Thursday

HSING: tough comments

Putting Away Childish Things

“When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” - First letter from Paul of Tarsus to the School of Corinth, Chapter 13, verse 11

A short meditation for the males in the audience: imagine that one day you wake up with a belly ache. A BAD one. So bad you have to go to the doctor. You get X-Rayed. They find a fetus growing inside your testicle sack, with no way to get out. And the fetus is pushing on your nads really, really hard.

Would you consider this to be a positive development in your life?


Would you consider this event to be “good for you”?

www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/science/12/21/potomac.fish.ap/index.html

“SHARPSBURG, Maryland (AP) -- Male fish that are growing eggs have been found in the Potomac River near Sharpsburg, a sign that a little-understood type of pollution is spreading downstream from West Virginia, a federal scientist says.

The so-called intersex abnormality may be caused by pollutants from sewage plants, feedlots and factories that can interfere with animals' hormone systems, The Washington Post reported Sunday.

Nine male smallmouth bass taken from the Potomac near Sharpsburg, about 60 miles upstream from Washington, were found to have developed eggs inside their sex organs, said Vicki S. Blazer, a scientist overseeing the research for the U.S. Geological Survey…”

Granted, the above doesn’t make the claim that this development is good for the fish in the Potomac. But a Bush administration EPA report released in Summer 2002 DOES insist that toxic sludge dumped into the Potomac by the Army Corps of Engineers was “good for fish”.

www.safe2use.com/ca-ipm/02-06-19e.htm

“EPA SAYS TOXIC SLUDGE IS GOOD FOR FISH
by Audrey Hudson of THE WASHINGTON TIMES.

The Army Corps of Engineers' dumping of toxic sludge into the Potomac River protects fish by forcing them to flee the polluted area and escape fishermen, according to an internal Environmental Protection Agency document…”

“…The document instructs officials to focus less on the concerns of fishermen who say the sludge dumping is killing fish and more on the ability of the fish to complete their spawn without interference from the discharges.

The Corps dumps 200,000 tons of "toxic sludge" into the river every year in violation of the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act, according to the House committee.

William Colley, a retired environmental engineer who worked for the EPA for 29 years, said he was removed from leading the new permit process in 1999 after advocating eliminating the discharges…”

One major point to take note of here: Colley was replaced in 1999. That means BOTH Dems and GOP are guilty here. Once again, THE PEOPLE (and the smallmouth bass) get FOCCED by the Finance, Oil, Chemical, Credit, Energy and Defense lobbies.

Another point to note: CNN manages to go through their whole report without once mentioning that the Potomac River is the same Potomac River where the ACoE has been dumping their toxic sludge, and without mentioning that ACoE and the EPA have declared this dumping of toxic sludge to be ‘good for fish’.


Some will argue that there’s no evidence the toxic sludge is responsible for these hermaphrodite fish. Some will argue that the sludge was being dumped somewhere else, perhaps downriver from the fish (this MAY be the case, I really don’t know). Some will argue that even if the fish ARE mutating, this mutation is good for them because it will make their survival more certain.

My response to those arguments is that none of them are the slightest bit relevant.

The adult looks at such claims by the EPA and ACoE and knows that their statements are rationalizations and not statements of fact. We KNOW that such an argument is childish – this sludge is labeled “toxic” for a reason. But still the people go to the polls, over and over, and vote for the same two party dictatorship.

A good definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result. And this is precisely the insanity that the American people have been engaged in for a century. It’s time to put away childish things.


Putting away childish things starts with recognizing the difference between childish behavior and rational, moral behavior. It starts with stripping away our fairy tales, and replacing them with a realistic, factual point of view. We begin this process by educating ourselves and forming our own opinions instead of parroting something we heard on TV News or on the 700 Club.

The process of putting away childish things requires that we judge our leaders not by what they say, but by what they do. They will ALWAYS say the right things, the things their constituency wants to hear. That’s why they’re politicians. Which is why we must measure results, not promises. By their fruits, we shall know them.

Let’s look at the present, and the stinky, rotten fruits produced by George W “head up his” Bush.

GULAGS R US

The ACLU has been doing some digging. They’ve been filing FOIA requests to try and get info related to Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. From these documents, it’s come to light that Bush did, in fact, approve the use of torture. It’s also come to light that the Pentagon tried to set the FBI to take the fall for prisoner abuse if any of the Pentagon’s torture tactics came to light. They did this by having DoD people masquerade as FBI agents.

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7524.htm

www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/12/21/guantanamo.interrogation.ap/index.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon is investigating new allegations by a civil liberties group that military interrogators at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay posed as FBI agents while using abusive techniques to question detainees.

