mr ed - i wonder what the bushits will do about this - its really not their way to accept a 'no'
Their lives forever changed, the victims old and new desperately want to find out why the vaccines are making some soldiers so sick, but say they can't fight the enemy if the Pentagon denies the enemy exists.
The first version of the article, "Deadly Bomb Explodes Near Baghdad Hotel," was filed on 12 Oct 2003 at 8:01 AM
Just seventeen minutes later, the AP released another version of the story onto the newswire. this 8:18 AM version had some new details--and a gutted witness statement:
The AP used the ellipsis (...) to delete Ghulam's description of the driver as a light-skinned non-Iraqi.
Cunningham has documents showing students getting paid between $50 and $200 for good S.A.T. scores while other students he says were paid not to take the test. Cunningham believes its part of a scheme to make the school systems overall S.A.T. score look good.
Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is planning to cut at least 100 of the nation's 425 military bases, more closures than in the four previous rounds of base closures combined, beginning in 2005
A millionaire industrialist has surged ahead in Switzerland's election campaign with an anti-immigrant and anti-European Union platform that threatens to upset the nation's image as a model of racial tolerance. "The Swiss are becoming Negroes."
mred. powell on tv on bbc justifying his un speech feb 5? he sed 'it was the best intelligence we had. experts always disagree. i presented the best judgement of our intellingence - and i had the head of the intellegince (tenet) sitting behind me'
He is heard across the US on 650 stations, and holds an eight-year $US285 million ($419 million) contract with Premier Networks. Limbaugh's audience has become known as the "dittoheads". To whatever he thinks, and whatever he says, they say "ditto". This audience is "rusted on" ? older folk who have formed their views, made their choices, and see no need to have anything but their beliefs and prejudices confirmed.
But the big difference between the audiences is that one makes the conscious decision to turn to Limbaugh to hear what he has to say; the other is tuning in for the football, and is quick to resent the intrusion of non-football elements, such as political or social commentary ? especially if it can be interpreted as having racial undertones.
He said of his radio program: "Everyone who listens to me agrees with me ? so where is the controversy?"
It's not what you say, Rush, it's where you say it.
But does Bush grasp that we have turned cynicism into an art form? George W, like all politicians, operates via stereotypes - it's just that his stereotypes are more simple, sharp and stark than most.
"Yet once his passion is aroused it overwhelms. When he talks of the terrorists he taps the table; he cuts through; he polarises opinion. You can see it and feel it. Bush's presidency was formed by September 11 "
mred - he doth protesteth too mucheth
Until about 12 months ago, Saad was with his father in the mountains. Bin Laden sent him to Iran because the electronic communications blackout imposed for security reasons made it impossible for him to direct operations.
mred - k - so now iran is toast...
NSW Premier Bob Carr yesterday delivered a blunt warning to gang leaders in southwestern Sydney following a double shooting murder this week: obey the law or leave the country.
As police continued their investigation, the Lebanese Muslim Association branded Mr Carr's comments appalling, saying it was a thinly veiled "Go home you wogs".
"The great thing about Australians is they're not afraid," Bush said at a White House interview with The Australian.
"When I go to Australia I'll be speaking to a country which does understand the consequences of sacrificing for something greater than themselves."
Asked whether he saw Australia as the US's deputy sheriff in Southeast Asia, the President said: "No. We don't see it as a deputy sheriff. We see it as a sheriff. There's a difference" - a line that drew a laugh. "Anyway, no, equal partners, friends and allies. There's nothing deputy about this relationship."
"I found that John Howard was a visionary person who was able to see beyond the immediate noise inherent in a democracy," Mr Bush said.
mr ed - a sheriff nonetheless. be afraid - be very fucking afraid.
He saw Australians as people who weren't afraid, who had been victims at Bali and who had a leader prepared to take the hard decisions.
He said: "The relationship in Southeast Asia is an important relationship, starting first and foremost with the strength of John Howard and the Australian people. There's a lot of things that we must continue to do together and that's part of the purpose by my trip. First of all, we've got to identify who these people are, which requires good smart intelligence-gathering, and the Australians are good at that.
