Poppy's tragic mistake.....

"Son, you're making the same mistake in Iraq that I made with your mother.

I didn't pull out in time..."

What Iraqis are blogging about...and trying to live through.

Here is a visual aid for the attacks reported in the posts:

Here is the link to make it larger if need be, take a LONG look at this map and realize it is neighborhoods fighting neighborhoods, and many people being forced out of the mixed neighborhoods to create more territory for either the Sunni or Shiite majorities that result from such actions.

This is what the Iraqi's are blogging about, not kfed not Stupid Hollywood divorces, or how bad it was that the Play station was not available, but how to fight and try to survive a civil war.

Especially not the stupid head up the ass ideas the reichwingnuts think should be further inflicted on these people. People like Rush who think we should just Nuke them all

A civil war Bush denies, but these people see as the reality on the ground.

Stay the course in any guise Bush puts out, AND HE WILL, is dooming these people to more weeks and months of the hell described below.

One question, what would you do if you had to live as described in these Web Postings from Iraqis


Iraqis Prepare for Further Sectarian Violence (Updated)


As the cycle of sectarian violence in Baghdad rages on, despite a three-day curfew, many people in the war-torn capital are bracing themselves for what they fear is the worst phase of the war to come.

The attack on Sadr City with five car bombs last Thursday will most likely be another turning point, ushering in a rising level of violence in Iraq, just the same as the shrine incident in Samarra last February.

At Baladruz, in the Diyala governorate, northeast of Baghdad, Sunni gunmen massacred 21 Shi’ite men, including a 12-year-old boy, in front of their families. Sunni and Shi’ite militiamen took to the streets and exchanged fire in Ba’quba for hours before U.S. troops intervened. An office of the Sadr movement was blown up, and in response, a Sunni mosque was set to fire.

With the curfew entering its fourth day since the Sadr City bombings last Thursday, Iraqi families were confined to their homes in fear as the exchange of mortar shells between Sunni and Shi’ite districts continued. Sunni insurgents targeted the Shi’ite districts of Sadr City, Abu Dshir, Ma’alif, Hurriya, Shu’la and Kadhimiya with mortars and Katyusha rockets in retaliation for attacks against the Sunni districts of Adhamiya, Sulaikh, Ghazaliya, Jami’a and Dora.

A few mortar shells have falled in the vicinity of our home in Baghdad. One shell tore through the roof of our relatives’ house, a few blocks away from us, into their living room, but nobody was hurt. Another hit our neighbours.

There was a two-hour broadcast from Sadr City on the state-run Iraqiya TV, in which three Sadrist MPs and angry residents vowed revenge for the car bombings that killed over 200 people last Thursday. Reports from the area indicate that militiamen are preparing for further attacks against Sunni districts as soon as the curfew is lifted. Several residents claimed on Iraqi message boards that the Mahdi Army is distributing police uniforms to its members in different Shi’ite districts throughout the capital to allow greater freedom of movement.

Nighttime clashes went on in several neighbourhoods of western Baghdad, as militiamen dressed in police uniforms attempted to enter Sunni districts. The remaining Sunni families in several mixed areas have been ordered to leave.

To grasp how dire the situation in Baghdad has become over the last few days, here is a sampling of posts on Iraqi message boards where people ask for instructions on how to defend their neighbourhoods from marauding militiamen:

Ali – Khadhraa district:
Please inform us about the areas that are expected to be targeted, so we can be prepared. Also please inform us on the necessary steps we should take to protect our families and ourselves.

Ibn Al-Iraq – Jihad district:
Salam Aleikum. I live in the Jihad district. A group from the Mahdi Army tagged Sunni residences and collected their weapons today. God is witness to what I say.

Mustafa – Ghazaliya:
We have been under mortar fire for two days. It is 10:50 p.m. now and we can hear heavy gunfire and an attack against mosques in the area. May God save us all from the injustice of aggressors.

A Mujahid for Allah – Baghdad of Al-Rashid:
In the name of Allah, the most gracious, the most merciful.
They want it a war, so be it. We are up to it, God willing.
My brothers, heed these recommendations:
1- Prepare weapons and ammunition.
2- To avoid their mortar fire, do not gather in large numbers at one place in your areas.
3- Spread out in small groups, and assign a commander to each.
4- Always take cover behind a barrier (anything that can protect you from enemy fire).
5- If there is an attack against your area, try not to waste your fire (make maximum benefit from the ammunition you have available).
6- Assign duties to your brothers.
7- Maintain communication with other groups in your area so you can respond to any breach of the area by the attackers.
8- Have courage and patience when you face them. They are cowards and will be defeated.
Remember that your brothers, the Mujahideen, will be with you in your fight against the murderous criminals. May God save us and save Iraq.

The son of Anbar – Baghdad:
Dear brothers, the Khadhraa and Jami’a districts are in need of ammunition. Please come to our aid.

Ali – Ghazaliya:
Groups from the evil Mahdi Army are preparing to enter Ghazaliya from the direction of the Centre Street and near the Muhajireen mosque, but residents are in control of most of the streets, despite assistance from the National Guard [for the Mahdi Army] and their cover for the mortar attacks from the Security Street. A woman was injured there from their damn mortars.

Abu Al-Hassan Al-Samarra’I – Baghdad:
To the Mujahideen brothers in all areas, attack them and let the initiative be yours so that you can relieve the pressure from other districts. Have no mercy for them. Be careful of their spies in your areas.

Anonymous - Jihad district:
Urgent. Please intervene to save the Jihad district from another massacre. Interior Ministry commandoes have been transporting fighters and mercenaries from the militias with their buses to their headquarters in the district. They are estimated to be around 500 mercenaries, fully armed with medium and light weapons. And now some of them are taking attack positions in preparation for a new massacre in the district. The buses have not stopped arriving, even though terrified residents have called the police and governmental officials.

Abu Mohammed – Baghdad:
I recommend to my brothers the following:
1- Trust in God, and defend your family, your possessions and your honour. Whoever is killed is a martyr for God.
2- Never surrender, because in that case they will kill us after maiming and torturing us. We should fight to the last breath.
3- Ensure surveillance for every area, especially main streets and entry points, and maintain communication to follow the movement of vehicles used by militias. Attack them wisely without wasting ammunition.
4 – Prepare ambushes for these militias on the streets they are expected to pass. Finish them off and take their weapons.
Remember that those militias are former looters, thieves and shoe shiners. Do not make such a big deal of them because, by God, they are lowly animals.

Salim Hussein – Raghiba Khatoun:
There is a large gathering of Mahdi Army militiamen at the Imam Ali bin Abi Talib husseiniya at Raghiba Khatoun, where they came from the Dilfiya area of the Qahira district. They intend to attack the residents of Adhamiya, Raghiba Khatoun and Sulaikh. Please be alert.

Ahmed Al-Janabi – Baghdad:
Salam Aleikum. I’m a resident of Yarmouk and I can hear gunfire from the Four Streets area as if in warning of an attack of sorts. God knows. Please come to our aid if the situation worsens.

Abdul Rahman Abdul Qadir – Karkh:
Salam Aleikum. Over 40 vehicles with Mahdi Army militiamen have gathered near the Dora police station. They started arriving at 7 p.m., and at 7:45 p.m. we could see about 40 vehicles preparing to attack Dora.

Abdul Rahman – Iraq:
Please keep these steps in mind:
1- Deploy snipers on the rooftops of buildings that lie close to the main entry points for each area.
2- Prepare positions for medium weapons at a distance from the entry point, and make pincers with sniper and PKC fire. When you choose a position, make sure you can retreat to alternate positions from it, in case the enemy overruns the area (do not choose a building that is not adjacent to another, or use ropes to quickly slide down the building).
3- RPG carriers should maintain their positions on side streets and take cover behind barriers. Do not fire just for the sake of it (attack the first and last vehicle).
4- Create heavy fire density to force the enemy to take cover, and then eliminate them by sniper fire.
5- Provide hand grenades and distribute them to the Mujahideen.
6- Fighters with light weapons should always change positions, fire from different angles and not stay at one place.
7- Prepare and plant roadside bombs on the entrance to every area.
8- Bomb the gathering locations for the army of filthy Muqtada.
9- Prepare a special group to deal with any breach, and it should be armed with RPGs, PKC machine guns and KIA vehicles.
10- Plan ambushes and lure the enemy by using bait vehicles that they chase to be dragged into the killing zone.

Iraqiya – Dora:
Urgent. Dora has been breached. There was an attack by the ragtag militias against residences, and we can now hear women screaming. They are raiding the Tu’ma district, which is inhabited by the Jubour tribes. There is also an attack against the Arqam mosque.

Ali – Dora:
Elements of the Interior Ministry commandos are attacking Dora (the Mechanic, Tu’ma, Sahha and Asia districts). But do not fear, for we are engaging them. Our battle cry is “They came for death, no one brought them.”

Ahmed – Jamila district:
Barbaric groups of the Antichrist [Mahdi] Army, and the Iranians that are with them, have killed dozens of Sunni youth at the Jamila district in the exact spot of the car bombing, in a mass execution orgy in front of people. This was broadcast on Sharqiya TV by an anonymous security source. The honourable Shi’ites from east of the [Army] Canal have told us that these groups are moving freely, and that they are preparing for a wide-scale assault on Sunni districts. Be prepared to confront the infidels.

Mohammed – Jami’a district:
Mahdi Army followers have been seen gathering at [MP] Sallama Al-Khafaji’s residence in Jami’a in preparation for an attack against the district.

Abdul Rahman – Iraq:
For the brothers who have not used weapons before, please take this advice:
1- Check your weapon if you have not used it before. You can ask your neighbour to teach you how to attach the magazine and to load and fire. Do not be ashamed that it would be said you don’t know how to use a weapon, as many people have not had a chance to.
2- Choose the appropriate spot on your roof that can provide you with cover and make it hard for the enemy to target you.
3- It is best if every two families gather in one house when the alarm of an attack is raised to keep spirits high.
4- When you shoot, try to make it intermittent so you do not waste your ammunition. Be patient until more fighters arrive and your neighbours start shooting too.
5- You may feel fear upon using a weapon for the first time or that something bad would happen to you, but think of your family and what awaits them if you are hesitant. Keep your honour and your children in front of your eye, and remember that they have burnt children with kerosene.
6- Make sure that you have an extra magazine because in the midst of action you may take away your weapon and forget your extra magazine. It is preferred that you tape two magazines together. Ask your neighbours how to do that. Practice with it several times.
7- Fear of using weapons will disappear with the first shot. Do not hesitate to pull the trigger and concentrate on hitting the enemy.

