Fight the recall of Governor Gray Davis: California's democratically elected Governor

I urge all citizens of California to vote no on the recall. The recall campaign is not about the people of California or fixing California's economy; it is simply an attempt by the Republican right wing to steal the governorship. The recall was bought and paid for by an extremely conservative multimillionaire congressman from San Diego (Darrell Issa) who wants to overturn the will of the people as expressed in the election of Davis.

The Republicans, realizing the people of California are not interested in having them run the state, have resorted to using an obscure California law and patently undemocratic means to overturn a fair and just election merely because they didn't like the result (the election of Davis).

This is an affront to the democratic process. It must be resisted by all people who believe in democracy and the right of the majority to decide who they want to lead them, as was accomplished in the election of Davis just a few months ago.

Three years ago the Supreme Court helped a candidate steal the highest office in our nation; however, this time the people of California, at least, have the opportunity to defend democracy and the right of ones vote to count in an election, an opportunity that millions of Americans wished they had in 2000.

The majority has spoken clearly in electing Gray Davis; it is now up to the people of California to defend America's great system of democracy and the will of its people.

The Supreme Court was complicit in bringing injustice and shame to our electoral process, but the people of California have a chance to bring back some of its honor. I sincerely hope they do not just for California's sake, but for the sake of all Americans.

VOTE NO ON THE RECALL!

Some anti-recall slogans I came up with for the people of California:

Groping women, Adolph Hitler: Hey Arnold, get a clue, this is California; we do things different here...
VOTE NO ON THE RECALL!


Hey California... Do we really want to be another notch on Arnold's belt...
VOTE NO ON THE RECALL!


Arnold apologized for groping women; what will he say after he rapes California...
VOTE NO ON THE RECALL!

Hundreds of billions for Iraq, but barely a billion to keep our nations passenger rail system running


Murray's efforts key in keeping Amtrak on track

Farmers committing a "a crime against all humanity" as they relentlessly chop and burn one of the world's few remaining biologically diverse and important forests


A steady onslaught of clearing in North America's largest rain forest likely will lead to its demise

British politician says Iraq invasion was a "political disaster" in which Blair's "cabinet was complicit"

War was a political disaster for Labour and Cabinet was complicit, says Cook

Orangutan's are going extinct: a coming catastrophe that must be stopped

Orangutans Could Go Extinct in 20 Years

Fear and extremism threaten women's rights and freedoms in U.S. occupied Iraq

Iraqi Women No Better Off, U.N. Official Says

Bush wasn't elected; Davis was

My girlfriend made a good point regarding the ludicrous claim that Californian's are stuck with current governor Gray Davis. She rightly points out that Californian's are not stuck with Davis because he was elected once and then just reelected a few months ago. As opposed to Bush, who we have truly all been stuck with, since he was never elected at all; he stole the presidency.

Compare Bush administration's quotes before war on Iraq and al-Qaeda to those after:

Before invasion of Iraq:

Bush lies trying to link al Qaeda to Saddam Hussein


After invasion:

Bush: No evidence Saddam was involved in 9/11 attacks


Wolfowitz Lets Slip that Iraq Was Not Involved in 9/11; No Ties to Al-Qaeda

The evidence is clear; Bush and the other crooks in the White House, and the Pentagon knowingly lied to the American people. He and his adminstration brought disgrace upon the United States of America and they need to be removed from power now!

Hero grandmother from British Columbia held in contempt of court

A grandmother in Canada is being criminalized for doing what I consider to be absolutely legitimate and highly commendable: she is trying to protect old growth trees in British Columbia. This woman is not a criminal, but a hero whose behavior we should all emulate.

Elderly protester found guilty

Fight the Recall of California governor Gray Davis!

Read an article entitled "The dirt on Schwarzenegger" here.

More info:

The Top Ten Conservative Idiots

Arnold's True Colors

More of Bush's buddies profiting from the war in Iraq

Washington Insiders' New Firm Consults on Contracts in Iraq

No one should have their voting rights taken away, that goes for former and current prisoners

This is especially true since the justice system is often anything but just, disproportionately imprisoning minorities and the poor while white collar criminals who rob millions of dollars from Americans remain free.

In addition many people are in prison for non-violent drug related crimes. No one and I mean no one should be in jail because of marijuana or because they are addicted to drugs.

Study: States End Ex-Felons Voting Bans

Update: Schwarzenegger even refuses a one-on-one debate with Davis on Larry King

Todd Harris, a spokesman for the Schwarzenegger campaign, used twisted logic in saying the Davis camp desire for a debate takes a page from the "desperate candidate's handbook."

Hardly, the more rational among us would conclude that a candidate who does everything possible to avoid participating in debate, an indispensable exercise of the democratic process, for fear of being outted as incompetent and wholly unelectable, is on page one of the desperate candidates handbook.

Schwarzenegger Declines Debate Invite

Comic debate was best anti-recall ad Gray Davis could have imagined


Schwarzenegger afraid to debate Davis

Its obvious that Arnold likes picking on women much more than facing a challenge by the incumbent governor Gray Davis. His campaign released a statement refusing to take Davis up on his challenge to a debate "right here, right now."

He is a tough guy when given the questions and spurting out silly one liners and platitudes that truly reveal his ignorance and utter lack of qualification for the highest office in the state of California; however, when given the chance to confront the stitting democratically elected governor of a state which has the sixth largest economy in the world, and the largest population in America, he retreats from the challenge.

This is because Davis would destroy him in a debate. The Schwarzenegger camp knows this. His handlers figure if he can keep his mouth shut for just awhile longer and stick to the prepackaged script they have given him full of trite one liners (the nonsense he built his career on) he can squeek out a win in a society where the dumbest actors get elected and the smartest ones get ignored.

Schwarzenegger is constantly attacking Davis, when Davis isn't right in front of his face; however, in a forum of direct confrontation, like a debate, Schwarzenegger's banal, stupid and baseless attacks would be volleyed right back leaving Scwarzenegger looking like what he is: an untalented actor and one of the worst choices for governor ever presented to the voters of California.


Schwarzenegger Declines Debate Challenge

Barbarian at the Gate

U.S. Atrocities and War Crimes: Revisiting the "Highway of Death" where tens of thousands of withdrawing Iraqi soldiers were massacred by U.S. forces following the 1991 Gulf War

The Massacre of Withdrawing Soldiers on "The Highway of Death"

On Antiwar.com today:

Parents Tell Bush: 'You Lied and Our Sons Died'

CIA wants probe of White House

Republicans question Iraq price tag

The world says no to the U.S. occupation of Iraq

Protests erupted today around the world in a call to end the criminal occupation of the nation of Iraq by the United States and its allies.

London drew the biggest protests, estimated at 20,000 people, with all attending voicing vehement opposition to the occupation. The occupation wasn't the only target as the crowd voiced disgust with the policies of Prime Minister Tony Blair. New polls just released, indicate that fifty percent of the British population want Blair to resign immediately for his involvement in the invasion of Iraq and the events leading to the suicide of David Kelly.

Calling him a war criminal and carrying signs that read "Bliar," it is clear that Blair's political career has been severely, probably irreparably, damaged by his insistence on going to war with Iraq even though the majority of Britons were extremely against any invasion.

Marchers Worldwide Call for Iraq Pullout

Huffington terminates the Terminator!

One of my favorite jibes in the California recall gubernatorial debate last night came from independent candidate Arianna Huffington, she said, "Republicans always talk about sexual morality, but not business morality."

I could not agree more with that statement. In fact, it is a premise for many of my arguments and posts right here on this blog. Moreover, I have actually been working on a blog dedicated entirely to that very point.

Of course, in the United States of America, the land of Enron, TYCO, Global Crossing and countless other lying, and stealing bastards, who put profit above all else, people won't get to hear Huffington's or similar points of view very often in the mainstream media; however, the BBC quoted Huffington's jab at the Republicans right at the beginning of their article on the debate. That is because, by no means perfect, the business climate in Europe isn't as wrought with corruption and recklessness as the U.S. economic system.

The corporate media won't give you so called "progressive" points of view, even those that would seem to be a given (that businesses should act in the public interest or at least not act against it), because such awareness might cause people to question the profit system itself, and the its fragile power structure, ultimately proving a threat to its actual existence.

The idea of actually putting morality into the process of business decision making is something that American corporations would never tolerate. The very suggestion that such an ideal should dictate how business is conducted galvanizes the most threatened members of the oligarchy (corporations and their political and media allies) to employ every effort to suppress it.

