Is anything really permanent?

Majority of America is on a double opiate - nonsense on tv/movies and the latest tunes to download.... it seems they really don't want to hear much of anything else that is actually shaping their daily lives...I find this in my family and friends who are otherwise caring wonderful people....

...there was a recent comment that you were back on WWRL in NY but it seems there was a nutrition-supplement commercial programming on when I tuned in to check... can someone verify...I sure don't want to miss the little programming they are providing NYC if they did indeed open up the airwaves to important information that we only seem to be able to get through Sam.... Miss you Sam---a lot...

Lieberman, on surprise visit to Iraq, says he's "happy" with the progress he sees.Think Progress

Respect Mah Authoritay!!!

What's mine is mine and what's yers iz mine.

Submitted by Kevin © on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 12:33pm.
---------------------------------------
I wonder who the joker was who issued Joe a WWII German helmet?

who is about to shit himself

it's his own

he does a killer John Banner impersonation at the Repub senate lunches he gets asked to

When he sez "I know noth-ingk!!" he feels it in his BALLS!

...since our last unannounced visit. After all, announcing our visits could make us targets for violence or kidnapping by insurgents and terrorists. Just look at what happened when we announced the surge.

wanna see if your house will survive the rising waters due to global warming?

http://flood.firetree.net/?ll=43.3251,-101.6015&z=13&m=7

Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 1:09pm.
wanna see if your house will survive the rising waters due to global warming?
---------------------------------------
Hey! I can see my boat dock from here!

sammy,
when a new thread is started, the blog program thing should automatically post a comment on the previous thread informing the slow hillbillies about the new thread

to be followed by jive-talk 101

Presumably our troops would guard against the possibility of another American invasion.

More like preventing thr Iraquis from stealing our oil.

flood maps
Submitted by Anonymous on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 1:09pm.
wanna see if your house will survive the rising waters due to global warming?

Wicked!! Safe as .. well .. Houses!

You "coasters" are free to come to Minnesota .. it's pretty much always nice here. Especially with the warmer winters! ; )

Better go check on the family compound in FLA now ...

We get the water to rise over .. hum .. looks like about 16 meters??? .. and we can defeat Cuba by having it cut in half!! Divide and conquer .. ya know??

God Damn!!! Do you suppose Global Warming is some elaborate plot by the Neo Cons to defeat communism??

The Nation.
Robert Scheer:

Perhaps they knew not what they did, but the picture the White House released of Vice President Dick Cheney, coming as close as he does to a smile, and his beaming wife, Lynne, cradling their newborn grandson, Samuel David Cheney, was a milestone in the nation's struggle for human rights for all. Never again will it be possible for conservative Republicans to shun homosexuals in any facet of American life without appearing outrageously hypocritical.

Con't

double post

Specter asks Supreme Court to let TV cover its sessions

By Maeve Reston, Post-Gazette National Bureau

Tuesday, September 27, 2005
Justices Indicate Supreme Court Is Unlikely to Televise Sessions

=====

2 Justices Indicate Supreme Court Is Unlikely to Televise Sessions

By LINDA GREENHOUSE
Published: April 5, 2006

Justice Thomas was equally firm, warning that television in the courtroom would have a negative impact on the argument sessions.

"It runs the risk of undermining the manner in which we consider cases," he said. He added that some members of the court "feel more strongly than others," but that all agreed that the court should decide the issue for itself. "The general consensus is not one of glee," he said.

Justice Thomas also said that televising the court would raise security concerns, "as members of the court who now have some degree of anonymity would lose their anonymity."

===

Power of the purse -- no TV, no funding (which comes up yearly.)

I've got it!!!
Submitted by wil_the_ersatz_... on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 1:42pm.
We get the water to rise over .. hum .. looks like about 16 meters??? .. and we can defeat Cuba by having it cut in half!! Divide and conquer .. ya know??

God Damn!!! Do you suppose Global Warming is some elaborate plot by the Neo Cons to defeat communism??

-----------------------------
and the blue coasts will be devastated too. sounds like neocon heaven

Smile!

Smile

At what point should Bush shut down MSNBC and "Countdown with Keith Olberman"....since obviously they're going to defend THIS--

CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez on Tuesday called opposition news channel Globovision an enemy of the state and said he would do what was needed to stop it from inciting violence, only days after he shut another opposition broadcaster.

Tens of thousands of Venezuelans marched in Caracas in a fourth consecutive day of protests over Chavez's closure of the RCTV network - a move which has sparked international criticism that the leftist leader's reforms are undermining democracy.

State television showed hundreds of government supporters marching in downtown Caracas celebrating Chavez's decision.

"Enemies of the homeland, particularly those behind the scenes, I will give you a name: Globovision. Greetings gentlemen of Globovision, you should watch where you are going," Chavez said in a broadcast all channels had to show.

"I recommend you take a tranquilizer and get into gear, because if not, I am going to do what is necessary."

indicates that Plame was "covert"
Submitted by jbenet on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 1:24pm.
thanks mmr

Np.. :)

The wing-nuts just lie their
asses off!!

.
Free 3D Glasses

1) Send us a Self Addressed Stamped Envelope �SASE� ($0.37 US). {now $0.41 ?]
To our address is at the bottom of this page.

Rainbow Symphony, Inc.
6860 Canby Ave. Suite 120 • Reseda · CA · 91335
(818) 708-8400 • (818) 708-8470 Fax

It's called ipredict.

They are talking a vote on:

MSNBC.com: Politics

iPredict: Fred Thompson will win the GOP nomination

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18661488/?vid=18938691

"if yes, then Bush and the occupation supporters Republicans (minus Ron Paul plus Holy Joe) want us in Iraq permanently"

How'd that vote from the DEMOCRATIC Congress go on making it "non-permanent"???

all my posts stem from & are derivative of...

derek & clive's "the horn"

it's the secret of my notoriety!

for without "the horn"

i'd be nothing!

i'd be... well if you must know, i'd be you

:p

yeah, yeah, gare

fuck off

and if it's not gare...

not-gare is snorting, "hee-fee, he fought i was gare"

(honk)
(honk)

i pretending to be nobody

(honk)
(honk)

"the system is working"

Don't mess with that arm!

Glenn Beck’s ratings plummet. Chris Achorn at My Two Sense looks at CNN Headline News host Glenn Beck’s ratings and finds that his “numbers for this week were LOWER then a year ago when he was just starting.” They are also the “lowest in cable news.” Beck has repeatedly made racist, sexist, and homophobic comments on air.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/glenn-becks-ratings-plummet/

Assim.Press:

Scranton, Pennsylvania - A troop of al Qaeda operatives are marching en masse through the Keystone State. Troop Commander Abdul Abdullah explained their presence at a rest area outside of Wilkes-Barre.

"When Rick Santorum was Pennsylvania's senator he said that America would not be safe unless he was able to keep his seat in the 2006 midterm elections," said Commander Abdullah. "Even though the average American can't find Iraq on a map, it's a well-known fact that we terrorists have always based our strategy on the outcome of Pennsylvanian elections. With Santorum out of the way we knew there was nothing standing between us and total domination of the entire North American continent."

Con't

Boeing sued over torture rendition flights. The ACLU has filed suit charging that a Boeing subsidiary “knowingly provided direct flight services to the CIA that enabled the clandestine transportation of the men to secret overseas locations, where they were tortured and subjected to other ‘forms of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment’ under the agency’s ‘extraordinary rendition’ program.”

“American corporations should not be profiting from a CIA rendition program that is unlawful and contrary to core American values,” said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU. “Corporations that choose to participate in such activity can and should be held legally accountable.”

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/boeing-sued-over-torture-rendition-f...

ok so Lieberman is lying about "the progress" being made in Iraq--when do we hold these guys acountable? shouldn't they have to pay for all the lies they keep telling? their lies are causing the deaths of our military and lives of innocent Iraqi's-not to mention we're still losing! I guess if the argument was they are lying but we were winning eh maybe there would be some difference but we're losing- our kids are dying and they are continuing the same murderous lies to continue this illegal war
c'mon isn't that treason or something?!

Assimilated Press:

How many members of the Bush administration does it take to change a light bulb?

Yesterday's DQ answer: None, they don't believe in light, only darkness.

...are you Lieberman's personal butt wiper, or what?

Justice Dept. Deems Sen. Stevens Too Corrupt To Participate In U.S. Attorney Scandal
Yesterday, the Anchorage Daily News reported that the FBI and a federal grand jury are investigating how, in 2000, “Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) jacked his house off the ground, inserted a new first story and placed the old first floor on top, thanks to the help of a top executive at local oil company Veco Corp. who hired at least one key contractor to complete the feat of a job.”

The remodeling is suspicious because two former Veco Corp. executives recently pleaded guilty to federal bribery and conspiracy charges, which includes paying $242,000 in illegitimate consulting fees to Stevens’s son, Ben, formerly president of Alaska’s state senate. Additionally, the Veco executives’ guilty pleas noted that “Veco was not in the business of residential construction or remodeling.”

Neither Ben nor Sen. Stevens have been charged. But actions by the federal government to keep the senator away from the investigation indicate that he may be involved. In Aug. 2006, the Bush administration took the unusual step of blocking the Sen. Stevens from having any say in choosing the new U.S. attorney for the state:

Stevens has been trying to get an Alaska lawyer appointed U.S. attorney here, but for one reason or another the people he recommended have been knocked out, a spokesman for the senator said Wednesday.

Instead, the Justice Department brought in a prosecutor from Pittsburgh. A Stevens aide told the Anchorage Daily News that the senator was “furious at the way the attorney general handled this.” In Sept. 2006, the Justice Department recused the entire U.S. attorney’s office in Alaska from the case, explaining that it would be run out of the department’s Public Integrity section.

Former Republican U.S. attorney Wev Shea also notes that President Bush probably personally approved the raid on Ben Stevens’s office:

I can guarantee you, virtually, that in the daily briefings that Bob (Mueller) has with the president that the president was briefed and gave his OK on this. It’s not something I say lightly.

ThinkProgress has also confirmed that Scott Leathard, son of Veco president Pete Leathard, continues to serve on Sen. Stevens’s Washington staff. Stevens has received more than $70,000 in political donations from VECO employees.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/stevens-veco/

Yep ... as a prelude to - no doubt - declaring his presidential intentions, Newt calls out Bush & Rove.

President Bush has presided over a Republican Party in "collapse." Karl Rove's strategy in the 2004 presidential election was "maniacally dumb" for focusing so heavily on the conservative base, and the CIA, among other agencies, begs for "radical transformation."

The words of Howard Dean, the Democratic National Committee chairman, perhaps? Or John Edwards, a Democratic candidate for president? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi?

None of the above.

The harsh assessment comes from Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker who engineered the 1994 Republican takeover of Congress. ...

More at Ersatz Blogger or at Ersatz Melange ....

DOJ expands U.S. attorney investigation. Today, Justice Department Inspector General Glenn Fine and counsel for the Office of Professional Responsibility wrote to the Senate Judiciary Committee and announced that their offices are expanding their U.S. attorney investigations to the allegations of the politicization of the Justice Department’s hiring practices. From their letter:

Letter at link:

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/doj-expands-us-attorney-investigatio...

aaaah.

Petraeus Adviser Says Escalation ‘Is Likelier To Fail Than Succeed At This Point’ »
Over the weekend, Fox News pundit Fred Barnes claimed that in September, Gen. David Petraeus will report “great progress and say [Baghdad] is heavily pacified.” That optimistic assessment is not shared, however, by one of Petraeus’ key advisers.

On CBS Evening News last night, Stephen Biddle, an early proponent of the escalation, argued that Bush’s strategy in Iraq is “likelier to fail than succeed at this point.” Biddle assessed that there is “maybe a one in ten” chance the escalation will succeed. “Maybe it’s a one in five longshot, if we play our cards right,” he said. Watch it:

Biddle is right to be cautious about the escalation’s success. Despite a brief lull at the beginning of the surge, sectarian murders in Iraq are on the rise again. Car bombings, chlorine bombs, and the use of children as bombers have all also increased. On Tuesday, May became not only the deadliest month for U.S. troops in 2007, but also the third deadliest month in the entire war.

Video at link:

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/escalation-succeed/

Administration fighting mad cow testing. “The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture tests less than 1 percent of slaughtered cows for the disease, which can be fatal to humans who eat tainted beef. But Arkansas City-based Creekstone Farms Premium Beef wants to test all of its cows.

Larger meat companies feared that move because, if Creekstone tested its meat and advertised it as safe, they might have to perform the expensive test, too.

http://commonsense.ourfuture.org/e_coli_conservatism_19_ne_plus_ultra

http://www.counterpunch.org/nader05302007.html

http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=12938&sectionID=60

Concerned Women for America spokesman blasts Mary Cheney and girlfriend as just "playing house," not "real parents," birth of son is "tragedy"

That doesn't even come close to dissing a newborn baby. But there you have it, Stephen Bennett, a spokesman for the Concerned Women for America, one of the largest religious right groups, today blasted Vice President Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter, Mary, and her partner Heather Poe for having a baby out of wedlock. As we reported yesterday, the White House published a baby announcement on the Vice President's portion of the White House Web site, noting that the Mary and Heather were both "parents" of the newborn child.

Well, that set the religious right off, big time. Here is what Bennett had to say about Mary and Heather having a baby, then I've posted his press release in its entirety - it's a must-read of venom.

Cindy Sheehan

What Muppet are you?

the open relationship that mary cheney has or the hypocrisy of the republicans...

its too bad these individuals don't realize that nobody really cares about their sacred values. if they did, they could do the world a favor and stay home when the next election comes around.

House Judiciary chairman 'supportive' of impeachment Nick Juliano
Published: Wednesday May 30, 2007

The head of the House Judiciary Committee, which has the authority to pursue impeachment of President Bush, said Tuesday he is "supportive" of the effort to oust the president from office, according to press reports.

Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., was speaking at a town-hall forum in his hometown of Detroit while Congress is on recess this week.

"I've been supportive of that movement," Conyers said, according to the Associated Press. "I encourage that nationwide."

Despite the chairman's support, actual impeachment proceedings seem unlikely. Prior to the Democratic takeover last year, Nancy Pelosi, now Speaker of the House, told fellow Democrats that impeachment was "off the table."