The American Civil Liberties Union released e-mails that showed FBI officials disapproved of the practice and suggested the military interrogators posed as FBI agents in part to take advantage of the rapport the FBI had established with some detainees at the prison.

The e-mails, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, also describe some harsh interrogation techniques and a suggestion they were approved by President Bush -- a charge the White House vigorously denied…”

Of COURSE they’re denying it. Because if they admit it, Bush go jail now. Ok, not jail, because he’d get Cheney to pardon him. But he’d be out of the White House. They can deny it all they want. The paper trail the ACLU has uncovered tells the tale.

www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/fbi.html

www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/FBI.121504.3977.pdf

“Of concern, DOD interrogators impersonating Supervisory Special Agents of the FBI told a detainee that REDACTED. These same interrogation teams then REDACTED. The detainee was also told by this interrogation team REDACTED. These tactics have produced no intelligence of a threat neutralization nature to date and CITF believes that techniques have destroyed any chance of prosecuting this detainee. If this detainee is ever released or his story made public in any way, DOD interrogators will not be held accountable because these torture techniques were done the “FBI” interrogators. The FBI will be left holding the bag before the public.” - 12/05/03

www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/FBI.121504.4940_4941.pdf

“Request for guidance regarding the OGC's EC regarding detainee abuse, referring to “interrogation techniques made lawful” by the “President's Executive Order.” - 05/ 22/04

PLEASE take the time to read the above PDF link in full. It’s an internal FBI document. One which makes it clear that Bush issues an Executive Order, obviously a classified one, approving torture. Only Bush could have done so, because no one else can issue an Executive Order.

This isn’t the first top-secret Executive Order ever written. And it won’t be the last. Before Desert Storm, Bush’s father issued a secret executive order waiving all conflict of interest issues related to the handing out of military contracts to corporations where the Bush 41 administration had close relationships. But Bush 43’s EO IS an illegal one, where his father’s was morally despicable and legally questionable, but not necessarily an outright war crime.

At this point, believing anything the Bush administration says is childish wishful thinking. By his fruits, ye shall know him. Torquemata, not Jesus. A killer and sadist in the Christian tradition, not a savior. A major league asshole, and liar, by any standards.

IRAQ

Some of you may remember that scene from Cheech and Chong’s “Nice Dreams”, where Cheech and Chong get caught by two cops while our Heroes have a truck made of marijuana in their possession. Chong is telling Cheech that everything’s cool.

Cheech responds by saying “what, you think they’re gonna come back and say ‘oh, you guys can just go’”.

A few seconds later, after some persuasion from a slutty looking chick, the cops come back and say, “oh, you guys can just go”.

Such things never happen in real life.


Or do they?

www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/10470106.htm

Soldier who killed unarmed Iraqi discharged to face lesser charges




Knight Ridder Newspapers

“WASHINGTON - A U.S. soldier was discharged from the Army for manslaughter rather than charged with murder for shooting an unarmed Iraqi prisoner last year, despite the fact that Army investigators found sufficient evidence to press the murder charge, Pentagon records released Tuesday show…”

“…The Army criminal investigators did find that a specialist with the 4th Forward Support Battalion, 4th Infantry Division, may have committed murder when he shot an unarmed prisoner at Camp Packhorse, near Tikrit, also in September 2003. The soldier, whose name was omitted from the investigative records, told military police he thought the prisoner was trying to escape.

But Army investigators found that the soldier, who's identified only as an electronic-devices repairman, probably "acted out of malice and went immediately to deadly force when it likely wasn't warranted," according to handwritten field notes.

The incident occurred Sept. 11, 2003, but wasn't reported to Army criminal investigators until four days later. When an investigator followed up on the case Nov. 20, an Army lawyer at Camp Packhorse told the investigator that the soldier had been administratively punished for voluntary manslaughter on Nov. 12, reduced to the lowest rank of private and discharged from the Army.

There's no explanation in the records of why the soldier was charged with the lesser crime and discharged, instead of facing a murder charge. The Army closed its investigation…”

How’s that for a recruiting commercial? Can you hear the narrative? I can.

__________________________________

US ARMY IRAQ RECRUITMENT CAMPAIGN 2005 – by I. Lov Jeezus

NYC. 9/11/01. Somber music. The planes hit the towers, FOX News reports in background. The towers come down. Shots of firemen, people bleeding and crying, ground zero shots in the aftermath. A crucifix/headstone.

NARRATOR: September the 11th affected us all. Some of you decided not to take it sitting down. Some of you decided to do something about it….

