I just spoke to a friend of mine in Boston who is a judge in family court. She went to school with Mr. Roberts, and says he is very conservative and will probably continue being conservative because he has been in basically the right wing think tanks from his collage days. She also said he isn't the absolute worse choice, the worst choice will come with the next appointment. She doesn't think they will get rid of Roe v Wade because they need social issues to keep the country divided and fighting with each other, but the ability to easily get an abortion will be taken away. Squeeze and dry up planned parenthood, take the morning after pill off the market, no sex education, etc. There have been more abortions under Bush than there ever was under Clinton.

Really fine piece of writing Sally... as usual. I will re-read and have comments I am sure. Thank you for your time and efforts and for our comfy corner, and especially for your encouraging words that "a new day always dawns." Namaste

This was the last post on the last thread. I am reposting it here because I believe it is important.

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

Explosives Used in London Bombings 'originated in the Balkans'
by Oui
Thu Jul 21st, 2005 at 03:40:34 AM EDT

.
~ Cross-posted from BooMan Tribune ~

Explosives used in London bombings 'originated in the Balkans'

Dublin July 14, 2005 (Irish Examiner) -- THE BALKANS were last night being named as the possible source of the explosive material used in the London bombings.

French Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy told the emergency meeting of EU justice ministers in Brussels, that there was strong suspicion the explosives used in the bombings came from the Balkans or Eastern Europe, where it is possible to buy the material on the black market after the Balkan wars.

However, British Home Secretary Charles Clarke said he was bewildered by the comments.

http://www.eurotrib.com/user/Oui/diary

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

I posted these links on the last thread, but they didn't appear. Soj writes for the European Tribune on Booman's website (he's a former Kossack) --- she is the writer in Italy who posted and translated during the press coverage of the USA military shooting at the Italian reporter and her escort, who was killed --- the Italian Secret Service Agent. Her writings are linked here on the London bombings.

Soj's 5-part series

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/8/4543/86667

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/8/41715/46066

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/18/4257/55681

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/19/31656/1752

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/20/162655/629

Yahoo is reporting more explosions in London, not as severe as two weeks ago...

and another "bombshell" of sorts --- we knew this was coming... just didn't know WHEN...
--------------

China Severs Its Currency's Link to Dollar
by susanhu
Thu Jul 21st, 2005 at 11:21:36 AM EDT

Bonddad is on this breaking news: "Yuan Revaluation: Not a Cure All." "This is a surprise move that caught everyone off-guard," writes Bonddad.
"BEIJING - China dropped its politically volatile policy of linking its currency to the U.S. dollar on Thursday, adopting a more flexible system based on a basket of foreign currencies that could push up the price of Chinese exports to the United States and Europe." (Full story: AP/Yahoo News, via RawStory)

Sally,

Today is called the Guru Purnima, the biggest full moon of the year. The day to honor the guru within and the guru without. I do not mean the hokey meaning of the maligned word guru. I see it as Gu= dark, Ru = light and the path inbetween it signifies. Also the guru within is you G-U-R-U ;-)

Last Updated: Thursday, 21 July, 2005, 11:52 GMT 12:52 UK

E-mail this to a friend Printable version

Q&A: China revalues its currency

US critics claimed China is kept the yuan low to boost exports
China has abandoned its currency's peg to the dollar and revalued the yuan by 2.2%. It now buys more US dollars than before.

With China both one of the world's largest exporters of manufactured goods and one of the largest importers of raw materials, the move's economic impact will be felt worldwide.

Why has China revalued its currency?

China's currency has been fixed at 8.28 yuan to the US dollar for 10 years.

But since China joined the World Trade Organization it has come under increasing pressure to break that link.

The US, in particular, has been worried that China's cheap currency gives it an unfair advantage as it sells its goods to Western consumers.

Already China has built up a huge trade surplus with the rest of the world, and appears to be able to make things more cheaply than its developing country rivals.

China may have been influenced by the fact that it is hosting the world trade talks in December, and did not want talk of its huge trade surpluses to dominate the discussion.

What difference will it make to China?

China's exports will become more expensive as a result of the increased value of its currency.

This might slow the rate of growth of its exports, which are the main engine of China's impressive economic growth.

A slowdown in economic growth could have serious social consequences in China if it led to higher unemployment.

But the relatively small size of the revaluation means it is unlikely to have a huge immediate economic effect.

How will it affect the rest of the world?

Both developing countries and industrial countries will breathe a small sigh of relief if China's export-led growth slows a little.

Developing countries will hope that they will be able to produce more industrial goods like clothing that they can export to Western markets.

And industrialised countries are likely to face less pressure for protectionism from both workers and manufacturers who the competition of Chinese exporters.

This is particularly important in the USA, where political pressure was mounting to do something about and against China.

Most recently this was symbolised by the opposition to a Chinese oil company buying its US-based rival Unocal.

Western consumers, however, may be hurting.

Inflation has been low across much of the Western world, not least because steadily falling prices for consumers goods 'Made in China' helped to keep prices down.

And Western companies that have invested heavily in China may have to adjust their business plans to take account of the new development - although many have done so already.

Are there more revaluations to come?

China has said it will link its currency to a basket of currencies, not just to the dollar, so there could be more changes ahead.

But the Chinese authorities will be careful not to move too quickly on revaluation as this could destabilise both exports and the huge inward investments made by Western firms.

In the long-run, as China focuses less on export-led growth and more on supplying the needs of its own consumers, the government will benefit as the lower prices for imports will help keep inflation in check.

What are the dangers of the move?

China resisted devaluing its currency during the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98, and this provided a key element of stability that contained the crisis after most other Asian developing countries were forced off fixed rates.

And if it has a floating currency this could make China more vulnerable to future financial crises.

However, China is protected by having huge currency reserves of $750bn (£400bn), built up by its years of trade surpluses.

But many of these are in US Treasury bonds, which will become less valuable to China after its revaluation.

So China may start to switch from holding dollars to holding other types of currency, for example the euro, which could lead to a sharp fall in the value of the dollar.

It could also make it more difficult (or expensive) for the US government to finance its massive budget deficit.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4703471.stm

Sally, I apologize... I meant only to post the last paragraph of the article from BBC... I don't know what I did wrong... I will use the preview button from now on!

In her books Alice Bailey pointed to the fact that new religions would be centered around Full Moons. I have a great hope that with Saturn at 0 degrees Leo and Chiron at 0 Aquarius (even with Chiron's slipping back to Capricorn) that we have a signal of a "new day" coming. Chiron is not only the "wounded healer" but the bridge between the old and new. Capricorns build foundations and love the old, while Aquarius is determined to break up those foundations to build something new and different. Saturn oppose Chiron does signal something new (remember Saturn is the only planet where the conjunction is an ending and the opposition is a beginning) I am sorry to say, it's not fast enough for me, nor in the manner I would like, but it is a signal of increased change and chaos. Aquarius doesn't care about chaos (unless it's their chaos) but they do see chaos as a positive thing and I do to. I have always loved Voltair's quote "never fear chaos because out of chaos a new order is born." As the truth of our government and country continues to emerge, and we find out that nothing was what we thought, I do embrace the chaos and the coming "new order." And I embrace the opportunity to be a part of building the new.

That's perfectly ok Jo. We've had long posts before and if we can just keep them down, an occasional one is no problem at all.

I find it interesting that this October, when Fitzgerald's grand jury is due to wrap up, Saturn will be transiting over Bush's Pluto in the first house.

Sally, you are so insightful and inspiring; each of your articles are gems.
Maybe the reason dubya hasn't been seriously injured during his danger period is that he has people *do everything* for him except breath and ride his bike. (So their charts buffer him from his?)
According to Louise L Hay, knee problems represent "Stubborn ego and pride. Inability to bend. Fear. Inflexibility. Wont't give in." Sounds like him.

Has anyone read the poem "The Limit of Tyrants" by Frederick Douglas? It applies to our fascist in charge. (I wonder when the public will reach it's limit?) Here's part of it.
...Find out what people will submit to,
and you have found out the exact amount of injustice
which will be imposed upon them.
The limits of tyrants are prescribed
by the endurance of those whom they oppose.

So you don't think I'm totally MS. Negative; here's some of a poem by Dorothy Day called "Commitment". [I know this poem already applies to everyone here.]

...A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions.
Each one of our thoughts, words and deeds is like that.
No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless.
There's too much work to do.

[I've never been so into poetry, must be tNeptune on my ASC, because I can't even recall a simple shopping list without writing it down. sigh]

Don't know if anyone caught the LA Times article on Roberts this morning (it's out on Buzzflash), but Roberts has ties to the Reagan and Pappy Bush WH and went ad hoc to Florida in 2000 for the Florida recount to give constitutional advice concerning the recount to shrub's baby bro. His selection to the Supreme Court bench couldn't have been more partisan. In my view, this bodes very, very ill for the electoral process in this country.

Ah, Cap'n Sally. It's so good to be able to access the site, to read your fine articles. (Believe Mercury RX made a premature visit to me.)

There are times when i must stop reading. The ability of this administration to promote an Order of Evil is the stuff of nightmares.

I wrote PBS awhile ago regarding a piece they did on the War on Terror. It struck me then that this ongoing assault is the War OF Terror. The recent Supreme Court selection is part of it.

John Roberts is a member of the Federalist Society. This group's members reads like a who's who of Power Plotters International including Scalia, Ashcroft, et al. http://www.prospect.org/print/V14/3/garbus-m.html

Yes, we're tettering on the precipis of chaos. Has this administration knowingly assured that?

Thanks again, Sally. Great article (as was the last!)

karen

Nice article, Sally!! I crunched a few numbers on Roberts. I think it is clear he will be confirmed. Except for a few rough days before September 9, when Saturn opposes his Sun, he will sail through and be confirmed and sworn in by later in September. He has really outstanding planetary configurations that suggest he is clearly the winner.

Progressed Uranus conjunct Jupiter;
progressed Moon opposite Jupiter/progressed Uranus;
transiting Jupiter square Jupiter;
transiting Mars station sextile Jupiter;
transiting Pluto quincunx Jupiter.

So we have three transiting planets - Mars, Jupiter, and Pluto - aspecting his Jupiter. And two progressed planets - Moon and Uranus - also aspecting his Jupiter. All of this comes together in the second half of September and the beginning of October. I don't see how he can lose.

The progressed Moon is a guess based on a Scorpio rising chart that gives him Pluto in the 9th and Sun and Mercury in the 3rd. Also a first house Venus. Just an educated guess. (I think he has Scorpio eyes.)

Sally ...great article as usual....but also interesting is this from Roberts' roomate at Harvard:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/07/21/MNGSJDR79J1.DTL

Roberts' resume runs political gamut

Bob Egelko, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, July 21, 2005

Bush Nominates Roberts

A liberal Washington, D.C., attorney says liberal critics of Supreme Court nominee John Roberts shouldn't be too quick to pigeonhole him as a right- wing ideologue.

Despite his conservative views and record as a Reagan administration lawyer, Roberts chose a bipartisan Washington law firm and a liberal mentor when he entered private practice in 1986, said Richard Lazarus, a law professor and head of the Supreme Court Institute at Georgetown University, and a former roommate of Roberts at Harvard Law School.

"He could have gone anywhere,'' Lazarus said. "It's remarkable how little (a role) politics has played in his life. ... He has friends of all political and ideological stripes. I think that counts for something.''

Liberal groups that were quick to label Roberts as the soul mate of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia after President Bush nominated him Tuesday may be pleasantly surprised when they look back on his work five to 10 years from now, Lazarus said.

But another court commentator recalled that 20 years ago, a former judge on the federal appeals court where Roberts now sits had the same reputation as an open-minded conservative.

"Ken Starr was held up as the conservative who liberals could talk to, and maybe occasionally convince,'' said Edward Lazarus, a Los Angeles attorney and author of "Closed Chambers,'' a book about the current Supreme Court. He is unrelated to Richard Lazarus.

more......
-------------
as I posted on the previous thread, many conservative supremes have gone 'liberalish' while on the bench. Certainly the gravitas of the situation of BEING a Supreme judge, and worrying not only about their own reputations, but the direction their work will take the country has got to eventually change their long held beliefs, except in such mediocre and inflexible people as Scalia and Thomas, apparently.

I keep wondering if John Roberts is a member of my Roberts line - the whole line originated in VA (my grandmother was the rightwing republican anti FDR death to Democrats Paducah Kentucky GOP ;journal editor, Jessie I. Roberts Wood....and there were tons of Roberts who were writers, newspaper people, and probably lawyers....but mostly, XIAN MINISTERS!) He sure looks like my family.....

And Sandra Day O'Connor, I thought, was very conservative? She made it possible for Bush to be IN this position, and expressed total distaste for dems in some off the cuff comments before the election and hoped 'her side' would win....I wonder now if she will hold on longer now that there won't be another woman to replace her?
And, finally, as David Borowitz wrote:
http://www.borowitzreport.com/

Breaking News

ROBERTS VOWS TO BE MOST GENERIC WHITE MALE IN HISTORY OF SUPREME COURT

Bush Praises Nondescript Nominee
more.....

