gave them a constitutional right to exclude gays and atheists. Now the California Supreme Court has been asked to look at the other side of that coin - whether the Scouts are a religious organization ineligible for certain types of government aid, including dollar-a-year leases of public land.

[Article continues at link. I support the Boy Scouts of America being able to exclude anyone they want, as long as they remain a private organization. When they get tax funding, they have to play by the same rules everyone else does.]

North Carolina 8th Distric Congressman Robin Hayes claims stability in Iraq depends on "spreading the message of Jesus Christ [...] everything depends on everyone learning about the birth of the savior."

[Rather than more of one superstition and less of another, I suggest less superstition across the board is the way to have more peace and stability in the world.]

This is why it seems to me that organization is the most important thing. Education and organization.

(pic goes to different link)

More college students seem to be practicing traditional forms of religion today than at any time in my 30 years of teaching.

At first glance, the flourishing of religion on campuses seems to reverse trends long criticized by conservatives under the rubric of “political correctness.” But, in truth, something else is occurring. Once again, right and left have become mirror images of each other; religious correctness is simply the latest version of political correctness. Indeed, it seems the more religious students become, the less willing they are to engage in critical reflection about faith.

The chilling effect of these attitudes was brought home to me two years ago when an administrator at a university where I was then teaching called me into his office. A student had claimed that I had attacked his faith because I had urged him to consider whether Nietzsche’s analysis of religion undermines belief in absolutes. The administrator insisted that I apologize to the student. (I refused.) [...] Distinguished scholars at several major universities in the United States have been condemned, even subjected to death threats, for proposing psychological, sociological or anthropological interpretations of religious texts in their classes and published writings. In the most egregious cases, defenders of the faith insist that only true believers are qualified to teach their religious tradition.

[Article continues at link. Tell you what: you don't pray in my schools and I won't think in your church.]

a first in MSM history?

Why do we hate the puny bands we see on MTV (when they bother to play music)? Because some of us remember when Gods walked the Earth (see below)..

"Failure" by the Kings of Convenience

Via BlueLatinos.org: Greeley Colorado.

Via HispanicTips: Video from Cactus, Texas.

Both will feature the occasional clueless person (in the interest of being "fair and balanced"), but will at least give you some idea of what went down.

The Mississippi-based American Family Association says it has sold more than 500,000 buttons and 125,000 bumper stickers bearing the slogan "Merry Christmas: It's Worth Saying."

The Alliance Defense Fund, a Christian legal aid group that boasts a network of some 900 lawyers standing ready to "defend Christmas," says it has moved about 20,000 "Christmas packs." The packs, available for a suggested $29 donation, include a three-page legal memo and two lapel pins.

And Liberty Counsel, a conservative law firm affiliated with the Rev. Jerry Falwell, says it has sold 12,500 legal memos on celebrating Christmas and 8,000 of its own buttons and bumper stickers.

[Article continues at link. Are secular people equally tricked by marketing programs like this, or does it take superstition to make people gullible enough to pay protection money for nontroversies like the 'war on Christmas?']

Merry X-mass! to nice Mr. nsa guy and the contract paid wanna be g-men...Something for YOU sadist's to masterbate to...


Warning!

This video contains graphic images and audio of torture and should only be viewed by a mature audience.

Brian Eno, Arundhati Roy, Ahdaf Soueif, and John Berger are among the 94 artists from Europe, North and South America, and the Middle East who have joined a cultural boycott against Israel.

The Berger letter, signed by artists from across Europe, North and South America, as well as Palestinians and Israelis, reads:

"There is a fragile ceasefire in Lebanon, albeit daily violated by Israeli overflights. Meanwhile the day to day brutality of the Israeli army in Gaza and the West Bank continues. Ten Palestinians are killed for every Israeli death; more than 200, many of them children, have been killed since the summer. UN resolutions are flouted, human rights violated as Palestinian land is stolen, houses demolished and crops destroyed. For archbishop Desmond Tutu, as for the Jewish (former ANC military commander presently South African minister of security), Ronnie Kasrils, the situation of the Palestinians is worse than that of black South Africans under apartheid. Meantime Western governments refer to Israel's 'legitimate right' of self-defence, and continue to supply weaponry.