Fallujah. Night. Hard charger music. Troops crossing the wire on a house to house sweep. Closeups on boots crossing the road, night vision headgear, rifles, hand signals from Master Sgt. The troops are ON THE GO.

NARRATOR: We’re at war with heretics in a strange land. A hostile land. A land that will make ANYBODY crazy. But this is the United States Army…

Fallujah. Night. A young Iraqi man scrounging for food in a rubbish heap, near dead flashlight in hand, eating out of the rubbish. He hears something, and turns the flashlight.

NARRATOR: We don’t GET crazy.

Fallujah. Night. As the flashlight turns, a trooper shoots the kid dead. A head pops out of a doorway to take a look. The house is riddled with gunfire by another trooper.

NARRATOR: We get even, in the name of the Lord.

Fallujah. Night. The two troopers who opened fire look at each other, and at their Master Sargeant. All look worried.

NARRATOR: Things happen in the field. The Army knows this. And the Army isn’t about to let a few innocent ragheads…

Basecamp, CO’s waiting room outside office. The two troopers and the Master Sargeant are sitting and waiting, heads down.

NARRATOR: …stand in the way of American moral values.

CO walks into office and into frame, seeing the 3 men sitting outside his office.

COMMANDING OFFICER: Oh, you guys can just go. (he smiles)

Their heads come up, surprised and happy. The troops smile. The CO gives them a wink and walks away whistling “I Wish I Was In Dixie”.

NARRATOR: Join the Army. Because you guys can just go.

___________________________

For those of you who will claim this piece of satire is unfair, all I can say is that you obviously don’t read the news. Half of the United States thinks that the implementation of a solution to the “Muslim Problem” would be a good thing.

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article7510.htm

The Associated Press

12/17/04 (
AP)
-- - Nearly half of all Americans believe the U.S. government should restrict the civil liberties of Muslim-Americans, according to a nationwide poll.

The survey conducted by Cornell University also found that Republicans and people who described themselves as highly religious were more apt to support curtailing Muslims’ civil liberties than Democrats or people who are less religious.

'Disturbing news'
Researchers also found that respondents who paid more attention to television news were more likely to fear terrorist attacks and support limiting the rights of Muslim-Americans.

“It’s sad news. It’s disturbing news. But it’s not unpredictable,” said Mahdi Bray, executive director of the Muslim American Society. “The nation is at war, even if it’s not a traditional war. We just have to remain vigilant and continue to interface.”

The survey found 44 percent favored at least some restrictions on the civil liberties of Muslim Americans. Forty-eight percent said liberties should not be restricted in any way.

The survey showed that 27 percent of respondents supported requiring all Muslim-Americans to register where they lived with the federal government. Twenty-two percent favored racial profiling to identify potential terrorist threats. And 29 percent thought undercover agents should infiltrate Muslim civic and volunteer organizations to keep tabs on their activities and fund-raising...”

True to form, the Christians want to hold fast to the idea that “all beings are created equal, but some are more equal than others”. And they want to legislate the superiority of Christianity over Islam, forcing special laws on people who don’t share their Christian “morals”.

Note that I used the GOP code word “morals” in my mock commercial. In my last rant, I explained that to Evangelical Christian voters, “morals” is political code for “we hate gays, believe women should be 2nd class citizens, and we still hate Niggers”.

Which sedgways nicely to this next article on the Army’s sentencing of one Federico Merida to 25 years at Leavenworth…

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3905366

'U.S. Soldier Killed Iraqi Teenager after Sex'

"PA"

A US national guardsman who pleaded guilty to killing a 17-year-old Iraqi soldier said he shot the young man after they had consensual sex in a guard tower, a newspaper reported today, citing court-martial records.

Private Federico Daniel Merida, 21, of the North Carolina National Guard, pleaded guilty to murder without premeditation and other charges during a court-martial in Iraq on September 25.

Merida was sentenced to 25 years in prison. He is being held at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

Merida, who was born in Veracruz, Mexico, has a wife and toddler son.

Army officials at Forward Operating Base Danger, where the court-martial was held in Iraq, had previously withheld details of the case.

But The News & Observer of Raleigh, North Carolina, reported today that records show Merida and the Iraqi were on guard duty on May 11 in a tower on the perimeter of an army camp near Tikrit in northern Iraq. At around 10.30pm, Merida shot the teenager 11 times with his carbine.

Merida first told investigators the 17-year-old demanded money at gunpoint. Later, he said he killed the boy because he forced him to have sex. In a third interview, Merida said he got angry after the two had consensual sex.

He also pleaded guilty to two counts of giving false statements.