Omar Al-Rawi – Baghdad:
Salam Aleikum. Mosques in the Adhamiya and Khadhraa areas have started chanting “Allahu Akbar” and reciting Quran through their loudspeakers to encourage residents to confront the Safavid militias.

Ibn Al-Mansour – Mansour:
Residents of Mansour, large groups of armed militiamen have been seen heading from the Washash and Iskan districts to attack Mansour. Prepare to defend yourselves and your neighbours, Sunni and Shia, from the attack of the treacherous Mahdi Army militias.

Al-Anbari – Baghdad:
Several mortar shells have hit the Jami’a and Khadhraa districts after the evening prayers. And there is news that militias are now gathering to prepare for the attack against these districts. Additionally, there are groups of the Antichrist [Mahdi] Army in the Safarat district preparing to attack the Qudhat district.

***
Some readers have asked me about Omar and Mohammed from Iraq the Model. I've been trying to get in touch with them but without luck. I also heard that a friend of theirs was kidnapped and that they have left the area where they were staying for now.

I've been trying to convince my parents not to send my brother Nabil to school. Young men of his age are the prime target for abductions and reprisal attacks. There hasn't been much progress in getting him out of the country yet, but if you want to help me with it, please go to his blog and hit the Paypal button.

UPDATE: More pleas for assistance on the Iraqi Rabita's message boards. Note that these are all from largely Sunni and mixed districts west of Baghdad, which seem to have taken the brunt of retaliatory attacks by militias.

Ghazaliya – Baghdad:
Urgent. The residents of Ghazaliya are in urgent need for medical supplies. The situation in Ghazaliya is dreadful, and the need for first aid supplies is pressing. The nearest hospital to the district is the Al-Noor Hospital in the Shu’la district, and no Sunni who enters there returns alive. Please contact any organisation that can provide Ghazaliya’s residents with necessary supplies. Residents have opened a makeshift health centre but we are in need for supplies.

Khattab Al-Iraqi - Al-Amil district – Baghdad:
The filthy [Mahdi] army is preparing to attack the Amil district. Young men in the Dhubat area are deployed to the streets, while the antichrist [Mahdi] army is lobbing mortars against us. But the brothers are determined to achieve either victory or martyrdom.

Ghazaliya:
Many mortar shells have been falling on the Ghazaliya and Kafa’at districts non-stop. People are appealing for help. Will anyone come to our rescue? There are three blindfolded, handcuffed bodies lying on the street of the Dar Al-Hikma School, near the Mansour grove. No one can go near them and people say not even the police can come because they are allied with the rats. Only the Americans can enter.

M.H.D:
Dear brothers, Please inform us on how the Shia pray because this will save many from being killed during interrogation after they are abducted.

Norway:
Response to the brother who asked how the Shia pray. With the usual Iqama and Edhan add the phrase “I am witness that Ali is the guardian of Allah,” but not as part of the Edhan used by the Prophet. This is the opinion of the majority of Shia clerics, including the Sadrists. The Shia also regard the Basmalla a part of any Sura … I personally prefer the Fatiha instead of the Tasbihat, but the majority of Shia read Tasbihat.

Ahmed Baghdadi – Baghdad Al-Jedida:
Dear brothers, Please use this forum as our means to post information. Verify the information before you post it, and please do not waste time on other websites. Every district and neighbourhood should cooperate 24 hours. Young computer users, this is your mission. Be an early surveillance centre for your neighbourhoods and circulate the information with others. When using cell phones, keep your information coded and as simple as possible. Now is the time for us to stand together. God be with you in defending our country.

Baghdad:
We heard that there is a bus in Qadisiya, Yarmouk and Jami’a districts with the occupants abducting people according to their I.D., taking them to unknown destinations. Please inform us about the model, number plates, colour, or any other identifiable signs on the bus.

Baghdad – Sulaikh district:
Salam Aleikum. A group of crows from the Interior Ministry Commandoes attempted to enter Sulaikh but the Iraqi army force, stationed in the districts for months, repelled them. They later told us that the Interior Ministry gunmen were not from their sector but that they came from another area. They reassured residents that they would not allow any attacks on the district. The lions of Sulaikh are also ready to stand with those honourable soldiers to defend the district from the evil of the Mahdi Army and Interior Ministry crows.

Khadhraa district:
We, the residents of the Khadhraa district, are prepared to confront the army of black crows. I remind our brothers to inform us of their gathering locations so we can be prepared. The headquarters of Public Order forces is in our district, and that worries us because we cannot carry our arms on the street. But we are stationed on rooftops and prepared.

This is what a civil war looks like thru bloggers eyes, that have to prepare for it, try to live through it, and thank Bush ET AL for creating the conditions for it. Next time you hear some idiotic pundit on Cable tv telling you it is NOT a civil war or is NOT that bad, remember the words of these people who are living inside one, their words makes liars out of all those pundits safe in their high priced homes, condos and apartments safe thousands of miles away from the reality on the ground.

Americans can ask Karen Hughes a question!

Oh my God, this is good. Karen Hughes, who is America's "goodwill" Embassador to help our country's reputation in the Middle East, is taking questions from the American people! And guess what? Out of the 1,000 when I last checked, many of the questions were against her and the Bush Regime. I love it!

If you want to, you can ask ole Karen a question or you can do what I did and read through the ones that have already been asked. FREAKING HILARIOUS!!!

Have fun!

This about says it all...

The CIA is freaking hilarious!

Yeah, applying for a job at the Central Intelligence Agency should be a fun time and the application should make you laugh like hell when you're filling it out too! Honestly, I don't think the CIA should be screening their future employees to see who has a better sense of humor or who 'gets it'. I think the CIA should be concentrating on hiring individuals who are professionals, who understand the history of our own country and the history of other countries, and who know many different languages to spy on our enemies across the planet. But hey, who am I to tell the CIA to act like professionals by hiring the right people for the job and by weeding out the serious people anyways?

Oh, this is funny:

The agency's online personality test is the equivalent of a help-wanted sign, posted on the closest thing the agency has to a front door - its Web site. The frivolous quiz is designed to encourage job applications while dispelling myths about the agency, some of them born of the James Bond stereotype.

For instance, the CIA wants you to know that everyone who works there does not drive a sports car with machine guns in the tailpipes. Successful applicants will, in fact, see their family and friends again. Also, "you don't have to know karate or look good in a tuxedo to work at the CIA," the personality quiz says.

All fun aside, the hiring push began almost immediately after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and picked up steam in November 2004 when President Bush called for a 50 percent increase in the agency's ranks of operatives and analysts.

I'm just laughing out loud now! Let's hope stand up comics all over our nation spend time chuckling and filling out this online application, because it will make me sleep better knowing we have comedians protecting us rather than professionals. Even the retirees of the CIA don't see the humor in the way the current leaders of it are handling the new recruits:

Some of the CIA's traditionalists fear the agency is tarnishing its proud, exclusive roots to meet the presidential directive. They worry that the CIA quiz and its advertisements during "MythBusters" and other cable shows with cult followings are too gimmicky.

In short, they worry that the agency is sacrificing quality to get quantity. Last year alone, the agency received 135,000 applications - a number that has more than doubled since Sept. 11, 2001.

Tom McCluskey, the CIA's chief of hiring and employee development, heard the concerns firsthand at a recent gathering of the Florida chapter of the agency's retirees association.

"Some of the old-timers grumbled, 'Where's the mystique? Where is the aura of mystery around what we do?"' McCluskey said in an interview. "The good news is that we are not seeking to hire those people."

Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller weighed in on the importance of setting humor aside when hiring for the CIA:

Meanwhile, Congress is watching the agency's recruitment efforts. The incoming chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., has said one of his priorities is investigating whether the CIA has the right people in the right jobs and ensuring the CIA has enough people who are fluent in crucial foreign languages.

Just recently within the past few months, the Senate Intelligence Committee held a meeting to talk with the individuals at the CIA about their hiring practices. As I watched this, one thing jumped out at me which was a comment made by Robert Mueller. He was asked why the Agency was not hiring young people out of college who spoke Arabic and other languages and who were highly educated individuals, which would be a benefit to our Intelligence field. Mueller responded to the question by saying the CIA likes hiring individuals from Wall Street instead because of their age, experiences, and because they just trust them more. Apparently those on Wall Street see the humor in the CIA and get first priority.

Uh huh. Wall Street & comedians are the best bet for the safety of our nation according to Mueller! Please don't send the CIA anyone with the necessary tools to combat terrorism to hire...oh no!...please just send the people who have a great personality and who will make the other agents at the water cooler laugh like hell!

If you don't feel safe, you have good reason to feel that way. Under the Bush Administration scientists and other professionals have been thrown to the curb, while the humourous and uneducated of our country (and the Bush Loyalists I may add) are put in positions that affect all of us, but they don't care. Great, huh? Think I'm making too much of this and taking it wrong? I don't care! I want people protecting me who know what the hell they're doing, rather than whether or not they get the sarcasm and irony of the CIA itself!

Quotes Of The Past Reflect The Reality of Today

Many great scholars and politicians from decades to centuries ago had similar reflections on war and its realities on society. These quotes are from both Democrats and Republicans, Scholars and Philosophers.


Issac Asimov: Violence is the first refuge of the incompetent.

Herbert Hoover: Older men declare war. But its the youth who must fight and die.

Benjamin Franklin: Never has there been a good war or a bad peace.

Dwight D Eisenhower: Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed.

Gandhi: What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy.

George McGovern: I'm fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.

Plato: Only the dead have seen the end of war.

Ronald Reagan: History teaches that war begins when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap.

Gandi: As soon as we lose the moral basis, we cease to be religious. Man, for instance, cannot be untruthful, cruel or incontinent and claim to have God on his side.


If only the Bush administration had looked into the past to see what the realities would be today, maybe they wouldn't have started such a senseless, baseless war that would destroy the lives of thousands.

In reflection, maybe they did look back and maybe Bush just doesn't care!

14053...........it is NOT just numbers.

14053, is the number of civilians admitted killed in Iraq from July 1st 2006 to October 31st 2006, basically from the 4th of July till Halloween. 14053 Mothers or fathers or sisters or brothers or sons and daughters no longer exist, they died in the secular violence the illegal invasion of the neo-cons spawned. They were kidnaped and were tortured with drills. They were shot in the back of the head, after being blindfolded. They were killed by a road side bomb, or killed by a mortar attack. They were killed for where they lived, or just who they were. Or more recently they were killed along with others by the rising number of car bombings as a means to incite more violence. By the mortar attacks which haunt Baghdad now days.