The challenge of apartheid was fought better. The non-violent international response to apartheid was a campaign of boycott, divestment, and, finally UN imposed sanctions which enabled the regime to change without terrible bloodshed. Today Palestinians teachers, writers, film-makers and non-governmental organisations have called for a comparable academic and cultural boycott of Israel as offering another path to a just peace. This call has been endorsed internationally by university teachers in many European countries, by film-makers and architects, and by some brave Israeli dissidents. It is now time for others to join the campaign ¡ as Primo Levi asked: If not now, when?

We call on creative writers and artists to support our Palestinian and Israeli colleagues by endorsing the boycott call. Read the Palestinian call (The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel).

Don't visit, exhibit or perform in Israel!"

US interrogators have devised a new form of torture. It debases the democracy they claim to be defending.

By George Monbiot. Published in the Guardian 12th December 2006.

After thousands of years of practice, you might have imagined that every possible means of inflicting pain had already been devised. But you should never underestimate the human capacity for invention. United States interrogators, we now discover, have found a new way of destroying a human being.

US/Nazi torturers "have found a new way of destroying a human being," (a "new form of torture") - thanks to George Monbiot for remembering Jose Padilla, a US citizen. We should too. And that requires hard work, courage - nothing less than delegitimizing the entire system and bringing these fucking bastards to justice.

The United States and Britain will begin moving additional warships and strike aircraft into the Persian Gulf region in a display of military resolve toward Iran that will come as the United Nations continues to debate possible sanctions against the country, Pentagon and military officials said Wednesday.

The officials said that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates was expected this week to approve a request by commanders for a second aircraft carrier and its supporting ships to be stationed within quick sailing distance of Iran by early next year.

Senior American officers said the increase in naval power should not be viewed as preparations for any offensive strike against Iran. But they acknowledged that the ability to hit Iran would be increased and that Iranian leaders might well call the growing presence provocative.
...
Steps are already being taken to increase the number of minesweeping vessels and magnetic “sleds” carried by helicopters to improve the ability to counter Iranian mines that could block oil-shipping lanes, Pentagon and military officials said.

As part of future deployments after the first of the year, the British Navy plans to add two mine-hunting vessels to its ships that already are part of the international coalition patrolling waters in the Persian Gulf.

A Royal Navy news release said the ship movements were aimed at “maintaining familiarity with the challenges of warm water mine-hunting conditions.” But a senior British official said: “We are increasing our presence. That is only prudent.” Military officers said doubling the aircraft carrier presence in the region could be accomplished quickly by a shift in sailing schedules.
...
at present there are about 45 warships deployed in the Persian Gulf and waters across the region from the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean, with a third of those supplied by allies, which this month include Australia, Bahrain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Pakistan and Britain.

Tick tock, tick tock...

Happy Solstice 2006

Core Strategic Premises

* Our obedience is the goal of rulers.
* Enclosure is their process to gain obedience… when murder quits working.
* Commodification is their method to accomplish enclosure.
* Ideology is the disguise that conceals and reproduces their power inside our minds.
* Epistemology is the constructed "knowledge" of which the disguise is assembled.
* Independence is the precondition of effective and active resistance.
* Independence of action facilitates independence of mind, and independence of mind facilitates independence of action.

In life, Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal was among the most famous Jews of the 20th century. In death, he wound up on a list of people eligible to be posthumously baptised as Mormons so they could enter heaven.

Bowing to protests from Jewish groups, The Church of Latter Day Saints said on Tuesday that it had removed Wiesenthal's name from its International Genealogical Index, a database of names of people who be could be baptised after death.

A church spokesman said the Nazi hunter's name was taken off the list after receiving a complaint from the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, a Jewish human rights group named in his honour.

[Article continues at link. The Mormons baptised Hitler after death, so Hitler is going to heaven while Wiesenthal is going to hell. Religion softens minds and hardens hearts.]

The post-hurricane gambling boom in Louisiana more or less came to a stop in November as gamblers lost $199.7 million in state-licensed casinos.

The figure was up from $184.4 million in November 2005, but that included a time when Harrah's New Orleans Casino was shuttered because of Hurricane Katrina. Harrah's provided $32.6 million of the overall take last month, state police reported today.

