America: From Freedom to Fascism

The documentary film, America: From Freedom to Fascism is now available on Google Video. It is a major production by big-name producer Aaron Russo. I have not yet watched it myself. I thought I would give the few random readers who pass my way a quick heads up.

Corporate Mafia in Republicans' Clothes

LiberalTruthSayer recently criticized the ABC piece-of-trash movie that blames 9/11 on Presient Clinton. The movie's script was written by an arch neoconservative who has no qualms about lying. As you may not have known, it was actually written into the neoconservative philosophy by the movement's founder, Leo Strauss, that it is necessary to lie to the American people in order to "save" the United States from itself.

LiberalTruthSayer's comments section is plagued by an incredibly annoying, unthinking conservative named olerockytoptennsessee. He argues using the same tired old emotions and demonizaton tactics that have always been devoid of substance. Sometimes he makes several unfocused, ranting comments in each blog entry, thus polluting her very nice site. I stopped reading his comments sometime back because they never change. Once again, he made several comments in a row, this time at the entry linked above.

This is my response to LiberalTruthSayer's entry (the first paragraph), as well as to "Rocky" (all four paragraphs).

Yes, isn't it rich that this movie is a lie about a lie? The first lie is how it happened and who really had a part in it. The new lie is a pathetic attempt to attribute the fake/intentional "failures" behind the first lie to a democrat. It is yet another attempt to convert this country to one-party rule, just like the old Soviet Union. That's the sort of America that Rocky obviously believes in now.

It's hard to believe Rocky was probably once a government-hating, backwoods conservative before the corporate mafia took over the once-honest republican party -- and then took over the mainstream media and used it to brainwash people like Rocky (I'll bet he temporarily returned to his old government-hating ways while Clinton was in office).

The corporate mafia knows that most republican voters blindly vote a straight-party ticket, regardless of their candidates ("because we can't let a hippie democrat get into office, now can we?!"). Members of the corporate mafia must certainly have thought to themselves, "Hmmm, blindly loyal republican voters. What better way to get elected? And you know, deep down in your heart, that they would defend us to the death if we were ever accused of any criminal behavior, because -- hey! -- we're republicans! Check your skepticism and common sense at the door!"

True to form, now that the members of the corporate mafia have been safely installed in office, those same blindly loyal republican voters are staunchly refusing to believe any of their elected representatives are criminals. Why? "Because "they're republicans! That's why! No criminal would EVER join the republican party. Criminals would NEVER try to fool God-fearing republican voters into thinking they are patriotic, red-blooded Americans simply to get elected. Would they? And, even if they did fool us, they're still republicans! That's all that matters. Better a criminal republican who is hell-bent on destroying this nation and our constitutional freedoms in an orgy of greed than an honest democrat or honest third-part candidate!"

No, Really! It Was a Whitewash

What do the following people have in common, besides their overall employer?

John M. Cole, Former Veteran Intelligence Operations Specialist; FBI

John Vincent, Retired Special Agent, Counterterrorism; FBI

Robert Wright, Veteran Special Agent, Counterterrorism; FBI

Sibel Edmonds, Former Language Specialist; FBI

Behrooz Sarshar, Former Language Specialist; FBI

Mike German, Special Agent, Counterterrorism; FBI

Gilbert Graham, Retired Special Agent, Counterintelligence; FBI

Coleen Rowley, Retired Division Counsel; FBI

Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Shaffer, DIA

Dick Stoltz, Retired Special Agent; ATF

Bogdan Dzakovic, Former Red Team Leader; FAA

Linda Lewis, Retired Emergency Programs Specialist; USDA

Mark Burton, Senior Analyst; NSA

Click this link to find out. If you feel you really must, then please skim the article until you get to the list of people I've just mentioned. There you will find a brief paragraph following each name that details their mistreatment by a certain group of biased sham artists. The true Americans among you might get a bit angry at our government as you read. If you do, then great. That's what I want.

The Power of Nightmares

WOW!

When something gets me really worked up, I have trouble writing about it. I have to force myself to limit the number of superlative words that I am tempted to use. And my descriptions of the individuals in question become more personal, to the point where they resemble insults, but are actually accurate portrayals of those individuals.

By way of an introduction, let me quote my last paragraph: "Here's my proof: The Power of Nightmares."

Tonight I learned that my intuition about the neocons has been based on solid, verifiable fact for the past 26 years, not just a strong gut feeling. Of course, I always knew this, but I could never prove it before. Why did I always know it? Because I entered adulthood just as they started to take power. As a result of that terribly sad fact, I have had a front-row seat to their shenanigans ever since.

Neocons are children, mentally and emotionally. And just like children (or, more accurately, just like selfish, self-righteous, arrogant, spoiled children), they see this extremely complicated world in very simple, black-and-white terms. What's worse, they are completely incapable of seeing it any other way. I just didn't realize HOW right I was about them until I clicked the link in the second, sixth and final paragraphs (if I link to it enough times, will that convince you that I really want you to watch it?).

What's even sadder for all of us is the fact that they are also the dumbest, most deceitful children in the world (that's a fact, not an insult), yet they honestly consider themselves to be intellectuals.

Don't take my word for it, though. Watch the documentary, The Power of Nightmares. You may think you have the ability to prove the producers wrong in their depiction of the neocons, but you don't. I have only watched part one, so far, so it is possible that the producers don't go far enough in revealing the depths to which these people, backed by the military-industrial complex, would sink to achieve their agenda.

Question: What ALWAYS happens when dumb people gain power?

Answer: The truly greedy, powerful, evil people (in this case the CEOs of the military-industrial complex) take maximum advantage of them. Together, they are destroying this once-great nation for purposes of truly naive idealism and truly disgusting greed.

We now see what happens in a very complicated world when people with childish fantasies get their hands on the reigns of power.

Here's my proof: The Power of Nightmares.

A Setback for An Aggressor Nation & It's Ally

Here are just a few thoughts and enlightening links on Israel's recent invasion of Lebanon:

Israel did not "win," and the lie that Hezbullah was targeting only Israeli civilians is clearly shown by an Israeli journalist: From Mania to Depression, by Uri Avnery. Now compare that to the innocent civilians that the "good and decent" Israeli army purposely targeted in Lebanon.

The fact that Israel lost is shown even more clearly in this incredibly concise commentary: What Did and Didn't Happen in Lebanon; It Ain't Over, by Rachard Itani.

Hezbullah did not start this war: The Two Israeli Soldiers Were Captured in Lebanon. Even if they really did cross into Israel to kidnap the soldiers, it would still have been a criminal act, not a first strike in a major war. Israel, with full encouragement by their partner in crime, the United States, had just been waiting for an excuse to invade Lebanon, and this weak one was all they could come up with. Was Lebanon supposed to have become one of the future embarkation points for the invasion of Syria by U.S. troops? Will it still happen?

Israel's goal isn't survival. It's theft -- theft perpetrated while hiding behind every nation's fear of being labeled anti-Semitic if they complain: An Interview with Noam Chomsky on Lebanon.

A Jewish writer and teacher in Montreal, Canada, explains it very well: No Peace Without Justice, No Justice Without Truth; Pulling the Plug on Israel, by David Himmelstein.

"Demographic threat" is a new code phrase for racism. Guess who uttered it and who is enforcing it with extreme violence.

Who set the historical precedent for Hezbullah's supposed fighting methods? War Crimes in Lebanon.

The U.S. news outlets' incredibly biased reporting: The US Media's "Special Relationship" by Remi Kanazi.

Just one of the possible reasons we get distorted one-sided news in the U.S.: AIPAC Congratulates Itself on the Slaughter in Lebanon, by John Walsh.

