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TORTURE AS FOREIGN POLICY

10.31.04 (11:37 am) [edit]

IMPEACH BUSH/CHENEY ... Nat Hentoff: "There has been much talk of values during the presidential campaign and the doctrine that exporting the ideals and practice of constitutional freedom can bring liberty to parts of the world afflicted by tyrannical regimes. However, on October 8, the House Republican leadership rolled over the Democrats to pass the 9-11 Recommendations Implementation Act with no input at all from the Democrats. Section 3032 of the bill empowers the secretary of homeland security to remove "certain aliens," including those on American soil, from the protections of the international Covenant Against Torture when the secretary finds those "aliens" a danger to the U.S... This means a person detained can be sent to countries that torture prisoners, so that the torturers can extract information from them that we can't. Shaun Waterman of United Press International noted that "at present, the procedure is carried out in a covert, extra-legal fashion by CIA operatives in chartered Gulfstream jets."

[b]Read article [/b] http://villagevoice.com/issue...

WHO REALLY WINS IF BUSH WINS??? [NOT YOU!!!]

10.31.04 (5:51 am) [edit]

[b]"We the People" should be outraged by the corrupt Bush/Cheney Inc.[i] junta's [/i]shameless pandering to rapacious corporations and hyper-rich plutocrats who are ruthless war-profiteers, having heinously abused our troops considered by these neo-cons as "expendable" cannon-fodder [i]as well as [/i]America's working people considered by these neo-fascists as "slave labor" serfs ...

Refer to [u]"Dog Days Of Employment[/u]" on http://www.tblog.com/template... ...[/b]

[u][b]Billionaires for Bush[/b][/u]

President George W. Bush received donations from 79 percent of the U.S. billionaires who contributed to a presidential campaign this year, while Democrat John Kerry was backed by 21 percent, a study says.

Bush received contributions from 116 billionaires, including Bill Gates, chairman of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., who was listed by Forbes magazine as the world's richest person, and Frederick Smith, chief executive of FedEx Corp., according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign donations.

Kerry got donations from 31 billionaires, including Warren Buffett, chairman of Omaha- based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and the world's second- richest person; Eli Broad, chairman of AIG SunAmerica Inc., a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group Inc.; and David Geffen, co-founder of Glendale, Calif.-based DreamWorks SKG, a movie studio.

Republicans often outscore Democrats in fund raising among corporate executives.

The 58-year-old Bush has 280 CEOs from Russell 1000 index companies, to 52 for the 60-year-old Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a nonpartisan group based in Washington.

Kerry, who accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, released a list of 204 executives who endorse his economic policies.

Of the 277 U.S. billionaires identified by Forbes magazine, 153 gave to a candidate, including six who gave to both Bush and Kerry.

Those giving to both candidates included Charles Dolan, chairman of Bethpage, N.Y.- based Cablevision Systems Corp.; and Donald Trump, chief executive officer of Atlantic City, N.J.-based Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts.

Another 124 billionaires, or 45 percent of the total, gave to neither candidate, including Ted Turner, the founder of Cable News Network and a former vice chairman of New York-based Time Warner Inc.; Roy Disney, chairman of Shamrock Holdings Inc. and a former director of the Walt Disney Co., founded by his uncle; and Forrest Mars Jr., chairman of Mars Inc.

"I'm always surprised at the separation of the business world from politics in a number of wealthy people," said Kent Cooper, co- founder of PoliticalMoneyLine. "To them, politics is a different world, and the business mind has a hard time understanding how politics works."

Kerry has the support of two billionaires who did not give to either presidential campaign: Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Computer Inc., and Barry Diller, chairman of New York-based IAC/InterActiveCorp, an Internet commerce and television shopping company.

A Kerry campaign spokesman declined to comment.

Calls to the Bush campaign were not returned.

[b]Wealthy donors [/b]

116 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to President Bush.

31 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

6 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to both Bush and Kerry. - http://www.rockymountainnews....,1299,DRMN_4_3094590,00.html

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

[b]Also read about the Saudi Royal Family (who were involved in the attacks against America on 9/11) who illegally fund Traitors Bush/Cheney by funnelling hundreds of millions through the Carlyle Group [/b] http://www.bushnews.com/bushm... http://truthout.org/docs_01/0... http://www.houseofbush.com/

[b]Even more shocking are the Corporations that bribe Traitors Bush/Cheney to rape America [/b] http://www.laborresearch.org/...

[b]Why do you think that Bush/Cheney don't give a damn about American working people and are Traitors? Look at the traitors, terrorists, corporations and plutocrats willing to destroy America, who they are [i]indebted to[/i]![/b]

WHO REALLY WINS IF BUSH WINS??? [NOT YOU!!!]

10.31.04 (5:51 am) [edit]

BUSH'S BLOODBATH: The Most Tragic Victims of the Iraq War

10.31.04 (5:48 am) [edit]

Recent information on the consequences of the Iraq war on civilians and children only confirms a devastating picture of the situation. According to an article in the medical magazine The Lancet, there has been an excess of 100,000 civilians deaths since the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The deaths have included a substantial number of children. Carol Bellamy, UNICEF's Executive Director, has called the death of 34 children in recent bomb attacks "an unconscionable slaughter of innocents."

Many of those deaths have been the consequence of coalition forces' actions. According to the authors of the study published in The Lancet, there has been substantially more deaths in Iraq since the war began that in the period immediately before the conflict. The killings of dozens of children in Baghdad's recent bombings show, according to UNICEF, "a disregard for innocent lives that recalled the recent massacre of children in Beslan, Russia."

This is the third time that Iraqi children have been victims of war in that country's recent history. The two conflicts previous to the present one were the eight-year war with Iran in the 1980s and the Gulf War in 1991, which caused considerable damage to Iraq's infrastructure. In addition, the country has been under over 12 years of comprehensive United Nations' sanctions.

Although after it was introduced in 1996 the Oil for Food Program (OFFP), which allowed the Iraqi government to sell oil and use the revenue to purchase humanitarian supplies, contributed to reduce the impact of the sanctions, it had significant shortcomings. Among them was Saddam Hussein's decision to use the funds for personal gain rather than to improve the basic services' infrastructure in the country.

Previous to this last conflict, Iraqi children were already highly vulnerable to disease and malnutrition. One in four children under five years of age was chronically malnourished, and one in eight children died before their fifth birthday. This was happening on a population where almost half is under the age of 18.

A limited post-war nutritional assessment carried out by UNICEF in Baghdad found that acute malnutrition has nearly doubled to what it was before the war. That assessment also found that seven out of ten children suffered from various degrees of diarrhea, which led to a loss of nutrients and often to death if not properly treated. Following this last war an already deteriorated water and sanitation system practically collapsed, leading to loss and/or contamination of piped water and greater susceptibility to contracting diarrhea.

It was estimated that 270,000 children born after the war had none of the required immunizations and routine immunization services were all but disrupted. In addition, the existent stock of vaccines became useless as a result of the destruction of the cold-chain system.

Hundreds of thousands tons of raw sewage are still pumped into the Tigris and Euphrates rivers every day. Because water cleaning chemicals have been looted or destroyed, the quality of water being pumped into the homes is extremely poor and leads to more frequent illness and malnutrition among children.

As a consequence of all these factors, Iraq is the country that has least progressed in reducing child mortality since 1990. In the 1990s, the most significant increases in child mortality occurred in southern and central Iraq, where under-five child mortality rose from 56 to 131 per 1,000 live births. Due to lack of security, many babies are now delivered at home, and many mothers do not receive any pre-natal care.

In the main cities, every day children are killed or injured when in contact with unexploded ordnance (UXO), land mines and other kinds of live ammunition littering the country. In Baghdad alone there are approximately 800 hazardous sites related to cluster bombs and dumped ammunition.

The Iraq Education Survey, carried out by the Iraqi government with support from UNICEF, describes how children educational opportunities have been affected by the war. In the most affected governorates, more than 70 percent of primary school buildings lack water service. The survey shows that since March 2003, over 700 primary schools had been damaged by bombing, more than 200 had been burned and over 3,000 had been looted. After a year and a half of hostilities the suffering of civilians seems to increase, rather than decrease. Even more poignantly, that over half of the deaths caused by the occupation forces are women and children is a severe indictment against this senseless war.

[b]Dr. César Chelala, an international public health consultant, is a co-winner of an Overseas Press Club of America award for an article on human rights. [/b] - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

BUSH'S BLOODBATH: The Most Tragic Victims of the Iraq War

10.31.04 (5:48 am) [edit]

BUSH'S BLOODBATH: The Most Tragic Victims of the Iraq War

10.31.04 (5:45 am) [edit]

BUSH'S BLOODBATH: The Most Tragic Victims of the Iraq War

10.31.04 (5:45 am) [edit]

EXPERTS REPORT: Pentagon Suppresses Details of Civilian Casualties

10.31.04 (5:38 am) [edit]

The Pentagon is collecting figures on local casualties in Iraq, contrary to its public claims, but the results are classified, according to one of the authors of an independent study which reported last week that the war has killed at least 100,000 Iraqis.

"Despite the claim of the head of US Central Command at the time, General Tommy Franks, that 'We don't do body counts', the US military does collect casualty figures in Iraq," said Professor Richard Garfield, an expert on the effects of conflict on civilians. "But since 1991, when Colin Powell was head of the joint chiefs of staff, the figures have been kept secret."

Professor Garfield, who lectures at Columbia University in New York and the London School of Hygiene and Public Health, believes the Pentagon's stance has confused its response to the latest study. "The military is saying: 'We don't believe it, but because we don't collect figures, we can't comment," he said.

"Mr Powell decided to keep the figures secret because of the controversy over body counts in Vietnam, but I think democracies need this information."

The first scientific study of the human cost of the Iraq war, published last week in The Lancet, http://www.thelancet.com/ showed a higher level of casualties than previous estimates. Iraqbodycount.net, http://www.iraqbodycount.net/... a website which collects accounts of Iraqi civilian deaths reported by two separate media sources, said yesterday the toll was between 14,181 and 16,312, but admits that the spreading violence in Iraq, which has made it all but impossible for journalists to move around safely, has undermined its method. That did not prevent the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, from using its figures to cast doubt on the academic survey.

The Government would examine the results "with very great care", Mr Straw told BBC Radio 4's Today program last week. "It is an estimate based on very different methodology from standard methodology for assessing casualties, namely on the number of people reported to have been killed at the time or around the time." Previously the Government has dismissed the findings of the Iraqbodycount website.

The study by US and Iraqi researchers, led by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, surveyed 1,000 households in 33 randomly chosen areas in Iraq. It found that the risk of violent death was 58 times higher in the period since the invasion, and that most of the victims were women and children.

"Making conservative assumptions, about 100,000 excess deaths have happened ... Violence accounted for most of the excess deaths, and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths," said Les Roberts of the Baltimore institution. The researchers excluded Fallujah, the most violent area of Iraq, from their results, which would have made the toll higher. But the finding that air strikes caused the highest casualties casts doubt on US claims that air attacks allow pinpoint precision.

Iraq's interim government has also suppressed casualty figures. Dr Nagham Mohsen, an official at the Iraqi Health Ministry, was compiling data from hospital records last year. In December she was ordered by a superior to stop. The Health Minister denied that the order was inspired by the Coalition Provisional Authority. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

EXPERTS REPORT: Pentagon Suppresses Details of Civilian Casualties

10.31.04 (5:38 am) [edit]

FOR GOD'S SAKE, VOTE BUSH OUT!!!

10.30.04 (3:02 am) [edit]

[b]For God's Sake, Vote Him Out

by Andrew Greeley [/b]

There are two proportionate reasons for rejecting President Bush's bid for re-election. Both the United States and the world are a mess. Mr. Bush is responsible for both messes. The first president ever to claim de facto infallibility, Mr. Bush tells us that he follows his instincts in decision-making after praying over the decision and talking to God. He admits no mistakes -- how could anyone who has a direct link to God make a mistake! In his next administration he will receive more divine inspirations which will make both the country and the world even more messy.

Consider the American economy. He has turned the biggest budget surplus in history into the biggest deficit because he wanted to give more money to the "haves and have mores" as he called them. He has presided over the largest job losses since the Great Depression. He has stood idly by while hundreds of thousands of American jobs have been flown overseas. His reform of health care has made it more expensive and more difficult for the elderly. He declines to rein in the greed of the drug companies and thus drives many Americans to Canada -- of all places -- to buy the medicines needed to stay alive. He has cast doubt on the future of Social Security. He has been on the bridge during the current absurd panic over flu vaccine; the deaths of those elderly and children who are not able to obtain flu shots are on his hands. What if one of those who die is your parent or spouse or child? He has not lifted a finger to help the many Americans whose pensions are being eaten up by greedy employers. Oil prices are climbing rapidly and the stock market is tanking.

We want four more years of this stuff?

Fecklessly he started the ill-advised and ill-prepared war in Iraq in which some Americans have to come close to mutiny to protect them from orders to bring contaminated fuel in badly equipped trucks to units that won't accept it. He misled the American people about the weapons in Iraq and the involvement of Iraq in the World Trade Center attack. He is disgusted, he tells us, by the kidnappings and the beheadings, the car bombs and roadside bombs, the ambushes and murder of civilians, but the bad decisions he and his cabinet made were mandated by God and could not have been mistakes. Pat Robertson tells us, however, that Mr. Bush told him that God had disclosed that the casualties in Iraq would be light. Maybe that was God's mistake!

Do we want him to continue with these god-driven policies for four more years? Eleven hundred dead Americans already. How many more thousands will have to die before God will tell Mr. Bush to get out of Iraq? How many tens of thousands more Iraqis will have to die?

The world is a mess because the United States is the natural leader of the free world and the American president the natural president of the free world. He blew the capital of support and sympathy that flowed to the United States after the World Trade Center attack by his "Bush Doctrine" that turned him into the bully of the free world. Next year the Poles will leave Iraq because the Polish people don't like the war. The Poles -- our strongest allies in Mr. Rumsfeld's "New Europe" -- are fed up with us! Four more years of divine inspiration and what will be left of America's power and prestige? We will still be a giant but like Gulliver a tattered giant chained to the ground by our president's madcap inspirations.

The pope is infallible only in certain limited circumstances and on specific matters. Unlike the pope, Mr. Bush apparently sets no limits on the policy decisions that will be made by conversations with God. We want four more years of those decisions?

The president, like every human, is entitled to his own relationship with God. He is entitled to use that relationship to make decisions, to justify them later, and to stick to them no matter what happens. Many Americans will accept such decisions because they believe he is a "godly" man. Not everyone else has to tolerate four more years of his divine right to govern.

Even if the election is close, Mr. Bush will win it. His lawyers are ready to go back into court and the supine Supreme Court will give the country four more years of divine right rule.

Do we really want that? - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

IMPEACH BUSH/CHENEY: Carlyle Cover-Up

10.30.04 (3:01 am) [edit]

Less than twenty-four hours after [i]The Nation [/i]disclosed http://www.commondreams.org/v... that former Secretary of State James Baker and the Carlyle Group were involved in a secret deal to profit from Iraq's debt to Kuwait, NBC was reporting that the deal was "dead." At The Nation, we started to get calls congratulating us on costing the Carlyle Group $1 billion, the sum the company would have received in an investment from the government of Kuwait in exchange for helping to extract $27 billion of unpaid debts from Iraq.

We were flattered (sort of), until we realized that Carlyle had just pulled off a major public relations coup. When the story broke, the notoriously secretive merchant bank needed to find a way to avoid a full-blown political scandal. It chose a bold tactic: In the face of overwhelming evidence of a glaring conflict of interest between Baker's stake in Carlyle and his post as George W. Bush's special envoy on Iraq's debt, Carlyle simply denied everything. The company issued a statement saying that it does not want to be involved in the Kuwait deal "in any way, shape or form and will not invest any money raised by the Consortium's efforts" and, furthermore, that "Carlyle was never a member of the Consortium." A spokesperson told the Financial Times that Carlyle had pulled out as soon as James Baker was appointed debt envoy, because his new political post made Carlyle's involvement "unsuitable." Mysteriously, there was no paper trail--just Carlyle's word that it had informed its business partners "orally."

You have to hand it to them: It was gutsy. In the leaked business proposal from the consortium to the Kuwaiti government--submitted almost two months after Baker's appointment--the Carlyle Group is named no fewer than forty-seven times; it is listed first among the companies involved in the consortium; and its partner James Baker is mentioned by name at least eleven times. In interviews, other consortium members, including Madeleine Albright's consulting firm, the Albright Group, confirmed that Carlyle was still involved, as did the office of the Prime Minister of Kuwait. Shahameen Sheikh, the consortium's CEO, told me that when Baker was named envoy in December, Carlyle was "very clear with us that they wanted to restrict their role to fund managers," but she said the firm was very much still a part of the deal.

That was exactly what Carlyle spokesman Christopher Ullman had told me. He also admitted that Carlyle would land a $1 billion investment if the proposal was accepted. After I reported these facts, Ullman even called to thank me for quoting him accurately.

So when I heard about Carlyle's about-face, I called Ullman to see what was up. I felt like I was talking to one of the brainwashed characters in The Manchurian Candidate, the Jonathan Demme remake about a Carlyle-esque company that conspires to put a mind-controlled candidate in the Oval Office. "We learned today that we did not even join the consortium," Ullman told me, drone-like. "When I spoke to you yesterday, I did not know that."

Amazingly, it worked. The story--which made front-page news around the world--vanished almost as soon as it had appeared in the press at home. The New York Times has not printed a word about Baker's conflict, despite the fact that when Baker was first appointed envoy, it published an editorial calling on him to resign from Carlyle in order to "perform honorably in his new public job." The Kerry campaign has been equally silent, apparently for fear that any criticism would boomerang onto the Democrats because of Albright. This was Carlyle's stroke of genius: When Baker was appointed, the consortium recruited Albright to front the deal; when they got caught, Carlyle denied all involvement in this "unsuitable" activity and left a prominent Democrat holding the bag.

As the story disappeared under Carlyle's spell, it was as if the entire US media had been implanted with Manchurian memory chips. Here was hard evidence that the Carlyle Group--the "ex-Presidents' club," run so much like a secret society that Charles Lewis of the Center for Public Integrity once described researching the firm as "shadowboxing with a ghost" --had participated in a scheme to use Baker to undermine US policy, possibly in violation of multiple conflict-of-interest regulations, including criminal statutes. Yet Carlyle was slipping out of reach once again.

Crucially, the central question remains unanswered by the White House: Have James Baker's business interests compromised his performance as debt envoy? That question does not go away simply because $1 billion will stay in the coffers of a wealthy oil emirate rather than in a Carlyle equity fund. The week after losing the deal, Carlyle handed a record-breaking $6.6 billion payout to investors. "It's the best 18 months we ever had," boasted Carlyle chief investment officer Bill Conway to the Financial Times. "We made money and we made it fast."

In Iraq, the last eighteen months have been markedly worse, and the stakes for Baker's job performance there are considerably higher. This was underlined on October 13, when Iraq's health ministry issued a harrowing report on its post-invasion health crisis, including outbreaks of typhoid and tuberculosis and soaring child and mother mortality rates. A week after the report came out, Iraq paid out another $195 million for war reparation debts, mostly to Kuwait. Meanwhile, the State Department announced that $3.5 billion for water, sanitation and electricity projects was being shifted to security in Iraq, claiming that, according to Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, debt relief is on the way.

Is it? In fact, Iraq is being plunged deeper into debt, with $836 million in new loans and grants now flowing from the IMF and the World Bank. Meanwhile, Baker has not managed to get a single country to commit to eradicating Iraq's debts. Iraq's creditors know that while Baker was asking them to show forgiveness, his company was offering Kuwait a special side deal to push Iraq to pay up. It's not the kind of news that tends to generate generosity and good will. And the timing couldn't be worse: The Paris Club is about to meet to hash out a final deal on Iraq's debt.

But that doesn't happen until November 12. And if 2000 is any indication, by then Baker could be on to bigger deals. Look out for him in swing states, if another election needs stealing.

[b]Naomi Klein is the author of No Logo and, most recently, Fences and Windows: Dispatches From the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate (Picador). She is writer/producer of The Take, a new documentary on Argentina’s occupied factories.[/b] - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

OSAMA BIN FORGOTTEN??? ... UNTIL NOW!!! ...

10.30.04 (2:59 am) [edit]

"PRESIDENT Bush said yesterday that he wanted Osama bin Laden, the Saudi exile, "dead or alive" in some of the most bellicose language used by a White House occupant in recent years. ... "I want justice," [Bush] said after a meeting at the Pentagon, where 188 people were killed last Tuesday when an airliner crashed into the building. "And there's an old poster out West that says, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.' "" - Bin Laden is Wanted:: Dead or Alive Says Bush, September 18, 2001, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/ne...

[i]VERSUS[/i]

At March 13, 2002 press conference, Bush said "So I don't know where he [Osama Bin Laden] is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him...I truly am not that concerned about him." Watch the video of Bush's remarks on http://mywebpages.comcast.net... ...

[b]"We the People" must not be diverted from the critical task at hand by the "surprises" in the news during the next few days:-- Instead, we must get out and vote for John Kerry for President ... However, [i]Daily Kos [/i]does offer a thought-provoking analysis of the OBL (Osama bin Laden) tape ...[/b]

From a look at the diaries and comment threads, people are a little exercised about the Bin Laden tapes. Stop and think about this.

It's the Friday before the election, and here are the two leading non-campaign stories: Osama Bin Laden is still on the loose and threatening the U.S., and tons of explosives are missing from Iraq and presumed to be in the possession of terrorists and/or the insurgents fighting our troops in Iraq. Regardless of what a shoddy Reuters story http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mymod/...*http://story.news.yahoo.com/n... may say, there is no way it helps Bush for the American voters to be reminded that Bin Laden is still on the loose. Those voters who are already voting for Bush may be all atwitter because of this tape, but the cynics who don't much like either candidate--and these folks are disproportionately included in the shrinking pool of undecided voters--won't be convinced that we should reelect George Bush because he's the guy who's been President for the last three years of our failure to capture Bin Laden.

The Bin Laden tape [i]does not [/i]help Bush. It probably has no significant effect, but if it does, that effect is probably negative toward Bush. The Bin Laden tape does not present any reason for us to be concerned in terms of the election. Our concern should be that Osama Bin Laden is still on the loose, and we need to elect a President who will make it a priority to capture Bin Laden.

So, get to that phone bank, put on your walking shoes, and get out there and do the GOTV. George W. Bush has ignored Osama Bin Laden. For that reason, for the next couple days we need to ignore Osama Bin Laden and train our attention on getting rid of George W. Bush. Then, we will have a President who doesn't ignore the threats to our national safety.

[b]Out task is to talk to voters and convince them to vote for John Kerry and Democrats from the top of their ballot to the bottom. Get out there, and savor the feeling of knowing we're on the verge of a win.[/b]

[b]Sources:[/b]

Daily Kos, http://www.dailykos.com

Apparently Osama bin Laden is Alive and Well???, http://www.tblog.com/template...

Osama Tries to Give Bush the Election, http://www.tblog.com/template...

Another Manhattan? My analysis of bin Laden's speech, http://www.tblog.com/template...

Bush Misleads on Osama Bin Laden, http://www.misleader.org/dail...

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

Bush's Former Professor Warns America that Georgey-boy Is "Mediocre ... Shallow" ...

10.29.04 (12:53 pm) [edit]

[b]How can [i]anyone[/i] deny the fact that is[i] staring us in the face[/i]:-- namely that Bush is simply[i] too stupid [/i]to be president??? ... [/b]Firstly Bush lies to us regarding phony WMDs in Iraq, his mendacious [i]casus belli [/i]for waging his illegal and immoral neo-con warfare to enrich Halliburton, Bechtel, Carlyle Group, Unocal, Big Oil, the Military Industrial Complex, etc. ... Now we find that the arrogant, spoiled and imbecilic (AWOL during Vietnam http://www.awolbush.com/ ) Bushy-boy [i]lusts for perpetual wars for perpetual profits[/i]: for now he is planning a pre-emptive strike upon Iran http://www.sundayherald.com/4... to forcibly dictate regime change ... For an[i] insightful and factual analysis[/i], please refer to "[i]Iran End Game[/i]??? ..." on http://www.tblog.com/template...

It is worth contemplating the observations of a Harvard Business School professor who confirms that Bush was a "shallow" and "mediocre" loser who thinks "connections" entitle him to treat other people with contemptuous disregard, and [i]now[/i] like cannon-fodder and slaves.

Can we [i]really afford [/i]anymore of what the neo-cons and right-wing toadies laughably call "Bush's successes"??? ... [i]Jeez[/i] ... Please refer to "[i]The Successes of President George Bush[/i]" on http://www.tblog.com/template...

[b][u]Former HBS Prof Blasts Bush[/u]

Business scholar says president was 'shallow,' 'flippant' in 1970s class[/b]

As the race for the White House heats up and the nation’s left-leaning heads come together to unearth potential skeletons in President Bush’s closet, one line in his resume has avoided major scrutiny: the time Bush spent just across the Charles River, earning an MBA at the Harvard Business School (HBS) in the 1970s. Now, as some fervently question the commander-in-chief’s performance in the Texas National Guard decades ago and more current-minded politicos take aim at the events surrounding Sept. 11, 2001 and the invasion of Iraq, one former HBS professor is doing his best to publicize his recollections of what he calls a sarcastic, mediocre student who went on to lead the United States.

Yoshihiro Tsurumi, an avowed opponent of Bush’s current views and policies who was a visiting associate professor of international business at HBS between 1972 and 1976, said Bush was among 85 students he taught one year in a required first-year course. In the class on “Environment Analysis for Management,” incorporating elements of macroeconomics, industrial policy and international business, Tsurumi said students discussed and debated case studies for 90 minutes several times a week.

Tsurumi—now a professor of international business at Baruch College in the City University of New York—said he remembers the future president as scoring in the bottom 10 percent of students in the class.

Thirty years after teaching the class, Tsurumi said the twenty-something Bush’s statements and behavior—“always very shallow”—still stand out in his mind.

“Whenever [Bush] just bumped into me, he had some flippant statement to make,” said Tsurumi when reached at his home in Scarsdale, N.Y. “The comments he made were revealing of his prejudice.”

The White House did not reply to requests for comment on Bush’s time at HBS.

Tsurumi said he particularly recalls Bush’s right-wing extremism at the time, which he said was reflected in off-hand comments equating the New Deal of the 1930s with socialism and the corporation-regulating Securities and Exchange Commission with “an enemy of capitalism.”

“I vividly remember that he made a comment saying that people are poor because they’re lazy,” Tsurumi said.

Tsurumi also said Bush displayed a sense of arrogance about his prominent family, including his father, former U.S. President George H.W. Bush.

“[George W. Bush] didn’t stand out as the most promising student, but...he made it sure we understood how well he was connected,” Tsurumi said. “He wasn’t bashful about how he was being pushed upward by Dad’s connections.”

Tsurumi said that the younger Bush boasted that his father’s political string-pulling had gotten him to the top of the waiting list for the Texas National Guard instead of serving in Vietnam. When other students were frantically scrambling for summer jobs, Tsurumi said, Bush explained that he was planning instead for a visit to his father in Beijing, where the senior Bush was serving at the time as the special U.S. envoy to China.

In addition, Tsurumi is still sore about what he recalls as Bush’s slight to his cinematic taste. When he arranged for students to view the film of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath during their study of the Great Depression, Tsurumi said, Bush derided the film as “corny.”

At the time, Tsurumi said his worries about his student extended no further than the boardroom.

“All Harvard Business School students want to become president of a company one day,” Tsurumi said. “I remember saying, if you become president of a company some day, may God help your customers and employees.”

When he discovered that his former pupil was vying for the presidency in 2000, Tsurumi said he tried to inform the public about his experience with the then-Texas governor at HBS—but got few results beyond hate mail.

“Last election time, if you recall, the American mass media did a shameful job of vetting [the presidential candidates],” Tsurumi said.

As another November approaches, Tsurumi is trying again to air his criticisms of the man he once taught and his actions as president.

“This time it seems to be getting around a bit more widely,” he said. “After three years of dismal record, people seem more inclined to believe that all his failed leadership was apparent during the Harvard Business School years.”

In a July 2 speech to the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan in Tokyo, Tsurumi repeated the broadside he has launched repeatedly in the past.

“I always remember two groups of students,” Tsurumi said then, according to published reports. “One is the really good students, not only intelligent, but with leadership qualities, courage. The other is the total opposite, unfortunately to which George belonged.” - http://www.thecrimson.com/art...

[b]Courtesy of SamAdams http://samadams.tblog.com [/b]

AND A'W'OL BUSH FINALLY ENDORSES OSAMA bin LADEN!!!

10.29.04 (12:45 pm) [edit]

BuzzFlash Interview With Esther Kaplan: Take on the Born-Again Loonies in the White House

10.29.04 (6:34 am) [edit]

[b]One of the great ironies of this political moment is that just as Americans woke up to the threat of Muslim fundamentalism abroad, our president threw open the doors of the White House to Christian fundamentalists here at home.[/b]

[b]Read interview [/b] http://www.buzzflash.com/inte...