[Article continues at link. Critical thinking skills might have prevented those people from giving $199.7 million in tax dollars designated for disaster relief to casinos instead. It might have even prevented them from living in a flood-prone area, or caused them to make their own provisions for surviving a flood. Critical thinking skills also might influence people to not vote for politicians who will clearly betray their best interests, or to tolerate superstition enfranchised into law. What can I do today to increase my and other people's critical thinking skills?]

See also: BlueVoice.org, Defenders of Wildlife, Save Taiji Dolphins, Dolphins Save Swimmer from Shark, Dolphins Save Lifeguards from Shark, Sea Shepherd, Earth Island Institute, Discover Dolphins with Dolphina the Belly-Dancer and Detox Your Home, Help Marine Life!

Former CIA Official Exposes Bush Administration Fraud

Flynt Leverett worked as a senior director for Middle East affairs at the National Security Council, the NSC, and he was a CIA analyst. He was recently threatened with criminal prosecution for trying to publish an op-ed in the NYT's.

Also see, Also see, Censored former official: White House blocked op-ed with no classified data

"We retain the rhetoric of liberal democracy, but in concrete terms this supposed democracy gets enacted as the commodity culture, in which freedom of choice really means [Coke versus Pepsi]." It looks like the 'tapeworm' is on the move:

Cheney’s Revenge

"This is the largest massing of military power in the region, and it is gathering for a reason."

The cabal will find a way to attack Iran...they have to. Notice that link I posted above about how Haliburton is being cut out of the action even via one of it's proxy companies?

For that and for many other reasons, not the least of which is the fact that the 9/11 truthers are catching up with all the lies...there has to be another catastrophic event, and soon.

This one will be 'the enchilada' as the Nixonion White House staffers used to say. This one will be the one where the cabal stares down the pathetic leftist opposition and merely says... We have star wars, we have HAARP, we have The Bomb we have numerous other biowarfare weapons...we have the entire world surrounded and we're taking over.

We're setting up a NWO and the first thing that goes is the Internet. At least as it is now known and loved....the new Internet will be just a high speed version of the boring and dried up Zionist MSM that nobody pays any attention to anymore. Like it or lump it.

Oh, and by the way, the banks have taken all your money and locked it up and will be doling it out to you in nickles and dimes.....so don't make any expensive plans.

Yes, it will be a Brave New World...and it will be starting shortly in the Strait of Hormuz.

The Democratic majority in Congress almost guarantees that the Cabal must launch a "DOS" (Denial-of-Service) attack on Democrats by melting-down the economy, launching a new war, and creating as many crises as possible to keep (nosey, investigating) Dems busy.

It's all part of The Long Coup which began you-know-when. By the time U.S. military are on U.S. streets, the "military" part of The Long Coup will be merely a technical formality.

Hell, it's already begun...

US Army Might Break Goodyear Strike
By Bernard Simon
The Financial Times

The US Army is considering measures to force striking workers back to their jobs at a Goodyear Tire & Rubber plant in Kansas in the face of a looming shortage of tires for Humvee trucks and other military equipment used in Iraq and Afghanistan. A strike involving 17,000 members of the United Steelworkers union has crippled 16 Goodyear plants in the US and Canada since October 5.

I can't help but think of Amira Hass's article of this past summer. Her words reverberate over and over again in my mind.

The experiment was a success: The Palestinians are killing each other. They are behaving as expected at the end of the extended experiment called "what happens when you imprison 1.3 million human beings in an enclosed space like battery hens.

The average person don't know what to think anymore. They are confused and and exhausted and mostly very, very afraid.

As a friend of my mother put it today, "We don’t know anymore who's right and who’s wrong, and who’s at fault and who isn’t. And we just want it to end."

Given that last quote, I would say the "policy" (heavy sarcasm) is working just exactly the way it was intended to.

The other day, a natural healing practitioner explained the strategy used by a tapeworm to prosper. A tapeworm, she said, injected a chemical into its host that triggered a craving by the host for what the tapeworm wished for its dinner. By managing its host’s desire, a tapeworm manipulated its host to set aside self-interest and please its parasite. And so the tapeworm proceeded to consume its host’s energy and health, with the host doing most of the work.


The story of how a tapeworm parasitically eats away at its ecosystem came at a moment when the math lover in me was having an adverse reaction to the description of America as the new Roman Empire that seems to be inspired by the recent occupation of Iraq. The investment economics of American imperial conquest work more along the lines of the tapeworm than of the Romans.