Conyers' wife, Monica, joined the rest of the Detroit City Council in a unanimous vote earlier this month to impeach Bush and Cheney, as RAW STORY previously reported. At least 70 cities and more than a dozen state Democratic parties have called for impeaching the president and Cheney.

In his Detroit appearance Tuesday, Conyers declined to offer the full support of his position atop the Judiciary Committee to the impeachment push.

"The goal is whether to impeach or follow up on the defects and disabilities of an administration," Conyers said, according to the AP.

Before the Democratic takeover, Conyers had raised the possibility of impeachment, but he has been less bullish on the possibility since last year's elections.

"For about a year now there have been two Congressman Conyers," wrote David Swanson, reporting on Conyers' appearance on pro-impeachment Web site AfterDowningStreet.org. "The defender of our constitution and the follower of Nancy Pelosi in her ban on impeachment."

More here...

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/House_Judiciary_chairman_supportive_of_imp...

WNBC catches Giuliani getting 'tripped up' by 9/11 activist David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Wednesday May 30, 2007

On Tuesday, members of a 911 truth activist group confronted former Mayor Rudy Giuliani at a New York fundraiser about the fall of the World Trade Center.

"How come people in the buildings weren't notified?" asked one member of the group. "And how can you sleep at night?"

Giuliani's politely-phrased response, caught by WNBC newscameras filming the event, was "I didn't know that the towers were going to collapse."

That response contradicts remarks the former New York City mayor made about being warned about the collapse during a phone interview with onetime ABC anchor Peter Jennings on September 11, 2001, as shown in a transcript WNBC obtained from the Giuliani 2008 campaign.

Giuliani told Jennings, "I--I went down to the scene and we set up headquarters at 75 Barkley Street, which was right there with the police commissioner, the fire commissioner, the head of emergency management, and we were operating out of there when we were told that the World Trade Center was going to collapse. And it did collapse before we could actually get out of the building, so we were trapped in the building for 10, 15 minutes, and finally found an exit and got out, walked north, and took a lot of people with us."

The following video from We Are Change and Infowars.com juxtaposes the two quotes.

Video at link:

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Video_tribute_to_Giuliani_911_lies_0530.ht...

By: Jane Hamsher

Rahm Emanuel continues to amaze and impress. Not content with nearly fucking up the 2006 House races as head of the DCCC with his "don't mention the war" strategy, he's now in the process of bungling immigration.

Con't

http://www.struggle.ws/rbr/rbr6/bakunin.html

Still in bankruptcy, Air America Radio is now up to a nationwide audience of 127.

Even though AAR is bankrupt, it still gets out on a few stations and over the internet although at only a fraction that it once was.

Whatever happened to Sam Seder radio?

Neither me or any of my relatives can pick up any AAR station as we just can't afford them. I liked them but they failed to do hardly any promotion

Soldiers missing limbs return to active duty
In Pentagon about-face, military putting amputees even back into combat.

http://www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.timesrec...

Some attorneys think Gonzales may be ripe to be disbarred Michael Roston
Published: Wednesday May 30, 2007

Some attorneys looking at the ethical issues raised by the firing of 8 US Attorneys think a case could be made that Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should be disbarred, according to a report in today's New York Observer.

"It depends crucially on what the facts are...Given the most unfavorable interpretation, there’s clearly a case for disbarment," David Luban, a law professor at the Georgetown University told the paper's Anna Schneider-Mayerson.

Gonzales could face trouble with the Texas Bar Association for reportedly asking his former aide Monica Goodling to discuss her recollection of the process that led to the firing of the Attorneys. He later told Congressional committees that he had avoided discussing the controversy with any of his employees in order to allow an internal investigation to proceed.

His participation as White House Counsel in a hospital room meeting with an ill Attorney General John Ashcroft to gain legal certification for a National Security Agency spying program could also place him into additional jeopardy.

"By seeking to advance an illegal scheme with the advantage of D.O.J. approval....Gonzales seriously interfered with the administration of justice," Stephen Gillers, a New York University Law School ethicist,told the Observer.

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Some_attorneys_think_Gonzales_may_be_0530....

I just noticed that usually there is as many or more guests online here as there is regulars.

System admin.

Website error rocks global oil markets
World prices jump briefly after Tulsa TV station posts erroneous story.

http://www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.yahoo.c...

Yahoo News-AFP-links Dem. Patrick Kennedy’s bio and voting record to Rapist
By: John Amato on Tuesday, May 29th, 2007 at 2:01 PM - PDT I'm going to address this new ruling about the death penalty for pedophiles in another post, but Yahoo News, the AFP and Fanny Carrier need to issue a correction and an apology to Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) immediately. They linked his bio and voting record to a man who has the same name—and is sentenced to death for rape of a minor.

The only man among more than 3,300 prisoners on death row who stands to lose his life under the new law is 42-year-old Patrick Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), who was sentenced to death in Louisiana in 2003 for raping his companion's eight-year-old daughter.

C&L's own Mark Groubert saw this last night and passed it on to me. This is outrageous. I doubt the Democratic Congressman knows about this, but now it'll be all over the Internet. A common criticism about bloggers I hear from the MSM is that we don't have editors monitoring our work. Ummm…Screen grabs below the fold.

Screen Grabs at link:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/05/29/yahoo-news-afp-links-dem-patric...

Republicans

_Ken Calvert of California, 8th term. ... This Guy Is My Rep. 8-)

_John Doolittle of California, 9th term. ...

_Jerry Lewis of California, 15th term. ... This Guy is Close by

_Gary Miller of California, 5th term. ...

_Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania, 3rd term. ...

_Rick Renzi of Arizona, 3rd term. ...

___

Democrats

_William J. Jefferson of Louisiana, 9th term. ...

_Alan Mollohan of West Virginia, 13th term. ...

sfgate.com

Free Democracy

omg that name.

at least we don't look anything alike.

When I saw JL
at the debate I realized I could be his stand in. : (

It's a beautiful day, especially any day that W does no damage!

hey there nobody. don't you ever work?

As little as I can get away with

Fuckoff you kick the nobody people!

Homeland Security Asks Sci-Fi Writers To Help Prevent Terror Attacks »

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

USA Today | Mimi Hall | May 30, 2007 02:36 PM

Looking to prevent the next terrorist attack, the Homeland Security Department is tapping into the wild imaginations of a group of self-described "deviant" thinkers: science-fiction writers.

"We spend our entire careers living in the future," says author Arlan Andrews, one of a handful of writers the government brought to Washington this month to attend a Homeland Security conference on science and technology.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/2007-05-29-deviant-thinkers-securit...

Anonymous: I had the same experience, and so it is with a very heavy heart that I say good-bye to Air America. Not all of us have Internet access on demand, and many of us rely on the old-fashioned radio airwaves to listen to AAR. But if I can't listen to Sam, quite frankly, I'm not interested in listening to the other hosts, as much as I respect and admire some of them. After all, to quote Paul Newman, if you have steak at home, why go out for hamburger? Good luck, Sam, and if you ever get a regular gig somewhere else, please let me know.

Us Army CH-47 Chinook helicopter shot down in Afghanistan. 10 people on board.

More info to come.

Pentagon believes fewer than 10 people on board.

I figured maybe you were tired of this crap, Sam. Guess not.

Not that I contribute much here in the first place, but I'm going on hiatus/strike. I'll be here for the shows, but that's about it, at least for now.

Cheers

I'm one microscopic kog
In his catastrophic plan

says LAPD chief By Jeremiah Marquez Associated Press,LOS ANGELES

LAPD Chief William Bratton said Tuesday that a breakdown in command at an immigration rally led officers to use force, swing batons and fire more than a hundred "non-lethal" projectiles to disperse a crowd of demonstrators and journalists.

"It was quite apparent ... it all broke down," Bratton said after the city's civilian Police Commission was given a minute-by-minute account of the May1 melee.

Reporters, demonstrators and others were pushed to the ground, struck with batons and targeted with almost 150 "non-lethal" rounds - including foam, sponge and bean bags - as officers in riot gear swept through MacArthur Park break up an immigration rally. More than 40 people were injured during the May 1 clashes, including nine members of the media and seven officers.

Bratton said there was confusion over who the incident commander was and that approval to use non-lethal projectiles was given by a commander who was a block away from the side of the park where officers opened fire. He also faulted poor communication and planning.

"We can do better than that. We have done better than that," Bratton said.
...

-Hey, when Alice and Dada show up...ask them...-

You have a different idea about all this than I do...ok? So..I don't mind what you think about it...& I just don't care enough to formulate a response to you with regard to Chavez...

Now CNN is reporting that Iran, possibly is arming the Taliban who they have been mortal enemies with for ages. The preface it with if the reports are true.

They say that the Taliban are getting armor piercing amunition and guns from the Iranians. The Iranians say they are not providing guns for the Taliban and are friends with the president of Afghanistan.

Othere reports are that it could be the rebel faction of the Iranians that are providing the arms.

All of a sudden it's the Iranians and not al Qaeda!! I think this was a way to have an excuse to attack Iran.

And the next report was from Condi Rice speaking to the Russians and telling them that the US is not trying to start the arms race again but the Russians aren't seeing it that way. All the reporters are mentioning a New Cold War starting.

More on this later.

Hey sorry if this is the wrong place to put this question. But I am a long time listener to Air America Radio and my favorite show has always been Majority Report/Sam Seder. Recently I have stumbled across the Alex Jones show and am not sure how to take it. Half of me is really intrigued and shocked, but the other half is thinking he is exagerrating things for ratings. Just wanted some opinions on the show, if it is worth lstening to or not. Some of the things he has said do ring true with me, but other stuff I am not so familiar with. Thanks for any feedback. I'm glad Sam is back at any rate!

Mike

The lead Story on my Local TV News ..... Kobe Bryant want's out of the Lakers ..... AND .... Lindsey Lohan off to Drug Rehab ... don't know how they can keep up with all that breaking news .... but they do.

8-)

Free Democracy

Chavez Takes on Opponents in Streets of Caracas

By Toby Westerman

CNSNews.com Correspondent
May 30, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - Facing one of its most serious crises, the government of Venezuela continues to use tear gas and rubber bullets against tens of thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators in the streets of Caracas.

President Hugo Chavez sent troops into the streets of his nation's capital to quell protests over the closure of Radio Caracas Television (RCTV), one of the last major sources of media opposition to his government.

The government accuses RCTV of violating broadcasting regulations, while critics say Chavez simply wants to silence a vocal opponent of the regime. Chavez on Wednesday turned his sights on another, smaller opposition news channel, Globovision, calling it an enemy of the state and accusing it of misreporting the RCTV story.

Chavez adamant as marchers fill streets

AP

Caracas: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez defended his decision not to renew the licence of a popular opposition-aligned television network and warned he might crack down on another TV station, accusing it of trying to incite attempts on his life.

Chavez said on Tuesday that his refusal to renew the licence of Radio Caracas Television, which went off the air at midnight on Sunday, was "a sovereign, legitimate decision." He broadly hinted that Globovision - one of the few channels that is still harshly anti-government - had encouraged attempts on his life and could also face sanctions.

"I recommend (Globovision) take a tranquiliser, that they slow down, because if not, I'm going to slow them down," Chavez said in a speech.

I hear him every now and then on Art Bell aka Coast to Coast. That's all I know about him.

'Doom' Scenario Would Decimate U.S. Cities

A Hiroshima-style bomb detonated in the heart of New York City would "obliterate” downtown, kill or severely injure half the people in the two-mile blast area, and expose many tens of thousands to radiation that would lead to cancer.

That’s the sobering disclosure from a soon-to-be-released report compiled by a blue ribbon panel of experts.

And the same horror would unfold in any major American city, according to the report to be released by the Preventive Defense Project at Harvard and Stanford University.

"This is a scary scenario. I hope it’s unlikely, but nobody can calculate the likelihood,” Ashton Carter, a former assistant Secretary of Defense in the Clinton administration and a co-director of the panel, told the New York Post.

http://www.daylightondemand.org/

Mitt Romney: Not 'Near Enough Troops' in Iraq

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Wednesday repeated his call to add more troops, saying the Iraq war had left the nation's military seriously stressed.

The former governor of Massachusetts said he supported President Bush's decision to intervene in Iraq, but conceded that the effort has had plenty of missteps.

"I think we've made a number of mistakes," said Romney, opening a two-day campaign trip to Iowa by speaking to a business group. "We were underprepared for what developed. I don't think we had anywhere near enough troops."

Romney said he supports adding at least 100,000 troops to the military.

Cold War II?
Compared to a decade or so ago, the belief in the messianic power of democracy and markets has reached a new low. Why another face-off between Washington and Moscow isn’t as impossible as you might think.

By Michael Hirsh
Newsweek
Updated: 58 minutes ago
May 30, 2007 - It wasn’t like Harry and “Uncle Joe” at all. Or was it? Sixty-two years ago, here at Potsdam, Harry Truman and Joe Stalin seemed to get along famously, putting on a display of bonhomie that belied how fast their relationship was about to go into a deep freeze. During the conference after the surrender of Nazi Germany, the U.S. president quietly received a message that said, “Babies satisfactorily born,” meaning the world’s first successful atomic test had just occurred at Los Alamos, N.M. The cold war—and the start of a four-decadelong arms race—was just a year or so away. On Wednesday, representatives of the major powers met again in the Berlin suburb of Potsdam, this time for a G8 meeting. Such gatherings are typically relentlessly amiable, and so the delegates tried to make it this time. But beneath the forced grins, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov exchanged icy, even scary, words that suggested a new cold war is not inconceivable. “The arms race is starting again,” Lavrov said flatly.