I have saved the best editorial for last: How Israel Could Destroy Itself; Delusional Expectations, by John Chuckman. Here is a brief quote from it (the comment in brackets [ ] is my own addition):

"Israel began by moving into a bad neighborhood [in the late 1940s, without invitation, and simply took land that had never been theirs], and everyone involved understood this from the beginning, yet Israel behaves as though it should be normal to enjoy a pristine Disney-like suburb with white-picket fences. It reacts to activities in the bad neighborhood that disturb its fantasy with ferocious indignation. Israel's destructive behavior is explained largely by this delusional expectation.

"If Israel had spent half the resources it has spent on war over the last fifty years instead on helping its neighbors and building up their economies, the region would be a far better place today. And if Israel had been willing to make reasonable concessions to the needs of others in the region, there might well be lasting peace today."

My concluding thought (just in case I am misunderstood): Israel is a nation, not a religion. It is populated by people, not by saints, and is governed by a greedy, violent, self-righteous government with total disregard for human rights. Criticism of the actions of a nation is not equivalent to criticism of that nation's predominant religion. That is a defense behind which many crimes can be, and clearly are being, perpetrated with reckless abandon.

I naively supported that country's aggressive land grabs for most of my adult life because I thought they were the good guys. I have every right to change my mind, and I've done so.

This Is America??????

Not much to say here. The article says it all: 9-11 Investigative Journalist Harassed And Beaten By Undercover Cops.

The Republican Snowball

I originally published the following as a comment at Tom Degan's Daily Rant. in response to a commenter nicknamed "fenrir." I like it well enough that I thought I would give it its very own blog entry.

Without further ado:

fenrir said: Regarding the republican party, "A person may be to blame, but not the entire party..."

I say: That's like saying, "A mafia member may be to blame, but not the entire mafia."

We have to admit that certain organizations and/or political parties attract a certain element of humanity (for a variety of reasons, both good and bad). Over time, by bits and pieces, some of the more radical elements corrupt the original philosophy of those organizations/parties to fit their own whims. Some are for ridiculously self-serving, petty reasons, but which hurt no one else in the country (certain liberal elements); others are for authoritarian reasons, cloaked in a veil of patriotism, that definitely infringe on the rights of everyone else in the country (certain conservative elements). Eventually, those bits and pieces add up. Once that accumulation passes a certain point, as has happened in our Congress, there is a snowball effect, and the corruption takes on a life of its own. Eventually, there is a point of no return for that snowball, and one must admit that that particular organization/party is a lost cause.

Personally, I believe that has happened to the republican party. It started in the mid 1960s, as Tom states (maybe even a little of it during the "red scare" of the 1950s). By January 1981, with Reagan's presidency (actually, George H.W. Bush's vice presidency), the snowball was starting to get out of control. All hope for the party was lost in January 1995 (although this may not have been clear to everyone yet), with Newt Gingrich's republican "revolution" in Congress (even Nixon's White House counsel John Dean believes this, as did Barry Goldwater).

As I state in my previous comment, I wouldn't vote for a republican candidate now, or ever again, even if he or she was the reincarnation of Gandhi, because he or she could possibly allow the bad republicans to keep a majority of seats in either or both houses. I suspect that there are many other Americans who feel the same way, and the numbers are growing -- hence the republican need for hackable voting machines made by republican-dominated corporations. If the republican snowball keeps on expanding and destroying everything in its path, even some hardcore republican voters are going to abandon it. If you doubt me, here is a very shocking survey that might give you pause: John Birch Society. You cannot get more TRADITIONALLY conservative than the John Birch Society.

In my book, this means the republican party is lost, although it may take a long time for it to die out. When that day comes, traditional, honest conservatives will have to start a new party from scratch.

Thus the cycle goes on.

I Smell A Rat

This is pretty simple math.

Israel has attacked Lebanon.

Israel seems to be threatening to attack Syria.

Iran's President Ahmadinejad has warned Israel not to attack Syria. This implies that he will send Iran's army to the aid of the Syrian army if Israel attacks it.

President Ahmadinejad is an extremely stupid person sometimes, almost as stupid as Usurper Bush. Usurper Bush's neocon handlers know this. Israel knows this. I'm willing to bet that both entities are taking full advantage of Ahmadinejad's stupidity, just as the final draft of their carefully written script requires. They are baiting the trap.

If -- When -- Iran's army comes to the aid of the Syrian army -- against "poor, innocent, practically defenseless" Israel (even though its army is larger than the armies of most of its neighbors combined; and even though it has nuclear weapons) -- Usurper Bush will insist to Congress that the United States must defend Israel at all costs. [There will be no explanation as to why we must defend Israel, since Israel has never -- in all of its history -- been of the slightest strategic or economic interest to the the United States, whatsoever. No oil exports, no food exports, no clothing exports, no U.S. military bases, nothing. Zilch.]

AIPAC (the staunchly pro-Israel lobbying group) will finally call in its markers and demand satisfaction from every member of the U.S. Congress, stating that it now expects repayment in full for the millions or billions of "campaign" dollars it has given them over the years. That satisfaction will naturally come in the form of Congress's approval of Usurper Bush's "purely altruistic" plan to invade Iran in order to "defend poor, innocent, practically defenseless" Israel.

The lapdog republican Congress then approves Usurper Bush's "purely altruistic" plan to invade Iran in order to "defend poor, innocent, practically defenseless" Israel.

Usurper Bush thus pulls an end run around all of his critics worldwide and finally gets a "legitimate" excuse to invade Iran after all. And Syria will even be thrown in as a bonus "enemy."

I smell a dirty, evil sewer rat -- or two. Is it possible that Israel's recent military overreaction was actually predesigned to ensure that the United States will get to attack Iran and Syria? Is it possible that that military overreaction is actually unrelated to a few dead or kidnapped Israeli soldiers?

It's too bad for the world that the United States is so short of troops these days. One can imagine the excessive slobber, from overactive salivary glands, that is even now dripping down the chins of Usurper Bush and his neocon handlers as visions of invasion and/or nuclear bombs explode in their heads.

[Update: 07-17-06: It appears that my theorizing above (from four days ago) may have been completely correct. Read this (making sure to note that the article continues below the video "screen"): Danny Schechter: The WWIII Meme.]

Disgusting Hypocrisy & Double Standards

1.) -----

I'm opposed to the invasion and brutal occupation of Tibet by China and the systematic genocide they have been conducting there since 1950. I even saw the Dali Lama in person a few years ago.

"I'm with you all the way, man."

2.) -----

I was opposed to Iraq's invasion of Kuwait back in 1990, even though I found out later it was because Kuwait was stealing Iraqi oil by drilling at a slant into Iraqi territory. Iraq warned Kuwait several times to stop, but Kuwait didn't listen.

"Yeah, that was a pretty despicable act on Iraq's part. I didn't know Kuwait was doing that stuff, though."

3.) -----

I was totally and violently opposed to the imprisonment and murder of millions of Jews by the Nazis in World War II and the subsequent theft of their property and wealth. One of my favorite movies of all time is Escape from Sobibor.

"Yes, that's one of the worst crimes in the history of the human race."

4.) -----

I was opposed to Serbians killing Muslim civilians in a genocidal manner in Kosovo and Bosnia and then taking their land merely because many residents in those provinces wanted independence and were willing to fight for it.

"That was really horrible. I agree with you."

5.) -----

I was opposed to the Indonesian invasion and occupation of East Timor a few years ago.

"So was I. I'm glad the UN forced the Indonesians out and allowed East Timor to become an independent nation."