14053 is a large number of people dying for any reason, it is almost 5 times the number who died on Sept 11 2001. In Iraq The Us has lost 2872 Soldiers since March 19, 2003 but in every month the Iraqi people have lost more people that the entire US losses for the war, or we lost on that fateful late summer day five years ago.

As a comparison, there are about 25 million Iraqi's and 300 million Americans, so if we were having a comparable number of violent deaths here it would be around 168,500 people killed violently by sectarian violence(in the same time period). If that were to happen, especially in a situation where two different groups of people were using extreme violence and mass killings to fight for control of the government and power here, I'm sure we would call it something akin to a civil war.

The Bush administration does NOT want to call it a civil war, OK lets call it what it really is war crimes spawned by the illegal invasion of a sovereign country by a group of people who thought they were above the law, the Geneva Convention, above being held accountable for their breaches of the code of human conduct that before this had been agreed upon by civilized nations.

Well George Bush must be happy, because there is NO Geneva Convention in effect inside Iraq. Hell there is not even the rule of law any more. People in Iraq have nowhere to turn except to the people causing these deaths, so they will continue. They will continue while the "Know Nothings" inside Washington debate the latest idea to try to turn this Fiasco around. The killings have gone on while Jim Baker polishes up his plan which is already outmoded. The deaths do not stop as the beltway pundits and pontificators argue whether more troops or less troops is the way to go.


These senseless killings are the result of their failure to listening to those who realized early on this was going to turn out bad. The mistakes of ignoring what was really happening on the ground. Placing more emphasis on purple fingers than security or electricity. Trying to stage manage the collapse of a society with no plan for rebuilding it, nor having enough qualified people who actually know how to do that. Mistakes piled upon mistakes as they have to pile body on body in the Baghdad morgue.

14053 is the number of reported deaths by the UN, the real number is probably higher still, but since the neo-cons deny this is a civil war, and refuse to count the civilian deaths, they do not really worry about the numbers or even the deaths. They are beginning to worry about their futures, because even though they do not think it is a civil war or they should be held accountable, most of the rest of the world KNOWS it is a civil war, and the neo-cons are responsible.

Quote of the day...

Clif, who is one of my contributors to my blog posted a thread below entitled, "It's Past the Tipping Point..." and it reminded me of what Winston Churchill once said:

"An appeaser is a guy who throws his friends to the alligator in hopes that the alligator will eat him last." ~ Winston Churchill

The neocon trolls in our country for the past six years or so (can even say that their brains changed in 1980 when Reagan became president at this point!) have been the cheerleading section for the most corrupt, vile, warmongering, and vicious presidency in the history of our nation. What they haven't realized all this time is that feeding these alligators will be their own demise at some point. After this year's election, they started eating each other. Awwwwwww. Idiots.

We are Americans and the leaders of our country always reflect us as a nation and this is why myself and others have been so pissed off! The last six years has been a bruise on our country's reputation and we have the APPEASERS OF THE BUSH REGIME to blame for that.

My conscience is clean and their's is not and will never be. Future historians will blame them and so will I.

It's past the tipping point.....it's real bad.

Blame Dave

by Davis Sweet

As the conventional wisdom on Iraq drifts from "there's no hope" to "there's no fucking hope in hell," it appears that the only thing keeping American troops in the line of fire is George Bush's unwillingness to accept blame for this colossal oopsie. So I have a simple solution for a witheringly simple man: blame me.

It wasn't GW who kept the vampire Rumsfeld in charge of "Defense" until after the mid-terms; it was me. Sorry. I thought he was going to come up with a brilliant plan to unscrew the mother of all fuck-ups, but I guess I was looking at the résumé rather than the man. Can't apologize enough, really.

As for the many-sided but oddly single-minded insurgency, that was me. You may have thought it was the power vacuum created by the Coalition Provisional Authority destroying the Iraqi government and army. Nuh-uh. I actually thought it would be a kind of friendly rivalry, like Bon Jovi and .38 Special, but the pyrotechnics got way out of hand. My bad.

We can let our fearful leader off the hook for every moment of jaw-dropping incompetence, every inhumanity visited on innocents, every motherless and/or fatherless kid -- Iraqi or American -- who's going to equate America with evil for the rest of their lives, and he doesn't even have to give back the bloody money he and his vice-ridden Veep have pocketed. They can just declare November whatever to be "National Dave Did It Day." I'll fess up. I'll even let one of those chickenhawk morons like Hannity or O'Reilly berate me on a live teevee interview for letting Bush take the blame for so long.

There's the deal, Blameless George. Point the finger -- at me, or, really, anybody whose scapegoatitude can make you comfy enough to pull your head out of your ass -- and BRING THE GOD-DAMNED TROOPS HOME NOW.

Thanks, and sorry. So incredibly sorry.


May be all the non neo-cons need to accept the blame for NOT working hard enough to stop this criminal enterprise, they call the Iraq War. Then the idiot can blame all of us, change course, and finally bring the troops home.

What ever it takes after this week, because I can not explain it, but things seem to be starting to get really out of control, and this is BAD, not last Feb Bad after the mosque bombing bad, but past the point of NO RETURN bad, fight till the death bad, large scale massacre bad, whole sale slaughter bad, revenge with NO MERCY BAD. This means the American Army and troops are in for one hell of a fight, to stay and possibly one just to get out.

The final exit out of Vietnam will seem like a well planned and coordinated exercise compared to what the troops could go through in the next six months.

I do not give it much longer than that. The situation is falling apart way too fast for the bureaucratic pentagon or national security establishment to respond to them and adapt. Especially when the "official line" is still it is NOT a civil war. If they have their collective heads that far up their asses this late in the game, it can NOT turn out good for the troops. Time is far past for it to turn out good for the people of Iraq.

As the days grind by and the news gets worse and worse, I see Iraq reaching the breaking point and both sides attacking with out pause, and the American Military will never have enough boots on the ground at that point.

Just as thanksgiving day and it's aftermath shows, the US and Iraqi government are slow to respond, which the insurgents and militias count on.

Basically we have two choices. Whether they are willing to admit defeat and leave, or they are going to try to stay, and if they chose that bad option, who they are gonna get to help us restabilize the country, and "occupy it for years while attempting to defuse this explosive situation.

It will have to include the Arab Sunni and Iran states in the middle east, because unlike Afghanistan, NATO troops will just be pouring gasoline on this fire. and no Russian or Chinese government want to help Bush out at this point with out being given at least part of the control of the situation on the ground.

The neo-con wet dream of a American presence in the Middle east with a democratically elected Iraqi Government inviting us to stay is OVER. They need to wake the fuck up, so we all can start getting the Iraqi people, US troops and the world out of the nightmare their dream has become in reality.

Not good news if it is true.....

From Juan Coles Blog

Another friend, a Sunni sheikh of the Shammar tribe noted to me that thousands of former officers are prepared to assault the G[reen] Z[one]. It is no longer a matter of can they do it, they are only mulling over the timing. The breach of the Green Zone security the other day was a test of their ability to get in, and not a real attempt at a coup, though it is reported as such. Every Iraqi I talk to says unambiguously that the resistance attached to the former regime would take out the Shiite militias with barely a fight, but that the resistance will not commit wholesale revenge against the Shiite population. They just want to get rid of the "carpet baggers" from Iran. '

What would be the result of a brazen attack on the green zone even if it failed in the end?

The United States military would have to question the safety of those who work for the US and Iraqi governments from there. They also would have to review what protections they have, and what they need. It could turn out to be the Iraqi version of Tet, especially if the Sunni Baathists had any success at all. Because they would prove that not only can they set up car bombs in Sadr City, or attack Shiite dominated Ministries like the Ministry of Health, but the very symbol of American power and influence in the country, the Green Zone.

Such an attack three and a half years after the Iraqi Baathists were supposedly crushed by the American Army would embolden the Sunni insurgency. It would also raise more doubts here at home about this war. If we had been so successful in the invasion, and we had what we need in that country to achieve some sort of victory, how could the Baathists even dare to attempt such a daring attack, let alone carry it out.

There are questions what this would do inside the country.

How would the American military react, especially how would they reposition troops to either attempt to stop such an attack like this, (they must know it is being planned, if it is on the net.)

What will al Sadr and the Shiites do, if they see the Sunni’s attacking the Green zone, stand by and allow the US and Sunni forces to fight it out, or come to either sides aid. More interestingly could they use such an attack as a welcome diversion. They could react by attacking in other areas knowing the vast US response will be in defense of the green zone, and not their timely attacks on Sunni forces they want to defeat in Baghdad and elsewhere.

The situation inside Iraq is fragile at best, and after this weeks attacks in sadr City, and on the ministry of Health, the Sunni’s are making a statement they are a force to be reckoned with, but are they willing to step it up a notch, and attack directly into the center of the American power presence in Baghdad?

The turkey spills the beans...

The Bush Thanksgiving

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and it's my favorite holiday of the whole year. I love nothing more than being with my son, eating tons of food, and taking the time to regroup ourselves on what it is that we are thankful for. Of course, most years my son is thankful for his Play Station, his electric guitar, and his dog, but he does manage to throw in that he loves his mother, which is huge because he's twelve and he's at that hormonal stage in his life where any woman or girl is not something he likes to show affection to. Anyways, every year I am thankful for my son and our health, but this year, I can throw in that I am thankful for Americans coming out of their mental slumber to vote the most vicious vile piece of crap neocons in our government out! Yes, it's going to be a great Thanksgiving and I bought spiced apple martini mix to celebrate our good fortune!

So, what do you think the Bush family is thankful for each year? I just picture these assholes sitting around a table not even talking about it, but rather, conspiring about their next global finanction transaction in the form of war and laughing over the thought of thousands of people being put in peril, or worse...put to death because of their greed! I mean really, what possibly could this family be thankful for except their power over our government for their own financial gain? I would love to be a fly on the wall or even part of the staff to listen to what they say this time of year.

Don't even get me started on Babs. She spawned these lying, stinking, warmongering, thieves and for that, she should be grateful her husband has Secret Service protection because the angry mobs would pull her apart like a golden turkey!!!

I have a lot to be thankful for this year and the biggest one being Americans making a huge statement to the Pigs in control of our country right now that we've had enough of them. I am thankful to be alive during the most incredible moment in our country's history. Come January, I will be making my resolutions and I'm sure somewhere tucked in that long list that I usually don't look at after I write it will be: I WILL CONTINUE TO TEAR OFF THE ARMS AND LEGS OF THE MOST VILE FAMILY & PRESIDENCY IN THE HISTORY OF OUR NATION. I WILL NOT QUIT THIS.