The immediate issue was a missile-defense shield that Washington is trying to set up in Poland and the Czech Republic. Rice, in remarks the day before on her plane, had dismissed Russian concerns that the shield was aimed at Moscow as “ludicrous.” The United States only intended to guard against nukes from smaller countries like North Korea and Iran, she said. But Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is still steamed over George W. Bush's unilateral withdrawal from the antiballistic-missile treaty, warned Washington against turning Europe into a “powder keg” and promptly fired off a new test ICBM. His deputy prime minister and putative successor, Sergei Ivanov, boasted that Russia “has new tactical and strategic complexes that are capable of overcoming any existing or future missile-defense systems." Asked about Rice’s comments at Potsdam, Foreign Minister Lavrov was cutting—and uncompromising. “There is nothing ludicrous about” Russia’s concerns, he snapped. The U.S. secretary of State, seeking desperately to keep the atmosphere light-hearted, tried a mild joke (to the extent that mass destruction can be funny). “I would note that President Putin said yesterday that Russia would ... destroy any shield,” she said. “We quite agree.” There were a few chuckles in the room. But the laughing ended when Lavrov said: “I hope that nobody has to actually prove that Condi’s right about that.”

This is rough language indeed for a meeting that’s supposed to represent the calm “world of ‘post-history’,” where great nations rise above such petty threats and make war no more. The atmosphere between Washington and Moscow has grown so tense—not only over this, but over Putin’s bullying on energy supplies, over continuing aggressive U.S. moves to bring former Soviet satellites and states into NATO, and over smaller issues like independence for Kosovo—that Bush resorted to the only card he has left, his still-cordial personal relationship with the Russian president. The White House abruptly announced Wednesday that the president was inviting Putin to the Bush family home in Kennebunkport, Maine, for two days in July. As if sensing that things had spiraled out of control in Potsdam, Rice interrupted the end of the news conference Wednesday to deliver what an aide described an impromptu confirmation of the visit. In Maine, Lavrov added humorlessly, “All sorts of areas where our positions do not coincide will be discussed.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18945566/site/newsweek/?from=rss

yessiree bob, that george bush is doing a heck of a job keeping us safe.

why just imagine what might have happened to new orleans if a democrat had been voted president.

That there are 7 dead in that Chinook Helicopter and that the copter was hit with a rocket-propelled grenade.

The UN recue unit rushed to the helicopter and were ambushed on the way to the copter and had to call in Air protection.

Thanks to the Bush admin. They could f*ck up a one car funeral!

Helicopter Crashes in Afghanistan
Chinook Helicopter Crashes in Southern Afghanistan; Taliban Claims Responsibility

By NOOR KHAN Associated Press Writer
KANDAHAR, Afghanistan May 30, 2007 (AP)
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NATO said one of its helicopters crashed in southern Afghanistan on Wednesday evening, and a Taliban spokesman claimed the militant group had shot it down.

A U.S. military official said it was a CH-47 Chinook helicopter. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release details.

NATO's International Security Assistance Force said the helicopter went down around 9 p.m. local time but gave no other details. A U.S. military spokesman at Bagram Air Base referred all questions to ISAF headquarters.

A purported Taliban spokesman, Qari Yousef Ahmadi, said in a telephone call to The Associated Press that militants had shot the helicopter down in Helmand province. That claim could not be immediately verified.

Ahmadi said the helicopter was shot down in the Kajaki district and that everyone on board died. He did not offer any proof of the claim.

"We have weapons that we have used to target helicopters before," he said.

Kajaki is the site of a large hydroelectric dam that is being repaired. It has been the scene of heavy fighting in recent months, mostly by British troops who operate in the region. A battalion of U.S. forces with the 82nd Airborne have also been in combat in Helmand province recently.

Helicopter crashes in Afghanistan have been relatively rare. A Chinook crashed in February in the southern province of Zabul, killing eight U.S. servicemembers. Officials ruled out enemy fire as the cause.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=3227304&CMP=OTC-RSSFeed...

Is Jeff Gannon back in The Whitehouse Press Corps,and visiting
The Whitehouse again??

FBI: Violent crime still increasing By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer
6 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Violent crime kept climbing in 2006, a top FBI official said Wednesday, previewing a report detailing nationwide increases in murders, robberies and other felonies for a second straight year.

The rising crime rate, in an FBI report expected next week, counters Justice Department attempts to tamp down violence by sending more funds to local police and studying U.S. cities for clues on how the increase began.

Asked if the report would show crime rates are still rising, FBI Assistant Director John Miller said: "I think you can anticipate it will." He declined to say by how much.

Miller said the FBI's findings will largely mirror those of the Police Executive Research Forum, a Washington think-tank that in March reported spikes in the number of big-city murders, robberies and gun crimes.

That survey "showed that there would be, in all likelihood, a continued uptick in violent crime, particularly among midsized American cities," Miller said during an interview taped for C-SPAN's Newsmakers program. "The data we're going to release Monday will contain no big surprises in that regard."

Preliminary numbers the FBI released in December showed violent crimes rose by 3.7 percent nationwide during the first six months of 2006.

The crime hike marks the latest blow to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who has targeted neighborhood violence as a top priority. Gonzales took office in early 2005, when violent crime rose by 2.2 percent in the first annual increase since 2001.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070530/ap_on_go_ot/fbi_crime_4

How nice to see Cheney smile with his new grandchild, but did they adopt the child, where are the parents?

By: Nicole Belle on Wednesday, May 30th, 2007 at 10:45 AM - PDT

In response to CREW's lawsuit over access to what should be public records, we learned that Vice President Cheney's lawyer told the Secret Service that visitor logs were his records, not theirs. That meant Cheney could prevent any public access. Before you read the AP article, know CREW's position according to our counsel, Anne Weismann: "The latest filings make clear that the administration has been destroying documents and entering into secret agreements in violation of the law."

Crew Has More

Yeah, I agree about WWRL. There's really almost nothing to listen to on WWRL, NYC's Air America station. I listen to Democracy Now on WBAI, 99.5FM in the morning.

WWRL s*cks, they've been broadcasting infomercials on Sunday afternoons and have the Bush whore Armstrong Williams on weekday mornings and re-broadcast in the evenings. Apparently, even Alan Colmes has a show. Who's next, Pat Buchanan?

We don't enjoy huddling around our measly computer with no speakers to stream the only good shows that are left: Sam Seder show (#1 by far) and the Air Americans with Mark Riley and Laura Flanders. And sometimes we're in a location, weekends unfortunately, with only a phone modem.

What's a gal to do?

AP/CREW:

30 May 2007 // WASHINGTON -- A half dozen federal investigations into the activities of Republican lawmakers are raising new worries for GOP leaders who hope to regain the House majority they lost last fall.

Con't

UPI/CREW:
30 May 2007 // The top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee said he wants to again interview former CIA officer Valerie Plame.

Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., said Plame has given inconsistent accounts of how her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, was sent to Africa to investigate reports that Iraq was trying to get uranium there, USA Today reported.

Plame's lawyer, Melanie Sloan, told USA Today questioning her account now is an attempt to divert attention from the "real wrong here -- a White House that outed a covert operative and undermined national security."

Link

C&L:

By: Nicole Belle on Wednesday, May 30th, 2007 at 10:01 AM - PDT In the past, pollsters have given us some ridiculously inane reasons why we choose to vote for or to not vote for a candidate, most of which has very little to do with their actual competence in doing the job. In 2000, I was horrified to see anti-intellectualism used to smear Al Gore over the "man-you-want-to-have-a-beer-with" George W. Bush. I just didn't want to believe that half of the country would prefer someone that embraced his lack of intellectual curiosity as the man that should run the last remaining world superpower (and you can see how well that's worked out for us).

Con't

Political Affairs Magazine
Free Speech and the Corporate Media
5-30-07, 9:24 am

If a news station supports an anti-democratic coup against a democratically elected president, does that station have the right to broadcast ultra-right propaganda over public airwaves? If the government shuts that station down for its democratic violations, does that constitute an attack on freedom of speech? Do the people of a country have the right to decide what they allow broadcasted in their airspace? Or do the corporations have that right?

These are some of the central questions generated by Venezuela’s recent shutdown of “RCTV”, a right-wing television channel that supported the coup against Hugo Chavez in 2002. The station reported several lies during the coup, actively encouraged citizens to riot against the government, and then failed to report Chavez’s return to power three days later, instead deciding to broadcast cartoons.

Now, the Venezuelan government has declined to renew RCTV’s broadcast license, and in it’s place, has created a new progressive public television channel. RCTV, obviously facing a big dip in their profits (since they can no longer broadcast in Venezuela), has used their remaining corporate media friends and contacts to incite several protests all across the country, a few of which have turned violent. At the same time, pro-socialist and progressive forces have staged several mass rallies in support of the government’s decision to rid their country of the right-wing propaganda machine.

So who is the greater threat to democracy? A television station with a large audience, vast amounts of wealth, and a proven willingness to lie to it’s viewers and incite them to violence and large-scale anti-democratic actions like, say, a coup? Or a democratically elected government supported by a majority of the population that decides to revoke the news station’s license to broadcast lies over public airwaves?

And isn’t there something hypocritical about a corporation screaming about the violation of its democratic right to free speech, when it has a well documented history of grossly anti-democratic behavior?

In fact, RCTV’s actions, had they taken place in practically any major industrialized democracy around the world, would quite likely have resulted in a much quicker license revocation. The FCC has certainly barred media stations from broadcasting for actions far less significant than treason in the US.
...

Haditha marine commander in court

Israel-Palestine on Record: How the New York Times Misreports Conflict in the Middle East

Shape Up Democrats: Anybody But Bush Will Not Do, By Paul A. Donovan

5/30/07

With the 2008 election approaching fast, I find myself with the same unsettled feeling I had in the last presidential race to the bottom. Perhaps it is because I feel that the age-old maxim, “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it,” is as true for today as it was in 2004. Fact is, if we do not wake up quick, and start pressing the current Democratic Party frontrunners Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama, to be more leftist, or in other words to be more like Presidential candidate Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), then we can hope for little substantive change in the next administration.
...

Gitmo detainee apparently kills himself 7 minutes ago

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A Saudi Arabian detainee at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay apparently committed suicide Wednesday, the U.S. military said.

The detainee was found unresponsive in his cell by guards in the afternoon, the military said in a statement from U.S. Southern Command, which oversees the military prison on the U.S. Naval Base in southeast Cuba. Attempts to revive him were not successful, it said.

It was the fourth suicide at Guantanamo since the prison camp opened in January 2002. On June 10, 2006, two Saudi detainees and one Yemeni hanged themselves with sheets.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070530/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/guantanamo_suicide...

I was born in Missouri...in one of the two major cities. Until recently I never thought of Missouri as a backwoods, Deliverance-like, unscientific, snake-handling cauldron of ignorance. I still don't think of the two major cities in that way.

However, the state's hinterlands have racked-up a number of embarrassing Favorite Sons over the years. Even the formerly harmless and mundane are becoming venomous and annoying (I'm thinking of Kit Bond).

Sure, John Danforth is a Missourian and, though he is a bona-fide preacher, he is of the educated variety and a voice of reason. His pro stem-cell-research crusade is admirable.

But he occupies a lonely perch on one side of the scale. On the other side looms Roy Blunt (a Tom DeLay clone) and his Missouri Governor son, Also Roy Blunt, Jr. Then there is John "Don't Make Me Sore" Ashcroft, recently resurrected from the depths of absurdity by the revelation that he told Gonzales and Company to go find themselves another religious nutjob patsy during their visit to his pancreatic sick bed, and has been further slightly elevated by the recent news that Monica "Sunday School J.D." Goodling might have been responsible for covering up Lady Justice's marble boobs as well as covering up for a number of other Justice boobs.

Missouri also sported a consummate party hack, Senator Jim Talent, albeit briefly. I will always be indebted to Claire McCaskill for proving yet another War Dog prediction useless (he over-weighted the dentistry deprived, Branson fan, rural voter before the educated urban precincts returns were in).

I don't know what to think of Missouri's Sons anymore? I hate to think that the State Motto will become "Not As Backward As Alabama."

It could be worse. I could have been born in Oklahoma.

Now that I see all the politicians you have/had .... you got screwed.

Free Democracy

Submitted by Kevin © on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 8:02pm.
Now that I see all the politicians you have/had .... you got screwed
--------------------------------------
Pass the gas.

... looks like Fred Thompson.

Richardson, Dodd out of Fox debate. Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) and Gov. Bill Richardson (D-NM) confirmed today that they won’t take part in the Fox News/CBC presidential debate. (They join former Sen. John Edwards (D-NC), and Sens. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Barack Obama (D-IL).) If the debate is held as planned, it will pit Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) against Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) and former Sen. Mike Gravel (D-AK).

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/30/richardson-dodd-out-of-fox-debate/

National Review’s Rich Lowry: “Was talking to an influential Republican strategist who thinks if Iraq looks the way it does now in September, Bush will lose about 25 Senate Republicans on a bill with some sort of timetable for withdrawal.”

http://atrios.blogspot.com/2007_05_27_archive.html#1928332958196680582

Really. Take some hair off the monster and that's him.

Outta there!

The DOJ has just told the Arkansas congressional delegation that Tim Griffin -- star player in the US Attorney Purge story -- is out as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas.

His resignation is effective Friday, June 1st.

No word on whether Griffin is taking that job as campaign manager for Fred Thompson's incipient presidential campaign. (No, we kid you not ...)

-- Josh Marshall

http://www.arktimes.com/blogs/arkansasblog/2007/05/its_official_4.aspx

Randi joked about Gannon on the list. But it could have also been implications of the Palfrey nature or Oil Executives.

The story leaves a lot to speculation. What if it was all of the above? An orgy of malcontents I think.

Bush to Nominate Zoellick as World Bank President
By Andrew Buncombe
The Independent UK

Wednesday 30 May 2007

President George Bush will today nominate Robert Zoellick - a former government official with close links to corporate America - to take over as head of the controversy-stricken World Bank.

Officials in Washington said that Mr Bush expected the board of the bank to accept the nomination, thereby drawing a line under the furore surrounding the organisation's out-going president, Paul Wolfowitz. The US - which as the bank's biggest lender traditionally nominates its president - is insistent that another American fill the top job despite calls from some quarters to open the process to candidates from across the world.

Mr Zoellick's experience in finance and diplomacy "make him uniquely prepared to take on this challenge," a Bush administration official said last night.

"He has the trust and respect of many officials around the world and believes deeply in the World Bank's mission of tackling poverty." But critics of the bank will likely focus on Mr Zoellick's close links to corporate America. He is the head of investment bank Goldman Sachs and previously he served on the board of Enron, the world's largest oil company.

