The WAWG Blog

In September of 2006, Col. Sam Gardiner discusses U. S. covert operatives in Iran. Was this plan set up a long time ago?

On January 25, 2007, Wayne White and Pat Buchanan discuss plans of President Bush and neocons to invade Iran.

In early February of 2007, Keith Olbermann compared what Bush said leading up to the invasion of Iraq with things he has been saying about Iran.

Also in February of 2007, BBC summarizes the U. S. briefing on weapons from Iran that are reportedly being used in Iraq.

On February 25 2007, investigative journalist Seymour Hersh reviewed plan with CNN’s Wolf Blizter to destablize Iran. In his article, The Redirection, published in The New Yorker, Mr. Hersh asks, “Is the Administration’s new policy benefitting our enemies in the war on terrorism?”

In March of 2007, General Wesley Clark summarized the early plan to take over the Middle East from a memo written by then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

Now Fox News is pimping the invasion of a Iran as it pimped the invasion of Iraq.

Republican Lobbying Firm Working to Undermine Iraqi Prime Minister – A powerhouse Republican lobbying firm with close ties to the White House has begun a public campaign to undermine the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. A senior Bush administration official told CNN the White House is aware of the lobbying campaign by Barbour Griffith & Rogers because the firm is “blasting e-mails all over town” criticizing al-Maliki and promoting the firm’s client, former interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, as an alternative to al-Maliki.

Arming the World – A few weeks ago, the White House announced plans to sell $20 billion in weapons to the Saudi royal family.  But to maintain balance, the US will increase aid to Israel by 25%, meaning an additional $30 billion over the next decade to them.  In 1990, an oil-rich, very nice little country named Kuwait was invaded by the very not-nice Iraq.   At that time, we had to weaken Saddam Hussein, who had become very powerful after purchasing weapons from the US.  We had to give him the weapons, because he was at war with Iran, where the previous regime had been armed by the US with things like F-14 Tomcat jets. But once Saddam got real powerful, we had to worry that he would topple our friends in Saudi Arabia.   So, we put troops in Saudi Arabia, which made Osama bin Laden mad, who had also become very powerful after the US gave wepons to him to fight the Russians in Afghanistan.

Republican Administration To Allow Coal Mining Companies to Dump Debris in Valleys and Streams – From 1985 to 2001, 724 miles of streams were buried under mining waste, according to the environmental impact statement accompanying the new rule.  If current practices continue, another 724 river miles will be buried by 2018, the report says.

Fox News Wants the US to Attack Iran – The same images, sound effects, yelling and threatening that led the U.S. to invade Iraq is happening right now to sell a war with Iran.  Will the rest of the media fall in line like they did for Iraq?

• Diplomacy Won’t Work
• An Imminent Threat
• Iran Is Crazy

Tell the networks not to follow Fox News down the road to war.   Here’s an open letter to the networks asking them not to fall in line with Fox News.   Will you sign it? 

Indicted Donor Poses Quandary for GOP Lawmakers Who Accepted Funds – Seven vulnerable House Republicans face difficult decisions about whether to return contributions from a major Republican donor who was charged last week on 23 counts of bankruptcy fraud, mail fraud, money laundering, obstruction of justice and perjury.

Alaska Republican Congressman’s $10M Earmark is Focus of Inquiry – A Justice Department corruption task force is investigating whether Alaska Republican Congressman Don Young took campaign cash in return for securing $10 million for construction of proposed Florida highway ramp.

Regards,
Jim

Republican Administration Slashes Health Plan, Leaves Children Behind – In another not so surprising move, the Bush administration has made a decision that would limit the health care coverage of thousands of children in middle-income families. On Friday, a letter was sent by Administration officials that outline new standards, which would make it much more difficult for states, such as New York and California to extend their health care coverage.

Since Republicans Took the White House, Americans’ Average Income Has Fallen – In 2005, Americans earned on average of 1 percent less then they did in the year 2000 and according to Citizens for Tax Justice, a group that believes Republican’s policies favor the rich, pointed out that people with incomes of more than a million dollars “received 62 percent of the savings from the reduced tax rates on long-term capital gains and dividends that President Bush signed into law in 2003.” Total income listed on tax returns grew every year after World War II, with a single one-year exception, until 2001, making the five-year period of lower average incomes and four years of lower total incomes a new experience for the majority of Americans born since 1945.

