Impeach Bush and Cheney Now!

5 Killed, 17 Injured in Baghdad Clashes
By SLOBODAN LEKIC Associated Press Writer

Apr 6th, 2008 | BAGHDAD -- Overnight clashes in Baghdad's volatile Sadr City district killed five people and wounded 17 a day after the Iraqi government relaxed security measures there, police and hospital officials said Sunday.

Sadr City is a stronghold of Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia. Iraq's government eased a vehicle ban there and in the Shula neighborhood on Saturday after complaints of food shortages.

The U.S. military had no immediate comment on the reported fighting that started Saturday night and continued with sporadic exchanges of gunfire until Sunday morning.

Officials at two local hospitals said the injured included two women and four children. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

A police officer who also spoke anonymously for the same reason, said that a U.S. Stryker armored personnel carrier was damaged in the fighting.

The Stryker is an eight-wheel armored personnel carrier weighing about 16.5 tons. It can carry a crew of two and nine infantrymen.

U.S. troops then took control of a police station near Jamila, detaining and disarming all the policemen there, the officer said.

Trucks carrying maintenance teams, food, oil products and ambulances are now allowed to get into Sadr City, home to some 2.5 million Shiites. Its residents have suffered as the result of the vehicle ban which remained in effect despite the lifting of a curfew elsewhere in the capital earlier this week.

The curfew was imposed after major fighting erupted between government forces and Shiite militias. Fighting eased after al-Sadr called his fighters off the streets March 30.

But sporadic clashes have continued.

Also Sunday, police said seven bullet-ridden bodies were discovered in the capital. Three other bodies were found in the town of Kut, 100 miles southwest of Baghdad.

old time religion:

Tensions Escalate At Polygamist Compound
Authorities Prepare For "The Worst" After Sect Leaders Refuse Search Warrant

(AP) Sect leaders at a polygamist compound in West Texas refused Saturday to let authorities search a temple for a teenage girl whose report of abuse led to the raid, and authorities said they were preparing "for the worst."

If no agreement is reached with sect leaders, authorities will forcibly remove the sect's followers "as peaceably as possible," Allison Palmer, a prosecutor in Tom Green County, told the San Angelo Standard-Times.

Medical workers are being sent "in case this were to a go in a way that no one wants," Palmer said. Law enforcers are "preparing for the worst," she said.

"Within the religion that we have encountered, their place of worship is very special to them," Palmer said. "It appears to be of great concern to them if a person from outside their congregation even attempts to step inside their place of worship."

A search warrant authorized troopers to enter the retreat, run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They are looking for evidence of a marriage between the girl and a 50-year-old man.

Court documents say the girl had a baby eight months ago, when she was 15.

State welfare officials on Friday removed 52 girls from the compound. Marleigh Meisner, a spokeswoman for Child Protective Services, said another 131 residents were removed overnight. By Saturday afternoon, 137 children and 46 women were being housed and interviewed at local community centers.

strange days

Morning Dems,

Well, Well, I see Gun Activist Charlton Heston died! Now we can really pry his gun from 'his cold dead hands" !

Should be quite a hefty estate he leaves, with all that money from Gun Mfgs who want to make sure that their weapons stay in the hands of Crazies, kids, and criminals !

Pam, first, good morning. Secondly as much as I agree that guns are a blight on our society and should be FAR more regulated, we do have a Second Amendment which allows law abiding citizens to keep and bear arms. As much as we dislike guns the founders put it in our Constitution for a reason and we should respect that decision or work to ammend it.

Dear MoveOn member,

For all the coverage this week of Senator John McCain's background, there are some important things you won't learn about him from the TV networks. His carefully crafted positive image relies on people not knowing this stuff—and you might be surprised by some of it.

Please check out the list below, and then forward it to your friends, family, and coworkers. We can't rely on the media to tell folks about the real John McCain—but if we all pass this along, we can reach as many people as CNN Headline News does on a good night.

Click here to tell us how many people you can pass it on to—and to see our progress nationally:

http://pol.moveon.org/mccain10/?id=12407-6923278-7KFjB5&t=231
10 things you should know about John McCain (but probably don't):

1. John McCain voted against establishing a national holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Now he says his position has "evolved," yet he's continued to oppose key civil rights laws.1

2. According to Bloomberg News, McCain is more hawkish than Bush on Iraq, Russia and China. Conservative columnist Pat Buchanan says McCain "will make Cheney look like Gandhi."2
3. His reputation is built on his opposition to torture, but McCain voted against a bill to ban waterboarding, and then applauded President Bush for vetoing that ban.3

4. McCain opposes a woman's right to choose. He said, "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned."4

5. The Children's Defense Fund rated McCain as the worst senator in Congress for children. He voted against the children's health care bill last year, then defended Bush's veto of the bill.5

6. He's one of the richest people in a Senate filled with millionaires. The Associated Press reports he and his wife own at least eight homes! Yet McCain says the solution to the housing crisis is for people facing foreclosure to get a "second job" and skip their vacations.6

7. Many of McCain's fellow Republican senators say he's too reckless to be commander in chief. One Republican senator said: "The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine. He's erratic. He's hotheaded. He loses his temper and he worries me."7

8. McCain talks a lot about taking on special interests, but his campaign manager and top advisers are actually lobbyists. The government watchdog group Public Citizen says McCain has 59 lobbyists raising money for his campaign, more than any of the other presidential candidates.8

9. McCain has sought closer ties to the extreme religious right in recent years. The pastor McCain calls his "spiritual guide," Rod Parsley, believes America's founding mission is to destroy Islam, which he calls a "false religion." McCain sought the political support of right-wing preacher John Hagee, who believes Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment for gay rights and called the Catholic Church "the Antichrist" and a "false cult."9

10. He positions himself as pro-environment, but he scored a 0—yes, zero—from the League of Conservation Voters last year.10
John McCain is not who the Washington press corps make him out to be. Please help get the word out—forward this email to your personal network. And if you want us to keep you posted on MoveOn's work to get the truth out about John McCain, sign up here:

http://pol.moveon.org/mccaintruth/?id=12407-6923278-7KFjB5&t=232

Thank you for all you do.

–Eli, Justin, Noah, Laura, and the MoveOn.org Political Action Team
Saturday, April 5th, 2008

Sources:
1. "The Complicated History of John McCain and MLK Day," ABC News, April 3, 2008
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/04/the-complicated.html

"McCain Facts," ColorOfChange.org, April 4, 2008
http://colorofchange.org/mccain_facts/

2. "McCain More Hawkish Than Bush on Russia, China, Iraq," Bloomberg News, March 12, 2008
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aF28rSCtk0ZM&refer=us

"Buchanan: John McCain 'Will Make Cheney Look Like Gandhi,'" ThinkProgress, February 6, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/06/buchanan-gandhi-mccain/

3. "McCain Sides With Bush On Torture Again, Supports Veto Of Anti-Waterboarding Bill," ThinkProgress, February 20, 2008
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/02/20/mccain-torture-veto/

4. "McCain says Roe v. Wade should be overturned," MSNBC, February 18, 2007
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17222147/

5. "2007 Children's Defense Fund Action Council® Nonpartisan Congressional Scorecard," February 2008
http://www.childrensdefense.org/site/PageServer?pagename=act_learn_scorecard2007

"McCain: Bush right to veto kids health insurance expansion," CNN, October 3, 2007

Posted by goodfoe on April 6, 2008 at 07:29 AM

justaguy, I say nothing about not allowing intelligent citizens to have guns. It is the crazies and criminals that are able to get them that pisses me off.

ps, ask ANY cop what HE thinks of our gun laws and you will get an ear full.

Funny how few tales you hear of everyday citizens really defending themselves against criminals. by the time they get to their gun, load or unlock it, and try and fight off a criminal in their house, they are already dead.

Our state has had some tragic home break-ins recently, and in neither case would a gun in the house have kept them alive.

Morning all good Dems,

Posted by gregg on April 6, 2008 at 08:11 AM

What happened to shock and awe? Clinton tried that with Waco and never heard the end of it.

I'll bet this mormon republican leader is a pedophile too just like the rest of the repukes.

pam you commie..as you write i am hold up in my lead reinforced apartment holding off the chinese hords that are landing on the shores of coney island intent on taking over the entire salty pretzel buisness in brooklyn. if charlton hadn't secured my right to own and operate this 105mm recoiless rifle that i picked up at sam's club where would we be??

Posted by justaguy on April 6, 2008 at 08:20 AM

Agreed and I might add, nor would I gleefully laud anyone's passing, not even Bush or Cheney. The loss of life is always just that....a loss.