In government Mr Zoellick served at the treasury under President Bush Sr and under the current president he served as deputy Secretary of State and US Trade Representative. He was creditted with playing a leading role in the peaceful reunification of Germany and the Doha trade talks.

If confirmed by the bank's 24-member board, Mr Zoellick will replace Mr Wolfowitz, who is stepping down on 30 June following an ethics controversy that erupted after it emerged he had helped his girlfriend receive a sizeable compensation package from the bank.

The affair prompted widespread calls for the resignation of Mr Wolfowitz, distrusted by many because of his role as an architect of the Iraq war while deputy Defence Secretary.

Observers said Mr Zoellick would face the challenge of regaining trust, rebuilding credibility and working to settle internal disputes within the 185-member organisation. In addition, he will have to persuade those member countries to contribute about $30bn (£15bn) over the coming years to fund a new showcase programme that provides interest-free loans to the world's poorest countries.

Politically, Mr Zoellick is closely aligned with the neo-conservatives. In 1998 he was a signatory to the mission statements of the Project for the New American Century, which called for increased military budgets and the ousting of Saddam.

A couple of years later he wrote an essay in Foreign Affairs magazine which imagined a US foreign policy far more interventionist than initially imagined by Mr Bush as he sought the presidency. He wrote: "A modern Republican foreign policy recognises that there is still evil in the world, people who hate America and the ideas for which it stands.

"Today, we face enemies who are hard at work to develop nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons, along with the missiles to deliver them. The United States must remain vigilant and have the strength to defeat its enemies."

Mr Zoellick, a keen long-distance runner, was selected for the nomination following a search process led by the US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/053007N.shtml

Isn't that the Creature from the Black Lagoon?

That's Frank Thompson. The soon to announce johnny come lately to the GOP presidential candidate list.

says freaked out BB reader

U.S. government fights to keep meatpackers from testing all slaughtered cattle for mad cow

The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.

The Agriculture Department tests fewer than 1 percent of slaughtered cows for the disease, which can be fatal to humans who eat tainted beef. A beef producer in the western state of Kansas, Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, wants to test all of its cows.

Larger meat companies feared that move because, if Creekstone should test its meat and advertised it as safe, they might have to perform the expensive tests on their larger herds as well.
...

Yes it is ..... 8-)

That's all I've got. It seemed funny at the time.

Not since the begining of time has the world known terror like this?

or the real thing ..... Caution Nude First Lady ....

http://ladybunny.net/blog/uploaded_images/download-1.php-768738.jpg

Free Democracy

George has work to do trimming the bushes on the ranch.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55925

WND Exclusive THE NEW WORLD DISORDER
Emergency detention plan: 'This way to the camps!'
Directive from Bush allows president extraordinary powers in national crisis

Halliburton's former engineering and construction subsidiary has a contingency contract with the Department of Homeland Security to construct detention facilities in the event of a national emergency, according to WND columnist Jerome Corsi.

As Corsi reported last week, President Bush recently signed a little-reported National Security and Homeland Security Directive granting extraordinary powers to the president in the event of a declared national emergency, apparently without congressional approval or oversight.

Houston-based KBR was awarded an initial $385 million contract in January 2006 for one year, with four one-year options extended into 2007. KBR held a previous emergency detention contract with ICE from 2000 to 2005.

GOP plots blue-slip attack

By Elana Schor and Jackie Kucinich
May 30, 2007

House conservatives are ready to stop the Senate immigration bill in its tracks with a potent procedural weapon should the contentious measure win passage in the upper chamber.

The trump card conservatives may hold is a constitutional rule that revenue-related bills must originate in the House. The Senate immigration measure requires that illegal immigrants pay back taxes before becoming citizens, opening the door to a House protest, dubbed a “blue slip” for the color of its paper.

House Republicans used the same back-taxes mandate for a blue-slip threat that derailed last year’s immigration conference. The new Senate bill still must survive two more weeks of voter scrutiny and contentious amendments, but several conservatives already are lying in wait for the Senate to “make the same mistake twice,” as one House GOP aide put it.

“If we get an opportunity to do it, believe me, we’ll do it,” the aide said. “I think it’s going to be a matter of who will get there first. A number of people in the House are dying to be fingered as the person who killed [the Senate bill].”
...

Operation Freedom From Iraqis
By Frank Rich
The New York Times

Sunday 27 May 2007

When all else fails, those pious Americans who conceived and directed the Iraq war fall back on moral self-congratulation: at least we brought liberty and democracy to an oppressed people. But that last-ditch rationalization has now become America's sorriest self-delusion in this tragedy.

However wholeheartedly we disposed of their horrific dictator, the Iraqis were always pawns on the geopolitical chessboard rather than actual people in the administration's reckless bet to "transform" the Middle East. From "Stuff happens!" on, nearly every aspect of Washington policy in Iraq exuded contempt for the beneficiaries of our supposed munificence. Now this animus is completely out of the closet. Without Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz to kick around anymore, the war's dead-enders are pinning the fiasco on the Iraqis themselves. Our government abhors them almost as much as the Lou Dobbs spear carriers loathe those swarming "aliens" from Mexico.

Iraqis are clamoring to get out of Iraq. Two million have fled so far and nearly two million more have been displaced within the country. (That's a total of some 15 percent of the population.) Save the Children reported this month that Iraq's child-survival rate is falling faster than any other nation's. One Iraqi in eight is killed by illness or violence by the age of 5. Yet for all the words President Bush has lavished on Darfur and AIDS in Africa, there has been a deadly silence from him about what's happening in the country he gave "God's gift of freedom."

It's easy to see why. To admit that Iraqis are voting with their feet is to concede that American policy is in ruins. A "secure" Iraq is a mirage, and, worse, those who can afford to leave are the very professionals who might have helped build one. Thus the president says nothing about Iraq's humanitarian crisis, the worst in the Middle East since 1948, much as he tried to hide the American death toll in Iraq by keeping the troops' coffins off-camera and staying away from military funerals.

But his silence about Iraq's mass exodus is not merely another instance of deceptive White House P.R.; it's part of a policy with a huge human cost. The easiest way to keep the Iraqi plight out of sight, after all, is to prevent Iraqis from coming to America. And so we do, except for stray Shiites needed to remind us of purple fingers at State of the Union time or to frame the president in Rose Garden photo ops.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/052707C.shtml

This is either a good Photoshop Pict .....
Submitted by Kevin © on Wed, 05/30/2007 - 8:44pm.
or the real thing ..... Caution Nude First Lady ....
------------------------------------------------------
There are lady gardens...and then there are sod ranches.

Heck of a job Gonzo

Violent crime rises again since Alberto becomes AG.

Maybe a visit outside the "green" zone and military bubble.

http://akamat.wordpress.com/2007/05/30/gonzales-outed-as-hologram/

Taxman54: Jesus?

JcDaMessiah: Matthew. Hey.

Taxman54: I need to talk to you about something…

JcDaMessiah: Okay, I’m listening.

Taxman54: Well, I did something…sinful. Not just once, either.

JcDaMessiah: Okay…

Taxman54: I’ve been looking at dirty websites.

JcDaMessiah: Oh. Well, yeah, that is a problem.

Taxman54: I can’t help it! I know it’s bad and everything, but I can’t resist the
temptation. It’s like I don’t WANT to look at the sites, but before I know it, my hand is
moving the mouse and there I am again. I’m so sorry!

JcDaMessiah: Okay. Well, this may sound harsh, but you may have to cut it off…

Taxman54: My hand?

JcDaMessiah: No, your connection to the Internet.

Taxman54: Oh. Crap. But I use it all the time.

JcDaMessiah: If it offends thee, cut it off.

Taxman54: Can’t I at least go to dial-up?

http://oneeggshy.blogspot.com/2006/04/if-jesus-had-im.html

Soldiers to Lieberman: “When are we going to get out of here?”
By: John Amato @ 6:30 PM - PDT (Leila Fadel/MCT) Hey, Joe—how's that helmet and flak vest working out for you?

The night before, 30 other soldiers crowded around him with questions for the senator. He wrote them all down. At the top of his note card was the question he got from nearly every one of his fellow soldiers: "When are we going to get out of here?"

The rest was a laundry list. When would they have upgraded Humvees that could withstand the armor-penetrating weapons that U.S. officials claim are from Iran? When could they have body armor that was better in hot weather?—

Then Lieberman walked in, wearing a pair of sunglasses newly purchased from an Iraqi market that the military had taken him to in southeast Baghdad. He'd been equipped with a helmet and flak vest when he toured the market, which he described as bustling.

It was unclear if they ever asked their questions. "It's like everything else in this war," Adams said, referring to Baghdad. "It hasn't changed." …read on (h/t Id)

What a cool market. I wonder if it was as "bustling" for Linsday Graham and John McCain?

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/05/30/soldiers-to-lieberman-when-are-...

Even if there were a bustling Iraqi marketplace where people were unafraid...
Even if a U.S. politician could waltz around unprotected...
Even if life were at its hunky-doriest...

...filming a Senator wrapped-up like a rape-defense trainer, surrounded by heavily armed Marines, over-flown by Apache gunships whilst buying a few cheap trinkets does not present the message that he hoped to convey.

Are they idiots or do they think that we are idiots?

Both.

It's maddening, we can spend hundreds of billions to bring the poor souls of other countries democracy whether they want it or not, but when it comes to concrete needs we can't come up with the 19 billion needed to feed them. Check out the theborgenproject.org, more more information.

no good Anon.

guess who

notice the smiling log next to her hand

the upper torso is in Contrapposto

while the lower torso is resting on both legs. It's a very good photoshop.

May 30, 2007 -- Bush-Cheney rift. WMR's Washington sources have confirmed that a major rift has opened up between President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney over U.S. Iran policy. Cheney and the remaining neo-con cabal inside the Bush administration favor quick and decisive U.S. military action against Iran while Bush, backed by the Joint Chiefs of Staff, favor the current diplomatic negotiations with Iran, particularly the Baghdad Green Zone talks concerning Iraq's security.

Bush has reportedly bristled at Cheney's suggestion that he is a "wimp." The junior Bush has made no secret of his obsession with his father's "wimp" persona and has striven to prove his own machismo. Cheney's "wimp talk" has infuriated Bush, according to our sources.

Ever since Deputy National Security Adviser J.D. Crouch resigned abruptly on May 4 (the same day ABC News was poised to reveal White House officials on the "Washington Madam's" list of clients), Iran-felon and Middle East super-hawk Elliott Abrams has served as the virtual number two man at the National Security Council under Stephen Hadley, according to our White House sources. Cheney and Abrams serve as a White House duet calling for U.S. military action against Iran.

There are also indications that former President George H. W. Bush is quietly supporting a "whispering campaign" against Cheney in an attempt to force him and his remaining neo-con stalwarts from office.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

May 30, 2007 -- This editor has marveled, once again, at the neo-con Psyops war being waged by those "other" so-called progressive sites. It is clear that, as these sites constantly attack people ranging from Greg Palast and Mike Gravel to Cindy Sheehan, Joe Wilson, Ann Wright, Hugo Chavez, and others who challenge their false and misleading "group think" constructs of the world, their true intentions become very clear. This editor has been attacked for reporting on the nature of the Bush administration's and Israel's end game in Lebanon. And we are pleased to publish the following article by Dr. Franklin Lamb of the American University of Beirut. [WMR began reporting on the planned U.S. airbase in Lebanon over a year ago].

***

It's the US airbase, Stupid!

Memorandum on the planned US Airbase at Kleiaat,

Franklin Lamb

Bibnin Akkar, Lebanon, site of proposed US Airbase

Nahr al-Bared Palestinian refugee Camp

On July 14, 1982, (Bastille Day) the late Bashir Gemayel sat with Ariel Sharon, Raphael Eytan, and Danny Yalon at the French flag draped Le Chef Restaurant in Ashifeyih, east Beirut for one of their working lunches.

As was by now their habit, the Israelis were inclined to pressure their recently anointed selection for Lebanon's next president. They were there to present a request for one more favor from the handsome 'golden boy' of the Phalange movement, as their army tightened its noose around west Beirut.

...

They seriously underestimated the Palestinian hating, Muslim despising, would be Phoenician Prince, Le sheik Bashir. In misjudging the charismatic Maronite, the Israeli trio had failed to appreciate that, on any day of the week, the average Lebanese is rather more sophisticated, clever, descent, and patriotic than many Israeli or American politicians give them credit for.

Sharon pulled out a piece of paper from his chest pocket, as one Phalange security person who guarded the restaurant door recalls, and shoved it across the table to Basher. Written on it was Israel's 'one last request' which contained one word: Kleiaat.

The Israelis studied Bashir's face for a sign of his reaction as he picked up the small piece of paper. Bashir, appearing to suppress a yawn, had heard this 'one last request' hustle many times and had long felt contempt for what he called "these pressure lunches." Yet, former alter boy that he was, the martyred, and still much loved Lebanese patriot, pressed his lips together and listened politely as is the Lebanese custom, as Sharon expounded on the details.

Bashir, fuming inside and about to erupt in anger as he had sometimes done previously when he felt squeezed by Sharon, instead smiled at the anxious trio. He leaned forward and whispered with a voice they still say in his Bekfayya neighborhood, would make women swoon: 'you will not be disappointed, my dear friends".

Sharon was delirious with Bashir's response and slapped him on the back, a gesture of friendship that the former parish crucifer found deeply offensive.

Returning to his Achharifeh Headquarters, bounding up the stairs to his office to meet with aids, where less than two months later, he would die from an assassins' bomb which would level the building and killed and wounded more than 200, Bashir bellowed as he entered his office, "An Israeli air base in Lebanon? Those crazy sons of bitches won't get one grain of sand from Kleiaat."

Nearly 25 years to the day later, some well informed sources within the Palestinian community as well as, Sunni, Shia, and Christian political analysts, agree on one point. In a coma as he may be, but Ariel Sharon may still get that one last favor he coveted.

As residents of Bibnin Akkar, less tha two miles from the site of the proposed US base and the Lebanese daily newspaper Aldiyar speculate, construction of a US airbase on the grounds of the largely abandoned airbase at Klieaat in northern Lebanon may begin late this year. To make the project more palpable, it is being promoted as a 'US/NATO' base that will serve as the headquarters of a NATO rapid deployment force, helicopter squadrons, and Special Forces units.