See? It's going to be a great Thanksgiving this year...and next year...will be more fun than the last!

Iraq Study Group Advises Bush Be Confined To Naughty Chair

WASHINGTON (IWR News Satire) - The bipartisan Iraq Study Group made a unanimous recommendation today that the President Bush should be confined to the naughty chair until the end of his term in 2009.

"It doesn't matter if we go long, short, home or if we end up slicing and dicing the whole goddamn country with a Vegomatic.

The first thing we have to do to stabilize Iraq is make sure dumb shit doesn't start anymore friggin' wars or piss any more Muslims off, and the best way to do that is to confine the moron to his naughty chair in the Oval Office," said Jim Baker to reporters.

Just another repug failure....

From TPM

Pretty amazing stuff. And it seems like it's being treated with a near total media blackout. Stung by the voters' rebuke, the out-going Republican Congress has decided to close its doors without doing it's mandated job, finishing the budget bills for next year. By all rights they should send back their paychecks too.

From the AP ...

Republicans vacating the Capitol are dumping a big spring cleaning job on Democrats moving in. GOP leaders have opted to leave behind almost a half-trillion-dollar clutter of unfinished spending bills.

There's also no guarantee that Republicans will pass a multibillion-dollar measure to prevent a cut in fees to doctors treating Medicare patients.

The bulging workload that a Republican-led Congress was supposed to complete this year but is instead punting to 2007 promises to consume time and energy that Democrats had hoped to devote to their own agenda upon taking control of Congress in January for the first time in a dozen years.

We're their employers. Shouldn't there be some sort of garnishment?

Let me know if you see mentions of this elsewhere in the news media or on the shows.
-- Josh Marshall

**********************************************

These bills were supposed to be done before Oct 1 2006, but the anti gay legislation and anti first amendment "flag burning" amendment is MORE important than the repug assclowns doing their REAL jobs, which the constitution tells them to do.

They should have to return their salaries this year....especially the leadership of the house, and repug chairmen of the committees who have failed to perform their constitutionally prescribed duties.

They should NOT be allowed to collect the money if they are not going to do the work.

I guess overpaying them does NOT produce the best congress ...eh tiny?

Give their salaries to the troops whose families are living on food stamps.

Give the money to the "food deprived" children of this country.

But do NOT pay these cretins who have the hubris to utterly fail in their jobs, no over site, no appropriations bills to fund the budget, and this is especially significant because this was the process they tried to shut down the federal government in 1995, which backfired on them, so this time they just refuse to do their jobs.

Thus.....we should refuse to pay them.

The reichwingnut view of Nov 7th 2006

From the screeching and gnashing of teeth, along with the daily wailing of doom from the bloviated blabbering talking heads of the reichwing, this image is their considered view of this past election.

Too bad these repugs were not being evacuated to serve in Iraq until they want those soldiers to come home.

Then at least they really would have something real to complain about.

For those who do not have the historical perspective to understand this image, The analogy of Vietnam April 1975 is the starting point, but the real analogy is the criminal behavior of those who were in charge the 6 years before then. We have a very similar situation in Iraq today. The criminal behavior of those who lead this country into another illegal war, and their refusal to admit their strategy failed .

That failed strategy has killed up to 750,000 people and destroyed a country, incited a war between the two major sects of Islam on the ground and possibly started a civil war which threatens to engulf the entire region. But unlike the Vietnam war which each administration kept upping the effort to use US military to fight a war against the expressed wishes of the majority of the Citizens of Vietnam, this Administration had a real plan to topple the government and set up their puppet government to achieve their no-con dream of restoring a puppet government that danced to the neo-con tune. That has failed in Baghdad as it failed in Saigon years ago and thus we are here where the same people are decrying the desire to withdrawal from this failed policy and strategy, just as they fought withdrawal from Vietnam until the bitter end.

As in Vietnam John Kerry's tragic horrible question begins to haunt us once again, "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?"

This is the question that the politicians do not want to ask, but that looms heavy over their actions, and will haunt those who incited this illegal war, and ignored the looming disaster it has become to try to save their grasp on power. It is fitting they decry this election which is a repudiation of their lies, failed policy and strategy. And a renunciation of their political agenda which used the politics of fear and military aggression to formulate a meme which they sold as the face of their criminal actions

They should feel like they need to be evacuated from our nations capital. They should feel scared they will be tried for crimes against the world, this nation, its people and it’s future. They should feel the fear that those illegally held in abu Ghraib and Gitmo felt. They should have to worry about their futures just as every Iraqi has to worry about theirs. They should be held criminally responsible for this crime against humanity, just as others before them have.

The Devil's Grip

There is a medical terminology for a patient that unexpectedly collapses and is out for days, and then bedridden for many more. That term is known as simply "The Devil's Grip".

This medical condition is seldom talked about, and seldom diagnosed, but can leave a person totally incapacitated.

There is also a term known as "The Devil's Grip" that pertains to politics and how decisions can grip millions around the country.

America is in "The Devil's Grip" as we watch the Bush administration keep a nation paralyzed over a war that has caused death and destruction to both the Iraqi's and also U.S soldiers and their families.

The Republicans lost control of both the House and Senate in early November, mainly due to the publics outrage over the war.

Bush claims he is open to ideas on Iraq, but his spokesman Tony Snow and his "father in residence" Dick Cheney say they won't leave Iraq, and they won't be swayed by any elections.

In November alone, 1370 Iraqi's have been killed as the civil war grows more violent. October saw 1216 Iraqi deaths. These figures don't include the deaths of U.S soldiers.

The public spoke on November 7th and their voices of outrage cost Bush his comrades, in the congress.

Bush says he will not leave Iraq without victory. He can't seem to explain what that really means.

Bush is also making plans to invade Iran, for their oil and Haliburton's rebuilding schemes. Bush doesn't take into account that his first war against a country with no army, can't be won.

The American people want out of Iraq. They want the U.S soldiers to be safe and at home with their families.

Bush refuses to heed the calls and election results of the American people. America is in the clutches of "The Devil's Grip".

That devil is George W. Bush.

Still feels good...

Republican state Senator in Montana switching parties because he's had enough

This is being done by a state senator in Montana, but who cares if it's only state level anyways! After the last 6 years, many republicans have realized that their party no longer stands for anything good. Nothing would please me more than to see more republicans in government to be doing this:

Party Switch Gives Democrats Edge in Montana
By JENNIFER BYRD, AP

HELENA, Mont. (Nov. 18) - A Montana state senator has officially changed his party affiliation from Republican to Democrat, breaking a tie to give his new party a 26-24 advantage.

State Sen. Sam Kitzenberg filed the paperwork at the secretary of state's office on Friday.

He said he had been thinking about switching parties for about 12 years and made the decision at the suggestion of Democratic state Sen. Mike Cooney, who contacted him after the Nov. 7 election put both parties on an even footing.

"He called and said 'Guess what? It's tied. I know you've mentioned changing parties in the past, and now is the time,"' Kitzenberg said.

Democrats have a 50-49 edge in the Montana House. One Democrat, Sheila Hogan, lost by just 24 votes and party officials said this past week that she will ask for a recount; if she were to win, the Democrats' lead would change to 51-48.

Kitzenberg dismissed Republican critics who suggested the change was "political payoff" for a state Revenue Department job he got from the administration of Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer.

"The job I have now had nothing to do with this decision," Kitzenberg said. "I sat down and tried to figure out what was really important to me. It just came down to me realizing who my real friends were and where my heart was."

11/18/06 11:03 EST

Just because I like the image.......of Georgie in time out!!!!!!!

Of course, it would be in Dallas.

Read THIS and then convince me racism is dead in this country....really find a way to convince me that in 2006, this group of White Sheeters in disguise are not doing exactly what the Jim Crow laws did. That they do not think exactly the same way Trent Lott expressed in the comment that cost HIM his majority position.

Oh and BTW tell the kids in this school why they had to attend separate but supposedly equal classes, and idea tossed aside in 1954 by the Supreme court.

Ruling: Classes divided by race

At Preston Hollow, principal tried to appease affluent parents, halt white flight, judge says



For years, it was an open secret at North Dallas' Preston Hollow Elementary School: Even though the school was overwhelmingly Hispanic and black, white parents could get their children into all-white classes. And once placed, the students would have little interaction with the rest of the students.

The result, a federal judge has ruled, was that principal Teresa Parker "was, in effect, operating, at taxpayer's expense, a private school for Anglo children within a public school that was predominantly minority."

Judge Sam Lindsay's opinion paints an unflattering picture of the elementary school and a principal who was so desperate to appease the school's affluent white parents that she turned back the clock on school desegregation 50 years.

In April, Hispanic parents sued, claiming illegal segregation. The three-week trial concluded in late August. On Thursday, Judge Lindsay declared that the school's principal violated the rights of minority children by assigning them to classrooms based on race.

The judge ordered Mrs. Parker to pay $20,200 to Lucrecia Mayorga Santamaría, the lone named plaintiff, who sued on behalf of her three children.

Although the judge did not find the Dallas school district liable for Mrs. Parker's actions, he strongly criticized DISD administrators for being "asleep at the wheel."

"The court is convinced that several of the area superintendents knew, or should have known, about the illegal segregation at Preston Hollow," the judge wrote in his 108-page ruling.
Also Online

WFAA-TV's Jeff Brady reports

En español

Read Judge Sam Lindsay's opinion

The district has until Jan. 17 to remedy the segregation at the school. Mrs. Parker did not return messages left at her home and school Friday.

District spokesman Celso Martinez said Mrs. Parker would remain the school's principal "until further notice."

Mr. Martinez said the school has undertaken steps to comply with the court order, namely relying on student language scores to place students.

"The truth is we have initiated quite a few changes at the school already," he said. "We need to compare those changes with the court order. We may well be in total compliance."

However, when asked if there are still classes at Preston Hollow containing only white students, Mr. Martinez replied: "That's a good question. I don't know the answer to that."
Desegregation plan

In 2003, a federal judge released the district from its court-ordered desegregation plan. That plan, however, focused on the allocation of resources and treatment of black students. In the 30 years the district operated under the order, whites fled and Hispanics have grown to become the majority. Blacks make up less than a third of the district; whites about 6 percent.

Preston Hollow's unwritten policy of clustering whites together was known for years among parents and teachers, according to testimony. In fact, Mrs. Parker's subordinates – including teachers and her assistant principal – raised concerns about it multiple times. One even wrote a letter to Superintendent Michael Hinojosa about it. Those complaints fell on deaf ears, the judge wrote.