Merida apologised to the victim’s family during the court-martial, records show. “He was a son, a brother, someone very important to them,” he said. “I took someone they loved and cared for.”

So in the first case, the army lets a cold-blooded killer walk. But in the second, they throw the book at a guy who admits to his crime, admits to his attempts at perjury, and apologizes to the victim’s family.

The question I have to ask: based on the handling of Abu Ghraib and the case above, is Merida getting 25 years for murder, or for being gay, and for being apologetic toward “the enemy”?

The comparison between the two cases proves that Military Justice is an Oxymoron. A childish thing having nothing to do with justice, and everything to do with Evangelical Christian politics. It’s a system that cannot be trusted to deliver actual justice.

If it DID deliver actual justice, General Boykin, General Sanchez, and all those involved in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib would have been in front of a firing squad by now. But don’t hold your breath. THIS US Government’s only interest is in killing poor colored people for Wall Street.

MORE ON MORONS IN IRAQ

It seems a lifetime ago that Bush declared, “mission accomplished” in Iraq. In my opinion, it’s pretty much been proved that he DID accomplish his mission in Iraq - the one he was talking about when he said, “mission accomplished”. Iraqi oil now belongs to America and the House of Morgan who, under Executive Order 13303, control all Iraqi petroleum products on behalf of the US Treasury.

Now, Bush is talking about elections in Iraq one month from now. Elections in the middle of a war where 100,000 Iraqis have been killed by Nazi bombs, and more are being killed each day? Elections at a time when hundreds of thousands of Shiite voters have been displaced from their homes, and probably can’t provide proper identification or demonstrate a place of residence, because their home no longer exists?

Nice trick huh?

Run the “election” to appoint CIA contractor Allawi as Obersturmfuhrer of Iraq at a time when the opposition can’t get their people to the polls. At a time when the country is so unsafe that no election monitors can be present while the CIA is stuffing ballot boxes. In fact, Iraq is so screwed up and dangerous that the so-called election monitors are going to be monitoring the Iraqi elections FROM JORDAN.

www.nytimes.com/2004/12/23/politics/23elect.html?ex=1104774762&ei=1&en=b462d58df1dc3915

Yes, you heard that right. The international observers are going to “observe” the electoral process from Amman, Jordan. It’s 300 miles from the Iraq/Jordan border to Baghdad. Amman is 500 miles or so away from Baghdad. It’s like saying “our observers in Oregon are going to make sure the Mexican election is free and fair”.

Naturally, this tactic on the part of the Bushites is going to work, because the American public that supports Bush are as gullible today as they were at age 3, thanks to Evangelical Christianity - people who still believe in fairy tales will believe any freaking thing told to them by someone who peppers his or her speech with words from those fairy tales.

The REAL tale of why they want Allawi and a puppet government in Iraq in a hurry can be found behind the scenes. All one has to do is judge Bush by what he DOES, not what he says. The big rush to hold elections that disenfranchise the Iraqi people is about enshrining PRIVATIZATION of Iraq’s natural resources into the new Iraqi Constitution, to ensure that oil revenue is given to Bush’s friends instead of to the Iraqi people as free health care and social services.

http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/1340

The Bushites want to privatize all of Iraq’s wealth, and via IMF Structural Adjustment Programs, turn Iraq, the most advanced nation in the Middle East until 1991, into a Third World Country dependent on the USA.

But this isn’t only happening in Iraq. It’s happening elsewhere too. In the Ukraine.

THE ARRANGED ORANGE REVOLUTION

There’s been much fuss over the “fraudulent” elections in the Ukraine which kept opposition leader Victor Yushchenko out of high office. The military industrial complex owned media in the USA has been squawking their self-interested garbage in the same way they squawked about the Yugoslavian elections when Milosevic was running for re-election.

The US government has used the same tactics in the Ukraine that they used in Yugoslavia, paying tens of millions to get pro-Yushchenko “supporters” out in the streets for the Western media, in order to make the overthrow of Yanukovich appear to be the legitimate voice of “the people”, when in reality, “the people” have been bought with a bottomless barrel of US funding for the election of Yushchenko.