Don't believe me? I challenge readers to submit to me any article from the U.S. mainstream press (national, state, city or local) that covered the debate and quoted the candidates, but didn't leave out Huffington's contention that Republicans only care about sexual, and not business morality. If you find any I'll post them.

Quote mentioned:

BBC
LA Times


Not mentioned:

Washington Post
Seattle Post Intelligencer
Seattle Times
New York Times
The San Francisco Examiner
The Boston Globe
USA Today
San Francisco Chronicle
The Chicago Tribune
The Miami Herald
The Minneapolis Star Tribune


Transcript of gubernatorial recall debate

Kennedy says Iraq war was a "fraud" that was "made up in Texas"


In Senate, Kennedy Fuels Sharp Debate

News World International (NWI) reports that Iraq has turned into a "vortex of violence"

A story on NWI, the Canadian twenty-four news organization, today says that the U.S. and its slim coalition are fighting a "guerilla war against mix and match enemies."

In fact, Bush himself has said the violence that the U.S. confronts daily is at least in part due "terrorists who have come to Iraq." I stated this fact in my first post ever on this blog (scroll down to bottom to read it).

The report states that it has been predominantly Saudis that have been coming in in the last few months. That is highly ironic due to the fact that we supposedly fought the war to prevent future terrorism (a boldface lie), but the war actually has greatly increased the likelihood of more terrorism from Arabs (who constituted the majority of the 9-11 hijackers no matter how much the Bush administration tried to imply otherwise) who have specifically gone to Iraq because Saddam's regime has fallen and utter chaos exists there now.

The myth propagated by the Bush administration and its cronies in the government and media establishment that the world is safer now that Saddam is gone, is a boldface lie. A power vacuum now exists in Iraq and Islamic terrorists from all around are filling it.

The violence also comes from guerilla cells formed from Saddam's 400,000 man army (who are now humiliated and unemployed, a deadly mix). These former soldiers are working separately from the Islamic militants.

Two radical Islamic groups, Hezbollah and Ansar al Islam, are also arriving there says Michael Eisenstat of the D.C. Institute for Near East Policy.

The report maintains that the reality is that the longer the fighting goes on in Iraq the more organized the resistance will get. It also points out that collapsed states, like Iraq, often have warring factions that fight themselves; we see this going on in Iraq right now. Such a situation would represent a worst case scenario where interfactional violence could spread like wildfire.

A legitimate Iraqi government (where the Iraqi people elect their leaders) must be created that, says the report, is one of the only ways to keep peace.

The news story says in closing that "if you believe in democracy this needs to happen."

Let the raping of the of the Iraqi economy begin; just don't touch the oil that's for us only

Iraq is open for business! Paul Bremer, unelected ruler, oops I mean civilian administrator of Iraq, has just announced that foreign investment will now be permitted in Iraq.

What this means, essentially, is that huge multinational corporations (most of which will probably be U.S. firms) will be given the opportunity to invest in any part of the economy except for oil.

On its face, it would seem that this would bring help to rebuild Iraq (destroyed because of 2 wars and twelve years of sanctions that have killed hundreds of thousands and wrecked the whole country); however, its really about enriching corporations with money from American taxpayers.

National Public Radio (NPR) reported, on Sept. 22, that:

• the problem in Iraq is not lack of foreign investment, but lack of security
  
  
• attempts in short order to privatize would bring terrible corruption and no help for the Iraqi people
  
  
• privatization should be accomplished over years not months (reverse of wht should happen with political control)
  
  

More info:

America Puts Iraq Up for Sale

Washing Away the Truth: Hurricanes and what gets lost in the whirlwind of the mainstream media

The mainstream media reported diligently on every minutiae of Hurricane Isabel, but they seem utterly unconcerned with the daily attacks on our societies' poor, sick, struggling and homeless or on the destruction of our forests, wetlands, air, and water. Such attacks are much more threatening to people and the environment than the rare visit of a swirling weather system; however, the corporate media is unwilling to address these issues, rather they opt for the all too convenient sound bite.

To be sure, there is often tragic loss of life in these storms; however, many more lives are lost from the lack of health care, housing, and sufficient income or from the toxic pollutants we drink, eat, and breath every day. If they wrote and broadcast stories on those issues, they would expose most of their advertisers and the media's own corporate owners as the real threat to us all.

The media uses hyperbole in most of their reporting, exaggerating the threat posed by events that are rare and uncommon (natural disasters, school shootings, violent crime, terrorist attacks, etc.) and minimizing or totally ignoring actual threats, like those to our health and the environment.

As Michael Moore puts forth in his movie, Bowling for Columbine, the result of this media fascination with violence and danger that doesn't match the real life statistics, is to create a climate of fear.

In a scene from his movie, a news crew shows up on a corner in Los Angeles to film something merely because a police chopper was hovering over the area. The problem, Moore finds out, is that they don't know what exactly is going on (they say some guy may have had a gun or there was a "near" drowning). Apparently, the drama of a chopper on the scene is all the news director needed for a story.

Michael Moore asks the news crews cameraman why they don't do a story on "how... you can't see the Hollywood hills because of the pollution." The cameraman agrees, laughing as if to say its a good idea, but the network won't go for it; indeed they probably won't.

Moore then finds a cop and he asks him basically the same question. This time asking if there is anyone that the cop can arrest because the Hollywood sign can't be seen due to the pollution. The cop responds tersely, "absolutely not," Moore then asks "why not... why is that" the officer says nothing as he starts to walk away.

It is clear that addressing the pollution issue would take true grit; the kind that the officer evidently doesn't have. The officer's reluctance to even respond to Moore's point, that serious crimes are being perpetrated on us all as the police spend time on low or non-existent threats, is telling, since, for the officer, acknowledging that polluters are killing us, albeit, more slowly than a gunshot, but deadly nonetheless, would require the officer to question what in fact his duties are and whether he is willing to do what it really takes to defend the public.

He, like most of his law enforcement peers, might no longer be able to rely on the stereotypical crime profiles and unfair treatment they give to the poor and minority communities. They might ultimately have to face the realization that most threatening and dangerous crimes actually don't occur in these communities, but rather in the boardrooms of major corporations. So the officer walks away, just as many others do, looking for the criminals that the media, the wealthy, and the powerful tell us should be locked up.

Fear keeps us: buying guns, spending billions to build bombs, stocking up on supplies for natural disasters, supporting U.S. Imperialism disguised as a "war on terror, " and most importantly for the media and its advertisers; it keeps us watching the news.

While the rest of us suffer the ramifications of a deteriorating economy (job loss, bankruptcies), the total net worth of the 400 richest Americans grew 10% to $955 billion

This is an injustice that must be corrected. There is absolutely no reason why any 400 human beings should have this amount of money.

Their combined net worth is more than the GNP of most entire countries where millions of people live and work.

This fact is a travesty of justice and one of the main reasons why we have terrorism in the world. We are an easy target with our excessive wealth and imperialistic foreign policy which usually supports despots and dictators around the world who brutalize and oppress millions of people.

We are seen as the biggest kid on the block, with a military and economy to prove it. So we are an easy target to the oppressed and destitute of the planet. Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, caught flak for making a similar argument a couple of years ago after 9-11, probably because it was too close to the truth for many of those in power.

It doesn't help that we also unconditionally support Israel. We rarely, if ever, chide Israel for any of their brutalizing policies against the Palestinians (targeted assassinations, and bulldozing their houses) which we never refer to as terrorism, but is.

Just a couple of days ago at the UN, the United States vetoed a resolution calling on Israel to neither kill nor expel Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. It would have passed, but for the U.S. veto.

Article: Net Worth of America's Richest Increases

Everyone, and I mean everyone, needs to read the report by Robert Fisk of London's Independent on the current conditions in Iraq.

Its titled, "What is Happening Is An Absolute Slaughter Every Night of Iraqi People," and you can read it here.

Although too little too late, former chief UN weapons Hans Blix thinks any WMDs Saddam may have had were probably destroyed 10 years ago

Blix basically says Iraq war was a fraud.

I wish we saw this kind of candor at the UN security council when Powell made that embarrassing and pathetic attempt to say Saddam had nukes and the like.

Full article:

Blix Attacks 'Spin and Hype' of Iraq Weapon Claims

The facts on the 9th Federal District Circuit Court

The 9th Circuit Court has more actual cases overturned because they hear more cases (11,000 in fact, the largest number of cases in the federal system). Only a tiny amount of the 9th Circuits cases are reviewed by the US Supreme Court; of those 75% are overturned, which is the same rate that the US Supreme Court overturns all the other federal circuit court rulings in the country.