Wonderful article, Cap'n Sally! As usual, I'll be reading it a few times to make sure I absorb it all. And, for you, here's a set of definitions for the full moons according to eastern and northern Native Americans. Full Buck Moon, or the time when deer antlers begin their growth cycle again. Interesting.
http://www.farmersalmanac.com/astronomy/fullmoonnames.html

Rep. Waxman reminds us that tomorrow at 10am Eastern, Congressional Dems will be convening a panel to discuss the national security implications of the Plame leak. Former CIA officials will be testifying.

However, it's not yet clear whether C-SPAN will carry the hearing live (or at all).

So here's a quick ACTION ITEM: Call or e-mail C-SPAN and politely ask them to cover this important hearing.

http://www.c-span.org/about/contact.asp

As Nancy and I both said "it's likely Roberts will be confirmed" and there is very little record for him to go on. I do know that if a Justice comes from the "Washington Insider' position it is less likely he will change his conservative views, than if he comes through normal channels.

The following link (scroll down) will tell you Mr. Roberts record, thin as it may be. But even as thin as it is, it doesn't look good for him to be a swing voter. Perhaps Justice O'Conner wasn't one either, perhaps she was just the jurist who was willing to make the conservatives look like they were still conservatives and still be able to see laws they wanted passed, even liberal laws.

http://www.liberaloasis.com/archives/071705.htm#072105

The other issue with Mr. Roberts that I mention in my article, is his intensified opportunities the last 4 years through astrological and energy pressure, to shift his way of thinking. Not that he did, but he had the opportunities.

Sally, great article! Creative chaos may be just the ticket. People have to wake up eventually. Some sooner than others. That's only natural.

On Roberts as a potential supreme court justice ... I'd rather have a highly intelligent person who can argue both sides of an argument sitting on the bench than Scalia and Thomas who are ideological idiots.

AHH.....Shylurker...full buck moon....is that what is going to have this administration feel they have the upper hand? Their horns are growing? LOL...a good laugh, just when we need one.

OK...breaking news at rawstory:
Report: Bloomberg to reveal Rove, Libby gave false testimony

RAW STORY

Bloomberg News has slotted a story alleging that senior Bush advisor Karl Rove and Vice President Dick Cheney's Chief of Staff 'Scooter' Libby provided false testimony to the special prosecutor to a Washington-based grand jury, RAW STORY has been told.

Patrick Fitzgerald, the Chicago special prosecutor appointed to investigate the outing of former covert agent Valerie Plame Wilson, may also be looking at whether other crimes -- such as perjury, obstruction of justice or leaking classified information -- were committed.

It's breaking tonight or tomorrow AM, sources say. Bloomberg has been among the head of the pack in breaking elements of the CIA leak scandal; they recently hired former Wall Street Journal editor Al Hunt.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/07/21/BAGTBDQUIK1.DTL&type=printable

BERKELEY
Activists start working on liberal spirituality
Conference seeks to morph energy into political clout
- Joe Garofoli, Chronicle Staff Writer
Thursday, July 21, 2005

Liberals have complained for two decades that conservatives misuse religion for political gain, but it wasn't until well-organized evangelicals powered President Bush's election in November that some decided that they had to do more than gripe.

The latest post-election attempt at transforming the spiritual energy of the left into political clout began Wednesday at UC Berkeley, where 1,200 people attended the opening of a conference on "Spiritual Activism."

The goal of the four-day conference is to create a spirituality-based platform to counter the religious right, but organizers are also intending to connect with "religio-phobic" liberals through seminars such as, "I Don't Believe in God, But I Know America Needs a Spiritual Left."

Another great one from Fiore...

http://www.sfgate.com/comics/fiore/

Juan Cole has a magnificent article up at Salon, and if you don't have a sub, you can get a day pass... please do, the article is a keeper...
------------------

The Iraq war is over, and the winner is... Iran

Hamstrung by the Iraq debacle, all Bush can do is gnash his teeth as the hated mullahs in Iran cozy up to their co-religionists in Iraq.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Juan Cole

July 21, 2005 | Iraq's new government has been trumpeted by the Bush administration as a close friend and a model for democracy in the region. In contrast, Bush calls Iran part of an axis of evil and dismisses its elections and government as illegitimate. So the Bush administration cannot have been filled with joy when Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari and eight high-powered cabinet ministers paid an extremely friendly visit to Tehran this week.

The two governments went into a tizzy of wheeling and dealing of a sort not seen since Texas oil millionaires found out about Saudi Arabia. Oil pipelines, port access, pilgrimage, trade, security, military assistance, were all on the table in Tehran. All the sorts of contracts and deals that U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney had imagined for Halliburton, and that the Pentagon neoconservatives had hoped for Israel, were heading instead due east.

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2005/07/21/iran/print.html

How lovely to think of Libby and rove getting busted for perjury. Just delicious!!

Here is another point on Roberts' chart that goes along with what Sally was saying about the possiblity of him going through some changes. In the tertiary chart , he has tertiary Uranus opposite natal Sun right now going through at least 2006 and maybe 2007. That is a wake up aspect and one that can put a person through some monumental shifts and awakenings.

Jo and everyone,

More blasts in London etc have been masterfully predicted by KN Rao below

http://www.journalofastrology.com/ARTICLES/new_brand_of_terrorism.htm

If all his predictions come true like the second
London blasts, it is going to be a HOT and unforgettable summer in London, Italy etc.

Other tidbits, Jo, that chinese revaluation will
solve absolutely NOTHING for US trade deficit;
these US econmists are in an absolute FANTASY world that revaluation of yuan will solve the prob
I can give YOU concrete proof, it WONT. Remember
reagonmics(that stupid form of economics), he and
his economic advisors tried to solve what was then
the BALOONING trade deficit with Japan by strengthening yen from 450 yen=$1 to 240 yen=$1 and then 120 yen=$1 and after 25 years, we still
run ENORMOUS deficits with Japan. So the same deficits will continue with china as with Japan.
These dumbest of economists work for reagonomics and the same clones work for the smirky now just like the neocons!

Nancy,

Perjury? That would be hors D'oeuvres... I'm salivating over the main course - Conspiracy, Obstruction of Justice --- and of course, the piec d'resistance --- treason...

Great that Bloomberg's is breaking the news--- some think a former senior official might be advising them... Powell? Nah!!! He wouldn't do that, now would he?

Seems Bloomberg hired Al Hunt, former editor of WSJ... Do we all remember the story about a drunken George W. Bush confronting Hunt in a restaurant (where he was dining with his family) and yelling at him about a negative story he wrote about Bush Sr.?

Seems there are lots of folks out there whom Rove and Libby and Cheney and Bush have treated badly... some karma coming to bite them in the butt? Short and long daggers coming out?

I prefer my popcorn au natural... how 'bout y'all?

"...So, great news, if it pans out. And if so, no questions for Bush's Midnight Judge. Nobody goes to the Supreme Court with Democratic votes while the White House stands accused of harboring traitors." ----- Kargo X http://thenexthurrah.typepad.com/the_next_hurrah/

Raj,

Believe you're right about it not helping us... folks shopping at Wal-Mart will be paying more... and interest rates may go up, and.... well, you know the drill

Think Progress has the Richard Keil story:

Rove, Libby Accounts in CIA Case Differ With Those of Reporters

By Richard Keil

July 22 (Bloomberg) — Two top White House aides have given
accounts to the special prosecutor about how reporters told them
the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the
reporters have said, according to persons familiar with the case.

Lewis “Scooter'’ Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief
of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that he first
learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of CIA
agent Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush
administration critic Joseph Wilson. Russert has testified before
a federal grand jury that he didn’t tell Libby of Plame’s
identity.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, who was first to report Plame’s name and connection to Wilson. Novak, according to a source familiar with the matter, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor.

http://thinkprogress.org/2005/07/21/breaking-bloomberg-reporting-that-rove-libby-may-be-subject-to-perjury-charges/

I think there's a race going on to stop Bush, Cheney et al. from an out all nuclear holocaust with Iran. The white cowboy hats better be ridin' their horses as fast as they can 'cause September is right around the corner.

page 27 August 01, 2005 issue of The American Conservative

In Washington it is hardly a secret that the same people in and around the administration who brought you Iraq are preparing to do the same for Iran. The Pentagon, acting under instructions from Vice President Dick Cheney's office, has tasked the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with drawing up a contingency plan to be employed in response to another 9/11-type terrorist attack on the United States. The plan includes a large-scale assault on Iran employing both conventional and tactical nuclear weapons. Within Iran there are more than 450 major strategic targets, including numerous suspected nuclear-weapons-program development sites. Many of the targets are hardened or are deep underground and could not be taken out by conventional weapons, hence the nuclear option. As in the case of Iraq, the response is not conditional on Iran actually being involved in the act of terrorism directed against the United States. Several senior Air Force officers involved in the planning are reportedly appalled at the implications of what they are doing - that Iran is being set up for an unprovoked nuclear attack- but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections.

P.S. the draft age was just raised to 42 on Monday. ain't no way ANYBODY in this admin. is going to sit still and be indicted.

ON C-SPAN 3, FRIDAY, 10 AM

Public Disclosure of Covert Agents
Senate Democratic Policy Committee

Waxman, Henry, U.S. Representative, D-CA
Johnson, Larry, Analyst, Central Intelligence Agency
Marcinkowski, Jim, Agent, Central Intelligence Agency
Goodman, Mel, Chief (Fmr.), Central Intelligence Agency, Soviet Union and Third World Affairs
Dorgan, Byron L., U.S. Senator, D-ND
Holt, Rush, U.S. Representative, D-NJ

Witnesses, including former CIA analysts and case officers, talk about the national security implications of disclosing the identity or affiliation of covert intelligence officers. They also comment on recent fallout from White House statements to the press that led to the disclosure that Former Ambassador Joseph Wilson’s wife, Valerie Plame, worked as a covert operative on issues involving weapons of mass destruction.

"...unprovoked nuclear attack- but no one is prepared to damage his career by posing any objections."

Amazing. A "provoked" nuclear attack would probably be all right tho. And then... as if anyone of those idiot nasty wargeezers would have a career after setting the World on Fire anyway. See the immense danger of a supremacist 1-di mind? Bah. Humbug. Where's my asprin.

Claudia Dikinis (starcats) has posted new analyses on her site, too! Do check it out.

Hellzapoppin! americablog.com has good summaries and links.

PS Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnold just got slapped: his redistricting initiative was thrown off the ballot for the special election he called (at our expense). They'll appeal, of course. We'll see. I just wish that Maria Shriver person would take her Thing home to SoCal. Forever.

Raj. He isn't always right but I love reading Rao, just love him.

Good call Nancy on Roberts, maybe all the "change of consciousness" aspects he's had over the last several years, have softened him up for this go round and he has had to think about his principles and ethics giving him a new perspective.

I find it interesting our government and media find something of great value in lies, stealing, misusing their power as if this stamps a person brilliant.

I heard Brian Williams say tonight that he worked his way through college and then was unable to finish and went to work as a fireman until he landed a small job at NBC and that to be in the position he is today makes him the luckiest man in the US. And I thought "no" our present leader and his band of merry white men are the luckiest, and the most protected."

Ugh, Brian Williams. What a troll. He says it's his duty to listen to Rush Limbaugh every day. OMG! There is something really off with that guy. He looks like Mr. Rogers as a used car salesman. Am I being petty or what!

Sally and good friends, Bush is going down, down, down. I post and Bloomberg reports (I'm referring to my reprise (previous thread) of the supposed "tinfoilhat" theory that it's time for these idiots to go. BOTH Rove and Libby, both, lied to the grand jury. Well, well, well...how about that. And lets see if Fitzgerald turns them against, who was that you said, their bosses...hahahahahaha... It's like a Frank Capra movie (if you get that reference your either a film student or as old as I will be on 7/28...yes it's my birthday, send cash). Bye bye Dickie, Bye bye Georgie. You guys are headed for the perp walk. America wants someone to blame, why not the perpetrators!!!

Thanks for another great article Sally. Love this line: "I believe the breakdown phase of the US will go on for about another year," Well, I can take it because as the year passes the antithesis will form and the slow grinding of the gears of history will become louder...wake up America and do something great, again!

Be optimistic. The people have turned on * reflecting their wisdom because they've had NO help from the Brian Williams' of the world.

We ARE the people we've been waiting for.

Another fat pink supremacist slugbot goin' down! Good Riddance .

* Schwarzenegger More Unpopular Than Ever, Poll Finds

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - CA Gov [aaaanie]'s approval rating dropped to a new low even before a controversy developed about his hefty side income from fitness mags, according to a poll released on Thur. Only 34% of adult CAians approve of the job [infantile tit-grabber] is doing as gov, compared with 51% who disapprove, according to a survey by the Public Policy Institute of CA.