A DIVIDER, NOT A UNITER

10.29.04 (6:28 am) [edit]

I finally put my money down on Tuesday, a whole week out. Kerry over Bush by two to three points in every state that matters except Florida. For those who find this an appalling, Bill Bennett-like display of disrespect for both good money and Our Nation's Future, I say, hey, no guts, no glory. Besides, Ladbrokes, the English betting firm, is offering 6 to 5 on Kerry.

These things usually start locking down a week out at the latest, so by the last two to three days, nothing much can change it unless we get hit with a political meteorite. Bush is still putting much more money than Kerry into television ads, but the ad-blat factor has set in. Ad-blat is a combination of ad-fatigue, particularly afflicting the heroic citizens of our swing states, and the ubiquitous campaign ads of everyone from Joe Don Billups for county commission, precinct 2, to Mary Hannah Gonzalez-Chiu for state agriculture director. We live in a great nation.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

A DIVIDER, NOT A UNITER

10.29.04 (6:27 am) [edit]

A DIVIDER, NOT A UNITER

10.29.04 (6:25 am) [edit]

OPEN LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

10.29.04 (6:22 am) [edit]

[b]Never in the history of humankind has an election had so much at stake[/b]

Dear friends,

As a journalist who has the good fortune to write for an international journal with millions of readers around the world, I have the individual responsibility to inform you of the feeling in the international community regarding the outcome of the election on November 2nd.

As citizens of the United States of America, who have the power to endorse or to dismiss the policies of the Bush regime, you have a collective responsibility not only unto yourselves, but to the world, which will hold you accountable for your decision.

I write this letter as a citizen of this international community and as a journalist for a newspaper whose name is Pravda (Truth), I have the obligation to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

I can say for a start that the vast majority of the international community will agree with the thoughts and requests expressed in this open letter. As proof, one only has to see the opinion polls held around the world, in which only a small handful of citizens from a tiny percentage of states prefer a re-election of George Bush to regime change in Washington.

It is not for foreigners to dictate to the people of the United States of America how to vote, however since the media in the USA is controlled and since people do not have access to the current of opinion in the international community, it is an act of friendship to inform the citizens of the USA how the world feels about the state of affairs today and it is our right as citizens of the world to express our concern, for the Bush administration does not confine itself to its shores.

9/11 was a horrific event, which went against the grain of human civilization, as did the horrendous terrorist attack in the school of Beslan in the Russian Federation. However terrible these events were, it is necessary to envisage the facts with maturity and to draw the correct conclusions from them, not to use an evil event to justify another act of evil.

Unfortunately this is what the Bush regime has done. While the attack against Afghanistan was understandable in the circumstances (although such an attack had been planned well before 9/11, not because of the Taleban regime, which George Bush Senior created, but because of the gas pipeline from Turkmenistan to Pakistan), the attack against Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with international terrorism.

From a moral point of view, the Bush regime could not have descended lower. Lies, forgery, blackmail, bullying and belligerence became the modus operandi of American diplomacy, instead of discussion, dialogue and debate, the fundamentals of democracy, which Bush and his clique of corporate elitists threw out of the window in their haste to get their hands on the resources of Iraq, a country which did not possess chemical or nuclear or biological weapons, despite the repeated claims that it did.

The raw truth is that Saddam Hussein was the man telling the truth and that George Bush was the one who "stiffed the world".

The fundamental precepts which justified the war have since been refuted and denied, in their entirety, by the very people who stood before the cameras and lied through their teeth, saying they knew where the WMD were hidden and they knew where the evidence would be found.

These people are the members of the Bush regime, not one or two members, but all of them. It is not only George Bush who stands for election on November 2nd - it is the entire regime, including the substantially important Jewish lobby within Washington. It is not only Capitol Hill which controls your foreign policy, it is also, and with increasing importance, the Knesset in Tel Aviv.

George Bush may have tried his level best at being President of the United States of America and nobody doubts that he will have wanted to give it his best shot and do a good job. However, his background, his speeches and his skills, make it only too apparent that he does not have what it takes. Like the Texas he was born in, he is a Lone Ranger.

George Bush and his government have managed to divorce Washington from the international community. He dare not step off an aircraft in most countries and even in the home of his closest ally, the UK, he was the only visiting Head of State to have to run out of Number 10 Downing Street by the back door, because he was too scared to leave by the front, given the fury of the demonstrators against him.

Is this the image you wish to vote for on November 2nd?

George Bush and his administration spent four long years breaking every fibre of decency† and each and every norm in practice in the diplomatic community. If New York is host to the United Nations Organization, how can it be justified to breach the UN Charter by attacking Iraq outside the auspices of this organization? Each and every resolution bears the express condition that any act of war must be the result of a separate resolution of the UN Security Council.

If Washington and London did not believe this to be the case, why did the USA and UK spend so many energies trying to secure the vote, only to deride this organism when they saw they could not win the day by diplomatic means? Hence the phrase, echoing around the international community: US out of UN or UN out of US.

George Bush has turned the USA into a pariah state in the international community and before the eyes of the citizens of the world.

The legacy of George Bush is unfortunately abject failure in everything he has done. Internally, it is up to the citizens of the USA to decide whether he has delivered on jobs, health care, welfare, pensions and so on - for this is nobody else"s business. Externally, however, he has wholly destabilized a delicate region which he was advised not to enter.

Afghanistan is far from pacified, the Taleban are as strong as ever, the difference being now that the heroin trade has restarted. Fantastic for the cities of Russia and Europe, now flooded once more by prime quality smack. We can thank George Bush for that every time an old lady is kicked to death for her pension money by some guy who needs a fix.

Iraq was never a bastion of terrorism, as Rumsfeld now admits. It is now, only after the illegal, incompetent, unfounded invasion launched by George Bush. Cities like Fallujah, more than one year on, are still in the hands of Iraq"s freedom fighters and now, the calls for British troops to help the US forces, who are losing control in Baghdad, are causing a political furore in London, due to the fact that the actions of the US armed forces would be considered war crimes in Europe.

The torture at Abu Ghraib was one symptom of a disease called George Bush and his neo-conservative, extremist, elitist regime, basically a group of super rich kids who thought nothing of spending two hundred thousand million dollars of your hard-earned money, which, you"d better believe it, you will pay a heavy price for in the coming years. Elect Bush again, and there will be more, much more.

You, the electors, will be the ones who pay, not Bush or Cheney or Rice or Rumsfeld or Wolfowitz. They"ve already filled their coffers, they only care about you before November 2nd. After that, all you can do is to sit back and watch as the horror unfolds before your eyes..

The final twist to this sordid and horrible tale is that the war crimes committed by the Pentagon have created a sullen hatred in the hearts and minds of the international community. The shock and awe we feel at learning how cluster bombs were dropped in civilian areas, for children to pick up thinking they were sweets, only to have their eyes and faces and futures and lives blown away, makes us stand together making a solemn and heartfelt request to our friends, or those we wish to count as friends, over the other side of the Atlantic.

Please, consider very carefully what you are doing on November 2nd. We want to have the USA back among us as part of the international community of nations. A vote for Bush is a vote for more wars, more terrorism, more violence, a shift further away from the welcoming arms of the community of nations, which wants to live together as brothers, not in hatred.

Killing tens of thousands of civilians is not Christian, it is evil and the callousness with which this issue is faced by the Bush regime is witness to the coldness in their hearts and minds, a coldness which creates shock and revulsion in the community of nations. In Europe, in Africa, in Asia, in Latin America, in Canada

If you cannot bring yourselves to vote for any of the other contestants, then at least, please, consider not voting for Bush. In a nutshell, there are no two ways about it. Killing tens of thousands of civilians by strafing their homes, mutilating tens of thousands more, commiting rape and torture on a scale unseen outside the concentration camps of Hitler, amounts to war crimes, murder.

Voting for Bush is voting for a war criminal and a mass murderer.

In the name of the world community,

[b]For the Love of God,

Respectfully and in friendship

Timothy Bancroft-Hinchey[/b], http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

OPEN LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

10.29.04 (6:21 am) [edit]

OPEN LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

10.29.04 (6:21 am) [edit]

THE BETRAYERS

10.29.04 (6:15 am) [edit]

On Sept. 14, 2001, as the Twin Towers in New York were still smoking, this column spoke of the coming response: "Blood will have blood; that's certain. But blood will not end it. For murder is fertile: It breeds more death, like a spider laden with a thousand eggs."

Almost 3,000 people died in the Sept. 11 attacks: a vast crime, a deep-dyed evil. The whole world rose up against it in condemnation and solidarity. The perpetrators claimed justification in the immense suffering their people had long endured at the hands of the West and West-backed tyrants, a death toll running into the millions. But the people of the world -- including the Muslim lands -- rejected that argument. There is no justification for shedding innocent blood, we all said, not even as "collateral damage" in a self-proclaimed "pre-emptive" war to avenge and protect your people, not even if you believe God Almighty has endorsed your cause. The terrorists' justifications were rightly thrust aside, and they were branded betrayers of our common humanity.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

THE BETRAYERS

10.29.04 (6:15 am) [edit]

THE BETRAYERS

10.29.04 (6:14 am) [edit]

Dumb Voters for Bush

10.29.04 (6:12 am) [edit]

[b]Studies show Bush supporters are misled on Bush policies and the news[/b]

Oh, you sweet, innocent, carefree citizens in non-swing states. You have no idea how much fun and slime you are missing.

In the swingers, wolves stalk us mercilessly (as the pro-wolf lobby points out indignantly, no one has ever been killed by wolves on U.S. soil, but try arguing that in the face of the relentless new TV ad campaign). Breaking news everywhere -- 380 tons of high explosives in Iraq left unattended, stock market down to year's low, leading economic indicators down, more tragedy in Iraq, the Swift Boat Liars are back, more Halliburton scandal, George Tenet says the war in Iraq is "wrong" -- it feels like you're dodging meteorites here in the Final Days.

Actually, the best evidence suggests we need to slow way down and go way back, because far from being able to take in anything new, it turns out many of our fellow citizens, especially Bush supporters, are stuck like bugs in amber in some early misperceptions that have never been cleared up.

It seems the majority of Bush supporters, according to recent polls, still believe Saddam Hussein had ties to Al Qaeda and even to 9-11, and that the United States found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Many of you are asking how that could possibly be, since everybody knows...

But everybody doesn't know. There it is. And if you are wondering why everybody doesn't know, you can either blame it on the media, always a shrewd move, or take notice that the administration is STILL spreading this same misinformation.

Both Donald Rumsfeld and Bush have publicly acknowledged there is no evidence of any links between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. However, as Dick Cheney campaigns, a standard part of his stump speech is the accusation that Saddam Hussein "had a relationship" with Al Qaeda or "has long-established ties to Al Qaeda." He makes this claim up to the present day. The 9-11 Commission, however, found that there was "no collaborative relationship" between the two.

Cheney, of course, also has never given up his touching faith that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, recently referring to a "nuclear" program that had in fact been abandoned shortly after the first Gulf War. Bush and Cheney misled the country into war using these two false premises, and it turns out an enormous number of our fellow citizens still believe both of them to be true. It's not because they're stupid, but because an administration they trust is still telling them both phony propositions are true.

Normally, when you get a situation like that -- where people are simply not acknowledging reality -- it is considered a cult, a form of groupthink based on irrational beliefs propagated by what is normally a charismatic leader. So those Kerry volunteers earnestly engaging Bush supporters on the latest outrage are way off base. They need to go all the way back to the Two Great Lies that got us into this: Many American soldiers marching into Iraq believed it was "payback for 9-11."

A third slightly blinding fact (to me) is that more people now think Kerry behaved shamefully in regards to Vietnam than did W. Bush. Incredible what brazen lying will do, isn't it?

A friend of Bush's dad got him into the "champagne unit" of the Texas Air National Guard, a unit packed with the sons of the privileged trying to stay out of Vietnam, and he failed to complete his service there. Kerry is a genuine, bona fide war hero. The men who served on his boat are supporting him for president, but those who didn't serve with him, who weren't there, who don't know what happened, have been given more credence. Wolves will get you!

In further unhappy evidence of how ill-informed the American people are (blame the media), the Program on International Policy Attitudes found Bush supporters consistently ill-informed about Bush's stands on the issues (Kerry-ans, by contrast, are overwhelmingly right about his positions). Eighty-seven percent of Bush supporters think he favors putting labor and environmental standards into international trade agreements. Eighty percent of Bush supporters believe Bush wants to participate in the treaty banning landmines. Seventy-six percent of Bush supporters believe Bush wants to participate in the treaty banning nuclear weapons testing. Sixty-two percent believe Bush would participate in the International Criminal Court. Sixty-one percent believe Bush wants to participate in the Kyoto Treaty on global warming. Fifty-three percent does not believe Bush is building a missile defense system, a.k.a. "Star Wars."

The only two Bush stands the majority of his supporters got right were on increasing defense spending and who should write the new Iraqi constitution.

Kerry supporters, by contrast, know their man on seven out of eight issues, with only 43 percent understanding he wants to keep defense spending the same but change how the money is spent, and 57 percent believing he wants to up it.

So what's going on here? I do not think Kerry people are smarter than Bush people, so why are they better-informed? Maybe a small percentage of ideological right-wingers don't believe anything the Establishment media say, but I don't think this is a matter of not believing what they hear, but of not hearing what's factual.

The great triumph of the political right in this country has been the creation of a network of alternative media. There are people who listen to Rush Limbaugh for more hours every day than the Branch Davidians listened to David Koresh. Watch Fox News, read The Washington Times -- hey, that's what the Bush administration does, according to its own words.

But it's not just the right-wing media purveying lies -- they are quoting the administration. These misimpressions come directly from the Bush administration, still, over and over.

Molly Ivins is the former editor of the liberal monthly The Texas Observer. She is the bestselling author of several books including Who Let the Dogs In? - http://www.workingforchange.c...

Dumb Voters for Bush

10.29.04 (6:10 am) [edit]

Dumb Voters for Bush

10.29.04 (6:08 am) [edit]

IT'S A PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR, STUPID: 'It's not just Al Qaqaa'

10.29.04 (6:02 am) [edit]

Just in case, the right is already explaining away President Bush's defeat: it's all the fault of the "liberal media," particularly The New York Times, which, so the conspiracy theory goes, deliberately timed its report on the looted Al Qaqaa explosives - a report all the more dastardly because it was true - for the week before the election.

It's remarkable that the right-wingers who dominate cable news and talk radio are still complaining about a liberal stranglehold over the media. But, that absurdity aside, they're missing a crucial point: Al Qaqaa is hardly the only tale of incompetence and mendacity to break to the surface in the last few days. Here's a quick look at some of the others:

[b]Letting Osama get away [/b]Just before the story about Al Qaqaa broke, the Bush-Cheney campaign was frantically trying to debunk John Kerry's statement that Mr. Bush let Osama bin Laden get away when he was cornered at Tora Bora. That getaway, Mr. Kerry asserts, was possible because the administration "outsourced" the job of closing off escape routes to local Afghan warlords.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

IT'S A PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR, STUPID: 'It's not just Al Qaqaa'

10.29.04 (6:00 am) [edit]

IT'S A PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR, STUPID: 'It's not just Al Qaqaa'

10.29.04 (5:59 am) [edit]

IT'S A PATTERN OF BEHAVIOR, STUPID: 'It's not just Al Qaqaa'

10.29.04 (5:59 am) [edit]

LOOK AT THE HAPPY, LIBERATED CORPSES: 100,000 Iraqi Civilians Dead, Study Reveals ...

10.29.04 (5:55 am) [edit]

About 100,000 Iraqi civilians - half of them women and children - have died in Iraq since the invasion, mostly as a result of airstrikes by coalition forces, according to the first reliable study of the death toll from Iraqi and US public health experts.

The study, which was carried out in 33 randomly-chosen neighbourhoods of Iraq representative of the entire population, shows that violence is now the leading cause of death in Iraq. Before the invasion, most people died of heart attacks, stroke and chronic illness. The risk of a violent death is now 58 times higher than it was before the invasion.

Last night the Lancet medical journal fast-tracked the survey to publication on its website after rapid, but extensive peer review and editing because, said Lancet editor Richard Horton, "of its importance to the evolving security situation in Iraq". But the findings raised important questions also for the governments of the United Sates and Britain who, said Dr Horton in a commentary, "must have considered the likely effects of their actions for civilians".

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

LOOK AT THE HAPPY, LIBERATED CORPSES: 100,000 Iraqi Civilians Dead, Study Reveals ...

10.29.04 (5:54 am) [edit]

LOOK AT THE HAPPY, LIBERATED CORPSES: 100,000 Iraqi Civilians Dead, Study Reveals ...

10.29.04 (5:53 am) [edit]

LOOK AT THE HAPPY, LIBERATED CORPSES: 100,000 Iraqi Civilians Dead, Study Reveals ...

10.29.04 (5:51 am) [edit]

What the 2nd Richest Man in the World Says About Taxing the Rich & The Rest of Us!!!

10.28.04 (7:21 am) [edit]

The annual Forbes 400 lists prove that -- with occasional blips -- the rich do indeed get richer. Nonetheless, the Senate voted last week to supply major aid to the rich in their pursuit of even greater wealth.

The Senate decided that the dividends an individual receives should be 50 percent free of tax in 2003, 100 percent tax-free in 2004 through 2006 and then again fully taxable in 2007. The mental flexibility the Senate demonstrated in crafting these zigzags is breathtaking. What it has put in motion, though, is clear: If enacted, these changes would further tilt the tax scales toward the rich.

Let me, as a member of that non-endangered species, give you an example of how the scales are currently balanced. The taxes I pay to the federal government, including the payroll tax that is paid for me by my employer, Berkshire Hathaway, are roughly the same proportion of my income -- about 30 percent -- as that paid by the receptionist in our office. My case is not atypical -- my earnings, like those of many rich people, are a mix of capital gains and ordinary income -- nor is it affected by tax shelters (I've never used any). As it works out, I pay a somewhat higher rate for my combination of salary, investment and capital gain income than our receptionist does. But she pays a far higher portion of her income in payroll taxes than I do.

She's not complaining: Both of us know we were lucky to be born in America. But I was luckier in that I came wired at birth with a talent for capital allocation -- a valuable ability to have had in this country during the past half-century. Credit America for most of this value, not me. If the receptionist and I had both been born in, say, Bangladesh, the story would have been far different. There, the market value of our respective talents would not have varied greatly.

Now the Senate says that dividends should be tax-free to recipients. Suppose this measure goes through and the directors of Berkshire Hathaway (which does not now pay a dividend) therefore decide to pay $1 billion in dividends next year. Owning 31 percent of Berkshire, I would receive $310 million in additional income, owe not another dime in federal tax, and see my tax rate plunge to 3 percent.

And our receptionist? She'd still be paying about 30 percent, which means she would be contributing about 10 times the proportion of her income that I would to such government pursuits as fighting terrorism, waging wars and supporting the elderly. Let me repeat the point: Her overall federal tax rate would be 10 times what my rate would be.

When I was young, President Kennedy asked Americans to "pay any price, bear any burden" for our country. Against that challenge, the 3 percent overall federal tax rate I would pay -- if a Berkshire dividend were to be tax-free -- seems a bit light.

Administration officials say that the $310 million suddenly added to my wallet would stimulate the economy because I would invest it and thereby create jobs. But they conveniently forget that if Berkshire kept the money, it would invest that same amount, creating jobs as well.

The Senate's plan invites corporations -- indeed, virtually commands them -- to contort their behavior in a major way. Were the plan to be enacted, shareholders would logically respond by asking the corporations they own to pay no more dividends in 2003, when they would be partially taxed, but instead to pay the skipped amounts in 2004, when they'd be tax-free. Similarly, in 2006, the last year of the plan, companies should pay double their normal dividend and then avoid dividends altogether in 2007.

Overall, it's hard to conceive of anything sillier than the schedule the Senate has laid out. Indeed, the first President Bush had a name for such activities: "voodoo economics." The manipulation of enactment and sunset dates of tax changes is Enron-style accounting, and a Congress that has recently demanded honest corporate numbers should now look hard at its own practices.

Proponents of cutting tax rates on dividends argue that the move will stimulate the economy. A large amount of stimulus, of course, should already be on the way from the huge and growing deficit the government is now running. I have no strong views on whether more action on this front is warranted. But if it is, don't cut the taxes of people with huge portfolios of stocks held directly. (Small investors owning stock held through 401(k)s are already tax-favored.) Instead, give reductions to those who both need and will spend the money gained. Enact a Social Security tax "holiday" or give a flat-sum rebate to people with low incomes. Putting $1,000 in the pockets of 310,000 families with urgent needs is going to provide far more stimulus to the economy than putting the same $310 million in my pockets.

When you listen to tax-cut rhetoric, remember that giving one class of taxpayer a "break" requires -- now or down the line -- that an equivalent burden be imposed on other parties. In other words, if I get a break, someone else pays. Government can't deliver a free lunch to the country as a whole. It can, however, determine who pays for lunch. And last week the Senate handed the bill to the wrong party.

Supporters of making dividends tax-free like to paint critics as promoters of class warfare. The fact is, however, that their proposal promotes class welfare. For my class.

[b]By Warren Buffett: The writer is chief executive officer of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., a diversified holding company, and a director of The Washington Post Co., which has an investment in Berkshire Hathaway[/b]. - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

What the 2nd Richest Man in the World Says About Taxing the Rich & The Rest of Us!!!

10.28.04 (7:21 am) [edit]

FAITH ABUSE: When God Becomes a Campaign Ploy ...

10.28.04 (7:18 am) [edit]

This is my last column before Election Day. With less than a week to go, I plan on doing everything in my power to defeat George W. Bush (need a ride to the polls?). Then I'm going to get down on my knees and pray to a higher power.

As someone for whom faith is incredibly important, and who regularly prays for all the people and things that matter to me, I'm hopeful that God is as appalled as I am with the way His name is constantly being taken in vain on the Bush campaign trail, and with how the president is abusing his faith to justify to himself and to the world his disastrous policies.

Lord knows there's a very long list of things to be angry with Bush about, but this one has moved to the top of my personal hit parade because, as Catholic theologians teach us, "The corruption of the best is the worst." And George W. is truly corrupting faith and dragging it into the political gutter. In two fundamental ways:

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

FAITH ABUSE: When God Becomes a Campaign Ploy ...

10.28.04 (7:18 am) [edit]

Bush's Big Lie(s) ...

10.28.04 (7:15 am) [edit]

On the campaign trail, George W. Bush repeatedly notes that his administration is achieving progress in the war in Iraq and in the so-called war on terrorism. "We're succeeding," Bush declares. And he says, "We're safer now." Both statements, though, have a shaky basis in fact. They comprise an isn't-it-pretty-to-think- so fairy tale that Bush is relying upon to retain control of the White House. And since truth, nuance, or a hardheaded recognition of reality might interfere with his reelection, Bush finds no need for them.

Against an enemy like al Qaeda--actually the enemy is now a global Islamic jidhadist movement difficult to track and target--there is no way to determine definitively if the United States is indeed "safer." The country certainly seemed safe in the years between the first World Trade Center bombing and September 11. Bush's "we're safer" declaration is based on assertion not proof. Saddam Hussein, a despicable tyrant (but one who did not pose an immediate threat to the United States), is out of power. Yet the invasion of Iraq has sparked an expansion of the fundamentalist forces that consider America the number-one target. And if the enemy is expanding, can one say that the threat facing the United States is diminishing? With US troops stuck in Iraq and the United States' standing in the world unquestionably tarnished, it is tough to define "safe," let alone claim an increase in safety. And Bush's parallel claim--"we're succeeding"--has been undermined by recent revelations and reports.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

Bush's Big Lie(s) ...

10.28.04 (7:15 am) [edit]

Bush's Big Lie(s) ...

10.28.04 (7:14 am) [edit]

BUSH'S CORPORATE FASCISM: 'The Bush Crony Full-Employment Act of 2003'

10.28.04 (7:09 am) [edit]

Josh Marshall writes a column for The Hill, a Congressional newspaper. Josh says that every big new piece of legislation needs a catchy title to set it apart, and he came up with a good title for the $87 billion allocated to rebuilding Iraq. "The Bush Crony Full-Employment Act of 2003." I like that, it's very fitting.

[b]Who is Joe Allbaugh?[/b]

Anybody remember Joe Allbaugh? He was part of the inner circle in Bush's 2000 presidential campaign, along with Karl Rove and Karen Hughes. In January 2001, Bush put Allbaugh in charge of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which dispenses disaster money and loans after hurricanes, floods and fires.

[b]New Bridge Strategies[/b]

I think Joe missed his calling. He should be a fortune teller, because somehow he knew a couple of weeks before Bush declared war on Iraq that he should quit his government job and go into the business of helping wealthy clients secure Iraqi reconstruction contracts.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

BUSH'S CORPORATE FASCISM: 'The Bush Crony Full-Employment Act of 2003'

10.28.04 (7:09 am) [edit]

Bush's Treasonous War-Profiteering: It's All In the Family!!!

10.28.04 (7:07 am) [edit]

[b]All in the (profiteering, first) family[/b]

Close relatives of President George W. Bush continue to benefit financially from the Iraq invasion, as revealed by sources including regulatory filings.

St. Louis, Mo.-based Engineered Support Systems (EASI), where William H. T. Bush, an uncle of George W. Bush, joined the board of directors in 2000, is a major military contractor. William H. T. Bush is a Bush ``Pioneer," a contributor raising more than $100,000, in the 2000 and 2004 elections. Following the 2000 election and Sept. 11, 2001, the company's federal contracts, revenues and stock price have increased. The company declined to comment for this article.

EASI received contracts from all branches of the armed forces in 2003. The Defense Department listed EASI in its top 100 contractors in 2001, with $330 million in contracts; and in 2002, with $380 million in contracts Estimates for 2003 are over $380 million.

As luck would have it, company products include ``Field Deployable Environmental Control Units" to deal with weapons of mass destruction.

On Jan. 17, 2003, the company announced orders from the Air Force and the Marines for these units, complete with Nuclear Biological Chemical Kits, in preparation for secret arsenals of WMDs hidden, the White House insisted, by Saddam Hussein.

On Jan. 22, 2003, President Bush delivered one of several speeches in St. Louis. On Jan. 28, 2003, he delivered his State of the Union address, including the famous accusations linking Saddam's Iraq to WMDs and illicit nuclear material.

On March 26 the company announced an Army order for its ``Chemical Biological Protected Shelter" systems, bringing Army orders for this product to a total of 204 units. On March 25, the Bush administration requested supplemental funding from Congress ``to cover military operations, relief and reconstruction activities in Iraq, and ongoing operations in the global war on terrorism."

On May 1, EASI announced the acquisition of its Maryland subsidiary, TAMSCO, coincidentally the day President Bush made his televised flight-suit appearance to announce ``mission accomplished" in Iraq. The following week, TAMSCO announced that it had begun technology support for U.S. Army logistics operations in the Middle East, stating that this tech support began linking the United States, Kuwait and Germany in February, 2003.

The White House has not responded to repeated telephoned and e-mailed requests for comment.

The stock advisor service VectorVest, which puts out a daily list of 7,500 American stocks ranked by value, safety and timing, has more than once listed EASI stock in first place. Directors of the company including William Bush, who is on the audit committee, received monthly consulting fees and options to buy stock at $28.42 per share. Company stock, which tripled in two weeks after 9/11, now trades at $49. In January 2003, William Bush owned 33,750 shares. In January 2004, he owned 56, 251 shares. Directors also own blocks of stock as a group.

This company track record is only part of a larger pattern, in which close associates of the sitting president share in financial benefits generated by the foreign policy of our highest office.

Former president George H. W. Bush resigned in fall 2003 from the finance giant Carlyle Group, heavily associated with military and security contracts, which received $677 million in contracts in 2002 and $2.1 billion in contracts in 2003. Carlyle recently sold $335 million in stock from its chief military subsidiary.

Neil M. Bush, a younger brother of George W. Bush, has a $60,000-per-year contract with a principal in Washington-based New Bridge Strategies, a private firm set up to generate contracts in Iraq.

A controversial $327 million contract, awarded in January by the U.S. Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, benefits Winston Partners, the private investment firm of Marvin P. Bush, another brother.

The contract, to equip the Iraqi armed forces and Civil Defense Corps, went to Nour USA, a Virginia company formed last May, which also benefited from an $80 million CPA contract awarded in July. Nour USA has come under scrutiny through its ties to Ahmed Chalabi, a member of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council.

It also has ties to Bush family interests. Nour USA is invested or affiliated with several companies in Winston Partners' portfolio, including Hobart West, an employment agency; LogoTel, a clothing company; and Axolotl, a computer-services company.