As far as claims that the 9th Circuit is ultra-liberal, it should be known that the pledge of allegiance decision, so lambasted by the right, which said having the phrase "under God" in the pledge was unconstitutional, was actually written by a Republican appointee.

CNN's Robert Novak: hypocrite of the day

While I was just watching CNN's Crossfire, I witnessed Robert Novak just call co-host Paul Begala anti-troops because Begala was commenting on a new report that says the Iraqi people no longer see US forces so much as the people who removed Saddam Hussein, but rather as the soldiers bursting into the homes of their wives and daughters.

Compare that statement to what Mr. Novak said a number of weeks ago when soldiers voiced understandable anger and distress with the attacks and deaths that they were experiencing daily. A situation they were put in by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz (Deputy Secretary of Defense) and Rice (National Security Advisor). Novak said at the time that American troops should stop complaining and "shut-up" and "do their job." If that's not anti-troops, I don't know what is.

CNN wastes no time trying to destroy Wesley Clark

They dug up all kinds of dirt and gossip and lobbed it right at General Clark almost immediately after his formal announcement that he would run for president. Did they do this to Bush when he announced his run? They certainly didn't use rumors and hearsay from his detractors no less to disparage Bush right out of the gate.

There was plenty to throw at Bush at the time of his announcement, much more damaging than anything they claim to have on Clark who is a decorated Vietnam War veteran and retired four star general, for example: his dubious record as governor of Texas, his many failed business endeavors, his dereliction of duty and undistinguised record as a member of the Texas Air National Guard, a sweetheart deal set up by his cronies giving him ownership of the Texas Rangers and a huge financial windfall, his drug and alcohol abuse, and his utter lack of intellect.

Blix says intelligence agencies were wrong and that Iraq destroyed all their weapons 10 years ago

No kidding Blix, this is what you should have said in the run up to the war instead of being bullied by the Bush Administration into saying what they wanted.

Click here to read article.

Bank of America certainly does not have "higher standards"

Their slogan "Bank of America: higher standards" is inconsistent with their past policies. Unless they consider involvement in efforts to subvert democratically elected governments and bankrolling ruthless dictators responsible for the death and torture of thousands as acting with 'high standards.' Read "U.S. Responsibility for the Coup in Chile"paragraphs 5-7 by Daniel Brandt to learn of Bank of America's and other major American banks role in events surrounding the coup.

Ford Motor Co. helped Argentina's military dictatorship torture and murder opponents of the regime

Ford supplied the cars used in the death squads which rounded up thousands of people for torture and execution. An article in the New York Times explains how Ford and its senior executives "managed, participated in or covered up the illegal detention."

Ford apparently was involved in the kidnapping of their own workers many of whom were union leaders who the Argentinian government wanted and who Ford wanted out of their way because unionized workers was seen as bad for Ford's profits.

A little Hussein budding in Herat, Afghanistan

Torture, repression, intimidation, and beatings in a closed society where dissent is not tolerated and the leader enriches himself and his cronies to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Oh, and by the way, the US brought him to power. No, I am not talking about Saddam Hussein, this man's name is Ismail Khan, warlord of Herat, Afghanistan.

Human rights watch reports Khan has a "disastrous" human rights record and that he is continuing the work of the Taliban in destroying much of Herat's "open culture" known for "literature and learning."

Despite this dismal human rights record, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld called Khan "an appealing person." (images of Rumsfelds handshake with Saddam Hussein in the early 1980's come to mind)What he meant by that though I cannot imagine.

Much of Afghanistan is in the hands of warlords supported, and armed by the US and who are every bit as bad as the Taliban. Khan is exceptional though in his wealth and strangehold on power. He brings in over a hundred million of dollars a year from proceeds derived from controlling trade with Iran, which Herat borders.

Human Rights Watch says the US put this tyrant "where he is today" and we have the "responsibility to make him clean up his act." I agree before 20 yrs from now a 90 something year old Rumsfeld, back in the White House somehow, wants to blow the crap out of Afghanistan because our current friend the "warlord" no longer wants to play nice with us. We definately need to stop watering this one and the like in Afghanistan now before its too late.

Alan Greenspan... part of the problem

Why does anyone still have faith in (Federal Reserve Chairman) Alan Greenspan? The guy kept raising interest rates while the bottom was falling out of the economy. Later he played catch-up lowering rates trying to fix a problem that he contributed to and was well on its way already. He also supports making Bush's tax cuts permanent. This guy really has zero credibility at this point.

Lets "recall" Bush

If the people of California can remove a governor who had little to nothing to do with that states economic problems then the rest of us should be able to remove Bush for being directly responsible for:

• an ever growing federal deficit currently at over half a trillion dollars
  
  
• hundreds killed, thousands wounded in a senseless war in Iraq
  
  
• millions of jobs lost
  
  
• terrorist threat growing
  
  
• ruined the image of the United States around the world
  
  
• gutting environmental protections
  
  

Too bad we can't recall Bush; we can, its called impeachment.

The United States Government, Corporations and Foreign Dictators: an alliance of terror
A series of articles on the overthrow of democratically elected governments
US government involvement in Chile's murderous military coup

I believe it was the year 2000, although I can't recall exactly, when I first learned about the coup in Chile that ocurred on September 11, 1973. The coup violently removed Salvador Allende, Chile's democratically elected socialist president, from power and installed a military dictator named Augusto Pinochet. The coup caused the death of at least three thousand people almost immediately, although many Chileans say it is many more, and would lead to the torture and murder of tens of thousands more over the next seventeen years at the hands of Pinochet and his tyrannical regime. All the while Pinochet acted with the full knowledge and support (military and financial) of the United States. It would not be an overstatement of fact to say that without the help of the United States the coup most likely would have never taken place and the killing and torture of countless human beings would have never ocurred. I remember vividly the revulsion and intense anger I felt at the fact that the overthrow of Allende was planned and orchestrated by the US government.

The reasons for the US support of the coup, and its brutal, tyrannical leader Augusto Pinochet, are many. Henry Kissinger, former national security advisor an international war criminal guilty of crimes involving murder and torture in Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay and Indonesia to name a few, said, "I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a country go communist because of the irresponsibility of its own people."

The people of Chile had elected Allende in a fair and just election which we just happened to not like (parallels can currently be made to president Hugo Chavez of Venezuela who the US tried to overthrow in a failed coup last year). In this context, it is easy to question what the real motives of US foreign policy are when the US government maintains that all we want is democracy for people in Iraq and Afghanistan so they have the freedom to choose their own leaders and live in peace.

The deadly logic employed by the US government was that socialism equals communism (or stalinism as it would be more aptly named since its manifestation on the political landscape resembled nothing like what Karl Marx had envisioned). The US government sought to overturn fair and democratic elections in many places around the world (I will go into detail on these countries in future posts) in order, so they said, to prevent a sort of communist contagion.

I argue that what they were really afraid of was socialism itself, the kind Allende's government in Chile was attempting to implement. Except for a few underinformed and misguided reactionaries of the time,
Soviet style communism taking hold around the world, the so called "domino effect" theory was not considered a reality. To be sure, it may have dictated foreign policy decisions to some effect, but it was mainly US corporations desire to exploit land and resources that fueled the imperialistic drive for economic and military control of nations around the world, and especially in this hemisphere.

Allende's government had nationalized the steel, coal and the highly important copper industry. The three U.S. copper giants of the time: Kennecott, Anaconda and the Cerro Corp. were nationalized. These companies had controlled 80 percent of the total Chilean copper production and had been taking profits out of the country in the sum of $80 million a year (Workers World, Population was mobilizing, para. 4) . Copper mining was big business for these and other US comapanies. In fact, in an article by Daniel Brandt entitled, "U.S. Responsibility for the Coup in Chile," Brandt points out that "over a 42 year period the [US] copper companies earned $420 billion on original investments totalling $35 million."

Copper companies weren't the only ones who robbed the Chilean people of their resources and supported their maiming and killing at the hands of the butcher Pinochet. International Telephone and Telegraph (ITT) had the largest holding of any single corporation (Brandt, Part 1, para 1). ITT (which had a former director of the CIA on its board) , with the help of the CIA, gave $700,000 help elect Allende's opponent. The president of ITT actually gave the CIA $1 million dollars to help defeat Allende (Brandt, Part 1, para 2).