The institute's poll mirrors sinking numbers in a Field Poll last mo among registered voters which found approval dropped to 37% from 55% in Feb. ... con't http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-politics-schwarzenegger.html?pagewanted=print

That was a good dose of reality, Sally, on this Capricorn full Moon. And their little Patriot Act noose is tightening again. They sure love to wave that one around. Rattling, flapping pages of impotent bullshit.

I'm not wasting a minute if Leo time. I'm partying anyway.

Joanna, if you look closely, god forbid, the slugbuts' pink skin is really greenish, yellowish, blueish, and god knows what all other shades. Lots of popping capillaries and cancerous lesions too. Warts, maybe. And, of course, herpes.

Sally, I echo everyone's sentiment in thanking you for another thought provoking, wonderful article.

Mike, no, you are not being petty; something is really off with Williams. During the 2000 election he snidely commented that Gore was "follicle challanged".

http://www.niagarafallsreporter.com/gallagher222.html

PUBLIC CATCHING ON TO DIRTY DEEDS
By Bill Gallagher
DETROIT -- Lying and denying, kicking and screaming, the Busheviks are defending comrade Karl Rove from the enemies of the state who are attacking him. We now have the "smoking gun" evidence that Rove was involved in the sordid scheme to "out" CIA officer Valerie Plame.

Retribution, a quintessential Rove political weapon, brought him to expose Plame and risk national security in the process to get back at her husband, former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, for telling the truth about George W. Bush's phony claims that Saddam Hussein was shopping for enriched uranium. Wilson debunked the bogus story that Iraq was seeking the nuclear material in Niger. That was a body blow for the Busheviks, who had worked so diligently to "fix" intelligence and build the lies to justify the invasion of Iraq.

A few weeks ago, when Rove claimed liberals coddled terrorists and wanted to provide them "therapy," I offered a few thoughts about the deputy White House chief of staff, the president's "brain," and designer of his political career.

I wrote, "Karl Rove is the most vile, despicable, duplicitous, power-addicted, warmongering, lying neo-fascist in the administration, save Dick Cheney and the man who lets them run the government for him."

Morgana,

What's going on w/ Mt. St. Helens? Sally's prediction about earth rumbings?

To all: the days leading up to this full moon have been extremely difficult for me... meaner than a junk yard dog, I have been feeling, 'til this a.m., now I feel a bit subdued (my family is saying thank you universe!) Anybody else?

Mike:

You are being petty, and I love it! Brian Williams is a twit, as is John Roberts on CBS -
since I haven't watched ABC in years I have no
idea of who is holding down that chair.
My favorite reporter on the air is Olbermann, and
in print is Frank Rich.
There are a great many I appreciate online however. All lefties.

Elvis Costello and Emmylou Harris singing on the concert series this moning on the Today show....beautiful song....beautiful song....pause......cusicians quiet down.......Elvis sings, ADMIT YOU LIED..AND BRING THE BOYS BACK....on with bearutiful song. Beautiful song ends.......Elvis....BRING THE BOYS BACK!

I just felt soooo happy!

...........

Jo, yes, I think things have been rough too.

My apologies. cusicians-musicians in post above.

Time now is 10:07. Tune in to C-Span 3, on your TV or on your computer. Waxman and Dorgan just started a hearing concerning the outing of CIA agents, etc.

**http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/oneworld/20050722/wl_oneworld/45361157571122011370

300 Events to Call for Bush's Impeachment over 'Downing Street' Allegations

Jo,
It isn't nice to mess with Mother Nature. I suspect Mt. St. Helen's may be looking to spit at Mt. Rainier.

Sally great article!

Shylurker I loved the link to the Native American Moons.

Post office finally delivered my copy of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. Can't wait to see what happens!

Whew! Saturn in Leo, Merc. retro, ack, tgif!

Jo,
You are not alone! It seems I'm in a phase where if I want anything done right I have to do it myself................so I am rearranging the "boyz" sewer installment disaster, one wheelbarrow full of topsoil at a time! ( Their finished product resembled the landscaping at a NJ mini mall!) We certainly did leave a lot of kids behind 20-25 years ago.
At high 80's - 90's, no rain for the vast amounts of grass seed they spread, I'm not someone you want to get too close to.!
A Democrat called today looking for money. He sounded moderate, reasonable, DNC, Dem. By the time we finished our conversation....he was passionate, fired up, & shouting. Too bad I'm so far from DC!

And in the "stupid Murikans" vein....local news item.........SC man caught smuggling his fiance in his car trunk, across the border
at Houlton Maine. She, Nova Scotian, was turned away at the border last week, now faces a $5,000. fine. If they had any intelligence, she could have married him and made him a Canadian!

Was it the "thunder moon" because it was sooooo thunderin" BIG? I saw it rise over the blueberry barrens, huge and very pink! Fantastic!!!!!! Appreciated more because the last several full moons have occured on cloudy or foggy nights.
Thank you for the creatively colorful and descriptive articles, Sally, and for the research you all do, so I can keep informed when I have so little time!
PQ

Okkaayyy! apparently the junk yard dog is still in residence. Kos has a piece up --- and some are giving him a piece - of their mind. Here's mine:
-------------

Well, here's mine... (none / 0)

Women's rights are not the BANE of the Democratic Party... we'll be glad to take our marbles from the Patriarchial warmongering facets of the party and start another one... looks more and more the way to go...

Abortion has no place in politics. Religion has no place in politics.

Women should have the right to choose... the control freaks who want to tell us what to do with every friggin facet of our lives are the problem. Not those who are pro-choice.

Don't bother to flame or ban me... I'm out of here.

An unexamined life is not worth living - Socrates
by crone on Fri Jul 22nd, 2005 at 09:26:25 PDT

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/7/22/121113/301#49

PS - Markos has the unmitigated gall to call this piece of venom "the big picture" --- his site has become the Clark for President site... a military man? And he's moving wait to the Center, which now is the right since the right has moved to fascism...

I'll shut my mouth now before I really say too much...

http://tinyurl.com/byhwv

Rove, Libby Accounts on Plame Differ With Reporters' (Correct)

(Corrects second paragraph on Russert testimony to prosecutor.)

July 22 (Bloomberg) -- Two top White House aides have given accounts to a special prosecutor about how reporters first told them the identity of a CIA agent that are at odds with what the reporters have said, according to people familiar with the case.

Lewis ``Scooter'' Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, told special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald that h e first learned from NBC News reporter Tim Russert of the identity of Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame, the wife of former ambassador and Bush administration critic Joseph Wilson, one person said. Russert has testified before Fitzgerald that he didn't tell Libby of Plame's identity, the person said.

White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove told Fitzgerald that he first learned the identity of the CIA agent from syndicated columnist Robert Novak, according to a person familiar with the matter. Novak, who was first to report Plame's name and connection to Wilson, has given a somewhat different version to the special prosecutor, the person said.

These discrepancies may be important because Fitzgerald is investigating whether Libby, Rove or other administration officials made false statements during the course of the investigation. The Plame case has its genesis in whether anyone violated a 1982 law making it illegal to knowingly reveal the name of a covert intelligence agent.

More...

Need some help moving that topsoil Pat QofP? [we are not 'subdued'!]

Jo, I am not sure why you have to shut your mouth....please keep it open and yelling, I'll join you....freedom of speech....use it or lose it I say. And a WOMAN political party is a great idea.....if women would actually understand how badly our sex is used. SF Chronicle has a couple of things in it today in various places on trafficking of children and women and the old prostitute/massage parlor game going on between the police and the people trying to outlaw all prostitution...and the beat goes on, as one of my friends likes to say.

And hey, the recent issue of Esquire has profiles of 10 men (I like Val Kilmer and Shaq)...but the main profile is on Rummy! couldn't bring myself to read it....and Brian Williams! and yes, what he said was true....and he didn't finish college... I guess we should all see 'Network" again! LOL....

Reporting from NYC:
I took three different subways today with appointments at my publisher in Soho downtown Manhattan, then off to 23 St to see my agent, then back to Brooklyn.
I saw NO police to randomly examine our personal bags on three subway stations. Wonder if this national news is bogus; used as a decoy.

Did I tell you how much your article rocks, Sally? Great work.

Pat C. Hope you had a good vacation. Nice to see you back.

Jo,
Stay real, your voice is distinctive and straight forward and lucid.
While you are in the world and deal with the real world = family, political activism. you are also a Truth Warrior for us at AW (and the www ;-). So much better than posting about the Land of the ALL Good. PC is usually tied up in shades of the Old Timey Heirarchal Religions with emotions of guilt, shame, fear. It's a fake naivite that if one follows the 'rules' they'll be 'seen' as oh so good. Why the naive still believe that some authority is always there to take care of them and get them through life. Why Amerikuns are so dumbed down and on alot of feel good drugs and have lost a work ethic or self-effort the country was built on.The paradigm shift already happened and now there's no turning back. We are now the 'seers, not the seen'. So sad for the Neo-Conartists that they just can't get this. They are so about what it 'looks' like, Why * nevers lives out his projects to the end and they are failures. They live in their imaginations and not on Earth.
We The People are being emotionally abused by psychopathic bullies and drug abusers. Truth Warriors play no Victim/Saviour roles. Truth Warriors transcend all roles and won't accept anything less than the truth. The world is frustrating for all and you talk about it with informative eloquent fire.
Go Jo! Go Jo ! Go Jo!
Thanks for all the great links too!

Welcome back, Pat C.! So nice to see you again.

Well, shet my mouth, Jo! But never shut yours--you've got too many insightful things to say.

Pat QOP, if you're near it, please tip a glass of Poland Springs Water today, cuz it's my birthday and some of my forbears were from there.

Thanks Judi G.,
I wasn't really advocating a strictly Women's party (there are lots of males who support a woman's right to choose!) --- but I was suggesting that a political party that advocates women acquiesce their 'bodies' for the 'party' is in serious trouble. Repug trolls infiltrated dKos months ago with their constant diaries on Roe v. Wade ... they have driven away quite a few Kossacks, with their endless debates suggesting that the issue, plus same sex marriage is destroying the Democratic party. Strange, seems to me that the lies and evil machinations of the Republicans are what is not only tearing apart the Democratic party but the Republic as well! Between that and Markos' blatant support of Clark and centrist position on every issue, I stopped posting there long ago... until recently, and now I'm done for sure. Billmon and Liberal Street and a few others see the site moving to the Center (wherever that is!) also...

Your comment about 'not finishing college' reminded me of Peter Jennings. I always thought he was the model for the anchor in 'Network' --- actually, for decades (until 9/11) he held his own with any of the college-educated. He is very articulate and has learned alot along the way. Jennings was the ONLY anchor on 9/11/2001 to ask "where is the President? down a rabbit hole?" I recall how proud I felt at that moment... but, well we know what happened the days and months after, when they all got their memos from Corporate America!

bhakti, you make me blush! I'm feeling like a warrior, but a little caustic... need to temper my words... certainly do empathize with Pat QofP...

((((((Pat QofP))))))) hope you are moving gently through your journey with Eric... white light to him, and to you. Namaste

Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you... Happy Birthday dear Shylurker... Happy Birthday to you... and manyyyyy more!!! Yeayyyy Shy!!!

Thank you, Sally. Words of wisdom.
Blessed full moon energy to ya'll~

Dommael

Yes!!! Happy B-day Shylurker!!!
~Dom

Thanks bhakti, and shy.

Happiest of birthdays to you shy!

One of the reasons I never vote for Senator in this State....

Sen. Byrd praises Bush on nominee
By Charles Hurt
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
July 22, 2005

Sen. Robert C. Byrd, one of President Bush's harshest critics, has become an unlikely ally on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge John G. Roberts Jr.
"I said to him, 'I am shouting your name from the steeple tops for reaching out, reaching across the aisle,'?" the West Virginia Democrat reported after taking a phone call from Mr. Bush to discuss a replacement for retiring Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20050721-115719-6891r.htm

Shy,

They say it's your birthday! nananananananana
It's my birthday too yeah (in 5mos)
nananananananana
I'm glad it''s your birthday!
Happy Birthday to ya!

(Ringo's drums)

Happy Birthday, shylurker. Are you a 29 Cancer or a 0 Leo?

Bush' Soviet State...

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072205Y.shtml

A recent article from the Associated Press titled "Experts Fear Endless Terror War" noted, "An Associated Press survey of longtime students of international terrorism finds them ever more convinced, in the aftermath of London's bloody Thursday, that the world has entered a long siege in a new kind of war. They believe that al-Qaida is mutating into a global insurgency, a possible prototype for other 21st-century movements, technologically astute, almost leaderless. And the way out is far from clear. In fact, says Michael Scheuer, the ex-CIA analyst, rather than move toward solutions, the United States took a big step backward by invading Iraq."

The article continues, "Scheuer, who headed the CIA's bin Laden unit for nine years, sees a different way out - through US foreign policy. He said he resigned last November to expose the US leadership's 'willful blindness' to what needs to be done: withdraw the US military from the Mideast, end 'unqualified support' for Israel, sever close ties to Arab oil-state 'tyrannies.'"