Controversy may obscure President Bush's reasons for embarking on the war in Iraq, but the record is clear that it profits his family. - http://www.independent-media....%20Bush%20Crime%20Family

THE MAD KING GEORGE'S MEDIEVAL TIMES

10.28.04 (7:03 am) [edit]

In the early 1960s, U.S. citizens witnessed America's "Camelot." JFK, Jackie, and their family opened up a youthful White House to a time of hope, a time of culture, a time of exuberance. Although the Cold War jitters were strong (The Cuban Missile Crisis was a nail-biter.) televised press conferences were the norm. Reporters roamed the White House freely. Somehow, no matter what, everyone believed they were safe. They had a leader they believed in.

Right now? Welcome to Bush's Medieval World, where people die in a far-off land during a Great Crusade, where what the King says goes (or else), where reality is ignored while the King concentrates on his God-given right to lead, where secrecy is not only admired but encouraged, where the press (and the public) is treated as the enemy and where the wallets of the poorest are pilfered.

It resembles those "Medieval Times" amusement restaurants, except there are no honorable knights left to joust and you can't afford to buy the meal. It's like the "real" Middle Ages, wherein the rights of the underclass were trampled by both military might and religious ideology and diseases (Back then, the "Black Death," today? Everything from AIDs to the common flu to sicknesses that might be cured by stem cell research.) were allowed to spread among the serfs, so the royalty could survive and prosper. The herd was thinned so there could be no revolt. The serfs that were left? They worked to keep the royalty in riches.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

THE MAD KING GEORGE'S MEDIEVAL TIMES

10.28.04 (7:02 am) [edit]

THE MAD KING GEORGE'S MEDIEVAL TIMES

10.28.04 (7:02 am) [edit]

THE MAD KING GEORGE'S MEDIEVAL TIMES

10.28.04 (7:02 am) [edit]

Real Reason Bush Is Running For President

10.27.04 (10:57 am) [edit]

BUSH'S TREASON: U.S. War-Profiteers Make A Killing In Iraq!!!

10.27.04 (10:49 am) [edit]

Jerry Zovko's contract with Blackwater USA looked straightforward: He would earn $600 a day guarding convoys that carried food for U.S. troops in Iraq.

But that cost -- $180,000 a year -- was just the first installment of what taxpayers were asked to pay for Zovko's work. Blackwater, based in Moyock, N.C., and three other companies would add to the bill, and to their profits.

Several Blackwater contracts obtained by The News & Observer open a small window into the multibillion-dollar world of private military contractors in Iraq. The contracts show how costs can add up when the government uses private military contractors to perform tasks once handled by the Army.

Here's how it worked in Zovko's case: Blackwater added a 36 percent markup, plus its overhead costs, and sent the bill to a Kuwaiti company that ordinarily runs hotels. That company, Regency Hotel, tacked on its costs for buying vehicles and weapons and a profit and sent an invoice to a German food services company called ESS that cooked meals for the troops.

ESS added its costs and profit and sent its bill to Halliburton, which also added overhead and a profit and presented the final bill to the Pentagon.

It's nearly impossible to say whether the cost for Zovko doubled, tripled or quadrupled. Congressional investigators and defense auditors have had to fight the primary contractor, Halliburton, for details of the spending. The companies say the subcontracts are confidential and won't discuss them.

About 20,000 private security contractors are now in Iraq, escorting convoys, protecting diplomats, training the Iraqi army and maintaining weapons.

The bills for this work flow from the bottom up. They start with Blackwater's $600-a- day guns for hire such as Zovko and his three comrades, who were killed escorting a convoy through Fallujah in March.

At the top is Houston-based Halliburton, which has an open-ended "cost-plus" contract to supply the U.S. military with food, laundry and other necessities. Cost- plus means the U.S. government pays Halliburton all its expenses -- its costs -- plus 2 percent profit on top.

So far the Army has committed $7.2 billion on this cost-plus contract to Halliburton, which has been criticized for its performance in Iraq. The company has drawn additional political fire because of its ties to Vice President Dick Cheney, a former Halliburton CEO.

Henry Bunting, a former Halliburton purchasing officer, said he heard a common refrain in 2003 in Kuwait from managers at KBR -- also known as Kellogg Brown & Root -- a division of Halliburton: "Don't worry about price. It's cost-plus."

"There is no question the taxpayer is getting screwed," said Bunting, who was an Army staff sergeant in Vietnam. "There is no incentive for KBR or their subs to try to reduce costs. No matter what it costs, KBR gets 100 percent back, plus overhead, plus their profit."

The Army said it is satisfied with Halliburton's performance.

"They are providing essential services to our troops every day," said Daniel Carlson, a spokesman for the Army Field Support Command, which oversees the contract. "All the reports from the field come back that they are providing the services adequately."

Even if the Pentagon could tally all the layers of profit and overhead, it would struggle to compare the cost of using contractors such as Zovko in Iraq against the cost of soldiers.

According to a Defense Department Web site, a soldier with Zovko's experience and final rank (he was a sergeant) would receive about $38,000 a year in base pay and housing and subsistence allowances. That figure would not reflect additional costs for things such as health and retirement benefits or combat pay.

The shift to private contractors has often been justified as cheaper and more efficient. But the real reason for the use of private contractors is to reduce the political costs of war, according to P.W. Singer, an expert on private contractors and the military at the Brookings Institution in Washington.

By using private contractors to do work soldiers once did, Singer said, the administration doesn't have to call up more regular troops, or National Guard and reserves, or compromise with allies to get them to send more troops.

"We don't need another division there -- we've got 20,000 private military contractors," Singer said.

But Singer said it's hard to see how five layers of profits and overhead could save money.

"A cost-plus structure is contrary to all the lessons of free-market economics," Singer said. "It is most ripe for abuse ... and by layering it and layering it, you make it even worse."

The way to keep costs under control is vigorous oversight, Singer said. But government auditors and congressional investigators have had a difficult time examining how money has been spent in Iraq.

A recent audit by the Defense Contract Audit Agency said Halliburton could not document 42 percent of a $4 billion invoice submitted to the Pentagon. Much of the $1.8 billion that lacked documentation was for subcontractors who helped feed U.S. troops -- the area in which Blackwater was working.

Halliburton will not discuss subcontracts, saying they are private dealings. Company officials dispute all accusations that they have overbilled the Defense Department.

The News & Observer obtained the Blackwater documents while reporting on the fate of four Blackwater contractors ambushed and killed in Fallujah in March: Zovko, Scott Helvenston, Wesley Batalona and Michael Teague.

In the days after the men were killed, the images of the mob abusing the contractors' bodies and dragging them through the streets drew worldwide outrage. The incident also spotlighted the growing role of private military contractors.

What wasn't clear at the time was how complex a structure lay beneath a simple decision: to use private contractors in Iraq.

Blackwater's charges to Regency for Zovko's work were $815 a day, a markup of $215. In addition, Blackwater billed Regency separately for all its overhead and costs in Iraq: insurance, room and board, travel, weapons, ammunition, vehicles, office space and equipment, administrative support, taxes and duties. Blackwater executives declined to be interviewed for this report.

Regency then billed ESS, the German food company. It's unclear how much Regency tacked on for profit and overhead; Jameel Al Sane, the owner of Regency Hotel, and his associate, retired U.S. Army officer Tim Tapp, declined to answer questions.

Kathy Potter, a former Blackwater employee who helped set up the company's Kuwait office, said Regency was making a tidy profit.

"Tim and Jameel would do stuff like quote ESS a price, say $1,500 per man per day, and then tell Blackwater that it had quoted ESS $1,200," Potter said in an interview this summer.

ESS, in turn, contracted with KBR, the division of Halliburton, which then billed the U.S government.

The Army would not provide information on payments to ESS. The government has no contract with ESS, officials said, so the public must request information from KBR.

Neither KBR nor ESS would answer questions about the contracts. The information belongs to KBR's subcontractors and is confidential, KBR spokeswoman Melissa Norcross said.

"Any contract details between Compass/ESS and its suppliers and employees are confidential and we adhere to a policy of non-disclosure," Mike Moore, managing director for ESS in the Middle East, wrote in an e-mail message.

Even the U.S. government struggles to get information about the spending. Accountants in the Defense Contract Audit Agency have had a long-running problem getting Halliburton to back up its invoices with documentation.

In March, the agency complained that Halliburton wasn't backing up its bills, despite repeated requests for supporting paperwork. The auditors said Halliburton couldn't ensure subcontractors were doing their work and didn't log their payments to them.

Halliburton billed the government for as much as three times as many meals as were actually served, auditors said. The company couldn't adequately explain or document payments to its dining subcontractors.

Despite those complaints, the defense agency that approves the payments, the Army Field Support Command in Illinois, kept giving Halliburton more time to answer the auditors -- three extensions totaling 135 days.

Finally, the auditors lost patience.

In a strongly worded memo Aug. 16, they said Halliburton could not support $1.8 billion of a $4.2 billion payment request. The auditors urged the Army to stop the extensions and withhold 15 percent of the payment until Halliburton provided the backup documents: "It is clear to us KBR will not provide an adequate proposal until there is a consequence."

The Army has not yet decided whether to withhold the 15 percent from Halliburton.

Congress has a hard time getting answers as well.

Rep. Henry Waxman of California and other Democrats on the House Government Reform Committee have had trouble getting information on basic spending or Defense Department audits of Halliburton.

The administration has not turned it over, and the committee has requested but not received copies of KBR contracts with subcontractors.

"We don't have accountability, we don't have transparency on where the money is spent," Waxman said. "Taxpayer money is being wasted. Huge amounts are going to subcontractors, and we have no idea how the money is being spent."

The private companies have also acted to protect themselves from their individual contractors and subcontractors.

For example, at least some private contracts protect the companies from their workers' becoming whistle-blowers. Contractors wanting to work for Blackwater in Iraq, such as Zovko, must sign contracts that compel them to pay Blackwater a quarter of a million dollars in instant damages if they violate their contract for doing things such as discussing details of the contracts or work.

The contract between Blackwater and Regency also contains explicit confidentiality clauses. Singer, the Brookings Institution analyst, said that is typical but troubling: The agreement is between private companies, but their activities are wholly in the public interest.

"The public is paying for it, and it is taking place in a war zone," Singer said. "It illustrates the lack of transparency in this whole business." - http://www.unknownnews.net/04...

A NATION DECEIVED ...

10.27.04 (6:59 am) [edit]

WHY WILL so many Americans buy images of national leaders that are so at odds with so much evidence?

This troubling question is crucial because the American democracy was founded on the notion that the truth will emerge in the deliberations of a free people.

Fear is surely a factor, especially so since our country came under attack three years ago. When we're afraid, we lose our tolerance for ambiguity. Black-and-white thinking is in: You're either for us or against us. When in the grip of fear, we crave certainty, because uncertainty magnifies the feeling of vulnerability. So a leader who shows no doubt, who doesn't even entertain second thoughts, is comforting for the fearful. The more afraid we are, the more we shift into a part of the brain where rational analysis does not govern.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

A NATION DECEIVED ...

10.27.04 (6:59 am) [edit]

A NATION DECEIVED ...

10.27.04 (6:59 am) [edit]

SAVING THE NATION ...

10.27.04 (6:55 am) [edit]

[b]This column doesn't contain enough space to recite all the appalling deeds of the Bush administration.[/b]

Nobody among the intellectual and power elites was overwhelmed by the Democratic candidate for president; the only thing they agreed on is that he would be marginally better than the alternative, who was a disaster.

And while they wanted him to win, they worried about whether he was decisive enough. They regarded him as a rich guy with a high society wife who liked hanging out with the beautiful people as well as the movers and shakers. While they didn't expect great things, they thought he'd be pretty safe, at least.

That's what they're saying now about John Forbes Kerry.

Which makes me smile, because that's exactly what they said back in the day about John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

SAVING THE NATION ...

10.27.04 (6:54 am) [edit]

SAVING THE NATION ...

10.27.04 (6:54 am) [edit]

THE GREAT ENABLER & HIS USEFUL IDIOT ...

10.27.04 (6:52 am) [edit]

It’s not surprising that Vladimir Putin endorsed Bush for president, saying that anything else would be a victory for international terrorists.

Of course, Putin considers Bush to be an idiot who blundered into a hopeless Iraq quagmire while trying to check Russian interests in the Middle East and Central Asia.

But Bush is a useful idiot.

There are three states that have unequivocally adopted a draconian, militarized, and unilateral security regime to deal with Islam-tinged terrorism: Israel, Russia, and the United States.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

IMPEACH BUSH/CHENEY: Signs of Voter Fraud Appear ...

10.27.04 (6:51 am) [edit]

[b]Registrations that are faked or tossed out have emerged in key states struggling to comply with ballot reform and a flood of new signups.[/b]

Broke, disabled and living at the Daisy Motel in downtown Las Vegas, Tyrone Mrasek Sr. took a temporary job late this summer registering voters here.

The employer primarily wanted President Bush supporters, but they were not easy to find. So Mrasek handed out cigarettes to drunks and ex-felons at a homeless shelter in exchange for signatures. Later he found a stack of signed registrations for Democratic voters in a trash can outside the company's office, he recalled.

"They had some shady things going on," Mrasek said.

Partisan registration drives have swept through battleground states such as Nevada, Ohio and New Mexico. Hundreds of thousands of new registrations have poured into county and state offices and strained the systems in these states.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

BUSH IS MILITARISTIC, NOT PRO-MILITARY (There's A BIG Difference!!!)

10.27.04 (6:48 am) [edit]

[b]Bush’s War Against the Military[/b]

George W. Bush so often invokes his nominal title of “commander in chief” at veterans’ rallies, on military bases and during presidential debates that he now appears like some latter-day caudillo. But his claims to be a commander of any kind in any serious way are a figment of his imagination.

Discounting that he sent American troops into Iraq on false pretenses, a real commander would fight for the welfare of his troops. But Bush has demonstrated a consistent unwillingness to do so, and as a result many high-ranking officers have endorsed Kerry, including retired Navy Adm. William Crowe and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Army Gen. John Shalikashvili.

Bush has failed the military on almost every level. While Halliburton and Boeing went to the bank this year with about $10 billion each, undermanned U.S. forces went into Iraq without armored vests and driving unarmored vehicles. The fatal results were hidden from public view as the dead were secreted home and the Department of Defense (DOD) obscured and juggled the numbers of maimed and wounded.

Once back in the United States, veterans found no federal welcome mat laid out for them. By April this year, one in six veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan had filed benefits claims with the Veterans Administration for service-related disabilities. These figures do not include those troops still serving and are twice the number the DOD Web site says suffered “Non-Mortal Wounds” in those conflicts. Today, one-third of those claims, almost 10,000, have yet to be processed. Further, Bush’s 2005 budget will cut 540 staff members of the Veterans Benefit Administration, which is the office that handles the claims. The outreach department that lets vets know of available services also was instructed in a 2002 memo by a deputy undersecretary in the Veterans Health Administration to run in silent mode to flush out people who had not made claims out of ignorance.

Even if the war wounded succeed in getting disability pay, in 2003 Bush threatened to veto a bill that allowed veterans to collect disability pay and pensions simultaneously.

In 2003, his administration also tried to cut combat pay from $225 to $150 a month and the family separation allowance from $250 to $100. And most callously of all, the frat brat who ducked a war that killed 48,000 American troops threatened to veto a proposal to double the $6,000 payment to relatives of soldiers killed in action.

That is typical of the way in which President Bush, who loves to dress up in uniform, treats those who actually wear one. As a June 30, 2003, Army Times editorial concluded: “President Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress have missed no opportunity to heap richly deserved praise on the military. But talk is cheap and getting cheaper by the day, judging by the nickel-and-dime treatment the troops are getting lately.”

In his ghostwritten 1999 biography A Charge to Keep, an indignant Bush wrote: “Nearly twelve thousand members of the armed forces are on food stamps. I support increased pay and better benefits and training for our citizen solders. A volunteer military has only two paths. It can lower its standards to fill its ranks. Or it can inspire the best and brightest to join and stay.” Despite four years to do something about it, more than 250,000 military families did not get Bush’s much-vaunted child tax credit because their breadwinner earned less than $26,000 a year. And in his 2005 budget, Bush proposes only that combat pay not count toward eligibility for food stamps—for which no less than 25,000 military families are eligible.

The U.S. Army pay scale is about half that of the British, which is why there is a major crisis in military recruitment. Senior officers talk about a “serious crisis” in recruitment for the regular forces. In addition, the Iraq war has put heavy demands on reservists and guard units. For the first time in 10 years, the guard failed to meet its recruitment target. In one Indiana unit, for instance, the reenlistment rate has dropped from 85 percent to 32 percent.

You would think that the Bush administration would be solicitous of the foot soldiers who carry out its imperial ambitions. But this administration is militaristic, not pro-military. Most of its members sedulously avoided combat and uniformed service of any kind in previous wars and most current enlisted personnel come from small town, blue-collar America, precisely the people whose voices are among the least heard. It is no surprise that Labor Secretary Elaine Chao’s proposals for cutting back legal entitlement to overtime pay this year included all those who had learned their skill in the military.

All of this penny-pinching may seem strange in light of Bush’s desperate attempts to associate himself with the military. But when he dons a flak jacket, the president is not looking to win over those GIs who have just had their term extended on stop-loss orders, but those TV-viewing voters who put the military on a pedestal as the guarantor of American virtues. - http://www.inthesetimes.com/s...

WATCH 5-MINUTE VIDEO OF COWARDLY BUSH READING 'MY PET GOAT' WHILE WE WERE UNDER ATTACK!!!

10.27.04 (6:44 am) [edit]

[b]Dubya[i] didn't have a clue [/i]what to do on 9/11. Instead of acting like a real leader (o[i]r even like a sane person[/i]), the Dry-Drunk Imbecile http://www.tblog.com/template... sat dumbfounded in a classroom with his proverbial "[i]thumb-up-his-butt[/i] "! Dubya [i]didn't even seem to consider [/i]that he should [i]get up off his poxxy-ass [/i]and see what had to be done to [i]protect[/i] our nation-- (At the time none of us knew, [i]unless the corrupt Bushies really knew in advance & let 9/11 attacks happen[/i], the potential extent of the attacks!) [/i][/b]

Somebody [i]with brains [/i]would have canceled the classroom photo-op and calmly told the Teacher and Kids that he had some important business to attend to. [i]Jesus Christ![/i] I've seen people far less powerful and important than the Prez of the USA do [i]that much[/i]! The [i]stupid propaganda tale [/i]perpetuated by Karl[i] 'Joseph Goebbles' [/i]Rove & their neo-con toadies is that Dubya didn't want to[i] "panic" [/i]people and it is a load of horse-shit. People with [i]even half-a-brain [/i]can calmly excuse themselves without causing panic, and if Dubya can't do [i]that much[/i] then he's so mentally unstable that he should be diagnosed as clinically incompetent and removed from office [i]ASAP[/i]-- What a [i]bunch of fools [/i]the neo-cons and their mad-dog toadies are to[i] think [/i]that they can bamboozle[i] all[/i] of us!

What an incompetent and stupid asshole Dubya truly is:-- The Dry-Drunk-Dubya goes into the classroom knowing the 1st WTC tower has been hit-- When told by Andy Card that the 2nd WTC tower has been hit and that the USA is under attack, the buffoon-boy sits there with a mindless look on his imbecilic smirking-face and[i] waits until they tell him [/i]that [i]it's time to go[/i]! But then Cheney and Rove [i]weren't there to give [/i]Dubya his script, [i]so he didn't act, but just sat there [/i]with a foolishly blank expression on his dumb-bell face during the worst attack upon America in modern times. This idiot[i] ain't fit [/i]to be called president of[i] anything[/i]!

[b]I guess Dubya thought reading "My Pet Goat" http://s89194761.onlinehome.u... was the most important thing in the world although millions of us might have been wiped-out!!![/b]

Go to [i]5-Minute Video of George W. Bush on the Morning of 9/11[/i] http://www.thememoryhole.org/...

WATCH 5-MINUTE VIDEO OF COWARDLY BUSH READING 'MY PET GOAT' WHILE WE WERE UNDER ATTACK!!!

10.27.04 (6:43 am) [edit]

WATCH 5-MINUTE VIDEO OF COWARDLY BUSH READING 'MY PET GOAT' WHILE WE WERE UNDER ATTACK!!!

10.27.04 (6:43 am) [edit]

Iraq Evidence 'Manipulated' by Bush's Neo-Con-Slut Feith's Unit, Senate Inquiry Finds

10.26.04 (4:08 pm) [edit]

LA Times: "A controversial intelligence unit set up in the Pentagon provided skewed prewar analysis to support Bush administration claims that Saddam Hussein was an ally of Al Qaeda, an investigation by Democrats on the Senate Armed Services Committee has found. The intelligence unit, run by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas J. Feith, shaded analytic judgments, ignored contrary evidence and sidestepped the CIA to present dubious findings to senior officials at the White House, the investigation concluded. The report was released Thursday by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) after a 16-month inquiry conducted by Democratic staff members on the committee. Levin has been a persistent critic of Feith and the Bush administration on Iraq."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.latimes.com/news/n...,1,2927542.story

Nothing Would Be More Deadly to the Lives of People Than (S)electing Bloodbath-George Bush!

10.26.04 (3:57 pm) [edit]

[b]Feeling the Draft[/b]

Paul Krugman writes: "Those who are worrying about a revived draft are in the same position as those who worried about a return to budget deficits four years ago, when President Bush began pushing through his program of tax cuts. Back then he insisted that he wouldn't drive the budget into deficit - but those who looked at the facts strongly suspected otherwise. Now he insists that he won't revive the draft. But the facts suggest that he will. There were two reasons some of us never believed Mr. Bush's budget promises... It's exactly the same when it comes to the draft. Mr. Bush's claim that we don't need any expansion in our military is patently unrealistic; it ignores the severe stress our Army is already under. And the... 'Bush doctrine' of pre-emptive war - would require much larger military forces than we now have. This leads to the justified suspicion that after the election, Mr. Bush will seek a large expansion in our military, quite possibly through a return of the draft."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.truthout.org/docs_...

The Republicans For Kerry Movement Is Growing Fast!!!

10.26.04 (3:54 pm) [edit]

Whatever the outcome of this presidential election 2004, it is clear that increasingly a growing number of Republicans are putting their country before party and standing against the corrupt Bush/Cheney Inc. [i]junta[/i] ... "We the People" need to bring a change of direction to our nation and together build a better society for all of our citizens ... Please vote for John Kerry for President of the United States of America ...

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.tblog.com/template...

Poll Shows Bush's Core Support Depends on Ignorance, Which is Promoted by the Media

10.26.04 (3:49 pm) [edit]

Greg Mitchell asks: "Is there a level playing field in terms of factual knowledge about certain key issues? If not, does the media bear any blame? I've been asking these questions all year, and now there's more food for thought." A new non-partisan poll reveals that the overwhelming majority of Bush's backers' faith in their candidate is based on a belief that Saddam Hussein had strong links to al-Qaeda and possessed WMDs or a major program for making them - ie, their support is based on LIES."The new survey finds that if the Bush supporters knew (or accepted) the truth, some of them might feel quite differently about the war. Asked whether we should have gone to war if Iraq was not making WMD or providing strong support to al-Qaeda, 58% of Bush supporters said no." So does the media work to promote the truth? Just the opposite: it continues to systematically distort and supporess it.

[b]Read article [/b] http://://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressin gissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=100068 2675

DimWitted Bush Says "'I Was One Guy in a Bubble'" (He Still Is!!!) ...

10.26.04 (3:47 pm) [edit]

Harold Meyerson writes,"'I have no outside advice' in the war on terrorism, Bush told Bob Woodward in December of 2001. In an interview that Woodward revealed to Nicholas Lemann in last week's issue of the New Yorker, Bush insisted that, 'Anybody who says they're an outside adviser of this Administration on this particular matter is not telling the truth. First of all, in the initial phase of the war, I never left the compound. Nor did anybody come in the compound. I was, you talk about one guy in a bubble.' Indeed. By every available indication, George W. Bush's is the most inside-the-bubble presidency in modern American history... Bush has fused anti-empiricism and cultural resentment -- and that, should he ride it to victory, will truly be a catastrophic success. "

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.alternet.org/elect...

Stupid Voters for Stupid Bush

10.26.04 (3:45 pm) [edit]

"In their latest strategy memo, James Carville and Stan Greenberg say 'the big story in this election is the Education Gap, which is greatly impacting who are the targets in the coming week, and will impact and be the story of the election afterwards. While the Gender Gap has diminished since 2000, the Education Gap has expanded significantly, and is now slightly larger than the division along gender lines.' 'In 2000, there was only a 2-point education gap, with Gore and Bush running dead even among college graduates and Bush winning by just 2 points among the non-college educated voters. The result was a 2-point education gap. But not so in 2004. Today, there is now a 12-point education gap. Kerry is winning college educated voters by 10 points but losing the non-college graduates by 2 points.'" ([b]Note:[/b] PDF file: http://www.democracycorps.com... )

SAFER? US Murder Rate Has Climbed Every Year Bush Has Been In Office!!!

10.26.04 (3:38 pm) [edit]

AP: "Every type of violent crime fell last year with one notable exception: Murders were up for the fourth straight year." I.e., they don't just beat you up now - they kill you. "After reaching a low point in 1999 of about 15,500 homicides, the number has crept up steadily since then to more than 16,500 in 2003 - or almost six murders for every 100,000 U.S. residents. That was a 1.7 percent increase from 2002 and a jump of more than 6 percent since 1999." Now get a load of the A.merican P.ropaganda spin line after this: "Still, the latest figure was 29 percent lower than the homicides in 1994." Who CARES what the rate was ten years ago? This stupid statement was inserted solely to soften the obvious blow to Bush's "Americans are safer" lie.

[b]Read article [/b] http://story.news.yahoo.com/n...

New Film Reveals the Shocking Depth of Collusion between Saddam and US Republicans

10.26.04 (3:37 pm) [edit]

Copies of the "The Trial of Saddam Hussein, the Trial You'll Never See," a documentary by French filmaker Michel Despratx and Canadian filmmaker Barry Lando reveals the "history of US collusion [with Saddam] going back to the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s, when Washington, fully aware Saddam was using mustard and nerve gas against Iranian civilians, calculated it was better to keep backing him against Tehran. US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is shown shaking hands and joking with Saddam in 1983...The 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait provides another scathing indictment of the US collusion with Saddam. The film shows a meeting between then US ambassador April Glaspie and Saddam eight days before the invasion in which she assures him Washington will take "no position in the event of any border conflict between Iraq and Kuwait". So far, NOT ONE AMERICAN STATION has ordered the film.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.theaustralian.news...,5744,11196219%5E2703,00.html

Flip-Floppin' FuckWit George Bush Suddenly Luvs Gay People Now??? HA HA HA!!!

10.26.04 (3:35 pm) [edit]

[b]Bush Flipflop: Hoping to Dupe Undecided Dems (all three of them), Bush Now he Says he's Pro-Gay![/b]

Political Gateway:"George W. Bush stressed Tuesday that he supports states' rights to allow civil unions for same-sex couples, contrary to his Republican Party's official stance, although he still opposes gay marriage. "I don't think we should deny people rights to a civil union, a legal arrangement, if that's what the state chooses to do," Bush said in an interview with ABC television aired Tuesday." LOL! This is coming from the man who wanted to change to constitution to send a message to gays! He apparently thinks liberals are as stupid as rightwingers - willing to believe any fairytale told them - like the ones about how he's a "moderate," a "uniter," "for patients' rights," and "pro-Kyoto protocol," just to name a few last minute campaign promises from 2000!

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.politicalgateway.c...

Bush is a Terrorist, Traitor & Fraud-- Putting Us In More Danger ...

10.26.04 (3:31 pm) [edit]

[b]Kerry Is Right, Bush Lies: US Let Bin Laden Escape, Hunt Was 'Outsourced' (Meanwhile Iraq is a Fucked-Up Nightmare with the Insurgency Growing!)[/b]

Josh Marshall: "Though we cannot in the nature of things have absolute certainty about bin Laden's whereabouts, there is little doubt that bin Laden was there. We had a 'reasonable certainty' he was there when the critical decisions were being made. And subsequent intelligence has only tended to confirm that belief. As to the issue of 'outsourcing,' the claim is unquestionably true. And it is widely believed that this was a key reason for the failure to capture bin Laden... What you simply cannot say is that the whole thing never happened. And yet that is precisely what the president and the vice president are now doing: Simply denying everything. Who you gonna believe? Me or your lyin' eyes? They are, in old fashioned English, lying. And the major news outlets covering the campaign -- as nearly as I've seen so far -- are just treating the disagreement as a he said/(s)he said in which both sides' arguments have equal merit. Sums up the whole campaign."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.talkingpointsmemo....

SINCLAIR-FASCIST SLUTS PLANNING LIES ABOUT KERRY FOR ELECTION EVE!!!