It’s not me making these accusations. It’s a member of the Republican Party.

http://csmonitor.com/2004/1223/p06s01-woeu.html

“…US Rep. Ron Paul (R) of Texas has alleged that some $60 million in US funding went overwhelmingly to finance activities that led to the "Orange Revolution," two weeks of protest that followed the disputed victory by Russian-backed Viktor Yanukovich over opposition candidate Viktor Yushchenko…”

www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2004/cr120704.htm

HON. RON PAUL OF TEXAS
BEFORE THE US HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS COMMITTEE
December 7, 2004

U.S. Hypocrisy in Ukraine

Mr. Chairman: President Bush said last week that, "Any election (in Ukraine), if there is one, ought to be free from any foreign influence." I agree with the president wholeheartedly. Unfortunately, it seems that several US government agencies saw things differently and sent US taxpayer dollars into Ukraine in an attempt to influence the outcome…”

“…How did this one-sided US funding in Ukraine come about? While I am afraid we may have seen only the tip of the iceberg, one part that we do know thus far is that the US government, through the US Agency for International Development (USAID), granted millions of dollars to the Poland-America-Ukraine Cooperation Initiative (PAUCI), which is administered by the US-based Freedom House.

PAUCI then sent US Government funds to numerous Ukrainian non-governmental organizations (NGOs). This would be bad enough and would in itself constitute meddling in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation. But, what is worse is that many of these grantee organizations in Ukraine are blatantly in favor of presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko.

Consider the Ukrainian NGO International Centre for Policy Studies. It is an organization funded by the US Government through PAUCI, but on its website you will find that the front page in the English section features a prominent orange ribbon, the symbol of Yushchenko�s party and movement. Reading further on, we discover that this NGO was founded by George Soros�s Open Society Institute. And further on we can see that Viktor Yushchenko himself sits on the advisory board!

And this NGO is not the only one the US government funds that is openly supportive of Viktor Yushchenko. The Western Ukraine Regional Training Center, as another example, features a prominent USAID logo on one side of its website�s front page and an orange ribbon of the candidate Yushchenko�s party and movement on the other. By their proximity, the message to Ukrainian readers is clear: the US government supports Yushchenko.

The Center for Political and Law Reforms, another Ukrainian NGO funded by the US government, features a link at the top of its website�s front page to Viktor Yushchenko�s personal website. Yushchenko�s picture is at the top of this US government funded website.

This May, the Virginia-based private management consultancy Development Associates, Inc., was awarded $100 million by the US government �for strengthening national legislatures and other deliberative bodies worldwide.� According to the organization�s website, several million dollars from this went to Ukraine in advance of the elections.

As I have said, this may only be the tip of the iceberg. There may be many more such organizations involved in this twisted tale.

It is clear that a significant amount of US taxpayer dollars went to support one candidate in Ukraine. Recall how most of us felt when it became known that the Chinese government was trying to funnel campaign funding to a US presidential campaign. This foreign funding of American elections is rightly illegal. Yet, it appears that that is exactly what we are doing abroad. What we do not know, however, is just how much US government money was spent to influence the outcome of the Ukrainian election.

Dozens of organizations are granted funds under the PAUCI program alone, and this is only one of many programs that funneled dollars into Ukraine. We do not know how many millions of US taxpayer dollars the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) sent to Ukraine through NED�s National Democratic Institute and International Republican Institute. Nor do we know how many other efforts, overt or covert, have been made to support one candidate over the other in Ukraine…”

This is PRECISELY what Clinton did to Milosevic. Clinton paid untold millions to get “opposition” supporters to rally in the streets for Western Cameras, and subverted the legally called for Yugoslavian constitutional runoff election by staging a bloodless coup which derailed the Yugoslavian electoral process.

Consider the following scenario. After the next election, it’s discovered that Osama Bin Laden supplied the GOP’s opponent with 60 million in cash with which to run for President. And the opposition wins.

Would Americans consider the election to be legitimate, or fraudulent because of foreign tampering in the US electoral process?

Once again, we need to judge Bush not by what he says, which is the childish thing to do, but by what he does, which is the rational thing to do. It’s all well and good for him to say the Ukranian elections should be free of foreign influence. But the reality is, Bush himself IS the foreign influence on the Ukranian election, according to US government documents. Stinky fruit.

I’ve often said that CIA factbook can be VERY handy. It’s a great tool to use to figure out what American corporations want to steal next, and how they plan to go about stealing whatever it is they want that someone else has. Go to the Ukraine section in the CIA World Factbook and take a look. The word PRIVATIZATION appears not once, not twice, but THREE TIMES.

www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/up.html

The Americans want to control the Ukraine’s military industrial base, which is the largest in the region, and the sixth largest on the planet. It’s also convenient for US arms manufacturers to go into business with the Ukraine, because via Ukraine, they can sell weapons to countries in which American firms can make no headway: Russia, China, Iran, and Malaysia, all of whom are current clients of Ukranian arms manufacturers.

www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1413379,00.html

They also want to control ocean access, in order to have an alternate Caspian pipeline route to the sea. They want to have control of a Caucasian nation bordering Russia. And most of all, US military contractors want to outsource slave wage labor from the Ukraine before Yanukovich can continue to implement wage reforms.