Willful blindness is an appropriate phrase. It captures not only the fact that we are manufacturing threats to our security every day we remain in Iraq, but the fact that virtually everything associated with Bush administration policy depends on self-delusion and the manipulation of data to fulfill political desires. Even the most fundamental underpinnings of conservative political philosophy have been ground up in the gears of this grand fantasy.

Truth no longer matters. Ethics no longer matter. Facts are there for the twisting. Decades-old conservative ideals regarding the budget and the size of the Federal government have been thrown under the bus because they are no longer convenient, and get in the way of the manufacture of reality. Soviet self-delusion led that nation into Afghanistan and disaster. The Bush administration’s self-delusion has led us into Iraq. Res ipsa loquitor.

Shy........HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!
Yes I will drink a toast to you tonight with Poland Springs Sparkling Water! I drink it regularly. The 2nd toast is to your Gov's low approval rating!
Jo, I agree with Judi G, You keep that mouth open & flapping!!
"Truth means never having to say you're sorry!"
Yes things are moving along gently & supportively with Eric.
Hardly a day goes by that one of the Progressive Democrats, we campaigned with, doesn't make the 2 hour trip to visit him. ( Much appreciated as I still have to do the library stint, & my car is needing some attention.) His sister is over again from NY, and his son will arrive tomorrow for a visit.
WV, I'm appalled with Byrd! .....but then Collins & Snowe both approved the extension of the Patriot Act!!!!! TIME TO BOOT THEM OUT! Although Collins has offered to help facilitate Eric's SS Disability process as SSA has been stalling it...................

Bhakti, They can't afford to check parcels on the NY subways, Remember? the large Homeland Security budget went to Wyoming!!
Yes you'all come on up & help me wheel barrow the dirt to the back garden & then we can dance on the top of the mound in the moonlight & drink Poland Springs water!
PQ

mike,
you're not at all petty about Brian Williams;this
guy must be out of his mind to say he has to listen to imbecile truth twisters and liars like
limbaugh. For heaven's sake there is no FORCE asking Brian that he HAS to listen to an idiotic
LIAR as Al Franken exposed him completely NAKED.
This guy, Brian, one has to wonder he is lucky OR
that he had the BIG connections like the smirky,
who STOLE the WHouse twice and is a (p)resident there,For how LONG we'll know shortly in a month or two, when Pat who really knows to work at a pace slower than a SNAIL, finally comes out with
his long list of indictments(hope Pat won't twist
the truth there, I'm not holding my breath, since
he moved from NY to be a mid westerner and I know
all too well about those rotten midwestern so call
ed midwestern Values?

shylurker,

Happy Birthday to you. I thought I wished you happy birthday only six months ago OR could be
that TIME is really fizzing by us real FAST!

WV,

Sorry about Byrd... he spoke out so many times against these fascists... but he's running for re-election, isn't he? And have the Repugs positioned a young woman to run against him? I don't think one should sell out for votes... but most politicians do, don't they?

Hey y'all, maybe instead of politicians --- we could actually have Representatives? You know, we decide on a local level how we feel about an issue, elect a REPRESENTATIVE to convey that position in a central conclave... and if he doesn't represent us, he's toast! No more campaigning, no more payola, no more kings... sound too radical? Too anarachist? Yeah, I guess as Sally's quote from Twain suggests --- we should just keep paying the pirates to steal from us. That's more traditional... not radical... won't upset anyone... something to think about.

Jo,

I simply cna't fathom out these guys like Byrd and
whole senate gang;they cahnge their colors even
more often than a chameleon. Idon't know on what dope they're in from one day to another or for that matter from this hour to the next? also was
not this same Byrd at one time a Ku Klux Kan
member in that very progreesive and advanced state
of WVirginia? Any way, I immigrated to this country much much later than those KKK times of
that very Honorable Byrd.

Raj,

Most white Southern men over the age of 75 were probably once KKK... pathetic isn't it?

Mike, did you see Juan Cole's brilliant article at Salon today? Billmon has a few words on it... great reads, both.

Bush Blocks Abu Ghraib Photo Release

July 22, 2005, New York, NY—The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) today denounced the latest efforts of the Bush Administration to block the release of the Darby photos and videos depicting torture at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib. [...]
In June, the government ... received an extension from the judge stating that they needed time in order to redact [faces in] the photographs and videos. They were given until today [but] at the eleventh hour filed a motion ... based on an entirely new argument [requesting] a 7(F) exemption from disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act to withhold law enforcement-related information in order to protect the physical safety of individuals. [HUH?]

http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2005/7/22/152156/865

Jo

When I came here I voted for Byrd in '94 and
Rockefeller in '96 but NEVER again! They are both
Republicans as far as I am concerned. Byrd will
always be a Klansman and Rockefeller votes with
his brother David a little too much for me.
In '94 Byrd had a Repug run against him. I met
his opponent in a Hardware store in the next
county who shook my hand and stated "I have just
been endorsed by the NRA". I said "You should be
ashamed of yourself. That is nothing to be proud of". They all looked at me rather strangely and
must have figured I was a peacenik, and have no
use for guns. I support hunters in this area because deer meat is all some of them ever get to
eat and the poverty is dreadful. Bush has really
screwed the people of Appalachia. Yet they voted
for him....Charleton Heston told them the Dems
would take their rifles away, and the Repugs told
them in 4 color glossy mailings that the Dems would take their Bibles away. Smells a
little like Rove.

Bhatki, thanks so much for the musical greeting. Didja know Ringo's a Cancer--and Santana just had his birthday about three days ago. Nice to be in such good company. And even better company in cyberspace.

Teresa, my life has been similar to a crash course in Turbulance 101, so I'll let you guess. Have a 29 Uranus as an added bonus, too.

Dommael, my young brother, you warm my heart every time you speak.

Raj, I welcome all your best wishes however often you want to extend them. Time does go by faster as the years do, but I've also noticed how much stronger gravity gets, particularly when you're sitting down weeding and then try to stand up. Funny, I haven't heard any physicist comment on it.

Pat QOP, some day I'd like to have a long chat with you while sipping some of that Poland Springs water. Much love to you and Eric.

And Jo, the mimosa in the backyard has blanketed the ground with what were those gorgeous pink, sweetly-scented blossoms. Thank heavens the one Ouida Mae tends near the veranda there under the bed doesn't shed. Bouquets of (non-shedding) mimosas and magnolias to you.

Pat C., I made a selfish wish for my birthday (that the Delta Breeze would cool this inferno down). That came true!! Let us hope my more universal wish does, too. And I know you share it.

'Happy, happy birthday Shy' or maybe '16 Candles'? In any case I wish you the happiest of birthdays. My wish is that all your wishes come true.

bob

Sally,

You mentioned in your article:

"I must say, that like many astrologers I know, we are tired and worn out from watching what's happening. It's been discouraging to watch scandal after scandal go ignored by the press, by the people. We can see what the likely outcomes will be in the years ahead unless there is a wake up, a forced shift and we fear there won't be, not in time anyway."

The blogs are chattering about conspiracy - not the tin foil hat variety -- the REAL kind... at least Rove, Libby, Fleischer, others --- espionage charges...

There's enough 'stuff' out there, we have to have a 'shift' --- [please, please, pretty please!]

Few minutes ago I had this wonderful image: tPluto has been slinging this mud for eons now, right? making 'piles' of manure everywhere, but its been throwing it in the dark... in a huge field, something like a galactic football field... and SUDDENLY, the night lights come on, all at once... and the people are sitting in the stadium looking down on these fascists in their hip boots... now they see what their noses were smelling!

Alright people... it stinks to high heaven... whatcha gonna do? There's a referee on the field, Fitzgerald? Yeahhh... and he's shouting --- foul, foul, foul... [in a double-entendre sort of way!]

Conspiracy! Espionage! Treason! Time to clear the field.

[yeah, I know, it's a stinkin' image --- but look what we have to work with!]

I'm going to spend more time every day visualizing these guys behind bars... if Martha can go to prison for 'lying' to an FBI agent, well... these perps can too... she didn't steal an election, or invade a country illegally or out a CIA agent, or....

and if you haven't seen Justin's article ---Patrick J. 'Bulldog' Fitzgerald, American Insurgent Occupied Washington under siege --- check it out, as well as his latest which is on the order of Juan Cole's and Billmon's...

Well, I'll swan. Bolton's all tied up in the mess, too, it seems increasingly clear:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1949581

PS to Bob--many, many thanks. If only my wish would come true!

wv,

I never knew you live in WVirginia; apologize for
some generalization of the state. Of course, even
in the reddest of states and also WVirginia, there
are very progressive people, only problem is that
they happen to be a tiny minority. By the way,
when I came here as a student, I went to Pitt(tri
state area of PA,WV and Ohio). But then it was also a RUST belt, so when I got the very first opportunity, I moved west to LA,CA and have never
regretted the move, an iota.

Uh-oh, MSH got herself all cloaked in clouds right now. Wonder if she's preparing a surprise. Back in the 80s she blew on my birthday!!
http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/volcanocams/msh/

Shy!!

I hope you are having a wonderful birthday. AWer's know how to celebrate. My gifts to you are my admiration and affection, although I do admit a selfish motive. I'm wishing you would post just a tiny bit more. I enjoy your comments so much, and miss you when you're gone. You're a great comfort.

HBD!

Just stopping in to wish Shylurker everything beautiful, miraculous and blessed on this day & always. You are very valuable to all of us here..and the same to all of you, especially Pat QOP & Eric. (Jo, didn't you say this was your mother's birthday?) JM, I've been too busy to reply to your comments on the Kerrys but I, too, think John Kerry is trying hard to do the right thing for this country and will continue doing that, with or without another presidential run. I have always felt that the Vietnam vet who took a courageous stand is still very much inside of him. And I expect and hope to see even more leadership on women, health and education issues from Teresa as I know her foundation is heavily involved in supporting these things.

New Orleans had a great all-day seminar today, lead by Jim Dean of Democracy for America (Howard's bro) with panels and discussion groups participated in by many local activists. It was called Beaucoup Blues! I did not attend but am proud of what's happening here. We have a wonderful core of hard working political activists in NOLA, some of whom come from Tulane. This is really a wonderful place. As an aside, the people here are so nice, they continually cross the line to offer help when many would hide behind the veil of beaurocracy & protocol. Just one example, I was served a meal without utensils today at lunch and the guy at the table a little ways off noticed and jumped up to hand me an extra set. Really good people here and a sanctuary of liberalism in the state.

Happy Birthday Shylurker. Did I mention that at first I thought your name was SKYlurker. Seems appropriate for this site. I like the way you observe and than write. Many happy returns.

Happy, HAPPY Birthday from me too, Shylurker. I hope your day was as special as you have become to us!

Oh, jm, Sharon, Jill and Peg, how wonderful of you to send such wonderful wishes and complimentary messages by way. Our community here at AW is very unique and provides much sustenance and encouragement to us all. Shylurker/skylurker--what does it matter? I am among friends and that is the greatest gift of all. Thank you, thank you, all.

raj -

I am surpised at the number of Liberals in my
section of WV - southeast corner - six miles from
the bunker at the Greenbrier. When I got out of
the service in 1955 I moved to San Francisco for
40 years, came here in my 'old age' - to get away
from the Yuppies. They drove me mental. It is a nice, quiet, rural, peaceful place to wrap it up.
To keep my sanity I go to Toronto every year - my
real home, I was born there. If there are great
earth changes the people here will certainly be
survivors. God knows they have been crapped on by
successive governments, the coal companies, chemical companies and big lumber. And as for
scenery, it doesn't take a back seat to any state
in the Union.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5245946-103677,00.html

Fundamentally speaking

Giles Fraser
Saturday July 23, 2005

Guardian

Muslims who preach hate are to be deported and subject to new restrictions, Charles Clarke announced in the Commons on Wednesday. So what would the home secretary have to say about stuff like this: "Blessed is he who takes your little children and smashes their heads against the rocks"?
Or this: "O God, break the teeth in their mouths ... Let them be like the snail that dissolves into slime; like the untimely birth that never sees the sun ... The righteous will bathe their feet in the blood of the wicked." No, this is not Islam, it is the Bible. And there is a lot more where that came from.

Why, then, are so many commentators persuaded that the Qur'an is a manual of hate - compared to the Judeo-Christian scriptures, it is very tame stuff indeed. More disturbing still for Christians and Jews, the nearest scriptural justification for suicide bombings I can think of comes from the book of Judges, where Samson pushes apart the structural supports of a temple packed with people. "Let me die with the Philistines," he prays, just before the building collapses.

It will not do to work with a Bible of the nice bits or allegorise these passages out of existence, leaving them hanging around for future fanatics to exploit. Religion must openly acknowledge its own dirty secrets.

Shylurker, Happy, Happy Birthday. Wishing you a fabulous year!

You're welcome, Shy-Skylurker --- hope it was a joyous day. And, wv, thanks for telling us a bit about your life...I love hearing about any & all of you as after participating here for about a year, it is really a privilege to get to know all of you, little by little, and each bit of information is like receiving a newly wrapped gift! Part of me is just itching to see pictures of everyone (or, better yet, meet you in person), but another part of me feels it is almost better to know the real "you" unadulterated by outer packaging.