"I began to see something very strange," Ms. Santamaría said in Spanish. "The difference was that the Anglo students would go to lunch together while the Latinos went with the Asians and the African-Americans." That, she said, raised a question in her mind "because the children don't know what segregation is."

Once the Hispanic families sued, Mrs. Parker tried to cover her tracks, according to testimony. For example, on the day an investigator was to observe classes at the school, Mrs. Parker "reshuffled" the student's classroom assignments, according to assistant principal Robert McElroy.

Mrs. Parker also asked members of her staff to sign confidentiality agreements about how students were assigned to their classes, and paperwork detailing the classroom assignments was destroyed under mysterious circumstances, according to the judge's ruling.
Principal uncooperative

The judge also took exception to Mrs. Parker's apparent unwillingness to cooperate with the court. At one point during the trial, the judge noted, Mrs. Parker testified that she didn't know whether Preston Hollow is a predominantly white neighborhood.

"The court finds it astounding that Principal Parker, who has served at Preston Hollow for five years, would testify that she knows nothing about the ethnic makeup of the immediate neighborhood surrounding her school."

The school's attendance zone is mostly north of Northwest Highway, east of Preston Road, south of Royal Lane, and just east of North Central Expressway. It includes affluent, mostly white single-family homes, as well as middle-class homes and apartments that are predominantly minority.

The judge also had sharp words for the district's attorneys, who argued that segregation would cause no harm to the minority students because their teachers used the same curriculum as those teaching white students.

"The court is baffled that in this day and age, that [DISD relied] on what is, essentially, a 'separate but equal' argument," the judge wrote.

Mr. Martinez, the district spokesman, said the district doesn't believe Mrs. Parker was segregating students, but he acknowledged that classrooms at the school need to be better integrated.

"It's our opinion that we were not segregating students at all," Mr. Martinez said. "In fact the judge found that we were not violating the constitutional rights of anybody. Do we need to integrate the classrooms? Yes, and we're doing precisely that."

Although the judge ruled against the school's principal in her personal capacity, he did not find the district, its trustees or Mrs. Parker liable in their "official capacities."

David Hinojosa, the parents' attorney from the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, said he apparently didn't convince the judge that the district knew the segregation was happening.

"You just have a certain legal standard you have to meet, and unfortunately, the court didn't find that," he said. "We might appeal the issue if need be ... but we got the ultimate relief we wanted. The parents wanted to stop the segregation that was going on there."
PTA chief criticized

Judge Lindsay also criticized Meg Bittner, the school's PTA president, who wanted to lure more affluent white families out of private schools and back to Preston Hollow.

More white families would result in a healthier PTA, she testified, bigger fundraisers and, ultimately, more money for the school. The best way to lure back white families, teachers and others testified, was to put white children together in the same classrooms.

Teacher Janet Leon told the court that "neighborhood classes" were predominantly made up of white students because "the people who live in the Preston Hollow neighborhood, who are the majority being white, would want their children grouped together."

To aid in the recruitment of more affluent whites, the school's PTA created a brochure for parents that featured almost all white students. Hispanic parents had shown up at the school the day photos were being taken for the brochure, but the principal blocked their entry into the classroom where the photos were being taken, the judge's ruling states.

Additionally, the PTA, in conjunction with the school, held separate open houses and kindergarten recruitments for white parents. And when PTA members gave prospective parents tours of the school, they were never taken down the "Hispanic halls" where the minority classes were housed, teachers testified.

Mrs. Bittner and other PTA officers did not respond to phone messages seeking comment.

An open secret. which MEANS many people KNEW she was breaking the law, and DID nothing.

Yes this country can be very great, but it fails so much of the time, because of people like this school principle.

Unwanted calls...a way out.

A Quick Reminder

Eleven days from today, all cell phone numbers are being released to telemarketing companies and you will start to receive telemarketing calls.

.....YOU WILL BE CHARGED FOR THESE CALLS

To prevent this, call the following number from your cell phone: 888-382-1222.
It is the National DO NOT CALL list. It will only take a minute of your time.
It blocks your number for five (5) years.

You can also register on-line at DoNotCall.gov

You must call from the cell phone number you are wanting to have blocked.
You cannot call from a different phone number.

HELP OTHERS BY PASSING THIS ON TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS

Thanks to Carl at Simply Left Behind for this reminder.

New Levels of Hubris

This Administration has achieved a new level of hubris. They have the gall to go to a hungry child and tell them they are NOT hungry, just food deprived. That is right, there is NO more hunger in the United States, just a lack of food. Well some might question why this is important, just ask the hungry child if they understand they are food deprived and not really hungry. Get back to me when the child says they are NO longer hungry.

It is one thing when these cretins play word games with grown ups, but to play this kind of unconscionable word game strikes of stooping into OJ territory. There is probably some correlation here, after all both OJ and these assclowns put themselves FIRST at the peril of everyone else including the children. OJ, his children, these cretins, all the rest. First in running a credit card system of funding the federal government which the children will have to figure out some way to pay for when they become adults. But even worse changing the wording they use to describe the child's empty stomach.

Only in an alternate reality could they think changing the words they use do anything to improve the situation. Yes they might not to have to hear about hungry children anymore, so in that meaning it releases their consciouses from having to realize the hungry child is a result of the policies they fought for and support. In the real world, they have not improved the child's situation, but then again they were NEVER about that were they?

One question, did Jesus call them food deprived children, or did Jesus understand their hunger pangs...and call a Pharisee a hypocrite. These people make the pharisee of Jesus's days seem mild by comparison, at least Herod could accept he created the conditions of the Hungry child. These empty hollow people can not even admit that much. They have NO plan to feed the children, just change the way they describe it. So they can dishonestly say we have NO more hungry children, just some families that are food deprived. I hope they choke on their next meal and get to explain it all to Jesus real soon.

Another random thought...

Has anyone in the Bush Regime realised that most of the Middle East is run by religious leaders and that the separation of church & state is something that they do not want....and trying to force a democracy on them is not going to work??!???!! I bet they haven't. Hell, they probably don't even care. As long as they can keep touting that we are going to "win!" that's all they need to stay there forever while they use this fake war in Iraq to steal money for us and then launder it to their corporate whore friends.

One way to look at it.

This is one way to look at what is happening since the election, but this view must be tempered with the knowledge that Bush 41, Baker and Gates would have celebrated if George W. Bush's illegal invasion of Iraq had succeeded, they are just trying to cut THEIR losses and resurrect their mid east policy of supporting the "moderate" dictators and keeping the oil flowing.

And they all agree it is the US who should decide in the end, NOT the Iraqi's or people who live there.

Georgie did not listen to what had worked because he was gonna out do the old man so daddy sends in his "friends" to save poor poor W all over again, but the saving of W is also saving daddy's friends and their generations of investments in the region. After all is said and done that is what they are after NOW.

Robert Gates originally helped Osama bin Laden

From DailyKos:

Robert Gates Promoted and Financed Osama Bin Laden
by LondonYank

Thu Nov 09, 2006 at 12:45:40 AM PST

Robert Gates made Osama Bin Laden what he is today. This is not exaggeration. By funding Osama Bin Laden's operations, training camps, weaponry and political influence from 1979 (even before Russia invaded Afghanistan), Robert Gates personally gave us our principal enemy in the "War on Terror".

More frighteningly, all of Robert Gates' support to Osama Bin Laden ran through Pakistan's ISI. ISI has been linked to training and funding the 9/11 bombers, the London bombers, the Madrid bombers, the Bali bombers and the Delhi bombers but is strangely immune from official Washington scrutiny.

I really wonder which side Robert Gates thinks he's on. With a 30 year history of pomoting and financing state and non-state terrorism, I doubt it is the side of the peace and prosperity of the American people and bringing our troops home safe.

I've said for many years that Bush Sr. has always been connected to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida and I've always believed that al-Qaida is a Bush family death squad used to catapult their global domination agenda and to use them to control the world's markets for their own profit and gain. I've never believed the Bush family story that Osama bin Laden was the blacksheep of the family. They just want us to believe that to remove any connection they have (and Osama's family has) to him.

Remember when Clinton became president the first time in 1992 and about 30 days later 'al-Qaida' tried to blow up the World Trade Centers? Well, I believe Bush Sr. was pissed off and outraged that he lost that race, so he had his death squad come in to try to make Clinton's administration look bad. It backfired, of course, because Clinton had the 5 guys involved arrested and jailed where they remain today. Bush Sr. never once during his presidency mentioned 'Osama bin Laden' to our nation but he knew full well who he was (the families have been friends for at least 30 years) and what group he was the head of! I spit on him.

September 11, 2001 was the same thing. The 19 hijackers were allowed to live in our country for years and go undetected (though one observant woman at one of the flight schools called and alerted the FBI that one of the hijackers was taking lessons...but the FBI ignored the call and did nothing). Someone was financing them and I think Osama may have but the money to house them wasn't always electronically transfered to our country. I believe, to escape detection by authorities, it was brought over here via boat or private planes and given to the Bush family friends to be given to the hijackers under the table.

So, it's not surprising to me that Robert Gates, who was recently brought in by Bush Sr. to help his son out, has been nominated to replace Donald Rumsfeld and is back again. The Bush family has their friends who would do anything for them. They're loyal to the Bushies and because of that loyalty many get jobs in high places and guys like Osama get to continue to roam the planet (if he didn't die years ago and his image is just being used by Bush Sr.'s CIA to brainwash the masses) free from prison after killing 3000 Americans on September 11th!!

It's so insane.

A random thought...

It's so interesting to me that Bush's daddy would come in last week and push Robert Gates onto him to nominate as the next Secretary of Defense to replace Donald Rumsfeld. Yes, it's a known fact that Robert Gates was connected to the Iran Contra scandal of the 1980's and that alone should be reason for the democrats to not vote for this guy when it comes up, but I think there's a more important factor in all of this and it occured to me that it's probably why Bush's daddy chose him.

They want the democrats to fail over the next two years.

I believe the reason why Gates was catapulted to the front of the line is because this man, on behalf of the Bush family (whose reputation in our country is lower than a dried up squished frog on the side of the road), will do WORSE than what Rummy did during his time overseeing the Iraq war and in the next two years (especially if the democrats decide to vote the guy in!!!!!) we will see a republican party saying, "See? They wanted change in the leadership of the Pentagon and what did we get? The same thing! We're in worse shape than when Rumsfeld was in there!".

I think this is the plan by these Pigs who could care less about the welfare of our troops and their families as long as their reputations are saved! They will continue this war no matter what the democrats or anyone in this country has to say about it. This fake war has been profitable to them and there is no way in hell that anyone is going to stop their corporate welfare checks.