Pam, we have had this conversation before. If it were not for the fact that there are 60 million lawful gun owners in this country that Bush and Cheney fear, you, I, (Johne and a lot of others who write and speak out against the criminals in our government) would already be in that Blackwater concentration camp in Texas.

As far as guns not doing any, aprox 700,000 times a year in this country, a home owner in this country chases off a criminal with out firing a single shot. The display of the homeowner being armed is enough to cause the criminal who does not expect the intended victim to be armed, to flee. These incidents are not often reported by the press because no one got shot, there is no sensational value, so it tis not reported...... Love and peace..... John Boy....

I was always taught that the guns were for defense against enemy soldiers.

I Understand that Switzerland's reservists house their guns at home.

We had a case recently where a kid had tried to steal a guys car twice. The second time the guy chased the kid down and accidently shot him dead because the kid resisted. He is going to jail. Is it worth going to jail over a car or a principal?

might i suggest that in the future we are a bit more careful about who we invade, why we invade them and how we decide who are the bad guys and who are the good guys?

from a piece at newsweek online:

"The insurgents have been driven out of her southwest Baghdad neighborhood, but the 30-year-old shop assistant is still frightened. A year ago Al Qaeda in Iraq ruled the streets outside her home, and Mahdi Army militia units kept the area under relentless attack. Now the Iraqis who helped get rid of the killers are the ones who scare her. The Americans imposed order a few months ago by recruiting and paying local men to turn in the names of suspected jihadists. Similar armed groups have popped up all around the city. Each has its own bizarre rules; some threaten to kill women who don't wear veils in public. The shop assistant is in mourning for her brother, who was killed last May, but she's asking for trouble if she wears black more than three days running. According to the new enforcers in her neighborhood, anyone who dresses in mourning is committing blasphemy by questioning the will of God."

...remember kids like bob dylan sang:

But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.

In a many dark hour
I've been thinkin' about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can't think for you
You'll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.

So now as I'm leavin'
I'm weary as Hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
Ain't no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God's on our side
He'll stop the next war.

Welcome to STAGFLATION the great new concept in depressions, brought to you by your local republican pedophile, homophobe, warmonger, liar and cheat.

Posted by Johne on April 6, 2008 at 08:52 AM

If that guy lived in Florida he wouldn't be going to jail. He'd be on the evening news as the poor victim who saved home and life by thwarting the criminal (under FL's recent gun law change you don't need much of a reason at all to shoot someone).

My neighbor told me yesterday that he chased this prowler down with his car, forced him into a dich, put a 45 to his head and said "don't come back". He hasn't seen the kid since.

Posted by Johne on April 6, 2008 at 08:52 AM

Good point Johne, that's one of the things that is taught over and over again in the Concealed hand gun licensing classes. Property is not worth taking a life over. property can usually be replaced, a life can not be replaced. Unless the man is your story had reason to believe that he would have no way to ever recover his property, there was no justification in the use of a firearm, especially if the kid was fleeing and he himself was in no danger of physical harm. Even then, even if the kid had actually stolen the car, that is what we are supposed to have insurance for. I would like to continue this but Cheryl has just given me my marching orders....Later....John Boy...........

I have this vicious f**king dog who will chew the leg off anyone that comes near the house. He even tries to bite my friends. Whenever anyone comes to the door I have to have him on a leash or the guest is toast.

easy on the strawberry syrup goodfoe!

time to honor the real heroes of our culture

Today's Talking Heads

via C&L:

Howard Dean is making the rounds this morning…

ABC’s “This Week” - Sens. Jim Webb, D-Va., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean.

CBS’ “Face the Nation” - Howard Dean.

NBC’s “Meet the Press” - Sen. Bob Casey Jr., D-Pa.; Gov. Ed Rendell, D-Pa.; Michael Eric Dyson, author of a book on Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. ; Andrew Young, former Atlanta mayor and an aide to King during the civil rights movement.

CNN’s “Late Edition” - Martin Luther King III; Rep. John Murtha, D-Pa.; Catholic University President David O’Connell; Sens. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and John Cornyn, R-Texas; Robert Reich, former labor secretary; Douglas Holtz-Eakin, adviser for John McCain’s presidential campaign.

“F-- News Sunday” - Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and John Kerry, D-Mass.; Joe Urschel, executive director of the Newseum media museum.

“The Chris Matthews Show” - Panel Ron Allen, Katty Kay, Gloria Borger and Andrew Sullivan.

---

via KOS:

Meet The Press: The bland & the blustering with Sen. Bob Casey & Gov. Ed Rendell. Very Serious MLK discourse with Tom Brokaw, author Michael Eric Dyson and Amb. Andrew Young.

Tweety: BBC's Katty Kay, NBC's Ron Allen, CNN's Gloria Berger & Andrew Sullivan.

This Week with George: Chairman Dean. Huckleberry Graham (R-McSame) vs. Jim Webb (D-VA). The sexy Katrina vanden Heuvel, Mr. Campbell Brown, 90's relic Cokie Roberts and George Will talk shop.

Face The Nation: Chairman Dean. Washington Post author Rajiv Chandrasekaran, McClatchy's Nancy Youssef, and the beautiful Lara Logan.

Faux News: [Mr. Potato Head]; Also, Senator Kerry & the Director of the Newseum.

Late Edition with Wolf: Rep. John Murtha (D-Pentagon), Catholic Univ. President Rev. David O'Connell, American Patriot Chris Dodd (D-CT), Dick The Debator Durbin (D-IL), and John Cornyn (R-TX). Ed Henry, Candy Crowley, and Bill Schneider talk shop.

60 Minutes: Stupidest F***ing Guy on the Planet, China's economical influence, NASA plans to go to Mars...

Tell Me Something I Don't Know:

Every week on The Chris Matthews Show, Matthews has a segment where he asks his panel of pundits to “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know.” This week, Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic spoke as bluntly as any talking head has done since Bush/Cheney took office:

The latest revelations on the torture front show—the memo from John Yoo—as well as revelations from Phillippe Sands’ book, mean that Donald Rumsfeld, David Addington and John Yoo should not leave the United States any time soon. They will be at some point indicted for war crimes. They deserve to be.

Good morning, all.

Shock and Awe doesn't work when either Rusmfeld does it or an Iraqi Shiite leader tries it...

Basra Assault Exposed U.S., Iraqi Limits

Anti-Sadr Gambit Seen Aiding Cleric

BAGHDAD, April 3 -- When Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki launched an offensive in Basra last week, he consulted only his inner circle of advisers. There were no debates in parliament or among his political allies. Senior American officials were notified only a few days before the operation began.

He was determined to show, his advisers said, that Iraq's central government could exert order over a lawless, strategic port city ruled by extremist militias. The advisers said Maliki wanted to demonstrate that he was a strong leader who could shed his reputation as a sectarian figure by going after fellow Shiites, and who could act decisively without U.S. pressure or assistance.

A week later, his ultimately unsuccessful gambit has exposed the shaky foundation upon which U.S. policy in Iraq rests after five years of war, according to politicians and analysts...

A senior official in Iraq's Defense Ministry, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to discuss military operations publicly, said Iraqi troops were overwhelmed by the second day of fighting.

"I was afraid the Iraqi forces would break," he said.

The official said he estimated that 30 percent of the Iraqi troops abandoned the fight before a cease-fire was reached. He also said that soldiers had been hindered by ammunition and food shortages and that some Iraqi police troops, who were supposed to be backing the Iraqi army, had actually supported the militias.

The official said the militias had 12,000 to 15,000 fighters -- roughly the same number as Iraqi troops. But being in their home territory gave the militias an advantage, he said.

As the fighting progressed, the official said, the militias received weapons from Iran, including mortars and other large weapons, a charge Iranian officials have persistently denied. The Iraqi army, meanwhile, received crucial air support from U.S. and British forces. "If the British and American forces were not there, the Mahdi Army would have gained a victory," he said.

On March 30, Sadr issued a statement, negotiated in the Iranian city of Qom, ordering his fighters to lay down their arms, provided the Iraqi government stopped conducting raids and detaining his followers and provided amnesty to his fighters. By the next day, attacks had dramatically subsided.

"It showed that the majority of Moqtada's followers obeyed his orders," said Sharif, the Shiite lawmaker from the Fadhila Party. "Maybe it's a message to the Iraqi government and the Americans that [Sadr] is able to control Iraq and turn it from a bad state to a good state" overnight, he said...

But Falluji was concerned that Sadr had met with Maliki's advisers in Iran. "The events in Basra have shown the weakness of the American role in Iraq and the strength of Iranian influence in Iraq," he said.