If you look at the CIA Factbook, you will find that the GDP in the Ukraine is US$5,400. That’s an average wage of $450 a month. When Yushchenko was Prime Minister from 2000 to 2002, he tried to put the people on a slave wage program full time. Since 2002 and the ousting of Yushchenko, salaries paid in at least one military manufacturing plant have doubled.


See now why a news station owned by General Electric, a top military contractor, is taking sides? They want their wage slaves.

There’s a pattern here. Invade Haiti just weeks after Aristide tries to raise minimum wage from 1 dollar a day to 2 dollars a day. Arrange a “revolution” in the Ukraine before the state makes it any less profitable to exploit the working class. Profit uber alles.

There are clues as to who Yushchenko is, what he represents, and who he works for. His wife is an American who sounds like a GOP pollster. He spends US taxpayer’s money like there’s no tomorrow. And the Clergy in the Ukraine has gone on TV to say “even God is for Yushchenko.

Sound familiar?

Yushchenko is the Ukraine’s version of a Bush Nazi. His supporters are even telling us up front that they intend to engage in GOP Brown Shirt tactics, refusing the recognize the results of the election if Yushchenko loses on Boxing Day.

http://csmonitor.com/2004/1224/p06s02-woeu.html

“…At a Wednesday night rally in Kiev, Yushchenko warned thousands of followers to remain vigilant. "There are some forces preparing to disrupt, they are preparing brigades to come to Kiev," he said. "We will come to this square after the vote on Dec. 26 and we will stay until our victory is celebrated…"

You see? They will stay until victory is celebrated, period. They will accept no other outcome, and will continue to march and organize, using American taxpayer’s dollars, until Yushchenko is appointed Obersturmfuhrer of the Ukraine on behalf of American arms manufacturers.

The election probably was rigged. Putin’s side probably did cheat. But for the US media to claim that election fraud is a legitimate reason to oust Yanukovich, after they’ve allowed the Bushites to steal 3 consecutive elections between 2000 and 2004 without doing their jobs, is a childish thing: George Bush has made election fraud a legitimate tactic for all the world.

PUTTING AWAY CHILDISH THINGS

Five years ago, if someone had told me that I’d have to read the Hindustan Times instead of NY Times or Washington Times to see what the US Secretary of State was saying, I’d have laughed at that person and told them they were crazy. I’d have said, “America may be fascist, but it’s not THAT fascist.”

And I’d have been dead wrong. If you want to find out what Colin Powell has said of late, you need to go to India, because the US news services won’t print it. I’m no fan of Powell’s. He’s the cat who covered up the My Lai massacre for the higher ups. He’s the rat who brought back Hitler’s Blitzkreig: the Powell Doctrine of overwhelming force. He even sat at the UN, lied, and pulled non-existent WMD out of a hat. Imagine that.

Where’s HIS head at?

What a brat.

But I digress. Oh yeah, the Hindustan Times. The Bushites even scare Colin Powell. He’s left some parting words, and in his typically perfect diplomatic manner, he’s taken a parting shot at, and given us a warning about, the schemings of one Ms. Condo-skeeza Rice. A woman so skanky and self-interested that she has a Chevron supertanker named after her. And it’s the biggest one in the fleet.


Read the article below carefully.

www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1165930,001300180038.htm

Insurgency in Iraq is 'very serious': Powell

Press Trust of India

Washington, December 23, 2004|12:37 IST

Describing the insurgency in Iraq as "very serious", US Secretary of State Colin Powell has said the insurgents can be defeated by raising Iraqi forces soon and providing them with logistical and other support.

"If we can build up the Iraqi forces fast enough to take over from us, and if we can support them with logistics as well as may be some continued presence, then there is no reason this isn't defeatable," Powell, a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told 'Paris Match' in an interview released by the State Department on Thursday.

Vietnam "was a case where we didn't have a clear enough strategy," he said, adding US has a clear strategy in Iraq.

Powell revealed for the first time that he strongly recommended to President George W Bush to go to war against the Taliban in Afghanistan first before going to war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq while others were urging that he move against Iraq first. He claimed "most of the time" Bush listened to his advice.

Asked whether it is not frustrating to go all the way to the top as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and resign, and go ahead all the way to the top as the Secretary of State and resign again, Powell responded: "No, this is life."

"I don't need to go higher," said Powell. "I just need to have work that is satisfying and that is contributing. I did not lobby to become National Security Advisor. I did not lobby to become Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and I did not ask to become Secretary of State."

Powell said he has no desire to run for elective office.