Bush Administration Did Not Study Environmental Impact of Fire Retardant; Killed 20,000 Fish – The Administration’s top forestry official has been ordered to explain why the US Forest Service failed to analyze the environmental impact of dropping a fish-killing flame retardant on wildfires — or face contempt of court. Forestry Service chemicals killed more than 20,000 fish in central Oregon. Agriculture Undersecretary Mark Rey may face jail unless the Forest Service assents to a court order enjoining the environmental review.

Cheney has Warrantless Wiretapping Documents, Won’t Turn Them Over – Vice President Dick Cheney’s office has in its possession more than 50 documents related to a congressional investigation of the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program, but Cheney’s lawyer on Monday refused to hand over the documents in response to a subpoena.

Neoconservative Calls for Enslaving or Killing All Mexican Immigrants and Invading Mexico – I wrote about this guy last week, when he said that George Bush should be president-for-life. Now we find that he also said, “The very least that must be done to halt the Hispanic invasion is the mass enslavement, or execution, of the invaders, which must be followed by an American invasion of Mexico to enforce American language and values upon the Mexicans.”

The Conservative Family Security Foundation Knows How We Should Have Handled Iraq – Nuclear Weapons! – They stated, “The wisest course would have been for President Bush to use his nuclear weapons to slaughter Iraqis until they complied with his demands, or until they were all dead.”

Electronic Voting Machines Provide Not-So-Secret Ballots – Two Ohio activists have discovered that e-voting machines made by Election Systems and Software and used across the country produce time-stamped paper trails that permit the reconstruction of an election’s results – including allowing voter names to be matched to their actual votes. Diebold’s AV-TSX touchscreen voting machine stores a time stamp showing the time which each vote was cast–down to the millisecond–along with the electronic record of that vote, so it has the same type of problem. Direct Recording Electronic touch-screen voting machines should never be allowed for use in another American election.

Amazon Forest Sold Off in Housing Scam – The Brazilian government stands accused of selling off huge swaths of the Amazon rainforest – including its oldest protected national park – to unscrupulous logging companies, under the cover of a flawed sustainable development project. The Brazilian President, Luiz Ignácio Lula da Silva, won power in 2003 with a promise to settle 400,000 homeless families during his four-year term, an unrealistic target he is accused of reaching in last-minute deals prior to last year’s election. An eight-month investigation by Greenpeace into the land scam, revealed that the Brazilian land reform agency, INCRA, had set up large settlements in rainforest areas instead of placing them in already deforested areas, and settling urban families who promptly sold logging rights to major timber companies.

Democratic Congressman Causes Airport Altercation – Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA) allegedly tried to enter a restricted area at the airport baggage claim and pushed aside an airport employee who tried to stop him, according to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority. Several witnesses told local Washington affiliate ABC 7 news they saw Filner push the employee and refused to leave the restricted office.

Two Months After Giving Iraqis “Two More Months” to Shape Up, Bill O’Reilly is Silent on Their Failure to Do So – On his radio show on June 20, Bill O’Reilly asserted, “I’m gonna tell you that the big picture is, the Iraqis have two more months. They’ve got two more months. And if they don’t step up and help more than they’re helping” on oil legislation and security, “in two months, it’s over. Come September and October, we’re pulling back, and that’s the truth.” August 20 marks the end of the two-month period, but O’Reilly is yet to mention the Iraqi government’s failure to reach an agreement on oil legislation or his claims about the need for improvements by the Iraqi Security Forces.

Regards,

Jim

In this twenty-second survey of the web, The WAWG Index monthly average was down by 19.2 percent from July 2007. Of the fourteen categories tracked, 13 were down and only 1 was up. The largest decrease for August, 88 percent, was for “fraudulent elections.” The only increase was for “military supremacy/avid militarism” at 17 percent.

Through August, the 12 month group moving average for all fourteen categories was down to 13.1 from 15.5 percent last month. Of the fourteen categories tracked, 5 were up and 9 were down the from the last 12 month period.

Avid Militarism Sanctions Torture

THE END OF POSSE COMITATUS:
As reported last October by Major Danby in Daily Kos, the rubber stamp 109th Congress gave President Bush the power to:

• – involuntarily take National Guard troops from State A and
• – require them to work in State B for up to a year,
• – in law enforcement rather than just traditional areas like disaster relief,
• – over the objection of both state’s governors

The Daily Kos provides more detail and background, but here are some highlights:

The Fiscal Year 2007 Defense Authorization Bill was envisioned as a bill that would strengthen the National Guard. With a sick sense of irony, the Bush Administration gutted this provision and replaced it with a “body snatcher” provision that represented “a sizable step toward weakening states’ authority over their Guard units.” The provision “mak[es] it easier for the President to declare martial law, stripping state governors of part of their authority over state National Guard units in domestic emergencies.”