Happy Birthday, Shylurker. And many happy returns.

I'm going to try to take heart at the number of threads slowly being woven together. The victory is not ours yet, but the strategies are forming and the opposition is slowing and painfully falling on its sword. So Karl Rove edited George Tenant's CIA reports, and now we know about it. Libby and Rove have different story about the leak's source than the reporters have stated, and we know about that. Slowly, but surely we are getting the loyal men and women of "Kansas" to see that this was all about hiding the real reason for the war in Iraq....all of it. Downing Street, Clarke's report after 9/11, David Kelly of Briton, many more in this country who have spoken the truth since the day George was a gleem in Rove's eye. They cannot all be silenced.

Incidentally, Cheney's troubles are about to accelerate...recently he went into hospital to check out his knee veins, related to his heart. Now his chief of staff, Libby, coming under fire.

Rush Holt proding Congress to get on the case...it's about treason, it's about national security....

I am hopeful.

Good read on the GC and Pluto here.
http://medicinegarden.com/astrology/cosmic_egg_GC.html

MUST READ DAVID CORN ARTICLE:
http://www.davidcorn.com/2005/07/a_cia_vets_mess.php

And to our dear Shylurker,Happy Birthday and many many more....just too bad that you won't get quite the birthday present that some of our Libra friends will come October(that is, unless Fitz gets too close to the truth and the Bushitters have to engineer a super 9/11 as a ruse/distraction/cover for imposing martial law/aattacking Iran/lockimg us down .....)

sorry, all, my typing sucks.....lol

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRRRRRRRTHDAAAAAAAAAY DEAR SHYLURKER, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!!!!!

Jo, I am discouraged, as are so many of us as we watch this destruction. I wonder sometimes if it's only about the destruction or those damn smirky faces that keep lookin at us from the papers and TV.

We don't really know what Fitzgerald is up to but I am certain he doesn't have a completely free hand, he has to report into his bosses at the Justice Department and it was stressed when he took this job that the scope of his investigation was a very narrow scope and if he went out of it the investigation would have to end. I don't think Rove or Libby will see jail time even if they did lie to the FBI (the Martha Stewart crime) and if they don't we need to scream to the high heavens and remind people that Martha did do jail time for the same crime Rove and Libby are suspected of committing. But to date there are not any indictments, and Rove and Libby are contradicting the "reporters" so except for Cooper's emails, (and possibly Judith Miller's) this is a he said, she said situation and it's my bet they will take Rove/Libby explanation. Nonetheless, the damage has been done to this administration and people will not believe this administration hasn't lied or gotten away with a cover-up. They will not be able to put enough lipstick on this pig.

These people are not so smart and never have been they are protected by money and power, period. When you look at the things they've done and how thinly they have covered their tracks they have been incredibly stupid, but they've been able to buy two elections, the media, and it looks like most of Congress. Money and power talks today, and I know that, but I will never ever say this group is smart, because they are not.

http://tinyurl.com/cfeyz

Information Awareness Office

The Information Awareness Office is a mass surveillance development branch of the United States Department of Defense's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. It has a mission to "imagine, develop, apply, integrate, demonstrate and transition information technologies, components and prototype, closed-loop, information systems that will counter asymmetric threats by achieving total information awareness".
Contents

1 Introduction
2 Public protests against the Information Awareness Office
3 IAO research
4 Literature and movies critical of TIA
5 See also
6 References
7 External links
7.1 Media coverage
7.2 Critical views (established sources)
7.3 Critical views (less well recognized)
7.4 Proponent views

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/stories/0705/23natmckinney.html

McKinney reopens 9/11

snip

What we are doing is asking the unanswered questions of the 9/11 families," McKinney, a DeKalb County Democrat who won back her seat in 2004, said during the proceedings.

She rebuffed a reporter's repeated attempts to ask her why she would so boldly embrace the same claims that led to her downfall.

"Congresswoman McKinney is viewed as a contrarian," panelist Melvin Goodman, a former CIA official, said. "And I hope someday her views will be considered conventional wisdom."

Though she left the testimony and questioning of panelists to others, McKinney was the main attraction, presiding over more than two dozen participants, including the author of a book that claims the U.S. government had advance knowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack and allowed it to happen, and Peter Dale Scott, who wrote three books on President John F. Kennedy's assassination.

Georgia peanuts, Cokes and coffee were available to more than 50 attendees, whose casual dress was a decided change from the gangs of blue-suited lobbyists who usually crowd Capitol Hill hearings.

McKinney herself offered witnesses bottled water and found additional trash cans to place around the room.

Nearly a dozen 9/11 enthusiasts lined one side of the room, camcorders at the ready, broadcasting the hearing live over the Internet or recording it for later release. C-SPAN cameras documented the hearing, and a DVD recording of the proceedings will soon be available.

Ten people sat in a section reserved for family members of 9/11 victims.

More...

Pat C, my homeopathic friend.

I hope you are refreshed and ready to continue keeping us well connected.

This has been a most unpleasant full Moon for me, although I did snatch a few hours of relief and inspiration this evening.
The screws have certainly tightened. It reminds me of when I had braces as a kid. When the wires were tightened, the pain dominated, but now I've got beautiful straight teeth!

Hello all! On this Capricorn Full Moon my Mom told me she has lung cancer (she's 80, a Capricorn, and has been smoking since she was 13), and she's not going to do anything about it. She does not fear death and I will back her up on that. She told the doctor "I earned it!" - speaking of her years of smoking.

Then my husband's mother had to have her leg cut off at the knee because of diabetes and infection.

Then I find out my son's girlfriend left him at 8 months pregnant, and I'm worried what's gonna happen with that! My heart is broken about this!

But today I wake up and feel good, optimistic, etc. Things will work out like they are supposed to.

wv - I respectfully disagree with you on Senator Byrd. Very often I feel like he is the only one that speaks for me, besides Kennedy, in the Senate. Wonderful, wonderful speeches.

http://byrd.senate.gov/byrd_speeches/byrd_speeches.html

Sally, great article. I really appreciate the time and effort you put into all this. It's about time I sent a donation, which I will try to do soon - to help keep the site up. I have been curious about you lately, what clients you may have, etc. I may contact you soon to help me sort out my son's problems (I'll e-mail you when I can afford to do it).

Have a great weekend everyone!

By the way, I hope you all watched the hearing on the outing of covert agents. It was very, very interesting and the whole country should see it, but of course they won't.

Where the hell are the Republicans on this? They think it's okay to out a covert agent? Sickening!

I am still just in complete awe that this country cannot see through the criminality and hubris of our administration. I am so ashamed. Honestly ashamed and disgusted. Now the administration will not allow the new pictures of the Abu Grahib torture to be released, claiming they have to "protect" the military. Yeah, blah blah.

Boy I'm "talkative" today!

Rep Conyers has come through AGAIN for his country. I ask again: What are the white boys and girls doing? Do you know not a SINGLE Dem showed up at Karen Hughes confirmation hearing yesterday, not even to ask questions about her testifying before the Grand Jury re Rovegate? And Biden sent a letter full of BS and admiration for Hughes? Anyway, not to digress, here is our hero (and he is a HERO):

My DSM Rovegate Chronology Released Today
by Congressman John Conyers [Subscribe]
Fri Jul 22nd, 2005 at 19:08:16 PDT

Today, I released my current version of the time-line both leading up to and subsequent to the Iraq war, entitled "Last Throes of Credibility: Five Years of Lies and Deception." Both the full 36-page time line and the summary and conclusions can be found at afterdowningstreet.org. I owe many thanks to the Kos community for helping me develop this interim chronology. We reviewed every single comment made at this cite several weeks ago, and were able to use a great deal of them. Those not used are still being retained in our files.

However, I am not done yet. It is just a draft, and obviously, the story of DSM, Rovegate, and the ongoing deception in Iraq is still evolving. If you get a chance, review the chronology, and let me know of any gaps or omissions that you see. I hope to update and finalize and continue the investigation based on these important facts. Thanks again for your help in this important endeavour.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/7/22/22816/1514

Oh, Cap'n Sally, Beasley, Garry and Janet your best wishes gladden my heart and made my day complete. What a grand birthday I had in cyberspace. Many thanks to all.

There is a wonderful thread going on at DU . It is very timely and succinctly expresses what so many of us feel. Heck, probably some of us were some of the contributors. Do go visit it if you can.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4173283

More on the London bombings, from an admitted conservative...please read, it's not quite the writing you would expect--it connects Alan Greenspan and the London Bombings.....

http://cunningrealist.blogspot.com/2005/07/following-money.html

namaste all and enjoy!!!

Wonderful link on DU, Shy. So many of us feel the same way. These people need to read about the Pluto transit of the GC in 06-07. Most interesting was the person who said he was in the market grocery shopping and "spontaneously" decided to fill 2 cards with unpershable canned goods. The Cunning Realist article you posted is also quite interesting, Garry. Although there may be no connection with the unusually high volume of liquid cash flow put out by the Feds on June 30 and the London Bombing, it is an erie "coincidence." And, "for something completely different," here's an article from the DU on "The Atlantis Gene!"

http://www.atlantisinsights.net/DNA.htm

Forgot to mention the news (another DU item) that the man shot in London was now established as having nothing to do with the bombings, yet he ws shot 5 times in the head at point blank range. People are conjecturing whether they needed to get rid of him for some reason!

(((JM)))

http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/050722_earthquake_sound.html#listen

Undrwater recording of the Indonesian earghquake..

Sound from last December's huge tsunami-causing earthquake was picked up by underwater microphones designed to listen for nuclear explosions.

Scientists this week released an audio file of the frighteningly long-lasting cracks and splits along the Sumatra-Andaman Fault in the Indian Ocean.

More...

Interesting link there Miss Pat C.,

my tin-foil hat became a permanent fixture after 9/11... I never have believed that was an 'earthquake'... an examination of the mundane 'events' at the time of the 'quake' are pretty interesting also.

Move along, now, nothing to see here... ohh, here's some news from the Middle East:

PA, Egypt do gas deal without Israel
Andrea R. Mihailescu
United Press International
July 22, 2005

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Israel is not expected to participate in the construction of a proposed pipeline transporting Palestinian liquid gas from a gas field on the Gaza coast to Al Arish in Egypt.

Following recent significant gas discoveries in areas of the Palestinian Authority by British Gas (BG), the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Egypt signed a government protocol in early July to arrange the sales of Palestinian gas to Egypt with exports to global markets to be made in the form of liquid natural gas.

Despite the good news for the Palestinians, some industry experts are skeptical of Israel's silence toward the news. Although it is a partner to the PA in a small gas field to the north of the Gaza Strip, Israel has in the past blocked Palestinian gas export and production agreements.

While the proposed pipeline project would export Palestinian liquid gas through Egypt, Israel has chosen to buy gas from Egypt rather than from the PA.

more at http://www.metimes.com/articles/normal.php?StoryID=20050722-023712-1135r

OMG, Jo. This was posted over in Salon under the "More News I Don't Know Where Else To Put".

"Both my parents died in their 50's of cancer, or then: kidney failure and heart attack. My mother drank 8 glasses of tap water per day, both her parents lived to 100, one 103 one 99.

When my dad had a kidney dialysis machine put into his room, the water turned the machine black in one 3 hour use. The nurse thought it was a faulty machine. But no, the water where they lived was just THAT polluted. They have a cancer cluster there, on Long Island, you wouldn't believe, being near JFK exhaust fumes from airplanes and god knows what else. In my old high school, there are about 17 deaths per year, these are kids! All my parents' friends virutally all of them, developed one cancer or another. Has this been investigated? Are you dreaming? So, as we all know, keep your family or yourself away from any place where cancer clusters are this obvious. Myself, I haven't drank tap water ever since their early deaths, my folks, I mean."

What does Hillary have to say about this. Is anyone familiar with this??

Friday, July 22, 2005

Sharon to Condi: F-- You!

Haaretz reports on US Secretary of State Condi Rice's visit to Israel:

' U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice spent Thursday in Jerusalem, where she met with Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom. Rice told Shalom that coordinating the pullout plan with the PA [Palestinian Authority] was critical and must be continued. She said it was important to be able to use the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and part of the northern West Bank to strengthen Abbas. Rice said she would like the disengagement to form the basis of a renewed diplomatic process and help boost Abbas' regime. '

~snip~

I hear MKs saying that I'm going to divide Jerusalem, but I don't intend even to discuss Jerusalem. The incitement keeps recurring, and even those who incite know it's a lie and that there won't be a second or additional disengagement, and that Jerusalem will not be divided." '

http://www.juancole.com/2005/07/sharon-to-condi-f-you-haaretz-reports.html

Israel does not OWN Jerusleum... Ariel Sharon is fanning the flames again, the same ones he fanned in 2000 with his threatening visit to the Temple Mount in fall of 2000, according to the 9/11 Commission Report. (Muslims interpreted the visit as a threat to tear down the Dome of the Rock so that the Temple alleged to be beneath it could be "rebuilt.")