Powell says the Iraq insurgency is “very serious”. But they’re just a small ragtag group of “dead enders”, aren’t they?

“He told him (Bush) so”, in Iraq, Powell claims.

Then the direct warning about Condi Rice, and considering that Ms. Rice is a soul sister and Powell a soul brother (albeit a really lame one), a very serious swipe at her Lady Macbeth ambitions. The swipe is in Powell’s last paragraph. The whole paragraph really. Remember, this is Beltway talk, not English. EVERYTHING is about context. Every word, every nuance, has meaning.

By saying he doesn’t need to go higher, there’s a between the lines implication that the new resident in the seat DOES have grand ambitions on power. That person is identified in the next two sentences. Powell didn’t lobby for the NSC chair, Rice did. And Powell didn’t lobby for his position at State: he waited to be ASKED to take the job, as any good Uncle Tom would do. But Condi Rice DID lobby to replace Powell.

Taking such thinly veiled shots at those he works with is uncharacteristic for Powell. For him to have said such things, he must REALLY be scared by this harpy in University Dean’s clothing. Which makes me fear what’s to come these next four years.

In the last four years, we’ve seen the Constitution shredded by the so-called Patriot Act, Bush’s version of the Enabling Act. We’ve seen the creation of an American Gestapo, the Department of Homeland Security, whose job description is identical to the job description of the Nazi Gestapo, taken from the US State Department’s case against the Nazis at Nuremburg. We’ve seen the promise of education reform, followed by Bush underfunding his own program by six billion dollars a year.

We’ve seen the invasion of two nations of behalf of US energy interests. We’ve seen photos of American torturers smiling for the camera. We’ve seen video of cold-blooded executions of unarmed, injured Iraqis by American soldiers. We’ve seen the evidence of the massacre of thousands of Afghan prisoners under US Special Forces supervision. We’ve seen the Pentagon admit to staging the Saddam statue pull-down event. We’ve seen the value of the US dollar cut in half while Bush praises his economic recovery. We’ve seen Bush try to entrench racism against gays into the Constitution.

We’ve seen Halliburton get billions in no-bid contracts even after they were caught cheating the taxpayers out of untold millions. We’ve seen Paul O’Neill, a staunch conservative and corporate robber baron from Alcoa, Bush’s choice for Secretary of Treasury, refer to this administration as “a bunch of kids rolling around on the White House lawn”. We’ve seen the largest deficits in human history. And we’ve seen LOTS of kids coming home with 2 or 3 limbs, for no reason.

It never ends. The fruits of Evangelical Christian values aren’t just bitter or rotten… they’re downright poisonous. The most hateful, hypocritical “morals” in recorded history.

And by their fruits, we should know them. They’ve traded in their Swastikas and White Sheets for Old Glory, but their mission remains the same. Steal everything in the name of the Lord, and kill anyone who resists.

It is time to put away childish things, and fight back against this Christian Minority and their corporate sponsors, who represent but a fraction of the American people. 57 million. One in five. Marginalized, they will have no power.

It is time to break with our irrational fears, spit in their eye, and piss on their Bible, which is the creation of a Western Emperor three centuries after the death of Jesus, who ordered the words and story of Jesus rewritten to support his mandate of a State Sanctioned religion. The words in that book are diametrically opposed to the words of Jesus from his own time, in his own tongue, which we’ve had in our possession for fifty years.


Fifty years is far too long for mankind to remain blind deaf and dumb to reality. It’s time to drop our irrational fear, peer into Galileo’s telescope, and see the moon for what it is. Their “religion” is not a religion. It’s a mind control cult to be mocked, ridiculed, and given the same amount of respect that Evangelicals give to women, gays, and Muslims.

In otherwords, none.

As Hunter S Thompson wrote recently, “fuck these Nazis”. Because that’s all the respect and courtesy they deserve. And now I’m going to take the cheesy way out and close this rant with some words from Roger Waters, because I’m lazy and I don’t have a good out planned, and Roger Waters says what I want to say anyway, in his typically brilliant style.

So let’s go out with a few poems from Roger Waters’ 1992 album, Amused to Death. To hear what he’s saying about Bush and the Middle East of late, go to www.rogerwaters.com and check out a couple of new songs. You’ll be glad you did.

Any by the way, David Gilmore: we now know “which one’s Pink”, and which one’s gone Yellow chasing the Green.