...

read more...

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

earlier, I believe.

It's the US Airbase Stupid!

That's what this was all about [and the oil... and money]. Controlling the region.

here a base, there a base everywhere a middle-east base!

May 29, 2007 -- North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones has a new job proposal for outgoing World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz. Jones says Wolfowitz should be sent to Iraq to be mayor of Baghdad since Wolfowitz and "the neo-cons" are responsible for the Iraq quagmire.

If the White House agrees to Jones' idea, Wolfowitz will have to be issued with adult undergarments. Wolfowitz was staying at Baghdad's Al Rashid Hotel on October 26, 2003 when insurgents launched a rocket at the hotel. A U.S. Army Colonel was killed in the 6:10 am attack and 15 other people were injured, including 11 Americans and one Briton.

A British journalist contacted this editor after the attack and said he witnessed Wolfowitz, shaken and in tears, running through the hotel lobby in his underpants with a blanket thrown over his head. The journalist also clearly saw that the seat of Wolfowitz's underpants was soiled with a very visible stain.

Just more proof that "neo-con" and bravery is a non-sequiter.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

May 29, 2007 -- On May 22, WMR reported on the Gulfstream Aerospace G550 (Tail Number N90AM) that flew "Australian Taliban" David Hicks to Australia from incarceration in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The Gulfstream's travel itinerary over the past 7 years closely matches those of other CIA rendition aircraft.

A Securities and Exchange Commission EDGAR database search reveals that the actual owner of N90AM is ProFlite LLC, an air charter company that is a Delaware limited liability company. ProFlite's principal place of business is 233 Industrial Avenue, Teterboro, New Jersey, the same address listed in FAA records for Time Works LLC. ProFlite's SEC filings also reveal that N90AM has been leased to Monster Worldwide, Inc., a Delaware corporation having its principal place of business at 622 Third Avenue, New York, New York, 10017.

A search of the New Jersey State Business Gateway Services reveals that Time Works LLC is a Foreign Limited Liability Corporation whose home jurisdiction is Delaware. Time Works' corporation filing papers were submitted on December 21, 2000 and its last annual report was filed on December 16, 2005. The corporation's status is "Active." There are two other entities listed in New Jersey's business registration database but they are spelled "Timeworks."

Time Works LLC's President is listed as Christopher Cummings of 222 N.E. Monroe Street, 8th Floor, Peoria, Illinois 61602. Listed under Officers/Directors/Members is Jeffrey Corron of the same Peoria address. Cummings and Corron are also listed as officers of the Marquette Group, a marketing group with offices at 222 N.E. Monroe Street, 8th Floor, Peoria, IL 61602.

Corron is listed as a contributor to the Bush-Cheney 2004 primary campaign under CFO, "Market Group," 222 N.E. Monroe St., Peoria, IL 61602.

The Yellow Pages Association Industry Guide describes the Marquette Group as specializing "in generating qualified, measurable leads on a local level by promoting national brands through print and online Yellow Pages, interactive advertising and direct marketing."

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

Interesting. Good detective work, Wayne.

For Wallace, Dems -- but not Republicans -- who vote "no" on Iraq funding bill are willing to "let the money run out for the troops"

http://mediamatters.org/items/200705310001

Boo!

Don't Let AT&T Ruin the Internet
Icon

The FCC is about to auction off a significant chunk of our public airwaves to the giant telecom companies -- AT&T and Verizon -- who want to make our Internet less free. The official comment period is closing May 30th, but you can still urge key commissioners directly to stop AT&T and Verizon from ruining our Internet before it's too late.

The upcoming auction of the 700 megahertz slice of the spectrum concerns invaluable frequencies that are particularly well suited to wireless broadband because they can easily pass through walls. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to save room on the spectrum for universal broadband access, and to apply the rules of Net Neutrality to our mobile phones as well as our Internet.

But phone and cable lobbyists are currently pressuring the FCC to sell companies like AT&T and Verizon our airwaves -- in a flawed auction process -- so they can hoard this valuable spectrum, and stifle competitive and cheaper alternatives to their established networks.

Not only has Big Telecom facilitated illegal Bush administration wiretapping of American citizens, but they refuse to open their networks to competitive applications and services. They lobby Washington to stifle new innovations like Internet phone service and to destroy Net Neutrality, the one principle that protects equal opportunity and free choice on the Web. We need to end their stranglehold and demand better Internet and mobile services for everyone.

Tell the FCC: use public airwaves for the public good instead of giving away our wireless Internet to these price-gouging, privacy violating, anti-Net-Neutrality giants.

http://actforchange.workingassets.com/campaign/dump_att?rk=r7wlOz51uHwXE

EEVS also creates ANOTHER vast federal database to verify the work eligibility of ALL American citizen job applicants. The system would contain extraordinary personal information on everyone who seeks or holds a job, and all of it keyed to a new biometric Social Security number. When this bill passes (and it will), every time we apply for a job, the Department of Homeland Security will determine our eligibility to work in OUR nation. In the essence of FACT, NO ONE will be able to work in the u.S. without DHS approval. And, guess what.....

http://www.newswithviews.com/Levant/nancy90.htm

THE KAKISTOCRACY EXPOSES ITS HAND

The publication of National Security Presidential Directive 51 (Homeland Security Presidential Directive 20) on 9 May 2007, now available on the White House’s web site, represents another major stage in the devolution of the United States from a constitutional republic to a Caesaristic police state. Inadvertently, though, it exposes the primary danger to the continuation of its own power that the Establishment now fears. As well, it emphasizes the impossibility of any succor for the American people from the present “two” major political parties......

by Edward Vieira, Ph.D., JD

...

While President Bush authorizes the CIA to bankroll and arm the real Al-Qaeda in Iran

Calls to Vote for American Idol...........................63 million

Calls to Congress to End Iraq War Funding......122,000

"We have met the enemy and they are us."

*sigh again*

the third hour of sam's show was broadcast on wwrl on sunday
the first two hours were infomercials

John Elliot show - NovaM

KANO, Nigeria — Authorities in northern Nigeria have filed a $2 billion civil case and were preparing criminal charges against the U.S. drug company Pfizer, accusing it of conducting a drug experiment that led to deaths and disabilities in a group of children more than a decade ago, according to court papers.

Pfizer here

Food for thought - Pfizer has friends in high places.
Eminent Domain Decision Redux

From Landis List:

Do you have a link to
Landis List?Can't find it.
Thanks. :)

This is a diary about pole vaulting, a stoning, and women.
Worth reading!

___________________

"WOMEN" by Carnacki.

Excerpts:

“It seems a far cry from a pole vaulter to the death of a teenage girl in Iraq. It's not. The sexual objectification of Stokke and the murder of Khalil are both symptoms of the same problem: men don't treat women as equals.

You hear people mouth the words, but then you hear a Don Imus refer to female athletes as ‘hos’ and you read another account of a young woman murdered by an estranged boyfriend. It's enough to make me sick of my entire gender.

We still treat half of the species as if they're inferior even though they pole vault, break up bar brawls, nurse wounds and most miraculously of all give birth to continue the species.

I want to believe it is getting better for women, but as optimistic as I tend to be it's hard for me to see much cause for hope because men have made such a mess of the world. When I do see hope, it's with people like Stokke and my girls and many other women leading the way.”

Link:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/5/30/1227/68782

___________________

Highly recommended comment by Meteor Blades:

“I disagree intensely ...

...with I am not really qualified to write about women."

"Men against sexism should and MUST write about women to educate other men who still don't 'get it.' You've done a fine job of that, Carnacki."

CNN's Jack Cafferty gave a big shout out to our buddies at CREW today. It's about Dick Cheney hiding the list of conservative religious nuts who have visited him at the vice president's mansion.

was a good day here

and here.

good posts, thanks!

NYT: Editorial

Published: May 31, 2007

The Supreme Court struck a blow for discrimination this week by stripping a key civil rights law of much of its potency. The majority opinion, by Justice Samuel Alito, forced an unreasonable reading on the law, and tossed aside longstanding precedents to rule in favor of an Alabama employer that had underpaid a female employee for years. The ruling is the latest indication that a court that once proudly stood up for the disadvantaged is increasingly protective of the powerful.

Con't

Fortunately, Congress can amend the law to undo this damaging decision. It should do so without delay.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
This Congress?!I wouldn't count on it!They can't find their asses from

from their elbows!!

Cartoon

Ann Coulter, Bill O'Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Lynne Cheney, and James
Dobson are treading water stranded in the middle of the ocean. They each
have one hand on the same life preserver ring. They all know the ring is
just adequate enough to keep 1 person afloat. Who survives?

Before they can fight over who gets the life preserver, they are attacked and eaten by two giant white sharks. Afterwards, one of the white sharks says to the other, "I love right-wingers, they're delicious."

Everyone sleeping in today!

Attorney targeted for protecting Native American votes.

“For more than 15 years, clean-cut, square-jawed Tom Heffelfinger was the embodiment of a tough Republican prosecutor,” the L.A. Times reports. “By the time Heffelfinger resigned last year, his office had collected a string of awards and commendations from the Justice Department.” So why was he targeted for firing?

Part of the reason, government documents and other evidence suggest, is that he tried to protect voting rights for Native Americans.

At a time when GOP activists wanted U.S. attorneys to concentrate on pursuing voter fraud cases, Heffelfinger’s office was expressing deep concern about the effect of a state directive that could have the effect of discouraging Indians in Minnesota from casting ballots.

Citing requirements in a new state election law, Republican Secretary of State Mary Kiffmeyer directed that tribal ID cards could not be used for voter identification by Native Americans living off reservations. Heffelfinger and his staff feared that the ruling could result in discrimination against Indian voters. Many do not have driver’s licenses or forms of identification other than the tribes’ photo IDs.

The Times adds, “About three months after Heffelfinger’s office raised the issue of tribal ID cards and nonreservation Indians in an October 2004 memo, his name appeared on a list of U.S. attorneys singled out for possible firing.”

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-usatty31may31,0,321...

fellow progressives and lurking conservatives...

Pfizer being sued for testing new drugs on children
by Chris in Paris · 5/31/2007 03:40:00 AM ET

The Washington Post has been covering the subject of Big Pharma testing in the developing world for years. In Africa it is not unusual to hear rumors of such testing and distrust of Big Pharma is widespread. If people volunteer for experimental treatment, perhaps, but the allegations in this lawsuit are horrifying not to mention illegal, with a complete disregard for human rights.

The panel said Pfizer administered an oral form of Trovan that apparently had never been given to children with meningitis. It said there were no records documenting that Pfizer told the children or their parents that they were part of a drug trial. And it said an approval letter from a Nigerian ethics committee, which Pfizer used to justify its actions, was a sham concocted long after the trial ended.

"The families of the children who [Pfizer] used as laboratory guinea pigs were led to believe and in fact understood that the Defendants were providing their children with volunteer relief, clearly focused humanitarian medical intervention and nothing more," the lawsuit says.

Parents were not told that alternative treatments were available, it adds.

The suit charges that parents were barred from Pfizer's ward and that the company's own lab tests had shown Trovan's life-threatening side effects. Researchers allegedly administered the comparison drug, Rocephin, in dangerously low doses to make Trovan look more effective.
This is very troubling.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/05/pfizer-being-sued-for-testing-new-dru...

How is O-hoho today?

hot and muggy. kids are out of school. creation museum is still getting undue attention / promotion in the paper. but i feel much safer now that our glorious legislature has passed new rules for strip clubs. god forbid they deal with minor issues like school funding or revitalizing the rust belt.

25 killed in suicide bombing in Fallujah
1 hour, 50 minutes ago
BAGHDAD - A suicide bomber hit a police recruiting center in Fallujah on Thursday, killing at least 25 people and wounding 50, police said. U.S. forces backed by helicopter gunships clashed with suspected al-Qaida gunmen in western Baghdad in an engagement that lasted several hours.

5 Americans among 7 dead in Afghan crash
24 minutes ago
KABUL, Afghanistan - NATO troops on Thursday secured the wreckage of a CH-47 Chinook helicopter apparently shot down by Taliban militants, an attack that killed everyone on board — five U.S. soldiers, a Canadian and a Briton, officials said.

CDC seeks those who sat near TB patient
2 hours, 34 minutes ago
ATLANTA - Health officials in North America and Europe sought passenger lists Wednesday for two trans-Atlantic airline flights in their effort to find about 80 people who sat near a honeymooner infected with a dangerous drug-resistant form of tuberculosis.

Lugovoi: British involved in spy's death
2 hours, 20 minutes ago
MOSCOW - The Russian businessman whom Britain has named as a suspect in the killing of ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko claimed Thursday that he has evidence of British special services' involvement in the poisoning death.

Economy nearly stalled in first quarter
1 minute ago
WASHINGTON - The economy nearly stalled in the first quarter with growth slowing to a pace of just 0.6 percent. That was the worst three-month showing in over four years.

Illinois wants to put a new tax on energy like electric, gas, etc.

Of course the cost of energy has risen and putting a higher tax on it will only hurt, uhm, EVERYONE!!!

Is anyone talking about this?
http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/05/30/churchill

Putin says missile test response to U.S. moves
35 minutes ago
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's test firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile on Tuesday was in response to U.S. steps that have sparked an arms race and undermined world security, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.

U.S. spars with Iran before Iran-EU nuclear talks
2 hours, 58 minutes ago
MADRID (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Thursday it was time for Iran to change its nuclear course or be isolated, but Tehran remained defiant hours ahead of talks on the issue with the European Union.

Stiglitz calls new World Bank boss "protectionist"
Thu May 31, 5:30 AM ET
ROME (Reuters) - The World Bank's former chief economist attacked its proposed new chief Robert Zoellick as a man of protectionism and said his nomination was a "wasted opportunity" for the bank.

who want to suspend the gas tax to give consumers some price relief?

personally i think thats cutting off the nose to spite the face, because the money to maintain the roads needs to come from somewhere. the other thing thats been suggested is that the current situation has shown that consumers will pay north of 3 dollars for gas so that if the tax was suspended, the oil companies would just jack up their portion and stuff even more money in their pockets.

http://www.kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/s11/churchill_cockburn.html

This "war on terror" has successfully produced terror! Read and try to feel the terror as Cindy writes of the "thousands of broken hearts." "How do you put behind you the screaming mothers on both sides of the conflict? How does the agony you have created escape you? It will never escape me I can't run far enough to get away from it."