Special correspondents K.I. Ibrahim and Naseer Nouri contributed to this report.

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/03/AR2008040300309.html?wpisrc=newsletter

(Emphasis mine.)

Al Sadr is calling Iraqis to come out Wednesday for a non-violent protest against the foreign occupation. He controls the streets.

It's obvious that we can't win militarily or politically because the forces that really control Iraq do not want us there nor will they ever accept us staying.

Posted by gregg on April 6, 2008 at 09:08 AM

No strawberry syrup this morning! sausage, eggs, etc.....yummie!....took Foster with us, he's built like a little tank and eats accordingly!

BTW. I thought you comment about the 105 mm recoilless was too funny! JB

Gov, Dean about to be on CBS.....Later!

Basra was a victory for the surge according to Bush and McCain...even though the facts say other wise.

But it doesn't matter because the MSM is reporting from Iraq any longer. They, like the majority of Americans, don't want to hear about it...but there is a huge story being ignored.

Op-Ed Columnist Tet Happened, and No One Cared By FRANK RICH Published: April 6, 2008

For the majority of Americans who haven’t met any of the brave troops who’ve been cavalierly tossed into the quagmire, the war is out of sight and mind in a way Vietnam never was. Only 28 percent of Americans knew American casualties in Iraq were nearing 4,000 last month, according to the Pew Research Center. The Project for Excellence in Journalism found that by March 2008 the percentage of prominent news stories that were about Iraq had fallen to about one-fifth of what it was in January 2007. It’s a poignant commentary on the whole war that Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, the nonpartisan advocacy group, was reduced to protesting the lack of coverage.

That’s why it’s no surprise that so few stopped to absorb the disastrous six-day battle of Basra that ended last week — a mini-Tet that belied the “success” of the surge. Even fewer noticed that the presumptive Republican nominee seemed at least as oblivious to what was going down as President Bush, no tiny feat.

In Mr. Bush’s telling, Basra was a “defining moment in the history of a free Iraq.” He praised the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, and boasted repeatedly that the Iraqi forces were fighting “in the lead.” The Pentagon spokesman declared that this splendid engagement was “a byproduct of the success of the surge.”

It was a defining moment all right. Mr. Maliki’s impulsive and ill-planned attempt to vanquish the militias in southern Iraq loyal to his Shiite rival, the cleric Moktada al-Sadr, was a failure that left Mr. Sadr more secure than before. Though some Iraqi armed forces were briefly in the lead, others mutinied. Eventually American and British forces and air power had to ride to the rescue in both Basra and Baghdad. Even then, the result was at best a standoff, with huge casualties. The battle ended only when Mr. Maliki’s own political minions sought a cease-fire.

Mr. McCain was just as wrong about Basra as he was in 2003, when he said the war would be “brief” and be paid for by Iraqi oil revenues. Or as he was in the 1990s, when he championed extravagant State Department funding for the war instigator Ahmad Chalabi, who’d already been branded untrustworthy by the C.I.A. (The relationship between Mr. Chalabi and the former lobbyist Charles Black, now a chief McCain campaign strategist, is explored in a new book, “The Man Who Pushed America to War,” by Aram Roston.)

As for Basra, Mr. McCain told Joe Klein of Time in January that it was “not a problem.” He told John King of CNN while in Baghdad last month that Mr. Sadr’s “influence has been on the wane for a long time.” When the battle ended last week, Mr. McCain said: “Apparently it was Sadr who asked for the cease-fire, declared a cease-fire. It wasn’t Maliki. Very rarely do I see the winning side declare a cease-fire.” At least the last of those sentences was accurate. It was indeed the losing side — Maliki’s — that pleaded for the cease-fire.

Perhaps all these mistaken judgments can be attributed to the fog of war. But Mr. McCain’s bigger strategic picture, immutable no matter what happens on the ground, is foggier still. Like Mr. Bush, he keeps selling Iraq as the central front in the war on Al Qaeda. But Al Qaeda was not even a participant in the Basra battle, which was an eruption of a Shiite-vs.-Shiite civil war. (Al Qaeda is busy enough in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the actual central front in the war on terror.)

Mr. McCain is also fond of portraying Mr. Maliki’s “democracy” in Iraq as an essential bulwark against Iran; his surrogate Lindsey Graham habitually refers to Mr. Sadr’s Mahdi Army as “Iranian-backed militias.” But the political coalition and militia propping up Mr. Maliki are even closer to Iran than the Sadrists. McClatchy Newspapers reported last week that the Maliki-Sadr cease-fire was not only brokered in Iran but by a general whose name is on the Treasury Department’s terrorist list: the commander of the Quds force of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard.

So this is where this latest defining moment in Iraq leaves us: with victories for Iran and Mr. Sadr, and with Iraqi forces that still can’t stand up (training cost to American taxpayers so far: $22 billion) so we can stand down. The Baghdad Green Zone, pummeled with lethal mortar fire, proved vulnerable once again. Basra remains so perilous that Britain has had to suddenly halt its planned troop withdrawals. Tony Blair had ordered the drawdown a year ago, after declaring that “the next chapter in Basra’s history will be written by the Iraqis.”

The surge is a success in exactly one way: American forces, by putting their lives on the line and benefiting from a now-defunct Sadr cease-fire, have reduced violence in Baghdad (though only to early 2005 levels). But as the Middle East scholar Juan Cole has written, “the ‘surge’ was never meant to be the objective but rather the means.”

None of the objectives have been met. Remember that “return on success” — as in returning troops — that Mr. Bush promised in January’s State of the Union? We will end 2008 with more Americans in Iraq than the 132,000 at the time the surge began. Even Gen. David Petraeus said last month that there has not been “sufficient progress” on the other most important objective, Iraqi political reconciliation. Mr. Maliki’s move against Mr. Sadr in Basra, done without even consulting Iraq’s “democratically elected” Parliament, was an attempt to take out his opponent by force rather than wait for the October provincial elections.

Not that other metrics are any brighter. At last, oil production sometimes reaches prewar levels. But a third or more of the oil, as The New York Times reported, is siphoned off to the black market, where it finances the insurgency.

The projected date for turning over security operations to the Iraqis — first set for the end of 2006 by Iraqi officials, then moved up to the end of 2007 and July 2008 by our own Defense Department — is omitted entirely in the latest Pentagon report.

“We’re succeeding,” Mr. McCain said after his last trip to Iraq. “I don’t care what anybody says.” Again, it’s the last sentence that’s accurate. When General Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testify before Congress again this week — against the backdrop of a million-Iraqi, anti-American protest called by Mr. Sadr — Mr. McCain will ram home all this “success” no matter the facts...

www.nytimes.com/2008/04/06/opinion/06rich.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin

(Emphasis mine.)

While Billary and Obama fight on for a stalemate, the situation in Iraq has become crystal clear and nobody is paying any attention...least of all the presidential candidates.

Maybe the millions of Iraqis staging a non-violent protest against the occupation in the streets on April 9 will...if the American MSM bothers to even report it?

bbl.

Morning,

Wasting food and water to drive autos around in circles while people go hungry is nuts. Subsidizing this unsustainable and inhumane folly with taxpayer monies is the height of madness.

This unwise direction in biofuels is a sabotage of alternative energy efforts, and planned misery with a backlash. A treacherous and distracting dead end. No moonshine for mercedes!
------------

Fear of unrest mounts as hunger spreads

By Javier Blas in Addis Ababa

Published: April 4 2008 01:57 | Last updated: April 4 2008 01:57

Rising food prices could spread social unrest across Africa after triggering riots in Niger, Senegal, Cameroon and Burkina Faso, African ministers and senior agriculture diplomats have warned.

Kanayo Nwanze, the vice-president of the United Nations’ International Fund for Agriculture, told a conference in Ethiopia that food riots could become a common feature, particularly after the price of rice has doubled in three months.

-not Condi, who is truly unathletic in the service of mankind. I think that she must have trouble relating to real people and suffering. She must think of herself as a business model, or an Exxon tanker.
--------------

Rice jumps as Africa joins race for supplies

By Javier Blas in Nairobi and Roel Landingin in Manila

Published: April 4 2008 15:23 | Last updated: April 4 2008 19:22

Rice prices rose more than 10 per cent on Friday to a fresh all-time high as African countries joined south-east Asian importers in the race to head off social unrest by securing supplies from the handful of exporters still selling the grain in the international market.

The rise in prices – 50 per cent in two weeks – threatens upheaval and has resulted in riots and soldiers overseeing supplies in some emerging countries, where the grain is a staple food for about 3bn people.