6.) -----

I am opposed to the mass genocide and eviction by the Sudanese government of the minority inhabitants of the Darfur region merely because a few Darfur rebels fought for more rights. The government is now using it as an excuse to take their land and kill them off.

"Yes, it's sickening. I cannot believe we are doing so little to stop it from happening."

7.) -----

I am totally opposed to the unprovoked invasion and occupation of Iraq (and the theft of their future oil rights) by the United States.

"Yeah, I've been protesting that one myself. Bush and Cheney used non-Iraqi terrorists as a weak excuse to invade that country."

8.) -----

I'm absolutely sickened by the right-wing christian takeover of the republican party.

"Yeah, those religious nuts need to keep their noses out of our government. They're destroying our democracy."

9.) -----

I am opposed to Israel's systematic mass imprisonment and murder of Palestinian civilians (including women and children) and the blatant theft of land that the Palestinians have owned for thousands of years.

"You disgusting, anti-Semitic, neo-nazi piece of trash."

I see... So what you're saying is that Israel isn't like all the rest of the countries I just mentioned. Instead, it is allowed to perpetrate crimes against humanity -- and no one, including the press, is allowed to identify them as crimes -- simply because most Israelis are Jewish? How come I'm not anti-christian for my opposition to the Serbian and U.S. invasions of Muslim territories? How come I'm not anti-christian due to my disgust with right-wing christians who are taking over our government? Or, if even if I did happen to be anti-christian, how come that's OK with you? How come I'm not anti-Muslim for my opposition to the Sudanese government's practice of genocide in Darfur and the Indonesian government's occupation of catholic East Timor? How come I'm not considered pro-Semitic and anti-Nazi for my total condemnation of the Nazi holocaust of World War II?

"Hmmm, I didn't think of it that way."

Yes, I know. From now on, please stop with the hypocrisy and double standards. No nation, including Israel, has the right to hide behind its predominant religion -- no matter what that religion is -- in order to commit its own atrocities. And no one should be demeaned and condemned for exposing those atrocities for what they are.

[Inspired by Israel's recent attacks on civilian targets in Gaza and Lebanon, no matter what their excuse might be.]

Framing Isn't Just a Foreign Affair

Darn that Gene Lyons! The famous mainstream editorialist has just ruined my day -- actually my foreseeable future -- by stating a possible conspiracy theory that is just too feasible -- or rather, too scary -- to contemplate (and I never used to be the paranoid type). I'm almost glad that I hadn't thought of it myself at some point in the past, at least not in such concrete terms. When even mainstream journalists start to think such thoughts, then one can only imagine the depths to which our government has sunk. [Off-topic note: Lyons also puts into perfect words why I despise The New York Times -- most of the time.]

Plan A, Part 1: U.S. Imperialism to "Fight Terror" (with Collateral Profits)
The Bush/Cheney Regime has stretched the U.S. military to the limit in that tiny postage stamp of a country known as Iraq. In doing so, it has re-revealed to the world the "soft underbelly" of our superpower status (it was originally revealed in Vietnam). As a result of this over stretching, it has now become somewhat impractical for them to try to frame some other Middle Eastern nation for a future "terrorist" attack within the U.S., although they certainly seem to be trying lately with all the "successfully foiled" terrorist "plots" (some of which have been attributed to poor, young American men -- keep that in mind -- who have neither the means nor the know-how to blow up massive skyscrapers). In essence, the Pentagon no longer has enough military personnel or taxpayer money with which to wreak "vengeance" upon yet another oil-producing nation (Usurper Bush has, according to inside sources, actually considered using nuclear weapons on Iran because of his lack of other options). In short, the Bush/Cheney Administration cannot attack any newly framed "transgressor nation" without partially or wholly abandoning its ill-gotten gains in the previously framed "transgressor nation" -- Iraq. [Some of us predicted this over stretching way back in early 2003.]

Plan A, Part 2: U.S. Dictatorship to "Protect Us from Terror"
There is more to the Bush/Cheney agenda than U.S. imperialism. They are also power hungry here at home (as if you needed me to tell you that). According to "Plan A", "foreign terror threats" are supposed to be the necessary excuse for increased domestic authority and decreased democracy. But what if they can no longer afford to use "foreign terrorists" as their primary excuse to abolish the U.S. Constitution? How, then, will they continue their dictatorial power grab here at home (and avoid war-crimes trials and hard prison time)? Well, there is always Plan B (which they might have been considering doing all along, anyway).

Plan B: U.S. Dictatorship to "Protect Us from Terror" (Revised)
Gene Lyons has provided me with a possible missing piece of a puzzle that I have been trying to assemble for some time now. It appears that Bush/Cheney might not have to rely solely on "foreign terrorists" to accomplish their domestic goals. Lyons concludes his most recent editorial with this unpleasant thought:

"Reasonable people never want to believe that extremists [radical conservatives and neocons] believe their own rhetoric. But quit kidding yourselves. This is mass psychosis. The next terrorist strike, should it happen, will be blamed on the enemy within: treasonous "liberals" who dissent from the glorious reign of George W. Bush. Unless confronted, it's through such strategems that democracies fail and constitutional republics become dictatorships."

Conclusion
You scoff at such a theory? I sincerely, with all my heart, hope you are right; however, as I remember it, it was an American (a gung-ho, flag-waving veteran of the first Gulf War) who was captured, tried and executed for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing (even though the FBI and local police confirmed to Oklahoma City TV stations that bombs were planted inside the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, and that they had even successfully defused two of them).

Maybe, as I have imagined all along, "treasonous liberals" are the motivating factor behind these things... For months, I've been trying to figure out what excuse the government would use to start filling them. Lyons has provided me with a possible answer.

Am I getting a little too carried away here? Probably. The losers in the White House don't have much credibility left to accomplish much of anything, and if they had any credibility, they wouldn't be concerned with liberals. But, hey, as I say, it has finally come to the point that I am keeping company with famous mainstream media journalists, as far as paranoia goes. That's not an insignificant thing for me.

Illegal Immigration Finally Costs Mexico Dearly

In a recent entry entitled, The Double-Standard Test, I wrote the following analogy regarding Mexico, the United States and millions of illegal Mexican immigrants:

Imagine two lifeboats on the open sea. Both are filled to capacity with passengers... The first boat suddenly springs a slow leak. It may well be moral and instinctual for some of the passengers in the second boat to invite the passengers from the first boat to join them [in spite of the fact that the passengers from the first boat are already inviting themselves into the second boat], but is it realistic? Wouldn't it be a lot more sensible for all concerned in both boats if those passengers in the first boat took some initiative and fixed the leak instead of abandoning their boat?

Well, the consequences of abandoning their "lifeboat" -- and not helping to fix that "leak" -- has finally come back to haunt the millions of illegal Mexican immigrants who chose to abandon their native land to its fate. The following quote is from an excellent editorial entitled, Anatomy of a Fraud Foretold, by John Ross (published at CounterPunch):

One of the IFE's [the Mexican "Federal Electoral Institute's"] more notorious accomplishments in this year's presidential elections was to engineer the non-vote of Mexicans in the United States, an effort that resulted in the disenfranchisement of millions of "paisanos" living north of the Rio Bravo. Undocumented workers were denied absentee ballot applications at consulates and embassies and more than a million eligible voters were barred from casting a ballot because their voter registration cards were not up to date and the IFE refused to update them outside of Mexico. Untold numbers of undocumented workers who could not risk returning to Mexico for a minimum 25 days to renew their credentials were denied the franchise the IFE was sworn to defend. The PRD insists that the majority of undocumented Mexicans in the U.S. would have cast a ballot for Lopez Obrador.

I hate to say, "I told you so."