Many of the biggest US banks, including commercial banks like Chase Manhattan, Chemical, First National City, Manufacturers Hanover, and Morgan Guaranty, all cancelled credits to Chile after Allende's election in 1970 (Brandt, Part 1, para 4). After the coup though, these same banks and others (like Bank of America), opened the flow of money back into Chile, and right into the hands of Pinochet (Brandt, Part 1, para 5).

Other US corporations fell over themselves to invest in Chile now that they felt their interests would be protected. It was of no concern to them that the regime they were dealing with was responsible for the horrific torture and killing of everyone from peasants and union leaders to students and intellectuals.

As was shown, the corporations weren't acting alone. They worked with the US intelligence (CIA) community in destroying the economy and fomenting the coup, but they also had access to the highest levels of the Nixon administration, namely Henry Kissinger. Massive pressure from ITT on Kissinger helped shift policy decisions on Chile from the State Department to the US Treasury Department where many former bank executives (including future Federal Reserve Chairman Paul A. Volcker) from the aforementioned firms (Chase, Bank of America etc.) were now working (Brandt, Part 1, para 6-7).

The Diplomatic community was also involved in the runup to the coup with the US Ambassador in Chile and the Secretary of Inter-American Affairs (William Rogers at the time) both having connections to ITT. In closed meetings which included representatives from ITT, Ford, Anaconda, Ralston Purina, First National City bank, and Bank of America (Brandt, Part 1, para 7) policy on Chile was decided (similar to closed meetings our current Vice-President Richard Cheney had with energy companies which directly helped shape US energy policy).

International Institutions like the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF), Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Agency for International Development (AID), and the Export-Import Bank all cancelled credits to Chile after Allende's election (no doubt due to pressure from the US government and its banking cronies). All credits were restored to Pinochet in 1975 (Brandt, Part 1, para 8).

By 1972, it became very difficult for Chile to purchase food, medicine, equipment and parts. This led to a trucker strike which caused more chaos (Brandt, Part 1, para 9). This was just what the US wanted. Nixon himself "wanted a plan for action that would include a military coup and a broad-based destabilization effort that would 'make the economy scream'" (Brandt, Part 2, para 7).

There was no boycott in US military aid (money and weapons), or training (Pinochet and others all spent time in US probably at the School of the Americas in Georgia) by the US (Brandt, Part 1, para 10). The economic boycott only affected items needed by the Chilean people (much like the sanctions in Iraq that killed up to a million people).

Note: I will be adding this post periodically

Further reading:

Allende's Leftist Regime

Kissinger Encouraged Chile's Brutal Repression, New Documents Show

Lessons of the Chile coup

U.S. Responsibility for the Coup in Chile

An answer to Pinochet's defenders

Bush guts environmental rules in place since Nixon

Corporations are sitting pretty nowadays, getting everthing they could ever want and more from the Bush administration. To be sure, its not just my view, but also that of Bill Kovacs, the vice president for environmental issues of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce (an organization lobbying for pro-business policies), who states, "We certainly had a number of victories this week; I don't think anyone can deny that." By the way, the week he was referring to was the last week in August before Labor Day. "The virtual dead of political and press night... you can't find a week when people are less likely to pay attention than the end of August," says Phil Clapp, the president of the National Environmental Trust. Its during these times, when most are unaware, that Bush announces most of his environmental policies (of destruction).

What are these rule changes you ask? Here are some:

• Drastically weakening of rules designed to limit pollution from coal-fired power plants
  
  
• Carbon dioxide, proven chief cause of global warming, no longer a pollutant that can be regulated by the EPA
  
  
• EPA now no longer to prohibit ballast (water in ships containing invasive species) from introduction into American waters where they cause major damage to native species
  
  
• Eradication of 25-yr-old rule preventing sale of PCB tainted land
  
  
• An order making it easier to drill for oil and gas on pristine federal lands
  
  
• Rule change resulting in dramatic slowdown in ability to implement regulations protecting the environment
  
  

The changes by the junior Bush administration even has those from the senior Bush White House up in arms. Dan Esty, EPA's deputy chief of staff in the first Bush administration, now heading Yale University's Center for Environmental Law and Policy, called the rule revisions "... not very environmentally sound."

"Breathtaking," is how Chuck Davis, a Colorado State University political scientist who specializes in environmental policy, described the changes in environmental protection taking place.

The way this works is that the preferred route to enacting changes in these laws is through Congress. There is no way though that even the Bush bullies could get rules weakening environmental protection through Congress, so they do it through administrative rule changes. "They leave the laws in place, but undermine the regulations below them, undermine the rules and undermine the agencies," says political science professor Stephen Meyer, the director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Project on Environmental Politics. He goes on to say, "The details get lost because the average person doesn't have the details or the time to follow it." The ignorance of the masses helps rogue leaders like Bush Inc. We need people paying less attention to sports scores and celebrity and TV nonsense and more time getting educated about their government. A truly worse case scenario for the Bush administration and others bent on destroying our lives and environment is an aware citizenry armed with the knowledge to beat back the bullies who will otherwise stop at nothing.

Read full article here.

Blix says the US overinterpreted its own intelligence

Well, its much worse than that Hans; they lied and made a fool out of you in the process! Former Chief UN Weapons inspector Hans Blix said the US and Britain, "... hoped and would have been happy... if a smoking gun [was] found... when we didn't do that... they were disappointed. And then they overinterpreted their own intelligence." He went on to say the White House was "anxious" and "too willing" to jump to conclusions on showing existence of Iraqi weapons in order to justify an invasion. Blix, " I said in the Security Council that if something is unaccounted for, it doesn't necessarily mean that [it] exist[s]." No kidding Blix, you should have opened up your mouth about this in the run up to the war instead of cowering from those wretches in the White House and on Downing street.

Article:

Blix Says Iraq's Weapons Declaration May Have Been True

Update (to Aug 22 post): Killing of 33,000 salmon by Bush and his political advisor, Karl Rove, to be investigated by Interior Department

Rove, according to an AP article, seeking to bolster Republican support among farmers, briefed dozens of political appointees at the Interior Department over a year and a half ago on diverting water from the Klamath River in Oregon to satisfy the greedy, selfish farmers who wanted it for their crops. The salmon were killed last year in the Northern California portion of the Klamath River. This tragic destruction of precious salmon was due to fatal gill rot disease caused by low river flows resulting from the diversion of the water for the farmers' crop irrigation.

Democratic senator and presidential candidate John Kerry, concerned the White House used the Interior Department as "a division of the Republican National Committee" and may have intimidated the staff appointees, reportedly asked the Inspector General (IG) at the Interior Department to investigate Bush's Klamath water policy after the revelation of Rove's meeting with the political appointees. The IG will be examining whether political interference or suppression of data by Bush and Rove was responsible for the disaster. If found, any such evidence will be immediately sent to the Department of Justice and the Office of Public Integrity since the Interior Department IG has no authority over the White House.

To the 69% of Americans who think Saddam was involved in 9-11, You are making the rest of us look bad

It becomes painfully clearer every day to see why the rest of the world thinks we Americans are stupid. Two years after 9-11, people still think Saddam Hussein was involved in the terrorist attacks. To be sure, its true that the president and other liers at the White House and Defense Department insinuated from the start that Hussein was involved, but people you must certainly be aware by now that they only did that to try and justify the already predetermined (before 9-11 attacks) decision to invade Iraq. Lets be serious, Dubya is strikingly similar to the dumbest kid in the class we all remember from school. No one took anything that kid or his loser friends said seriously, Bush and the other lying bullies he surrounds himself with should have their opinions similarly dismissed as nonsense.

Its not just the present warmongers occupying our government that have repeatedly and successfully demonized Hussein, turning him in the minds of millions of Americans into an immediate and deadly threat. Its been going on since the Gulf War. Politicians and the media have turned Saddam into the worst monster since Hitler! Of course Saddam is a terrible guy, but he was not involved in any way with the 9-11 attacks, period. Repeated attempts by the White House to link him to the attacks and al-Qaeda have all failed.

I'd like to point out that the murderous dictator Hussein was supported by the United States right up until the invasion of Kuwait. A little known fact, the US signaled Iraq that it would not interfere with Iraq's longstanding issues over Kuwait. What occurred is that in late July 1991, before the invasion of Kuwait, US State Department Spokesperson Margaret Tutweiler stated that "We do not have any defense treaties with Kuwait, and there are no special defense or security commitments to Kuwait." Further indicating our intent to stay out of what was seen as an internal dispute, US ambassador April Gillespie met with Saddam the next day to explain Tutweiler's statements. She told Saddam, "We have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait," continuing she said, "(Secretary of State) James Baker has directed our official spokesmen to emphasize this instruction." This has been widely interpreted as giving Saddam a green light to invade Kuwait.