"Secondly, it means that we've got to work to cut off funding ... we've got to collectively cut off money. John Howard knows that. And then we've got to have the capacity to move and work with other governments to bring these killers to justice. And the Australians are very good at that as well."
"They've hijacked a great religion," Mr Bush said of the terrorists. "They kill innocent life in the name of a great religion, in order to have their way, in order to create conditions of fear. We must fight them - we must fight them. There's no negotiations with these people. You cannot deal with these killers that way."
Not that any of us is in a position to criticize the Great Scriptwriter in the Sky, but don't you think She's been going a little heavy on the irony lately?
All those folks who had conniption fits over Bill Clinton's affair are now pooh-poohing Arnold Schwarzenegger's sexual misconduct -- and vice versa. The right-wingers who are always griping about Hollywood stars who express political opinions -- "Shut Up and Sing" -- suddenly find an actor perfectly fit for high political office based on his experience as The Terminator.
Professional patriots who would have been screaming with horror had the Clinton White House ever leaked the name of an undercover CIA agent now struggle to justify or minimize such a thing.
President Bush has spent $300 million trying to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and come up with zip, so now he wants to spend $600 million more. And let's mention the president's interesting theory that NOT finding any weapons of mass destruction means the Iraq war was fully justified. (Hello?)
Connoisseurs of political folly who have been enjoying the antics in California should not overlook the doings in the Great State, where Texas Republicans have achieved such a pluperfect snafu that the state's primary will be delayed next year.
The Iraqi Governing Council is complaining because the United States is wasting so much money in Iraq.
"The story of what we've done in the postwar period is remarkable," Nethercutt, R-Wash., told an audience of 65 at a noon meeting at the University of Washington's Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs.
"It is a better and more important story than losing a couple of soldiers every day."
Nethercutt said Saddam Hussein provided a good model for threats the nation should confront with its pre-emptive policy. Terrorism attacks that can kill large numbers of people have made pre-emptive action necessary, he said. "We can't counterpunch anymore," Nethercutt said.
His heavy-lidded eyes still give him a mellowed-out vibe, and he still has a subversive sense of humor, but today's senior citizen Chong, 65, is a meditating, woodworking, charity-giving, inner-city-youth-teaching father of six who has been married to the same woman for more than 30 years. He practices Bikram yoga and hasn't gotten high since the bust. "I'm on a protest fast," he said.
"I've never heard of this statute," said Michael Nasatir, a partner of Chong's attorney who specializes in drug law. "And neither had experienced U.S. attorneys in the narcotics division in this district (which covers Los Angeles). Not that it hadn't been prosecuted ? they had never heard of it. I've been in this business for 35 years."
The maximum sentence possible in the Operation Pipe Dreams cases is three years in prison and $250,000 in fines.
mred - ashkroft is really out of his fukking mind. and his stupid fukking head pops up at all of these odd cases - bong pipes, and lakhani and texan sodomy. i cant remember one serious stroy he has mentioned...
"Father, you chose to go one step further," judge Strombom said.
But the most appropriate punishment - community service - wasn't available to her, she said, because Bichsel spends his days in such service. The Catholic Worker Community just up the hill from the courthouse serves people usually ignored by society - the homeless, the mentally ill and women recently released from prison.
Beyond Bechtel, a number of other companies have landed smaller contracts. But Halliburton is so dominant that it is hardly a stretch to call it the general contractor of the war in Iraq and its aftermath.
Cheney and his aides vigor- ously reject allegations of wrongdoing in the awarding of Halliburton contracts or the receipt of Halliburton money. The vice president has nothing to do with deciding which companies get government contracts, they say, and his payments from Halliburton since taking office are for 1999 salary that he chose to defer long before taking office.
The president and vice president are exempt from recent government ethics rules
For its part, Halliburton is no stranger to controversy when it comes to dealings with the fed- eral government. In 1978, the company paid $1 million to settle grand jury charges that it and a competitor had colluded on construction work. The government fined Halliburton $3.8 million in 1995 for making illegal exports to Libya.
The company also settled a lawsuit last year, filed in Sacra- mento, agreeing to pay the government $2 million over charges of contract inflation for maintenance and repairs at Ford Ord, a now-closed military base near Monterey, between 1994 and 1998. Cheney was Halliburton's chief executive officer during most of that time.