Well, no, actually I don't hate to say it... "I told you so."

The presidential vote in Mexico was very close ("closeness" being the preferred smokescreen tactic of republicans in the U.S. who wish to cover their own vote stealing in countless elections). If illegal Mexican immigrants had remained in their own country and had worked for change, there might have been a president there now who would have tried to improve conditions in Mexico dramatically (or at least until he was assassinated by the CIA, etc.). Even conservative Lou Dobbs of CNN, who clearly doesn't like Socialists, appeared to admit as much. Instead, thanks to fraudulent elections, aided and abetted by millions of absent Mexican voters illegally living in this country, Mexico will get another cohort/puppet of the Bush Administration (as is Vicente Fox), and the newly revealed plans for a North American Union, whose government would likely have the authority to countermand decisions made by our own government (thereby nullifying huge portions of the U.S. Constitution -- any idealists reading this should remember that fact if they think a union is a good thing, as I once did) is one step closer to reality.

Footnote: Make no mistake. If Bush is in favor of an American Union, then it cannot possibly be for the good of the citizens of any of our countries, but rather it is for the convenience of his own puppet masters' authoritarian goals and for the unlimited profits of global corporations (puppet masters and corporations probably being one and the same).

Here is video proof that I am not just making this up:

Yet Again... Do I Dare to Hope?

Although the federal government is desperately short of that element of humanity known as "good guys," we now at least have an extremely solid legal basis for the prosecution of the members of the Bush Administration for war crimes. Amazingly, the legal groundwork for this prosecution was laid by yet another criminal organization, the very organization that illegally installed this future war criminal as president back in December 2000: The Supreme Court of the United States. Read on:

Supreme Court: Bush Administration Has Committed War Crimes

...What has been largely missed is the clear point that the Supreme Court has now declared that for the past five years, Bush and his gang of war-mongers, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of State and former National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, former Attorney General Donald Rumsfeld and current Attorney General and former White House Chief Counsel Alberto Gonzales, and many others in the administration, have been guilty of violating the Third Convention on treatment of prisoners of war. They are also, therefore, in violation of federal law, which back in 1996 adopted that convention as part of the U.S. criminal code. [Read the rest here.]

Do I Dare to Hope?

I'm trying to restrain myself...

And not to hold my breath...

Could something really be happening?!

Finally?!!

"RFK Jr., Florida Law Firm to File Federal Whistleblower Suits Against Two Voting Machine Companies!

"First Case to be Filed Next Week, According to Attorneys Scheduled to Meet with U.S. Dept. of Justice Officials This Week."

Read the rest here.

Yes, maybe this is a very small step; but it is at least one taken in the right direction, finally. One step in the right direction is better than standing still facing the wrong direction (RFK Jr. just needs to be very careful for the next few weeks).

Please watch this excellent 35-minute video:

Votergate - The Presidential Election Special Edition (Election Fraud)

Truth and Laughter

I laughed out loud at when I read the name of a particular U.S. demographic group for the first time just moments ago. It is mentioned in Max Udargo's Blog. Below are just the first two paragraphs of that blog, which was written in early May but has not lost any of its impact on me:

"President Bush appears to be losing support among a key group of voters who had hitherto stood firmly with the president even as his poll numbers among other groups fell dramatically.

"A new Gallup poll shows that, for the first time, Bush’s approval rating has fallen below 50% among total fucking morons, and now stands at 44%. This represents a dramatic drop compared to a poll taken just last December, when 62% of total fucking morons expressed support for the president and his policies..." (Read the rest here.)

Rather Than Couric

Tom Degan, one of the best new voices of the blogosphere (and long renowned for his comments at Alternet), has just written an excellent piece on CBS News, the hostile ouster of Dan Rather and the planned arrival of Katie Couric in September 2006. I have been thinking about this topic quite a bit myself lately.

Tom Writes
"When [CBS] announced that they were replacing the great Bob Scheiffer on the CBS Evening News with someone of the journalistic stature of Katie Courac, that did it. When it comes to getting the news, "cute and perky" doesn't really work for me. Maybe she'll surprise us. When Mike Wallace arrived at the company in 1962, no one took him seriously either."

My Reply
Yes, but in 1962, every single tributary of the mainstream media wasn't owned by the same five republican-driven corporations, and there was certainly no policy at that time to promote "cute and perky" faces to the job of presenting party-line, zero-substance, PR propaganda. In the present era, no journalist will succeed in the PR industry (because it's not really "news" anymore) if he or she doesn't follow those rules. If a "journalist" even dared to try to expose any really substantive truth to the public in any story regarding the Bush Administration, or present the other side of a story fairly, their show would either be cancelled or immediately moved from its prime 7 PM (EDT) time slot to 11 PM (EDT).

Couric
As for Couric herself, I have had zero respect for her (to put it mildly) since April or May of 1995, when she interviewed a celebrity who believes in always questioning our government officials and never simply taking their word for anything (I'm almost certain that man was comedian David Brenner, whose hometown is Philadelphia, PA, birthplace of the Constitution). I believe (because it's not easy to remember the details), Brenner came on to discuss the U.S. Constitution or the freedom to dissent, or something like that. The interview took place shortly after the Oklahoma City bombing, and the country was in a rage against the sort of radical separatist groups to which Timothy McVeigh supposedly belonged (even though he had been a rabidly patriotic soldier in the first Gulf War just a couple of years earlier).

During the course of Couric's interview, she asked him several questions. To one question, he responded as all TRULY patriotic Americans have responded since the founding of our government in 1787. It's been eleven years since the interview, so I don't remember his exact words, but his response was very vaguely along the lines that he didn't trust our government without question and that no American should trust our government without question. He may even have said (or I was thinking it myself as I watched) the Founding Fathers expected American citizens to be ever vigilant in scrutinizing the actions and motives of our goverment. Keep in mind that Brenner wasn't discussing the FBI debacle in Waco in 1993 or to the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. He was just speaking in general.

In short, Brenner was being the sort of person that the press had been championing for decades.

But, by 1995, times had changed. Couric suddenly, and with great hostility, launched into classic TV-news ambush mode, comparing Brenner to the likes of Timothy McVeigh, Terry Nichols and all the members of the Neo-Nazi groups in this country.

With a very loud scream of disbelief and anger, I immediately switched the channel, and I have never watched Couric since. I can say with great certainty that I despise her and her cutesy, innocent-looking, cherubic face. In that brief moment, she had lumped all patriotic Americans in with radical hate groups because we dare to question our government and to mistrust its motives in some cases.

Anti-Climactic Post Script
As for Rather's retirement, I'm hoping he will soon be hitting us with a few excellent exposés on the Bush/Cheney gang of evil stooges now that he is free of major corporate shackles (or as free as any news person can get in this country). I'm not going to hold my breath, but I might slow my breathing down a bit -- every once in a while.

An Amazing Coincidence

Regardless of your position on this topic, you cannot help but admit that a major coincidence (at the very least) took place on the morning of June 23, 2006.

It all began on the evening of June 22, 2006, when "Hannity & Colmes" (on the FOX/RNC Channel) had a guest on by the name of Dr. James H. Fetzer (see endnote). Fetzer is a member of 9/11 Scholars for Truth. Due to some unexpected initial confusion on the part of the hosts regarding their chosen "attack theme" (they got their "facts FOXED," as Fetzer said), Fetzer was given a rare opportunity to answer an open-ended question -- almost without interruption. As the lawyers all say, "Never ask a witness any question to which you do not already know the answer."

Colmes asked Fetzer something to the effect, "So can you give us one piece of evidence that would tend to point toward 9/11 being an inside job by the Bush Administration?"