The increase also risks stoking further inflation in emerging countries, which have been suffering the impact of record oil prices and the rise in price of other agricultural commodities – including wheat, maize and vegetable oil – in the last year.

Charlton Heston didn't get any money from the gun manufacturers. He served one term as president of the NRA, and because he was famous he got stuck in the gun control crazies' minds, even though there have been several NRA presidents since, including a woman.
Guns aren't just for deterring two-legged miscreants. I have carried at times when I am out in the woods, because of the possibility that bears, wolves, or mountain lions in a specific area may cause problems. I put a shot shell in my pistol in the first chamber as a warning shot. A lot of times just the sound will change a predator's mind. I have also shot and eaten deer and antelope, they not only taste good, they are free of human growth hormones and antibiotics.
BTW you get a lot fewer home invasions where you have armed citizens.
As for Johne's dog, I have a large dog, who barks at strange people and won't let them come into the yard, but when I tell him it's OK, he stops and behaves himself. Having a mean undisciplined dog is as dangerous as a gun in the wrong hands.
My dog will bark a greeting and then let the neighbor kids and our adult friends come on into my yard. He likes to play with the neighbor kids, but any stranger who would try to mess with those kids is going to have a large problem.
One of the problems with the "gun control" advocates is that they are not looking at the real causes of much of this gun violence. When I was growing up, kids were taught to respect guns and what they can do. Any more with first-person-shooter video games, and the "blow 'em all away" movies, which advocate shooting people, kids are being taught to think that guns are for shooting people, and that's how you solve your problems. Wrong answer.
I've seen people who stopped the Eddie Eagle program, which teaches kids to respect what a gun can do, from being shown in their schools hand their kids the money for violent first person-shooter-games and not think twice about their kids learning to blow human beings away. To me it is the height of hypocrisy!

Greed

* Cindy Sheehan

Key Note Speech, 2nd Encuentro Continental
Mexico City, Mexico, April 4, 2008
By Cindy Sheehan

First of all I would like to thank the International Labor Council and the Electrician's Union for such a warm welcome and I would like to assure you all, my brothers and sisters that I represent millions of North Americans who are in solidarity with you, because we are also plagued with an illegitimate President!

Once, a couple of years ago, I was getting a pedicure in the deep south in the USA, of all places, and my pedicurist was a Latina from Mexico. She lived two hours from where she and her husband owned the shop and she left her young son home with her mother-in-law for six days a week, while she and her husband toiled at the shop. She was very sweet and sympathetic to my situation as a mother whose son was killed in Iraq, but she looked up from my feet at one point and asked me: "Why do you Americans have to have everything. If you all weren't so greedy, I could still live in my country with my family." Greedy? Hmm? Her earnest and passionate comment gave me much to think about.

********
I know there are many more solutions and a comprehensive platform of "No human left behind" would guarantee the rights of all humans to safe and plentiful food and drinking water; shelter; good and free education; sustainable employment; security and safety from US corporate-militarism; and the basic rights that were guaranteed of: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

For far too long, the United States of America has greedily gobbled up too much of global wealth and resources and our chickens of greed and violence are coming home to roost. As alarming as these trends are, we North Americans are only slightly beginning to feel the ravages of what we have been manufacturing and exporting for years: death and destruction. A new paradigm of global sharing and caring must be implemented and today is the beginning.

www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/32503

Brave Sheehan speaks of the generousity and rights of real people, and fascists tremble and squirm at her simple words. Greedy and dangerous fools would sullify her or wish her harm. She is on a mission of peace. Her courage and spirit are inspirational to those who still can think for themselves and wish life as God created it to continue on this Earth.

Having a mean undisciplined dog is as dangerous as a gun in the wrong hands.

Absolutely. That was my thought when I saw that post.

"Why do you Americans have to have everything. If you all weren't so greedy, I could still live in my country with my family."

I don't follow the logic of this statement.

Posted by Tawanna_LaShond on April 6, 2008 at 11:57 AM
The logic of that statement has to do with the huge number of Mexicans, particularly rural Mexicans who were shafted by NAFTA.
BigAgriBushiess dumped cheap subsidized corn on the Mexican market which drive down corn prices and made it impossible for Mexican farmers to stay and work on their land. In the mean time, the maquiladoras which were touted as Mexico's step into a better economy were open for a few years, until another trade agreement gave the BigBusinesses a cheaper job market elsewhere, and they quietly closed their operations, many illegally breaking contracts to do so, and taking their factories elsewhere. All this has been recently compounded by the jump in corn prices caused by corn based ethanol production, which has increased the price of tortillas, a staple food in Mexico. Think $20 a loaf for plain white bread.
US workers are not the only people who have been harmed by "free" trade agreements. They are really very costly.

Thanks for the good information on this blog.

Thanks also to Governor Dean for doing an excellent job this morning on the Sunday shows.

His point: as the primaries continue, the remaining superdelegates need to state whom they're supporting by the end of June. At that point, we must all put our bruised feelings aside and unite behind the winner for the good of the country. The country cannot survive under four more years of Republican rule.

Only "Democratic disunity" can make McCain the next president. The two candidates must agree on some way of seating some kind of delegation from Michigan and Florida.

All this can happen if we put the good of the country, and the survival of the Constitution, first.

And keep in mind that the Democratic turnout in all the states so far has been phenomenal--that bodes well for the future!

Butte -

So the corn prices dropped, which created a hardship. I understand that. But now, as you say, corn prices are skyrocketing due to ethanol. So wouldn't that be a boon for the farmers there?

I apologize for my dumbness :)

I don't follow the logic of this statement.

Posted by Tawanna_LaShond on April 6, 2008 at 11:57 AM

The logic or sense is that Americans want all the resources of the world, and the needs and desires of the rest of the world's population are of secondary concern. As this woman would rather be elsewhere doing differently, if she was free to do so.

Posted by Butte on April 6, 2008 at 11:32 AM

Excellent! I appreciate you're taking the time to respond on this.

desires of the rest of the world's population are of secondary concern.

The world's interests are by nature a secondary concern. Our government is charged with acting in our own interests, as are the governments of other countries of the world charged with acting in THEIR own interests . That is the nature of nation-states. If you want a one-world overview and caretaker, the UN is the place for that.

Posted by Tawanna_LaShond on April 6, 2008 at 12:15 PM
The corn prices in Mexico rose, but many rural families had already left their farms for the cities, and the small Mexican farms wouldn't raise enough corn to really let the families take advantage of the rise in corn prices, anyway. It's a question of scale. Midwestern farmers on our large open prairies have hundreds of acres of land to farm. Mexican farmers in mountainous Mexico are doing good if they have fifty acres. Most Mexican farmers were only barely above subsistence farming in the best of times.
BigAgriBusiness is doing its best to eliminate the family farmers in this country, they certainly have no interest in helping small family farmers in any other country. They want to control production from seed to elevator, and they don't care about the harm to the family farmers, the environment, or our increased reliance on foreign oil (for diesel fuel for farm machinery, and petroleum based fertilizers and pesitcides) to do it. All they care about is money.

So the corn prices dropped, which created a hardship. I understand that. But now, as you say, corn prices are skyrocketing due to ethanol. So wouldn't that be a boon for the farmers there?

I apologize for my dumbness :)

Posted by Tawanna_LaShond on April 6, 2008 at 12:15 PM
___

Corn Can't Solve Our Problem

There is another problem with relying on a food-based biofuel, such as corn ethanol, as the poor of Mexico can attest. In recent months, soaring corn prices, sparked by demand from ethanol plants, have doubled the price of tortillas, a staple food. Tens of thousands of Mexico City's poor recently protested this "ethanol tax" in the streets.

In the United States, the protests have also begun -- in Congress. Representatives of the dairy, poultry and livestock industries, which rely on corn as a principal animal feed, are seeking an end to subsidies for corn ethanol in the hope of stabilizing corn prices. (It takes about three pounds of corn to produce a pound of chicken, and seven or eight pounds to grow a pound of beef.) Profit margins are being squeezed, and meat prices are rising.

U.S. soybeans, which are used to make biodiesel, may be about to follow corn's trajectory, escalating the food vs. fuel conflict. The National Biodiesel Board recently reported that 77 biodiesel production plants are under construction and that eight established plants are expanding capacity.