Spit. I hate them all.

If the democrats do vote Gates in and the above starts unfolding, you can bet your sweet bippy that I will screaming from the rooftops about it.

Automakers Wasting Their Time

The leaders from the big 3 automakers will meet with George W Bush today to discuss the effecs of global competition,healthcare, trade and energy.

Bush has already stated that he will not give relief to the automakers who are struggling to stay out of bankruptcy.

Bush is the one who flung open the doors of foreign competition by agreeing to massive trade give aways to many countries, including those from Central America and especially China.

Bush won't help Americans or American business with healthcare, as he thinks people should find their own money to buy healthcare.

Bush won't do anything about energy costs as he and Cheney are knee deep in oil money.

George W Bush and the Republican party are the best friends foreign corporations have ever known. Bush has eased tariffs on foreign products to the extent they flood U.S shores virtually cost free.

Bush has kept tariffs on U.S products high so foreign companies like China can overrun the playing field.

Bush refused to help,when Delphi filed bankruptcy on its U.S operations and closed many factories, putting thousands out of work. This was allowed to happen even though Delphi is the largest American employer in China.

Bush refuses to help General Motors and Ford who are stradling the bankruptcy fence.

U.S automakers are wasting their time in trying to discuss helping U.S manufacturers. They would be better served working with the Democratic controlled House and Senate to force fair trade and healthcare on Bush to help American families.

One less Kook loose on the streets.

Terrorist Who Mailed White Powder to Olbermann Arrested

Good news. The crazie who has allegedly mailed the fake anthrax powder to Keith Olbermann has been arrested in California. And, he is is also a suspect in other incidents involving liberal celebrities and politicans:

A California man suspected of mailing threatening letters containing a suspicious white powder to celebrities and U.S. politicians has been arrested and could face federal charges on Monday, the FBI said.

Investigators identified Chad Castagana, 39, of Woodland Hills, California, as the person suspected of sending more than a dozen threatening letters to media outlets and the homes of public figures in various cities, the FBI said in a statement on Sunday evening.

According to a federal search warrant, among those who received threatening letters were Jon Stewart of Comedy Central's "The Daily Show;" talk show host David Letterman; Keith Olbermann of MSNBC; Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California, who is set to become Speaker of the House of Representatives, and Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, both Democrats.

Just for the record, I don't recall any fake anthrax letters being sent to Republican celebrities and pols, do you? Assuming Mr. Castagana is guilty, it seems clear he had it in for liberal politicans and other people identified with anti-Republican sentiments. I wonder who gave him the idea that mailing threatening letters filled with white powder was a legitimate means of expressing his opinion about their political views. What do you think: this person or this one? Or someone else?

Well, at least one of these eliminationist nutjobs is off the streets.

Update [2006-11-13 11:34:54 by Steven D]: Apparently Chad Castagana, the accused terrorist, frequented Free Republic and other conservative websites.


And to think, They did it all with out invading California, Bombing San Francisco, or putting "Arnold" on trial....

I guess law enforcement does work against TERRORISTS like HIM.

The Real 'Mission Accomplished'

All I could add to this is,

AMEN

Mission Statement.

My actions should be self-explanatory, and since in our self-obsessed culture words seldom match the deed, writing a mission statement would seem questionable. So judge me by my actions. Maybe some will be scared enough to wake from their walking dream state - am I therefore a martyr or terrorist? I would prefer to be thought of as a 'spiritual warrior'. Our so-called leaders are the real terrorists in the world today, responsible for more deaths than Osama bin Laden.

I have had a wonderful life, both full and full of wonder. I have experienced love and the joy and heartache of raising a child. I have jumped out of an airplane, and escaped a burning building. I have spent the night in jail, and dropped acid during the sixties. I have been privileged to have met many supremely talented musicians and writers, most of whom were extremely generous and gracious. Even during the hard times, I felt charmed. Even the difficult lessons have been like blessed gifts. When I hear about our young men and women who are sent off to war in the name of God and Country, and who give up their lives for no rational cause at all, my heart is crushed. What has happened to my country? we have become worse than the imagined enemy - killing civilians and calling it 'collateral damage', torturing and trampling human rights inside and outside our own borders, violating our own Constitution whenever it seems convenient, lying and stealing right and left, more concerned with sports on television and ring-tones on cell-phones than the future of the world.... half the population is taking medication because they cannot face the daily stress of living in the richest nation in the world.

I too love God and Country, and feel called upon to serve. I can only hope my sacrifice is worth more than those brave lives thrown away when we attacked an Arab nation under the deception of 'Weapons of Mass Destruction'. Our interference completely destroyed that country, and destabilized the entire region. Everyone who pays taxes has blood on their hands.

I have had one previous opportunity to serve my country in a meaningful way - at 8:05 one morning in 2002 I passed Donald Rumsfeld on Delaware Avenue and I was acutely aware that slashing his throat would spare the lives of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocent people. I had a knife clenched in my hand, and there were no bodyguards visible; to my deep shame I hesitated, and the moment was past.

The violent turmoil initiated by the United States military invasion of Iraq will beget future centuries of slaughter, if the human race lasts that long. First we spit on the United Nations, then we expect them to clean up our mess. Our elected representatives are supposed to find diplomatic and benevolent solutions to these situations. Anyone can lash out and retaliate, that is not leadership or vision. Where is the wisdom and honor of the people we delegate our trust to?

To the rest of the world we are cowards - demanding Iraq to disarm, and after they comply, we attack with remote-control high-tech video-game weapons. And then lie about our reasons for invading. We the people bear complete responsibility for all that will follow, and it won't be pretty.

It is strange that most if not all of this destruction is instigated by people who claim to believe in God, or Allah. Many sane people turn away from religion, faced with the insanity of the 'true believers'. There is a lot of confusion: many people think that God is like Santa Claus, rewarding good little girls with presents and punishing bad little boys with lumps of coal; actually God functions more like the Easter Bunny, hiding surprises in plain sight. God does not choose the Lottery numbers, God does not make the weather, God does not endorse military actions by the self-righteous, God does not sit on a cloud listening to your prayers for prosperity. God does not smite anybody. If God watches the sparrow fall, you notice that it continues to drop, even to its death. Face the truth folks, God doesn't care, that's not what God is or does. If the human race drives itself to extinction, God will be there for another couple million years, 'watching' as a new species rises and falls to replace us. It is time to let go of primitive and magical beliefs, and enter the age of personal responsibility. Not telling others what is right for them, but making our own choices, and accepting consequences.

"Who would Jesus bomb?" This question is primarily addressing a Christian audience, but the same issues face the Muslims and the Jews: God's message is tolerance and love, not self-righteousness and hatred. Please consider "Thou shalt not kill" and "As ye sow, so shall ye reap". Not a lot of ambiguity there.

What is God? God is the force of life - the spark of creation. We each carry it within us, we share it with each other. Whether we are conscious of the life-force is a choice we make, every minute of every day. If you choose to ignore it, nothing will happen - you are just 'less conscious'. Maybe you are less happy (maybe not). Maybe you grow able to tap into the universal force, and increase the creativity in the universe. Love is anti-entropy. Please notice that 'conscious' and 'conscience' are related concepts.

Why God - what is the value? Whether committee consensus of a benevolent power that works through humans, or giant fungus under Oregon, the value of opening up to the concept of God is in coming to the realization that we are not alone, establishing a connection to the universe, the experience of finding completion. As individuals we may exist alone, but we are all alone together as a people. Faith is the answer to fear. Fear opposes love. To manipulate through fear is a betrayal of trust.

What does God want? No big mystery - simply that we try to help each other. We decide to make God-like decisions, rescuing falling sparrows, or putting the poor things out of their misery. Tolerance, giving, acceptance, forgiveness.

If this sounds a lot like pop psychology, that is my exact goal. Never underestimate the value of a pep-talk and a pat on the ass. That is basically all we give to our brave soldiers heading over to Iraq, and more than they receive when they return. I want to state these ideas in their simplest form, reducing all complexity, because each of us has to find our own answers anyway. Start from here...

I am amazed how many people think they know me, even people who I have never talked with. Many people will think that I should not be able to choose the time and manner of my own death. My position is that I only get one death, I want it to be a good one. Wouldn't it be better to stand for something or make a statement, rather than a fiery collision with some drunk driver? Are not smokers choosing death by lung cancer? Where is the dignity there? Are not the people the people who disregard the environment killing themselves and future generations? Here is the statement I want to make: if I am required to pay for your barbaric war, I choose not to live in your world. I refuse to finance the mass murder of innocent civilians, who did nothing to threaten our country. I will not participate in your charade - my conscience will not allow me to be a part of your crusade. There might be some who say "it's a coward's way out" - that opinion is so idiotic that it requires no response. From my point of view, I am opening a new door.

What is one more life thrown away in this sad and useless national tragedy? If one death can atone for anything, in any small way, to say to the world: I apologize for what we have done to you, I am ashamed for the mayhem and turmoil caused by my country. I was alive when John F. Kennedy instilled hope into a generation, and I was a sorry witness to the final crushing of hope by Dick Cheney's puppet, himself a pawn of the real rulers, the financial plunderers and looters who profit from every calamity; following the template of Reagan's idiocracy.

The upcoming elections are not a solution - our two party system is a failure of democracy. Our government has lost its way since our founders tried to build a structure which allowed people to practice their own beliefs, as far as it did not negatively affect others. In this regard, the separation of church and state needs to be reviewed. This is a large part of the way that the world has gone wrong, the endless defining and dividing of things, micro-sub-categorization, sectarianism. The direction we need is a process of unification, integrating all people into a world body, respecting each individual. Business and industry have more power than ever before, and individuals have less. Clearly, the function of government is to protect the individual, from hardship and disease, from zealots, from the exploitation, from monopoly, even from itself. Our leaders are not wise persons with integrity and vision - they are actors reading from teleprompters, whose highest goal is to stir up the mob. Our country slaughters Arabs, abandons New Orleaneans, and ignores the dieing environment. Our economy is a house of cards, as hollow and fragile as our reputation around the world. We as a nation face the abyss of our own design.

A coalition system which includes a Green Party would be an obvious better approach than our winner-take-all system. Direct electronic debate and balloting would be an improvement over our non-representative congress. Consider that the French people actually have a voice, because they are willing to riot when the government doesn't listen to them.

"Any people anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up, and shake off the existing government... " - Abraham Lincoln

With regard to those few who crossed my path carrying the extreme and unnecessary weight of animosity: they seemed by their efforts to be punishing themselves. As they acted out the misery of their lives it is now difficult to feel anything other than pity for them.