And a September 2000 report by the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, found that Brown & Root, the subsidiary, had overbilled the government millions of dollars for excessive electric-ity, overstaffing and unnecessary furniture in Kosovo.
Under an ideological revolution introduced by Ronald Reagan, Barber said, government was branded as bulky and inefficient and many public functions were shifted to the private sector.
The result, according to Barber, is a blurring of the tradi-tional line between public service and private work.
"When the government is the problem and the market is the solution, it no longer is corruption," he said. "It becomes efficiency."
mred - one wonders whether cheney shouldnt just cash out the amount - at least it clears the future, and it is apparently explainable. and it removes any future appearance of conflict of interest. and i think he kinda rich anyway - seems a big price to pay.
In 1986 some members of the Skull and Bones Society contacted members of the Apache Nation, the San Carlos Apache specifically and told them the Skull and Bones Society had Geronimo?s skull on display.
The story was told how a written journal detailed the raid on the Chiricahua Apache?s grave at Fort Sill, Okla. And that Patriarch Bush led the dig. The society refers to older members as patriarchs and the Bush was President Bush?s grandfather Prescott Bush.
The Skull and Bones Society, with powerful leaders like the president, former president, former Secretary of State Averill Harriman, presidential candidate John Kerry, some of the Rockefellers, former Supreme Court justices and leaders in corporate America, condone behavior based on either implied grave robbing or at the least displaying human remains as objects of adoration.
Virginia was chosen by the US Attorney General John Ashcroft as the location for the first sniper trial precisely for this reason. The state's death penalty has the dubious honour of being second only to Texas. In terms of upholding convictions on appeal, Virginia holds the national record.
When defence lawyers surveyed potential jurors around Washington earlier this year, all but one said Mr Muhammad was guilty and should be executed. The sole exception was someone who did not know whether or not the defendant was guilty but said he should be executed anyway.
The Pentagon denies that there is any sanctioned propaganda drive behind the five-paragraph letter, but one soldier told of speaking to a public affairs officer about what he thought would be a news release, then being surprised to hear he was being presented as a letter writer whose words had been published in a newspaper back home.
Pentagon adviser Richard Perle said the recent Israeli attack in Syria was long overdue and expected US military action against Damascus.
In fact, a complete autopsy report would state in which direction the wounds were inflicted. The coroner?s inquest was never completed as it was preempted by the Hutton inquiry and the autopsy report will not be made public. Neither will the toxicology report.
(Sept 6) there is now far too much talk about the neocons and their goals. Kristol, Wolfowitz and others are being clearly identified as pro-Israel?if the White House keeps dropping in the polls, heads will roll and it will be the neocons and their people?this will lead to more anti-Semitic remarks and is not desirable?
(Sept 20) ?general PR problems about growing lack of recruits for the military. Now, a good percentage of the reserve men are opting out when they can. There will be a massive publicity campaign which will state that recruitment is ?way up? and more men are joining out of patriotism ?than ever before.? We will have to print this nonsense?
(Sept 21) Bush is tanking in the polls and the White House is getting wet pants. They are working on new magic for the President to pull out of his hat to dazzle and bewilder the public?.best guess is a ?terrorist attack? on some beloved domestic target
(September 21, 2003) ?? the seasons change and the political season is also changing, gentlemen. Corporate, not only ours but most of the other major entities, have decided, reluctantly it is admitted, that Bush has to go.
The general aim now is to distance ourselves from the whole miserable crew?if we remain neutral in these attacks, we may suffer the accusations that we are pro-Bush and that will hit us in the ad revenue. The key to all of this, gentlemen, is to watch the New York Times editorial pages and be advised accordingly?.?
(Sept 25) Note that a purloined copy of a security report about assassination attempts and threats against the President is circulating. As nearly as we can discover, it is genuine but we have been told that any mention of this could fall under the Patriot Act and we do not want to join Wall Street heavies in perp walks. The summation is that to date, there have been more ?viable? threats against Bush in one month than in the entire reign of Clinton
(October 1) Some cretin at the RNC was talking at the Cosmos Club yesterday about the possibility of running?God, don?t quote me on this one, please!?Neal Bush for office! He is stupider than his brother (if that?s possible!) and missed serious criminal charges on the savings and loan scandals only because of Dad?s influence?