10.26.04 (6:29 am) [edit]

[b]Sinclair's 'POW Story' Promoted More Lies[/b]

"On October 22, Sinclair Broadcast Group aired a program titled A POW Story: Politics, Pressure and the Media that consisted of more than thirty minutes focused on Senator John Kerry's Vietnam War record, followed by less than four minutes purporting to examine President George W. Bush's service during the Vietnam era, and a final segment on the media. Parts of the anti-Kerry film Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal, as well as segments from a pro-Kerry film titled Going Upriver: The Long War of John Kerry, were shown during the broadcast. Kerry attackers and the program's host, Jeff Barnd, made a number of factually false statements, some of which were rebutted by Kerry defenders while others were left uncorrected. The overwhelming evidence that Bush shirked his Texas Air National Guard duty was glossed over: Viewers were told only that questions remain about whether Bush completed his required service. "

[b]Read article [/b] http://mediamatters.org/items...

ELECTION 2004 IS ALL ABOUT NAZI FASCIST ROVE-ISM ...

10.26.04 (6:27 am) [edit]

Neal Gabler writes,"All politicians operate within an Orwellian nimbus where words don't mean what they normally mean, but Rovism posits that there is no objective, verifiable reality at all. Reality is what you say it is, which explains why Bush can claim that postwar Iraq is going swimmingly or that a so-so economy is soaring. As one administration official told reporter Ron Suskind, 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own realityâ?¦. We're history's actors.' When neither dissent nor facts are recognized as constraining forces, one is infallible, which is the sum and foundation of Rovism. Cleverly invoking the power of faith to protect itself from accusations of stubbornness and insularity, this administration entertains no doubt, no adjustment, no negotiation, no competing point of view. As such, it eschews the essence of the American political system: flexibility and compromise."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.latimes.com/news/o...,0,6702300.story?coll=la-sunday-comm entary

THE CASE AGAINST BUSH: TEN REASONS AMERICA DESPERATELY NEEDS A CHANGE!!!

10.26.04 (6:23 am) [edit]

[b]Ten Reasons America Needs a Change [/b]

George W. Bush has been a busy boy these past four years. Because his Administration's policies are so radical and his attempts to change our country so far-reaching, it is sometimes difficult to remember them all. Here's a summary of why Bush and his gang of bloodthirsty corporate goons must go; voters may take them along to the polls to help them cast their ballots.

[b]1. He stole the 2000 election. [/b]Voting to "reelect" an illegitimate commander-in-chief who seized power by judicial coup d'état is a tacit endorsement of how he got into the White House in the first place. How the U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) ruled in Bush v. Gore is irrelevant. As a federal court, the five runaway Supreme Court justices had no right to agree to hear the case. Under our system of government, elections--and election disputes--fall under state jurisdiction. Their decision to take the case, the way they fixed the outcome in Bush's favor, and Bush's willingness to assume the presidency extraconstitutionally are outrages that no patriotic American, even if they agree with his policies, can forgive.

[b]2. He politicized 9/11. [/b]During the early days after the attacks on New York and Washington, a stunned nation came together to mourn, and to assess the motivations of the 19 men who despised us so much they were willing to commit suicide as mass murderers to drive home the point. Rather than channel our newfound solidarity into positive initiatives, however, Bush used 9/11 to push for the USA Patriot Act, fast-track signing authority on free trade, tax cuts for the wealthy, lax regulations for polluters and a multitude of items from the partisan Republican Party wish list. He portrayed Democrats and others who disagreed with him as un-American traitors.

[b]3. He let the terrorists get away while giving them a payraise.[/b] The 9/11 hijackers were Egyptians and Saudis recruited by an Egyptian group, Islamic Jihad, with funding from Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, some of whom received training at camps which were mostly in Pakistan, all of which were funded by Pakistani secret intelligence. Osama bin Laden (news - web sites), who may have funded all or part of the operation via Al Qaeda, was in Pakistan on 9/11. So who does Bush go after? Afghanistan (news - web sites), at best a back lot of Pakistani-backed Islamists and Iraq (news - web sites)--which had nothing to do with 9/11. And what does he do about our real enemies in Pakistan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia? He sells them more weapons. Egypt becomes the second largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid after Israel, collecting over $2 billion annually. Pakistan, ruled by a pro-Taliban general who jailed and tortured his democratically elected predecessor, is encouraged to develop its nascent nuclear capabilities. The 3,000 victims of 9/11 remain unavenged--and the stage is set for future attacks.

[b]4. He murdered nearly 100,000 people.[/b] The war in Afghanistan killed at least 10,000 civilians and 20,000 Afghan soldiers (of which 10,000 were POWs allegedly massacred by Northern Alliance soldiers as U.S. Special Forces troops supervised the slaughter.) As of three weeks after the fall of Baghdad, General Tommy Franks estimated Iraqi dead at 30,000 civilians and 30,000 Iraqi soldiers, men who were fighting to defend their country from a hostile invasion army. At least 10,000 more civilians and 5,000 Iraqi resistance soldiers have died since then. Neither Afghanistan nor Iraq have anything to do with the war on terrorism, which has yet to start. Both wars were waged to expand American military and economic hegemony and Dick Cheney (news - web sites)'s policy of "total energy dominance" over oil and natural gas resources. The world would be safer if Charles Manson, a mere amateur killer by comparison, were released and Bush was sitting in prison.

[b]5. He bankrupted the treasury.[/b] When Bush took the oath of office in January 2001, the U.S. Congressional Budget Office (news - web sites) projected a surplus of $5 trillion over the next ten years. Now, after two expensive wars of aggression and two series of extravagant tax cuts for the ultrarich--including the elimination of inheritance taxes on multimillionaires' estates--the federal budget is facing a $5 trillion shortfall. That's a $10 trillion net deficit--ten times more than the Reagan deficit that took Clinton his entire tenure to pay off--for giveaways to Bush-connected defense contractors like Halliburton and a fraction of one percent of wealthy individuals. Most Americans will get nothing out of this but the bill which, if history serves a guide, won't be repaid until our children are dead. Goodbye national healthcare, sayonara help with college tuition. Bush has stolen our future.

[b]6. He threw thousands of innocent people into concentration camps.[/b] Drawing from another of fascism's greatest hits, Bush used his fictional war on terrorism as a lame pretext to throw thousands of Muslims and Arabs into a new gulag archipelago spanning the globe from secret CIA (news - web sites)-run prisons in Afghanistan and Iraq--including the infamous Abu Ghraib--to INS detention centers in Brooklyn to the naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Detainees caught in battle were denied their Geneva Convention rights as POWs, tortured and even murdered. Illegal immigrants who should have been deported were jailed indefinitely without access to attorneys, or visits from family. In the ultimate Orwellian twist, they were turned into "unpersons"; even their names were withheld from the media. Any president who endorses such atrocities, as Bush has repeatedly done in speeches, is against everything that America purports to stands for. Bush has even signed a secret directive authorizing himself with the right to assassinate anyone, anywhere--including American citizens--as "enemy combatants."

[b]7. We are more feared than Al Qaeda.[/b] Bush's radical new policy of "preemption"--a self-ascribed right to invade other countries based on a presumed hunch--has terrorized then international community. Even though they have never threatened us, nations like Iran and Syria wonder whether or not Bush will invade them next--and are racing to develop nuclear weapons to protect themselves from the U.S. threat. Our traditional allies, who still want to engage themselves with the rest of the world, have been forced to distance themselves from our bull-in-a-china-shop foreign policy. We, not Islamist terrorists, are the world's most feared power. We are feared, which is why we are hated. Because we are hated, we are in greater danger.

[b]8. Bush has done nothing to improve the economy.[/b] At one of the presidential debates, Bush was asked what he would tell someone who had lost their job to outsourcing overseas. He answered that the unemployed had received their $300 tax cuts, and that within five years his education policies would start to help children. The truth is, Bush did nothing to jumpstart the weak post-dot-com economy he inherited in 2000. Like most Republicans, he favors high unemployment as a way to keep labor week and salaries cheap. A Bush victory would ensure more of the same--fewer jobs, lower salaries, reduced unemployment benefits. A president can do a lot to stimulate the economy: jobs programs funded by the government, tax cuts for the working class. But Bush won't act because it would run counter to his ideological beliefs.

[b]9. Bush will appoint the next Supreme Court justice.[/b] Whether they're values issues like abortion or gay marriage, or the next election dispute, the Supreme Court is balanced on the razor's edge between reason and right-wing fascism. Sandra Day O'Connor (news - web sites) and William Rehnquist (news - web sites), who originally intended to step down during the last four years but evidently decided not to do so because of Bush's lunacy, are over 80 years old. They may not last another four years. We can't let Bush have the chance to appoint their successors.

[b]10. We deserve a president who can speak English and doesn't look like a chimpanzee.[/b] John Kerry (news - web sites) is a far from ideal prospect but he's a huge leap forward from an evolutionary standpoint. - http://story.news.yahoo.com/n...%2Fucru%2F20041020%2Fcm_u cru%2Fthecaseagainstbush

BUSH WANTS $70 BILLION MORE FOR IRAQ-- BRINGING NEO-CON WAR-PROFITEERING TO $300 BILLION!!!

10.26.04 (6:23 am) [edit]

[b]Bush Wants $70 Billion More for Iraq, Bringing Total Cost of Iraq and Afghanistan to over $300 BILLION[/b]

Washington Post: "The Bush administration intends to seek about $70 billion in emergency funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan early next year, pushing total war costs close to $225 billion since the invasion of Iraq early last year." Add the cost of Afghanistan from Oct. 2001 to the invasion of Iraq, and you top off at over $300 BILLION. Notice how the White House always neatly omits that year and a half in Afghanistan to keep the "sound byte totals" down. Of this $300 Billion, so far, the lion's share has gone to US corporations, one way or the other, with the second chunk going to our troops (who should be first) and the smallest chunk to reconstructions (which should have been second).

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.timesunion.com/Asp...

THE CASE AGAINST BUSH ...

10.22.04 (10:19 am) [edit]

IF BUSH WINS ...

10.22.04 (10:18 am) [edit]

FOR ARGUMENT'S SAKE, let's assume that George Bush is reelected on November 2. What then? Well, for starters, somewhere in a Pakistani cave, Osama bin Laden will pop open a mud-caked bottle of champagne. The elongated Saudi multimillionaire could not have asked for a better friend in the White House than Bush has been, and the prospect of four more years of neocon imperialism promises a future so bright for Al Qaeda that they may don shades for their next taunting video. Anyone who doubts this need only examine what Bush has already done to unwittingly aid and abet the cause of Islamic radical fundamentalism.

Soon after his inauguration, Bush removed the United States from the Israeli/Palestinian negotiating table and gave right-wing Israeli premier Ariel Sharon the go-ahead to take aggressive action against the Palestinians, which has resulted in more than three years of incredible bloodshed in the Holy Land and provided an invaluable recruiting tool for the likes of Al Qaeda. Four more years of Bush assures that the U.S. will not do the last thing that bin Laden wants, which is to act as a committed “honest broker” in any Mideast peace process. Osama wants holy chaos, and Bush has helped give it to him.

Another gift Bush gave Osama was ousting bin Laden's secular enemy, Saddam Hussein, and turning Iraq into potentially the world's largest terrorist state, one that is on the constant brink on civil war. Also, by unilaterally invading Iraq, Bush alienated most of Europe and the rest of the world — making it highly unlikely that he can build multilateral coalitions against global terrorism — and transformed Iraq into a huge red, white and blue target for Islamic rage and a terrorist breeding ground, while allowing the far more dangerous nations of Iran and North Korea to enhance their nuclear capacities.

So, should Bush win reelection, you don't have to be Nostradamus to foresee how foreign relations will unfold in the near future. Most of America's allies will continue not to trust Bush's word, causing numerous problems in both economic and military/intelligence cooperation, and much of the world's opinion of U.S. policies will remain at an all-time low.

In Iraq, the tenuous “coalition of the willing” will continue to evaporate, and the over-hyped January elections will prove meaningless because terrorists will continue to pour over the borders and the centuries-old factions within the country will continue to vie for power, no matter who wins at the ballot box. And in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the bloodbath will continue because of Bush's unflinching support of the Likud Party, and “Death to America” will remain an Al Qaeda battle cry that, sadly, will continue to resonate on the Arab streets.

As troubling as the situation abroad will be for America with four more years of Bush, the domestic outlook is equally bleak. Because of his unflinching commitment to tax cuts for the wealthy, it's safe to predict that the deficit will remain sky-high and individual states will bear the burden of trying to maintain services with less and less financial help coming from the federal government, and more and more hostility coming from the local citizenry.

This trickle-down policy will most certainly lead to more problems for public schools, higher tuition for colleges, cuts in job-training programs and a general gutting of social services that will — taken together — result in both a continuing chasm between the rich and poor and an ongoing squeeze of the bottoming-out middle class. Plus, don't expect reduction in either the outsourcing of jobs or the slavish dependence on foreign oil.

And since Bush apparently believes that the sole reason health care costs are spiraling out of control is hefty malpractice judgments, expect him to work only on capping jury awards in this area while neglecting the mammoth role his friends in the insurance and pharmaceutical industries play in exorbitant health care expenses. And don't expect him to tell Americans that malpractice-related costs account for just a fraction of these soaring expenses and that states — such as Texas — that have capped jury awards do not have significantly lower health care premiums than most other states.

On social/cultural issues, count on more wedge issues like gay marriage and “under God” to dominate the Bush administration's agenda, and more reactionary justices like Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia to be appointed to the Supreme Court. Expect a “strengthening” of the Patriot Act, a loosening of corporate regulations, a tightening of censorship standards, a broadening in the number of media outlets one person can control, a rolling back of women's reproductive rights and a minimizing of the role science can play in combating terrible diseases.

For the past several months, Bush has run a cynical campaign composed of little more than Swift Boater attacks on John Kerry, coupled with shameless flag-waving, fear-mongering, saber-rattling and Bible-thumping. If this works and Bush is given a second term, the prospects for a united America and a more cooperative world will suffer a huge setback.

If nothing changes on November 2, don't expect a change for the better anytime soon. - http://www.freetimes.com/modu...

CHRISTOPHER REEVE'S Wife Endorses John Kerry

10.22.04 (10:18 am) [edit]

[b]Kerry Calls for Science, Tech Investment [/b]

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites) on Thursday accused President Bush (news - web sites) of slowing scientific advancement after earning a special endorsement from the widow of actor Christopher Reeve, a proponent of the embryonic stem cell research on which the president has placed limits.

"The American people deserve a president who understands that when America invests in science and technology, we can build a stronger economy and create jobs for the 21st century," Kerry said during a campaign rally. "But George Bush (news - web sites) has literally ... turned his back on the spirit of exploration and discovery."

Reeve's widow, Dana, said her family has been grieving privately since her husband died Oct. 10. "My inclination would be to remain private for a good long while," she said. "But I came here today in support of John Kerry because this is so important. This is what Chris wanted."

Reeve had lived as a paraplegic since a riding accident in 1995. He had become an advocate for medical research and believed studying embryonic stem cells might unlock lifesaving cures and treatments, Dana Reeve said.

"His heart was full of hope, and he imagined living in a world where politics would never get in the way of hope," she said.

The Kerry campaign said Dana Reeve approached the Massachusetts senator about making what probably would be her only campaign appearance. Another Kerry supporter, former Vice President Al Gore (news - web sites), has been asked to campaign this weekend in Florida, where he is seen as a symbol of an election many Democrats believe the GOP stole from them.

In his remarks at the rally, Kerry said scientific innovation needs political support and that Bush, beholden to special interests, refuses to make investments that benefited everyone.

"On the other hand, he has an extreme political agenda that slows instead of advances science," Kerry said.

In addition to stem cell research, Kerry wants to invest in manufacturing and biotechnology, spur automobile innovations and urge students to go into science with education benefits.

Kerry knew the "Superman" actor for about 15 years through family and activist connections. Reeve left him a long telephone message the day before he died, thanking him for campaigning on behalf of medical research.

His death has since reverberated on the campaign trail, as Kerry battles Bush over the ethics of stem cell research using embryos. Bush restricted federally funded research to lines already existing before his 2001 executive order, a decision criticized by some scientists and research advocates.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a Tennessee Republican and a heart surgeon, said Thursday that Kerry is wrong when he criticizes the Bush administration and its support of science.

"John Kerry showed today that as the election nears he is not interested in the facts and will say or do anything to gain him a political edge, regardless of the truth," Frist said. "He accused this administration of neglecting science, when President Bush has increase federal research and development funding by 44 percent."

Earlier this month, Frist accused Kerry and running mate John Edwards (news - web sites) of "shamefully trying to use the death of people like Christopher Reeve to promote falsehoods and dishonesty" about Bush's position on stem cell research. The Bush administration points out that he is the first president to provide funding specifically for stem cell research.

Edwards invoked the actor at a campaign event when he said, "If we do the work that we can do in this country, the work that we will do when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve will get up out of that wheelchair and walk again." - http://story.news.yahoo.com/n...

COMPARATIVE BIOGRAPHIES of George W. Bush and John Kerry

10.22.04 (10:18 am) [edit]

[b]W., John, Abe & Co. through the ages [/b]

[b]Comparative biographies of George W. Bush and John Kerry, with milestones from other political biographies:[/b]

Birth

George W. Bush is born July 6, 1946, in New Haven, Conn., where his father is attending Yale.

John Kerry is born on Dec. 11, 1943, in a military hospital in Denver, where his serviceman father is hospitalized.

Age 2

George W. Bush moves with his family to the oil town of Midland, Texas. George Bush Sr. is a well-connected and wealthy oil man. Midland is an oil-executive enclave, where streets are named for Ivy League schools.

Age 6

In 1950, Kerry's family moves to Washington, where his father begins his career as a salaried foreign-service officer.

Age 16

Bush is a cheerleader at the exclusive Andover School in Connecticut, 1962. His grade point average is in the C range.

Kerry founds a debate club at the exclusive St. Paul's School in New Hampshire, 1960.

Age 18

Despite a C average in prep school, George Bush is accepted at Yale. They see something in the young man, perhaps a resemblance to his father the congressman (Yale, 1948) and his grandfather, former Connecticut senator and now Yale trustee Prescott Bush (Yale, 1917).

Age 20

Bush is arrested for stealing a Christmas wreath from a New Haven hotel and charged with disorderly conduct, 1966. The charges are later dismissed.

(With smoke billowing from his plane's bullet-riddled fuselage, Navy pilot George H.W. Bush bails out over the Pacific, 1944. His two crewmen do not survive, and this fact haunts the future president for the rest of his life.)

Age 21

In May 1968, George W. Bush graduates from Yale with a low C average. Now eligible for the draft, he avoids service in Vietnam by jumping to the front of a long waiting list of young men to join the 147th Fighter Group, the so-called "Champagne Unit" of the Texas Air National Guard. On his application, under the heading Overseas Assignment, Bush checks the box marked "Do not volunteer."

Age 22

John Kerry is chosen to deliver the class oration to the Yale graduating class of 1966. In his speech he questions the wisdom of the Vietnam War, saying: "The United States must, I think, bring itself to understand that the policy of intervention that was right for Western Europe does not and cannot find the same application to the rest of the world." Despite his misgivings, he enlists in the Navy.

Age 24

In the fall of 1968, while serving on the guided missile frigate USS Gridley in the Gulf of Tonkin, John Kerry volunteers to command a Swift boat in the Mekong Delta. The casualty rate among Swift boat personnel is around 75 percent, compared with around 14 percent in the rest of Vietnam. His best friend from Yale, Richard Pershing, has already died in combat.

(The general store Abraham Lincoln has been operating in New Salem, Ill., fails after one year, 1832. He has no powerful friends or relatives, so nobody bails him out.)

Age 25

In May 1972, with two years left in his enlistment, Bush requests reassignment to an inactive postal unit of the Texas Air National Guard. The unit has no planes, but he has lost his flight status for not taking a physical.

On Feb. 28, 1969, while on patrol, Kerry's boat comes under attack from the shore. Ignoring generally accepted evasive procedures, Kerry turns his craft directly into the enemy fire, beaches it and single-handedly chases down and kills an enemy armed with a rocket launcher. For this action he receives a Silver Star for gallantry. He may have been in Cambodia at Christmastime in 1968, delivering agents during the secret war, or it may have been a month later.

Age 26

At Christmas 1972, in Houston, Bush is driving drunk when he plows into a neighbor's garbage cans. When his father asks to have a talk, George Jr. challenges him to a fistfight.

Age 27

Bush is granted an early release from the Texas Air National Guard so he can attend Harvard Business School, 1973.

John Kerry becomes one of the leaders of Vietnam Veterans Against the War. In 1971 he attends the Winter Soldiers Conference in Michigan, where he listens to other veterans' accounts of atrocities committed under orders in Vietnam. On April 22, 1971, Kerry testifies before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and asks the difficult question: "How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?" He relates some of the accounts told to him at the Winter Soldiers Conference. (George Washington marries a rich widow, 1759.)

Age 28

Kerry loses badly in his first run for political office, in the fall of 1972, in Massachusetts.

Age 30

Bush is arrested for drunken driving in Kennebunkport, Maine, September 1976. His teenage sister Dorothy is a passenger in the car. He pleads guilty and pays a $150 fine.

Kerry is earning a law degree at Boston College, 1974.

Age 32

George W. Bush's father sets him up in the oil business, 1978. The company is called Arbusto.

Age 34

John Kerry is working as a prosecutor in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, where he wins a high-profile murder case, and later gains the conviction of a notorious crime figure, George Edgerley. He never loses a case in Middlesex County.

Age 36

Some friends of George Bush Sr., then vice president, bail George Jr. out of his disastrous oil venture, absorbing Arbusto into Spectrum 7.

Age 39

(Lincoln, having been elected to Congress two years earlier, decides not to run for reelection, 1848. His vocal opposition to the war with Mexico was not popular with his constituents and may have played a part in his decision.)

In late 1986, Bush's new oil company, Spectrum 7, is $3 million in debt when it is rescued by Harken Energy, which is owned by friends of his father, the vice president. He is put on the Harken board, has his debts paid, is given another $2.2 million in stock options and a salary of $120,000 a year, with no real duties to perform.

Age 40

In 1986, Bush celebrates too hard at his 40th birthday party. He promises never to drink again.

In 1984, Kerry is the lieutenant governor of Massachusetts, a post he uses to champion better air and water regulations. On the retirement of Paul Tsongas, Kerry runs for his Senate seat, and wins.

Age 41

In 1985, Kerry bucks his party to support the Gramm-Rudman Balanced Budget legislation.

Age 42

Sen. Kerry employs his prosecutorial experience to investigate and uncover the Reagan administration's covert dealings with Islamic terrorists and the secret, illegal funding of guerrillas in Central America. The Iran-contra investigations result in convictions of several high Reagan administration officials.

Age 43

In June 1990, Bush sells two-thirds of his stake in Harken Energy at 2.5 times the original value of the stock, netting $848,560 two weeks before Harken announces a disastrous quarterly report. The SEC investigates the president's son in association with the sale of his stock.

(Washington is put in command of the Continental Army, 1775. His prudent strategy is to avoid direct engagement with the British, but to retreat slowly and strike when least expected. He avoids being wounded in battle but many of his fellow soldiers co nsider him a hero anyway.

Age 45

With an investment of $500,000 of borrowed money, Bush becomes a part owner of the Texas Rangers. He is given a $200,000 salary.

In 1989, Kerry votes to end the Apache Helicopter program, agreeing with Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney's recommendations to do so.

Age 46

In October 1990, Kerry votes to follow Cheney's recommendation to end the wasteful B-2 Bomber program. Kerry votes to stop making the F-14, which Cheney is growing skeptical of as well. Cheney proposes cutting the Trident submarine program and the Bradley Fighting Vehicle program, and Kerry, again, votes to support the defense secretary's wishes. Fourteen years later Kerry's support on these defense cuts will emerge as Vice President Cheney's bitterest criticisms of Kerry in the presidential campaign.

Age 47

In May of 1991, following the roadmap to normalization laid down by President George H.W. Bush, John Kerry visits Vietnam. As chairman of the Senate committee charged with investigating the POW/MIA issue, he works closely with a Republican senator and former POW, John McCain.

Age 48

With the help of wealthy friends, most notably Enron Chairman Ken Lay, George Bush is elected governor of Texas in 1994. While in office, he will set the record for executions by any governor in American history.

Age 51

In 1998, Bush sells his shares in the Texas Rangers, which he purchased for $500,000. The shares net $14.9 million. The biggest reason for the large profit is the fancy new stadium he helped persuade the state of Texas to build for the team.

Age 53

Running for president in early 2000, Bush loses to McCain in the New Hampshire primary but beats McCain in the South Carolina primary, after a very successful phone campaign in which Bush's people suggest McCain fathered a black child out of wedlock.

Age 54

Bush wins the Republican nomination for president. In November 2000, Bush claims victory in the presidential election, despite winning 500,000 fewer votes than opponent Al Gore. The Electoral College deadlock is broken when the U.S. Supreme Court stops a recount of votes in Florida. Bush receives liberal use of the corporate attorneys and corporate jets of Enron Corp. during the Florida vote-count litigation. He is the first U.S. president to be sworn into office with a criminal record.

Age 59

In early December 2003, most observers think Kerry's chances of winning the Democratic nomination for president are slim to none.

Age 60

Kerry accepts the Democratic nomination for president, July 2004.

[b]Eric Hanson is a Minneapolis writer and artist. The above is a selection from his forthcoming book, "The Political Book of Ages."[/b] - http://www.startribune.com/st...

THE US INVASION OF IRAQ: The Military Side of Globalization?

10.21.04 (11:09 am) [edit]

With the major justifications for the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq -- the former regime’s supposed possession of weapons of mass destruction and ties to the terrorist Al-Qaeda network -- now discredited, and claims of wanting to created a democratic Iraq highly dubious, this raises the question as to what actually motivated the United States to take on the problematic task of conquering and rebuilding that country.

To embrace the simplistic notion that it was done simply for the sake of the profits of American oil companies ignores the fact that even the most optimistic early projections of the financial costs of the invasion and occupation far exceed any additional profits that could have been reaped in the foreseeable future. Furthermore, Saddam Hussein was certainly willing to sell his oil at a reasonable enough price to satisfy Western buyers and his standing among fellow OPEC members was too low at that point to have wielded sufficient influence to successfully push the cartel to adopt policies detrimental to American interests.

This is not to say, however, that economic factors did not play an important role in prompting a U.S. invasion.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.commondreams.org/v...

WHEN THE ONLY THING THAT'S LEFT IS FEAR ...

10.21.04 (11:07 am) [edit]

'The only thing we have to fear is fear itself," said Franklin Roosevelt in his first inaugural speech. It was a powerful message for Americans who were facing the greatest economic challenge in their history.

George W. Bush uses fear in his message, too, only in a different way. If for Roosevelt, fear was the great enemy, for Bush, it is the great friend.

Fear, according to the polls, helps Bush's chances for re-election. On the economy, John Kerry leads Bush handily, but on who would do a better job fighting terrorism, Bush has the lead. On the stump and in the debates, Bush has sought to make voters fearful of a Kerry presidency.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

WHEN THE ONLY THING THAT'S LEFT IS FEAR ...

10.21.04 (11:07 am) [edit]

BUSH'S TEXAS RANGERS' Plot Thickens into Tax Evasion and More ...

10.21.04 (11:05 am) [edit]

As if Bush's sale of his $606,000 share of Texas Rangers stock to owner Tom Hicks for $15 million wasn't enough, there's more from deep in the heart of Texas to nail the good old boy, namely the possibility of tax evasion. That is, Bush declared the proceeds as a long-term capital gain, which it wasn't, as opposed to ordinary income, which it was. This means Bush paid at the capital gains' rate of 20 percent as opposed to the ordinary income rate of 39.6 percent. Beating the IRS out of nearly 20 percent in additional taxes. But the fun doesn't stop there.

As reported by MakeThemAccountable.com, http://www.makethemaccountabl... Bush had had prior business with Tom Hicks, who also was cofounder, with his brother R. Steven Hicks, of a radio company that merged in 1999 into AMFM, Inc. It was soon engulfed and devoured by Clear Channel Communications, of which old Tom became vice chair (I think the title is appropriate, don't you?).

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.smirkingchimp.com/...

BUSH'S TEXAS RANGERS' Plot Thickens into Tax Evasion and More ...

10.21.04 (11:05 am) [edit]

BUSH PRE-IRAQ ATTACK: "We're Not Going to Have Any Casualties"

10.21.04 (10:59 am) [edit]

[b]Robertson: I Warned Bush on Iraq casualties

President's response: 'We're not going to have any'[/b]

NEW YORK (CNN) -- The founder of the U.S. Christian Coalition said Tuesday he told President George W. Bush before the invasion of Iraq that he should prepare Americans for the likelihood of casualties, but the president told him, "We're not going to have any casualties."

Pat Robertson, an ardent Bush supporter, said he had that conversation with the president in Nashville, Tennessee, before the March 2003 invasion U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. He described Bush in the meeting as "the most self-assured man I've ever met in my life."