Few Americans know that the Iraqis had always believed Kuwait was part of their country. Although Kuwait as a state (created in 1899) predated Iraq (created in 1920), Iraqi leaders from the Ottoman empire (when Kuwait was part of the province of Basra then controlled by the Ottomans) to General Abdelkarim Qasim (1961) and Saddam Hussein (1990) have laid claimed to Kuwait. In fact, the British, who controlled Kuwait, put 6,000 troops there to prevent an expected Iraqi attack after Kuwaiti independence in 1961. The attack never occurred and Iraq respected Kuwait's boundaries until the 1990 invasion. Despite this long historical border dispute, it seems that US officials, knowing how their words would be interpreted by Hussein, were willing to allow Saddam to move into Kuwait. To be sure, the US may have expected Saddam to seize only some oil wells that were in dispute on the border (the Kuwaitis were using slant drilling equipment to pump billions of dollars of oil from under Iraqi land); however, they were most likely at least aware of the risk of a full scale invasion. Why did we do this? Why had we been appeasing this murdering thug all along? We knew he was using chemical weapons against his own people and against the Iranian soldiers. We gave him the satellite intelligence to make it easier to gas human beings to death. American firms and subsidiaries were involved in selling the chemicals needed to make the weapons of mass destruction we so often speak about. The irony is he hasn't had any in years, but when he did have them we did nothing to stop him from using them. It can even be said that we encouraged his war with Iran. The Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran was public enemy number one in those days for the US. Our efforts in supplying Iraq with weapons and intelligence for their aggression against Iran were in part due to protecting Kuwait from the ayatollah's of Iran. It was the US that through its actions helped bring to power brutal dictators and murderous regimes like the Shahs and the ayatollahs who ruthlessly ruled Iran. Kuwait had even agreed to pay part of the cost of its defence to Iraq. When the war was over the Kuwaitis reneged on payment to an Iraq now near bankruptcy. Adding insult to injury, they instead opted to steal Iraqi oil!

We feign concern for the Iraqi people now. I was just listening to Bush's speech talking about freedom for the Iraqi people from Saddam's torture and repression, but he neglected to mention our role in those crimes right up until and after Kuwait. Cheney's Haliburton had, through its subsidiaries, been rebuilding Iraq's oil wells (the same ones destroyed while Cheney was Secretary of Defense in Gulf War 1); meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis were dying because of US imposed sanctions that did nothing to weaken Saddam's control on the country; on the contrary, these sanctions allowed him to consolidate his power.

Bush, Cheney and the neo-cons accomplished the ultimate power grab in Iraq. They had their fake causus belli linking Hussein to the 9-11 attacks (no link existed) and claiming he had weapons of mass destruction (never found despite US claims they existed); after all, everybody hates Hussein and Americans were revolted by the terrorist attacks. All Bush and his oil cronies had to do was connect the dots somehow and Iraq was theirs. The truth wasn't important. Nor does it seem were the lives of US soldiers and countless Iraqis. They couldn't find Osama, so they fell back on Saddam and blamed him for whatever they could. This way the Bush administration finally had something they could try and sell to the American people to try and justify their pre-9-11 planned conquest of Iraq. Nothing would stand in the way of this administration's thirst for the profits and power that would ultimately flow from the imperialistic conquest and control of the second largest oil reserve in the world. The US and Britain have been doing this kind of stuff in the Middle East for years (see my post of August 26th). Toppling democratically elected governments, then installing dictators then ousting the dictator. Its all part of the game that the world powers play at the expense of the people caught in the crossfire. When the US looks at the Middle East it doesn't see human beings, but rather oil with people on top of it. They don't care how they get it; just that they do. As former assistant US Defense Secretary Lawrence Korb said referring to the invasion of Kuwait and the first Gulf War, "If Kuwait grew carrots we wouldn't give a damn... Oil is worth going to war for." So to the 69% that think Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9-11 attacks, lets get it right once and for all; Saddam Hussein didn't grow carrots and we were well aware of that all along.


More Info:

Bush justifies Iraq occupation with lies on “terror”

Worthy reads:

Blix Felt U.S. Intimidating Him Before Iraq War

Bush to Seek $60 Billion or More for Iraq

Employers Slashed Jobs in August

EPA Exempts Plants From Clean-Air Rule

Funding Woes Plague Superfund Clean Up

Halliburton's Deals Greater Than Thought

IMF Warns U.S. Over Budget Deficit

Number of Wounded in Action on Rise

Poll: European Support for U.S. Fading

Poll: Iraq war makes U.S. less safe

California’s Governor Davis denounces “right-wing power grab”

A Look at U.S. Daily Casualties in Iraq

Sickening fact:

30,000 Americans a year killed by pollution from old industrial plants

More Info:

People Pressure for Clean Air, click for audio

I like Clinton much better when he is lying about getting blow jobs

When Bill Clinton, the man who was impeached because he lied about something as unimpeachable as getting head, was asked about Bush's lies on Iraq all he had to say was that intelligence can often be difficult to interpret. He is going easy on the Bush administration because he wants Bush to win in 2004. Why? you may ask. Because he wants Hillary to win in 2008. I am convinced that is why both he and Hillary have their heads so far up Bush's ass they can choke on his pretzels. Both Clinton's are convinced that Hillary will be the first woman president when she runs in 2008. They are banking on the country (whatever would be left of it after another 4 years of Bush) wanting a change by then. Certainly, even the moderate to right of center Clinton's could attack the Bush administration right now on just about anything and everything: the economy (millions of jobs lost, half a trillion in debt this year), civil rights (right wing judges, one word: Ashcroft), the environment (the Bush administration actually thought Christie Whitman was an environmental radical!), 9-11 (stonewalling investigating committee, forced EPA to lie about dust hazards, no Osama yet), Iraq (uranium from Niger: lie, chemical and biological weapons: lie, Saddam involved in 9-11: lie), and the list goes on and on. Hillary (actively trying to shed her 'liberal' image) is basically a Republican now, much like Joe Lieberman, and a candidate of that ilk is the last thing we need at this point.

The US did the terrorists a "favor" in Iraq

I was just listening to NPR. They report that Isalmic militants are "flocking" to Iraq because it still has no legitimate government and the terrorists are ecstatic with the idea of ridding the country of its non-Muslim occupiers. A militant interviewed said the US did his cause a favor by removing Saddam Hussein because Islamic fighters can now slip in and out of Iraq with impunity to hide or plan future attacks, much like the safe haven Afghanistan provided under the Taliban. Before the US attacked Iraq, the terrorists had to trek all the way to Afghanistan or northwest Pakistan to plot and train for attacks. Now they just cross the thousand mile, mostly unprotected, border from Saudi Arabia (where fifteen of the nineteen 9-11 hijackers came from) into Iraq (Iraq, virtually no terrorists before US invasion, now probably thousands) where our troops are like sitting ducks. Afghanistan is in chaos, due to rival faction infighting and the return of the Taliban to parts of that country, and Iraq is fast becoming more chaotic and dangerous every day, in other words an Afghanistan in the making, but worse. All this for a mere five billion a month! With this kind of success who needs failure.

The United States Government, Corporations and Foreign Dictators: an alliance of terror
A series of articles on the overthrow of democratically elected governments
First in the series: The CIA backed coup in Iran

In 1953 the CIA and their British counterparts planned and accomplished a coup in then non-fundamentalist governed Iran, overthrowing the government of democratically elected Mohammad Mossadegh. This action was directly responsible for bringing the Shah to power and a reign of murder and terror to the Iranian people ultimately leading to the Iranian Islamic revolution and the totalitarian state of affairs that exists in Iran today.

I am going to summarize some points from the discussion on the radio program Democracy Now! However, I do encourage all to also go to their website and read the full transcript of yesterday's program on the issue. Host Amy Goodman spoke with Stephen Kinzer author of All the Shah's Men: An American Coup And The Roots of Middle East Terror .