Thank you guys for your responses ! I appreciate it :)

have a great day

Let us suppose that you are an auto worker. You haven't been on the job long, but your new job has given you a real sense of hope for yourself and your family for the future for the first time in your life. Then, suddenly, unexpectedly, your plant is shut down and you learn that your employer has built a new plant in China because wages are cheaper there
Think I'm talking about a US auto worker I'm not, I'm talking about a Mexican auto worker. Capital, in our race to the bottom, is chasing the lowest price labor where ever it may be: China, Korea, India, or Timbuck Tu.The logical extension of this is when the American middle class works for the equivalent of the lowest wages to be found world wide. It will not make any difference to the multinational companies that you and I now live in grinding poverty like that of African third world people's, they will still be rich and getting richer.

That is why this next election is so important!

If I am going to have to rely on corn fed transportation, I'd prefer a good mule. They beat 4WD vehicles for going anywhere, and the waste products can be used to grown more corn. Besides, how many cars can double as a designated driver? ;-D

Environment News Service:

Why Ethanol Production Will Drive World Food Prices Even Higher in 2008

…The World Bank reports that for each 1 percent rise in food prices, caloric intake among the poor drops 0.5 percent. Millions of those living on the lower rungs of the global economic ladder, people who are barely hanging on, will lose their grip and begin to fall off. […]

…There is much to be concerned about on the food front. We enter this new crop year with the lowest grain stocks on record, the highest grain prices ever, the prospect of a smaller U.S. grain harvest as several million acres of land that shifted from soybeans to corn last year go back to soybeans, the need to feed an additional 70 million people, and U.S. distillers wanting 33 million more tons of grain to supply the new ethanol distilleries coming online this year. Corn futures prices for December 2008 delivery are higher than those for March, suggesting that market analysts see even tighter supplies after the next harvest.

Whereas previous dramatic rises in world grain prices were weather-induced, this one is policy-induced and can be dealt with by policy adjustments. The crop fuels program that currently satisfies scarcely 3 percent of U.S. gasoline needs is simply not worth the human suffering and political chaos it is causing. If the entire U.S. grain harvest were converted into ethanol, it would satisfy scarcely 18 percent of our automotive fuel needs.

The irony is that U.S. taxpayers, by subsidizing the conversion of grain into ethanol, are in effect financing a rise in their own food prices. It is time to end the subsidy for converting food into fuel and to do it quickly before the deteriorating world food situation spirals out of control.

EU ambassador hits out at US subsidy for biodiesel exports

16 January, 2008

The European Commission’s ambassador to the US has launched a rare public attack on the country, for its failure to stop exports of subsidised biodiesel which are claimed to be killing off biodiesel producers in the European Union (EU).

"The European biodiesel industry is being threatened by a flood of subsidised US biodiesel," said John Bruton, who promised to press the US Congress further for an end to the subsidies.

"What we are witnessing here is US taxpayers effectively subsidising European motorists to the tune of around $300m last year," said John Bruton. "And that figure is set to be even higher this year - all while Americans themselves are suffering at the pump."

www.bioenergy-business.com/index.cfm?section=lead&action=view&id=11007

The US subsidies are going to big agribusiness that seeks to profit and control the market. Just good corporate-state economics and bully for US. International trade treaties are running the show, and the UN has little jurisdiction or ability for involvement.

bbl

Peggy Seeger:

“I have a song about President Bush. Would you like to hear the chorus?” Seeger says before singing, “Impeach, impeach that’s what we got to do/Impeach, impeach let’s get Dick Cheney, too.”

“I sang that recently,” she adds, “and this man came up to me and said ‘I’m a Republican and Bush is my President, but dang that’s a good chorus.’ ”

The world of peoples and nations has been eclipsed by a world of corporations and nations. Corporations are mercenary and play people's differences and nation's laws against each other for profit.

Once proud peoples have seen their nations be overrun by technology and business. There is a better business plan, and it involves respect for all life, respect for the will to live. And non-violent cooperation.

Did you see them, did you see them?
Did you see them in the river?
They were there to wave to you.
Could you tell that the empty quivered,
Brown skinned indian on the banks
That were crowded and narrow,
Held a broken arrow?
-Neil Young

Death to war,

peace

Interesting site, with maps and info

Current world conflicts
http://www.didyouknow.cd/story/conflicts.htm

I am a lower economic class citizen and the size of the numbers boggle my mind. What is it now? 12 billion per month poured down a rat hole om Iraq? We would have been better off to have left Saddam in the hole and kept our money. McCain says we have to stay there in order to prevent the Islam-terrorists from taking over. Let them have it! It's simply not worth the price in blood and treasure that we are paying. These fools in the Iraqi government have had 5 years to create a workable government. The Kurds have done it because they wanted to. Bring all the troops home now and Impeach Bush and Cheney NOW!!

BBL

I've been thinking lately. All the evidence points to the Bush-Cheney regime has been manipulating the economy, especially the dollar devaluation, simply to maximize oil company profits. Everything else in their fiscal policy has taken a back seat. I don't see any other explanation for their actions, or really their inactions.

Thank you, moderator (Michael?) for the Oust®!

{{smooch}} ;-)

Ohio Hospital Contests a Story Clinton Tells

Over the last five weeks, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has featured in her campaign stump speeches the story of a health care horror: an uninsured pregnant woman who lost her baby and died herself after being denied care by an Ohio hospital because she could not come up with a $100 fee.

The woman, Trina Bachtel, did die last August, two weeks after her baby boy was stillborn at O’Bleness Memorial Hospital in Athens, Ohio. But hospital administrators said Friday that Ms. Bachtel was under the care of an obstetrics practice affiliated with the hospital, that she was never refused treatment and that she was, in fact, insured.

“We implore the Clinton campaign to immediately desist from repeating this story,” said Rick Castrop, chief executive officer of the O’Bleness Health System.

Linda M. Weiss, a spokeswoman for the not-for-profit hospital, said the Clinton campaign had never contacted the hospital to check the accuracy of the story, which Mrs. Clinton had first heard from a Meigs County, Ohio, sheriff’s deputy in late February.

Link

Why does the Cinton campaign use lies?

Free Speech it cost when you use it against corporate interests. It seems they want to ban the diversity to question their candidates.

Wow, I wish I could be a Clinton and demand a Royalty fee to speak in front of "We the people." As a poet, it is like you have to use your retirement to dream in front of an audience.

I wish these trolls would grow up.

weren't the trolls gonna be vacationing in baghdad by this time this year??

bushwar....brought to you by the same people who brought you bush economics, bush hurricane relief, bush global warming, bush four dollar high test, and so on....

AP
updated 39 minutes ago

BAGHDAD - A rocket attack on the U.S.-protected Green Zone on Sunday killed three American soldiers and wounded at least 31 people, a military official said. The strike came after heavy fighting in a Baghdad neighborhood that left 20 dead and more than 50 wounded in the worst violence here since a cease-fire was declared a week ago.

hey people!
we have a house full of guns.
my husband hunts deer and my father was a gun enthusiast. when he died he left us a bunch of guns. the only one I really know how to shoot is a sawed off shot gun. it's sawed off just enough to be legal. someone engraved the ELEGANT DUDE on the side of it. my dad got in in a trade or a card game or something.my husband just went and got a concealed weapons permit. he is in the woods allot with bears, coyotes, bobcats and maybe even mountain lions. you cannot carry a pistol during bow season unless you have a permit. it was easy as pie for him to get since he is not a felon. both my father knew and my husband knows how to use guns properly. they have always been locked in a cabinet here and not loaded. some folks say a gun won't do you any good unless it's loaded but we've never been so afraid that we had to have one loaded in the house. my father was a heavy eqipment operator. in the 60s and 70s he worked in Mingo county WV and told stories about sleeping with a loaded pistol under his pillow. that place was like the wild west. we buried my dad with one of his favorite pistols. southern people like their guns. my daughter was a student at Va. Tech last 4-16. now the state wants to pay off the families $100,000 to silence them because their children were slaughtered by a maniac with a gun. that's not nearly enough. how can you even put a price on it? I support Tech but mistakes were made. they should have shut the whole place down after the first shooting. I don't really know why the taxpayers are paying for the mistakes of the university. what am I trying to say here? I'm not sure. I'm rambling. there has to be some sort of middle ground. a person with a history of serious mental illness or a felon should not be able to buy a gun. but people like my husband should. and I figure they will bury old Charlton Heston with a shit load of guns. he probably died with one in his cold hard hands. my father would roll over in his grave if he knew what lunatics have taken over the NRA. Ted Nugent will probably presdide over the funeral.

someone correct me if I'm wrong but Howard Dean got the supprt of the NRA as Governot of Vt. I remember him saying that states like Vt should not have the same gun laws as places like NYC. It should be different for each state or even locality. makes sense. which is more important to you? freedom of speech or the right to bear arms? and maybe that IS what keeps Bush and Cheney from locking mouthy liberals in Gitmo. liberals have guns too. Cheney is someone who should never have a gun. He couldn't go to war himself but goes to staged hunts where the birds are thrown out in front of him and ends up shooting someone in the face drunk. there should be laws against that. what a worthless wretch. and bush letting that assault weapons ban expire when every cop alive begged him not to. what f$cking hypocrites. worthless wretched evil cowardly bastards.

seriously, do you want to edit people's freedom of speech when you come here? or do you sometimes want to go get a gun when you read some of this shit? or both? personally I don't want to edit or get a gun. honestly.
how about you?