(October 3) The NYT is starting in on the Bush Roast now. Before we commit ourselves too firmly, let?s see how it flies
(October 4) We have just finished looking through a long official report that proves conclusively that the Iraqi oil bonanza touted both by the Prez and Cheney was , like WMD, a pack of lies. The system was shot to hell and the wonderful oil revenues that Bush pushed to justify the war to corporations, were as phony as the rest of his bs. And what?s even prettier, children, is that they all knew it long before they shoved it down our throats. There is no way this can be kept from the public and we are all agreed to give it full rein without the usual Rovespins.
(October 6, 2003) ?and a thick stack of official directives from the Pentagon indicates that a more positive view of the attitudes of U.S. military personnel should be presented to the public?samples of obviously concocted stories are so ludicrous that it would not be wise to make them public?
(mred - google news first reports these fake letters oct 12)
(October 12) Apparently, SARS is expected to return with the flu season. No vaccine available so any reporting on this is to be very circumspect. The key word here is ?pneumonia? and not SARS?
(October 14) We expect an official release about ?large shipments? of Iraqi oil in the near future. Ain?t happening men. Our vehicles can?t even get enough gas there and, believe it or not, their fuel has to be imported from the US!?the sad arrival of dead military personnel at Dover is a thing of the past. Strictly forbidden to comment on or attempt to photograph arriving aircraft with the dead?the higher death tolls are redacted for the time being (waiting for after the elections? Hum?)
Forging a Case for War
07/11/2003 @ 7:12pm [permalink]
Here?s a fun game: Imagine the Chinese government announces itself threatened by a secret American plot, and declares it is preparing preemptive military action against us. Making Beijing?s case before the UN, President Hu Jintao waves around a set of documents laying out a complicated conspiracy. One of the documents purports to be from ?Prime Minister Richard Cheney of the Unionized States of America.? Another, dated October 2000, is signed by ?Secretary of State James Baker.? The Chinese would look absolutely deranged, relying on such obvious forgeries; the world would recoil in confusion and fear. Yet this is what our President did in his State of the Union address, when he cited similarly ludicrous forgeries as evidence Saddam was uranium-shopping in Niger.
So this week, he and others in his Administration will be going around "the filter" to give interviews with local newspapers and small television stations. The idea is that journalists not used to dealing with Presidents and Cabinet secretaries will be more easily awed and deferential. In other words: We've reached the point in our Iraq adventure where the President de facto admits his policies can't stand up to even basic media scrutiny -- his only hope is to avoid questions, because he can't really answer them."
"Somewhere, Orwell's ghost is smiling grimly. In his novel "1984," the British writer imagined a Ministry of Truth that would be responsible for manufacturing news of victories and triumphs. Now, it's no longer fiction; it's your tax dollars at work.
Arnold is so heinously amoral his is claiming to be a liar - that is his good side. "No, I am not complete scum," he pleads, "I am just a chronic liar." He should be done in the press after this admission.
You won't want to miss the wonderfully illuminating quotes about the Gov. wannabe, such as, "...in walks Arnold who started shouting out, 'Down with the blacks, niggers this and blacks that,' for about 10 min."
Reported nowhere but here as of yet is the bitter blood between Arnold and former President Reagan's daughter Patti Davis. According to our source, Arnold's harassing ways were too much for her to bear.
As our source told us, "Arnold had either slept with or hit on every woman at the gym." He was referring to Gold's Gym, where Arnold used to go to work out. And the woman who hated him most was Patti Davis.
When Arnold bought the gym, Patti refused to continue going there. She shared her fury and disgust with Arnold, and quit the gym to go find another place to work out.
Why was Patti so furious? Well, according to our source, it was his disgusting, drooling, womanizing ways, harassment, and something very personal. He said back then and said a number of times since that he will be very surprised if Patti doesn't come forward to speak out about him.
Keep an extra piece of information in mind. In California, no I.D., social security number, or anything else is required to register to vote. And, no reason is needed to vote by absentee ballot. So, for example, if I feel like registering to vote as John Johnson, all I need to do is fill out a form I get at the post office, mail it, and I will receive a ballot in my mailbox allowing me to vote by absentee as John Johnson.