Peace

What God Wants Part 1

What God wants God gets God help us all
The kid in the corner looked at the priest
And fingered his pale blue Japanese guitar
The priest said:
God wants goodness
God wants light
God wants mayhem
God wants a clean fight
What God wants God gets
What God wants God gets
Don't look so surprised
It's only dogma
The alien prophet cried
The beetle and the springbok
Took the Bible from its hook
The monkey in the corner
Wrote the lesson in his book
What God wants God gets

God wants peace
God wants war
God wants famine
God wants chain stores
What God wants God gets
God wants sedition
God wants sex
God wants freedom
God wants semtex
What God wants God gets

Don't look so afraid
I'm only joking
The alien comic lied
The jackass and hyena
Took the feather from its hook
The monkey in the corner
Wrote the joke down in his book
What God wants God gets

God wants borders
God wants crap
God wants rainfall
And God wants wetbacks
What God wants God gets
God wants voodoo
God wants shrines
God wants law
God wants organised crime
God wants crusade
God wants jihad
God wants good
God wants bad
What God wants God Gets God help us all

- Roger Waters

The Bravery Of Being Out of Range

You have a natural tendency
To squeeze off a shot
You're good fun at parties
You wear the right masks
You're old but you still
Like a laugh in the locker room
You can't abide change
And you're home on the range
You opened the suitcase
Behind the old workings
To show off the magnum
You deafened the canyon
A comfort a friend
Only upstaged in the end
By the Uzi machine gun
Does the recoil remind you
Remind you of sex
Old man what the hell you gonna kill next
Old timer, who you gonna kill next
I looked over Jordan and what did I see
Saw a U.S. Marine in a pile of debris
I swam in your pools
And lay under your palm trees
I looked in the eyes of the Indian
Who lay on the Federal Building steps
And through the range finder over the hill
I saw the front line boys popping their pills
Sick of the mess they find on their desert stage
And the bravery of being out of range
Yeah the question is vexed
Old man what the hell you gonna kill next
Old timer who you gonna kill next
Hey bartender, over here
Two more shots
And two more beers
Sir, turn up the TV sound
The war has started on the ground
Just love those laser guided bombs
They're really great for righting wrongs
You hit the target, win the game
From bars 3,000 miles away
3,000 miles away
We play the game
With the bravery of being out of range
We zap and maim
With the bravery of being out of range
We strafe the train
With the bravery of being out of range
We gain terrain
With the bravery of being out of range
We play the game
With the bravery of being out of range

- Roger Waters

Amused To Death

Doctor Doctor, what is wrong with me
This supermarket life is getting long
What is the half life of a colour TV
What is the shelf life of a teenage queen
Ooh western woman
Ooh western girl
News hound sniffs the air
When Jessica Hahn goes down
He latches on to that symbol of detachment
Attracted by the peeling away of feeling
The celebrity of the abused shell, the belle
Ooh western woman
Ooh western girl
Ooh western woman
Ooh western girl
And the children on Melrose
Strut their stuff
Is absolute zero cold enough
And out in the valley, warm and clean
The little ones sit by their TV screens
No thoughts to think
No tears to cry
All sucked dry
Down to the very last breath
Bartender what is wrong with me?
Why am I so out of breath?
The captain said excuse me ma'am
This species has amused itself to death
Amused itself to death
It has amused itself to death
Amused itself to death
We watched the tragedy unfold
We did as we were told
We bought and sold
It was the greatest show on earth
But then it was over
We ohhed and aahed
We drove our racing cars
We ate our last few jars of caviar
And somewhere out there in the stars
A keen-eyed look-out
Spied a flickering light
Our last hurrah
Our last hurrah
And when they found our shadows
Grouped 'round the TV sets
They ran down every lead
They repeated every test
They checked out all the data on their lists
And then, the alien anthropologists
Admitted they were still perplexed
But on eliminating every other reason
For our sad demise
They logged the only explanation left
This species has amused itself to death
No tears to cry, no feelings left
This species has amused itself to death
Amused itself to death
Amused itself to death (repeating)
(switch channels)
[Alf Razzell:] Years later, I saw Bill Hubbard's name on the memorial to the missing at Aras. And I...when I saw his name I was absolutely transfixed; it was as though he...he was now a human being instead of some sort of nightmarish memory of how I had to leave him, all those years ago. And I felt relieved, and ever since then I've felt happier about it, because always before, whenever I thought of him, I said to myself, 'Was there something else that I could have done?' [background: I'd rather die, I'd rather die...] And that always sort of worried me. And having seen him, and his name in the register - as you know in the memorials there's a little safe, there's a register in there with every name - and seeing his name and his name on the memorial; it sort of lightened my...heart, if you like.
[woman:] When was it that you saw his name on the memorial?
[Alf:] Ah, when I was eighty-seven, that would be the year, ninete...eighty-four, nineteen eighty-four. – Roger Waters

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