If my rudimentary understanding of the rise and fall of ancient empires is useful, the Roman Empire brought an advancement of science, infrastructure, technology and material progress to many of the poorer lands that it conquered. In essence, Rome’s territory grew in part from its ability to increase the ‘return on investment” of many of the places it conquered.

...

The tapeworm -- a parasite that over time eats its host ---can more accurately describe the demonic patterns of stripping places of intellectual capital that come with American imperial conquest. The “dumbing down” so often complained about within America’s borders is a phenomenon that our military appears to be implementing globally. We seem intent on removing spiritual power and intellectual IQ as we depopulate globally, moving out the honest and competent and putting the corrupt and bureaucratic in charge.


One of the things that is most disturbing about the American tapeworm is that it has organized its leadership around private banks and defense contractors and its governance and intellectual air cover around think tanks and private universities and their tax-exempt endowments.

...

The Tapeworm Ransacking of Iraq

The economic desperation that lead up to the invasion of Iraq has been eloquently described by Chris Sanders of Sanders Research Associates and fits the patterns that SRA colleague John Laughland and his colleagues at the British Helsinki Human Rights Group, have documented in Eastern Europe. Assuming the patterns that we have seen throughout the world apply, that tapeworm’s economic desperation will feed on Iraq as follows:


- The first meal to be harvested on Iraq is the profits of invasion --- from government contracts and arms trafficking to media coverage.


- The second meal to be harvested on Iraq is the resulting control of assets, including gold, oil, bank accounts and antiquities. Iraq will be stripped, shipped, or otherwise switched to new ownership. Occupiers will use Iraqi assets to leverage more debt that generates more contracts and business for the inside companies. The antiquities in Iraq and this area of the world have a special meaning and attraction for the American and British leadership networks, so don't underestimate the value of these. The gold bugs at LeMetropole Café reported that the Americans have captured $1 billion of gold which was quite relevant as the NY Fed Banks (particularly JP Morgan, Goldman, Citibank) are running significant short positions to suppress the gold price. Such a replenishment of their stocks (or the US Treasury whom they may be trading on the account of -- they usually simply move the shorts over to the taxpayers on all these types of situations) will be quite refreshing.


- The third meal on Iraq to be harvested will be “occupation management.” If Eastern Europe is representative, America will partner with local and global organized crime and other intelligence agencies to significantly increase organized crime profits from the place. Attractive children will be culled from the population for shipment to Europe and other areas for sex slavery and pedophilia. Narcotics trafficking will increase as it has in Afghanistan. The award to CSC DynCorp of a $500 million sole source contract to run police, courts and judiciary in Iraq is an important signal. After years of research, my question is whether CSC DynCorp’s core competencies relates to enforcement infrastructure designed for places with growing financial fraud, narcotics trafficking, sex slavery and control of leadership through "control files.” These are the talents that the U.S.-based economic elites need to stripmine the assets to feed its economic desperation.


- The fourth meal to be harvested on Iraq will be “fixing” it and declaring “victory.” This will involve significant government contracts to bring “Western Civilization” as defined by building those things that ensure the assets that the private corporations and investors have now acquired have the largest increase in value at no expense to themselves. A careful analysis will show expenditure rations in the “soviet” style—that is, the U.S. government will spend much more than necessary to get anything done. The banks will acquire an entirely new market. Critical to the fixing it phase is the financing of the occupation with the requirement that Iraq use the US dollar. We will print dollars and the Iraqis will use them. This is free financing for us. Next will come the payback for the not-for -profit groups. Because Christianity is an essential political support base for legitimizing the de-population of the Muslim territories, a flow of resources to the right church groups to support an expansion of their missionary ministries is likely. Progressive groups will bid for contracts to bring the rule of law and economic development and things like “the rights of women.” There will be a flow of money from foundations and universities to study how to help Iraq and to justify what we are doing.The Tapeworm's Triumph? Confronting the Parasitic Corporate Underpinnings of U.S. Empire

Re: Tapeworm Talk

Some scientists recently proposed that parasites were, in fact, the "top of the food chain" and that we other organisms evolved specifically to be vehicles for them.