"You remember Mark Twain said, 'He looks like a contented Christian with four aces.' I mean he was just sitting there like, 'I'm on top of the world,' " Robertson said on the CNN show, "Paula Zahn Now."

"And I warned him about this war. I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, 'Mr. President, you had better prepare the American people for casualties.' "

Robertson said the president then told him, "Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties."

The White House has made no reaction to Robertson's comments.

Robertson, the televangelist who sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1988, said he wishes Bush would admit to mistakes made.

"I mean, the Lord told me it was going to be A, a disaster, and B, messy," Robertson said. "I warned him about casualties."

More than 1,100 U.S. troops have died in Iraq and another 8,000 troops have been wounded in the ongoing campaign, with the casualty toll significantly increasing in the last six months as the insurgency there has deepened.

Asked why Bush has refused to admit to mistakes on Iraq, Robertson said, "I don't know this politics game. You know, you can never say you were wrong because the opposition grabs onto it: 'See, he admitted he screwed up.' "

Even as Robertson criticized Bush for downplaying the potential dangers of the Iraq war, he heaped praise on Bush, saying he believes the president will win the election and that "the blessing of heaven is on Bush."

"Even if he stumbles and messes up -- and he's had his share of stumbles and gaffes -- I just think God's blessing is on him," Robertson said.

As for Bush's Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry, Robertson said, "I don't think he's a leader. He's a ponderous debater, a good senator probably." - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

[b]CNN SHOW TRANSCRIPT: PAULA ZAHN NOW 8:00 PM EST October 19, 2004 Tuesday [/b]

ZAHN: He's been posed repeatedly in debates, what mistakes have you made? He's been asked that on the campaign trail and he hasn't come up with any.

ROBERTSON: I met with him down in Nashville before the Gulf War started. And he was the most self-assured man I ever met in my life.

You remember, Mark Twain said, he looks like a contended Christian with four aces. He was just sitting there, like, I'm on top of the world, and I warned him about this war. I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, Mr. President, you better prepare the American people for casualties.

Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties. Well, I said, it's the way it's going to be. And so, it was messy. The lord told me it was going to be, A, a disaster and, B, messy. And before that, I had deep, in my spirit, I had deep misgivings about going into Iraq.

ZAHN: You just told me...

ROBERTSON: Yes. Yes.

ZAHN: As I asked you that question that you wished the president had admitted to the American public he's made these mistakes.

ROBERTSON: Well, sure.

ZAHN: Why don't you think he has?

ROBERTSON: I don't know this politics game. You can never say you're wrong, because the opposition grabs on it. And, you see, he admitted he screwed up. And so I don't know. But...

ZAHN: But, as someone who has run for president, you know this game better than just about anybody.

ROBERTSON: Oh, yes.

(CROSSTALK)

ZAHN: When you felt that you had the lord telling you that this was going to be a very bad thing to go into Iraq and you warned the president about it, he seemed to be dismissive.

ROBERTSON: Well, I warned him about casualties.

ZAHN: Of the casualties.

Where do you think that came from? Do you think he got bad advice? Do you think he was ignoring some of the advice he had gotten? What is it?

ROBERTSON: I just think he was so sure that this man was a tyrant, he was evil and he needed to be taken out. I mean, he just felt it.

Of course, he had advisers, the so-called neocons, around him that said, Mr. President, go get him, and we will liberate these oppressed people.

ZAHN: There are a lot of neoconservatives...

ROBERTSON: Yes.

ZAHN: ... who believe that president hasn't edited a lot of the advice he has been given.

BUSH PRE-IRAQ ATTACK: "We're Not Going to Have Any Casualties"

10.21.04 (10:59 am) [edit]

BUSH PRE-IRAQ ATTACK: "We're Not Going to Have Any Casualties"

10.21.04 (10:59 am) [edit]

The "I ain't no elite... I'm as thick-as-shit & proud of it" Factor!!!

10.20.04 (8:30 pm) [edit]

[b]Blue States Smart - Red States Dumb[/b]

Todd Smyth writes, "OK, call me an elitist but this is disturbing: Bush's Chief Advisor, Karl Rove has already said it: "As people do better, they start voting like Republicans...unless they have too much education and vote Democratic, which proves there can be too much of a good thing." Here's a chart that clearly indicates how stupid Republicans are compared to Democrats." The chart shows that the states with the highest % of college graduates are strongly DEM, while the states with the lowest % of college grads are strongly REP. Tell your Republican friends - why would they want want to be a member of the STUPID party?

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.independent-media....%20Reported

THE DUMB-ASS FACTOR

10.20.04 (7:20 pm) [edit]

DUELING LUNATICS: Pat Robertson and George W. Bush Told Different Stories by God! LOL!

10.20.04 (7:15 pm) [edit]

[b]Dueling Lunatics: Pat Robertson Said God Told Him War would be 'Messy,' While Bush 'Just Knew' There Would Be No Casualties[/b]

Newsday reports that religious fanatic Pat Robertson says "God had told him that the war would be messy and a disaster. When he met with Bush in Nashville before the war Bush did not listen to his advice, Robertson said... "He was just sitting there, like, 'I'm on top of the world,' and I warned him about this war...I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, 'Mr. President, you better prepare the American people for casualties.' 'Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties.' 'Well,' I said, 'it's the way it's going to be.' And so, it was messy. The lord told me it was going to be, A, a disaster and, B, messy." When ya get TWO Messianic complexes going at it, things should get interesting!

[b]Read article[/b] http://www.nynewsday.com/news...,0,5139955.story?coll=nyc-nationhome -headlines

I DON'T KNOW if Laura Bush is "Lazy", But Laura Bush is a PROVEN LIAR!!!

10.20.04 (3:54 pm) [edit]

[b]Whopper: Laura Bush

The first lady lies in order to make the president look ... stupid? ... Laura Bush has no character, but is a Stepford Wife LIAR willing to vomit whatever Karl Rove puts into her mouth!!! ...[/b]

"President Bush is a great leader and husband—but I bet you didn't know, he is also quite the poet. Upon returning home last night from my long trip, I found a lovely poem waiting for me. Normally, I wouldn't share something so personal, but since we're celebrating great writers, I can't resist.

Dear Laura,

Roses are red, violets are blue, oh my lump in the bed, how I've missed you.

Roses are redder, bluer am I, seeing you kissed by that charming French guy.

The dogs and the cat they miss you too, Barney's still mad you dropped him, he ate your shoe.

The distance my dear has been such a barrier, next time you want an adventure, just land on a carrier.

I'm happy to be the inspiration behind this poem."

[b]—Laura Bush, remarks at the National Book Festival in Washington, Oct. 3, 2003. http://www.whitehouse.gov/new... [/b]

Q: Now, who could have written that poem, huh? I mean, what ...

A: Well, of course, he didn't really write the poem. But a lot of people really believed that he did. That evening at the dinner, what some woman from across the table said: "You just don't know how great it is to have a husband who would write a poem for you."

[b]—Laura Bush on NBC's Meet the Press, Dec. 28, 2003. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/38233... [/b]

[b]Comment. [/b]This lie is about an obviously trivial matter, and there's something endearing about the first lady's undisguised pleasure at conning so many people. Still, it is not only a lie, but an entirely gratuitous one—Mrs. Bush's remarks about the joys of reading didn't need the anecdote, and arguably were undermined by its mawkishness. Of particular interest is the apparent aim of Mrs. Bush's hoax. Ordinarily, when a surrogate tries to pass off a fake quotation as a president's actual words, the quotation is meant to make the president sound scholarly, or witty, or lapidary. In this case, though, whatever White House staffer prepared Mrs. Bush's remarks obviously strained to make the president's purported love poem sound sufficiently moronic that no one would doubt Bush had written it. Chatterbox doesn't know what to make of this.

[b]More[/b] ... http://slate.msn.com/id/20934...

PAT ROBERTSON: "Bush Told Me There Would Be NO Casualties in Iraq"!!!

10.20.04 (2:22 pm) [edit]

[b]Robertson warned Bush of Iraq toll — President's response: 'We're not going to have any'

NEW YORK (CNN)[/b] -- The founder of the U.S. Christian Coalition said Tuesday he told President George W. Bush before the invasion of Iraq that he should prepare Americans for the likelihood of casualties, but the president told him, "We're not going to have any casualties."

Pat Robertson, an ardent Bush supporter, said he had that conversation with the president in Nashville, Tennessee, before the March 2003 invasion. He described Bush in the meeting as "the most self-assured man I've ever met in my life."

"You remember Mark Twain said, 'He looks like a contented Christian with four aces.' I mean he was just sitting there like, 'I'm on top of the world,' " Robertson said on the CNN show, "Paula Zahn Now."

"And I warned him about this war. I had deep misgivings about this war, deep misgivings. And I was trying to say, 'Mr. President, you had better prepare the American people for casualties.' "

Robertson said the president then told him, "Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties."

Robertson, the televangelist who sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1988, said he wishes Bush would admit to mistakes made.

"I mean, the Lord told me it was going to be A, a disaster, and B, messy," Robertson said. "I warned him about casualties."

More than 1,100 U.S. troops have died in Iraq and another 8,000 troops have been wounded in the ongoing campaign, with the casualty toll significantly increasing in the last six months as the insurgency there has deepened.

Asked why Bush has refused to admit to mistakes on Iraq, Robertson said, "I don't know this politics game. You know, you can never say you were wrong because the opposition grabs onto it: 'See, he admitted he screwed up.' "

Even as Robertson criticized Bush for downplaying the potential dangers of the Iraq war, he heaped praise on Bush, saying he believes the president will win the election and that "the blessing of heaven is on Bush."

"Even if he stumbles and messes up -- and he's had his share of stumbles and gaffes -- I just think God's blessing is on him," Robertson said.

As for Bush's Democratic rival, Sen. John Kerry, Robertson said, "I don't think he's a leader. He's a ponderous debater, a good senator probably." - http://www.cnn.com/aol/story/...

BUSH'S BETRAYAL OF AMERICA: Polluters Getting a Pass from EPA

10.20.04 (2:17 pm) [edit]

Polluters are breathing easier under the current regime at the
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which has registered a 75
percent reduction in civil lawsuits filed against polluters,
according to a new study from the nonpartisan Environmental
Integrity Project (EIP).

Using data obtained in part under the Freedom of Information
Act, the Project found that EPA filed only 36 civil lawsuits for
violations of the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, Safe Drinking
Water Act, and other environmental laws in the first three years
of the Bush administration. By contrast, in the last three years
of the Clinton administration EPA filed 152 suits.

The report was compiled by EIP's Eric Schaeffer, the former head
of EPA's Office of Regulatory Enforcement. Schaeffer resigned in
2002 in protest over the administration's reluctance to enforce
the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act.

"EPA's recent record suggests that the 'full weight of the law'
has gotten a lot lighter over the past three years," said
Schaeffer. "Teddy Roosevelt must be turning over in his grave."

According to the EIP report, the nation's largest energy
companies (and biggest polluters) are on an "extended vacation"
from EPA enforcement actions. While the Justice Department has
continued to litigate cases it inherited from the Clinton
administration, it filed new lawsuits against only three energy
companies from 2001 to January 2004.

"While refineries and coal-fired power plants appear virtually
immune from prosecution, the Justice Department did find time to
take a dry cleaner to federal court for failure to pay an
administrative penalty," the report notes.

In fact, last November EPA's enforcement staff was told to "set
aside" investigations against more than 70 power companies,
including some of the biggest polluters of the nation's air.

The EPA had earlier referred 14 cases against power companies to
the Justice Department for prosecution, but the Department has
filed only one new case since January of 2001.

EPA staff have also been ordered to halt investigations of
industrial scale "factory farms" that house thousands of animals
and often make the air in surrounding communities unfit to
breathe.

According to the report, EPA has been able to mask the decline
in its enforcement program by cashing in settlements set in
motion by the Clinton administration. In fact, many of the most
important settlements EPA has celebrated either in press
releases or in its annual enforcement reports resulted from
Clinton-era lawsuits, the EIP report says.

In addition to drastically scaling back on enforcement, the Bush
administration has shackled EPA staff with debilitating
cutbacks. Only two months after coming to power, the White House
proposed eliminating more than 13 percent of the Agency's civil
enforcement staff.

Former EPA top enforcement official J.P. Suarez, appointed by
President Bush, said of enforcement cutbacks, "We did not have
enough money for travel, for technical support, for
investigations, for depositions [and] for experts...I can tell
you that there is going to be a major collapse if that is not
rectified..."

###

[b]SOURCES:[/b]

"Polluters Breathe Easier," http://ga3.org/ct/D71eOJs1sQZ... EIP report.

BUSH'S BETRAYAL OF AMERICA: Polluters Getting a Pass from EPA

10.20.04 (2:14 pm) [edit]

HERR FUHRER BUSH: 21st Century Fascist Monster ...

10.20.04 (11:52 am) [edit]

[b]Seeking Out Monsters

By Committing Himself to Preventive War, George Bush has Overturned Two Centuries of US Thinking on Global Diplomacy[/b]

Forty-five per cent of the American electorate love George Bush; 45% loathe him. Their minds are made up, pro and con, and there is little chance of changing them. Ten per cent, more or less, remain undecided. The undecided will determine the outcome, at least of the popular vote. There may be again, as in 2000, an electoral-college misfire by which the popular-vote winner loses the White House.

War haunts America. Iraq and terrorism forced their way last week into the third presidential debate, ostensibly dedicated to domestic issues. There is no immunity for wartime presidents. In 1952, the unpopularity of the Korean war led President Truman to withdraw from the contest. In 1968, the Vietnam war drove President Johnson from office. The swift victory of President Bush the Elder in the first Iraq war was of small benefit when he was defeated for re-election in 1992. On the other hand, President Nixon running against George McGovern - like Senator Kerry, a decorated war hero turned into a war critic - scored a smashing triumph in 1972.

President Bush the Younger categorically defends his launching of the second Iraq war. He has no doubt about the rightness of his course or the brilliance of his team. President Kennedy dismissed the CIA advisers who led him into the Bay of Pigs. Despite the Pentagon's build-up of Ahmad Chalabi, despite torture and Abu Ghraib, despite the incompetence of postwar planning, despite the collapse of his reasons for looking on Iraq as a clear and present danger to the US, President Bush has dismissed few senior officials.

The recent report by Charles Duelfer, the top American arms inspector for Iraq, effectively destroyed what remains of the contention that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. The second reason Mr Bush gave was the alleged partnership between the secular Muslim Saddam Hussein and the Muslim fundamentalist Osama bin Laden. The Bush administration put over this allegation so successfully that 42% of the American people, according to an October poll, still believe that Saddam was personally involved in 9/11. But the secretary of defence, Donald Rumsfeld, and President Bush himself admitted that they had no hard evidence of the existence of the evil partnership.

The third reason was the liberation of the people of Iraq from a monstrous tyrant. But Paul Wolfowitz, deputy secretary of defence and long-time advocate of the war on Iraq, said that liberation by itself was "not a reason to put American kids' lives at risk". Two reasons having been shot down from under him, the American president is left with a reason once deemed an inadequate justification for American kids to kill or be killed. George Bush, and Tony Blair too, are unquestionably right when they say that the world is a happier place now that Saddam Hussein is behind bars. But was it worth the price of more than 1,000 American lives and heaven knows how many Iraqis?

The second Iraq war fits into Bush the Younger's strategy of "pre-emption". There is deliberate confusion here. Preventive war has a bad reputation in Washington. It is not only due to imperial Japan's preventive strike at the American fleet in Pearl Harbor, but Presidents Truman and Eisenhower explicitly rejected preventive war, and those recommending preventive war against the Soviet Union were generally derided as loonies.

So the Bush administration replaced "preventive" by "pre-emptive". The distinction between "pre-emptive" and "preventive" is worth preserving - it is the distinction between legality and illegality. "Pre-emptive" war refers to a direct, immediate, specific threat that must be met at once. In the words of a department of defence manual, "an attack initiated on the basis of incontrovertible evidence that an enemy attack is imminent". "Preventive" war refers to potential, future and, therefore, speculative attacks.

"Daniel Webster wrote a very famous defence of anticipatory self-defence," Condoleezza Rice, President Bush's national security adviser, informed the press. Dr Rice, the former provost of Stanford, does not know her American history. According to Secretary of State Webster's "famous" 1841 statement, a pre-emptive reaction could be justified only on very narrow grounds - if the prospective attack showed "a necessity of self-defence, instant, overwhelming, leaving no choice of means, and no moment for deliberation". This was manifestly not the case with Iraq. It was not a pre-emptive war. It was a preventive war.

Preventive war rests on the premise that the preventer has accurate and reliable knowledge about the evil enemy's capabilities and intentions. It rests on the assumption of the perfectibility of the intelligence process. It rests therefore not on fact, but on prophecy. Yet history outwits all our certitudes.

This aphorism does not commend itself to the younger Bush. He is an unrepentant preventive warrior. His re-election is far from certain; but he would take re-election as an endorsement of his first term and would probably see it as a national mandate to pursue his methods and goals during a second term. Already, premonitory warnings against Iran are eerily reminiscent of those that preceded the preventive war against Iraq. He might take it as a national mandate to pursue the policy of truculent unilateralism. Already the Bush administration's contempt for "old Europe", the UN and international institutions is hardly concealed. Never in American history has the republic been so unpopular abroad, so mistrusted, feared, even hated.

President Bush is a militant idealist. He proposes to use America's military, economic and cultural power to spread "liberty". However, there are a lot of bad guys on the planet. Is the US obliged to eliminate them all? Does the US serve as the world's judge, jury and executioner?

As John Quincy Adams, perhaps our greatest secretary of state, said, America, while sympathising with struggling peoples, "goes not abroad in search of monsters to destroy". Should America seek out monsters, Adams continued, "the fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force ... She might become the dictatress of the world: she would no longer be the ruler of her own spirit."

That is the significance, for America and the world, of the American presidential election.

[b]Arthur Schlesinger was an adviser to President Kennedy. His most recent book is War and the American Presidency, published by WW Norton. [/b]- http://www.commondreams.org/v...

BUSH'S REAL CONSTITUENCY ...

10.20.04 (11:35 am) [edit]

[u][b]Billionaires for Bush[/b][/u]

President George W. Bush received donations from 79 percent of the U.S. billionaires who contributed to a presidential campaign this year, while Democrat John Kerry was backed by 21 percent, a study says.

Bush received contributions from 116 billionaires, including Bill Gates, chairman of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., who was listed by Forbes magazine as the world's richest person, and Frederick Smith, chief executive of FedEx Corp., according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign donations.

Kerry got donations from 31 billionaires, including Warren Buffett, chairman of Omaha- based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and the world's second- richest person; Eli Broad, chairman of AIG SunAmerica Inc., a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group Inc.; and David Geffen, co-founder of Glendale, Calif.-based DreamWorks SKG, a movie studio.

Republicans often outscore Democrats in fund raising among corporate executives.

The 58-year-old Bush has 280 CEOs from Russell 1000 index companies, to 52 for the 60-year-old Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a nonpartisan group based in Washington.

Kerry, who accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, released a list of 204 executives who endorse his economic policies.

Of the 277 U.S. billionaires identified by Forbes magazine, 153 gave to a candidate, including six who gave to both Bush and Kerry.

Those giving to both candidates included Charles Dolan, chairman of Bethpage, N.Y.- based Cablevision Systems Corp.; and Donald Trump, chief executive officer of Atlantic City, N.J.-based Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts.

Another 124 billionaires, or 45 percent of the total, gave to neither candidate, including Ted Turner, the founder of Cable News Network and a former vice chairman of New York-based Time Warner Inc.; Roy Disney, chairman of Shamrock Holdings Inc. and a former director of the Walt Disney Co., founded by his uncle; and Forrest Mars Jr., chairman of Mars Inc.

"I'm always surprised at the separation of the business world from politics in a number of wealthy people," said Kent Cooper, co- founder of PoliticalMoneyLine. "To them, politics is a different world, and the business mind has a hard time understanding how politics works."

Kerry has the support of two billionaires who did not give to either presidential campaign: Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Computer Inc., and Barry Diller, chairman of New York-based IAC/InterActiveCorp, an Internet commerce and television shopping company.

A Kerry campaign spokesman declined to comment.

Calls to the Bush campaign were not returned.

[b]Wealthy donors [/b]

116 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to President Bush.

31 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

6 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to both Bush and Kerry. - http://www.rockymountainnews....,1299,DRMN_4_3094590,00.html

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

[b]ALSO REFER TO HOUSE OF BUSH, HOUSE OF SAUD [/b]... http://www.houseofbush.com/

LAWMAKERS PROD CIA for Pre-9/11 Accountability Report

10.20.04 (11:32 am) [edit]

[b]The agency says the document isn't finished, but some think they're stalling to benefit Bush.[/b]

WASHINGTON — The ranking members of the House Intelligence Committee have asked the CIA to turn over an internal report on whether agency employees should be held accountable for intelligence failures leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks, congressional officials said Tuesday.

The CIA has not responded to the request, raising concerns among some Democrats in Congress that the report is being withheld to avoid embarrassment for the Bush administration in the final weeks before the presidential election.

The report was drafted in response to a demand from Congress nearly two years ago for the CIA to conduct an internal inquiry into the performance of agency personnel before the attacks. The agency was asked "to determine whether and to what extent personnel at all levels should be held accountable" for intelligence breakdowns cataloged in a joint congressional investigation of Sept. 11.

No agency employee has been fired or faced other disciplinary measures in connection with Sept. 11 inquiries, a fact that has frustrated critics of the CIA and relatives of those who were killed in the attacks.

A U.S. intelligence official said Tuesday that the document had not been provided to Congress because it was not complete. "The report is just a draft," the official said. "It's not yet finished, and the matter is still under review." The official declined to elaborate.

But congressional officials voiced skepticism and said that mounting frustration with the agency had prompted the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), and the ranking Democrat, Rep. Jane Harman of Venice, to send a letter to the CIA two weeks ago directing the agency to deliver the report.

The existence of the letter was first reported Tuesday in the Los Angeles Times in an opinion column by Robert Scheer. The column quoted Harman as saying, "We believe that the CIA has been told not to distribute the report. We are very concerned."

Congressional officials said they were told that the CIA inspector general's office had completed the report in the summer, but that it would not be turned over because of a request by then-acting CIA Director John E. McLaughlin for additional information on the report's contents.

"The concern here is that this [delay] has gone from days to weeks to months," a senior congressional aide said on condition of anonymity. "We're concerned that the work of the inspector general not be altered or censored or in any way precluded from coming over here."

The ranking members of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and John D. "Jay" Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), also have inquired about the report, but have not written a letter asking for it to be turned over, aides said.

The FBI conducted a similar inquiry and has provided a copy of its report to congressional committees, aides said. The FBI has not disciplined any of its employees in connection with Sept. 11, officials said.

The scuffle over the CIA report could pose a problem for the CIA's new director, Porter J. Goss, who now is head of the agency he helped investigate when he was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Goss, a former Republican congressman from Florida, was a principal member of the joint congressional inquiry into Sept. 11 intelligence failures. The report was sharply critical of the CIA, and the request for an internal investigation of employee accountability was among the dozens of recommendations in that congressional probe. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

LAWMAKERS PROD CIA for Pre-9/11 Accountability Report

10.20.04 (11:29 am) [edit]

A'W'OL BUSH: Flip-Flopper-in-Chief ... (Ooopppsss... I meant 'Thief') ...

10.19.04 (7:49 pm) [edit]

[b]President Bush: Flip-Flopper-In-Chief[/b]

From the beginning, George W. Bush has made his own credibility a central issue. On 10/11/00, then-Gov. Bush said: "I think credibility is important.It is going to be important for the president to be credible with Congress, important for the president to be credible with foreign nations." But President Bush's serial flip-flopping raises serious questions about whether Congress and foreign leaders can rely on what he says.

1. Social Security Surplus

BUSH PLEDGES NOT TO TOUCH SOCIAL SECURITY SURPLUS... "We're going to keep the promise of Social Security and keep the government from raiding the Social Security surplus." [President Bush, 3/3/01]

...BUSH SPENDS SOCIAL SECURITY SURPLUS The New York Times reported that "the president's new budget uses Social Security surpluses to pay for other programs every year through 2013, ultimately diverting more than $1.4 trillion in Social Security funds to other purposes." [The New York Times, 2/6/02]

2. Patient's Right to Sue

GOVERNOR BUSH VETOES PATIENTS' RIGHT TO SUE... "Despite his campaign rhetoric in favor of a patients' bill of rights, Bush fought such a bill tooth and nail as Texas governor, vetoing a bill coauthored by Republican state Rep. John Smithee in 1995. He... constantly opposed a patient's right to sue an HMO over coverage denied that resulted in adverse health effects." [Salon, 2/7/01]

...CANDIDATE BUSH PRAISES TEXAS PATIENTS' RIGHT TO SUE... "We're one of the first states that said you can sue an HMO for denying you proper coverage... It's time for our nation to come together and do what's right for the people. And I think this is right for the people. You know, I support a national patients' bill of rights, Mr. Vice President. And I want all people covered. I don't want the law to supersede good law like we've got in Texas." [Governor Bush, 10/17/00]

...PRESIDENT BUSH'S ADMINISTRATION ARGUES AGAINST RIGHT TO SUE "To let two Texas consumers, Juan Davila and Ruby R. Calad, sue their managed-care companies for wrongful denials of medical benefits ‘would be to completely undermine' federal law regulating employee benefits, Assistant Solicitor General James A. Feldman said at oral argument March 23. Moreover, the administration's brief attacked the policy rationale for Texas's law, which is similar to statutes on the books in nine other states." [Washington Post, 4/5/04]

3. Tobacco Buyout

BUSH SUPPORTS CURRENT TOBACCO FARMERS' QUOTA SYSTEM... "They've got the quota system in place -- the allotment system -- and I don't think that needs to be changed." [President Bush, 5/04]

...BUSH ADMINISTRATION WILL SUPPORT FEDERAL BUYOUT OF TOBACCO QUOTAS "The administration is open to a buyout." [White House spokeswoman Jeanie Mamo, 6/18/04]

4. North Korea

BUSH WILL NOT OFFER NUCLEAR NORTH KOREA INCENTIVES TO DISARM... "We developed a bold approach under which, if the North addressed our long-standing concerns, the United States was prepared to take important steps that would have significantly improved the lives of the North Korean people. Now that North Korea's covert nuclear weapons program has come to light, we are unable to pursue this approach." [President's Statement, 11/15/02]

...BUSH ADMINISTRATION OFFERS NORTH KOREA INCENTIVES TO DISARM"Well, we will work to take steps to ease their political and economic isolation. So there would be -- what you would see would be some provisional or temporary proposals that would only lead to lasting benefit after North Korea dismantles its nuclear programs. So there would be some provisional or temporary efforts of that nature." [White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, 6/23/04]

5. Abortion

BUSH SUPPORTS A WOMAN'S RIGHT TO CHOOSE... "Bush said he...favors leaving up to a woman and her doctor the abortion question." [The Nation, 6/15/00, quoting the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, 5/78]

...BUSH OPPOSES A WOMAN'S RIGHT TO CHOOSE "I am pro-life." [Governor Bush, 10/3/00]

6. OPEC

BUSH PROMISES TO FORCE OPEC TO LOWER PRICES... "What I think the president ought to do [when gas prices spike] is he ought to get on the phone with the OPEC cartel and say we expect you to open your spigots...And the president of the United States must jawbone OPEC members to lower the price." [President Bush, 1/26/00]

...BUSH REFUSES TO LOBBY OPEC LEADERS With gas prices soaring in the United States at the beginning of 2004, the Miami Herald reported the president refused to "personally lobby oil cartel leaders to change their minds." [Miami Herald, 4/1/04]

7. Iraq Funding

BUSH SPOKESMAN DENIES NEED FOR ADDITIONAL FUNDS FOR THE REST OF 2004... "We do not anticipate requesting supplemental funding for '04" [White House Budget Director Joshua Bolton, 2/2/04]

...BUSH REQUESTS ADDITIONAL FUNDS FOR IRAQ FOR 2004 "I am requesting that Congress establish a $25 billion contingency reserve fund for the coming fiscal year to meet all commitments to our troops." [President Bush, Statement by President, 5/5/04]

8. Condoleeza Rice Testimony

BUSH SPOKESMAN SAYS RICE WON'T TESTIFY AS 'A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE'... "Again, this is not her personal preference; this goes back to a matter of principle. There is a separation of powers issue involved here. Historically, White House staffers do not testify before legislative bodies. So it's a matter of principle, not a matter of preference." [White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan, 3/9/04]

...BUSH ORDERS RICE TO TESTIFY: "Today I have informed the Commission on Terrorist Attacks Against the United States that my National Security Advisor, Dr. Condoleezza Rice, will provide public testimony." [President Bush, 3/30/04]

9. Science

BUSH PLEDGES TO ISSUE REGULATIONS BASED ON SCIENCE..."I think we ought to have high standards set by agencies that rely upon science, not by what may feel good or what sounds good." [then-Governor George W. Bush, 1/15/00]