While Ollie North (who was guest hosting for Hannity) was apparently still lost in confusion, Fetzer had a rare opportunity to speak a few full sentences without hostile, obnoxious interruptions. He said (and I'm paraphrasing here again), "I point you to Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta's testimony before the 9/11 Commission. Mineta said he had encountered Vice President Cheney in a bunker in Washington, DC, at 9:20 AM, on the day of the attacks [forty-three minutes earlier than Cheney said he had arrived]. Every few seconds a young man would come into the room and say, 'Sir, it's 50 miles out. Sir, it's 40 miles out. Sir, it's 30 miles out,' and so on. Finally the young man asked the Vice President, 'Sir, do the orders still stand?' Cheney replied gruffly, 'Of course, the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?'

Fetzer went on to explain that only later did Mineta learn that the young man was referring to Flight 77 approaching Washington, DC, and the orders the young man was referring to were obviously orders NOT to shoot the plane down [please see my first July 6, comment in the comments section for an update on this paragraph]. That's why the young man had finally asked if the orders still stood, to which Cheney replied that they did. Shortly thereafter, Flight 77 (or a "reasonable" facsimile thereof) struck the Pentagon.

Obviously, the producers of the "Hannity & Colmes Propaganda Hour" had not anticipated such a damning bit of irrefutable evidence to escape over "their" airwaves to their glassy-eyed, drool-chinned audience.

Here's the Real Kicker...
The very next morning, less than twelve hours after his 9/11 testimony had been unexpectedly "exposed" to the FOX faithful, Norman Mineta resigned as Secretary of Transportation.

What an unbelievably amazing coincidence of timing!

Just for the sake of argument, let's say Mineta's timing was truly nothing more than a coincidence. If so, then he couldn't have picked a worse time to announce it (unless it was his relatively subtle way of sending a message to the masses). Or, if he was forced to resign by Bush/Cheney (for whatever reason), they couldn't have picked a more self-incriminating time to make it happen.

There has been barely a peep about Mineta's resignation in the mainstream media. I saw the same, generic, non-informational, totally uncurious five-second clip about it several times, but there has been absolutely no speculation as to why he did it (although his recent back surgery is implied to be the main reason). That's incredibly unusual behavior for our babbling heads, isn't it? Other high-level resignations in the last few months from the Bush Administration were the subject of endless babble among the MSM "elite."

A Final Thought
I can only imagine the sudden conflicting thoughts of at least five out of every one hundred Fox viewers who had heard Fetzer mention Mineta's damning testimony just a few hours before Mineta resigned. What must they have been thinking for a short time before their self-hypnosis kicked back in?

Click here to download the clip of the four-minute interview (in Windows Media Format). An AVI version is here.

[Note: James H. Fetzer (FM) Distinguished McKnight University Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Duluth, a former Marine Corps officer, author or editor of more than 20 books, and co-chair of Scholars for 9/11 Truth.]

VIDEO: Cheney Usurps Command of NORAD

The Trojan Horse Party

The following is an observation of an independent voter (me):

Bad people with lots of money, power and sinister motives have learned to choose their electors wisely.

The Set Up
Most Americans would probably agree that democrats tend to vote across party lines more than republicans do. Republican voters, on the other hand, have traditionally shown a very stubborn loyalty to candidates and elected officials of their own party. They tend to remain loyal to those candidates and elected officials even when they are caught telling serious lies or engaging in illegal behavior. In fact, republican voters seem to be completely unwilling to admit that anyone in the republican leadership is capable of making mistakes or of engaging in illegal activity. (1)

What an Opportunist Would See
Herding republican voters in a particular direction is a snap..., but only if you are "one of them." For instance, if a republican leader (such as George W. Bush) points to a perceived enemy (either foreign or domestic, or real or invented), republican voters will immediately start waving the American flag while eagerly waiting for orders to attack the "enemy" and/or smear any "disloyal" doubters in this country. If a democratic leader (such as Bill Clinton) points to a perceived enemy, republican voters immediately accuse him of pulling a selfish ratings stunt.

Trying to herd democratic voters in any direction, on the other hand, is like trying to herd cats. They are an unwieldy collection of loosely allied groups who can barely agree with one another half the time. They have allied themselves with one another merely for the sake of political convenience (since the two-party system is entrenched in this country). If either republican or democratic leaders point to a perceived enemy (either foreign or domestic, or real or imagined), many democratic voters (and independent voters) will march in protest and demand proof of the government's claims before they will lend their support to such a cause. (2)

An Opportunist Makes His Decision
Now please tell me, if you were a wealthy, greedy, power-hungry individual with sinister motives, and you wanted to fool the largest number of voters into voting for you and defending you blindly once you were elected, which group of Americans would you choose to hoodwink? Would you try to smooth-talk an unwieldy collection of loosely allied groups who can barely agree with one another half the time? Or would you smooth-talk those voters who are blindly, fanatically loyal to their party, no matter how corrupt their candidates or leaders might be? If I were a greedy, sinister, corrupt power broker, and I wanted to fool the greatest number of voters into voting for me, I would definitely campaign as a republican and spout all sorts of patriotic and democrat-bashing clichés. Depending on where I live in this country (Nebraska, for instance), I would almost certainly win the election in a landslide.

In Conclusion
What this tells us is that those Americans who are the most patriotic of all are also the most gullible in allowing evil people to take over our country. The Republican party has come to resemble the famous Trojan Horse, and republican voters are the Trojan soldiers who are unwittingly bringing the bad guys into the fort. I wish republican voters would keep that in mind from now on. I fear that it is too late, though. The damage has been done. The evil people are already in power (thanks, in part, to gullible voters and to the stolen elections of 2000 and 2004), and they will find every way they can never to relinquish that power again. (3)

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Footnotes
(1) Such blind loyalty might, in part, be attributable to the almost thirty years of incessant conservative propaganda that has thoroughly demonized the democratic party. This propaganda seems to have left most moderate republicans completely afraid to vote for any democratic candidate, even when they cannot stand the republican candidate. Even when members of the republican leadership are caught red handed engaging in illegal activities, republican voters usually rationalize that they did it because that is the only way for "decent, patriotic American leaders" to get around "evil liberal" judges and politicians, as well as the "liberal" media. Breaking the law is the only way they can fight the "good fight" in order to "save" America.

(2) By the way, nourishing a healthy suspicion of our government's activities is exactly how the Founding Fathers intended for Americans to act.

(3) Thanks to rigged voting machines (a fact proven by several official tests) that are manufactured by virulently pro-republican corporations.

The Double-Standard Test

Illegal President George W. Bush is promoting what amounts to an open-border policy with Mexico. Why hasn't it occurred to most people (liberals, independents and other common-sense Bush haters) that if he is for it then there are probably a thousand reasons that we should all be totally against it? That embarrassment of a human being cannot possibly have a noble motive in promoting such a policy. He has never had a noble motive in his life (check out the definition of a sociopath; if that doesn't describe George W. Bush, then nothing does). He clearly has an ulterior motive, and he is tricking liberals in this country (using their ideals against them) into giving him exactly what he wants (keep in mind that I am a staunch independent who leans ever so slightly to the left in most situations). His chief aim is almost certainly to help corporations by replacing high-wage American workers with low-wage foreign workers. He is probably using those foreigners to lower our own wage standards, so that we will all eventually have no choice but to work for the same low wages if we want to put any food at all on the table. The richest of the rich (one percent of the population) will then get to add a big portion of that ten-percent of America's wealth that they don't already control to the remaining ninety percent that they do control. Of course, as immediate citizens, these immigrants would also get to vote right away, and one wonders who they would vote for in grateful numbers (Jeb Bush? or George again, if he breaks the law and chooses to run again?). Of course millions of them would settle in California. Would they be enough to turn California into a Bush state? There may be more sinister motives behind Bush's immigration policy, but that remains to be exposed.