So now the President can send troops from Tennessee to quash what he deems a threat to civil order in Oregon, even if the governors of Tennessee and Oregon both object.

This, by the way, is how the Chinese – whose approach to government and party building Bush seems so much to admire – broke up the protests in Tienanmen Square. They brought in troops from the provinces who knew nothing about what the protest was about, but knew that if they were ordered to shoot, they had to shoot.

Such small changes to the law. Such a huge result. Imposition of federal martial law, using state troops, over the objection of the states.

THE CHRISTIANIZED MILITARY:
Add to this, the takeover of our military by unquestioning evangelical officers and we are another step closer to a single-party state run by the Bush/Cheney/Rove/Gonzales team. As documented in a recent interview of Michael L. Weinstein on Los Angeles City Beat, LA City Beat states, “He [Weinstein] found an unconstitutional infiltration of the entire U.S. armed forces by believers of ‘dominionist Christianity,’ who reserve the right to either convert or kill anyone, including American soldiers, who doesn’t believe in what Weinstein calls a ‘weaponized Jesus Christ’ – and use your tax money to do it. ”

Here are a few excerpts of Mr. Wienstein from that interview. Where he uses the phrase dominionist Christians, just substitute right-wing authoritarian.

I’m not a Jewish leader. I’m a civil libertarian. We’re telling the military: Look, you’re going to be at least as constrained as the shift manager at McDonald’s or KFC or Starbucks. If you want to see a Fortune 500 CEO brought to his or her knees, just have the most junior person at the mailroom claim, “Hey, I’m being evangelized in the workplace.” That’s a killer lawsuit under Title 7 of the U.S. Code. But in the U.S. military, that’s not just your shift manager; that’s your military superior.

We now have 737 U.S. military installations scattered around the world as we garrison the globe in 132 countries. And in every one of them, we have this Christian Taliban. It’s the Officers Christian Fellowship for the officers, and the Christian Military Fellowship for the enlisted. And they have a tripartite goal – a goal that they view as much more critically important than merely the oath that they all swore to protect and to serve the Constitution: Number one, they want to see a “spiritually transformed military”; number two, with “ambassadors for Christ in uniform”; and number three, “empowered by the Holy Spirit.”

Our founding fathers were well aware that, in Europe, most of the tyrannies had been conducted by men of the cloth who were also men in political power, so in Clause 3 of Article 6 of the Constitution, they stuck in the phrase that we will never have a religion test for any position in the federal government. Oh, I guess except the U.S. Air force, the Marines, the Navy and the Army, which will hold a Geiger counter up to anyone on planet earth and if it says, “Oh, we think you’re unchurched,” then you better be prepared to be evangelized. There’s no difference between them and Sharia – Islamic law – or Wahabiist Islam.

There’s over 100 of the largest evangelical organizations in Colorado Springs. It’s like the Vatican. I saw the flyer for one of their brown-bag lunches. It said, “Do not take this flyer down. This is an officially sponsored Air Force Academy activity in conjunction with the Christian Leadership Ministries.” This was attended by scores of senior officers and senior civilian people. Today’s luncheon topic, and I quote: “Why we cannot let you have your God while we have ours.”

This is all part of a passion play, now. Commanders in the field are censoring the soldiers’ DVD libraries, leaving only the movies that have appropriate Christian content. Battle staff meetings are being diverted into evangelical prayer sessions. I had a Captain JAG tell me that he recently tried to stand up to the colonel to refuse this, but the colonel grabbed him by the lapels of his battledress uniform in front of all the troops, and said, “Boy, we’re here to do two things: spread the gospel of American democracy and spread the gospel of our lord Jesus Christ. And if you don’t like it, I’ll send you home now.”

For more information on the Christianization of our military refer to Military Religious Freedom Foundation

AN ATTEMPTED COUP IN 1933:
If all this sounds a little far fetched, let’s look back at a possible coup attempt by the American Liberty League (ALL), composed of members of the DuPont family, as well as leaders of U.S. Steel, General Motors, Standard Oil, Chase National Bank, and Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. Their plan was to push President Franklin Roosevelt aside and replace him with a “Secretary of General Affairs.”