Penn out as Clinton senior strategist

According to Justice Department filings, Colombia agreed last year to pay Burson-Marsteller $300,000 to help "educate members of the U.S. Congress and other audiences" about the trade deal and secure continued U.S. funding for the $5 billion anti-narcotics program Plan Colombia.

The Colombian government announced Saturday it had fired Burson-Marsteller after Penn apologized for meeting with its representatives, saying his statement conveyed a "lack of respect" for the country.

Link

Never has one company, Burson-Marsteller, represented so many sides against the Democratic core of representing "We the people" over special interests. It seems Clinton's strategist Mark The Penn is Anti-Union, and Pro-Trade Unions that sells our interests abroad costing us dearly in our birthrights of working futures for our kids.

It seems the Clinton's are total contradictions of their own words and their loyal close Royal supporters, seem to have forgotten America lives on a dream born from the seed of our Heritage. Our History is of a Constitutional Federation, not a Corporate Conglomerate Republic of totalitarian Executive Privilege, where “At Will” they can redefine the core ingredients of the founding father principles of American patriotism. Never has a President named Bush, so forgotten the meaning of Freedom and Democracy in his own autocratic rule, tossing the words around as if they were his legacy, lost.

I wonder, if Hillary is paying for Bill’s fame? In that the more he talks, the more she falls under his shadow, where now if she is elected, he will run this nation from his mouth of Kitchen Sinks bullying his way around Washington. Can you see the Clinton Peacock strut for compliance to Presidential Executive Privilege, where lobbyists pay dearly for tickets to his one act show that raises millions then a billion as a Democratic political star par excellence? The Clinton ticket next to the Bush’s, the most sought after by the Corporate power brokers of the new World Order.

It seems if you have dreams of a future for your children, you are a Liberal. It seems that being Conservative means that you have a corporate label as a Royal conformist being a follower that never questions his superiors for their WMD intelligence.

so it's moron night here at the blog. well i guess the morons need a night and tomorrow all their crap will be washed away.

Posted by This_place_reeks_of_asshats_says_Harpo on April 6, 2008 at 09:22 PM

Jesus Christ! A LINK would have been sufficient!

So Penn is taking a more subdued role on the Clinton camp now, is he? There is also an article out that says the PM of Britain has designs on hiring him to help repair HIS image?

Posted by This_place_reeks_of_asshats_says_Harpo on April 6, 2008 at 09:38 PM

People are MORE likely to "skip on by" the long, drawn out, verbal diarrhea posts....so you shot yourself in the foot on that one.

Nice that Sadie is carrying on the tradition of painting on thorazine.

Posted by This_place_reeks_of_asshats_says_Harpo on April 6, 2008 at 09:55 PM

WOW! you are such an adoring fan of my writing that you looked up something I wrote a year ago! how cool! and I still feel that same level of disgust for your men bush and cheney. I would just love for you to get the opportunity to say these things to my face someday.I would truly love that. how much research have you actually done on me? maybe I really should keep one of those guns loaded in my house.

How sad it is if President like Washington, Adams and Jefferson would have to look down at Presidents since Nixon, where our government was Incorporated against "We the people" stockholder civilian wishes. That Bohemian power brokers defied the Constitution's protections against invasive government, where they rule us and our homes, much like Plantation owners owning working slaves classes. Here they can control your actions, and at time, with the economy force them to subjugate themselves to isolation.

It is that we must Declare our Independence from the Corporate Yoke of special interests and restore the "We the people" rule of law, where the scales of Justice has three equal and divinely appropriate parts to assure US this nation will stay a nation run by the people, and not Royalists of a New Order.

The New Order cannot have Free Minds with the right to question their judgment, people must be cloned to Fraternities of social order, where secrecy determines, who leads this nation under there "At Will" doctrines. When you have Poetry, Abstract Art, Jazz, and other Independent forms of self expression then control is lost among Free Speech.

Clinton's hidden trade deals with Columbia, how many more secret meeting are there behind closed doors? As President does Hillary offer the same closed door dealings, and Cheney collaborations? What is the truth to the Clinton NAPTA legacy? Does not Mark the Penn dealings undermine the unions, and the Main Streets of competitive America? What secret dealing are in the "Mark the Penn" company portfolios? Are there other Bohemians involved in their Fraternity of closed door dealings. How much of America has "Mark the Penn" sold way for the profits of people like the Bush's, and other political elite Royals. I wonder if Mark the Penn is doing Bill's speeches scheduling. do you smell the stench of the status quo of Washington's quagmire corruption? It would be interesting if the stock portfolio of Mark the Penn and the Clintonites share the same stocks, and secret dealings.

June is early! If neither candidate has a lock on the delegate count before Denver then it has to be on to Denver! This is still an open convention if the lead in delegate count or even the popular vote could switch by the end of the remaining primaries and the accepting of the Florida & Michigan voters votes and there chosen delegation. No candidate should drop out and no one should attempt to end it with arm twisting before Denver. Only after 10 more primaries are done and Florida and Michigan have been counted should the Super delegate’s commitments be demanded and not one day before. If the DNC or the media or anyone puts pressure on Super delegates to commit and there commitment ends up deciding this Democratic Presidential race before the end of those 10 primaries and Florida & Michigan are accepted the DNC will have a war and a mutiny on there hands because that will be seen as making all of there voice and votes of no effect. The DNC and Party leadership has to avoid anything that even hints that the “big boys” ended the selection process before all the people’s voices have been heard. They only way it can end before Denver is if Obama or Hillary locks down the required number of delegates from state primaries which we all know is just no longer possible for either of them. Each and every super delegate who pledges at this point is only seen as a power play by the "boys & back room bosses" to end the race unfairly. Well actually any super delegate’s commitments since Ohio they have been viewed that way.

Post for Pam B.
I know that I've been gone for awhile. I've had a couple of major surgeries (Full Hysterectomy). That has got to be the most non-fun thing ever! I do not recommend it! Avoid it if you can.
I will be back regularly after we get a candidate. I love to point out the faults of and 'trash' re-THUG-licans but all of the personal attacks on our candidates by the supports of the other just does not interest me.
On to more important matters:
BASKETBALL!
I mean this sincerely - I am disappointed that the Ladies Championship will not come down to UTenn and UConn. I saw the Lady Huskies play a couple of times this year and they were - at that time - the best team in the country. I guess they may have just 'peaked' a few weeks too early. They really are great! They have nothing to hang their heads about! I hope their fans will remind them of how great they are. On the other hand, I am seriously happy that my Lady Vols are going to be there and that my Memphis Tigers Men's Team will play for the National Championships!
Anyway - just finished watching the games and had to drop you a line before I take any MORE pain meds and zonk out!
Chat with you soon!
Your fellow 'rabid' democrat!
MaryMac

I awoke with these words, and a volatile stomach, I wrote the words down, as they will nail me as a Liberal, but then Free Speech has already cost me everything. Just as patriots around 1776 found out that standing up cost a few people their jobs. At least being terminated for Poetry, I have regained the right to write it 24/7 on retirement funds.

The Ole “patriot act”

The ole patriot moved the ground germinating his words,
The grave foundations of a core of what is the United States.
The blood of a founding fathers fighting on Bunker Hill;
“Don’t Tread on Me” rattlesnake’s Independence symbol.

America, nation founded for “We the people” over Royalty.
Yet today some will incorporate its design “At Will,”
Redefinitions of Freedom and Democracy in their Patriot Act
“Take Over” of Civil Liberties - pride in banning Free Speech.

The ground quakes, thunder rolling among storming fronts,
Whether or not this nation was blessed upon a divine design.
Electrifying elocution of marching patriots resounding fight
That no Conglomerate Confederation Republic shall stand.

This nation Heritage is in the “Truth” of its leader’s words
That bear no secrecy inside Corporate Bohemian alliances
That conspired against citizen’s right to command attention.
Our questions are paramount to a Free Nation’s accountability.

Oh, ghost haunting my sleep, awakening vibrating fingers.
How does one wake a nation complacent with being cloned
That King George would be so pleased for the capitulation
Where patriot’s furor murmur is muted so deadly silent.