The Democrats did not do it! They did not listen to Cindy or those mothers or the American people who gave them their vote last November. They did not do it!

Cindy wrote that the Camp Casey Peace Institution will meet in Philadelphia on July 4th "to try and figure out this 'two' party system that is brought and paid for by the war machine which has a stranglehold on every aspect of our lives." Cindy is leaving the Democratic Party because to stay with the Democrats is to "stay the course" of disaster lead by the Republican administration.

She is leaving the Democratic Party, for they "have failed" those who put them in power "to change the direction our country is heading."

"We did not elect you to help sink our ship of state but to guide it to safe harborWe gave you a chance, you betrayed us."

Dr. Jean Daniels

(UAP) Presidente-para-Vivo Hugo Chavez today announced that he was opening several dozen "day spas" specifically tailored for his political opponents. These spas located in the hinterlands of Venezuela's rainforest, will feature plenty of exercise, a selective diet, and (to insure no favoristism) an egalitarian dress code involving single sackcloth shirts and pants and occasionally shoes.

Chavez said that his opponents were free to enjoy the amenities of these spas for as long as they wish, or until they "repent of their bougeouise Yanqui-inspired attempts at counter-revolution."

American supporters of the Venezuelan President hail the decision to concentrate these people in camps that will allow them to enjoy all the fresh air and sunshine that is so common in the South American country.

"I think it's, like, real cool," said Alice Moonflower of Berkeley, California, "That Ooh-go is showing that he can be nice to even those who, inspired by the CIA, wish to overthrow his peaceful, benevolent rule!"

for Child endangerment and driving while under the influence.

Chip off the old block.

No.I was just writing another Nasty letter to my Senator.Senator Feinstein.

Which reminds me.If you guys don't see me on the blog for
a few days.Pass around the hat,and Bail Me Out Please!!

Nothing criminal,but pissed.
But,ya never know these days.

Chavez Opens "Day Spas" For Political Opponents--
Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 9:22am

That's just Cold!

Don't you just love Summer..???

I know I do...!!

Bike rides..

Cookouts...

Boating...

Trips to Branson..!!!

This is gonna be another great Summer...

Fun ... Fun ... Fun ...

While US and Venezuelan corporate press crow about the “unfair” targeting of RCTV; while even some segments of the US Left express “concern” about press freedoms in Venezuela; an examination of the facts leads one to this clear conclusion: these folks are full of a substance that emanates from the hind end of a male bovine.

Fact: not renewing the broadcasting license of coup plotters, lawbreakers, and liars like RCTV is the kind of thing it takes to defend Venezuela and make it the haven of free speech, free media, and participatory democracy that it is today.

Ha ha ha ha ha...

That a good one..!!!

I coulda told her the Dems don't want no part of that Crazy Talk...

But she wouldn't have listened...

Janeane didn't listen..!!

No they are both gone..!!!

====================================================

Cindy is leaving the Democratic Party because to stay with the Democrats is to "stay the course" of disaster lead by the Republican administration.

She is leaving the Democratic Party, for they "have failed" those who put them in power "to change the direction our country is heading."

Senate foes accept electric rate freeze
ComEd, Ameren executives predict dark days ahead

By Jeffrey Meitrodt
Tribune staff reporter
Published May 31, 2007
SPRINGFIELD -- In a dramatic turnaround, a Senate committee backed legislation Wednesday that would freeze electric utility rates statewide at last year's levels for three years, potentially delivering billions of dollars in relief to customers who have been shocked by skyrocketing utility bills.

Though Senate President Emil Jones, an ally of Commonwealth Edison, said a freeze is "not the proper way to go," he didn't block the bill from being heard in the Senate Executive Committee, which he closely controls. The panel approved the measure 7-3.

The move appeared to clear the way for passage of a measure that many lawmakers wrote off as dead a month ago, after Jones' floor leaders used an obscure parliamentary maneuver to derail a statewide freeze. The legislation, which the House passed 92-5 in March, will go to the governor if the full Senate approves it.

Senate Majority Leader Debbie Halvorson (D-Crete), who voted against the freeze, said she thinks the bill will pass.

Commonwealth Edison and Ameren Corp. have offered $500 million in rate relief and customer assistance if lawmakers do not enact a freeze, but most lawmakers rejected the offer as inadequate. Democrats and Republicans expressed hope that Wednesday's actions, including a separate House hearing that advanced a bill to radically overhaul the entire electric industry, will prompt the companies to sweeten their offer.

(The rate relief they offered was, get this, time payments, you could pay on time with no penalty)

The battle over electric rates has consumed lawmakers this year, with many threatening to withhold their votes on a budget until relief is provided to customers, some of whom have seen electric bills triple since a decade-old freeze ended in January.

"In my district, electric rates are more important than anything else we're doing right now," said Sen. Gary Forby (D-Benton), who watched in frustration last month when Jones' allies managed to undo a 33-24 vote in favor of a statewide freeze. "I can't go home without something being done on electric rates."

This Venezuelan station didn't get it's license renewed, and it's like a slap in the face to corporate media.

haha!

Fact: not renewing the broadcasting license of coup plotters, lawbreakers, and liars like RCTV is the kind of thing it takes to defend Venezuela and make it the haven of free speech, free media, and participatory democracy that it is today.

============================================================

1. Got to tamp down that opposition..!!!

============================================================

Butt Hole is Back!

Hahahahahaha...

That would be bad news for the Jon Stewart and the Daily Show....

I wonder if our little Libbies would scream if Jon Stewart were sent to Club Gitmo for the Summer..?????

See how that works..??????

Oh God
new
Submitted by MMRules on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 9:42am.
Butt Hole is Back!

Justice's daughter pleads guilty to drunken driving

Published May 31, 2007
WHEATON -- A daughter of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia pleaded guilty Wednesday to drunken driving in Wheaton in February.

Ann S. Banaszewski, 45, a Wheaton mother of five, had three of her children in her van when she was stopped.

Banaszewski accepted a plea agreement with prosecutors and was sentenced by DuPage County Judge Daniel Guerin to 18 months of court supervision. She also was ordered to perform 140 hours of public service (of which 40 hours must be beneficial to children), attend counseling and treatment sessions, attend a victim-impact panel and pay $1,500 in fines and fees.

Assistant State's Atty. Michael O'Donnell, as part of the agreement, dropped four other charges, including endangering the life of a child, failure to secure a child younger than age 8 in a child-restraint system, improper lane usage and driving an uninsured motor vehicle.

Banaszewski was arrested by Wheaton police the evening of Feb. 12 in a 1996 Ford van near Gamon Road and Longfellow Drive after a citizen reported a possible drunken driver.

Banaszewski declined to take a Breathalyzer test and under state law she lost her driving privileges for a six-month period beginning March 30.

Guerin told her she would be allowed to drive to counseling and treatment sessions.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-scalia_31may31,1,5690156.st...

Wow, Scalia's daughter! Wonder if he disowned her?

Butt hole!

You couldn't fall in Love
with some Male Singer/Actor in Bronson,and stay there??

What a great gift for the Democrats...!!!

I join the Democrats...

Cindy runs away..!!!

Works for me..!!!!

* there have been more than 600 cases of non-renewal of TV broadcast licences around the world, but it is only the Venezuelan government that has been singled out and condemned for allegedly violating free speech.

* Last month, the Peruvian government shut down five to six TV stations. That is, not simply withdrawing their concessions, but actually shutting them down, which is what Chavez has falsely been accused of doing to RCTV.

* In Venezuela, five private television stations, reaching 90% of Venezuela’s viewers, and nine of the ten national newspapers, support the opposition. (oop, not anymore!)

See? Facts.

Chavez gets all the attention in the US because he successfuly challenges corporate monopoly, and has oil.

When Cindy led the evening news, they let her bleat and blow, but when she dissed their Liberal views, was time for her to go.

Get along, home, Cindy, Cindy, get along home. Get along home, Cindy Sheehan, you're just so yesterday.

When Cindy got religion, the Left built her a church, but when she turned her other cheek they left her in a lurch.

Get along, home, Cindy, Cindy, get along home. Get along home, Cindy Sheehan, please go home and stay.

She did Crawford in the summer time, Caracas in the fall, but now she's not the gal they want so her big world's getting small.

Get along, home, Cindy, Cindy, get along home. Get along home, Cindy Sheehan, you blew your chance to play.

Cindy's now just history, she hangs her head and cries, the Moonbats hung her out to dry, one bat they now despise.

Get along, home, Cindy, Cindy, get along home. Get along home, Cindy Sheehan, they buried you today.

"I am shocked, shocked that RCTV has lost its license. Being blessed with content free bradcast by ABC, NBC and CBS, I sympathized with with Venezuela’s citizens, who from now on have to think for themselves. Thank God our invincible military is fighting bravely to defend liberty in Iraq and bliss of ignorance in the USA."

hee hee

MMRules?

The Left Loves em...

So long as they don't have to live under their rules..!!!!!!

Elections???

We don't need no stinkin elections..!!!!!

Genocide Group

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2007/05/30/...

65%: Think Corporate Profits too High
That's the percent of Americans who say corporate profits are too high, up from 59% in 2003. And check back every weekday for another number in the news. Read more

http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?t=9qgmqacab.0.ta4tqacab.r5mmtrbab.31852&ts=S0253&p...

Fernando.

Ethanol trickle down continues - expect higher costs
by Chris in Paris · 5/31/2007 04:38:00 AM ET

The Big Farm payday from the government continues to have a negative impact, now with the price of dairy rising. Alternative energy research and development makes all the sense in the world but corporate welfare like this, without planning and without researching the full impact, is just another example of the Bush administration hard at work. The GOP has a belief that if you throw millions and billions of dollars at a problem, it will somehow all work out. The fly in the ointment has consistently been that they never think about the full consequences of their policies beyond wads of cash to friends.

U.S. retail milk prices have increased about 3 percent, or roughly a dime a gallon, this year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

But University of Illinois dairy specialist Michael Hutjens forecasts further increases of up to 40 cents a gallon for milk over the next few months, and up to 60 cents for a pound of cheese.
Again, it's the middle class footing the bill for another failed GOP program.

Hutjens and others said higher gasoline prices have increased the costs of moving milk from farm to market, and corn — the primary feed for dairy cattle — is being gobbled up by producers of the fuel-additive ethanol. The USDA projects that 3.2 billion bushels of this year’s corn crop will be used to make ethanol, a 52 percent increase over 2006.

Ethanol has increased the average American's grocery bill $47 since July, and Iowa State University study concluded.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/05/ethanol-trickle-down-continues-expect...

"Got to tamp down that opposition...!!!"

Who are you kidding. You would do the same thing, if not worse.

Greg Palast:

We’re not asking for much: a Social Security check that won’t bounce, schools for our kids that won’t make them dumber, a fighting chance for a job that will let us take the tykes to Disney World, health insurance, and, when the waters rise, a government that will have some kind of plan to pluck us from the flood.

Fat chance.

Con't

2,000,000 Iraqi refugees or Lieberman/Cheney
by Chris in Paris · 5/31/2007 06:10:00 AM ET

Who are you going to believe? If the war is going so well, why are so many running away from Iraq?:
After months of agonizing delays and withering criticism from advocacy groups and lawmakers, the Bush administration has finalized new guidelines to screen Iraqi refugees, including those seeking asylum because helping the Americans has put them at huge risk.

The 2 million-plus people — the fastest growing refugee population in the world — have left Iraq, but Washington has balked at allowing them into the United States for security reasons.
So Bush creates this disaster and then hides behind the security issue - always a winner with the pro-fear crowd - to block the refugees from coming to America. With Chertoff at the helm, it's true that expectations should be pretty low for managing this process but to accept fewer people than Sweden is simply pathetic.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/05/2000000-iraqi-refugees-or.html

has been posting about Guilliani's lies about 9/11 for a few days.

Raw now has the confrontation where he tries to cover his tracks.
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Video_tribute_to_Giuliani_911_lies_0530.ht...

He must have received them in his spam email account this AM.

Oh, Gee, and what are they?

Cindy Sheehan (the wingers hate her for telling the truth)

and

Chavez (Oh my! For discontinuing a TV station)

But none of the things that are really important to the US.

S-O-S WD s-O-S!!!

"Elections???
We don't need no stinkin elections..!!!!!"

December 4, 2006 - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has been re-elected to a third term in office with a large margin over social democrat rival Manuel Rosales.

Scalia and Cheney

Religious right furor over Mary Cheney's baby grows
by John Aravosis (DC) · 5/31/2007 08:36:00 AM ET

Now a religious right news service is jumping on the bandwagon. The Bushies, with Mary's help, created this religious right monster by happily embracing these bigots into the GOP. Now they'll have to deal with the consequences of their own actions.

http://www.americablog.com/2007/05/religious-right-furor-over-mary-chene...

the opposition.
new
Submitted by dada on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 10:02am.
"Got to tamp down that opposition...!!!"

Who are you kidding. You would do the same thing, if not worse.

===============================================================

If the public don't like a network...

The Network goes bankrupt..!!!

(Sorry Sam)

And if the love it...

The Networks makes big money...

(Ya gotta love Rush!)

It's the free market..!!!!

Only thing ya have to fear is the Competition...!!!

I never meant 2 cause U any sorrow

I never meant 2 cause U any pain

I only wanted one time 2 see U laughing

I only wanted 2 see U laughing in the commie red rain

Democrats seek to overturn pay ruling By JESSE J. HOLLAND, AP Labor Writer
Wed May 30, 8:08 PM ET

Congressional Democrats said Wednesday they would try to reverse a Supreme Court decision that limits the time that workers have to sue their employers for pay discrimination.

"All Americans deserve equal pay for equal work, and it is my hope that Congress can remove the technical hurdles that will prevent individuals from receiving what is rightfully theirs," said Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., a Democratic presidential candidate.

The Supreme Court voted 5-4 on Tuesday to throw out a Goodyear employee's complaint that she earned thousands of dollars less than her male counterparts.