For the record, I am not at all against people immigrating legally to this country or even staying on extended visas or green cards. Throughout most of my life, if there has been someone from another country in the same room with me, I will invent any excuse I can think of to visit with that person. My brother even dragged a Norwegian tourist home with him once because he thought I would want to visit with him (I was actually head-over-heels in love with an Iranian woman in college, and, yes, she was head-over-heels in love with me too; to be truthful, though, I fell in love with her before I was fully aware of her foreign status). However, I do know that there is a limit to what our job market/economy can handle, and an endless stream of people immigrating here illegally is not sensible. Paul Craig Roberts, a conservative economist who hates Bush with a passion (he thinks, as I do, that Bush is the most dangerous, destructive and incompetent leader this country has ever seen) wrote the following a few months ago. The numbers are very sobering: Nuking the Economy. Roberts says it far, far better than I can, so I strongly encourage you to read his editorial (or at least the first four or five paragraphs if you are pressed for time). In fact, I strongly encourage you to read all of his editorials (most of which don't involve economics). They can be found at the same web site, as well as at two or three other sites.

Think of It This Way
Imagine two lifeboats on the open sea. Both are filled to capacity with passengers. Adding a few more passengers to either boat would cause it to sink. The first boat suddenly springs a slow leak. It may well be moral and instinctual for some of the passengers in the second boat to invite the passengers from the first boat to join them (I would probably be among those doing the inviting), but is it realistic? Wouldn't it be a lot more sensible for all concerned in both boats if those passengers in the first boat took some initiative and fixed the leak instead of abandoning their boat? Wouldn't Americans fix the "leak" if it was in our own boat? Isn't that what we've done a number of times in the past 230 years?

In fact, let's think about that for a moment: What if the roles were reversed? What if the United States was suffering from the economic "troubles" that Mexico is now experiencing? What if millions of Americans just abandoned this country and their moral responsibility as citizens and crossed illegally into Mexico or Canada and then, to add insult to injury, started demanding (while waving thousands of U.S. flags at huge protest rallies) that those governments give them full citizenship? Would Americans really have the audacity to do that? What would the world say about those millions of us who participated in those invasions and rallies? I suspect the general consensus would be negative -- AND RIGHTFULLY SO. Most liberal and independent Americans would probably be doing the loudest screaming, saying such things as, "How dare we impose our will on any foreign government! Those are sovereign nations! We have no right to invade their countries and then demand that they give us what we want!"

Yet when the shoe is on the other foot, and it is the United States that is being illegally invaded by the millions, we are demonized for not giving in to the invaders' demands. Why do other nations, and even tens of millions of our own citizens, hold the United States to a different standard?

Will the Misleading Never End?

Lou Dobbs, whom I respect half the time, finally reported on the highly suspect "irregularities" of one of the voting-machine companies, in this case, Sequoia. He mentioned the "problems" experienced by voters in Illinois who recently used Sequoia machines in the primaries.

I thought Lou's report was probably too good to be true, and it was. He immediately blamed all of the company's shady problems on the fact that they are now owned by a Venezuelan company. It's mighty convenient for Lou that Venezuela is ruled by that "horrible" socialist and "public enemy" No. 3 or 4 or 5, Hugo Chavez (who is no more a threat to us than Castro has been since November 1962 -- after the Cuban Missile Crisis had ended --, only Hugo has that highly addictive magic elixir, OIL, which makes the ultra rich take all leave of their senses, their ethics, their common sense, etc., at the mere mention of its name).

Yep, Lou found a foreign scapegoat to take the implied blame for "all" of America's voting "irregularities." Never mind the fact that those irregularities were almost certainly engineered by the Americans who owned the company long before the Venezuelans had even heard of it. It's also mighty convenient that Lou found this foreign scapegoat just in time to counter Robert Kennedy Jr.'s Rolling Stone article.

Yes, Lou, it's totally OK to ignore the far more serious and thoroughly proven criminal behavior of such one-hundred-percent American-owned companies as Diebold and ES&S.

Lou condemns American corporations, such as Big Oil, all the time, but he refuses to condemn the voting-machine companies. Why?

I think the answer is simple: Big Oil cannot hide its criminal behavior from the American people. We are victims of it every time we pull up to a gas pump. The Mainstream media cannot hide this truth from us. The criminal behavior of voting-machine companies, on the other hand, is supposed to be a secret. We are not supposed to know that we are being screwed every time we use one of their machines; therefore, the mainstream media is duty bound to continue to hide those horrible secrets at all costs -- unless there just happens to be a foreign "enemy" to use as a convenient scapegoat. The mainstream media probably wouldn't even have reported this fact if it hadn't found it necessary to conduct damage control in the wake of Kennedy's article.

Yes, I am just speculating, but the timing is amazing. It has been public knowledge for a while that a Venezuelan company owns Sequoia. Why did Dobbs wait until now a day or two after Kennedy's article, to attack them?

Update June 7, 2006: On the June 5, episode of Lou Dobbs, reporter Kitty Pilgrim said, "The big worry for U.S. elections is Smartmatic and other voting machine companies are private companies. They have proprietary software that they can call a trade secret. Electronic voting experts with extensive experience say it's nearly impossible to verify if a proprietary system is tamper-proof... Some voter watchdog groups and others in congress are calling for a full review and say the ownership of all electronic voting companies should be reviewed to determine if it poses a risk to U.S. elections."

I got the above Pilgrim quotes from "Hannan," a commenter at BradBlog. I replied to him as follows:

"I just read Hannan's Kitty Pilgrim quotes after I made my previous comment. I didn't watch Lou Dobbs yesterday (after being frustrated with last week's report), so I must commend Kitty Pilgrim on making such helpful comments. That is encouraging.

"Wildly wishful thinking: Maybe she and Dobbs (or at least Pilgrim alone) are ever so carefully -- deviously -- working their way around CNN's neocon censors. Maybe their report on foreign (or at least Venezuelan) ownership of a voting-maching company is merely the trojan-horse method of talking about the electronic-voting scandal in this country.

"Yes, as I say, that is wildly wishful thinking. The skeptic, the optimist and the realist in me are equally powerful (or weak), and every day, all day long, they battle it out with one another like the Three Stooges during Happy Hour."

Those Annoying Coincidences

The Coincidence Theorist's Guide to...

I Urge You

If you value a free and democratic United States, PLEASE read this: Top 10 Signs of the Impending U.S. Police State

The Anatomy of Demonization

Someone named "MM" commented on my message to Senator John Thune regarding the Samuel Alito Supreme Court nomination.

He/she wrote: "Ohhh I feel that groundswell rising against Alito. I Am Scared. You dems really really scare me... Yeah, I'm scared. Scared that you idiots would ever have power again in this country."

My reply:

Oh, there was a groundswell, MM. Just because most democratic senators ignored the the thousands of emails and faxes that each one received, and the mainstream media completely ignored the story, doesn't mean it didn't happen. I saw it happening. If you don't believe it, there's nothing I can do about it.