Without fear I go now to God - your future is what you will choose today.

The man who wrote these words, Malachi Ritscher.

He was writing a mission statement for HIS suicide as a protest against the War in Iraq.

HERE is the report of that suicide......

Here is the obituary Malachi Ritscher wrote about himself.

He will never be considered a causality of this war by many, but it killed his soul, he just stopped his body from living in protest.

Bush's Gift To The Trolls

George W Bush likes his Republican counterparts and their avid support of all his policies that he has created something special for each one.

It is the Republicans, who send their trolls out each day to attack blogs of progressive thinking individuals, in hopes of bringing confusion and disruption.

It is the Republicans who avidly support each policy of Bush, no matter how damaging to the rights of Americans he is supposed to represent.

Bush created the "Homeland Security Act" and it is because of this act that Bush and his allies can spy on innocent Americans.

So Trolls, this website www.license.shorturl.com is Bush's present to you.

Type in your name and state, Trolls and see what Bush has done for you.

Maureen Dowd summed up Tuesday's election beautifully

Drapes of Wrath

by Maureen Dowd

November 11, 2006

The new Democratic sweep conjures up an ancient image: Furies swooping down to punish bullies.

Angry winged goddesses with dog heads, serpent hair and blood eyes, unmoved by tears, prayer, sacrifice or nasty campaign ads, avenging offenses by insolent transgressors.

This will be known as the year macho politics failed — mainly because it was macho politics by marshmallow men. Voters were sick of phony swaggering, blustering and bellicosity, absent competency and accountability. They were ready to trade in the deadbeat Daddy party for the sheltering Mommy party.

All the conservative sneering about a fem-lib from San Francisco who was measuring the drapes for the speaker’s office didn’t work. Americans wanted new drapes, and an Armani granny with a whip in charge.

A recent study found that the testosterone of American men has been dropping for 20 years, but in Republican Washington, it was running amok, and not in a good way. Men who had refused to go to an untenable war themselves were now refusing to find an end to another untenable war that they had recklessly started.

Republicans were oddly oblivious to the fact that they had turned into a Thomas Nast cartoon: an unappetizing tableau of bloated, corrupt, dissembling, feckless white hacks who were leaving kids unprotected. Tom DeLay and Bob Ney sneaking out of Congress with dollar bills flying out of their pockets. Denny Hastert playing Cardinal Bernard Law, shielding Mark Foley. Rummy, cocky and obtuse as he presided over an imploding Iraq, while failing to give young men and women in the military the armor, support and strategy they needed to come home safely. Dick Cheney, vowing bullheadedly to move “full speed ahead” on Iraq no matter what the voters decided. W. frantically yelling about how Democrats would let the terrorists win, when his lame-brained policies had spawned more terrorists.

After 9/11, Americans had responded to bellicosity, drawn to the image, as old as the Western frontier myth, of the strong father protecting the home from invaders. But this time, many voters, especially women, rejected the rough Rovian scare and divide tactics.

The macho poses and tough talk of the cowboy president were undercut when he seemed flaccid in the face of the vicious Katrina and the vicious Iraq insurgency.

Even former members of the administration conceded they were tired of the muscle-bound style, longing for a more maternal approach to the globe. “We were exporting our anger and our fear, hatred for what had happened,” Richard Armitage, the former deputy secretary of state, said in a speech in Australia, referring to the 9/11 attacks. He said America needed “to turn another face to the world and get back to more traditional things, such as the export of hope and opportunity and inspiration.”

Talking about hope and opportunity and inspiration has propelled Barack Obama into the presidential arena. His approach seems downright feminine when compared with the Bushies, or even Hillary Clinton. He languidly poses in fashion magazines, shares feelings with Oprah and dishes with the ladies on “The View.” After six years of chest-puffing, Senator Obama seems very soothing.

Because of the power of female consumers, some marketing experts predict we will end up a matriarchy. This year, women also flexed their muscle at the polls, transformed into electoral Furies by the administration’s stubborn course in Iraq.

On Tuesday, 51 percent of the voters were women, and 55 percent of women voted for the Democratic candidate. It was a revival of the style of Bill Clinton, dubbed our first female president, who knitted together a winning coalition of independents, moderates and suburbanites.

According to The Times’s exit polls, women were more likely than men to want some or all of the troops to be withdrawn from Iraq now, and 64 percent of women said that the war in Iraq has not improved U.S. security.

The Senate has a new high of 16 women and the House has a new high of at least 70, with a few races outstanding. Hillary’s big win will strengthen her presidential tentacles.

Nancy Pelosi, who will be the first female speaker, softened her voice and look as she cracked the whip on her undisciplined party, taking care not to sound shrill. When she needs to, though, she says she can use her “mother-of-five voice.”

At least for the moment, W. isn’t blustering and Cheney has lost his tubby swagger. The president is trying to ride the Mommy vibe. He even offered Madame Speaker help with those new drapes.

This entire week in ONE picture...

Nuff said, this pic explains itself....

Bush’s Chernobyl Economy; hard times are on the way

By Mike Whitney

11/08/06 "Information Clearing House" -- -- In the next few months, a financial crisis will arise somewhere in the world which will jolt the American economy and trigger a swift and precipitous decline in the value of the dollar.

This is not speculation; it will happen and there is nothing that the Bush administration can do to stop it.

All of the traditional supports for the dollar have been removed by the shrinking economy, a massive $800 billion account deficit, dramatic increases in the money supply, and the reckless manipulation of interest rates.

Now, the noose is tightening. Our foreign trade partners can see that we are drowning in red ink and are refusing to buy back our debt in the form of US Treasuries. This is a death sentence for the dollar. It means that in a matter of months the once-mighty greenback will crash through the floor and free-fall through open space.

Mike Swanson of the WallStreetWindow explains the worrisome details related to last month’s trade deficit:

“Just a few days ago the US Treasury reported that the net capital inflows from the rest of the world into the US fell for a 6th month in a row. Private (purchases) from abroad fell to $34.7 billion in August and from $72.9 billion in July. Asian central banks made up for the shortfall. If they hadn’t the current account deficit would have exploded. The NY Times quoted Ashraf Laidi, a currency analyst at MG Financial Group as saying, “foreign central banks saved the dollar from disaster. The stability of the bond market is at the mercy of Asian purchases of US Treasuries.”

Swanson poses an interesting theory, but it can’t be verified since we the Fed stopped printing the M-3 (which would provide the relevant facts about the current cash inflows) and since China and Japan have slowed their purchases of UST Bonds.

Jim Willie of GoldenJackass.com, offers an entirely different theory in his recent article “Spent Dollar Momentum”. Willie opines:

“Behind the scenes are the many illicit London-based firms busily buying US Treasury Bonds with freshly-printed money from the Dept of the Treasury. Their tracks are covered by the blackout on the money supply statistic. (M-3) An isolated US government with a well-oiled printing press as the primary support device makes for a dangerous currency situation.”

Willie’s “conspiracy theory” jives nicely with the US Treasury’s figures on the “Foreign Financing of US Government Debt” (June 2006) Surprisingly, between 2005 and 2006 our friends in the United Kingdom purchased an additional $142 billion of USD bringing their stockpile of dollars to $201.4?!?

Why?

Why would UK investors suddenly stock up on dollars when everyone else in the currency market is bemoaning the greenback’s systemic problems?

Could it be that banks in the UK are just hiding the paper trail for friends in America who want to forestall a collapse in the dollar until after the election?

Of course, there could be another explanation for the irregular activity in cash inflows, (purchase of US Treasuries) that is, that we’re still living in a "faith-based" Wonderland where our overseas trading partners are more than willing to buy an endless supply of worthless paper from a well-meaning Goliath who is busy spreading democracy to the "great unwashed" in developing world.

This is an utter fiction. The world is backing away from the dollar and whether one accepts the conspiracy theories or not, it’s clear that the Federal Reserve is trying to cover its tracks and conceal its shadowy maneuverings.

There is nothing accidental about the crisis we'll soon be facing. Officials at the Federal Reserve and the US Treasury are fully aware of the devastating effects of massive trade deficits, increasing the money supply, and self-serving interest rates manipulations. They have set the country on the path to ruin as part of a broader scheme for remaking the global-system according to well-known precedents. In truth, the plan to modify the present system has a long history; going back to the 1980s when many of the same actors in government today were in positions of power in the Reagan administration. For the last 6 years they have been patching together their strategy; producing record deficits, unfunded tax cuts, mammoth government expansion, and doubling the money supply.

How can anyone argue that they did not understand the implications of their actions?

Did Greenspan know that by lowering interest rates in 2001 to 1.5% that he would sluice trillions of dollars into the real estate market producing the largest equity bubble in history? And, if he didn't know, then how is it that the Fed provides the statistics which state precisely how large the housing bubble really is?

Didn’t Greenspan read the charts and graphs put out by his own organization?

And why did Greenspan support the shaky “no down payment”, “interest-only” loans and ARMs which allowed “high-risk” people to qualify for mortgages when the Fed knew, according to their own figures, that when interest rates went up, foreclosures would skyrocket?

Of course he knew; they all knew. How could they NOT know? They produce the facts and figures themselves! It’s all part of a madcap scheme to shift wealth to the top 1% and drive a wooden stake into the heart of the middle class. When Greenspan saw that doomsday was approaching, he got “cold feet” and bailed out. Now the scholarly Bernancke is left to supervise the economic meltdown and face the public scorn.

Trouble Ahead

Currently, the U.S. economy is held together by the slimmest of threads; literally duct-taped together by massaging all of the crucial economic numbers, pumping as much cheap fiat-currency into the system, and by "increasingly-suspicious" maneuverings in the futures markets. After the elections, they’ll be no reason to conceal the rot at the heart of the system. After all, we are not facing an unforeseen catastrophe, but a planned demolition intended to increase the disparity between rich and poor to such an extent, that democracy, as we know it, will no longer be possible.

Nothing is more repugnant to America’s ruling elite than the notion that every man, however broke and insignificant, can participate in our system of government.

The Federal Reserve's bloody fingerprints are all over our present dilemma. The privately-owned Fed has never operated in the public interest. By doubling the money supply in the last 7 years and keeping interest rates artificially low, the Fed has generated a $10 trillion housing bubble while, at the same time, ignoring a $800 billion trade deficit which is sucking up American assets and crushing American industry at an unprecedented rate.