Under the court's decision, an employee must sue within a 180-day deadline of a decision involving pay if the employee think it involves their race, sex, religion or national origin.

Lilly Ledbetter, a supervisor at Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.'s plant in Gadsden, Ala., sued right before she retired. She ended a 19-year career making $6,500 less than the lowest-paid male supervisor, and claimed earlier decisions by her supervisors kept her from making more.

The court's five most conservative members said the woman waited too long to complain. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, writing in dissent for the court's four liberal members, urged Congress to amend the law.

"As Justice Ginsburg suggests, the ball has now fallen into Congress' court and we intend to address this ruling," House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., said Wednesday. "The Supreme Court's narrow decision makes it more difficult for workers to stand up for their basic civil rights at work, and that is unacceptable."

Miller will be working with his Senate counterpart, Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Chairman Edward Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., on legislation to help reverse the court's decision and give workers more time to build their cases.

Kennedy said Congress did not intend to set such a short time limit.

"Many victims of pay discrimination who didn't immediately realize they were being paid less than others will have no remedy, even though the discrimination continues with every paycheck," Kennedy said. "With women earning only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men, the nation needs strong laws against pay discrimination. This is not what Congress intended when we passed the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1991, and we need to restore full protection against wage discrimination."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_go_co/pay_discrimination_congr...

Eureka!

All I want is the truth! Rudy!

Chavez Disputes American Idol Results: Shuts Down Station

Written by Kilroy

Story written: 30 May 2007

"Badges? We Don't Need No Stinking Badges!" Hugo Chavez says he has had enough of American television shenanigans. The unstable Venezuelan leader recently moved against RCTV after Melinda Doolittle was voted off American Idol.

"What in the hell were you people thinking keeping "Beat-Box-Boy" and "Baby Huey" while dumping an overwhelmingly talented Doolittle?" he screamed into the microphone, pounding a podium with his fist for emphasis. "If he was in my country, I would have Blake Lewis shot for making those annoying sounds,'" he growled menacingly, veins popping from his forehead. "And don't get me started about that Sanjaya! How did he get as far as he did?"

As Chavez's podium collapsed from the furious pounding and weight of his...uh...argument, he paused his tirade briefly while another podium was brought in.

GOP fear fallout from new ethics probes By CHARLES BABINGTON, Associated Press Writer
Wed May 30, 8:05 PM ET

A half dozen federal investigations into the activities of Republican lawmakers are raising new worries for GOP leaders who hope to regain the House majority they lost last fall.

In recent weeks, two veteran Republicans surrendered prominent committee seats after FBI agents raided the offices of family businesses. Others have long-running investigations hanging over them. Some conservative activists are criticizing the party's handling of the matters.

Democrats say at least six GOP House members are under some degree of Justice Department scrutiny, although Republicans question whether all the inquiries are active.

In pure numbers, Republicans are approaching the magnitude of their problem at this stage of the 2006 election cycle. Eventually, nine House Republicans faced FBI investigations. Four stepped down, and two — Reps. Randy "Duke" Cunningham of California and Bob Ney of Ohio — are in prison. Of the five who sought re-election, three lost and the other two remain under ethical clouds.

Republicans call attention to the fact that Democrats have their own ethical problems.

Two House Democrats are the focus of federal investigations. Rep. William J. Jefferson, D-La., has been under scrutiny in a bribery investigation since at least 2005, when FBI agents found $90,000 in his home freezer. The Justice Department also is investigating whether Rep. Alan Mollohan (news, bio, voting record), D-W.Va., benefited from steering federal funds to nonprofit groups he helped start. Both Jefferson and Mollohan easily won re-election last year.

Republicans say Democrats will have trouble duplicating the success of last year's "culture of corruption" campaign theme because the current allegations against GOP members are far less severe. There is no evidence of the type of overt corruption that felled Cunningham and Ney, they say, and no one under scrutiny has the national name recognition that former Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, had in 2005 and 2006.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_go_co/gop_ethics_5&printer=1;_...

"I wonder if our little Libbies would scream if Jon Stewart were sent to Club Gitmo for the Summer..?????"

They just didnt have ther license renewed. No one was sent to prison without trial. In fact, they can still broadcast online.

I think you are letting us in on one of your secret fantasies.

finish blowing me, I will serve you a nice, big Cleveland Steamer on a fine dinner plate!

They just didnt have ther license renewed. No one was sent to prison without trial. In fact, they can still broadcast online.

============================================================================

I wonder if AAR lost their licence would you be so cavalier..???

"It's the free market..!!!!"

Critics of laissez-faire variously see the "free market" as an impractical ideal or as a rhetorical device that puts the concepts of freedom and anti-protectionism at the service of vested wealthy interests, allowing them to attack labor laws and other protections of the working classes.

Because no national economy in existence fully manifests the ideal of a free market as theorized by economists, some critics of the concept consider it to be a fantasy - outside of the bounds of reality in a complex system with opposing interests and different distributions of wealth.

"Only thing ya have to fear is the Competition...!!!"

Only thing you have to fear is Reality.

"I wonder if AAR lost their licence would you be so cavalier..???"

Oh, stop your crying.

I've seen two Chavez parodies so far on this thread. That's funny stuff, you guys should stick to parody writing.

Ha ha ha ha ha ha..

Reality...

Ya gotta love it...

I think Capitalism will safe for one more day...

Perhaps next year we shall switch to communism...

And we will make Microsoft mail Dada a nice fat check the first of every month..

And that will be the new Reality..!!!

Oh, stop your crying.

=================================

Hahahahahaha..

Things are goin great...

Chavez is getting what for...

The Dems have backed the War Dog Plan..

Cindy has been shown the error of her ways...

Iran is working their way into War..

Summer in comin..

Things are just as they should be..!!

follow this link and sign this petition at petitionsite.com:

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/114923172

Here are the details of the petition:

"Congress is retreating. They are passing a bill that fully funds Bush's war through September and includes no binding restrictions. This isn't a compromise. It's a concession.

Tell Congress that this isn't good enough -- we need a binding plan for withdrawal. We need to make our voices heard. If the President won't end the war and if Congress will not force real change, it is our obligation--our duty as Americans--to speak up.

Please sign the petition and tell your Representative to take action! We've reached our initial goal of 100,000 Americans calling on Congress to stand up to Bush and end the war. But we need to keep climbing. Only massive, direct public pressure can end this war."

Clean up your own house before whinning about another country.
Look at your Republican dito heads.
Their best friend right now,is their lawyer trying to
keep their corrupt asses out of Jail!!

It is time for the Hot Tub...

It's a beautiful sunny day...

The birds are singin...

And everything is green and lovely...

And just think...

You only have a few more years with Bush...

Time flies whey you are havin fun..!!!!

a free press"----Submitted by dada on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 9:33am.

So why wouldn't throwing opposition leaders in political prisons be the first step in "securing democracy"???

ROFLMAO! You think the Hard Left will EVER figure out why they're seen as hypocritical loonies?!!?!?!?

2 U.S. firms recall feed ingredients

By Elizabeth Weise and Julie Schmit, USA TODAY
For the first time, the industrial chemical that contaminated pet food ingredients imported from China has been found in livestock and fish feed ingredients produced in the USA.
Two companies in Ohio and Colorado recalled the ingredients found to contain melamine, a chemical used in the manufacture of plastics that was linked to the massive pet food recall in March. The contaminated pet food is believed to have killed dogs and cats across the USA.

The tainted products have embroiled China in a global controversy over the safety of its food exports. The Food and Drug Administration's Wednesday announcement of the feed recall marks the first discovery of melamine in U.S.-made ingredients.

Melamine is not approved for use in feed, pet or human food. The recalls cover the ingredients and fish feed made using the ingredients. Any livestock feed made using the ingredient wasn't recalled because the melamine levels were so low, the FDA said.

The FDA said there is also little risk to human health because of the low concentrations. Yet, the discovery is likely to stoke concern about what goes into the food supply.

The melamine was found in products used to bind feed pellets together made by Tembec BTLSR of Ohio. The company said it added the melamine to increase the binding property of the ingredient, the FDA said. The Ohio concern is a subsidiary of the Canadian-based forest products giant of the same name.

Tembec spokesman John Valley said the company thought it was making a "compliant product" because it wasn't intended for U.S. markets.

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/food/2007-05-30-food-recall_N.h...

If Americans had 15 minutes with President Bush, the majority (54 percent) would tell him to “focus on getting U.S. troops out of Iraq,” according to a new Gallup poll.

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/05/31/if-americans-had-15-minutes-with-pre...

“The United States is among the least peaceful nations in the world, ranking 96th between Yemen and Iran, according to an index of 121 countries.” Iraq ranks last.

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-briefs31.2may31,...

The Supreme Court ruling this week “in favor of an Alabama employer that had underpaid a female employee for years” is effectively “gutting a key part of the Civil Rights Act,” the New York Times writes. “Fortunately, Congress can amend the law to undo this damaging decision.” House labor chairman George Miller (D-CA) and others have announced plans to do just that.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/31/opinion/31thu1.html?ex=1338264000&en=b...

President Bush “is under pressure from European allies to give ground on climate change at next week’s meeting of the world’s richest countries, but policy experts say prospects for a breakthrough are slim.”

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSN3045843020070530?feedType=RS...

is it merely a coincidence that conservatives always have dirty water in their hot tubs?

...even Wilkes drew a line on what he would do for the congressman. For one thing, Wilkes was totally disgusted by the hot tub Cunningham put on the boat's deck during the autumn and winter. What repelled Wilkes -- and others invited to the parties -- was both the water Cunningham put in the hot tub and the congressman's penchant for using it while naked, even if everybody else at the party was clothed. Cunningham used water siphoned directly from the polluted Potomac River and never changed it out during the season. "Wilkes thought it was unbelievably dirty and joked if you got in there it would leave a dark water line on your chest," said one person familiar with the parties. "The water was so gross that very few people were willing to get into the hot tub other than Duke and his paramour." That was a reference to Cunningham's most frequently seen girlfriend, a flight attendant who lived in Maryland.

what, nobody wants to drink a beer with him anymore? imagine that.

"NEWS CONSUMER" said...

Sonny Carson Battle in City Council

Sonny Carson Supporters Commandeer a Brooklyn Park

CBS: Iraqi PM doesn't trust his military, says coup possible David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Thursday May 31, 2007

Iraqi PM al-Maliki told Lara Logan of CBS Evening News in an exclusive interview on Wednesday that he has a real fear of a coup by the Iraqi army.

Al-Maliki said that some of the officer corps have been creating problems and even violating the security of military operations. He stated, "I'm not afraid, but I have to watch the army, because those still loyal to the previous regime may start planning coups. Those people don't believe in democracy, and for that reason we are monitoring the status of the army very closely."

Al-Maliki also insisted that his government is not ordered around by the Americans, saying, "The Americans don't order us to do this or not to do that. On the contrary, we're the ones who tell them to do this and don't do that."

The following video clip is from CBS Evening News.

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Iraqi_PM_doesnt_trust_his_military_0531.ht...

25 GOP Senators may vote for Democratic Iraq withdrawal timetable in September

Yes, the vote last week was a disappointment, but in the end this war is going to be the end of Bush and the GOP.

From the National Review Online:
Iraq--the Coming GOP Collapse? [Rich Lowry]

Was talking to an influential Republican strategist who thinks if Iraq looks the way it does now in September, Bush will lose about 25 Senate Republicans on a bill with some sort of timetable for withdrawal.

China's climate change plan due ahead of G8 summit
Reuters via Yahoo! News - May 31 12:12 AMChina will release its first national plan to tackle climate change next week, seeking to rebut international criticism that it is not doing enough to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, officials said on Thursday.

http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0WTTkgl615GRXsBRgzQtDMD;_ylu=X3oDMTBjYzZubXM2...

beaut of a day here.

incredibly clear skies last night for stargazing.

Iraq's bloodiest month for US troops since Fallujah invasion
26 minutes ago
BAGHDAD (AFP) - Six more US soldiers have been killed in Iraq, the military announced on Thursday, confirming that May has become the deadliest month for American forces in two-and-a-half years.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070531/wl_afp/iraq_070531145719;_ylt=AnwJT...

this is on i-75 as you enter cincinnati from the north. quite impressive, eh.

Luckily you missed the dog! He's hot tubbing today.

Heh! I did that with a photo also

Is that on the river?

Vets’ disability claims keep piling up

By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday May 31, 2007 7:16:34 EDT

Two pieces of good news for veterans — a possible $6.5 billion increase in the 2008 Veterans Affairs Department budget and passage of six bills to improve veterans programs — were overshadowed May 23 by a discussion that showed there is no quick or easy solution to the huge backlog of veterans’ disability benefits claims.

Retired Navy Vice Adm. Daniel Cooper, VA’s undersecretary for benefits, who has spent five years wrestling with claims processing, said headway is proving difficult because new claims are being filed faster than old claims can be handled. In fiscal 2006, the VA received 806,382 claims, and expects 811,000 this fiscal year, he said.

Claims also are becoming more complicated, he said. More than 25 percent include eight or more disabling conditions, each of which must be weighed. And more cases involve chronic progressive disabilities, such as cardiovascular problems and diabetes, which will worsen and likely result in additional claims, if only to increase a disability rating.

The $6.5 billion increase in VA funding approved by a House Appropriations subcommittee will help modestly by allowing the VA to hire 1,500 more claims staff. But Cooper cautioned that “increased staffing levels do not produce immediate production improvements,” and in fact could slow things down as experienced staffers are diverted to help new employees learn procedures. It could be a year or more before improvements are seen, he said.

“We are at a crisis stage and it will certainly get worse,” said Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee chairman who hosted the discussion that involved veterans’ groups, VA workers who process claims, legal experts and academics who have looked at the VA’s problems.

http://www.rawstory.com/showoutarticle.php?src=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.airforce...

this guy that owned a large acreage horse farm is a fundamentalist. he built this place called the living rock church at the monroe exit on i75. in the finest traditions of idolatry he put this huge fountain with the praying hands in. its lit up at night for all to enjoy.

i'm sorry but if people really supported the troops this problem wouldn't exist. i think support the troops should mean more than i support your right to die in a far off dessert so that george bush's friends can make more money from oil...

sorry, i guess i'm ranting.