Juan Cole's link above gives some insightful info.

The Party that didn't show up. Why?
http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/22/182748/027

Good question Shy...

Remember the news yesterday that gov't did not produce pictures from Abu Ghraib, still stalling... It's been a year, and the rest of the world has seen them. A German artist has painted some renderings from photos... his images are on the internet now... Kossack has diary up with an EIGHT year old girl being beaten by American troops! You heard me. There are other pictures and links.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/7/23/15839/3683

Kerry Seeks Release of Roberts' Documents

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072305C.shtml

As the Supreme Court nominee John G. Roberts continued courting senators, Sen. John Kerry urged the White House to release "in their entirety" all documents and memos from Roberts' tenure in two Republican administrations.

.............

Cheney Lobbying Against Anti-Torture Legislation

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072305A.shtml

The Bush administration has been lobbying to block legislation that would bar the US military from engaging in "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" of detainees, hiding prisoners from the Red Cross, and using interrogation methods not authorized by a new Army field manual.

ACLU Says Gov't Withholding Abu Ghraib Images

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072305B.shtml

The American Civil Liberties Union accused the government Friday of putting another legal roadblock in the way of its bid to allow the public to see photographs and videos stemming from the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal.

Have any of the good astrologers done a prediction on Judith Miller? Will she be outed or skate as a martyr?

The world's biggest internment camp
by Sirocco
Sat Jul 23rd, 2005 at 01:20:12 PM EDT

Next door to Sinai where tonight's devastating terror strikes took place is the Gaza Strip, where thousands of Israeli settlers are protesting their imminent eviction.
Below is my translation of an op-ed by Morten Strøksnes, my favorite Norwegian print journalist and a capacity on the Middle East. He puts the evacuations into perspective by describing, in no uncertain terms, what life has been like for Palestinians in the giant outdoors prison known as the Gaza Strip.

Mohammed don't swim

No country is more experienced at evicting people from their homes than Israel. However, Palestinians are one thing. Doing the same to Jews is painful and difficult.

Morten Strøksnes, Bergens Tidende, 22.07.05

[From the Norwegian by Sirocco]

Last week Mohammed came to visit. He is a twenty years old Palestinian from an overcrowded refugee camp in Gaza. The heat in Oslo was oppressive even for Mohammed. We went for a bath in Hverven Bay.

It was slightly over half a year ago I first met Mohammed in Gaza. The Israeli army had recently demolished many hundred Palestinian houses. The procedure is as follows: Monstrous bulldozers, about three times the normal size, come rolling at night when everybody is at sleep. With Apache helicopters hanging in the sky above and tank guns sweeping the terrain from strategic locations, the destruction begins. No warnings are given. No Israeli soldiers make themselves known. The deafening machines, armored and chock-full of high technology, get the job done. In the ensuing panic, people have more than enough saving their lives. They cannot save anything else. Many are trapped like rats, dying inside the houses under demolition. The next morning, when it is all over, children, adults and the old sit around in the ruins with nowhere to go.

http://www.eurotrib.com/story/2005/7/23/132012/317

A long, but good read...

America the Beautiful

The Pain of Patriotism

By Joel Miller

07/23/05 "ICH" - -Patriotism is love of country. Like the pains of lost love the patriotic trauma resulting from a ravaged country dulls our senses and promotes denial. Patriot pain also warps our sense of community.

The roots of patriotism go deep into our collective consciousness. We are social creatures. We have been dependent on the activities of the group since our earliest stone-age way of life. Today's nations are extensions of those primitive groups. The patriotic love of country stems from our commitment to a communal struggle for survival. A community survives the deaths of individuals, but no individual survives the death of the community. Patriotism is an extension of the love of the community and its pride and pain should not be taken lightly.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9553.htm

Jo

Something that George Bush, Tony Blair and Ariel
Sharon have yet to learn. There will NEVER BE PEACE as long as the world is being strangled by
Zionism. That is the problem! The sooner our Congress, the British Parliment and Israeli Kenneset realize that it no longer works we will all be FREE. The Horror will end - and please
don't anyone reply that anti-Zionism equals anti-
Semitism. That's Bullshit!

Are you guys EVER happy about ANYTHING?!?! It's one post after another, one link after another that just highlight everything wrong in the World. There are GOOD things, too! If I wanted to be depressed, I'd read the Corporate News. When I come to AstroWorld, I'm looking for astrology ... not a littany of everything Israel's doing wrong. There are Forums for that. My thinking was this wasn't one of them. Am I wrong?

I'll check back next week when perhaps everyone's mood has changed.

Sheesh!

Studies by Saudis and Israelis show that Iraq

has created terrorists

http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2005/07/17/study_cites_seeds_of_terror_in_iraq/

Anonymous-

Send us a list of the 100 things YOU are happy
about. After all this is a astrological and
political column.

And have the decency to sign your name. Or are
you "Joe" just hiding out in drag?

Actually, wv, I wrote it in a rush and was assigned the moniker Anonymous because I forgot to sign my name. So, hold the flame, please.

What am I happy about? My dog, my health, the movie I'm producing. I can hear, see, taste, smell, sense. I have friends who love me and whom I adore. And I have a bright, ceaseless curiosity about the World around me. Which brings me to this site ... and often leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth as it's one thing after another about how horrible the Israelis are.

I know I don't contribute astrologically often (I don't have the confidence in my astrological abilities to do so), but, I come here to learn and satitiate my astrological curiosity. If I wanted anti-Israel diatribes, I'd look elsewhere and not here.

Aren't there Forums out there for those kinds of links? Am I wrong?

I'm also happy I can write my thoughts like this without black booted thugs breaking down my door. The worst that will happen is y'all will disagree with me ... but that's something I can live with. No harm done.

Jonathan (not anonymous)

Under the circumstances, with the world events of the past week and the social consciousness of Astroworlders, the influence of two full Capricorn Moons is hardly a cause for happiness.
It brings to mind serious questions about government responsibility, morality, and dignity. It's a sobering time to look at this and if one does, I can't imagine not being disturbed and 'unhappy'.

Right Jonathan,

We can bash the American government all day, 24/7, but we don't dare criticize Israel...? Israel is a problem. Deal with it.

Would our astrologers please comment on this. Abu Ghraib photos and videos that the government is fighting releasing apparently contain horrendous, utterly sickening images. What is going on astrologically connected to this and what does the likely result appear to be? Will this be the final wake-up call or have we descended completely to hell? Thank you.

I do agree, Jonathan, that it is cause for some good feeling that boots aren't in the streets at our doors, but I still wouldn't call it happiness.

feelings are like that. They can overpower. And the Moon is the gal. I do admit I felt pleasure, myself, when I walked under that Moon last night, but I still sense the feeling of sorrow in the air that wants immediate expression.

Who in the Hell do you think you are, Jo, to tell me to "deal with it"?! I brought up an issue that has been grating on me (as well, I'm sure, with other astroworlders) and you tell me to "deal with it"? It's not appreciated.

Yes, as Americans, we can bash our Government all we want. But if I wanted a bash Israel forum, I'd find one. Again, I didn't think this was it. And, again, am I wrong? If so, I'll find another forum (and contribute) for astrology and go there.

But don't you ever tell me to "deal with it". Ever.

Know what? This Moon has been effecting me all day and I've been a thorn in everyone's side. I shouldn't be posting. My cheeks are red, my blood pressure is soaring and I'm sure to say (more) things I regret.

Please accept my apologies for speaking my mind and being in the minority when it comes to the links people provide. I'll think twice before I post. (not that I post much anyway)

Night all ... and, again, sorry. I still think your Grands are lucky, Jo, and I'm sure we'd have one heck of a time on your porch under that Full Moon ... and you can still reach your hand in my popcorn bowl.

Over and out.

Maybe you provided the shot we need to help get us out of these phlegmatic doldrums, Jonathan.
There's a limit to how much we can do and I agree that's it's wise to always be grateful for the good things we have while we discuss the seemingly insurmountable problems that we face collectively.

Jonathan -

It isn't Israel bashing - it is Zionist bashing.
If you took the time to study the movement and
all the sh*t it has caused - especially since
1916.
The "boots" aren't kicking our doors in YET!
For that we are lucky - Palestine is still the
problem, and until that is cleared up there will
never be peace. The Zionists have NO plans to ever get out of the West Bank. If you can't accept
than you can't accept reality. And if we don't
change our Foreign Policy toward Israel we are lost.
I would suggest you read Ha'aratz occasionally,it
is an eye opener.
I am glad you are happy but that doesn't change
the fact that this is an Astroligical Political
column. Most of us are happy, but we come to AW
to discuss Astrology and Politics - and that's the
was it is!

Shylurker, I would posit that it is Pluto approaching the Galactic Center....something's gotta give, and then there are all those other more arcane black holes and stuff (boy, this is so professional of me...STUFF).

Jo....I agree that Israel is a problem...and I am not anti semetic, either...but the amount of political power going into supporting Israel causes our own gov't to kind of act likeke a black ops gov. for them. Big problems.....big.

Jonathan, something is getting set off in your chart, as happens to all of us....funny that you mentioned " I've been a thorn in everyone's side." I have had my own special vision (X-RAY???) of my effect on people also...or am I just seeing how other people are in their OWN world and not relating to me? Damned if I know, but this Saturn on Venus at 00 Leo sure has something to do with it.

Your red cheeks and blood pressure are probably also related to the horrendous heat and humidity, huh? NYC getting the heat!

Acturally, I think this administration is playing footsy with both the Zionists and the Arab Nations....not to mention China. Interesting to say the least.

.............

Cockburn--

It's Roberts, foe of federal power, except when it comes to police powers, as in the Gitmo trials, and the French Fry case. Even last week, Roberts took time out from preparing for his confirmation hearings to issue a dissent in a case involving an illegal search of a car. Roberts was alone on the Appeals Court in siding with the cops, who conducted a full-blown car search after pulling the vehicle over for a faulty tail-light. There may be some haze obscuring Roberts' views on Roe v. Wade, but there's nothing disguising his animosity toward the 4th Amendment.
As for hauling water for the White House there's the Gulf War vets' case. The vets brought suit against Saddam for Gulf War illnesses, encouraged to do so by the Bushies. Then, when Saddam was toppled, the Bush administration invoked "immunity" for the new Iraq government, a move which Roberts supported.
http://www.counterpunch.org/

Nah, the heat doesn't bother me. I've got great AC. :-)

I think the main issue is the fact that I don't see things in terms of black or white. I see things in shades of grey. Israel aren't all wrong. The Palestinians aren't all right. The Republicans aren't all wrong. The Democrats or Third Party candidates aren't all right. There is "right" and "wrong" in each of their positions. And one can't immediately assume that if one lives in Israel then one supports what the Government is doing. Many in the younger generation of Israelis and Palestinians are actually friends (I've heard). It's just the older generations keeping the mutual hatred alive.

So, for one who doesn't see in Black and White, proclamations of one side being "right" and another "totally wrong" tend to not sit well with me. It's a personal thing. The Universe is much too complicated to use mass generalization or easy-to-understand (and, therefore, to judge) labels.

Just my opinion.

Thanks so much for responding, Judy Gem. When I freak (and when it comes to cruelty to children, in particular, I do tend to freak), I only see the extremes. I suppose the ugliest scenario of all is that people just shrug and move on. You'd think torture of children would jolt people awake--which is probably a huge factor in their trying to deny the public access to the images. Will the Pluto retrograde prolong this? I'd appreciate your response.

Jonathan,

I don't like ANYTHING about the USA government these days. I don't like that our treasury has been frisked, that our economy depends on China, Japan and other Asian countries, who hold the bulk of our Treasury bonds. I don't like that our troops are being trained to torture, that our present Attorney General and former White House Counsel is counseling this White House that they can continue to torture 'detainees'... some of them children. I don't like that Roe v. Wade is a hair away from non-existence... I don't like that my grands, including my granddaughter may be drafted to fight in perpetual wars... and on and on...

But I have to 'deal with it' --- I have to recognize that these things are happening. I have to internalize that my government is not what I thought it was. And yes, I am not happy about it.

But I do not need to apologize to anyone for what the USA is doing... they do it not in my name... when someone moans and groans about our government I do not feel it personally. I know that this American government is not me. I must deal with it... however, it is.

I apologize for offending you... But I do not understand why reports about Israel can not be brought to this board without offending you. The Israeli government is a group of people, led mostly by Ariel Sharon. I do not approve of Mr. Sharon's policies or methods, any more than I do Mr. Bush's or Mr. Cheney's. Why do you find that so disturbing? It has nothing to do with how I feel about Israelis, anymore than my not liking Bush has to do with my still loving my country and Americans.

My comment to you to deal with it was inappropriate. But when I hear you say you are tired of posts about Israel... I hear you telling me what information I can bring. In effect, I hear you say 'shut up'... that is my problem. I am sorry for having spoken to you inappropriately, for offending you. I appreciate your comments after my remark, it shows immense courage and maturity on your part. I am sorry that we disagree on this matter, but truth is, we do. Namaste.