“Don’t Treat on ME” versus Cheney’s Big Oil Dynasty.
“JOIN or DIE” banner as the standard for patriotism,
Where we never surrender our Free Will as slaves,
To the Corporate Merger of Washington’s government.

Our scales of Justice has no CEO President autocratic rule,
It is not an Executive Branch of totalitarian Executive Privilege
It is not John Woo’s Benedict Arnold legal redefinitions
In torture and his creed dismantling of our Civil Liberties.

Those of Bush Intelligence will stand indicted by public opinion
As the Army of Potomac arises cries of “ Give Me Liberty or Death”
That no one has the right to override Constitutional protections
That Congress must impeach the character of those deemed traitors
Representatives that says the Presidency has n0 power of Royalty.

Sleep shall again silence Poetry, where in dreams “We Become Free”
To express things that are banned by the Bush Corporate doctrine
Where our homes are subject to warrant less White House invasions
That tortures the definitions of true patriot acts of Constitutional law.

Yes, John Woo’s legal status needs to be impeached by Congress
That in a vote to the confidence of fallen patriot comrades
That we again reaffirm and restore the Law of the Land
Where “We the people” claim our birthright of Heritage ‘n Pride.

Congress such distain you have brought America in your homework
The shame of your moral corruption by special interest lobbyists
Corporate greed of paychecks, where you sell your HeArt’s of dreams
Where upon Public Schools, they are marked with Katrina sad scars.

You have sold your soul and this nation’s prayers in total disgrace.
Look at the millions you make and then look at real American faces!
Then talk in front of an audience say, “They are picking on me!”
And trash America with Kitchen Sink bullying tactics,
“One Must Win At All Cost,
Even With Bush Intelligence Lies!”

Posted by FrostyMacCowpies on April 7, 2008 at 03:53 AM

Your words are a display of your inner character.

Posted by YoungPoet on April 7, 2008 at 03:43 AM
Posted by YoungPoet on April 7, 2008 at 03:43 AM

Nice poem, I woke up at 2AM, read the entire blog.

Poor Harpo! Such childish, petulant outbursts! The adults must have forgotten to change his poopy diaper again! He gets cranky like this when his rash starts to spread. And such fowl language! Shows his true state of arrested development! His arrested development is the only explanation as to why a 40 years old man is still in diapers and can not change them for himself! Pity his poor parents!

Posted by FrostyMacCowpies on April 7, 2008 at 04:06 AM

That was a nice, little fairy tale, one of your better efforts!

I don't remember if Harpo has a wife and children. If he does, I feel sorry for them. It would be hard to live with someone that nasty, that vulgar, that uncouth!

Posted by FrostyMacCowpies on April 7, 2008 at 04:06 AM

No comment from you Frosty? What's the matter? Did you get confused again trying to switch identities?

Frosty, did you buy that .38 Special revolver for your niece yet? If you did, you should test fire it before you give it to her. Just load all the chambers and put it down to the top of your foot and pull the trigger twice, very quickly. That way, you can literally shoot yourself in the foot which is what you do every time you or one of your alter egos posts here.

Posted by FrostyMacCowpies on April 7, 2008 at 04:58 AM

You're still here! I thought by now you would be in your 1990 Chev P/u, headed back to your shack in the deep woods in Mn. How come you're late leaving?

Frosty, I'm surprised that you would bring up the subject of"manbearpig" You know the last time the police in Armpit, Mn found you running around in the woods naked chasing "Manbearpig", they told you to get dressed and leave it alone!

I guess that Frosty doesn't want to talk about getting cought chasing "Manbearpig" around in the woods naked. He may be busy trying to finish filling out his shift end security guard's report.

This is for Essie, if she comes on line this morning: "What profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul" I'm not good at quoting scripture, but that is what often pops into my mind when I think about George W. Bush.

Alan the Greenspan has endorsed John McCain. So what? Big deal, the only people who will give that any credibility are Republicans who are too stupid to think for themselves!

Morning JohnBoy,

I had a good laugh last night. I heard that mclame may be considering rice for vice president. I laughed my ass off but suddenly realized that if these two won the race, it would be time to move to Canada.

I thought that the chimpenfuhrer was going to dump laura and marry rice and take her away to Paraguay.

When is the Congress going to get some balls indict rove for railroading (lying) about the Governor of Alabama. The governor was on 60 Minutes last night and said that rove refused to appear before Congress.

Congress should deputize special federal marshalls and go find rove and lock him up. He needs to be behind bars for at least 30 years.

Bill Clinton Earned $15.4 Million From Burkle Firm (Update2)

April 5 (Bloomberg) -- Former President Bill Clinton has earned $15.4 million from billionaire Ron Burkle's Yucaipa Cos. investment firm since 2003, according to tax documents released by his wife, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

The earnings represent 20 percent of the approximately $75 million Bill Clinton earned during the same period, according to the documents. That may raise new questions about what services he performed for Los Angeles-based Yucaipa, whose investors include the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid al- Maktoum.

Link

It seems that the Clinton legacy is also intertwined with Dubai, just like the Bush's and Cheney. It seems that they have paid the Clinton's very well, I wonder how much they have given to the Clinton museum? I wish that the Clinton's were more "Made In America." It seems they also strive to make the Dubai connection of Bohemian power brokers, over the American civilian stockbroker of "We the people." I cannot see the Clinton's being a Washington, Jefferson, or a Adams President by Declaring Independence from the corporate Royalists. I do not see them as Ben Franklins, for they are right of center Progressives with Conservative Corporate ideas. They are not Liberals of the Trilogy of separation of power, where three branches have the check and balanced system of accountability. They will rule with an iron fist much like King George, where she as President, will become Queen Victoria, ruling as a tyrant with autocratic rule. They will have their Cheney closed door closet dealings, where Dubai is well represented, as the new Wall Street, and new New York banking center. I do not see America’s dream in their private dream to become billionaires at the expense of the American worker. Yes, American workers will have second class slave status, where she become their parent. It is time for America to awake. While Obama may not be a perfect “We the people” candidate, look at the alternative; the Clinton’s and how much they made during the Bush corporate years, and how much we lost as a nation.

This is long but it is a decent read. It shows how the criminals on Wall Street take care of one another and seldom lose even when you lose big time!

Countrywide Bigs Now Vultures for Your Mortgage

You’d probably think that being one of the major players in the subprime mortgage meltdown wouldn’t be a great career move.

But it worked out just fine for one of them. Namely, Stanford Kurland, the former president of Countrywide Financial, the country’s biggest mortgage lender.

He was just named chairman and chief executive of Private National Mortgage Acceptance Co. (PennyMac). That’s a joint venture between two highly esteemed money management firms: BlackRock and Highfields Capital Management.

BlackRock is led by Laurence Fink, who reportedly was considered for the CEO position at both Citigroup and Merrill Lynch.

Story continues below . . .

As for Kurland, you may remember his old firm, Countrywide. It had to sell itself to Bank of America earlier this year for $4.1 billion to avoid going under.

That $4.1 billion price tag may sound like a windfall compared to the $2.4 billion JP Morgan Chase will apparently pay for Bear Stearns, but it’s about one-sixth of what Countrywide was worth on the stock market less than eight months prior to its sale.

Put another way, thanks to the policies of Kurland (who left the company in September 2006) and other Countrywide officials, the institution’s shareholders lost 83 percent of their investment in less than eight months.

And why did Countrywide stock drop like a rock?

Because it was issuing subprime mortgages like there was no tomorrow. In 2006 alone, Countrywide granted $40.6 billion worth of them, putting it third in the country for subprime lending behind HSBC and New Century Financial.

Kurland isn’t the only ex-Countrywide executive joining PennyMac. At least nine of his fellow Countrywide bigwigs are going with him, according to Bloomberg News.

Meanwhile, Bank of America just agreed to pay another Countrywide former president, David Sambol, $28 million in cash and stock to stay on and run the unit. Bank of America bought Countrywide as it fell apart.

PennyMac will buy loans "from financial institutions seeking to reduce their mortgage exposures,” it says. In other words, Kurland and his cronies will be buying some of the same paper they issued during their time at Countrywide.

Presumably they’ve learned through their experience which mortgage-backed securities are toxic and which are undervalued gems.

For those in the mortgage industry, Kurland’s plumb new assignment is no big deal.

"It’s really a terrific time to design and build” a mortgage company, K. Terrence Wakefield, a consultant to lenders tells Bloomberg. Kurland and company "have the experience and contacts and relationships to be successful.”