Furthermore, MM, this is the United States! Please stop demonizing the political party/philosophy to which you do not belong. Those are the tactics of the Communist Chinese, North Koreans, Cubans and former Soviets, to name just a few. The fact that republicans do it now on a daily basis speaks volumes about the sort of people who have taken over that party in the last two and a half decades. Your arrogance is astounding. You actually seem to believe that your party can do no wrong, and the other party can do no right (which is laughable since the neocons have done nothing right since Bush stole office). "Lefties" and "liberals" are no threat to democracy or freedom. If anything, they want too many "liberal" freedoms that conservatives find reprehensible (one or two of which I am not too thrilled with myself, but that's what democracy and compromise are all about, MM; in the U.S., no one is allowed to have it all his or her own way). At least those "leftist liberals" are in favor of excessive freedom, whereas you and other conservatives are not. You clearly appear to be in favor of forcing everyone to live life according to an ideology that is a weird cross between John Wayne movies and "Leave It to Beaver," even if it means passing restrictive laws to get us all to live that way. The problem is that you cannot legislate culture or religion, except in the Middle East. Those people excel at legislating culture and religion. By all means, let's be more like them.

Democracy dies when only one party holds the reins of power and demonizes (lies about) all opposition (more on this here).

To the rest of my readers (who number in the ones, I'm sure), I say that we cannot argue with modern republican neocons. They don't want to hear any opinion but their own. We can only watch in resignation as they finally get a chance to impose their long-cherished fantasies (many of them criminal) on the world and then watch as those fantasies fall apart around them (or rather around all of us); and that's what is now happening. Every one of Bush's delusional fantasies is falling apart. When it's all over with, we will get to say, "Told you so," as we reassume the reins of power and clean up their world-class messes (only I think it's too late to fix their messes in many cases). Many of us non-rocket scientists predicted these negative outcomes several years ago, including my newest hero, Paul Craig Roberts, who was President Reagan's Assistant Secretary of the Treasury and later wrote for the conservative Wall Street Journal and was also a contributing editor at the ultra-conservative National Review. You may read many of his reviews at the preceding link and the above link. He, too, is sure that putting Alito on the Supreme Court is a terrible mistake (in fact, he sees Bush himself as an abomination). However, he says it much better than I do. See for yourself. Why don't you demonize Roberts as a "leftie" too, MM? Oh, I know. You probably will, even though you would be totally off base.

Modern republicans don't like anyone who disagrees with even the smallest aspect of their republican neocon party line, not even other republicans. Such people cannot see anything but pure black and white. Even the slightest shade of "off-black" (aka "gray") is considered pure white to them and is demonization material. The fact that I am not a "leftie" would fall on deaf ears if I were to proclaim it to MM. For instance, I voted for Reagan in 1980 (although I quickly grew to hate him and am now somewhat embarrassed to admit that I voted for him). In 1992, to get rid of Evil Bush Number One, I voted for Bill Clinton. I quickly lost all respect for him because he became a sellout to corporate interests. I voted independent in 1996. I would have voted for McCain in 2000 (a mistake, I now realize), if he had gotten the nomination; however, Goober "Al Capone" Bush's puppet masters resorted to dirty tricks to defeat McCain. Instead, I voted independent again. I despise John Kerry because he is a complete Washington insider and corporate crony, but, thanks to idiotic democratic primary voters, he was the only alternative in 2004 to the truly evil Bush. I did not like Gore at all until this year, when he gave one of the most inspiring speeches that anyone has given in decades and forced me to reassess my earlier long-held opinion of him (come on, now, MM; break free from that North Korean philosophy of yours; click the link and listen to what the "opposition" party has to say; be an American). Finally, I would gladly consider voting for Chuck Hagel for president in the future, but NOT until the criminal republicans are a microscopic minority in congress.

In conclusion, I am an American who believes in freedom at all costs (NOT neo-conservatism at all costs nor politically correct liberalism at all costs), but that declaration would also fall on deaf ears wouldn't it? I am an independent and have been since I was old enough to know what politics are all about. If I was forced to choose against my will, though, I would say that I presently consider the democratic party to be the lesser of two evils, because I cannot help but see the self-righteous, self-centered arrogance and greed of the conservatives who have hijacked the republican party and falsely demonized their opposition. I desperately want a third party to gain enough traction to scare both the republicans and the democrats into becoming honest again.

Democracy - WWF Style

Many registered democrats (as well as many independents, probably) have been utterly baffled as to why democratic politicians seem to be consistently willing to play the role of the losers in recent years, or, even worse yet, side with this most horrible president in U.S. history. If they don't actually side with him, then they almost always surrender without a fight, or else they pretend to be beaten in a fair fight. Why?

It's highly likely that they are simply nothing more than cowards.

But what if they aren't cowards? What else could it be?

Here's my theory. It is presented in the form of a side-by-side comparison with another professional "show sport": professional wrestling.

The Identical Settings:
A.) Wrestling "arena."
B.) The Capitol building.

The Identical Opponents:
A.) "Evil" wrestlers vs. "good" wrestlers.
B.) Democrats (demonized as "evil") vs. Republicans (idolized as "good").

The "Fights":
A.) Battling for the world "championship."
B.) Battling over legislation/judges/the Constitution/world domination/wars, etc.

The Outcomes:
A.) With a few exceptions (to keep the silly "sport" from looking totally fabricated), the "good" wrestlers, with the help of the announcer, demonize the "bad" wrestlers, pretend to take a few fake "sucker punches" to the kidneys from the "bad" wrestlers to gain audience sympathy and then eventually win.
B.) With a few exceptions (to keep the democratic process from looking totally fabricated), Republicans, with the help of the mainstream media, demonize Democrats, pretend to take a few fake "sucker punches" in the kidneys from the "bad" democrats to gain voter sympathy and then eventually win.

The Aftermaths:
A.) The "bad" wrestlers and the "good" wrestlers (along with the announcers) leave the arena, receive their weekly salaries and go straight to the local watering hole, have some laughs together over a few tequila shooters and discuss tomorrow's script, which was written a long time ago, and has just been handed to them by the producers.
B.) Both the Republicans and the Democrats (along with their mainstream-media accomplices) leave the people's capitol, receive their weekly "salaries" and go straight to the local country club, have some laughs together over a few martinis and discuss tomorrow's script, which was written a long time ago, and has just been handed to them by "the producers."

The Results:
A.) A small, yet highly dedicated fan base thinks the wrestling is real, worships the "good" wrestlers and admires their every move. Much of the rest of the TV audience looks away, speechless than anyone could actually fall for such poorly acted crap. The majority of the TV audience, however, just doesn't care.
B.) A small, yet highly dedicated voter base thinks democracy is still real in the halls of Congress, worships the Republicans and follows their every move. Much of the rest of the voter base looks away, speechless than anyone could actually fall for such poorly acted theatrics. The majority of Americans, however, just doesn't care.

The Consequences:
A.) As far as "professional" wrestling goes..., it sure as hell isn't good for quality TV.
B) As far as Washington, goes, it sure as hell isn't good for democracy.

The democrats aren't the "losers." They're just actors playing the parts of losers.

Saving Our Constitution

I just wrote the following message to Senator John Thune (R) of South Dakota. I know it is a hopeless cause, but it's better than doing nothing at all:

Dear Senator Thune,

Like you, I am a South Dakotan. I graduated from Lyman High School in 1979. You and I are from a generation and a state that prides itself on its philosophy of individual rights and freedoms. We believe in less government, not more. I know that deep down you are more of a South Dakotan than you are a loyal member of an agenda-driven political party. You have a chance to make history (and a very big name for yourself) by taking a very principled stand and protecting our Constitution, rather than voting for a person, Samuel Alito, whose record undeniably shows that he has ruled against individual rights 85 percent of the time.

Many conservative South Dakotans are so caught up in overturning Roe v. Wade that they are blind to the much greater dangers posed by Alito. That said, a survey in South Dakota shows that its citizens are evenly split between pro-choice and pro-life; therefore, as far as abortion goes, you are going to offend half the population of South Dakota, no matter what you do. So abortion is a non-issue in this particular matter. In fact, it is nothing more than a distraction.