I don't think that just Israel and just Zionism are the problem, but I do think Israel has been unnecessarily harsh on the people in its response to suicide bombers, and I am sympathetic to the anguish and pain that prompted suicide bombings to even occur. It's a complex situation. There are people that did and do not want Israel to have a country, but, I for one, understand that the establishment of Israel gave protection to the Holicaust refugees. It is a tragedy indeed what people in the world do to each other.

I just read an article on truthout.org by John Pilger from the New Statesment called "Blair is Unfit to be Prime Minister." I am impressed by John Pilger and his years of covering the Mideast, making films about it, winning awards, and I basically agreed with his premises. However, I found at least one inaccuracy in his article in that he stated there were no suicide bombers in Israel until Ariel Sharon was elected. That is so untrue. Ariel Sharon was elected in response to a year of numerous deaths in Israel due to suicide bombs. Having no email address for Mr. Pilger, I wrote to his editor pointing this out and asked her to forward my email.

I basically agree with Jo & wv & many others that Israel is not behaving at all ethically and is stupid in providing "crumbs" to the Palestinians by the Gaza withdrawal, with no intention to give any more than that. I know security is an issue for Israel. I know Hamas (and probably Islamic Jihad) has made it clear recently that they do not want Israel to exist. It is a terrible problem. One of the problems is that Sharon & many in Israel are acting unilaterally. I know that an unofficial peace plan was proposed last year and that it was supposed to be a fairer one. Even if the leaders were open to it, how could it be enforced with so many zealots?

I think these are all valid issues. I have no problem with anyone posting anything that concerns them or on which they have an opinion.

Dear Jonathan, you are important and special to us here. I'm sorry you're having a difficult time time (Judi, too)but be glad that you are a feeling human being, and a very creative. I wish you would one day tell us a little more about your film as I am very excited about it and would love to hear more.

Jo,

We disagree less than you think. I am not a censor, nor would I ever want to play that part. I suspect I was referring to the deluge of links that were, in my opinion, nothing but anti-Israel. To have a few in a thread is fine. They're interesting (although I find many of them one-sided) and informative to a point. But when the thread becomes nothing BUT them, then it grates.

Again, not your problem or the Board's problem (we can post what we want ... thanks Sally). It just got to be too much and I missed the Astrology. That's all.

So, we're good. No problems there. Thanks for putting up with my temper tantrum. Leo Rising? Aries Sun? Me? Nah! LOL

I'm not that well educated in Zionism. However, I do associate it with another fundamentalist/corporate mind mode. Being Jewish I do not see wv's or Jo's posts as anti-Israel or anti-Jewish. They only link us to the news; they do not create the news. wv wrote his post in a very impassioned way, but upon reading it a few times I understood what he is saying and found no offense in it.

At this point, getting to the heart of the problem (fundamentalism) and plucking it out from it's deepest roots is the only way to rebuild a new level of conciousness. That is ALL fundamentalism. And ALL of our Old Timey Heirarchal Patriarchal religions branch out and go there). The world's admistrations need to be brought to the fire for purification.

I'd rather the money US gives to Israel be better spent here. Being Jewish does not mean I condone acts of violence towards Palestinians (or any other human being).

Jonathan,

You are not alone in feeling a 'thorn...'

tSaturn is sitting on my nPluto, and a few other aspects are posing stress, including this recent full moon and now Merc is Rx... I am feeling 'wound tight' and then of course the news has been nonstop...

I sat in the humidity today, watching the boys swim... thinking about Sally's comments upthread. Those dealing with Fitzgerald and his 'narrow' scope. Like many on this board I have lived through Watergate and Iran-Conra... and there is an anger rising in me that these crooks will get away with it all this time again... perhaps by firing Fitzgerald... who knows. I try not to think that way, but of course it is there at the edge of my consciousness. I like to think that Saturn in Leo will be as (our) Sharon has suggested, the downfall of kings and kingmakers.

It is really hard to post about happy things when there are so many horrific things. And as Shy has mentioned, the torture of children freaks me out. My youngest grand turned nine in April... and the pictures on the internet (renderings actually) now of the eight year old little girl from last year tear my heart out.

One on one we can talk to each other, work things out, even when we don't understand each other. Why can't we do that in groups? How can we continue to hurt each other? How can we do this to our children?

I live in the South... at the pool today was a white mother with a small black child... another bi-racial couple with children... and lots of children of color... all having a wonderful time, all playing together, warmed by the rays of the summer (Leo) sun, cooled by the languid water. But outside that scene, these children and these families live in a "red" county, in a red state, probably a paycheck away from poverty. And other children across the planet are starving and some are being tortured.

As Shy asks, how can people just turn away from that? From suffering children?

JO...yeh, Peter Jennings was the model for the William Hurt character in Network....but Williams is this generation's PJ....

I have been reading from the link http://medicinegarden.com/astrology/cosmic_egg_GC.html about Pluto/GC....when I posted above I hadn't read any of the posts and didn't know that others were writing about this also...as for the energy speeding up since the Harmonic Convergence (brought up in the article)...well, it sure has in SF baby area...starting with the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989. I know that when I was taking an astro weekend workshop in 1990 and an entity appeared which my teacher and another student saw was for me, I was told by the teacher that the entity would come to me in one year, but that they had to work with my vibrations in order not to FRY me. I ended up in 2000 working with an intuitive psychic who changed my energy levels enought to be able to endure the changes. The single biggest change for me is being able to make 'connections'....which leads me to all of the news stories and the overwhelming feeling that the people in DC are leading the front to the ultimate war of destruction ...which too many sources call the end times.

All we can take with us is our own developed spirituality. No toys, no filthy lucre.. ...and what kind of spirituality is it that leads us to total ruin in the guise of ruling the world? How much do we need to protest? Is this so 'destined' in people's minds that the energy GOES to destruction? (WWIII) How do we effectively change the dynamic is what I want to know.

I think I meant to write "SF Bay area" not baby area, althought it is that also!

Shylurker, ad my birthday wishes to your card! And I, too, thought for a long time you were a Skylurker!

ShyL...
you wrote: When I freak (and when it comes to cruelty to children, in particular, I do tend to freak), I only see the extremes. I suppose the ugliest scenario of all is that people just shrug and move on. You'd think torture of children would jolt people awake--which is probably a huge factor in their trying to deny the public access to the images. Will the Pluto retrograde prolong this? I'd appreciate your response.

(Shy-if the people of the US WANT to see these photos...it won't matter if Pluto is Retro or not....but are people awake enough yet?)
....well, Pluto is retrograde half the year every year....and cruelty to children goes on year round. Will Pluto on the GC change that? Or will Pluto on the GC have people STOP walking away from ugliness like this? All murder and torture is ugliness....as a child I was tied to a tree by an older neighborhood bully and my shirt stripped off and he whipped my back with a rope. Did this change him as much as it did me, which prompted my first encounter with the Universe? In my fervent 'prayer' to what I didn't know even existed I asked for him to be punished in a big way, as he sure wasn't given much punishment by his own parents. He ended up stepping on a kiave thorn which is barbed and he ended up in the hospital in a great deal of pain for weeks. Now, this was an incident between two CHILDREN....did he remain a bully? I don't know, we moved to a different island. But I sure got my spiritual developement prodded! I think this is what people have to wake up to on so many levels...first that children are human (hey, some people don't even think women are, or gays, or colored skinned people are human...and not bloody possessions or toys...or sex objects) wouldn't THIS be a hell of an awakening? Because this is what I see as the problem (not seeing the divinity in each person)...and I suspect this is what you are seeing also, all of you. Why else would we all be so angry?

Jonathan, I used to see things as you do also-kind of a 'make nice' aspect which well could be generational...and my daughter, who is a Leo Sun/ Leo rising is your age....she is just not ready yet to assume the mantle of being her own person and OWN it....which means owning your own views and feeling strongly about them.....I think Saturn here is waking all of us Leo 'types' up....its been 30 years since the last time he knocked on the door.....and 30 years ago you were a little kid dealing with stuff with NO power to speak of. Now you have it....Saturn says....you gotta use it!

Jonathan, I think Bhakti hits the nail on the head. Zionism (not Judiasm) is a political fundamentalism which has consistantly degraded the Arab population of Palestine since WWII overtly. In 1916, there were other issues which laid the groundwork for what was to come.

I can honestly say, having grown up in Beirut, that I have seen many forms of political fundamentalism being swathed in religious absurdities. It is horrifying to see the results.

Many of the "fundamentalist" parties in Palestine are a direct result of Zionist arrogance.

I wonder how we might feel if Mexico or Canada came into our country and rounded up the men and he boys, and some of the women and children, and killed them outright and claimed our lands? I wonder how we might feel if the rest of the world turned a blind eye? I wonder how we might feel if the Canadians or the Mexicans then told the rest of the world through some horrific media blitz that we were less than as people, that we couldn't go to school any more, that we could not vote, that we could not go back home, that we could not have jobs and that we had to wear a yellow patch on our clothes to indicate we were disgusting Americans, because AFTER ALL, GOD HAD GIVEN THIS LAND to the Mexicans or Canadians. What if this were the case? And what if this went on for 65 years or more?

Posted on Salon:

Is Roberts Opus Dei?
All indicators point to "yes" --

Roberts & wife left their DC parish to follow their pastor when he was re-assigned:

http://www.cathstan.org/news/09-16-04/1.shtml

Msgr. Peter Vaghi, who has been pastor of St. Patrick Church downtown for nine years, has been appointed pastor of Church of the Little Flower, Bethesda. He will replace Msgr. William Kane, who is retiring.

Born in 1948, Msgr. Vaghi attended Gonzaga College High School here; Holy Cross College in Worcester, Mass.; the University of Salzburg, Austria, where he studied as a Fulbright Scholar; the University of Virginia School of Law, Charlottesville; and the Gregorian University, Rome. Ordained in 1985, he was later appointed assistant pastor of St. Patrick's and became pastor there in 1995, the same year he was named a monsignor.

He has been active in numerous Catholic organizations such as the John Carroll Society of which he is chaplain and the Downtown Washington Serra Club. While a practicing attorney before ordination, he was an associate in the Washington firm of Sidley & Austin and legal consultant to Sen. Pete Domenici (R.-N.M.).

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/politics/whispers/archive/july2003.htm

7/22/03

Judge Bork, baptized at 76 It may be a little late to start for most, but Robert Bork, the former Supreme Court nominee who has written books decrying the decline of Western culture, has just been baptized. Rev. C. John McCloskey, who represents the conservative and activist Opus Dei arm of the Roman Catholic Church and oversaw the baptism, said, "I can confirm that he was received in the Catholic Church."

Bork, a scholar with the conservative American Enterprise Institute, was raised a Protestant and had called himself a "generic Protestant." He was known more for his conservative legal views, which some Democrats used to shoot down his court nomination during the Reagan administration.

Pakistani Leader Takes on Blair
"There are religious leaders who indulge in extremism and hate campaigns within London. Have they arrested any of them? Please set your house in order first. Because this indoctrination of youngsters is happening in England. These three came from there. They've been born there, they've been educated there. How is Pakistan to blame? So please stop casting aspersion"
"You do your job in your country. I do my job in my country."
"What have you done? There hasn't been anybody here passing an edict against Mr. Prime Minister Tony Blair. But here sitting in London they passed an edict against me. Nothing has been done."
ABC News--

http://tinyurl.com/7ccef

To save space will be using RA for right ascension.

Alberto Gonzales was sworn in as Attorney General Feb 3, 2005, 5:35 PM, EST, Washington, D.C..

Do that chart, do the chart for the Full Moon of Aug 9, 2006 for Washington, (in either long or RA) place the Full Moon chart around the swearing-in chart.

The RA of the Sun in the swearing-in chart was 317d 40 m. (17d 40m of Aq). The RA of Neptune in the swearing-in chart was 317d 34m (17d 34m Aq). Transiting Saturn in the FM chart of Aug 9 will be 137d 48m (17d 48m Leo) in opposition to both and about to cross the Ascendant of the swearing-in chart (within days).

Gonzales natal Mars has a RA of 138d 20m 18d 20m Leo), hit by that FM and to be hit by transiting Saturn shortly after. His secondary progressed Saturn at 226d 02m (16d 02m Sco) will have been squared by transiting Saturn just shortly before Aug 9.

John Roberts natal Saturn has a RA of 228d 28m (18d 28m Sco) while his secondary progressed Saturn will be at 229d 07m, (19d 07m Sco)both to be squared by transiting Saturn within days after Aug 9.

Judith has prog Pluto @ 137d 56m (17d 56m Leo), nPluto @ 139d 16m (19d 16m Leo), prog Saturn @ 140d 26m (20d 26m Leo), nSaturn @ 144d 39m (24d 39m Leo), prog Mars @ 146d 57m (26d 57m Leo), and Prog Mercury @ 323d 33m Aq (23d 33m Aq). All of these planetary positions are retrograde astrologicaly.

Progressed Pluto, natal Pluto, and prog Saturn each receive 1 hit from trans Saturn (Aug 10 to Aug 30 2006).