...BUSH ADMINISTRATION REGULATIONS IGNORE SCIENCE "60 leading scientists—including Nobel laureates, leading medical experts, former federal agency directors and university chairs and presidents—issued a statement calling for regulatory and legislative action to restore scientific integrity to federal policymaking. According to the scientists, the Bush administration has, among other abuses, suppressed and distorted scientific analysis from federal agencies, and taken actions that have undermined the quality of scientific advisory panels." [Union of Concerned Scientists, 2/18/04]

10. Ahmed Chalabi

BUSH INVITES CHALABI TO STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS...President Bush also met with Chalabi during his brief trip to Iraq last Thanksgiving [White House Documents 1/20/04, 11/27/03]

...BUSH MILITARY ASSISTS IN RAID OF CHALABI'S HOUSE "U.S. soldiers raided the home of America's one-time ally Ahmad Chalabi on Thursday and seized documents and computers." [Washington Post, 5/20/04]

11. Department of Homeland Security

BUSH OPPOSES THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY..."So, creating a Cabinet office doesn't solve the problem. You still will have agencies within the federal government that have to be coordinated. So the answer is that creating a Cabinet post doesn't solve anything." [White House spokesman Ari Fleischer, 3/19/02]

...BUSH SUPPORTS THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY "So tonight, I ask the Congress to join me in creating a single, permanent department with an overriding and urgent mission: securing the homeland of America and protecting the American people." [President Bush, Address to the Nation, 6/6/02]

12. Weapons of Mass Destruction

BUSH SAYS WE FOUND THE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION..."We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories...for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong, we found them." [President Bush, Interview in Poland, 5/29/03]

...BUSH SAYS WE HAVEN'T FOUND WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION "David Kay has found the capacity to produce weapons.And when David Kay goes in and says we haven't found stockpiles yet, and there's theories as to where the weapons went. They could have been destroyed during the war. Saddam and his henchmen could have destroyed them as we entered into Iraq. They could be hidden. They could have been transported to another country, and we'll find out." [President Bush, Meet the Press, 2/7/04]

13. Free Trade

BUSH SUPPORTS FREE TRADE... "I believe strongly that if we promote trade, and when we promote trade, it will help workers on both sides of this issue." [President Bush in Peru, 3/23/02]

...BUSH SUPPORTS RESTRICTIONS ON TRADE "In a decision largely driven by his political advisers, President Bush set aside his free-trade principles last year and imposed heavy tariffs on imported steel to help out struggling mills in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, two states crucial for his reelection." [Washington Post, 9/19/03]

14. Osama Bin Laden

BUSH WANTS OSAMA DEAD OR ALIVE... "I want justice. And there's an old poster out West, I recall, that says, 'Wanted: Dead or Alive.'" [President Bush, on Osama Bin Laden, 09/17/01]

...BUSH DOESN'T CARE ABOUT OSAMA "I don't know where he is.You know, I just don't spend that much time on him... I truly am not that concerned about him."[President Bush, Press Conference, 3/13/02]

15. The Environment

BUSH SUPPORTS MANDATORY CAPS ON CARBON DIOXIDE... "[If elected], Governor Bush will work to...establish mandatory reduction targets for emissions of four main pollutants: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, mercury and carbon dioxide." [Bush Environmental Plan, 9/29/00]

...BUSH OPPOSES MANDATORY CAPS ON CARBON DIOXIDE "I do not believe, however, that the government should impose on power plants mandatory emissions reductions for carbon dioxide, which is not a 'pollutant' under the Clean Air Act." [President Bush, Letter to Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), 3/13/03]

16. WMD Commission

BUSH RESISTS AN OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION ON WMD INTELLIGENCE FAILURE... "The White House immediately turned aside the calls from Kay and many Democrats for an immediate outside investigation, seeking to head off any new wide-ranging election-year inquiry that might go beyond reports already being assembled by congressional committees and the Central Intelligence Agency." [NY Times, 1/29/04]

...BUSH SUPPORTS AN OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION ON WMD INTELLIGENCE FAILURE "Today, by executive order, I am creating an independent commission, chaired by Governor and former Senator Chuck Robb, Judge Laurence Silberman, to look at American intelligence capabilities, especially our intelligence about weapons of mass destruction." [President Bush, 2/6/04]

17. Creation of the 9/11 Commission

BUSH OPPOSES CREATION OF INDEPENDENT 9/11 COMMISSION... "President Bush took a few minutes during his trip to Europe Thursday to voice his opposition to establishing a special commission to probe how the government dealt with terror warnings before Sept. 11." [CBS News, 5/23/02]

...BUSH SUPPORTS CREATION OF INDEPENDENT 9/11 COMMISSION "President Bush said today he now supports establishing an independent commission to investigate the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks." [ABC News, 09/20/02]

18. Time Extension for 9/11 Commission

BUSH OPPOSES TIME EXTENSION FOR 9/11 COMMISSION... "President Bush and House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) have decided to oppose granting more time to an independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." [Washington Post, 1/19/04]

...BUSH SUPPORTS TIME EXTENSION FOR 9/11 COMMISSION "The White House announced Wednesday its support for a request from the commission investigating the September 11, 2001 attacks for more time to complete its work." [CNN, 2/4/04]

19. One Hour Limit for 9/11 Commission Testimony

BUSH LIMITS TESTIMONY IN FRONT OF 9/11 COMMISSION TO ONE HOUR... "President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have placed strict limits on the private interviews they will grant to the federal commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks, saying that they will meet only with the panel's top two officials and that Mr. Bush will submit to only a single hour of questioning, commission members said Wednesday." [NY Times, 2/26/04]

...BUSH SETS NO TIMELIMIT FOR TESTIMONY "The president's going to answer all of the questions they want to raise. Nobody's watching the clock." [White House spokesman Scott McClellan, 3/10/04]

20. Gay Marriage

BUSH SAYS GAY MARRIAGE IS A STATE ISSUE... "The state can do what they want to do. Don't try to trap me in this state's issue like you're trying to get me into." [Gov. George W. Bush on Gay Marriage, Larry King Live, 2/15/00]

...BUSH SUPPORTS CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT BANNING GAY MARRIAGE "Today I call upon the Congress to promptly pass, and to send to the states for ratification, an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of man and woman as husband and wife." [President Bush, 2/24/04]

21. Nation Building

BUSH OPPOSES NATION BUILDING... "If we don't stop extending our troops all around the world in nation-building missions, then we're going to have a serious problem coming down the road." [Gov. George W. Bush, 10/3/00]

...BUSH SUPPORTS NATION BUILDING "We will be changing the regime of Iraq, for the good of the Iraqi people." [President Bush, 3/6/03]

22. Saddam/al Qaeda Link

BUSH SAYS IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEEN AL QAEDA AND SADDAM... "You can't distinguish between al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror." [President Bush, 9/25/02]

...BUSH SAYS SADDAM HAD NO ROLE IN AL QAEDA PLOT "We've had no evidence that Saddam Hussein was involved in Sept. 11." [President Bush, 9/17/03]

23. U.N. Resolution

BUSH VOWS TO HAVE A UN VOTE NO MATTER WHAT... "No matter what the whip count is, we're calling for the vote. We want to see people stand up and say what their opinion is about Saddam Hussein and the utility of the United Nations Security Council. And so, you bet. It's time for people to show their cards, to let the world know where they stand when it comes to Saddam." [President Bush 3/6/03]

...BUSH WITHDRAWS REQUEST FOR VOTE "At a National Security Council meeting convened at the White House at 8:55 a.m., Bush finalized the decision to withdraw the resolution from consideration and prepared to deliver an address to the nation that had already been written." [Washington Post, 3/18/03]

24. Involvement in the Palestinian Conflict

BUSH OPPOSES SUMMITS... "Well, we've tried summits in the past, as you may remember. It wasn't all that long ago where a summit was called and nothing happened, and as a result we had significant intifada in the area." [President Bush, 04/05/02]

...BUSH SUPPORTS SUMMITS "If a meeting advances progress toward two states living side by side in peace, I will strongly consider such a meeting. I'm committed to working toward peace in the Middle East." [President Bush, 5/23/03]

25. Campaign Finance

BUSH OPPOSES MCCAIN-FEINGOLD... "George W. Bush opposes McCain-Feingold...as an infringement on free expression." [Washington Post, 3/28/2000]

...BUSH SIGNS MCCAIN-FEINGOLD INTO LAW "[T]his bill improves the current system of financing for Federal campaigns, and therefore I have signed it into law." [President Bush, at the McCain-Feingold signing ceremony, 03/27/02]

26. 527s

Bush opposes restrictions on 527s: "I also have reservations about the constitutionality of the broad ban on issue advertising [in McCain Feingold], which restrains the speech of a wide variety of groups on issues of public import." [President Bush, 3/27/02]

…Bush says 527s bad for system: "I don't think we ought to have 527s. I can't be more plain about it…I think they're bad for the system. That's why I signed the bill, McCain-Feingold." [President Bush, 8/23/04]

27. Medical Records

Bush says medical records must remain private: "I believe that we must protect…the right of every American to have confidence that his or her personal medical records will remain private." [President Bush, 4/12/01]

…Bush says patients' histories are not confidntial: The Justice Department…asserts that patients "no longer possess a reasonable expectation that their histories will remain completely confidential." [BusinessWeek, 4/30/04]

28. Timelines For Dictators

Bush sets timeline for Saddam: "If Iraq does not accept the terms within a week of passage or fails to disclose required information within 30 days, the resolution authorizes 'all necessary means' to force compliance--in other words, a military attack." [LA Times, 10/3/02]

…Bush says he's against timelines: "I don't think you give timelines to dictators." [President Bush, 8/27/04]

29. The Great Lakes

Bush wants to divert great lakes: "Even though experts say 'diverting any water from the Great Lakes region sets a bad precedent' Bush 'said he wants to talk to Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien about piping water to parched states in the west and southwest.'– [AP, 7/19/01]

Bush says he'll never divert Great Lakes: "We've got to use our resources wisely, like water. It starts with keeping the Great Lakes water in the Great Lakes Basin...My position is clear: We're never going to allow diversion of Great Lakes water." [President Bush, 8/16/04]

30. Winning The War On Terror

Bush claims he can win the war on terror: "One of the interesting things people ask me, now that we're asking questions, is, can you ever win the war on terror? Of course, you can." [President Bush, 4/13/04]

…Bush says war on terror is unwinnable: "I don't think you can win [the war on terror]." [President Bush, 8/30/04]

…Bush says he will win the war on terror: "Make no mistake about it, we are winning and we will win [the war on terror]." [President Bush, 8/31/04]

[b]DOWNLOAD POSTER [/b] http://www.americanprogressac...{65464111-BB20-4C7D-B1C9- 0B033DD31B63}/gwb.pdf

BUSH/CHENEY'S CRIMES: The 9/11 Secret in the CIA's Back Pocket

10.19.04 (7:43 pm) [edit]

[b]The agency is withholding a damning report that points at senior officials[/b]

It is shocking: The Bush administration is suppressing a CIA report on 9/11 until after the election, and this one names names. Although the report by the inspector general's office of the CIA was completed in June, it has not been made available to the congressional intelligence committees that mandated the study almost two years ago.

"It is infuriating that a report which shows that high-level people were not doing their jobs in a satisfactory manner before 9/11 is being suppressed," an intelligence official who has read the report told me, adding that "the report is potentially very embarrassing for the administration, because it makes it look like they weren't interested in terrorism before 9/11, or in holding people in the government responsible afterward."

When I asked about the report, Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice), ranking Democratic member of the House Intelligence Committee, said she and committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.) sent a letter 14 days ago asking for it to be delivered. "We believe that the CIA has been told not to distribute the report," she said. "We are very concerned."

According to the intelligence official, who spoke to me on condition of anonymity, release of the report, which represents an exhaustive 17-month investigation by an 11-member team within the agency, has been "stalled." First by acting CIA Director John McLaughlin and now by Porter J. Goss, the former Republican House member (and chairman of the Intelligence Committee) who recently was appointed CIA chief by President Bush.

The official stressed that the report was more blunt and more specific than the earlier bipartisan reports produced by the Bush-appointed Sept. 11 commission and Congress.

"What all the other reports on 9/11 did not do is point the finger at individuals, and give the how and what of their responsibility. This report does that," said the intelligence official. "The report found very senior-level officials responsible."

By law, the only legitimate reason the CIA director has for holding back such a report is national security. Yet neither Goss nor McLaughlin has invoked national security as an explanation for not delivering the report to Congress.

"It surely does not involve issues of national security," said the intelligence official.

"The agency directorate is basically sitting on the report until after the election," the official continued. "No previous director of CIA has ever tried to stop the inspector general from releasing a report to the Congress, in this case a report requested by Congress."

None of this should surprise us given the Bush administration's great determination since 9/11 to resist any serious investigation into how the security of this nation was so easily breached. In Bush's much ballyhooed war on terror, ignorance has been bliss.

The president fought against the creation of the Sept. 11 commission, for example, agreeing only after enormous political pressure was applied by a grass-roots movement led by the families of those slain.

And then Bush refused to testify to the commission under oath, or on the record. Instead he deigned only to chat with the commission members, with Vice President Dick Cheney present, in a White House meeting in which commission members were not allowed to take notes. All in all, strange behavior for a man who seeks reelection to the top office in the land based on his handling of the so-called war on terror.

In September, the New York Times reported that several family members met with Goss privately to demand the release of the CIA inspector general's report. "Three thousand people were killed on 9/11, and no one has been held accountable," 9/11 widow Kristen Breitweiser told the paper.

The failure to furnish the report to Congress, said Harman, "fuels the perception that no one is being held accountable. It is unacceptable that we don't have [the report]; it not only disrespects Congress but it disrespects the American people."

The stonewalling by the Bush administration and the failure of Congress to gain release of the report have, said the intelligence source, "led the management of the CIA to believe it can engage in a cover-up with impunity. Unless the public demands an accounting, the administration and CIA's leadership will have won and the nation will have lost." - http://www.latimes.com/news/o...,1,6762967.column?coll=la-util-op-ed

WITHOUT A DOUBT: The Story of a Stupid Stupid Man ...

10.19.04 (1:35 pm) [edit]

Bruce Bartlett, a domestic policy adviser to Ronald Reagan and a treasury official for the first President Bush, told me recently that ''if Bush wins, there will be a civil war in the Republican Party starting on Nov. 3.'' The nature of that conflict, as Bartlett sees it? Essentially, the same as the one raging across much of the world: a battle between modernists and fundamentalists, pragmatists and true believers, reason and religion.

''Just in the past few months,'' Bartlett said, ''I think a light has gone off for people who've spent time up close to Bush: that this instinct he's always talking about is this sort of weird, Messianic idea of what he thinks God has told him to do.'' Bartlett, a 53-year-old columnist and self-described libertarian Republican who has lately been a champion for traditional Republicans concerned about Bush's governance, went on to say: ''This is why George W. Bush is so clear-eyed about Al Qaeda and the Islamic fundamentalist enemy. He believes you have to kill them all. They can't be persuaded, that they're extremists, driven by a dark vision. He understands them, because he's just like them. . . .

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.nytimes.com/2004/1...

TRAITORS BUSH/CHENEY: Tax Cut Bill Gives Two Military Contractors (Bush's Pimps) $500 Million!!!

10.19.04 (10:45 am) [edit]

A little-noticed provision in the sweeping corporate tax bill that passed Congress last week would reduce taxes at two major military contractors by nearly $500 million over the next 10 years.

The provision, which primarily benefits General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman, would allow shipbuilders to postpone their taxes for years on profits from building ships and submarines for the Navy.

The new provision would benefit a handful of major shipyards, all owned by one of the two military conglomerates. They include the Bath Iron Works in Maine acquired by General Dynamics in 1995 and the company's Electric Boat division in Groton, Conn., as well as the Northrop-owned Newport News shipyard in Virginia.

The new tax break would reverse a rule that Congress imposed as part of the sweeping tax overhaul of 1986, when lawmakers in both parties were incensed that major military companies often paid no income taxes despite earning billions of dollars providing major weapons systems to the military.

Under the bill, Navy shipbuilders would be allowed to once again defer paying most federal income taxes on a project until the contract was completed. Because it takes about five years to build an aircraft carrier and three years to build a destroyer, the shipyards would be able to delay their tax bills for years, allowing more opportunity to offset taxes against future losses.

The measure's primary sponsor was Senator Olympia J. Snowe, Republican of Maine, who said she was determined to protect Bath Iron Works, one of her state's largest employers.

"This provision takes dramatic steps to remedy the inequity of how naval shipbuilders pay their taxes," Ms. Snowe said in a statement last week, just after House and Senate negotiators agreed to include the provision in a broader bill that would shower $140 billion in tax cuts across almost every segment of industry.

But critics said the provision would not create jobs, the stated intention of the tax bill, because employment at naval shipyards is determined almost entirely by federal spending on ships and submarines rather than by tax incentives.

"We're not going to buy any more war boats if we give them a tax incentive," said Robert S. McIntyre, director of Citizens for Tax Justice, a liberal research group here that has long scrutinized corporate tax practices. "We're going to buy more boats if the government decides we need more boats."

The shipbuilders' tax cut was typical of the furious scramble by lawmakers to include special provisions for their constituents in the bill. The final bill, which President Bush is expected to sign soon, includes tax breaks for oil companies, corn farmers, wine distributors and dozens of other highly specific industries.

General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman, which will also benefit from many of the new bill's general tax cuts, are heavy contributors to political campaigns. Since January 2003, General Dynamics' employees and political action committees have contributed $1.3 million, about 64 percent to Republicans. Northrop contributed $1.24 million, about 58 percent to Republicans.

Senator Snowe was among dozens of lawmakers whose support was needed to win final passage. She was also part of a bipartisan group that tried to tie a $10 billion buyout program for tobacco farmers, which is also part of the bill, to a new requirement that would allow the Food and Drug Administration to regulate cigarettes and other tobacco products.

House Republicans rejected that provision, but Ms. Snowe voted for the overall bill in part because it included the shipbuilding tax break that she had proposed.

She was hardly alone. Senator John Breaux, Democrat of Louisiana, opposed many parts of the overall bill but supported the shipbuilding tax break and numerous other tax cuts for oil companies that are big employers in his state.

Few if any lawmakers publicly objected to the shipbuilding provision, which was tiny in comparison with sweeping tax cuts, worth $42 billion over 10 years, on foreign profits of American multinationals.

The House and Senate passed the overall bill by overwhelming majorities.

[b]Continue [/b]... http://www.nytimes.com/2004/1...

FOR WHOM THE BUSH VOTES ARE REALLY CAST ...

10.19.04 (10:40 am) [edit]

[u][b]Billionaires for Bush[/b][/u]

President George W. Bush received donations from 79 percent of the U.S. billionaires who contributed to a presidential campaign this year, while Democrat John Kerry was backed by 21 percent, a study says.

Bush received contributions from 116 billionaires, including Bill Gates, chairman of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., who was listed by Forbes magazine as the world's richest person, and Frederick Smith, chief executive of FedEx Corp., according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign donations.

Kerry got donations from 31 billionaires, including Warren Buffett, chairman of Omaha- based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and the world's second- richest person; Eli Broad, chairman of AIG SunAmerica Inc., a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group Inc.; and David Geffen, co-founder of Glendale, Calif.-based DreamWorks SKG, a movie studio.

Republicans often outscore Democrats in fund raising among corporate executives.

The 58-year-old Bush has 280 CEOs from Russell 1000 index companies, to 52 for the 60-year-old Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a nonpartisan group based in Washington.

Kerry, who accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, released a list of 204 executives who endorse his economic policies.

Of the 277 U.S. billionaires identified by Forbes magazine, 153 gave to a candidate, including six who gave to both Bush and Kerry.

Those giving to both candidates included Charles Dolan, chairman of Bethpage, N.Y.- based Cablevision Systems Corp.; and Donald Trump, chief executive officer of Atlantic City, N.J.-based Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts.

Another 124 billionaires, or 45 percent of the total, gave to neither candidate, including Ted Turner, the founder of Cable News Network and a former vice chairman of New York-based Time Warner Inc.; Roy Disney, chairman of Shamrock Holdings Inc. and a former director of the Walt Disney Co., founded by his uncle; and Forrest Mars Jr., chairman of Mars Inc.

"I'm always surprised at the separation of the business world from politics in a number of wealthy people," said Kent Cooper, co- founder of PoliticalMoneyLine. "To them, politics is a different world, and the business mind has a hard time understanding how politics works."

Kerry has the support of two billionaires who did not give to either presidential campaign: Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Computer Inc., and Barry Diller, chairman of New York-based IAC/InterActiveCorp, an Internet commerce and television shopping company.

A Kerry campaign spokesman declined to comment.

Calls to the Bush campaign were not returned.

[b]Wealthy donors [/b]

116 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to President Bush.

31 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

6 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to both Bush and Kerry. - http://www.rockymountainnews....,1299,DRMN_4_3094590,00.html

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

[b]ALSO REFER TO HOUSE OF BUSH, HOUSE OF SAUD [/b]... http://www.houseofbush.com/

GEORGE W. BUSH IS UNFIT TO BE PRESIDENT: A Stupid Man & A Miserable Failure!!!

10.19.04 (10:36 am) [edit]

[b]GEORGE W. BUSH IS IMPOTENT [i]Where It Really Counts [/i](The asshole has[i] [i]No Brains[/i] so has to be WIRED to get his [/i]weasel words) ... I don't give a rat's ass about "below the waist" although I do feel very, very sorry for poor Laura and lap-dog Condi Rice ...[/b]

[b]There it is: right between Cheater-Bush's shoulder blades. My fellow Americans, George W. Bush was wired for all 3 debates! Tell the media to tell the truth about Cheater-Bush!!! http://community.democrats.co... [/b]

[b]Technical Expert Says Bush Was Wired[/b]

"Now a technical expert who designs and makes such devices for the U.S. military and private industry tells Salon http://www.salon.com/news/fea... that he believes the bulge is indeed a transceiver designed to receive electronic signals and transmit them to a hidden earpiece lodged in Bush's ear canal. 'There's no question about it. It's a pretty obvious one -- larger than most because it probably has descrambling capability,' said Alex Darbut, technical and business development vice president for Resistance Technology in Arden Hills, Minn... On Tuesday, in response to repeated questions from Salon, the Bush camp finally issued a flat denial. Campaign spokesman Reed Dickens denied that Bush has ever used an electronic device to aid his public speaking, insisting the president was wearing 'nothing during the debates.'" LoL! Just like we thought - the Emperor was Buck Naked, but no one dared say he "had no clothes"!

[b]THIS IS OUTRAGEOUS!!! DON'T LET THE MEDIA COVER-UP BUSH'S CHEATING!!! BUSH IS TOO STUPID (AS WELL AS A LIAR) TO BE PRESIDENT!!![/b]

A'W'OL BUSH, THE FASCIST WAR-MONGER: What About The Next Pre-Emptive War???

10.19.04 (10:34 am) [edit]

President Bush was caught in the turbulence of his own spin in last week's final debate with Sen. John Kerry.

Accusing the president of taking his focus off of the hunt for Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan to go after Saddam Hussein in Iraq, Mr. Kerry made this accurate observation:

"Six months after he said Osama bin Laden must be caught dead or alive, this president was asked, 'Where is Osama bin Laden?' He said, 'I don't know. I don't really think about him very much. I'm not that concerned.'"

Trapped, though he may not have realized it, the president denied ever having said such a thing.

"Gosh, I don't think I ever said I'm not worried about Osama bin Laden," Mr. Bush said. "Of course we're worried about Osama bin Laden. We're on the hunt after Osama bin Laden. We're using every asset at our disposal to get Osama bin Laden."

Wrong on both counts.

For one thing, at a news conference March 13, 2002, as the Bush administration already was beating the drums against Iraq, Mr. Bush was asked why he wasn't talking about bin Laden much anymore.

The president responded, "So I don't know where he is. I just don't spend much time on him ... We haven't heard much from him and I wouldn't necessarily say he's at the center of any command structure.

"And, again, I don't know where he is. ... I truly am not that concerned about him. I know he is on the run. I was concerned about him when he had taken over a country. I was concerned about the fact that he was basically running Afghanistan and calling the shots for the Taliban."

Thanks to the Annenberg Political Fact Check at the University of Pennsylvania for reminding us what Mr. Bush did say, which included the assertion that the United States did not invade Afghanistan so much to get bin Laden as to make sure he wasn't running Afghanistan any more.

The other count on which Mr. Bush was wrong in last week's debate was his assertion that the United States is "using every asset at our disposal to get Osama bin Laden."

The United States is not using every asset at its disposal to catch bin Laden. A far greater portion of American assets has been devoted since 2003 to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

In order to justify that war, the Bush administration depended on concocted intelligence that Mr. Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction -- probably nuclear weapons -- which posed an imminent threat to the United States. Bunk!

And it depended on the equally concocted assertion that there was a tie between Mr. Hussein and the 9/11 attacks that bin Laden masterminded against America. More bunk!

In order to support the war in Iraq -- and to face down the criticism that Iraq was a distraction from the real war on terror -- it was necessary to pretend that bin Laden wasn't the central, arch-villain any longer, that he was somehow irrelevant since Afghanistan had been freed of his Taliban hosts.

Mr. Bush calls his plan to fight terrorism "a comprehensive strategy." With the war in Iraq as its centerpiece, I find the strategy incomprehensible.

Afghanistan has held its first-ever election, one in which women voted, which is a good thing, and it would not have happened without the U.S. invasion of that country. But bin Laden is still at large, probably somewhere in Afghanistan or Pakistan. So the mission in Afghanistan is not accomplished.

Iraq is in a hellish condition. Every day brings news of more car bombings, rocket and grenade attacks that have killed thousands of Iraqis and hundreds of Americans. Some day there will be elections in Iraq, too, probably with prominent Baathists in the mix. But elections in Iraq will not help America to recover the lost lives, the squandered billions of dollars and the loss of international stature in Iraq.

Mr. Bush persists in the assertion that these are the prices paid for his war against terrorism, his "comprehensive strategy to not only chase down al-Qaida ... but to make sure that countries that harbor terrorists are held to account."

More Iraqs?

It's being said that Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry don't differ much on what's necessary to extricate America from Iraq now that we're there. What Americans should consider in this country's free election 16 days from now is which of these men is likelier to take us into another pre-emptive war somewhere else and which will stay focused on the real, abundantly justified war. - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

CORPORATE-SLUT BUSHY-BOY Lies To Americans About Tax Cuts

10.19.04 (10:33 am) [edit]

At Wednesday's debate President Bush said most of his tax cuts "went to low- and middle-income Americans."1 That statement is flatly false.

An analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that, in 2004, the top 20 percent of earners received 69.8% of the tax cuts enacted by President Bush.2 While the middle 20 percent of earners received an average tax cut of $647, the top 20 percent received an average tax cut of $5,055.3 As a result, those in the middle class are paying a greater share of the federal taxes today than they were four years ago.4

[b]Sources:[/b]

1. "Transcript of Debate Between Bush and Kerry, With Domestic Policy the Topic," New York Times, 10/13/04.
2. "Tax Returns: A Comprehensive Assessment of the Bush Administration Tax Cuts," Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 04/04.
3. Ibid.
4. "Tax Cuts Go Mostly to the Rich," OMB Watch, 2004.

BRAIN-DEAD YANKEES & MORONIC MACARONIS Are Blind To Blundering Buffoon Bush

10.19.04 (10:29 am) [edit]

Why do so many Americans still support George W. Bush after all those damning revelations about Iraq? That's the question I'm invariably asked when abroad.
Former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan, in his superb, must-read new book, Where the Right Went Wrong, provides some answers.

"In 2003," he writes, "the U.S. invaded a country that did not threaten us, had not attacked us and did not want war with us, to disarm it of weapons we have since discovered it did not have."

White House assurances that U.S. troops would be greeted in Iraq with flowers were as laughable as its pledges Mideast peace and democracy would ensue.

Chief U.S. arms inspector Charles Duelfer's recent, 960-page report contradicted almost every Bush administration prewar claim about Iraq, which were used to justify an illegal war that has killed 20,000 Iraqis and more than 1,000 Americans, caused 14,000 U.S. casualties and will soon have cost $200 billion US -- when Washington can't even supply flu vaccine.

No administration official has accepted blame for this needless conflict, lying to Congress and the public, blundering into a no-win war, condoning torture, and provoking worldwide disgust at the once admired United States.

Either the self-proclaimed "war president" and his men committed the worst set of blunders overseas since Vietnam, or they lied the nation into an imperial war to grab oil and boost Israel's fortunes.

Republicans don't care. Amazingly, a recent CNN/USA Today poll showed 62% of Republicans still believe Iraq was behind 9/11. This is after a flood of contrary evidence and Duelfer's report.

How can Republicans remain so blinkered? Part of the fault lies with the sycophantic national media, which collaborated with the Bush administration in whipping up war fever. The media still are not telling people the truth about Iraq, Afghanistan, or the so-called war on terrorism.