Some historical background is necessary. The early twentieth century saw the discovery, in Iran, of the largest oil well ever found. It was discovered by the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company which had set up shop in Iran. Hundreds of millions of dollars of oil was pumped from Iranian soil with the British holding the monopoly and thus most of the profits. Holding a monopoly on the oil allowed Britain to only have to give 16 percent of the profits to Iran. Keeping this flow unimpeded was of principal importance to the British government and its corporations. Meanwhile nationalism of the post-World War II era had spread to Iran where people began to rightfully expect to keep the profits from their countries' resources. A charismatic politician named Mohammad Mossadegh sought to give the people of Iran control of their resources by nationalizing companies like Anglo-Iranian (the British empire's largest company) Oil who were robbing the country. The astonished British government vowed not to let the people have their oil. The British plan to go to the United Nations to get back the company failed when Mossadegh himself went to the UN to argue his case. The UN body was so impressed by presence and argument that they refused to have him give up the company to the Brits. The coup idea, always on the table, was now front and center. Mossadegh found out and closed the British embassy sending all the secret agents planning the coup from the embassy back to England.

Enter the United States on the scene. The British turned to President Truman for help. He said no way. Claiming that the CIA had never overthrown a government, and never should as far as he was concerned. The British were tapped out. There was nothing they could do. That was the situation until 1952 when President Dwight Eisenhower came into power. Reversing the Truman policy of not (apparently not, anyway) overthrowing governments, the Eisenhower administration dispatched Kermit Roosevelt, Teddy Roosevelt's grandson, to Iran to carry out the coup.

Stephen Kinzer, author of All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror, in describing how Kermit Roosevelt, Near East director for the CIA, slipped into Iran at the end of July 1953 and started a series of events leading to the coup 3 weeks later he became aware of "how easy it is for a rich, powerful country to throw a poor, weak country into chaos" (also see US action in Iraq, Chile etc. further supporting this assertion). With the goal of tossing the whole of Iran into chaos , Roosevelt bribed politicians, newspaper editors, reporters, and religious leaders to begin an attack campaign of lies against Mossadegh to cause his downfall. He bribed street thugs and military officers to come in to beat, torture and murder all those opposing the coup. Some pretending to be communist pro-Mossadegh rioters and others, whose job it was to attack the first mob, as pro-Shah. All this by the way was accomplished with US taxpayer dollars but without these same taxpayers knowledge and consent. .

In comes Norman Schwarzkopf, not Gulf War Schwarzkopf, but his Dad. The elder Norman Schwarzkopf (I wish these guys would stop having kids) spent many years in Iran and was a great influence on the Shah. Kinzer goes on to explain that Schwarzkopf's purpose, in the first coup attempt, was to force the timid Shah (the US creates these guys and inevitably suffers the blowback) into to signing some document, rigged by the US of course, ordering the removal of Mossadegh from power. The coup initially failed , but Roosevelt against the advice of the CIA, stayed and tried again

Apparently, this document was never signed. However, Iran was thrown into chaos and the coup was successful anyway. On August 19, 1953, after a hundred people were killed at Mossadegh's house, he was arrested. The Shah who had fled after the failed first coup attempt came back and thus began 25 years of a brutal and repressive government.

Discussing the real reasons for the US entry into this disgraceful episode, Ervand Abrahamian, Middle East and Iran expert at Baruch College, explains that the US government and its business community were as concerned about oil, and who controls it, as the Brits were. The US did not want the people who own the oil (i.e. Iran and Venezuela) to control it. Abrahamian claims that Iran, by nationalizing the British oil industry, "would have set an example...seen as a threat to U.S. oil interests throughout the world, because other countries would do the same." To borrow the term, you might say a sort of fear of the ludicrous and debunked "domino theory of states falling to communism", but in this instance applying to states nationalizing oil production, was the fear of US imperialist interests. If that happened the US government and its corporations could no longer, steal it, lets call it what it is folks, from these nations. Thus, nationalization was completely abhorent to US interests and they were intent on doing anything to prevent it.

Truman, Ike and the British all wanted to keep the oil in their hands and most importantly in their control. As Abrahamian says, the difference was only in tactics. Truman thinking he could get Mossadegh to give up on nationalization through having Parliament or the Shah get rid of the enormously popular leader (as tried). Point being that Truman had no moral repugnancy to the idea of overturning a democratic election and robbing a nation of its resources. The coup was being worked on by the British and the US before Ike, but only put into action after the realization that Mossadegh had too much popularity to be removed by politics alone. They decided on violence and murder, ultimately, and as so aften happens when forcing brutal anti-democratic regime change bent on imperialism, bringing to power a regime of the same.

As Kinzer so succinctly puts it, the US "sent a message, not only to Iran, but throughout the entire Middle East... that the United States does not support democratic governments (but)... prefers strong-man rule that will guarantee us access to oil." Thus, today we hypocritically call for democracy in the Middle East when all we ever really wanted was dictators that allowed us to exploit their resources. Human rights, freedom and democracy was not a factor then and is not one now. Don't let good ole' Bush and his lying warmongers try to tell you Iraq was about saving the Iraqi people or anyone else for that matter from a brutal dictatorship bent on murder and torture. Everyone should know those same dictators we now demonize were made by the USA with our tax dollars. We claimed ignorance to their crimes while the getting was good for us. Once the gravy train stopped; they had to go to save the people. The same people we never gave a crap about before and don't now either.

More info:

1953: U.S. overthrows Prime Minister Mossadeq of Iran and installs Shah as dictator

Three US corporations agree to stay out of Alaskan forest

KB Home, Hayward Lumber and Staples, Inc. oppose a proposal by the Bush administration, supported by most Republicans in Congress, to lift a ban Clinton put in effect preventing road building and development in Alaska's Tongass and Chugach National Forests. These are old growth forests with diverse wildlife and beauty. The fact that that moron in the White House and his co-conspirators in Congress would ever think of touching these forests when so many forests have already been destroyed is an impeachable offense in and of itself! Logging has already destroyed ALL of the old growth forests on the east coast and 97% of those on the west coast. What has happened to our forests and wildlands is a national disgrace. I propose that any fool in elected office that proposes causing any more damage to whats left of the beauty that preceded our arrival in this country should be thrown out of office immediately.


Three Companies Oppose Forest Proposal

Hey Mr. President, say hello to your new neighbors!

Guess who has moved into the president's little hideaway in Crawford, Texas. Peace Activists! Dallas peace activist, John Wolf, paid $54,000, raised by selling $1 dollar peace buttons at rallies, for a house near Bush's ranch. In fact, it is not far from a gas station where the president picked up coffee last week. People who help care for the house say its a place peace activists can go and feel comfortable when visiting Crawford. Sounds good to me. Now all we got to do is get Bush out of the White House and back to Crawford to stay.

Protest in Seattle day after Bush's visit

On Saturday, hundreds of protesters, myself included, marched along the Seattle waterfront to show our dissatisfaction, thats putting it mildly, with the right-wing, anti-democratic policies of the Bush administration. This, following an anti-Bush rally at Seattle's historic Pike Place Market on Friday, the day of his visit. I was also at that rally. It too had a sizable turnout and a great vibe. Other Friday protests occurred across the lake on Seattle's eastside and in Tacoma. All rallies were peaceful, as most anti-war and anti-Bush rallies are. The mainstream media often likes to inflate minor skirmishes with police that sometimes do occur into the principle story of the protest, missing the actual tone and message of the event entirely.


Info on Saturday protest:

Hundreds protest Bush a day after visit

GDP drenched in blood

The murderous and unprovoked attack on the people of Iraq seems to be responsible for an uptick in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The US buildup of its own "weapons of mass destruction" accounted for 1.7% of the 2.4% GDP annual rate for the second quarter, topping estimates of 1.5% growth. This highly disturbing fact buttresses the idea that the US government and American corporations support war and aggression because its good for business. The military industrial complex (corporations, US armed forces, and the federal government joined in a conspiracy for money and power) salivates over the thought of the billions in taxpayer dollars that go into the buildup of a mammouth and deadly US weapons arsenal. In fact, defense spending has risen 44.1%, the highest rate since the third quarter of 1951!

For more on the Military Industrial Complex:

CorpWatch: Military Industrial Complex

The real story behind the problems in Liberia

Great article on the roots of the violence and chaos in Liberia. Guess who is behind it all, thats right, US corporations! Imperialist corporations in the United States are largely responsible for the present disaster and destruction in Liberia.

Worthy Reads:


Civil Rights

Free Speech

Free speech activist defeats computer industry


Drug policy

Vancouver to take new approach with legal injection site for addicts


Environment

Save the Redwoods Boycott the Gap!