This massive expansion of debt has increased the likelihood that an unexpected event, like a bank failure or a teetering hedge fund, will cause a major disruption in the markets sending tremors through the global system. Even if nothing explosive happens, the faltering real estate market will continue to swoon, consumer spending will dry up, and the fragile economy will crash to earth. In fact, this is taking place right now; retail sales are anemic, residential housing dropped a whopping 17% in the last 3 months, and economic growth shrunk to a measly 1.6% in the third quarter. The only thing keeping the economy from collapsing entirely is the sudden drop in oil prices which “conveniently” coincided with the midterm balloting.

This won’t last. According to industry analyst Matthew Simmons the world production of oil may have already peaked setting the stage for a leveling-off period before the inevitable decline. Simmons has data to show that “world supply of oil has declined to 83.98 million barrels per day in the second quarter after hitting 84.35 million bpd in the forth quarter of 2005.” Oil production is going backwards not forwards.

No one believes the price of oil is going down any time soon. As energy prices rise and the housing market falls; consumer spending, which added $825 billion from home equity into last year’s economy, will continue shrivel. Thus, the Fed will have to make the tough-choice of whether to loosen the purse strings and lower interest rates to keep the economy sputtering along or ratchet up rates to attract more foreign investment. (Keep in mind that the real estate market is already in retreat, even though, the full force of the Fed’s interest rate increases won’t be felt for up to 6 to 12 months after they have been raised. The worst is yet to come)

Most economists believe that Fed Chairman Bernancke will be forced to lower rates sometime in 2007 to try to stimulate the economy and to affect a “soft landing” in the housing market, but don’t count on it.

I believe the Fed is more likely to either keep rates the same or raise them to outpace the anticipated increases in Europe and Asia. The reason for this is simple; it presently takes nearly $2.5 billion per day to cover our current account deficit. To continue to attract foreign capital, US Treasuries must offer a higher rate of return than their foreign competitors. Now that the economies in Europe and Asia are growing; naturally their interest rates are going up accordingly.(to slow inflation) That means that the only way that America can continue to expand its debt, through the exchange of fiat currency for resources and manufactured goods, is by raising the return on Treasuries. And, that is probably what Bernanke will do, even though it will skewer the struggling American worker and further damage the US economy.

The secret of running the global economic system is to control the issuance of currency and, thereby, be in a position to expand one’s own debt as one sees fit. The Federal Reserve must preserve its “dollar hegemony” if it wants to maintain the greenback as the world’s reserve currency. To achieve that, the dollar must stay one step ahead of its competitors (higher rates) and prove that it is on solid financial footing. This is impossible now that the US economy is contracting, so Washington has decided to do the next best thing; corner the oil market. By controlling Middle East oil US policy-makers believe that they can force foreign nations to accept the debt-plagued greenback regardless of the faltering US economy. It is no different than any other extortion racket.

If the plan succeeds the dollar will remain the de-facto international currency. But it is difficult task and the escalating violence in Iraq suggests that the results are far from certain.

Corporate Colonization

“Free Trade” is the Holy Grail of neoliberalism. It is essentially a public relations scam intended to disguise the shifting of wealth, jobs and resources from either the middle class or the public sector to the corporate and banking establishments’. Despite the zealous cheerleading of Thomas Friedman and his ilk; the basic facts have been thoroughly examined and are not in dispute. Free trade has been a dead loss for everyone except the people for whom it was originally designed; the wealthiest and most powerful men on the planet. It has served them quite well.

For example, “since NAFTA went into effect in 1994, the US has lost over $4 trillion to foreigners through its trade deficit”…”During that 11.5 year period , foreign ownership of US assets skyrocketed an amazing 400% from $3 trillion to over $12 trillion”… “Foreign interests now own 46% of US Treasury debt, 26% of corporate bonds, and 13% of US corporate equities. Now nearly 100% of on-going borrowings by the government are funded by foreign interests.”…”Foreign interests also control a majority of US domestic industries such as movies, music, publishing, metal ore mining, cement production, engine and power plant production, rubber and plastics and are major owners of US industries such as pharmaceuticals, chemical manufacturing, industrial machinery manufacturing, motor vehicles, and electronic equipment and components…In addition, the US has lost 3 million manufacturing jobs over the last decade, real wage growth after inflation has been essentially zero,” and personal debt has never been higher. (Data from Thomas Heffner EconomyInCrisis.org)

Since 1980, 13,730 major companies have been sold to foreign corporations. We no longer produce what we need to sustain ourselves.

These facts may have a mind-numbing affect on the reader, but they make a point which is simple and unavoidable. The country is being colonized by corporate predators and its main assets are being sold off to the highest bidder. This rampant carpet-bagging is taking place in full view of the American public which still clings to the spurious idea that “free trade” is generally beneficial for all. It is not, and we are about to experience its full-effects as America’s “straw-house” economy topples from its loss of manufacturing-capacity and its staggering account imbalances.

“Foreign investors now own 46% of US Treasury debt” over $3 trillion dollars! The Federal Reserve and their corporate she-wolves are planning to prolong the hemorrhaging of US wealth as long as possible extracting every last farthing from the prostrate corpse of the waning republic.

Now, we are at the brink. Energy prices will go higher after the elections, manufacturing will continue to flag, and the housing Zeppelin is drifting towards the high-tension wires. To make matters worse, the American consumer; the “engine for global economic growth”, is drowning in a sea of personal debt.

There’s no place to go but down.

Every part of this bleak picture was anticipated by its architects. That’s why they hastily slapped together the requisite legislation for a modern-day police state. After passing the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (which allows the president the arrest whomever he chooses without charges) and overturning the Posse Comitatus Act (the president is now free to deploy the military within America against US citizens) the Bush administration is as ready as they can be. Apparently, they feel like they can manage the public’s shock and outrage with detention camps and water cannons.

We’ll see.

In any event, the trap has been set and any minor disruption in the hedge funds or derivatives markets will put the economy into a violent tailspin forcing our "Unitary” president to activate his plans for the new world order.

Battle Stations; Battle Stations

Last week an article by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard appeared in the UK Telegraph, where he stated:

“(Treasury Secretary) Paulson re-activated the secretive support team to prevent markets meltdown. Judging by their body language, the US authorities believe that the roaring bull-market is just a sucker’s rally before the inevitable storm hits….the plunge protection team is a shadowy body with powers to support stock-index, currency, and credit futures in a crash. Otherwise known as the working group on financial markets, it was created by Ronald Reagan to prevent a repeat of the Wall Street meltdown in October 1987”….Paulson has set up “a command center at the US Treasury that will track global markets and serve as an operations base in the next crisis.” (Members include the heads at Treasury, Federal Reserve and Securities and Exchange Commission)

Evans-Pritchard adds: “Mr. Paulson has asked the team to examine ‘systemic risk posed by hedge funds and derivatives, and the government’s ability to respond to a financial crisis…We need to be vigilant and make sure we are thinking through all of the various risks and that we are being very careful here. Do we have enough liquidity in the system?’”

And, finally, Evans-Pritchard queries: (Do) Mr. Paulson and Mr. Cox (SEC) know something that we do not: whether other hedge funds are in the same sinking boat as Amaranth Advisors and Vega Management, keel-hauled by bets on natural gas and bonds? Or whether currency traders with record short positions on the Japanese Yen and Swiss Franc are about to learn the perils of the Carry Trade, a high-stakes game of chicken where you bet against fundamentals with high leverage to make a quick profit. Everybody knows it will blow up if the dollar goes into free fall”.

So what is Paulson anticipating?

Gabriel Kolko offers us a clue in a counterpunch article “Why a Global Economic Deluge Looms”:

“The entire global financial structure is becoming uncontrollable in crucial ways its nominal leaders never expected. Instability is its hallmark…Contradictions now wrack the world’s financial system, and if we are to believe the institutions and personalities who have been in the forefront of the defense of capitalism, it may well be on the verge of serious crisis.”

Deregulation and reduced market transparency have created a plethora of financial instruments which are relatively untested and extraordinarily volatile. By eliminating the “rules of the game” market-savvy investors have raked in the profits but reshaped the economic landscape in a way that no one can predict what the ultimate outcome will be. Hedge funds are now loaded with over-leveraged debt-instruments that promise a generous return in an up-tempo market, but certain doom in an economic downturn. Now, that all the arrows are pointed towards recession the devastating effects of this new “liberalized” system will be felt throughout the global economy.

No one knows what is in store for these high-risk hedge funds which have only been in existence for a short time and which Americans have dumped trillions of their hard-earned savings. As Kolko says, “The credit derivative market was almost non-existent in 2001, grew fairly slowly until 2004, and went into the stratosphere, reaching $17.3 trillion by the end of 2005.”

Is it any wonder why the main players at the Fed, the Treasury and the SEC are feeling a bit jittery?

Any shock to the markets could set off a system-wide cataclysm. Just this week, for example, Taiwan was bracing for a stock market crash following the surprise indictment of first-lady Wu Shu-chen. Even relatively small incidents like this on the other side of the world create the potential for contagion that can spread rapidly in this new world of globalized markets. The danger is even greater when those markets are built on a foundation of sand.

Hank Paulson was doubtless selected as Treasury Secretary as the best possible “industry-insider” to oversee the unwinding of America’s humongous account imbalances and flimsy “deregulated” markets. His job is to ensure that, at the end of the day, US banking giants, the Federal Reserve, and western elites still control the global economic system and that the dollar reigns supreme. Whatever happens to the American middle class in the process is of no consequence.

But Paulson faces a daunting task from this point on; fudging the numbers only works won’t work forever. So far, the greenback has benefited from the manipulation of oil prices, but that will soon end. (Better “fill ‘er up” now) The US economy is a shriveled shadow of its former self; housing and manufacturing are in a shambles and growth depends entirely on the expansion of debt. As GDP begins to nosedive, foreign investment will dry up, capital will flee to more promising markets in Asia and Europe, and the American people will totter into a barren world of soaring unemployment, hyper-inflation, and 1930s-type deprivation.

The country is now facing a Chernobyl-type meltdown and the prospects for changing direction appear to be minimal. The foundation blocks for sound economic growth and prosperity have been replaced by a misguided faith in military adventurism and police state repression. The results are plain to see.

We are now more vulnerable to a seismic economic event than anytime since the Great Depression. The corporatists and the money-lenders have absconded with the nation’s wealth; gutting the manufacturing sector, creating enormous equity bubbles, and raffling off our vital industries to foreign investors. At the same time, the Bush administration has sown dragons-teeth around the world leaving the US with precious few friends to throw us a lifeline when ship starts taking on water.

Hard times are on the way; only this time it’ll be detention centers instead of soup kitchens.