Interesting. We do seem to have the predisposition for it. I used to have regular fights with a day-trader friend of mine who insisted that welfare recipients were "social parasites", whereas I insisted that that distinction belonged to the leisure class (whether you define the leisure class as merely bourgeois, or if you expand that, as I do, to include highly overpaid, but useless, CEOs). By my reckoning, the Bush Dynasty represents the penultimate achievement of human parasites.

The analogy of how a tapeworm influences behaviour chemically is illustrative, but there are better examples. Take the humble Sacculina carcini , which does not have a common name because few people want to get to know it any better. It's an amorphous crab parasite that injects itself into its host where it grows "roots" into every part of the crab's body. It then steers its host in the same way that we would steer a car... it takes over the motor functions of the crab who then becomes a zombie slave. If the host crab is male (which is unsuitable for the parasite to reproduce), it changes the host into a female. The crab will no longer moult or be able to regrow appendages as healthy crabs do... it's short, unhappy life is dedicated exclusively to foraging for food for its parasite with no nutrients going towards its own survival any longer. Kind of like what Halliburton does to congress.

Also see, August 2000 Discover Magazine article Do Parasites Rule the World? , by Carl Zimmer.

Today's young adults are feeling the full, deep impact of a massive shift in the US economy, and are no longer able to start and sustain a family, build a career and grow assets in the same manner as the previous generation, according to a new report series published today by Demos, a national, nonpartisan public policy center.

The new five-part "Young Adult Economics Series" shows that America's young people are feeling the full effect of a 30-year shift from an industrial to technology- and service-based U.S. economy. The series shows that the combination of stagnant wage growth, growing debt, and high costs of education, homeownership and healthcare are new realities. These are now common factors that challenge the ability of America's 20-and 30-somethings to start, and sustain, an economically stable adult life.

whether you "buy into" the "American dream" or not, this situation is like Saturn devouring his children. I do think the US needs to downsize its consumption, but not at the expense of the young.

People who seek and hold power over others aren’t influenced for the good by public discourse. They mine it for leverage, seek ways to direct it towards things supportive of their programs and mine it for trendy, effective rationales. Public discourse is a vehicle for their psychological warfare. The first step is always getting people to consider something patently ridiculous as worthy of serious attention. Social Security, for example, is now under attack by Charles Rangel [D-NY] and Robert Rubin , the Clinton administration Secretary of the Treasury. They know their arguments are bogus. They want them to be taken seriously, and discussed seriously, so that elements of them appear in the received wisdom columns in the newspapers. Eventually, enough people will accept that there must be something wrong. Why would people be talking about it so much if there weren’t?

One might well ask how anyone could know that such things are psychological warfare, beyond a shadow of a doubt. It’s because the designers of the campaign explicitly say so. They’re proud of it, they think it’s good and a good thing to be doing. When someone says he’s going to do something and then verifiably takes steps to do it, you’re not going to get much better proof. People like that aren’t going to be swayed by debunking. At best, they’ll be forced to change their perception management tactics. They’ll be swayed when 20 or 30 percent of the labor force refuses to show up for work. They’ll be swayed when they lose privileged access to crony networks. The “lesser evilism” votes harvested by cretins like Rangel aren’t persuasive. Every counter-argument, no matter how well explicated, becomes a waste of effort if the last step of it is affirming the shreds of legitimacy he’s gained through formalized, circumscribed democracy.

The programs offered by Spartacus and Lohmann offer much more scope for achieving something positive. They’re fairly modest, goodness knows.

BOULDER, Colo. - A Montana man who gave a woman $170,000 as he tried to rid himself of "bad karma" that the psychic said was ruining his love life filed a lawsuit to get his money back.

[Article continues at link. Maybe teaching people critical thinking skills from childhood onward is a good idea. Or maybe teaching people superstition from childhood onward is a good idea. Which do you think?]

(Worcester, Massachusetts) A same-sex marriage advocate is nursing cuts and bruises after being attacked by a leading advocate of a constitutional amendment to end gay marriage in the only state where it is legal.

Sarah Loy, 27, went to a rally organized by VoteOnMarriage in front of Worcester City Hall, west of Boston, on the weekend. The demonstration was one of several behind held on weekends throughout Massachusetts aimed at pressuring the Legislature to vote on the proposed amendment.

At a lectern Larry Cirignano, leader of the Boston-based Catholic Citizenship group had just finished leading the Pledge of Allegiance when he spotted Loy near the front of the crowd with other supporters of gay marriage staging a counter protest.