Environmentalists Warn of Roads, Dams in Amazon



Human Rights

Argentina Repeals Amnesty Laws Protecting Ex-Military From Prosecution


Iraq and Afghanistan

U.S. Troops Provoke Anger, Fear in Afghan Villages

Coalition forces in Iraq begin to be deserted by their allies

Iraqi exiles ready to walk out on US

Afghan resistance takes shape

War casualties overflow Walter Reed hospital

US general condemns Iraq failures

A Price Too High

Civilian deaths stoke Iraqis' resentment

US Debates Bid to Kill Hussein and Avoid Trial

Soaring costs of 'rescuing' Iraq

Iraqi civilians gunned down in US military raids


US Politics

Texas Republicans impose heavy fines on boycotting Democratic legislators

Bush Approval Slips - Fix Economy, Say Voters

The Case for Impeachment


Workers Rights

Child labor laws fail boys killed on job

White House got EPA to lie about safety of air after WTC collapse

AP article says the EPA, at orders from the White House, and without doing adequate testing, put out statements after the WTC collapse that sought to assure the public that the air was safe to breathe. Thus, people may have been needlessly exposed to contaminants such as PCBs, soot and dioxin. In fact, the air had not returned to pre-Sept. 11th levels until June 2002 which was well after hundreds of workers who came in contact with the dust began to suffer respiratory ailments and other problems. The EPAs internal inquiry also brought to light a previously unknown "collaboration process" between the National Security Council or NSC (Bush's forum for discussing national security and foreign policy matters with his aids and cabinet), the White House Council on Environmental Quality (never heard of it) and the EPA. The NSC had to clear any information the EPA sought to report. This resulted in public safety policy decisions being based on politics instead of science. Further damning, is the revelation that the Bush administration actually forced the EPA to leave out directions for workers on how to deal with airborne dust and indoor spaces polluted with asbestos, lead, glass fibers and concrete. It is clear that the Bush administration and its allies' hunger for power and self-preservation trumps the safety and well being of the citizens of the United States or anywhere else.


NY Times Editorial on issue:

Dust and Deception

Just back from anti-Bush rally

Bush came into Washington state today to grab a quick 1-2 million dollars from douche bags who paid $2,000 each to hear him speak (funny, I'd pay to stop him from speaking) at the disgustingly large and obnoxius estate of cell phone billionaire Craig McCaw. According to an article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, US taxpayers are getting part of the bill for what is essentially a fund raising trip to the west coast for his 2004 campaign. You see, as long as he mixes his cash grab with "public events" like talking about salmon restoration (ironic since his water policy in Oregon recently killed thousands of salmon in the Klamath River, but more on that later) taxpayers get to foot the exorbitant costs associated with shuttling this fool and his entourage around the country. Thus, we, the taxpayers, get to pay for half the hotel, car and other expenses the millionaire in the White House runs up. We get to pay the full amount, get ready for this, of the $57,000-an-hour it costs to operate Air Force One!

Bush politics kill salmon

Now back to my earlier point, this chief hypocrite actually had the balls to come to Washington state and claim that he supports salmon runs. This is the same president who, according to an article on the website Common Dreams, had Karl Rove, his political strategist, intervene on the side of greedy, water sucking Oregon farmers over endangered salmon in a dispute involving water flows in the Klamath River. Conservationists and Native-American tribes want the water for threatened fish species which include downriver salmon. The farmers want it for irrigation. With the help of Karl Rove, the farmers have been getting their way. In March 2002, the federal government ordered water set aside for the dwindling salmon population to be released to the farmers. This disastrous policy decision made by a political operative solely for political purposes (to bolster support among northwest farmers), resulted in in the killing of 33,000 precious salmon in one of the largest fish kills in US history. Bush and Rove are directly responsible for this tragic event. In fact, a federal judge has ruled the Bush water plan was based on "flawed science." The truth is that Bush's policies are based on lies. Lies on the environment, the economy, the war with Iraq, the war on terror and just about everything else. The lies are meant to conceal a right-wing fascistic agenda narrowly crafted to benefit only religious zealots, corporations, and warmongers. Unfortunately few in the mainstream media, the spineless Congress or the unquestioning public like to point this out.

Seattle anti-Bush rally information:

StopBushSeattle.com

Sound Nonviolent Opponents of War

Majority Visibility Project

Bush To Visit Northwest Next Month

"Sweet Home Alabama," the US military is burning their chemical weapons down by you!

Free Speech Radio News (FSRN) reports that the US government is planning on going ahead with its plans to incinerate chemical weapons; yes I said incinerate chemical weapons in Anniston, Alabama. We have all heard of chemical weapons. Those are the weapons we were told Saddam Hussein had. Well, he doesn't have any, but we have lots. So we are incinerating some. Don't worry though because we'll make more, deadlier ones! The people are protesting, but, (borrowing another line from Skynyrd) in Anniston anyway, they don't all "love the governor." Thats because the Republican governor of Alabama stopped protesting the incineration. I wonder who got to him? Certainly no one in the Bush administration or their henchmen! One thing though governor, does your conscience bother you? Tell the truth.

Welfare rolls go down, but number in poverty goes up

Free Speech Radio News (FSRN) reports that so called "welfare reform" passed by Congress and signed by Bill Clinton in 1996 is currently responsible for thrusting more people into poverty. The meager safety net welfare used to provide is no longer available to the millions who cannot find work.

The US miltary: free to loot and pollute

Free Speech Radio News (FSRN) reports that the desire to consolidate the 96 bases the US has in South Korea will force the eviction of 350 farms that will have to be removed to accomodate the movement of soldiers into fewer but larger bases. Evictions by the US army of people off their own land is nothing new for the Korean people. It has been going on since the Korean War. In fact, the US already has 2 of its largest bases in the world in South Korea. Equally as shocking is the fact that under the US Status of Forces Agreement the US military is exempt from most environmental laws ! Thus, the United States miliitary releases untreated oil runoff from its bases into irrigation canals used by South Korean farmers. FSRN spoke to the farmers who say the river "turns black" and "turns really really black" when it does not rain for awhile. They also say the "fish are black... and smell like oil," but before they were "delicious." Adding insult to injury is the fact that the South Korean farmers themselves have to clean the oil out of the rivers causing them to seemingly get some kind of rash on their legs because farmers say their legs "turn red." Thus, the United States, the big bully of the world, forces others to clean up the mess it itself makes.

Cameras are not rocket propelled grenades

American soldiers shot and killed an award winning camerman filming a US run Iraqi prison. Reuters reports that Mazen Dana, a Palestinian, who worked for Reuters was filming the prison with the express knowledge and permission of US armed forces in the area. Further perplexing is that the incident ocurred in the afternoon daylight. They were about to leave after filming the prison when a tank leading a convoy pulled up. Dana got out of his car to film and was "noted and seen clearly" by the US troops according to Dana's soundman who was traveling with him. It was then that he was shot. He died at the scene. According to a statement by the US military, the US soldiers thought his camera was a rocket propelled grenade.

War on Afghanistan and Iraq puts US at higher risk of terrorist attack

More evidence that George W. Bush's "war on terror" is helping no one but, the US military industrial complex, corporate criminals intent on exploiting foreign resources (i.e. Haliburton), and the terrorists, comes from a world market research study out of London. The report says another 9-11 style terrorist attack here is "highly likely." This due to the fact that, "U.S.-led military action in Afghanistan and Iraq has exacerbated anti-U.S. sentiment." In fact, the study puts the US at fourth. Making it barely safer than Columbia, Israel, and Pakistan, but more at risk than, get ready for this, Afghanistan, Indonesia, Iraq and India!

Hempfest Seattle

Just returned from hempfest here in Seattle. Actions that will send you to prison in the United States include: growing or selling marijuana, robbing to feed or care for your family, and exercising your constitutional right to freedom of speech in peaceful nonviolent protest. Actions that will not send you to prison in the United States include: murdering thousands of human beings in preemptive imperialistic wars, robbing other people of their life savings making yourself rich in the process, producing and poisoning air, land, water and food with deadly chemicals, chopping down ancient pristine forests, and developing weapons of mass destruction by and for the US military. The reality that those who grow and enjoy a harmless plant are persecuted while destroyers of life, environment and well being are left unscathed, in fact rewarded, for their actions is disgusting and represents one of the greatest injustices we face as a society.

95% of Americas old growth forests have been destroyed

If that isn't heartbreaking enough, The real criminals in our society, like Boise Cascade, want to tear down what remains. Most of which are inside the national forests.