In 1934, the Congressional McCormack-Dickstein Committee looked into the allegations by Marine Corps Major General Smedley Butler that ALL attempted to recruit him to serve as the leader of a plot and to assume and wield power once the coup was successful. In their final report, the Congressional committee supported Butler’s allegations on the existence of the plot, but no prosecutions or further investigations followed ….

For more detail on this event, read, on-line, The Plot to Seize the White House by Jules Archer. The book concluded with:

In 1964 Speaker of the House John W. McCormack referred to the plot in his speech before the Democratic convention in Atlantic City, when he warned against right-wing extremists in the Barry Goldwater camp. But he did not give any details, and only a knowledgeable handful of Americans understood the full implications of what he was talking about.

The conspiracy unquestionably inspired the novel Seven Days in May, made into a successful film, which portrayed a Fascist plot by high-placed American conspirators to capture the White House and establish a military dictatorship under the pretext of saving the nation from communism[terrorism]. Few of the millions of Americans who read the novel or saw the film suspected that it had a solid basis in fact.

It would seem time that school textbooks in America were revised to acknowledge our debt to the almost forgotten hero who thwarted the conspiracy to end democratic government in America.

If we remember Major General Smedley Darlington Butler for nothing else, we owe him an eternal debt of gratitude for spurning the chance to become dictator of the United States-and for making damned sure no one else did either.

IS ANOTHER COUP ATTEMPT IN OUR NEAR FUTURE?
Imagine now a national incident that would provide President Bush, or some future authoritarian Republican president, with the opportunity to declare an national emergency. It would be so easy now with a spineless Congress, politicized executive and righteous judiciary. Imagine any authoritarian as president with all the enabling changes in our laws, directing our own Christian military to enforce whatever he commands. Anyone who objected could be declared an “enemy combatant” and put out of the way without legal recourse. Imagine a minority of Christianists taking away all hope of the majority for a more pluralist, diverse and inclusive society. Imagine a president-for-life who spends trillions of dollars we have borrowed from other countries to rid the world of terrorists, which will, instead, grow in numbers. Image how you would feel if we let this happen. If all future elections become a fraud where only the votes of members of the Republican party are actually counted. Imagine the suspension of a national presidential election because of the next 9/11 and the beginning of the American Dictatorship to protect us from all enemies of the hijacked Republican Party.

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison,

Thank you for your reply email dated 8/16/07.

Below I quote some of your reply followed by my concerns.

“I support the President in his efforts to strengthen domestic and international security, …”

I, like the majority of this nation, don’t support the President. We especially don’t support his approach to national and international security. We have taken away a meager excuse of a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan and replaced it with a 5 star battle field. They have learned better ways to kill our children. They have been able to recruit many more jihadists than we have killed, captured, or hidden away. They use real life experience in Iraq to understand our ways and better prepare for future attacks. They can then export and implement this experience around the world. How can we be more secure with all this growth in the terrorists work force?

“… and I believe Congress has the constitutional checks and balances appropriate to ensuring the executive branch upholds its duties.”

I believe Congress has turned its back on its duties to check and balance the executive branch. Congress has stood by and let this unitary presidency grow far past the bonds the Richard Nixon exceeded. This president has thumbed his nose at Congress with hundreds of signing statements to Congressional bills and Congress says, “yez mazte.” During the first 6 years of this presidency, Congress rubber stamped every thing the president wanted, especially if it was in the name of national security. All he has to do is mention national security and Congress roles over like a submissive bitch (as in female dog). Congress was so good at pleasing this president, he forgot, if he ever knew, how to spell veto. You say Congress is ensuring the president and his fellow war mongering neocons are upholding their duties. I think Congress has forgotten the other side of the coin – ensuring they don’t violate their duties.

“I will continue to work with my colleagues in Congress to strengthen priorities for the security of our nation, keeping your concerns in mind.”

I’m not sure what you mean by “strengthen priorities for the security of our nation.” If your priorities are only national security, I suggest you broaden your scope of thoughts and concerns. There are many national issues that are being ignored by and need the attention of Congress. Congress is spending this nation into bankruptcy and Osama bin Laden couldn’t be happier. Cutting taxes while increasing spending and making up the difference by borrowing from China and Japan will not come to a good end. Just like sub prime lending, this reckless budget management by Congress will eventually come crashing down Then there’s the continuing rise in all of our medical costs. One reason is the 50,000,000 citizens that don’t have insurance and have to use the emergency room to get an aspirin. We all pay for this cost and there has to be a better way. Then there are the citizens with employer sponsored medical coverage, who have to work until they die for fear of some major medical situation that will bankrupt them. Unlike the government, which Congress is partially responsible for, they can’t borrow to make up the difference.