The media utterly failed to remind Americans that Bush, who loves to play war leader, actually claimed Iraqi drone aircraft were poised to fly off ships in the North Atlantic and bombard America with germs. Bush should have been laughed out of office for believing and promoting this comic-book nonsense.

Many Republicans simply don't see what the rest of the world does. So what if Iraq was no threat? Don't bother these golf club Rambos with details. They're delighted to see the U.S. pounding Arabs in revenge for 9/11.

Bush's core Republican support lies in the suburbs and Bible-belt rural areas, where many people rely on TV sound bites for their world view, and have little understanding of history, geography or foreign affairs. This is the new "dumbed-down Republicans Party," fertile ground for nationalist hysteria, religious extremism, and anti-foreign xenophobia.

[b]Surplus-turned-deficit [/b]

Buchanan identifies the real secret of the Republican Party's current success: "Cut taxes and don't let the Democrats outspend us."

No matter that Bush's policies have created millions of jobs in China instead of the U.S., or that he turned a $236-billion US surplus into a $521-billion deficit. His tax cuts and spending win elections.

As the real president, v-p Dick Cheney, observed to a horrified U.S. Treasurer Paul O'Neill, "deficits don't matter." This kind of liberal-left Democrat economic voodoo used to be anathema to Republicans.

Today, there's no real conservative party left in Washington, says Buchanan. Only in tax-cutting do Republicans still hew to their principles. Otherwise, they are just like the wildest-spending liberal Democrats.

"Historically, Republicans have been the party of conservative virtues -- balanced budgets, healthy skepticism towards foreign wars, fierce resistance to the growth of government power.

"No more," Buchanan says. "To win and hold office, many have sold their souls to the very devil they were baptized to do battle with."

As for Bush's vow to wage unceasing war on America's enemies around the globe, Buchanan quotes President James Madison: "Of all the enemies to public liberty, war is perhaps the most to be dreaded, because it compromises and develops the germ of every other. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare." - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

SUPREME COURT CLERKS Expose Right-Wing Partisan Abuse in Bush v. Gore, Fascists Launch Witch Hunt

10.18.04 (1:40 pm) [edit]

[b]Washington Post:[/b] "In the October issue of Vanity Fair magazine, former Supreme Court law clerks from the court's 2000-01 term speak out -- under cover of anonymity -- about what they saw behind the scenes during the fateful case of Bush v. Gore. That case, decided by a 5-4 vote, ended the contentious recount in Florida, thereby giving the presidency to George W. Bush. [C]lerks contend that the decision was a rank exercise in partisanship by conservative Republican justices.... 'We feel that something illegitimate was done with the Court's power, and such an extraordinary situation justifies breaking an obligation we'd otherwise honor,' one clerk told the magazine. [But] Republican senators John Cornyn, Saxby Chambliss and Lindsey Graham have asked Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) for hearings 'to determine whether there has been misconduct.'" Whistle-blowers tell the truth about partisan abuse of the Supreme Court, so right wing Senators launch a witch hunt.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.washingtonpost.com...

SUPREME COURT SPANKS DeLay, Orders Re-Examination of 'Unprecedented' Right Wing Redistricting Scam

10.18.04 (1:37 pm) [edit]

[b]Washington Post:[/b] "The Supreme Court today ordered a lower court to reconsider its decision upholding the 2003 Republican-drawn congressional district map for Texas. The high court said the case should be reviewed in light of its opinion last April in a case from Pennsylvania. In that complicated ruling, the court left open the door for court challenges to redistricting based on claims of partisan gerrymandering but offered little new guidance to lower courts on how to consider such claims.... Reversal, analysts believe, is a long shot. It was yet another chapter in a venomous partisan battle involving two unsuccessful walkouts by Texas Democratic lawmakers and an ethics infraction by Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.). In an unprecedented mid-decade redistricting of Texas, Republican lawmakers redrew the map so as to give Republicans a 10- or 11-member edge in the state's 32 member congressional delegation, which is now split evenly." Maybe there's some hope for fairness in Texas?

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.washingtonpost.com...

ENTIRE WORLD Sick-n-Tired of Herr Fuhrer Bush/Reich Marshall Cheney (Neo-Nazi Thugs)!!!

10.18.04 (9:56 am) [edit]

[b]'America's image has taken a hit worldwide' [/b]

LONDON: America's reputation around the world is hurting, according to a series of coordinated polls published on Friday from 10 countries, including many of US' closest allies.

In eight of the countries where the surveys commissioned by major newspapers were conducted, more people said their view of America had worsened over the past two to three years than improved. That question was asked in nine countries.

By big margins, those questioned said the war in Iraq did not aid the global fight against terrorism.

And in eight out of 10 nations, those polled said that they hoped to see Democrat John Kerry beat US President George W Bush in next month's election. Bush won backing from a majority of respondents only in Russia and Israel.

The polls were conducted in Canada, France, Britain, Spain, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Mexico, Israel and Russia, with results to be published in the participating newspapers on Friday. Not all questions were asked in every country.

[b]Continued[/b] ... http://timesofindia.indiatime...,curpg-2.cms

NEW POLL: U.S. Troops & Military Families Sick of Bush's Bloody Incompetence!!!

10.18.04 (9:54 am) [edit]

[b]WASHINGTON (AP) -- Members of the military and their families say the Bush administration underestimated the number of troops needed in Iraq and put too much pressure on inadequately trained National Guard and reserve forces, according to a poll released Saturday[/b].

The National Annenberg Election Survey questioned active duty troops in the regular military and the National Guard and Reserves, as well as family members of active duty members.

Family members were more critical of the administration's Iraq policy than those on active duty.

The poll found that 62 percent in the military sample -- 58 percent of troops and 66 percent of family members -- said the administration underestimated the number of troops that would be needed to establish peace in Iraq. (Part 1 of the Annenberg survey results)

And 59 percent -- 56 percent of troops and 64 percent of family members -- said too much of a burden has been put on the National Guard and the reserves when regular forces should have been expanded instead.

This critical view comes from a military group that has a more favorable view of President Bush, Iraq, the economy and the nation's direction than Americans in general.

A slight majority of the military and families, 51 percent, said showing photos of flag-draped coffins being returned to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware would increase respect for the troops.

That broke down to 47 percent of troops and 56 percent of family members. Less than 10 percent of the sample said it would decrease respect for the troops.

The Pentagon has refused to release government photos of the coffins, saying it has begun enforcing a policy installed in 1991 intended to respect the privacy of the families of the dead soldiers. - http://edition.cnn.com/2004/A...

GEORGE W. BUSH IS UNFIT TO BE PRESIDENT: A Stupid Man & A Miserable Failure!!!

10.18.04 (9:53 am) [edit]

WHORES BUSH/CHENEY=TRAITORS Betraying US(A) On Behalf of Their Corporate Pimps!!!

10.18.04 (9:51 am) [edit]

[u][b]Billionaires for Bush[/b][/u]

President George W. Bush received donations from 79 percent of the U.S. billionaires who contributed to a presidential campaign this year, while Democrat John Kerry was backed by 21 percent, a study says.

Bush received contributions from 116 billionaires, including Bill Gates, chairman of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., who was listed by Forbes magazine as the world's richest person, and Frederick Smith, chief executive of FedEx Corp., according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign donations.

Kerry got donations from 31 billionaires, including Warren Buffett, chairman of Omaha- based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and the world's second- richest person; Eli Broad, chairman of AIG SunAmerica Inc., a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group Inc.; and David Geffen, co-founder of Glendale, Calif.-based DreamWorks SKG, a movie studio.

Republicans often outscore Democrats in fund raising among corporate executives.

The 58-year-old Bush has 280 CEOs from Russell 1000 index companies, to 52 for the 60-year-old Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a nonpartisan group based in Washington.

Kerry, who accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, released a list of 204 executives who endorse his economic policies.

Of the 277 U.S. billionaires identified by Forbes magazine, 153 gave to a candidate, including six who gave to both Bush and Kerry.

Those giving to both candidates included Charles Dolan, chairman of Bethpage, N.Y.- based Cablevision Systems Corp.; and Donald Trump, chief executive officer of Atlantic City, N.J.-based Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts.

Another 124 billionaires, or 45 percent of the total, gave to neither candidate, including Ted Turner, the founder of Cable News Network and a former vice chairman of New York-based Time Warner Inc.; Roy Disney, chairman of Shamrock Holdings Inc. and a former director of the Walt Disney Co., founded by his uncle; and Forrest Mars Jr., chairman of Mars Inc.

"I'm always surprised at the separation of the business world from politics in a number of wealthy people," said Kent Cooper, co- founder of PoliticalMoneyLine. "To them, politics is a different world, and the business mind has a hard time understanding how politics works."

Kerry has the support of two billionaires who did not give to either presidential campaign: Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Computer Inc., and Barry Diller, chairman of New York-based IAC/InterActiveCorp, an Internet commerce and television shopping company.

A Kerry campaign spokesman declined to comment.

Calls to the Bush campaign were not returned.

[b]Wealthy donors [/b]

116 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to President Bush.

31 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

6 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to both Bush and Kerry. - http://www.rockymountainnews....,1299,DRMN_4_3094590,00.html

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

[b]ALSO REFER TO HOUSE OF BUSH, HOUSE OF SAUD [/b]... http://www.houseofbush.com/

BUSH'S FASCISM: Teachers Ejected Just for Wearing T-Shirts saying 'Protect our Civil Liberties'

10.18.04 (9:49 am) [edit]

[b]Bend.com: [/b]"Bush taught three Oregon schoolteachers a new lesson in irony - or tragedy - Thursday night when his campaign removed them from a Bush speech and threatened them with arrest simply for wearing t-shirts that said "Protect Our Civil Liberties," the Democratic Party of Oregon reported. The women were ticketed to the event, admitted into the event, and were then approached by event officials before the president's speech. They were asked to leave and to turn over their tickets - two of the three tickets were seized, but the third was saved when one of the teachers put it underneath an article of clothing. "The U.S. Constitution was not available on site for comment, but expressed in a written statement support for "the freedom of speech" and "of the press" among other civil liberties," a Democratic news release said."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.bend.com/news/ar_v...^3Far_id^3D18712.htm

BUSH CRIMES FAMILY: W. Gets Big-Brother to Rig Florida Again ...

10.18.04 (9:47 am) [edit]

[b]Jeb LIED About Felon Purge Warning[/b]

Florida's Herald Tribune reports Jeb "Bush said Friday that he was never warned about any problems before the list was released. But his denial contradicts a May 4, 2004, e-mail in which Florida Department of Law Enforcement computer expert Jeff Long describes how election officials told Bush the list needed to be abandoned. 'Paul Craft called today and told me that yesterday they recommended to the Gov that they 'pull the plug,'' on the voter database, Long wrote in an e-mail to his boss, Donna Uzzell. Long added that state election officials 'weren't comfortable with the felon matching program they've got.' 'The Gov rejected their suggestion to pull the plug, so they're 'going live' with it this weekend,' Long wrote." Jeb is lying - IMPEACH Jeb now!

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.heraldtribune.com/...

I'M NOT BORED, I'M ANGRY: 10 More Soldiers Die in Bush's Bloodbath in Last 24 Hours!

10.17.04 (5:31 pm) [edit]

[b]BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. forces battled insurgents around the rebel stronghold of Fallujah on Sunday, and militants ambushed and killed nine Iraqi policemen returning from training in Jordan. Many Iraqi Christians skipped Mass following bombings at churches in the capital[/b].

Fierce clashes between U.S. troops and insurgents broke out on a highway east of Fallujah and in the southern part of the city, witnesses said. The road, which leads to Baghdad, has been completely blocked. Residents reported fresh aerial and artillery attacks as explosions boomed across the city.

Plumes of smoke were seen rising from the Askari and Shuhada neighborhoods in eastern and southern Fallujah as families began to flee the area, residents reported. They said a Humvee was seen burning in the eastern edge of the city. Hospital officials said three civilians were injured in the clashes.

By sundown, U.S. troops had pulled back, setting up a checkpoint southwest of the city, witnesses said.

Late Sunday in Baghdad, a car bomb exploded in the Jadiriyah district, targeting an Iraqi patrol and causing an undetermined number of casualties, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said.

Ministry officials said they were uncertain how many casualties resulted from the blast, which occurred near Ahmed Ourabi Square. Emergency vehicles were seen rushing toward the area.

Jadiriyah, located on a peninsula in the Tigris river, includes several foreign embassies and corporate offices.

[b]Deadly weekend[/b]

In the Sadr City district of Baghdad, a mortar shell exploded at a sports stadium about 15 minutes before Prime Minister Ayad Allawi was due to arrive to inspect a program under which Shiite militiamen are handing in weapons in return for cash.

The itinerary was quickly changed and Allawi instead visited several other sites before arriving at the stadium.

The fighting came after a deadly two days for U.S. forces. Two Americans were killed Saturday when a pair of helicopters crashed south of Baghdad, and four U.S. troops died in car bomb blasts in northern Iraq and near the Syrian border on Friday.

Fallujah, 40 miles west of the capital, is considered the toughest stronghold of insurgents. Commanders have been speaking of a possible new offensive to wrest it out and other cities of militants' control, and the Marines said Saturday they had tightened their cordon around the city to keep suspected terrorists from fleeing the area. Still, officials have said that intensified airstrikes and fighting over the past week don't mark the start of a new operation.

Along the Syrian border, clashes Saturday between U.S. troops and insurgents left four people dead and 13 others wounded, according to Dr. Wael al-Duleimi from the hospital in the border town of Qaim on Sunday. The city, a hotbed of insurgent activity, was scene to one of the deadly car bombs on Friday.

Meanwhile, police said Sunday that nine Iraqi policemen returning from training in Jordan were ambushed and killed on their way home to Karbala. The bus they were traveling in was attacked Saturday in Latifiyah, a town of frequent insurgent attacks 25 miles south of Baghdad, said Karbala police spokesman Abdul-Rahman Mishawi. The attackers escaped.

Insurgents have repeatedly attacked Iraqi security forces in an attempt to destabilize and hamper reconstruction. Hundreds of police have been killed by mortars, roadside bombs, and car bombers in recent months. - http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6...

CORRUPT BushMedia Tries to Spin Normal Back-to-School Sales as 'Surprise Boost' to Economy!

10.17.04 (5:23 pm) [edit]

[b]Here's the real story:[/b] Americans pushed their spending on back-to-school stuff and fall items ahead a bit into September because they had been forced to spend more on their AC bills and summer vacation trips due to inflated energy prices. Now check out the BushMedia spin: "American shoppers splurged in malls and car showrooms in September, boosting retail sales by an unexpectedly strong 1.5 per cent.. The sizeable gain came after shoppers took a a bit of a breather in August, causing sales to dip by 0.2 per cent. The "buying spree" seen in September offered a fresh sign that consumers - the lifeblood of the economy - still have inclination to spend despite soaring energy prices and a questionable jobs outlook. " We can't wait to hear how Propaganda Central spins depressed pre-Christmas sales!

[b]Read article [/b] http://business-times.asia1.c...,4574,132393,00.html

JON STEWART BLASTS the Toady Mainstream Media for Betraying America to Bush's Fascism ...

10.17.04 (5:22 pm) [edit]

[b]Mtv.com: [/b]"The Daily Show" host Jon Stewart...on a live broadcast of CNN's "Crossfire" [said] the mainstream media [has failed] to do their duty as journalists to keep politicians and the political process honest. After co-host Tucker Carlson suggested that Stewart went easy on John Kerry ...on "The Daily Show," Stewart [fired back, saying] Carlson and Paul Begala "partisan hacks" and chiding them for not raising the level of discourse on their show beyond sloganeering. "What you do is not honest. What you do is partisan hackery. You have a responsibility to the public discourse, and you fail miserably. I watch your show every day, and it kills me. It's so painful to watch." He went on to hammer the network, and the media in general, for its coverage of the debates. Stewart said it was a disservice to viewers to immediately seek reaction from campaign insiders and presidential cheerleaders, noting that the debates' famed "Spin Alley" should be called "Deception Lane.""

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.mtv.com/chooseorlo...

BUSH'S FASCISM: Teachers Ejected Just for Wearing T-Shirts saying 'Protect our Civil Liberties'

10.17.04 (5:21 pm) [edit]

ENTIRE WORLD Sick-n-Tired of Herr Fuhrer Bush/Reich Marshall Cheney (Neo-Nazi Thugs)!!!

10.17.04 (5:17 pm) [edit]

NEW POLL: U.S. Troops & Military Families Sick of Bush's Bloody Incompetence!!!

10.17.04 (5:13 pm) [edit]

DUMB-AMERICANS SUPPORT OF BUSH: A Helluvalot To Be Ashamed Of ...

10.17.04 (5:10 pm) [edit]

[b]U.S. Civil Rights Commission Slams Bush's Record[/b]

The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights reports, "Civil rights problems remain entrenched in American society, the stubborn result of unequal treatment over time. Discrimination in housing, employment, and the voting booth, unequal educational opportunity, and other problems still stand between some Americans and true equality. Presidential leadership is necessary to break down obstacles and realize the promise of civil rights. What follows are the results of the Commissionâ??s examination, expressed in terms of: (1) whether civil rights enforcement is a presidential priority; (2) federal efforts to eradicate entrenched discrimination; (3) expanding and protecting rights for disadvantaged groups; and (4) promoting access to federal programs and services for traditionally underserved populations. This report finds that President Bush has neither exhibited leadership on pressing civil rights issues, nor taken actions that matched his words."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.usccr.gov/pubs/bus...

GEORGE W. BUSH IS UNFIT TO BE PRESIDENT: A Stupid Man & A Miserable Failure!!!

10.17.04 (5:08 pm) [edit]

WHORES BUSH/CHENEY=TRAITORS Betraying US(A) On Behalf of Their Corporate Pimps!!!

10.17.04 (5:06 pm) [edit]

[u][b]Billionaires for Bush[/b][/u]

President George W. Bush received donations from 79 percent of the U.S. billionaires who contributed to a presidential campaign this year, while Democrat John Kerry was backed by 21 percent, a study says.

Bush received contributions from 116 billionaires, including Bill Gates, chairman of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., who was listed by Forbes magazine as the world's richest person, and Frederick Smith, chief executive of FedEx Corp., according to PoliticalMoneyLine, which tracks campaign donations.

Kerry got donations from 31 billionaires, including Warren Buffett, chairman of Omaha- based Berkshire Hathaway Inc., and the world's second- richest person; Eli Broad, chairman of AIG SunAmerica Inc., a subsidiary of New York-based American International Group Inc.; and David Geffen, co-founder of Glendale, Calif.-based DreamWorks SKG, a movie studio.

Republicans often outscore Democrats in fund raising among corporate executives.

The 58-year-old Bush has 280 CEOs from Russell 1000 index companies, to 52 for the 60-year-old Kerry, a four-term Massachusetts senator, according to PoliticalMoneyLine, a nonpartisan group based in Washington.

Kerry, who accepted the Democratic presidential nomination last week, released a list of 204 executives who endorse his economic policies.

Of the 277 U.S. billionaires identified by Forbes magazine, 153 gave to a candidate, including six who gave to both Bush and Kerry.

Those giving to both candidates included Charles Dolan, chairman of Bethpage, N.Y.- based Cablevision Systems Corp.; and Donald Trump, chief executive officer of Atlantic City, N.J.-based Trump Hotels and Casino Resorts.

Another 124 billionaires, or 45 percent of the total, gave to neither candidate, including Ted Turner, the founder of Cable News Network and a former vice chairman of New York-based Time Warner Inc.; Roy Disney, chairman of Shamrock Holdings Inc. and a former director of the Walt Disney Co., founded by his uncle; and Forrest Mars Jr., chairman of Mars Inc.

"I'm always surprised at the separation of the business world from politics in a number of wealthy people," said Kent Cooper, co- founder of PoliticalMoneyLine. "To them, politics is a different world, and the business mind has a hard time understanding how politics works."

Kerry has the support of two billionaires who did not give to either presidential campaign: Steve Jobs, chief executive officer of Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple Computer Inc., and Barry Diller, chairman of New York-based IAC/InterActiveCorp, an Internet commerce and television shopping company.

A Kerry campaign spokesman declined to comment.

Calls to the Bush campaign were not returned.

[b]Wealthy donors [/b]

116 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to President Bush.

31 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry.

6 Number of billionaires who made donations this year to both Bush and Kerry. - http://www.rockymountainnews....,1299,DRMN_4_3094590,00.html

[b]Courtesy of WinstonSmith http://winstonsmith.tblog.com... [/b]

[b]ALSO REFER TO HOUSE OF BUSH, HOUSE OF SAUD [/b]... http://www.houseofbush.com/

BUSHY-BOY'S WORLD: Only Working People (NOT Rich) Sacrifice Their Sons & Their Pocketbooks!!!

10.17.04 (11:54 am) [edit]

[b]A Little Patriotic Sacrifice

by Bill Moyers [/b]

There are moments when you see suddenly crystallized in a particular event, a threat to democracy as ominous as the smoke rising from Mt. St. Helens.

This week it was that enormous payoff to big corporations by their subjects in Congress. I say payoffs advisedly. Business elites provide politicians with the money they need to run for office. The politicians pay them back with a return on their investment so generous it boggles the mind. That legislation enacted this week is worth $137 billion in tax cuts for corporations. One company alone -- General Electric -- will receive over $8 billion, despite earnings last year of over $15 billion. Many companies -- Microsoft, Oracle, Hewlett-Packard, Eli Lilly, among others -- have been parking profits overseas rather than bring them back to America where they are taxed. So Congress has now blessed them with a one-time "tax holiday" during which they can bring home the bacon at about one-seventh of the normal tax rates.

These plums are usually couched in such language they would defy a Delphic oracle to interpret them -- all the more to hoodwink us. What's behind those hieroglyphics in Section 713, Subsection A and B, Page 385? Why, a multimillion dollar windfall to Home Depot for importing ceiling fans made by serfs in China. And that little clause written in Sanskrit so tiny it would take a Mount Palomar telescope to read? Nothing less than a $27 million tax present to foreigners who bet at American horse and dog tracks. On and on it goes, the pillaging and plundering by suits with Guccis.

In a time of war, terror, and soaring deficits, you would think the governing class would be asking these corporate aristocrats to make a little patriotic sacrifice like that asked of single mothers or our men and women in Iraq. Instead they're allowed to pass their share of the burden to workers and children not yet born. At the least they ought to be required to remove the flag from their lapels and replace it with the icon they most revere -- the dollar sign.

[b]Bill Moyers is the host of [i]NOW with Bill Moyers[/i], airing Friday nights at 9 on PBS (check local listings at www.pbs.org/now/sched.html)[/b] - http://www.commondreams.org/v...

[b]How Did Your Representatives Vote?[/b]

US House Roll Call 509: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/20...
HR 4520 10/7/2004

US Senate Vote 211: http://www.senate.gov/legisla...
HR 4520 10/11/2004

BUSH CRIME FAMILY=FASCISTS: Report Reveals Jeb Bush Ignored Felon List Ad

10.17.04 (11:51 am) [edit]

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush ignored advice to throw out a flawed felon voter list before it went out to county election offices despite warnings from state officials, according to a published report Saturday.

In a May 4 e-mail obtained by the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, Florida Department of Law Enforcement computer expert Jeff Long told his boss that a Department of State computer expert had told him "that yesterday they recommended to the Gov that they 'pull the plug'" on the voter database.

The e-mail said state election officials "weren't comfortable with the felon matching program they've got," but added, "The Gov rejected their suggestion to pull the plug, so they're 'going live' with it this weekend."

Long, who was responsible for giving elections officials his department's felon database, confirmed the contents of the e-mail Friday to the Herald-Tribune. He said he didn't remember the specifics, but that Paul Craft, the Department of State's top computer expert, had told him about the meeting with Bush.

A software program matched data on felons with voter registration rolls to create the list of 48,000 names. Secretary of State Glenda Hood junked the database in July after acknowledging that 2,500 ex-felons on the list had had their voting rights restored.

Most were Democrats, and many were black. Hispanics, who often vote Republican in Florida, were almost entirely absent from the list due to a technical error.

Bush's spokeswoman, Jill Bratina, denied allegations that the governor ignored warnings about the list.

"It's also irrelevant because the list isn't being used," Bratina said Saturday.

Bush told the Herald-Tribune that Craft didn't call him, and he denied that any meeting took place May 3 with Craft or other election officials.

"Once it became clear after talking to the secretary of state that there were problems with the list (in July), that's when we decided to end it," Bush said.

Craft hung up on a Herald-Tribune reporter seeking comment Friday. A message left for a Paul Craft in Tallahassee was not immediately returned Saturday.

U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek, the Florida chairman of Democratic Sen. John Kerry's presidential campaign, said the report shows the extent Bush will go to ensure his brother's re-election.

"Jeb Bush and the Bush campaign need to come clean about their involvement in this sad spectacle," Meek said.

Florida is one of few states that does not automatically restore voting rights to convicted felons when they complete their sentences. Purging felons from voter rolls has been a hot-button issue since the 2000 presidential election, when many citizens discovered at the polls they weren't allowed to vote.

Election officials have said that anyone who feels they have been inadvertently removed from the voter rolls on Nov. 2 will be allowed to use a provisional ballot that will be examined later to determine eligibility. - http://www.commondreams.org/h...

CORRUPTION: Survey of 'Military and Families' Clearly Bogus and Designed to Hide the Truth

10.17.04 (11:48 am) [edit]

One look at this survey and you just KNOW the results have been fudged. First, you find a whopping 62% of respondants say that Bush has failed to send enough troops to Iraq - the number one factor that has led to the present crisis. The poll also found that 42% said the National Guard and Reserve troops were not properly trained for Iraq [only 38% said they were]. 51% to 8% said they opposed the Bush administration's decision to prevent the media from photographing the flag-draped coffins of men and women killed in Iraq." Yet we are then supposed to believe that 63% these same people also "approve" of the way Bush is handling the war and 64% believe the war was worth it? C'mon! No one believes people in the military are this stupid or confused! What we hear from REAL SOLDIERS is that their NUMBER ONE frustration is that the US public is not hearing the truth. This poll adds just one more nail in truth's coffin.

[b]Read article [/b] http://quote.bloomberg.com/ap...

INCOMPETENCE: Bush Invaded Iraq With NO Plan for the Occupation

10.17.04 (11:47 am) [edit]

We've known it all along, and now the Detroit Free Press provides the proof: George "W stands for War" Bush invaded Iraq without even the beginnings of a plan to win the peace. The civilian officials at the Pentagon ignored the advice and warnings of the military leaders, and launched a "faith-based" invasion with inadequate -- well, with inadequate everything. We know the result: more than 1,000 U.S. soldiers dead, coalition soldiers dead, tens of thousands of Iraqis dead, hostages dead. Bush must love death, he's deliberately done things in a way that's caused so much of it.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.freep.com/news/nw/...

REGIME CHANGE AT THE N.Y. TIMES: BUSH WAS SELECTED!!!

10.17.04 (11:41 am) [edit]

It looks like there has been a Regime Change at the NY Times! On 11-12-01, the Times front page read: "Study of Disputed Florida Ballots Finds Justices Did Not Cast the Deciding Vote." In fact, that study - the Media Consortium recount of 175,000 NEVER-counted ballots - showed the opposite, namely that Gore won under 6 of 9 scenarios. Today, in its endorsement of John Kerry, the Times finally acknowledge the TRUTH: "the Supreme Court awarded [Bush] the presidency." Better late than never...

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.nytimes.com/2004/1...

Kerry Has the Qualities to be a GREAT President, Bush Ain't Fit to Wipe Toilet in Wal Mart

10.17.04 (11:39 am) [edit]

[b]NY Times opines[/b], "Senator John Kerry goes toward the election with a base that is built more on opposition to George W. Bush than loyalty to his own candidacy. But over the last year we have come to know Mr. Kerry as more than just an alternative to the status quo. We like what we've seen. He has qualities that could be the basis for a great chief executive, not just a modest improvement on the incumbent. We have been impressed with Mr. Kerry's wide knowledge and clear thinking - something that became more apparent once he was reined in by that two-minute debate light. He is blessedly willing to re-evaluate decisions when conditions change. And while Mr. Kerry's service in Vietnam was first over-promoted and then over-pilloried, his entire life has been devoted to public service, from the war to a series of elected offices. He strikes us, above all, as a man with a strong moral core." Read this enthusiastic endorsement, and send it to all your friends!

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.nytimes.com/2004/1...