"NEWS CONSUMER" said...

You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!

Who blew what up?

Back to the Cold War:
Putin says Bush has triggered new arms race
President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that tests of new Russian missiles were a response to the planned deployment of U.S. missile defense installations and other forces in Europe, suggesting Washington has triggered a new arms race.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_re_eu/russia_putin;_ylt=AhhBUu...

A real "Law and Order" candidate

Fred Thompson, former senator and current star of NBC's hit TV show Law and Order, is running for president.

A tough-talking southerner (at least he plays one on TV), many predict Thompson to be the darling of the southern vote – a role that no current GOP candidate fills to the liking of our confederate loving friends down south.

But as the most recent edition of Rolling Stone points out, this is a guy who left the Senate because it was too much work. I guess running for president is easy breezy.

... On a side note, though, he plans to rely heavily on the Internet to run his campaign – probably because he already gets plenty of TV exposure by the seemingly 24/7 reruns of Law and Order. But it might be a good gauge of the power of the net in politics... If that southern base of his can figure out how to turn on a computer (I'm kidding South, don't yell at me).

http://andrewwarner.cincinnatibeacon.com/2007/05/real-law-and-order-cand...

busy here lately.

waiting for enough peeps to get the message about what's happening to stomp this administration into the dirt.

Edwards wants probe
of high gas prices
Democratic presidential hopeful John Edwards says a wave of mergers in the oil industry should be investigated by the Justice Department to see what impact they have had on soaring gasoline prices.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_el_pr/edwards_gas_prices;_ylt=...

He's hot tubbing today.

And already drinking no doubt. Closet lush that he is. ;-p Hmmmm... drinking and hot tubbing... maybe he'll accidentally drown. Couldn't happen to a better prat.

5-2007

US deaths 123

UK deaths 3

Other 2

TOTAL 128

Avg per day: 4.13

Days 31

Yep. Good ol' Joe sees progress. Hope he was able to buy some rugs in those preety and safe outdoor Iraqi markets as well.

"waiting for enough peeps to get the message about what's happening to stomp this administration into the dirt."

It's been way too long for these people to realize what has happened. Too much damage done already.

I call them, not the silent majority, but the sleeping majority!

has shrivelled his brain, GBC.

He's living in lala land because nothing has effected him yet.

Wachovia to buy
A.G. Edwards for $6.8B
Wachovia Corp. said Thursday it would acquire A.G. Edwards Inc. for $6.8 billion in cash and stock in a deal to form one of the largest retail stock brokerages in the United States.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070531/ap_on_bi_ge/wachovia_a_g__edwards;_y...

be back in a bit.

i don't know. most people i know seem to be simply beaten down or tenderized past the point of caring. the constant conservative drumbeat of msm just enforces the notion that they don't conform to what the 28% majority believe in. throw in a well managed war (we may hate the way its being run, but it is well managed. bush stays away from funerals. you don't see the body bags. the press stays inside the green zone. and should you persist and say but, you are accused of nothin less than treason), and there you have it.

as for me, i just don't know what the catalyst will be that will energize people again. it was an unfortunate stroke of genius on the neocons part to get the 2008 election kicked off 12 months too soon. by the time the serious part comes around, we'll all be so tired of it or broke from supporting our favorite son (or daughter) that it will be a fizzle.

actually a hot tub and drink is starting to sound pretty good...

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Spc. David Williams, 22, of Boston, Mass., had two note cards in his pocket Wednesday afternoon as he waited for Sen. Joseph Lieberman. Williams serves in the 82nd Airborne Division from Fort Bragg, N.C., the first of the five "surge" brigades to arrive in Iraq, and he was chosen to join the Independent from Connecticut for lunch at a U.S. field base in Baghdad.

The night before, 30 other soldiers crowded around him with questions for the senator.

He wrote them all down. At the top of his note card was the question he got from nearly every one of his fellow soldiers:

"When are we going to get out of here?" [snip]

Next to him, Spc. Will Hedin, 21, of Chester, Conn., thought about what he was going to say.

"We're not making any progress," Hedin said, as he recalled a comrade who was shot by a sniper last week. "It just seems like we drive around and wait to get shot at." [snip]

Spc. Kevin Krasco, 20, of Medford, Mass., and Spc. Kevin Adams, 20, of Moosup, Conn., chimed in with their dismay before turning the conversation to baseball.

"It's like everything else in this war," Adams said, referring to Baghdad. "It hasn't changed."

LINK

The New Jersey GOP honored George W. Bush today. For $300 you could submit to a background check, wait for two hours and witness a political farce all to catch a glimpse of our president. For $5000 you could have your picture taken with him. For $10,000 you could have a shower after he put his arm around you.

He was there to help the party raise money, and boy do they need it. New Jersey is a blue state. Very blue. And we're getting bluer. We're winning races in traditionally Republican counties.

For this we have President Bush, his administration and their disasterous policies to thank. People hate George Bush. Republicans, Democrats, businessmen, students, retirees, veterans. We all hate him.

So when New Jersey democrats heard that Bush was stepping outside his self-constructed bubble, we couldn't help ourselves.

Chairman Waxman Announces Hearing with GSA Administrator Doan

The Oversight Committee will hold a hearing on June 7, 2007, to examine statements made by GSA Administrator Lurita Doan that impugn the reputation of federal officials who cooperated with a Committee investigation into Ms. Doan's conduct at the General Services Administration.

"Shutting down opposition media is the first step to securing a free press"
Submitted by Anonymous on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 10:54am.

No, but not renewing the broadcasting license of coup plotters, lawbreakers, and liars might help.

---

You know, Saudi media is totally repressive, but they're our friends... Journalists are assassinated in Mexico and Colombia, and of course, the most dangerous place to be a journalist is in Iraq. But what does the media care about most? A corporate station with a shady history that didn't get it's license renewed.

Well, a little reminder, lest we lose focus:

By not recognizing the danger that may arise when a powerful oligarchy controls most of the media, the braying voices of the press establishment ignore the issue of the professional responsibilities of the mainstream media.

GOOD!!

May more people wake up and protest these idiots.

i read that kind of talk here every day. would you apply your same standard to the internet and amateur subversive as are found at this site?

finish blowing me, I will serve you a nice, big Cleveland Steamer on a fine dinner plate!

"So why wouldn't throwing opposition leaders in political prisons be the first step in "securing democracy"???"

Sure, we do that in America. For many years we've done that.

"would you apply your same standard to the internet and amateur subversive as are found at this site?"

You'd have to give me a license frist, before you decided not to renew it, wouldn't you?

You are full of criticism for the left.

Where exactly do you stand?

You nit pic everything we say but you have yet to reveal to us your thoughts.

Until that time, you have no room to talk or criticize!

do you remember what site you got your music player from for your website?

the first sign of an impending dictatorship is the suppression of ideas. left wing right wing, the pattern is the same.

New thread

Which ever way the wind blows. Or, whatever is opposite what someone else here thinks. What else do they need? How would the GOP group-think function if they had more than a random few free-thinkers among them? You know, like how they're treating the Ron Paul's of the GOP?

Then again, the true conservative base (not this sham conservobot republican bs we see now) are trying to get their party back.

Personally, we should all just register as Independent. Throw them all for a loop. I'd love to see how the press and the parties deal with that lil' mindfuck.

bbl~

"the first sign of an impending dictatorship is the suppression of ideas. left wing right wing, the pattern is the same."

The question is whether privileged elites should dominate mass communication, and should use this power as they tell us they must – namely to impose necessary illusions, to manipulate and deceive the stupid majority and remove them from the public arena.

"do you remember what site you got your music player from for your website?"

The site has it's own musicplayer, as part of the package.

~

Great that Nicky brought up Ward Churchill...

*

“Every U.S. war against oppressed peoples and nations has begun with saturating the entire civilian population with war propaganda that so demonized the leader of the targeted population that any crime was treated as acceptable and beyond question. This has been true since the wars against Native populations and the demonization of Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, Geronimo and many, many other Indigenous leaders, up to the leaders of every progressive or revolutionary struggle over the past 50 years. It doesn't matter how mild or committed to non-violence the leader is. Consider the case of the kidnapped former priest, President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti, who was charged with corruption, drug running and gang violence. Today President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran are increasingly portrayed as madmen, dictators and evil incarnate.” -insurgelicious.blogspot.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cmw6Jne0tAQ

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_(Planet_of_the_Apes)

"NEWS CONSUMER" said...

Oops!

There’s an old urban phenomenon taking on a new form in and around Manhattan, and you have probably seen it, even if you didn’t know exactly what you were looking at. Consider the now-famous three-block section of Bleecker Street that runs between West 11th Street and West 10th (that may not sound like three blocks, but it is). With its immaculate rowhouses and lush trees, it could be Paris, and it now has the shops to prove it. There’s a Lulu Guinness store, filled with $400 gold suede heels, and a block over there’s Cynthia Rowley’s flagship store, with her pink metallic shoes and diaphanous dresses. NYU students flock to Intermix to buy slinky-hipster fashion on their parents’ credit cards, and there’s a Robert Marc store with chunky architect-style eyeglasses. Ralph Lauren has two stores facing each other—men’s and women’s—and Marc Jacobs has a rather amazing three stores, all within eyeshot of each other.

For years, these blocks were more or less indistinguishable from the long eclectic mess of Bleecker, studded with delis, laundromats, a bricked-up dentist’s office, and a handful of sleepy antiques stores. But four years ago, it began to rapidly transform after Marc Jacobs opened up his first shop. Within a year, the stampede was on, as high-end retailers sensed a Hot New Thing and rushed to grab a piece of it. Now Vanity Fair gushes over how chichi the strip has become (“the new Nolita”), and Upper East Siders wander down with their nanoscale dogs to browse the $800 handbags. Young, hip mothers push Bugaboos and sift through cashmere sweaters after lunch. On the weekends, the tourists and out-of-towners descend in droves. As do the celebrities: Julia Roberts and Scarlett Johansson and Sarah Jessica Parker, a local who is practically a fixture.

Real-estate agents shake their heads in amazement. “Soho took fifteen years,” says Gene Cordano, a Halstead agent. “This only took three.” Cordano says he gets calls every day from retailers begging him to find them space down on Bleecker. To them, merely being in “the Village” isn’t meaningful anymore. They want to be part of those three blocks, and those three blocks only. “It’s so European,” says Khajak Keledjian, the owner of Intermix, who fell in love with it while Rollerblading nearby. “It just feels like a cohesive whole,” says Cynthia Rowley, who’s even moving into an apartment a few blocks away. “It feels like a neighborhood.”

More precisely, it’s a “microneighborhood,” and it is now the defining trend of New York real estate. . .

Isn't this wonderful? What is the state of gentrification in your town?

Have you trusted in the system, but are now in despair because it often fails?

http://www.counterpunch.org/leupp05312007.html

There’s an old urban phenomenon taking on a new form in and around Manhattan, and you have probably seen it, even if you didn’t know exactly what you were looking at. Consider the now-famous three-block section of Bleecker Street that runs between West 11th Street and West 10th (that may not sound like three blocks, but it is). With its immaculate rowhouses and lush trees, it could be Paris, and it now has the shops to prove it. There’s a Lulu Guinness store, filled with $400 gold suede heels, and a block over there’s Cynthia Rowley’s flagship store, with her pink metallic shoes and diaphanous dresses. NYU students flock to Intermix to buy slinky-hipster fashion on their parents’ credit cards, and there’s a Robert Marc store with chunky architect-style eyeglasses. Ralph Lauren has two stores facing each other—men’s and women’s—and Marc Jacobs has a rather amazing three stores, all within eyeshot of each other.

For years, these blocks were more or less indistinguishable from the long eclectic mess of Bleecker, studded with delis, laundromats, a bricked-up dentist’s office, and a handful of sleepy antiques stores. But four years ago, it began to rapidly transform after Marc Jacobs opened up his first shop. Within a year, the stampede was on, as high-end retailers sensed a Hot New Thing and rushed to grab a piece of it. Now Vanity Fair gushes over how chichi the strip has become (“the new Nolita”), and Upper East Siders wander down with their nanoscale dogs to browse the $800 handbags. Young, hip mothers push Bugaboos and sift through cashmere sweaters after lunch. On the weekends, the tourists and out-of-towners descend in droves. As do the celebrities: Julia Roberts and Scarlett Johansson and Sarah Jessica Parker, a local who is practically a fixture.

Real-estate agents shake their heads in amazement. “Soho took fifteen years,” says Gene Cordano, a Halstead agent. “This only took three.” Cordano says he gets calls every day from retailers begging him to find them space down on Bleecker. To them, merely being in “the Village” isn’t meaningful anymore. They want to be part of those three blocks, and those three blocks only. “It’s so European,” says Khajak Keledjian, the owner of Intermix, who fell in love with it while Rollerblading nearby. “It just feels like a cohesive whole,” says Cynthia Rowley, who’s even moving into an apartment a few blocks away. “It feels like a neighborhood.”

More precisely, it’s a “microneighborhood,” and it is now the defining trend of New York real estate. . .

Isn't this wonderful? Yay real estate speculation and all of its dodgy aspects. What is the state of gentrification in your town?

"The press must grow day in and day out — it is our Party's sharpest and most powerful weapon."

Submitted by dada on Thu, 05/31/2007 - 2:14pm.

The question is whether privileged elites should dominate mass communication, and should use this power as they tell us they must – namely to impose necessary illusions, to manipulate and deceive the stupid majority and remove them from the public arena.

"manipulate and decieive stupid majority"...quite the "lover of masses", isn't he?

BTW....the quote was from Stalin. I'd quote Lenin on "bougeouise press" and "lying"...but dada probably likes Lenin, while he merely "has some differences" with Uncle Joe.

""manipulate and deceive stupid majority"

That's called biting sarcasm. Spoken from the point of view of the privileged elites, who know what's best for us.

I see you have nothing to say about the real issue:

"By not recognizing the danger that may arise when a powerful oligarchy controls most of the media, the braying voices of the press establishment ignore the issue of the professional responsibilities of the mainstream media."

And go to great lengths to avoid it. Instead of facing the underlying situation, you'd rather make wild claims about me. Good for you.