If Kurland thrives at his new venture, he certainly won’t be the first person in the investment world to cause huge losses and then rebound.

Victor Niederhoffer, who first made his reputation as a partner of the legendary hedge fund mogul George Soros, has apparently made and lost at least two fortunes through his investments.

There is a difference between Niederhoffer and the Countrywide crew, however.

Niederhoffer’s mistakes hurt himself and his clients. Countrywide’s mistakes helped push the economy into what probably is a recession and the financial system into a serious crisis.

Many people are to blame for that crisis. But certainly the leaders of Countrywide, including Kurland, played a role.

So the new gig for Kurland and his Countrywide colleagues rightly galls some observers.

"The whole subprime mortgage fiasco was built on sort of Wall Street’s snake-oil salesmen convincing America this is a can’t-miss scheme,” Irv Ackelberg, a consumer lawyer in Philadelphia, tells The Wall Street Journal.

"It sounds like they’ve just morphed into some new version."

I wonder if Mark The Penn's company has a Dubai connection among its Columbian trade connections? I wonder have many Bohemian interests, they represent and why they are ingrained into Washington slimy dealings of Kitchen Sink diplomacy.

Good morning. Here's a reason to smile today.

Mark Penn is out!

Penn out as Clinton senior strategist
4/7/2008, 7:19 a.m. EDT
By BETH FOUHY
The Associated Press

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Hillary Rodham Clinton is turning to her communications chief and pollster to plan her presidential election strategy after giving the boot to a polarizing top aide because of his work on behalf of a trade agreement Clinton opposes.

Mark Penn, a lightning rod for controversy throughout Clinton's presidential campaign, left the campaign Sunday after it was disclosed he had met with representatives of the Colombian government to help promote the trade agreement.

Communications director Howard Wolfson and pollster Geoff Garin will direct the campaign's message and strategic efforts for the campaign going forward, said campaign manager Maggie Williams. She said Penn will continue "to provide polling and advice to the campaign."

http://www.nj.com/newsflash/index.ssf?/base/politics-14/1207527546259480.xml&storylist=topstories

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I can only wonder why it took Hillary Clinton so long to dump him. I also wonder why she hired him when so many people told her to stay away from this creep who plays both sides. Penn is in it for money and has no goals other than getting rich.

Posted by Johne on April 7, 2008 at 07:25
Good morning Johne, I would like to see Rove locked up in Iraq! They'll take real good care of him!

JohnBoy,

I went to school with a fellow nerd with the last name of Niederhoffer. I wonder if he is any relation.

Posted by rjsnj on April 7, 2008 at 07:40 AM

There is usually a compelling, often hidden reason why people do things. Maybe Hillary hired Mark Penn because she had to!

While noting in passing that King spoke out against the Vietnam War, mainstream reports today rarely acknowledge that he went way beyond Vietnam to decry U.S. militarism in general: "I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos," said King in 1967 speeches on foreign policy, "without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today -- my own government."

In response to these speeches, Newsweek said King was "over his head" and wanted a "race-conscious minority" to dictate U.S. foreign policy. Life magazine described the Nobel Peace Prize winner as a communist pawn who advocated "abject surrender in Vietnam." The Washington Post couldn't have been more patronizing: "King has diminished his usefulness to his cause, to his country, and to his people."

When King's moral voice moved beyond racial discrimination to international issues, the New York Times attacked his efforts to link the civil rights and antiwar movements.

King's sermons on Vietnam could get as angry as those of Barack Obama's ex-pastor: "God didn't call America to engage in a senseless, unjust war ... We've committed more war crimes almost than any nation in the world." In 1967, King was also criticizing the economic underpinnings of U.S. foreign policy, railing against "capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries." Today, capitalists of the West reap huge profits from their domination of media -- in the U.S. and abroad.
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MLK was way ahead of everyone. Back then most did not comprehend globalization and the new imperialism.

Posted by goodfoe on April 7, 2008 at 07:46 AM
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Hi goodfoe,

I see your point. I won't speculate. Here's another angle on the story in KOS:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/6/20525/15947/864/491358

I thought that the chimpenfuhrer was going to dump laura and marry rice and take her away to Paraguay.

Posted by Johne on April 7, 2008 at 07:19 AM
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Hey JE,

He's working on it. The war criminal needs to be careful about being picked up by Interpol.

McCain Runs Into Trouble On Health Care Reform Hotlist
by DemFromCT
Sun Apr 06, 2008 at 06:11:55 AM PDT

You gotta love this headline (unless you're a Republican).

McCain camp working out healthcare details
Aides struggle to sort out his promises

Aides struggle to sort out his promises? Oy. See, he's got a problem. His proposals don't make much sense.

When Senator John McCain unveiled his healthcare proposal last fall, a journalist asked whether the Arizona senator's battle against skin cancer would make him sympathetic to the idea of requiring that insurance companies provide coverage to people with preexisting conditions.

McCain flatly rejected the idea. "That would be mandating what the free enterprise system does," McCain said.

McCain's response highlights the challenge he faces as he prepares to try to sell his healthcare plan in the fall campaign. He says the country must provide access to healthcare for all our citizens, and that "we need to help people who need it." But McCain also wants to shrink government's role in healthcare and doesn't want to impose regulations on insurance companies.

As a result, McCain's aides have been scrambling to come up with ways to satisfy those who want more coverage without violating what they call McCain's conservative principles on the issue.

And therein lies McCain's problem. You can't move towar

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/4/6/91155/74099/337/490868

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Now that's an oxymoron - conservatives (like McCain) and health care plans.

McCain doesn't have a freakin clue. McCain's "plan" will result in 200 million with no health care coverage! In other words, the man is equally dangerous in domestic and foreign policy.

McCain ... worse than Bush.

Posted by YoungPoet on April 7, 2008 at 07:36 AM

Listen here, you phoney pathetic poet, Bill Clinton has done more for ALL colors of American people than 100,000 people combined. I'm sick of you comparing him to Bush. They are polar opposites. President Clinton put America on a far different track than Reagan and Bush. And he was much better than Kennedy, your idol who had more bad ties than we'd like to admit.

So cool it on your anti-white, anti-Clinton hate speech. He was the best President America has had in a long time. If you want to keep attacking our President, who lifted millions of people out of poverty, go ahead. If you want to be like a troll, go ahead. But don't think we'll let you attack the best Democrat to ever lead this Nation.

I heart George Soros. God Bless that man.
He's a major defender of Democracy. He's not a phoney Patriot like Hannity and Rush.

Posted by rjsnj on April 7, 2008 at 08:03 AM

McCain isn't worried about your health care. He has the best health care in the world as a Senator. When he was in the military, he had government health care there too. McCain has been feeding at the public trough so long, he has no understanding of what real working Americans deal with everyday. And he's married to a millionaires, he has his, so his attitude is "So?" Sound familiar?

Posted by rjsnj on April 7, 2008 at 07:53 AM

RJ, thax for the link on Mark Penn. Good material.

BBL

Yet another point of view from The Nation on Mark Penn:

Mark Penn NOT REALLY Stepping Down: Smoke & Mirrors Hotlist
by dawnt [Subscribe]
Sun Apr 06, 2008 at 05:06:20 PM PDT

Rumors of Mark Penn's demise have been greatly exaggerated. I am writing this diary to try to set the record straight.

Mark Penn did not resign. Mark Penn was not fired. In fact, this is just another bit of smoke and mirrors from the Clinton campaign. From TheNation:

CLINTON DROPS PENN, SORT OF... After months of criticism and allegations of conflicts of interest swirling around Mark Penn, Hillary Clinton's "chief strategist," the Clinton Campaign announced on Sunday that Penn is losing his title.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/6/20620/63110/928/489260

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Ummm Hillary Clinton ... if this is just smoke and mirrors then you have NOT done right! American workers are still angry about Mark Penn and his support of the Columbia free trade agreement. We will NOT be fooled by moving someone to a different title.

Dump Mark Penn completely OR unions will drop you completely!

Posted by Big_Yellow_Dog on April 7, 2008 at 08:11 AM

Made my day!

New thread open...

Sound familiar?

Posted by goodfoe on April 7, 2008 at 08:43 AM
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goodfoe, he's just like all of these hypocritical conservative GOP-PERS. They take from the public but will they ever share ...

But don't think we'll let you attack the best Democrat to ever lead this Nation
Posted by Big_Yellow_Dog on April 7, 2008 at 08:11 AM

Bill Clinton Might be the greatest Democrat of recent history, but these campaign shananagans have defineately tarnished his reputation.

IMO

Greatest Democrat of all time: FDR