May I suggest that you broaden your involvement with the voters in Texas and limit your time with those that bought a place at your table. Group thinks doesn’t serve a congressperson any better that it serves a our president.

Respectfully but seriously concerned for this nations future as a demacracy,

President-for-Life George W. Bush – Family Security Matters is a right-wing group that advocates that Bush should be our permanent president. The following is excerpted from one of Family Security Matters’ “must read” articles. It’s not a post from some wacko reader; it was a featured article on their site.

If President Bush copied Julius Caesar by ordering his army to empty Iraq of Arabs and repopulate the country with Americans, he would achieve immediate results. He could then follow Caesar’s example and use his newfound popularity with the military to wield military power to become the first permanent president of America, and end the civil chaos caused by the continually squabbling Congress and the out-of-control Supreme Court. President Bush can fail in his duty to himself, his country, and his God, by becoming “ex-president” Bush or he can become “President-for-Life” Bush: the conqueror of Iraq, who brings sense to the Congress and sanity to the Supreme Court. Then who would be able to stop Bush from emulating Augustus Caesar and becoming ruler of the world? For only an America united under one ruler has the power to save humanity from the threat of a new Dark Age wrought by terrorists armed with nuclear weapons.

Who’s on the Family Security Matters advisory board? (You can read about FSM and their board at Right Web and Sourcewatch)

Barbara Comstock who was instrumental in assisting Republican operatives in the 2000 Florida vote recount, wrote the Republican ‘playbook’ defending Bush nominees such as John Ashcroft for attorney general, conducted investigative efforts against the Clintons, and assisted the defense team work on behalf of “Scooter” Libby and Tom Delay.

Laura Ingraham who encouraged her radio listeners to jam the phone lines of a toll-free Democratic Party number intended for voters to report problems in voting.

James Woolsey who on September 12, 2001, on CNN, stated, “This is a very complex operation and the possibility that there was a state sponsor behind or working with Bin Laden, such as possibly Iraq, I think has to be investigated. There is a book out late last year by Lory Milroy called Sadam’s study of revenge about the possibility that Saddam was behind the 1973 (sic) World Trade Center bombing and that Ramzy Yousef who was the mastermind of that was involved with Iraqi intelligence … there may be a government other than a harbor, such as the Iraqi government that is orchestrating and to some extent funding, working closely on it behind Bin Laden or some other terrorist group … It really needs to look carefully at the possibility that there may be state sponsorship here and I think the most likely, certainly not the only possibility err.. is Iraq.”
and Dick Cheney (enough said).

More Conservatives Hoping for Another Big Terrorist Attack on America –
The Philadelphia Daily News -‘ Stu Bykofsky suggests another 9/11-style attack to “help” America unite. Matt Drudge seemed to think highly of the idea, conservative radio host Mike Gallagher invited Bykofsky on to his show, and Fox News’ John Gibson went so far as to endorse Bykofsky’s thesis on the air, saying: “I think it’s going to take a lot of dead people to wake America up.” To them, it’s OK if thousands die, just as long as we all get united behind conservative ideology and the Republican party.

That Enron Feeling: Bush Backs Business, Not Shareholders in Fraud Lawsuits – In a closely watched Supreme Court case of big business versus shareholders, the Bush administration decided to side with the business side. The administration’s position is largely at odds with the Securities and Exchange Commission, which earlier this year took the side of the shareholder plaintiffs. The case centers on whether shareholders can sue to hold third parties accountable for their company’s fraud.

White House Doesn’t Want General Petraeus To Testify Publicly On Iraq – Senior congressional aides said yesterday that the White House has proposed limiting the much-anticipated appearance on Capitol Hill next month of Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker to a private congressional briefing, suggesting instead that the Bush administration’s progress report on the Iraq war should be delivered to Congress by the secretaries of state and defense.

Karl Rove Thinks Most Americans are Snobs – In his interview with Rush Limbaugh this afternoon, Karl Rove claimed that the people criticizing Bush are “sort of elite, effete snobs who can’t hold a candle to this guy. What they don’t like about him is that he is common sense, that he is Middle America.” Limbaugh suggested that Bush critics are frustrated that the President “outsmarts ‘em.” Considering Bush’s disapproval ratings, doesn’t that mean that Rove thinks most Americans are snobs?