LIAR, LIAR, PANTS ON FIRE: Bush's Freudian Slip Reveals His Secret Plan for a Draft

10.17.04 (11:36 am) [edit]

"Bush turned the tables Saturday on Sen. John Kerry , declaring 'the best way to avoid the draft is to vote for me,' and pledged to oppose mandatory military service. The Democrat stuck to domestic issues, blaming Bush for a shortage of flu vaccines. Kerry also opposes a draft and has suggested that re-electing Bush would greatly increase the prospects for one. The president, fearing that young voters will be swayed by the charge, fired back, 'The person talking about a draft is my opponent.' Campaigning in an area heavily dependent on the military, Bush said, 'WE WILL NOT HAVE AN ALL-VOLUNTEER ARMY' before correcting himself. 'Let me restate that,' he continued. 'We will not have a draft ... . The best way to avoid a draft is to vote for me.' Polls show that a majority of young voters believe Bush would reinstitute the draft, despite the resident's denials."

[b]Read article [/b] http://story.news.yahoo.com/n...

U.S. PATRIOTS SAY: Kerry Will Restore 'Unity and Strength'

10.17.04 (11:36 am) [edit]

[b]Boston Globe opines[/b], "Iraq, simply put, is out of control. Kerry is best qualified bring it under control, not least by reassuring the Iraqis themselves that the United States does not have permanent designs on their strategic bases or oil. On terrorism, Kerry understands that intelligence, police work, diplomacy, and economic development are the the principal weapons against a diffuse but knowable enemy. At home, Kerry is a strong supporter of civil rights and women's rights. His nominees to the Supreme Court would not be likely to roll back decades of important gains for women and minorities. He would rein in the Bush deficit by restoring 1990s-era tax rates to the top brackets. Although we fear that rolling back the tax cuts will not produce enough revenue to halve the deficit and implement Kerry's ambitious healthcare plan, his priorities are right: to restore fiscal sanity and to reduce the number of Americans without health insurance -- at 45 million, a national scandal."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.boston.com/news/gl...

SHAME ON THE RNC: Bush Campaign Tries to Hide Cheney from Voters in Oregon

10.17.04 (11:33 am) [edit]

" Dick Cheney is missing from a pamphlet Oregonians consult as they ponder who to vote for - and state officials say they are getting "tons of calls" about the omission." The Repugs, trying hard to find any evidence of Democrat election funny business to offset the growing list of GOP crimes, accused Sec of State Bill Bradbury, a Dem, of intentionally not sending in the info. Turns out it was REPUG funny business - as usual. The Bush-Cheney campaign decided not to send the material. Although they claim it was to save the $1,000 it would have cost to place Cheney in the pamphlet, we suspect the omission was done to avoid reminding voters of the fact that corporate fraud and human rights criminal Cheney wasn't part of the Bush ticket! Either than, or they wanted to create the illusion of Democrat funny business.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/...

BUSH CRIME FAMILY'S COUP d'ETAT: Jeb LIED About Felon Purge Warning

10.17.04 (11:30 am) [edit]

Florida's Herald Tribune reports Jeb "Bush said Friday that he was never warned about any problems before the list was released. But his denial contradicts a May 4, 2004, e-mail in which Florida Department of Law Enforcement computer expert Jeff Long describes how election officials told Bush the list needed to be abandoned. 'Paul Craft called today and told me that yesterday they recommended to the Gov that they 'pull the plug,'' on the voter database, Long wrote in an e-mail to his boss, Donna Uzzell. Long added that state election officials 'weren't comfortable with the felon matching program they've got.' 'The Gov rejected their suggestion to pull the plug, so they're 'going live' with it this weekend,' Long wrote." Jeb is lying - IMPEACH Jeb now!

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.heraldtribune.com/...

BUSH'S ECONOMIC FIASCO: Fascist Policies Endanger Our Ability To Create New Industries And Jobs

10.16.04 (2:57 pm) [edit]

[b]The Progress Report: [/b]"America needs to improve its research and development climate, so it does not lose its edge in high-tech industries. The Bush administration's latest five-year budget would cut research and development budgets in 21 of 23 scientific agencies and its post-9/11 visa policies have had a negative affect on the flow of foreign scientists to the U.S (http://www.geosociety.org/abo...). This endangers America's ability to create new industries and jobs. American Progress recommends (http://www.americanprogress.o...%7bE9245FE4-9A2B-43C7-A52 1-5D6FF2E06E03%7d/offshor ing.pdf) that the research and experimentation tax credit be made permanent, that the administration increase support for scientific and technology research and update immigration policies to reflect the critical role that immigrants play in enhancing U.S. innovation and competitiveness."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.progressreport.org...

BUSH'S ECONOMIC RAPE OF AMERICA: 1st Time Since WWII, Deficit Grew 4 Straight Years!!!

10.16.04 (2:55 pm) [edit]

[b]OFFICIAL TREASURY REPORT SHOWS FOURTH YEAR OF DEFICIT GROWTH, DESPITE ECONOMIC RECOVERY[/b]

This Marks First Time Since World War II that Deficit Grew for Four Straight Years

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.cbpp.org/10-14-04b...

TEACHERS EJECTED from Bush Speech Just for Wearing T-Shirts saying: 'Protect our Civil Liberties'

10.16.04 (2:50 pm) [edit]

BUSH'S BLOODBATH: In Less than 24 Hours, SEVEN MORE SOLDIERS DIE in Iraq and Afghanistan

10.16.04 (2:46 pm) [edit]

[b]Newsday:[/b] http://www.nynewsday.com/news...,0,5068376.story?coll=nyc-nationhome -headlines "Car bombs killed five U.S. troops in Iraq, the U.S. military said Saturday, the latest in a string of such attacks at the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. Blasts also targeted five churches in the Iraqi capital. The two car bombs went off Friday, the military said. One, carried out by a suicide bomber driving an explosive-laden vehicle, targeted a U.S. patrol near the town of Qaim, an insurgent hotspot near the border with Syria, killing four U.S. troops...The other blast went off in the northern city of Mosul, 225 miles north of Baghdad, killing a U.S. soldier assigned to Task Force Olympia." Meanwhile, two US soldiers traveling with a convoy in Afghanistan were killed by a bomb blast. http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD... Bush and his media toads' excuse? The start of Ramadan. Before that, the Iraqi constitution... next it will be Jan. elections. As the death count grows, so do the number of BushMedia excuses.

THE WORLD BACKS KERRY

10.16.04 (2:31 pm) [edit]

Millions of Americans are scratching their heads over how to vote on November 2 after the last of the three televised presidential debates left George Bush and John Kerry neck and neck over jobs, education, health care and taxes, with little mention of Iraq or 9/11. But the rest of the world, according to a poll we and several other newspapers publish today, has already made up its mind, backing the Democratic challenger by a margin of two to one.

Any sample, of course, is just a sample, but this survey of public opinion in 10 countries does include the US's two immediate neighbours, Canada and Mexico, as well as Israel and Russia, Washington's close allies in the "war on terror", and Britain, still its most loyal transatlantic friend, despite widespread criticism of Tony Blair. Unfortunately, Muslim countries are absent, though their inclusion would have made even gloomier reading for the White House. A recent Pew Research Centre poll, for example, showed just 7% of Pakistanis approve of Mr Bush, while 65% have a favourable opinion of Osama bin Laden.

These findings - likely to achieve a high degree of exposure because they are media-driven - confirm previous polls in underlining the degree of global hostility to President Bush and the Iraq war. Some 74% of Germans, according to GlobeScan, want to see Mr Kerry win the election. A June poll conducted by the German Marshall Fund found that 76% of respondents in nine European countries disapproved of Mr Bush's handling of international affairs, up significantly from a survey in 2002. It also found that 80% of Europeans polled - compared with half of Americans - said Iraq was not worth the human and financial cost. In Europe, only Poles would rather see Mr Bush back in the Oval office. Elsewhere in "new Europe" there is a distinctly "old European" wish to see the Massachusetts senator win. Further afield, Israelis are the only people to back the incumbent and to see American democracy as a model for other countries. Similarly positive views in Russia appear to reflect the hardline US view on Chechen terrorism: the survey was carried out in the aftermath of the Beslan school massacre.

Against this bleak background, the good news is that there is a clear distinction between anti-Americanism and criticism of US policies. No less than 68% of all those polled - with the French, Mr Kerry's most fervent backers, scoring a surprising above-average 72% - have a favourable view of Americans but are implacably opposed to the US government. Opinions of the US have worsened for 57% over the past three years.

Strikingly, though, political differences may now be casting shadows in other areas. Young Britons, avid consumers of Big Macs, Starbucks and Friends, are now hostile to American culture on a scale traditionally associated with the French. Canada, Mexico and South Korea feel even more threatened. It is common ground that Iraq and the Guantánamo Bay and Abu Ghraib scandals have eroded the sympathy generated by the 2001 terrorist attacks. Encouragingly for whoever does win, 90% believe it is important to maintain good relations with the US. The danger is, perhaps, of expecting too much from a Kerry victory.

Mr Bush may well wish to exploit this hostility, against a rival he has portrayed as caring too much for allies and not enough for America. Clearly, if the world had a vote, the result on November 2 would not be in doubt. The president is unlikely to be surprised that the Guardian, Asahi Shimbun, Le Monde or El Pais believe that Iraq is a "deadly and highly questionable war". That though, is the view of the Lone Star Iconoclast, published in his home town of Crawford, Texas. It matters a lot what others think about the US. But it is only Americans who can choose their own leader. - http://www.guardian.co.uk/use...,15221,1327971,00.html

YET ANOTHER Global Poll Reveals: The World HATES Bush

10.16.04 (10:00 am) [edit]

To sum up world opinion in a nutshell: 'We like Americans but we HATE G.W. Bush." The Guardian reports: "George Bush has squandered a wealth of sympathy around the world towards America since September 11 with public opinion in 10 leading countries - including some of its closest allies - growing more hostile to the United States while he has been in office. According to a survey, voters in eight out of the 10 countries, including Britain, want to see the Democrat challenger, John Kerry, defeat President Bush in next month's US presidential election. The poll, conducted by 10 of the world's leading newspapers, including France's Le Monde, Japan's Asahi Shimbun, Canada's La Presse, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Guardian, also shows that on balance world opinion does not believe that the war in Iraq has made a positive contribution." In short - vote for Bush, and you vote for America to continue to go it alone in Iraq and everywhere else.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.guardian.co.uk/use...,15221,1327568,00.html

BUSH=CROOK: Republican Dirty Tricksters Sproul & Associates Accused of Vote Fraud

10.16.04 (9:58 am) [edit]

[b]Progress Report:[/b] "Employees in the two western states have accused [Republican 'consultants' Sproul & Associates] of destroying, dumping or shredding the forms of Democrats who thought they were registered to vote. Also, an employee in West Virginia quit after she was told to only register individuals who would confirm they were planning to vote for President Bush. The head of Sproul & Associates, Nathan Sproul, has long ties to the GOP: he was the former executive director of the Arizona Republican Committee. Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Ted Kennedy (D-MA) have asked Attorney General John Ashcroft to launch an immediate investigation on the federal level. The New Yorker provides a look at how Ashcroft's Justice Department itself has politicized the voting process (http://www.newyorker.com/fact...)."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.americanprogress.o...

BUSH=CHEAT: Evidence Shows Direct Ties Between RNC/Pro-GOP Dirty Tricksters Sproul & Associates

10.16.04 (9:57 am) [edit]

[b]Progress Report:[/b] "This week, explosive new evidence emerged of direct ties between the RNC and a Republican consulting firm being investigated by Oregon and Nevada for perpetrating widespread voter fraud. (http://www.latimes.com/news/n...,1,7860167,print.story) Sproul & Associates, paid $500,000 by the Republican National Committee (http://www.mercurynews.com/ml...), created a voter registration front group in several states. Some of the canvassers the company hired say they were told they wouldn't be paid (http://www.azcentral.com/news...) for registering Democrats."

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.americanprogress.o...

BUSH LIES: IRAQI PRESIDENT SAYS ELECTIONS MAY NEED TO BE POSTPONED

10.16.04 (9:55 am) [edit]

[b]Progress Report:[/b] "President Bush and other top members of his administration have been insistent that elections in Iraq will occur as scheduled, on 1/31/05. But yesterday, 'President Ghazi Ajil Yawer was quoted in Baghdad by the newspaper Asharq al Awsat as saying that the vote could be postponed because of security threats' (http://www.latimes.com/news/n...,1,5368543.story?coll=la-home-world) . President Yawer said, 'If we see that elections held by that date without security or conditions favoring a fair and comprehensive vote ... will have a negative impact on our country, then we will not hesitate to change its date.' Bush 'has repeatedly pointed to the January elections as evidence that Iraq's recovery is on schedule.'" Once more, Bush is lying, delusional or both.

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.americanprogressac...

A'W'OL BUSH Exhibits All of the Primary Symptoms of Abusive Personality Disorder

10.16.04 (9:46 am) [edit]

Reading through this check list of symptoms of abusive personality, it seemed as if we were reading a description of Bush and his most dedicated supporters - right down to the cruelty to animals (Bush admitted he used to blow up frogs for fun). Just shift the focus of the abuse from home to global situation ("past battering" could refer to invasions of poor countries) and there you have it - a president who is a perpetrator and a blindly devoted army of followers who exhibit all the signs of abuse victims (codependence, making excuses for the perp, endangering self or others to please the perp, low self-esteem, etc.).

[b]Read article [/b] http://www.healthyplace.com/C...

HOW CAN YOU FIGHT A WAR With Your Head Up Your Ass, A'W'OL Bush???

10.16.04 (9:36 am) [edit]

[b]Hatred, fear reign after 'liberation'

Violence, anarchy cutting too close to home for some[/b]

Baghdad -- Behnam Farho pinpoints the moment when the fear got to be too much, when he decided his country was lost, and it was time for him to gather up his family and leave Iraq -- for good.

It was late August, just after his beloved niece, Mayada, was abducted by gun-toting men in front of her home. Farho, a mild-mannered goldsmith, began a weeklong odyssey into Baghdad's new underworld in search of Mayada.

At one point he found himself sitting in an outdoor teahouse in Sadr City, a Baghdad slum where gunbattles rage nightly between militias and the U.S. Army, having an awkward conversation with a whiskey-guzzling crime lord who he hoped might be able to shed light on Mayada's fate.

"What if the police come now?" Farho recalls asking. "They'll arrest me, too."

The mobster laughed heartily. "Before the police even left the station, I would get a call on my cell phone," he said.

A few weeks later, he had paid a $10,000 ransom, collected his distraught niece and begun selling off the extended family's property. He was heading to Syria.

"There's no place for us in Iraq," Farho said. "Even if I wound up in a poor country in Africa, I'd be happy, as long as I could sleep at night without fear."

Fifteen years ago, Iraqi exile Kanan Makiya published "The Republic of Fear," a terrifying, surreal account of a country where President Saddam Hussein's security apparatus wrought havoc on the lives and psyches of ordinary Iraqis. Today, the country feels almost as surreal and terrifying, with a new kind of fear -- that the violence, the hatred, the chaos of "liberated" Iraq keeps edging closer to one's own life, family and closest friends.

Car bombs and mortar fire shake the day and night. A trip to the supermarket becomes a life-threatening exercise when a gunfight erupts outside. An Iraqi teenager wearing an AC Milan hat glares at an American in a guard post. The burly soldier, carrying an M-16, stares back, stone-faced.

Shop owners who used to welcome foreign reporters with tea now politely but firmly order them out. "I'm sorry, it's not you," one shop owner explains. "I'm just scared someone will target my store because they see foreigners here. "

At a stall in the Bab al Sharji "thieves market" -- a sprawling bazaar in the old section of Baghdad now filled with pickpockets, car thieves and prostitutes -- 13-year-old Allawi Ali Haydar does a brisk business selling videos of insurgents fighting U.S. forces and Iraqi national guards. Bloody scenes flickering on a monitor show the Mahdi Army militia of firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr firing on U.S. soldiers from alleyways.

"I don't feel good when I see them," says the youngster, sadness flickering in his brown eyes. "I don't want such things to happen in my part of town."

A little way down the pockmarked Sadr City road, past a blue and-white Mercedes bus riddled with bullet holes, a smiling Mahdi Army fighter is giving orders. He has an infectious laugh and flashes perfect teeth, giving his name as Ali "Abu Hossein." At 24, he leads a group of pumped-up followers -- some as young as 12 -- for a night of what passes for fun in Sadr City: resetting remote control bombs that failed to detonate during the previous night's battles with U.S. soldiers.

A group of Iraqi police stands 20 feet away. "The police are with us," says Ali. "Or they are afraid," says one of his followers.

Throughout the country, graffiti-covered walls read "Iraq will be America's graveyard," "Long live the holy warriors," "The occupier will leave, by God," and "Traitors and spies beware."

Paranoia infects every move, even among hardened foreign correspondents - - fear of being followed or of being sold out for a few hundred dinars to kidnappers, or that the next car bomb could have one's own name on it.

"We have to keep moving," a journalist's Iraqi translator says, abruptly ending an interview. "We'll be safer if we keep moving. Let's get out of here. "

Even little children feel the all-encompassing fear.

Hanna Abdul Hakim takes her two children, ages 6 and 8, to work with her because they refuse to stay at home without their mother, ever since a string of bombs killed at least 35 children. One of the bombs exploded a few hundred yards from Hakim's house.

"We're scared for our kids mostly," Hakim says. "But we cannot keep our children locked up. They have so much energy. We can no longer take them to the park or public places, because of the explosions. They're afraid of the explosions."

Someday, things will return to normal, people say wistfully. The question, says an Iraqi translator, is "what level of suffering we'll have to endure before things go back to normal."

Every day, headlines on Radio Sawa, the popular U.S.-financed radio station, paint a bleak picture: Sunni clerics abducted and murdered. Three Kurdish peshmerga fighters beheaded. Intense fighting on Haifa Street. New Abu Musab al-Zarqawi communique promises more violence against collaborators.

Then, back to the music.

"I'm like a bird -- I'll only fly away," Canadian pop artist Nelly Furtado sings. "I don't know where my soul is. I don't know where my home is."

The dwindling cadre of U.S. officials in Baghdad continues to express unbridled optimism for the future of Iraq and America's aims. But Thursday's bomb attacks in the Green Zone proved even that fortress, home to U.S. and Iraqi officials, is no longer safe. At least six people, including four Americans, were killed when suicide bombers slipped into the zone and set off coordinated blasts at a popular cafe.

Iraqi officials, for their part, acknowledge their country's deep troubles but say they see them as the inevitable growing pains.

"We believe this is a natural result of the collapse of the regime," says Hamid al-Bayati, the deputy foreign minister. "This has happened everywhere: the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, Iranian Revolution. When a dictatorial regime with 13 security organizations, with a huge army of a half million or more collapses, and the arms go into the hands of gangs, criminals and thieves, this is the obvious result."

Some Iraqis still believe that time can ultimately heal wounds.

"In my opinion, now is not the time for resistance," says Hamid Feras, a 30-year-old civil service worker. "Up to this point, we should be grateful to the Americans, because they got rid of a nightmare we'd never thought we'd get rid of. We should give them two, three, four years to rebuild the country."

U.S. soldiers, however, have growing doubts about such a long-term commitment.

"I like the Iraqi people," says Pfc. Isaac Staley, 30, of Springfield, Ore., standing guard at a joint U.S. Army-Iraqi police checkpoint in central Baghdad. "But there's so much separating them from us, from our Western civilization, that it's hard to get past. There's prejudice. ... There's prejudice on our side, and there's prejudice on their side."

The Iraqi police radio crackles out an all-points bulletin. "A guy with a beard named Mohammad," says the dispatcher. "If you see him, detain him." A Black Hawk helicopter roars overhead. Then another one.

Many soldiers suspect the people who smile at them during the day are the ones firing rocket-propelled grenades at them by night. "Don't trust anyone, not even the 10-year-old kid on the street," says U.S Army Capt. Jeff Mersiowsky of Tucson.

In Baquba, a hotbed of insurgency, a soldier with the Army's 4th Infantry Division who wished to remain anonymous, says, "The only question for us is how many of us have gotta die before we get to go home."

For droves of young Iraqis who have grown weary of the fear and paranoia, passport offices have become popular destinations. Ahmad Ibrahim, 21, worked as a translator for the U.S. Army, an $800-a-month job as dangerous as any in Iraq. Iraqis on the street told him he was a traitor. Three of his friends who were translators have been killed. He found one of his friends, Mohammad, who had been abducted -- lying close to the river, a bullet in his head.

Still, he stayed on. But when a battalion commander handed him a pistol during a violent confrontation with insurgents and advised "Watch your back," Ibrahim knew it was time to go.

"I didn't sign up for this. I just wanted to be an interpreter," he says after he was granted a visa. "I want to leave, but it's still my country. I feel so bad about it. Everything is starting to get worse and worse." - http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/art...

[b]BUSH HAS FUCKED-UP IRAQ SO BADLY THAT HE DESERVES TO BE IMPEACHED AND PUT ON TRIAL FOR WAR CRIMES!!![/b]

MORE BUSH AWOL DOCUMENTS: Remedial Training to Deal with Blackouts

10.16.04 (9:34 am) [edit]

[b]From the AP, via Corrente: [/b]"Weeks after Texas National Guard officials signed an oath swearing they had turned over all of President Bush's military records, independent examiners found more than two dozen pages of previously unreleased documents about Bush. ... The 31 pages of documents turned over to AP Thursday night include orders for high-altitude training in 1972, less than three months before Bush abruptly quit flying as a fighter pilot. ... The training involved instruction about the effects of lack of oxygen on the body and exercises in which the pilots are exposed under supervision to the thin air of high altitudes. The purpose is to familiarize pilots with the effects of lack of oxygen so they can recognize them and take appropriate action to avoid blacking out at the controls." ... 'You know what can cause brain damage, and sometimes does it by accelerating the onset of a deterioration which would otherwise take place much later in life? Google "anoxia"..'

[b]Read article [/b] http://corrente.blogspot.com/...

HONOR THE MILITARY: Impeach Bush/Cheney for the Brownshirting of America

10.16.04 (9:25 am) [edit]

[b]The Brownshirting of America [/b]

James Bovard, the great libertarian champion of our freedom and civil liberties, recently shared with readers his mail from Bush supporters. For starters, here are some of the salutations: "communist bastard," "a**hole," "a piece of trash, scum of the earth." It goes downhill from there.

Bush's supporters demand lockstep consensus that Bush is right. They regard truthful reports that Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction and was not involved in the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. – truths now firmly established by the Bush administration's own reports – as treasonous America-bashing.

Bovard is interpreted as throwing cold water on the feel-good, macho, Muslim butt-kicking that Bush's invasion of Iraq has come to symbolize for his supporters. "People like you and Michael Moore," one irate reader wrote, "is [sic] what brings down our country."

I have received similar responses from conservatives, as, no doubt, have a number of other writers who object to a domestic police state at war with the world.

In language reeking with hatred, the Heritage Foundation's TownHall.com readers impolitely informed me that opposing the invasion of Iraq is identical to opposing America, that Bush is the greatest American leader in history and everyone who disagrees with him should be shot before they cause America to lose another war. TownHall's readers were sufficiently frightening to convince the Heritage Foundation to stop posting my columns.

Bush's conservative supporters want no debate. They want no facts, no analysis. They want to denounce and demonize the enemies that the Hannitys, Limbaughs, and Savages of talk radio assure them are everywhere at work destroying their great and noble country.

I remember when conservatives favored restraint in foreign policy and wished to limit government power in order to protect civil liberties. Today's young conservatives are Jacobins determined to use government power to impose their will at home and abroad.

Where did such "conservatives" come from?

Claes Ryn in his important book, America the Virtuous, explains the intellectual evolution of the neoconservatives who lead the Bush administration. For all their defects, however, neocons are thoughtful compared to the world of talk radio, whose inhabitants are trained to shout down everyone else. Whence came the brownshirt movement that slavishly adheres to the neocons' agenda?

Three recent books address this question. Thomas Frank, in What's the Matter With Kansas?, locates the movement in legitimate conservative resentments of people who feel that family, religious, and patriotic values are given short shrift by elitist liberals.

These resentments festered and multiplied as offshore production, jobs outsourcing, and immigration took a toll on careers and the American dream.

An audience was waiting for right-wing talk radio, which found its stride during the Clinton years. Clinton's evasions made it easy to fall in with show hosts, who spun conspiracies and fabricated a false consciousness for listeners who became increasingly angry.

Show hosts, who advertise themselves as truth-tellers in a no-spin zone, quickly figured out that success depends upon constantly confronting listeners with bogeymen to be exposed and denounced: war protesters and America-bashers, the French, marrying homosexuals, the liberal media, turncoats, Democrats, and the ACLU.

Talk radio's "news stories" do not need to be true. Their importance lies in inflaming resentments and confirming that America's implacable enemies are working resolutely to destroy us.

David Brock's The Republican Noise Machine lacks the insights of Thomas Frank's book, but it provides a gossipy history of the right-wing takeover of the U.S. media. Brock is unfair to some people, myself included, and mischaracterizes as right wing some media personalities who are under right-wing attack.

Brock is as blindly committed to his causes as the right-wing zealots he exposes are to theirs. Unlike Frank, he cannot acknowledge that the right wing has legitimate issues.

Nevertheless, Brock makes a credible case that today's conservatives are driven by ideology, not by fact. He argues that their stock in trade is denunciation, not debate. Conservatives don't assess opponents' arguments, they demonize opponents. Truth and falsity are out of the picture; the criteria are: who's good, who's evil, who's patriotic, who's unpatriotic.

These are the traits of brownshirts. Brownshirts know they are right. They know their opponents are wrong and regard them as enemies who must be silenced if not exterminated.

Some of Brock's quotes from prominent conservative commentators will curl your toes. His description of the right wing's destruction of an independent media and the "Fairness Doctrine" explain why a recent CNN/Gallup poll found that 42% of Americans still believe that Saddam Hussein was involved in the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the U.S. and 32% believe that Saddam Hussein personally planned the attack.

A country in which 42% of the population is totally misinformed is not a country where democracy is safe.

Today there is no one to correct a lie once it is told. The media, thanks to Republicans, has been concentrated in few hands, and they are not the hands of newsmen. Corporate values rule. If lies sell, sell them. If listeners, viewers, and readers want confirmation of their resentments and beliefs, give it to them. Objectivity turns listeners off and is a money loser.

In his book, Cruel and Unusual, Mark Crispin Miller, professor of media studies at New York University, explains how right-wing influence has moved the media away from reporting news to designing our consciousness. "The Age of Information," Miller writes, "has turned out to be an Age of Ignorance."

Miller makes a strong case. His description of how CNN and Fox News destroyed the credibility of Scott Ritter, the leading expert on Iraq's weapons, reveals a media completely given over to propaganda. Ritter stood in the way of the neocons' invasion of Iraq.

CNN's Miles O'Brien, Eason Jordan, Catherine Callaway, Paula Zahn, Kyra Phillips, Arthel Neville, and Fox News' David Asman and John Gibson portrayed Ritter as a disloyal American, a Ba'athist stooge on the take from Saddam Hussein, and compared him to Jane Fonda in North Vietnam.

With this, the right-wing talk radio crazies were off and running. Anyone with the slightest bit of real information about the state of weapons development in Iraq was dismissed as a foreign agent who should be shot for treason.

By substituting fiction for reality, the U.S. media took the country to war. The CNN and Fox News "journalists" are as responsible for America's ill-fated invasion of Iraq as Cheney and Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Perle.

With a sizable percentage of the U.S. population now addicted to daily confirmations of their resentments and hatreds, U.S. policy will be increasingly driven by tightly made-up minds in pursuit of unrealistic agendas.

American troops are in Iraq on false pretenses. No one knows all the fateful consequences of this mistaken adventure. Bush's reelection would be seen as a vindication of aggression, and more aggression would likely follow. A continuing expenditure of blood, money, alliances, good will, and civil liberties is not a future to which to look forward.

[b]Dr. Roberts served as assistant secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. During the Cold War era, he was a member of the Committee on the Present Danger. He is a former associate editor and columnist for the Wall Street Journal editorial page and a former contributing editor for National Review. In 1986-87 he assisted the French government's privatization of socialized firms and was awarded the Legion of Honor[/b]. - http://www.antiwar.com/robert...

'SQUANDERED SYMPATHY': Poll Reveals World Anger at Bush ...

10.16.04 (9:23 am) [edit]

[b]Eight out of 10 countries favor Kerry for president[/b]

George Bush has squandered a wealth of sympathy around the world towards America since September 11 with public opinion in 10 leading countries - including some of its closest allies - growing more hostile to the United States while he has been in office.

According to a survey, voters in eight out of the 10 countries, including Britain, want to see the Democrat challenger, John Kerry, defeat President Bush in next month's US presidential election.

The poll, conducted by 10 of the world's leading newspapers, including France's Le Monde, Japan's Asahi Shimbun, Canada's La Presse, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Guardian, also shows that on balance world opinion does not believe that the war in Iraq has made a positive contribution to the fight against terror.

The results show that in Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Japan, Spain and South Korea a majority of voters share a rejection of the Iraq invasion, contempt for the Bush administration, a growing hostility to the US and a not-too-strong endorsement of Mr Kerry. But they all make a clear distinction between this kind of anti-Americanism and expressing a dislike of American people. On average 68% of those polled say they have a