More information:

Rain Forest Action Network: Boise briefing paper

Another post in the "US to world on Iraq: This land is our land" series
Note to US military: Tearing down Islamic banners won't win you friends in Iraq

Even the Shiites want us out. According to an article by the AP, US soldiers have 24 hours to get out of a neighborhood east of Baghdad "otherwise we are not responsible for whatever reactions the U.S. soldiers might face if they entered the city", says the Shiite group Al-Sadr. This after US troops in a Black Hawk helicopter were trying to rip down an Islamic banner atop a communications tower. Someone in the crowd of protesters then fired a rocket propelled grenade. In response US soldiers fired back killing one and injuring four others.

Update: AP reports US apologizes to the people of the neighborhood for the incident. Military now says it is possible the banner may have been taken down intentionally by US soldiers. This is a retreat from their earlier posture of maintaining that the banner was blown down by "rotor wash" from the Black Hawk. Implying that the incident was an accident. Although the area seemed calmer after the apology, A new banner on a building near the incident read: "The Americans should not be allowed to enter the city again because of the blood shed in their aggression yesterday." Best way to prevent these types of events from occurring in the future is for the US to end the occupation of Iraq now. Its time to get out of Iraq, especially since we had no right to be there in the first place.

French government sits and watches as heat kills thousands

French suffer through worst heat wave since 1947. Read on for more.

Robin Hood in reverse

Millions in tax cuts going to the filthy, disgusting rich while the poor lose savings and homes due to job loss and past welfare "reform". Read on for more.

As Bush takes month long vacation, families say send Bush to Iraq and troops to his ranch

An article in the AP reports the disgust and anger that the military and their familes feel on news that the troops currently in Iraq are to spend at least another year on active duty where they have been suffering daily attacks. A poster who goes by the name "Bette" on the web site of Military Families Speak Out says, in discussing her son-in-law's companies' two-day vacation versus the presidents month long safe and relaxing vacation on his sprawling ranch, that we should "send all of the troops to President Bush's ranch and send the President to Iraq". Military families and the soldiers themselves have had enough. They want the soldiers home. The increasing outcry from the ranks and their families clearly shows the crisis this administration faces in the quagmire that is the Iraqi occupation. The soldiers and their families know the president, his administration, and their warmonger allies in Congress lied to them to justify a war that was unjustifiable.

Further reading:

Military Families Speak Out

Bring Them Home Now

Support Network for an Armed Forces Union

32 yrs later Agent Orange still poisoning the Vietnamese

Agent Orange, a "weapon of mass destruction" that the United States likes to try and forget it used on the Vietnamese people and American soldiers from 1962 to 1971, still brings pain and suffering decades later. Agent Orange is a defoliant that was used to destroy the forests of Vietnam with the goal of exposing and starving the Vietnamese soldiers. In a study published in the August issue of The Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, it was revealed that 95% of Vietnamese in an area 20 miles north of the former Saigon, now Ho Chi Minh city, were found to have elevated levels of the most toxic of the dioxins present in Agent Orange. Agent orange, unexploded cluster bombs, and depleted uranium weaponry all leave a lasting legacy of death and disease to the peoples of the world we claim to "liberate".

For more information on Agent Orange, cluster bombs and depleted uranium go to:

Agent Orange Website

Cluster Bombs (Viewer Discretion due to Graphic Images)

Campaign Against Depleted Uranium

Depleted Uranium Education Project

Have the salmon, but hold the PCBs

Salmon farmers are serving up the known cancer causing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) to consumers who consume the farmed fish. This according to a study commisioned by the Environmental Working Group. There is no risk
from wild and canned Alaskan salmon says the article.

Iraqi family massacred by "trigger happy" US soldiers

As that moron in Crawford hosts a BBQ for fund raisers, American troops are gunning down children in Iraq. In an atrocious action, worthy of universal disdain and condemnation, US troops opened fire on a family at a checkpoint. The Independent reports that a father and his 3 children, one as young as 8 years old, were murdered in a hail of gunfire. These people were guilty of absolutely nothing except trying to get to their home. This as the lying hypocrite Bush says in his Saturday radio address "Life is returning to normal for the Iraqi people ... All Americans can be proud of what our military and provisional authorities have achieved in Iraq".

Blood and gore ok, T and A not

Why is it that that the people who pull the strings in this society believe that the atrocious display of dead mutilated corpses to millions of people in the US and around the world is acceptable behavior. These same people would be absolutely livid if male and female genitalia were shown on the airwaves. The live breathing human body is apparently disgusting to these people, but dead battered bodies are presumably not. I have had it with the tolerance and outright encouragement of violent behavior and images in society while anything involving sexuality and nudity is offlimits.

Haliburton's bloody profits

Haliburton's quest for profits kills not only Iraqi's, but also their own workers.

"War on terrorism", protecting us from 71-year-old nuns?

Were you an anti-war protester? I was. I guess I better get ready for an anal cavity search. Well actually I am probably safe for now, but I have my doubts. It seems the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has a list of anti-war activists, left-wing constitutional lawyers, and outspoken nuns singled out for special questioning and strip searches, according to an article in the Independent. Apparently, enjoying your civil rights in this country is a crime now. What was it the U.S. administration said we were supposed to be fighting to protect again?

Nuclear material for sale on the streets of Iraq

We did a great job of protecting the oil wells in Iraq, but that was about it. Everyting else was pretty much looted and destroyed. Now there are reports that there may be "400 potentially lethal radioactive sources" being sold by black marketers in Basra according to a story in the The Sunday Herald.

Foolish Democrats

The Democrats cannot take the moral high ground on the Iraq issue. When the Democrats attack the Republicans on the war, the Republicans correctly point out many of the Democrats voted for the war. We need a new party. One that does not supprot war, capitalism and the destruction of human rights and the environment.

Maybe they should have tried priceline?

CNN Crossfire's Paul Begala tells co-host Tucker Carlson Bush wasted 1 trillion dollars on a tax cut for the rich while only 28 billion is allotted to the Department of Homeland Security. Thus, 6,000 airport screeners are being cut. Kudos Mr. Bush, I feel safer already! But thats not all. The stupidity continues. I would like to add a fact that Begala did not mention. Get ready for this one. Air marshalls will be cut from flights because there is no money to pay for their overnight stays at hotels! 5 billion a month wasted on Iraq and Afghanistan to no avail while stopping a sure fire way the terrorists used to attack us is not a concern of the Bush administration and its allies in Congress.

CNN..... get it straight

CNN, Cable News Network, or as I like to call it, Cowardly News Network, once again never ceases to pay homage to the Bush administration in their reporting. They continually maintain that Bush has "very high" poll numbers on national security while neglecting to point out that his poll numbers have dropped 10 points in a little over 3 months

US to world on Iraq: This land is our land

WMDs, Al-Queda, if you answered those as reasons the US went to war in Iraq, you would be wrong. What the US really is concerned about is mobile phone networks! With plenty of time to spare since giving up looking for WMDs, what the US military does now with its spare time is threaten to confiscate equipment of foreign phone companies! According to an article in the Independent, the US wants to get its hands on regional mobile phone licenses. The article states these are "almost certain to be one of the most lucrative contracts in post-Saddam Iraq". Now, to be sure, its not just phone licenses that acted as a casus belli for war, lest we forget about that rogue elixir now seeping through the walls of the White House and running through the veins of Bush and his junta. No, not alcohol, Bush kicked that long ago, this one he and his cadre of liers love to much to quit. Come on, you all know the word! Lets say it together now oiiiiiillllll.

I hate Bush...seriously

Article in the Independent on how the fool wants to run a gas pipeline through pristine rainforests in the Peruvian Amazon and enrich his Texas cronies. No, I am not making this up. I wish I was though, believe me.

What does the White house have to hide?

Could it be Papa Bush's connections to the corrupt, brutal regime of Saudi Arabia. Ill give you a link so you can decide for yourself.

Where have all the consumers gone?

Consumer's, whose spending fuels two-thirds of the US economy, sentiment is in the toilet. Contrary to what the crooks in the White House and their minions in Congress maintain consumers are not and will not benefit from Bush's tax cut, not now or ever. Wow! surprise there. You mean giving tax cuts to the rich does not produce "growth and jobs" benefiting the middle class and poor as the administration likes to ludicrously claim, and not so subliminily stick behind Bush's melon, every time Bush makes a speech on anything?! You must be kidding! Pretty soon you will be saying Iraq has no weapons of mass destruction!

Under Dumaya, safety is an illusion

If anybody believes the Bush administration, with its bloodthirsty "war against terror", is making us safer from terrorism, then read this.

There is only one kind of hummer for me, and its not the car

Great site for all those who oppose that obscene, disgusting, ridiculous, a**hole mobile, aka the Hummer.