Which leaves us, the people of the nation - the moderate, independent people in particular - where? 13 seats of Congress changing hands without our votes, maybe more if the Democrats follow suit with redistrictings. Already the census overcounted rural white people and undercounted urban people and minorities by over 3,000,000 - one percent of the population, and one percent of the seats in Congress - and despite this knowledge, it won't be fixed.
In case you ever wondered why a President might give huge tax cuts to the the rich, even at the expense of sending the country into massive debts, now you know - the real reason behind the tax cuts is to provide this new breed of Bush/Limbaugh Republican with extra millions upon millions which, in return, they can use to ensure this democracy-hating, deficit-creating party stays in power.
GOV. BUSH: I just announced my vice presidential search headed by Dick Cheney.
GOV BUSH: ?Listen, I'm not going to play like I've been a person who's spent *hours* involved with foreign policy. I am who I am.
A CNN exit poll showed that while 50% of voters had a favorable impression of Scwarzenegger, 64% thought that he had not addressed policy in enough detail.
"'Space assets will play a major role in any future use of force against Taiwan and in preventing foreign intervention in a Taiwan scenario,' said Stokes. Such space assets in effect 'are important force multipliers that can help to even the playing field when you go up against a technologically superior adversary,' he continued."
One reason for this is that the civil war in the Bush administration has become crippling. The CIA is in open revolt against the White House. The State Department and the Defense Department aren't working together at all.
There's nothing like a war to bring out the inner George Orwell in a government.
Unfortunately for Bush, the Democrats lost hold of every branch of government, and so now his numbers have finally started to plummet because the game that holds them all together ? the ?blame and lie? game ? only works if you have someone to blame. Left to stand in the actual light of day with no mirror tricks possible, Bush must now fry in the heat of what he has done.
The California recall campaign has made a number of things perfectly and undeniably clear. Never again can the Republicans claim to be the party of moral values. Never again can the Republicans claim that the media is anything other than a right-wing puppet tool. Never again can the Republicans pretend they actually mean well and come with a platform that will not be destructive, deficit-causing, and cause us to live in lesser conditions, sacrificing everything important while getting nothing in return.
They are delighted to see the trend in new voter registrations since May: 120,000 first-time voters are 45 percent Republican, 40 percent "declined to state," and only 10 percent Democratic.
CAN ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER govern California? Of course he can, so long as he adheres to rule number one for Republican governors: Don't raise taxes without first making a heroic effort to wipe out a deficit by spending cuts alone. If spending cuts won't suffice, borrow to cover the shortfall. And if borrowing isn't an option, make sure any tax hike is tiny and temporary.
For Schwarzenegger, there's only one way to redeem his campaign promise of no new taxes (bets, of course, being off in the event of a major earthquake or 9/11-like terrorist attack)
mred - uh-oh
ca: And this in one of the most liberal states in the country, which Bush lost to Al Gore by 11 points.
Eleven percent of China's exports are produced in factories owned and operated by Taiwanese. Indeed, Taiwan dominates mainland China's information technology industry, accounting for 68 percent of its exports.
U.S. diplomats, who work out of an "institute" rather than an embassy, oppose the creation of a Republic of Taiwan, believing it could start a series of unintended consequences leading to war. With Islamic militants taking over large patches of Indonesia and the Philippines, and increasing belligerence shown by North Korea, the last thing Washington needs is additional tension along the China coast.
Unable to distinguish between working girls and disillusioned wives, the government has declared all Chinese spouses to be security risks. Unfortunately, this is the only issue on which Taiwan's political parties agree.
If the Bush II view of the world is vindicated, in other words, Bush I will no longer be the administration remembered primarily for decisively winning the Persian Gulf War. It will be remembered as the administration that left Saddam Hussein in power, inadvertently leading to a chain of events culminating in 9/11 and a far-flung world war. This is the link between Saddam's rule and 9/11 that can never be denied or discredited.
SAY WHAT YOU WILL about Ambassador Joseph C. Wilson IV, but one thing is sure: The man loves the spotlight.
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