Please tell me that you value our Constitution and our future as a nation (a nation that proudly does its best to "err" on the side of freedom every time in judicial matters) more than you value your temporary spot in the United States Senate. Millions of Americans have put their lives on the line in order to protect our Constitution from foreign threats. Surely, the very least you could do is put your senate seat on the line in order to protect it from an insidious domestic threat. You took an oath to do that very thing.

If you do not, this nation will feel the effects of your decision long after you have left office, maybe for all time. Almost certainly your children and grandchildren will not grow up with the same freedoms that we did. Are you willing to risk those freedoms for temporary political benefit? You have a chance to take a stand for something unbelievably important, instead of quietly towing a party line for a president who is clearly not pursuing the greater good for our nation (you must surely see that, as I do, since we were raised practically next door to one another). Far more South Dakotans agree with me than you may realize. Make them proud. They are more deserving of your representation than are those who have a particular agenda. Take a stand that will surely get you noticed (and even admired) around the world. Shock our mainstream media out of their six-year slumber. They will beat down your door to get interviews with you. When they ask baited questions, you answer bluntly. Don't mince words. The strength of your convictions will be far more impressive to their millions of viewers than will a comparatively anonymous party-line vote for a dangerous Supreme Court nominee.

In conclusion, let me repeat: You are a South Dakotan. I want to have faith in you, regardless of party affiliation (party affiliation is tearing this nation apart). I want to continue to brag to my Nebraska friends about the enlightened citizens of South Dakota, as I have for thirty years now (off and on, as I have moved back and forth between here and "home").

Thank you.

P.S. I think you may be unaware of the vast grassroots anti-Alito movement that has been building in this nation over the weekend. Believe me. It is definitely a bipartisan movement. Even the ultra-conservative John Birch Society has sided overwhelmingly against President Bush.

Sacrificing to Preserve the Constitution

I emailed the following message to Senator Ben Nelson (D), here in Nebraska and a nearly identical version to Senator Tim Johnson (D) of my home state of South Dakota. Believe it or not, because I have nothing to lose, I also wrote a similar message to Senator Chuck Hagel (R) of Nebraska. It concludes this entry.

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"It amazes me that so many democratic senators are more concerned with keeping their senate seats than in keeping their oath to protect and defend our Constitution. Veterans have lost their lives defending it against short-lived foreign threats. Do you think it was easy for them to do that? The least you could do is risk losing your senate seat to defend our Constitution against a much more insidious domestic threat (one that will continue to threaten it long after you have retired from public life). More Nebraskans will respect your courage than you realize. For those who will be angry with you, tell them in no uncertain terms exactly what I have told you here. It's really as simple as that. A show of convictions may even impress a few of them, too.

"Yes, there are people in this state who would gladly sacrifice a number of our freedoms in order to impose their political and religious ideologies on all of us. Would you really cater to their whims in order to keep your senate seat for a few more years? The damage that will be done by Alito will probably be irreversible. Your grandchildren and their children will pay the price for the rest of their lives. They will never know the America we know. Please don't take the short-term easy way out. Why are you there, if you aren't going to stand for anything?"

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"I know that this is a lost cause, but I must try: You served in the military and put your life on the line in order to protect and defend this country and our Constitution from foreign threats. Many others gave their lives in the same defense. Now party loyalty is more important than defending the Constitution against an insidious domestic threat in the form of Samuel Alito (you must see how dangerous he is). As a result, your grandchildren may not enjoy many of the freedoms that we now enjoy. For their sakes, please stand apart from this president once again. If you could put your life on the line for this country, certainly you could put your senate seat on the line, too. What sort of country will our future soldiers be defending if you don't?"

My Comment to Craig Crawford

Craig Crawford wrote a brief entry on his blog, Crawford's List, about the likelihood that Alito will overturn Roe v. Wade. He says that Alito probably will do so because that's why Bush picked him. Crawford concluded by saying that Americans elected Bush, so we asked for it: "You get the Democracy you deserve," he wrote.

In a rare opportunity to correspond with a member of the mainstream media, I replied in his comments section as follows:

Whether the mainstream media wants to cover it or not, the evidence strongly indicates that Bush was not legitimately elected in either 2000 or 2004, Mr. Crawford. So, no, sir, we didn't ask for this president.



On what evidence do I state my opinion, you may ask? There is no shortage of such evidence, and it is not the stuff of crazy conspiracy theorists. Eminent scholars and mathematicians have even shown the statistical impossibility of Bush's victory in 2004 (Google it for yourself). Furthermore, it has been proven (although you would never know it by the mainstream media) that Diebold voting machines, among others, allow vote tampering, not only at the local level, but at the much more crucial central-tabulator level, where one person can change the overall tallies that are compiled from the hundreds or thousands of precinct machines with a couple clicks of the mouse. The conclusion of one participant in an official test is that such flaws could not have been accidentally built into the software (see the Leon County paragraph below).



A few examples:



Bev Harris [of Blackboxvoting.org] showed Gov. Howard Dean how to get into Diebold's main server through an "unlocked back door" that she had discovered by accident. This demonstration took place prior to the 2004 election. He was able to switch votes in a mock election in just a few seconds without leaving a trace of his presence. This all happened on the actual Diebold servers without Diebold's knowledge. I saw it happen. It is recorded in a 30-minute documentary film, which is available for free online [here] (may require QuickTime software).



Still skeptical? The Department of Homeland Security's very own web site warns about Diebold's back-door security flaw. In fact that flaw was listed on the site prior to the 2004 election, yet absolutely nothing was done about it. Even more amazingly, the warning is still there. Click here to see for yourself.



Still skeptical? Click the following link to read the findings of an OFFICIAL Leon County, FL, test of a Diebold optical-scanning machine in December 2005 (yes, just a little over one month ago). This particular report was written by one of the participants. You can Google "Leon County" and "Diebold" to find a number of local press reports of the test. It's funny how the mainstream national media has not covered it.



Finally, how come the exit polls were way off base ONLY in those states that used voting machines? And in each discrepancy, the final "official" tally always benefitted Bush. Yet, in counties that used paper ballots, every exit poll was almost a perfect match of the official vote tally. Here are some very revealing charts; and never mind the strange URL title, because the information is still very legitimate.



Exit polls are so very accurate that Bush even hired the same exit-poll company/companies to monitor the election in the Ukraine. In that country, Bush used the exit poll data to force a second election, because it showed that the challenger had won, while the actual election results showed the incumbent had won. How come we consider the exit polls sacrosanct there, yet they are the objects of scorn here, even though they came up with the very same discrepancies here as were found in the Ukraine?



So, no, sir, we didn't ask for this president.



Other links that reveal overwhelming evidence of an environment in which elections have been/could easily be stolen:
The United States Goverment Accountability Office
Steven Freeman, University of Pennsylvania (pdf)
Video documentary of 2000 election in Florida (requires RealPlayer)



There are so many others out there. Just Google it in every way you can think of. Suspend your skepticism long enough to read the evidence for yourself. Don't dismiss it because of what you might consider the "lack of credentials" of the initial web sources. In the majority of cases, they are merely relaying information from very reputable sources.

The Enemy of My Enemy...

Many of you will probably remember the John Birch Society. Founded in 1958, it is one of the oldest and most arch-conservative groups / societies / clubs, what have you, in the United States. On their web site (found via BuzzFlash), they ask, "Should George Bush be impeached and removed from office." I will let you read the results for yourself. Click here and be sure to read the caption above each bar graph. I swear... What is this country coming to? ;-)