Loy was carrying a sign reading "No discrimination in the Constitution". Other members of her group were yelling "You lost, go home, get over it," at the crowd.

The Worcester Telegram & Gazette reports that Cirignano rushed from behind the lectern and tackled Loy to the ground. "You need to get out. You need to get out of here right now," he allegedly told her as her head was pushed into the concrete sidewalk.

As Loy lay bruised and bloodied on the sidewalk Cirignano reportedly returned to lectern, joining other leaders of the protest in condemning same-sex marriage and demanding the proposed amendment be put on the ballot.

[Article continues at link.]

Bush on a fishing expedition
December 18, 2006

The Bush administration has come up with a new weapon in its arsenal of secrecy: the use of a grand jury subpoena to demand not just one copy but all copies of a leaked document, in this case 3 1/2 pages e-mailed this fall to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Ordinarily, subpoenas are issued to force an unwilling person or organization to provide evidence needed in an investigation or trial. By requiring the ACLU to provide all copies, the administration clearly hopes to stop the ACLU from publishing the contents of the e-mail. The ACLU even believes the administration already knows who the leaker is -- suggesting the subpoena is intended for another purpose. Judge Jed S. Rakoff of the federal district court in Manhattan should quash the government's action.

No one is supposed to say what the document, which was unsolicited, is about, but the ACLU says that it "has nothing to do with national defense" and would be only "mildly embarrassing" to the administration. Clearly, the administration has lit on this one instance of many leaked documents to see if it can use a subpoena for "any and all" copies of a revealing memo or report to keep the media and organizations like the ACLU from divulging its contents.

In the Pentagon Papers case during the Vietnam War, the Nixon administration tried to suppress publication, but the US Supreme Court said that would be prior restraint of the press. The justices set a very high standard for the harm that publication would have to cause to justify prior restraint: it would have to be "direct, immediate, and irreparable to our Nation or its people." There is no evidence yet that publication of the contested document would have such a dire effect. The ACLU argues that the document has no information about troop movements, intelligence sources, or communication methods.

Neoconservatives lobbied for an unnecessary war and are getting blamed. But they have made comebacks before.

Despite the obituaries now being written, neoconservatism will not soon be over with and certainly won’t disappear in the way that American communism or segregation have. The group has always been resilient and tactically flexible.
...
But if Bush has failed them, what options remain? Joe Lieberman has less national appeal than Henry Jackson did, and once you have been embedded in the Pentagon and the vice president’s office, forays from the Senate will seem a weak brew. John McCain is another matter, and if Americans can be persuaded that the solution to their Middle East, terrorism, and other diplomatic dilemmas lies in more troops and invasions, neoconservatism will have springtime all over again.

In the short run at least, neoconservatism is wounded and is likely to present a different public face. The soaring language about how it is America’s destiny to spread democracy throughout the globe, the efforts to define an American global empire as something greatly to be desired—this will dropped, a casualty of the Iraq fiasco. But it’s not clear that the neocons will miss the democracy baggage.
...
What won’t be dropped is the neoconservatives’ attachment to Israel and the tendency to conflate the Jewish state’s interests (as defined in right-wing Israeli terms) with America’s. So one can look forward to neoconservative agitation on two fronts: a powerful campaign to draw the United States into a war to eliminate Iran’s nuclear potential and an equally loud effort in support of maintaining Israeli dominance over the West Bank and denying the Palestinians meaningful statehood. Those who argue effectively for a more even-handed American policy towards Israel and Palestine will risk the full measure of smears linking them to historical anti-Semitism.
...
This election season ends with neoconservatism widely mocked and openly contemptuous of the president who took its counsels. The key policy it has lobbied for since the mid-1990s—the invasion of Iraq—is an almost universally acknowledged disaster. So one can see why the movement’s obituaries are being written. But the group was powerful and influential well before its alliance with George W. Bush. In its wake it leaves behind crises—Iraq first among them—that will not be easy to resolve, and neocons will not be shy about criticizing whatever imperfect solutions are found to the mess they have created. Perhaps most importantly, neoconservatism still commands more salaries—able people who can pursue ideological politics as fulltime work in think tanks and periodicals—than any of its rivals. The millionaires who fund AEI and the New York Sun will not abandon neoconservatism because Iraq didn’t work out. The reports of the movement’s demise are thus very much exaggerated.