Mine Safety Czar Richard Stickler: Another Bush Fox Guarding the Henhouse – The man who will oversee the federal government’s investigation into the disaster that has trapped six workers in a Utah coal mine for over a week was twice rejected for his current job by senators concerned about his own safety record when he managed mines in the private sector. President George W. Bush resorted to a recess appointment in October 2006 to anoint Richard Stickler as the nation’s mine safety czar after it became clear he could not receive enough support even in a GOP-controlled Senate. In the wake of the January 2006 Sago mine disaster in West Virginia, senators from both sides of the aisle expressed concern that Stickler was not the right person to combat climbing death rates in the nation’s mines.

Big Business Republicans Don’t Care if You Get Shafted – Republican policies failed to take important steps on mine safety. For too long, the Bush administration and the Republican-controlled Congress allowed mine operators to put off making needed investments to ensure their workers’ safety. And last year when a string of coal-mining disasters — that killed 48 miners — forced Congress to enact new safety legislation, it still gave companies far too much time to install communications systems that might have helped find the Utah miners. Democrats proposed forcing mine operators to adopt, quickly, emergency communications systems that could track and communicate with workers in the event of an accident, but Congressional Republicans and the Bush administration opposed the Democrats’ efforts.

Take Your Choice of Authoritarians in 2008 – Perhaps you’ve heard of the Political Compass website, where you can take a test that places you on a grid based on the degree to which you are “left” or “right” on the economic scale as well as how socially libertarian or authoritarian you are. Now we can see how the 2008 U.S. presidential candidates fit on the grid.

[Please note: This measure of the candidates is not the same as Professor Robert Altemeyer’s test for identifying right-wing authoritarian personalities. Professor Altemeyer’s research shows that those who score high on his test are overwhelmingly Republican. He has yet to find a liberal RWA, “I’m sure one can find left-wing authoritarians here and there, but they hardly exist in sufficient numbers now to threaten democracy in North America.” Andy]

Newt Gingrich Says That the War Here at Home Against Illegal Immigrants is Even More Deadly than the War in Iraq and Afghanistan – Gingrich, who is considering a run for the White House, was referring to a recent crime in Newark, N.J., where three college students were murdered execution style in a school playground. One of the suspects is an illegal immigrant from Peru who was on bail on charges of raping a child when the murders occurred. Gingrich said another suspect is an illegal immigrant from Nicaragua with a long record of arrests who was ordered deported in 1993 but never left. However, The (Newark) Star Ledger reported Tuesday that the man obtained permanent legal residency in 2001. Gingrich has tried this angle before , in 2000 in the Susan Smith case, when he said that baby killing was a campaign issue and declared, “The only way you get change is to vote Republican.”

Misleading Letter Reveals New Republican National Committee Voting Hackery – What 83 year-old William Sidwell of Queen City, Missouri found in his mailbox last week scared him. It was a letter from the Republican National Committee, but it seemed to bear grave news: “Our records show that you registered as a member of our Party in Schuyler County, MO,” the letter said. “But a recent audit of your Party affiliation turned up some irregularities.” Audit? Irregularities? Was he in trouble? Were they threatening him? Sidwell went immediately to his ask his son, Dennis, a licensed public accountant, for advice. Particularly puzzling to the both of them, Dennis told me, is that his father is a life-long Democrat. The letter, it turns out, is just a misleading pitch for a contribution to the RNC — one of the “irregularities” cited in the letter is that “I cannot find a record of you taking a single action in support of the Republican Party — not locally, not nationally!” A contribution, the letter suggests, would help set the record straight. The letter is signed by Bill Steiner, the director of the RNC’s Office of Strategic Information The voter “audit” requests detailed information about the voter’s voting history and current opinions on the 2008 presidential race.

Regards,

Jim

The September Iraq Report Won’t Really be From General Petraeus – Despite Bush’s repeated statements that the September Iraq report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government. Despite Bush’s repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government. And though Petraeus and Crocker will present their recommendations on Capitol Hill, legislation passed by Congress leaves it to the president to decide how to interpret the report’s data.

US Spy Satellites to be Used on Americans – Information from “some of the U.S.’s most powerful intelligence-gathering tools” will soon be at the disposal of a wide array of law enforcement agencies at all levels of government. Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell decided to increase access to the spy data earlier this year and asked Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff to facilitate access to the spy data by civilian agencies and law enforcement. The move to turn spy satellites on American citizens raises legal questions because the use of such data for law enforcement is “largely uncharted territory.” Even the officials behind the move were unsure of its legal implications. But you know the what the neocons say about that: “Legal, schmegal.”

Conservative Web Blog Says It Hopes That a City Full of Dirty Liberals Gets Destroyed by a Terrorist Attack – The Conservative Web Blog, Maine Web Report, calls the Daily Kos a hate site, calls FiredogLake foul-mouthed, and calls MoveOn.org extremists. Then it publishes the following post:

“You know what this country needs? Another terrorist attack. Take out SF or some other city full of dirty libs, and then the country will rally behind the GOP for protection.”

Tom Delay Was Briefed Alone on the NSA-Driven Surveillance Program for the First and Only Time on the Day After the Comey-Gonzales Hospital Visit to John Ashcroft – Why? What was going on? The investigations must continue.

Throw Out the Baby, But Keep the Bathwater – Jackson County, Mississippi, decides that since Diebold makes a lousy printer to put on their lousy voting machines, they should get rid of those printers and just keep the lousy voting machines.

More Voting Machine Company Deception – Election Systems & Software, Inc (ES&S) failed to disclose that their equipment was being made in a sweatshop in the Philippines even though they are supposed to reveal all such information to the federal Election Assistance Commission.

Regards,

Jim

Rule Allows Alberto Gonzalez to Fast Track Death Penalty Appeals, Executions – A little noticed provision in the reauthorization of the Patriot Act last year, gives Attorney General Alberto Gonzales power to decide whether or not states are providing enough counsel for defendants in death penalty cases and the power to shorten the time that death row inmates have to appeal convictions to federal courts.

Rick Perry Appoints Extreme Creationist to the Chairmanship Texas State Board of Education – Rick Perry Appointed Don McLeroy to the chairmanship Texas State Board of Education on July 17. McLeroy, a self-described social conservative, is one of eight Republicans who vote as a bloc on nearly all issues. He casts votes that are based more on ideology than on science or facts. McLeroy is known for his skepticism about the theory of evolution and has tried to convince textbook publishers to offer dissenting views on the origin of life. The board can refuse to place offending materials on the state approved list. If school districts want textbooks not on the list, the districts must purchase such materials entirely from their own funds. McLeroy has dragged the Texas State Board of Education into a series of divisive and unnecessary culture-war battles:

In 2001, McLeroy and a majority of the board rejected the only Advanced Placement textbook for high school environmental science because its views on global warming and other events didn’t comport with the beliefs of the board majority. McLeroy claimed the book wasn’t factual and was anti-American and anti-Christian even though panels of experts – including one panel from Texas A&M – found the textbook free of errors. . Meanwhile, dozens of colleges and universities were using the textbook, including Baylor University, the nation’s largest Baptist college.

He voted in 2001 to reject the only advanced placement environmental science textbook proposed for Texas high schools. Baylor University in Waco used the same textbook.

In 2003 McLeroy led efforts by proponents of creationism and intelligent design to de-emphasize discussion of evolution in proposed new biology textbooks. He was one of only four board members who voted against biology textbooks that year that included a full account of evolution. In 2003, Dr. McLeroy was one of four board members who voted against proposed high school biology textbooks because he felt their coverage of evolution was “too dogmatic” and did not include possible flaws in Charles Darwin’s theory of how life on Earth evolved from lower forms.

In 2004, McLeroy voted to approve health textbooks that stress “abstinence-only” in regard to instruction about pregnancy and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases.

Hopefully enough folks will take action on this, and get this disaster turned around. Write or call Rick Perry

Tom DeLay Predicts Karl Rove Will Continue His Quest for a Permanent Republican Majority – Former Rep. Tom DeLay warned Tuesday that Democrats shouldn’t be so quick to rejoice about Karl Rove’s resignation because the revered and reviled political strategist isn’t going to shrink back into the shadows. “He’s not dying. … He’s not just going to go away; he’ll still be around,” DeLay said in an interview of Fox News Tuesday morning. “In fact, I think he’ll be more powerful than ever, because he’ll be involved in a lot of campaigns, I’m sure. He’ll be an adviser to a lot of sitting elected officials. He’ll be bigger than ever.” Asked what Rove’s intentions are related to next year’s presidential election, DeLay predicted the architect of Bush’s successful White House runs fielded “at least nine or 10 calls yesterday” from this year’s slate of Republican hopefuls. “If they want his advice, he’ll give all nine of them his advice,” DeLay predicted. “I know he’ll be a major player … particularly in 08 and beyond.” DeLay predicted Rove would continue his quest for a permanent Republican majority.