Donald Rumsfeld's final speech as defense secretary

If it were proved to me that in making war, my ideal had a chance of being realized, I would still say "no" to war. For one does not create a human society on mounds of corpses.
~Louis Lecoin

Robert Pastor, a leading intellectual force in the move to create an EU-style North American Community, told WND he believes a new 9/11 crisis could be the catalyst to merge the U.S., Mexico and Canada.
Pastor, a professor at American University, says that in such a case the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America, or SPP – launched in 2005 by the heads of the three countries at a summit in Waco, Texas – could be developed into a continental union, complete with a new currency, the amero, that would replace the U.S. dollar just as the euro has replaced the national currencies of Europe.

US residents and those with relatives in the States, pay heed to the Armed Forces' most recent manual on Urban Operations. Article should be read in its entirety so I will not excerpt.

Rolling right along...

The real problem is the Israeli Lobby's powerful influence - about which the Lobby brags - over U.S. policy in the Middle East and Israel's inflexibility toward the Palestinians, whose land Israel has stolen. As long as Israel exercises a veto over U.S. policy in the Middle East, the powder keg will remain alight.

The members of the ISG are elder statesmen. They have held high positions and accumulated the honors. Their careers are behind them. They have nothing to lose. They can afford to tell the truth and to address the real problem.

If news reports are correct (see, for example, this), former Secretary of State James Baker has proposed a Middle East peace conference without Israeli participation. According to an official quoted by Insight magazine, "As Baker sees this, the conference would provide a unique opportunity for the United States to strike a deal without Jewish pressure. This has become the hottest proposal examined by the foreign policy people over the last month."

According to Insight, "officials said the Baker proposal to exclude Israel garnered support in the wake of Vice President Dick Cheney's visit to Saudi Arabia on Nov. 25. They said Mr. Cheney spent most of his meetings listening to Saudi warnings that Israel, rather than Iran, is the leading cause of instability in the Middle East." The official told Insight that the administration "has fallen in line," but that "Bush is not in the daily loop. He is shocked by the elections and he's hoping for a miracle on Iraq."

President Bush lacks the knowledge, judgment, and experience to be in the Oval Office. He has been deceived and manipulated by neoconservatives who live in the fantasy world of their own ideology and who have been aligned with Israel's right-wing Likud Party for most of their careers.

The neoconservatives put Bush and the U.S., along with Iraqis, Afghans, and Lebanese, in harm's way. Their fantasy enterprise failed, and now they damn Bush for a lost war that they said would be a cakewalk. Neoconservatives told Bush that U.S. troops would have flowers thrown at them, not bombs.

Also via Steve Clemons (on Huffpo, sorry...)



Saudi Royal Family Split on Iraq

The split played a key role in this week's abrupt resignation of the Saudi ambassador to Washington. It also could hurt U.S. efforts to forge a new overall strategy to calm Iraq.

More broadly, the internal dispute shows how Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, long key partners in U.S. efforts to stabilize the Middle East, are struggling to decide how to proceed as Iraq boils over and Iran gains influence.

...The split played a key role in this week's abrupt resignation of the Saudi ambassador to Washington. It also could hurt U.S. efforts to forge a new overall strategy to calm Iraq.

More broadly, the internal dispute shows how Arab countries like Saudi Arabia, long key partners in U.S. efforts to stabilize the Middle East, are struggling to decide how to proceed as Iraq boils over and Iran gains influence.

Clemons responds to this report by saying:

The escalating tension between Prince Bandar bin Sultan, the current Saudi National Security Advisor and former Saudi Ambassador to the United States, and Prince Turki al-Faisal, who only this this week resigned his position as Saudi Ambassador in Washington, is taking some new and disturbing turns.

Clemons claims this is a power play b/t Bandar and Turki...not quite the same thing as "jealousy."

Sources also confirm that Ambassador Turki's decision to resign not only had to do with his refusal to tolerate the unprofessionalism of Bandar and Massoud [more at the link above] -- but with the signals that Bandar and Massoud have sent to Cheney, David Addington and others on Cheney's national security staff that Saudi Arabia would "acquiesce to, accept, and not interfere with" American military action against Iran.