Incestuous Amplification: If you only talk to the people who already agree with you, then the more extreme positions get noisier and noisier

Diebold Deletes Paragraphs From Wikipedia That Are Critical of Diebold – On November 17th, 2005, an anonymous Wikipedia user deleted 15 paragraphs from an article on e-voting machine-vendor Diebold, excising an entire section critical of the company’s machines. While anonymous, such changes typically leave behind digital fingerprints offering hints about the contributor, such as the location of the computer used to make the edits. In this case, the changes came from an IP address reserved for the corporate offices of Diebold itself.

Fox News Scrubs Wikipedia – Someone at Fox News has been making changes to Wikipedia. So, what kind of changes has Fox been making? Changing things to make them look better and make their critics look bad. They’ve been deleting what they don’t want you to know. And adding things to twist the truth. Details of the edits at the link below:

Katrina Aid Going To Wealthy Investors For Million $$ Football Condos – With large swaths of the Gulf Coast still in ruins from Hurricane Katrina, rich federal tax breaks designed to spur rebuilding are flowing hundreds of miles inland to investors who are buying up luxury condos near the University of Alabama’s football stadium.About 10 condominium projects are going up in and around Tuscaloosa, and builders are asking up to $1 million for units with granite countertops, king-size bathtubs and ‘Bama decor, including crimson couches and Bear Bryant wall art. While many of the buyers are Crimson Tide alumni or ardent football fans not entitled to any special Katrina-related tax breaks, many others are real estate investors who are purchasing the condos with plans to rent them out.

Regards,

Jim

AT&T Censors Lyrics During Lollapalooza Webcast
During the performance of “Daughter” the following lyrics were sung to the tune of Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall” but were cut by AT&T from the webcast:

– “George Bush, leave this world alone.” (the second time it was sung); and
– “George Bush find yourself another home.”

This troubles citizens concerned with the issue of censorship and the increasingly consolidated control of the media. AT&T’s actions strike at the heart of the public’s concerns over the power that corporations have when it comes to determining what the public sees and hears through communications media.

LA County Registrar is a Diebold Cover Girl, Concerned About Profits of Voting Machine Company – Conny McCormack is worried Diebold won’t make enough money off the voters she is supposed to be working for. McCormack told the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors that Friday’s decision by Secretary of State Debra Bowen requires all votes made on computer touch-screen systems to be hand-counted after the election to ensure accuracy. “I think we have to see what the vendors are going to say about that,” McCormack said. “The vendors aren’t going to make much money in Los Angeles County if they have to pay $400,000 for the recount.” Why is McCormack so protective of the vendors? She appeared on the Diebold sales brochure to help them sell their voting systems.

The New Chairman of the Democratic Leadership Committee Said He Doesn’t Know Who’s Been Right About the Iraq War – Harold Ford, new chairman of the DLC, on Hannity and Colmes:

Colmes: “Barack Obama had a great point when he said those who voted for the war in Iraq and then had to apologize for that vote should probably be the last people to criticize he—who was right about the war in Iraq all along.”
Ford: “I don’t know who’s been right about this war all along…”
Colmes: “Sure you do…”
Ford: “That’s open for dispute.”
Colmes: “You don’t know who’s been right about the war all along?”

Administration Fights Democrats’ Plan to Boost School Aid for Vets – The Bush administration opposes a Democratic effort to restore full educational benefits for returning veterans, according to an official’s comments last week. But I’m sure conservatives will continue to display their “Support the Troops” magnets on their SUVs.

Hillary Clinton Chastises Obama for Agreeing With Her – Democrat Hillary Clinton, who chastised rival Barack Obama for ruling out the use of nuclear weapons in the war on terror, did just that when asked about Iran a year ago. Hillary Clinton said last year, “I don’t believe that any president should make any blanket statements with respect to the use or non-use of nuclear weapons.” Hillary Clinton said last week, “I would certainly take nuclear weapons off the table.”

Kent, Ohio Police Officer Tickets Man for ‘Impeach Bush’ Sign – See how much better things are? Back during Vietnam, they killed people in Kent for protesting.

Regards,

Jim