Prog Mercury, nSaturn, and prog Mars each receive 3 hits from trans Saturn (Sep 26 2006 to Jul 18 2007). All probably while she lounges in her orange pyjamas.

If any of the fine astrologers here at AW would care to explain for the non astrologers what the above data may represent I (and I think they also) would be most appreciative. I am a researcher and do tons of charts in my work. I can interpret as I must do in looking at the charts I do in research but my mind races at lightning speed as I go from one chart to another. I barely take time to scribble some notes, let alone type anything out. (Mercury sextile Mars, trine Uranus, Uranus trine birthplace MC).

Sorry for the long post but I like to get this stuff out there 'before its to late'as The Eagles sang to the Desperado. Should I go silent I may be in the horsepistol or visiting Digger O'Dell.

bob

bob

Wow, Beasley! Your "what ifs" were actually the case in this country. Our European ancestors came over here and did precisely those things to our Native American ancestors (speaking as one who descends from both groups). Yes, indeed. And it was as ugly as genocide ever is.

Oh, and Beasley, I agree 100% with you. It is the extremists always who cause such agony for everybody else.

And Judy Gem, thanks so much for addressing my issues. This Thunder Moon is making my head pound. Or, maybe that's just the sensation of fresh growth taking place (and not little horns on my forehead--haha) during Full Buck Moon.

Uh-oh. Bob's gone and done it again. Gotta re-read about RAs.

WV, your favorite writer, Frank Rich, has a new article out... some say it blows the lid off Rovegate --- ties Gonzales to it...

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/24/opinion/24rich.html?hp

Jo -

You're right it is a great article. Ah, the web
these idiots weave...they never learn from history.

Rich and the NYTimes are fed up with the Bushes..
but they helped put them where they are...they are
trying to protect Judy Chalibi. I think the FBI
should raid her home and office and get all of her
notes and hard drives. She is responsible for too
many deaths.

Clinton got impeached for having mutual sex, and
not hurting anyone but his wife and daughter.
Martha went to jail because she told a lie to the
FBI. Meanwhile, Ken Lay has had lots of time to
liquidate and move all of his money off shore and
has not had to face trial. And this bunch of crooks goes on and on.
Mr Gonzales is Mr Fitzgerald's boss - how convenient. When are George Tenent and Webster
going to serve their country with dignity and spill the beans.
I pray they all end up in the Hague along with
the Media Barons in this country who have condoned
their actions.
I also hope that when a new goverment takes office. the first act of the new Congress is to
repeal all bills passed since Jan 20, 200l.

Amen, Shylurker

A bit more horror from some of more enlightened rulers:

Tweedle Dee...
Congressman Tom Tancredo (R-CO) is fast becoming one of our most reliable sources for controversy here at Countdown. The latest episode centers on his statements on a radio show concerning potential responses to an attack on American soil. "If this happens in the United States, and we determine it is the result of extremist, fundamentalist Muslims, you know, you could take out their Holy Sites," he said. "You're talking about bombing Mecca," clarified the host. "Yeah," answered Tancredo. Tancredo's remarks were printed by newspapers throughout the Arab and Muslim world and Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul admonished him for speaking "irresponsibly and without thought of how far his statement would reach or what kind of problems they would create." Dean of the House of Representatives, John Dingell (D-MI) elevated the discourse, saying , "First of all, suggesting the bombing of a holy site of any religion is simply inexcusable for an elected official in the United States Congress and an anathema to the millions of people of faith across our nation...We must stand united and strong against terrorism, but these are exactly the kind of careless comments that Muslim extremists feed off of and use to recruit new terrorists." Mr. Tancredo deluged further into the bizarre and hypocritical in chastising a Chinese official for threatening remarks towards the United States. "For a senior government official to exhibit such tremendous stupidity by making such a brazen threat is hardly characteristic of a modern nation," said Tancredo. For once, we couldn't agree with you more, Mr. Congressman.

From the ArabAmerican weekly political bulletin.
www.aaialert@aaiusa.org

I think it would help to stop worrying about Fitzgerald since this is entirely out of our control and there is no way of knowing exactly what is happening or what the outcome will be. It is interesting to study the case and speculate, but no matter what happens right now, justice eventually comes to criminals as the universal balancing factor dictates.

One thing to keep in mind is that Jupiter will be going into Scorpio just when the indictmants are due. Revenge is a factor. Many people want it. If justice is not working at the moment, maybe other measures will have to kick in. If Jupiter rules the courts, and you all know full well what Scorpio can do, the jury is really still out.

We all hope for these people to be stopped, and no one knows for sure when it will happen, but until the plot unfolds we will have to remain in suspense.
I, of course, will not abandon hope.
It's not fair to ourselves to superimpose an ending to the story that's not there yet.

Wow, I've been away too long today. Reading these posts puts me in mind of the polarization of the whole country, in fact the world. Jonathan is right from the perspective things aren't all black and white, everyone thinks they have "right" on their side. The Democrats, the Republicans, the Fundamentalist Christians and the rest that call themselves Christians. Jews and Zionists, conservatives and progressives and the list goes on. For myself I have to look at the groups bent on spreading hatred and anger. There are certainly people angry in reaction to the seeming attempts by groups who have to "prove" the rightness of their actions by stuffing their beliefs down everyone's throat. Saturn in Leo isn't going to help that and we will all end up fighting over things we don't even know the whole story or all the information.

Carl Jung once said that countries could have and throughout history, have had psychotic breakdowns just like people, and we certainly having a collective psychotic breakdown in this country. This is Pluto opposing Mars and squaring Neptune, both relate heavily to the 12th house in the US chart and the 12th house is where all our psychosis reside. It's the house of "self-undoing" because we (individually or collectively) cannot see what we are doing. Beginning in the 1990's transiting Pluto was in the 12th house inconjunct the US Venus and Jupiter, it came roaring out of the 12th in Sept. 2001 dragging all our national insanity with it for the world to see and it was inconjuncting the US Sun, and conjunct the US Asc, we have not begun to deal with Pluto on the GC as of yet. We are still dealing with the craziness of our national Mars/Neptune square and Pluto will go stationary direct opposing the US Mars.

I can guarantee you that those pictures will come out, at some sub-atomic level we want them to come out. We want to know the worst of ourselves, we want it out there, all of us do somewhere, someplace inside of us. Look at the amount of time we all spend (the right and the left) digging up yet another article that shows us the worst of ourselves and the horrible things the GOP (for the left) are doing, and the Democrats (for the right) And whether we are right, left or in the middle we are rock solid in what we believe. Until Pluto gets past the GC, well past, no one is going to be able to see their way clear to give an inch.

They've had us (the people) focus on the Clinton (for or against) the the Bushes (for or against) now they are trying to put Senator Clinton in the WH, and we will turn back to the Clintons again, and there is not one ounce of difference between the Clinton's and the Bush's. It will be the exact same agenda, globalization, New World Order. Not until Pluto goes into Aquarius will we be able to see the response of "we the people."

So wait for the pictures, because they will make their way into the hearts and minds of the American people. Some will look and some won't, some will defend and some won't, but the Patriot act has been put permanently into place now and our options are running out. Our past options that is, only the future will be able to tell us what our options will ultimately be.

Jo,
Thanks for the heads up re the Frank rich article. I personally consider it a MUST read.
I really think it will all come down to what Fitzgerald will (or will not) do by the end of September. As with many people posting here (+ Kos, D.U., etc.) I am totally disheartened, frustrated, and extremely frightened that nothing seems to stop these sociopathic #@&^%#%$#$ in their dysfunctional/evil tracks.

So to perhaps oversimplify: if there are indictments, the press and everyone else will feel free to pile on and Bushco will be under enormous and probably unsustainable pressure...

...If there are NO indictments, whatever the reasons, they will all skate, saying how honest and upright they were after all; the press will once again be totally cowed, and then we can once and for all kiss America as we once knew it goodbye.

Well, I'm to stock up on food, water, and precious metals, but remain neutral, so as not to be too crazy and take a side.

I can't count on my vote counting in any State of the Union, but at the same time love them for their weakness.

It's just too confusing for me. I'm a simple person.

In a few days Mars will be going into Taurus for six months. There's a chance that this will stabilize things a little. It will square Saturn and who knows, maybe some things can be accomplished, even though Neptune will be squaring to.

Taurus is partly about appetites and personal pleasures. The things that relax us. What we feed our senses. Enjoying the material realm. As we plod along through this external horror show maybe Mars in Taurus can direct us to some ways of coping with it by turning some attention to ourselves and what makes us feel good. We are really in better shape to affect the environment positively if we stay as healthy as we can, take care of ourselves, and make sure we find a rythm of pleasure in some way, in between the bouts of pain.
Jonathan , with his Moon in Taurus, touched on this today. It's beginning to make sense. He listed the things that bring him pleasure, as you recall.It's a good thing to remember that we are guilty of some things, but we probably do a lot of things right and we should recognize this and the fact that we can allow ourselves some good experiences. Wholeheartedly, with relish, and without guilt and remorse.

Another note is our man, John Conyers, with his Sun/Jupiter conjunction in Taurus. He is steadily going along in his furrow with full intentions of getting the country's support in proving that this administration falsified intelligence and lied us into war.
As you can see, Mars will be spending the six months on his conjunction.

janet, wv, and raj: thank each of you for endorsing my pettiness. i feel truly actualized as i approach a union with my galactic center on 7/28. let's see what i can be petty about:

--why on earth is sandra bullock marrying a Hells Angel (saw that in a supermarket line)?

--anybody notice bush's nomineee for the supreme joke, er court is actually shorter than bush

--did campbell brown (haven't seen her in a couple of years) have facial lyposuction or what -- she's awfully gaunt looking sitting in for Chris Matthews (watched until she pissed me off ... political reasons not her mousy hair).

well, that should do it for me until 2006.

petty in the cybersphere

Sally,

Wow! I really thought I could keep myself out of the recent debates on this site, and then you say that there is not one ounce of difference between the Clintons + the Bushes. I love this site, your articles, all the cool postings, but I respectfully disagree with you on this one big time. First some perspective:

**I don't really care for Bill that much and somewhat dislike Hillary, who is just too right wing, hypocritical, and potentially authoritarian for my taste(astro-profile anyone??) Bill hasn't been the same since his surgery (hope they didn't put any of Cheney's parts into him by mistake!), sucking up to the Bushes and until it became mainstream news, even denying any awareness of the Downing Street Memo! Yes they are both obviously super-slick major opportunists cozily in bed with big business, BUT if either were president since 2000:

a/ 9/11 would NOT have happened because either person is far too vigilant and proactive re "real" threats (also, putting on our tin foil hats which seem to me increasingly like normal habadashery these days, if Bush was complicit or just turned the other way, both I am afraid quite possible, I don't believe either Bill or Hill are that evil or demented to have done the same thing!).

b/ As cozy as they are with big business/mega-rich people, etc. neither would have supported the recent tax cuts giving obscene amounts of breaks to the very richest people who need the money the least, because they would have known that ultimately it would decimate the economy. They also would not have spent sleepless nights like Bushco thinking of new ways to totally dismantle even the most basic programs for poor and helpless people, such as children, the sick, the long-term unemployed, wounded combat vets, etc.

c/ They would not, I believe, have put the biggest and most flagrant corporate polluters in charge of re-writing the environmental rules, and pressing for drilling in the sacredly pristine wildlife preserve in Anwar.

d/ Neither would have pulled a Schiavo like stunt, cozying up to the American Taliban of the religious extreme right to destroy the rule of law as they encouraged the threatening of judges to motivate their demented supporters.

e/ I just cannot believe (intuitively) that either would have put up with the sickness and horrors of Abu Gharib or Gitmo even if a 9/11 type event had happened on their watch.

f/ Neither would have so vigorously tried to destroy social security, unlike Bushco, which semingly cannot stomach the fact that currently at least, old, sick people are at least to some degree insulated from dire poverty and kept off the streets.

g/ Neither would have started a pre-emptive war after totally lying about the reasons and their real agenda and scaring the American people into submission, and neither would have been so @#$&*$#$* stupid, careless, hypocritical, and downright treasonous to expose the identity of a CIA operative working on weapons of mass destruction, just to get a little political revenge and send a strong message to other "non-believers" to not question anything they would do in the future.

Thanks for listening!!

We know the Clintons would not have done those rezaholic deeds because they didn't! After all, he was prez for 8 yrs. ;O)

((((((((((((((((Laurie)))))))))))))))),
Strength & white light to see you through your difficult time.
Re: post on the 23rd.
My admiration to your Mother for her acceptance and may she have ease through her decision........
I hope your son's relationship is resolved satisfactorily. Would that be your first Grandchild?
And I hope you have a good relationship with your Mother in law, as dealing with her physical problems will be enough stress!

I was given a stack of old National Geographics, and have been fascinated reading them! If you are depressed about the state of the country, try it. We have matured collectively sooooo
far from the 20's.
A. The original cast of producers, include a lot of names from the Scull & Bones, families. ( Didn't have time to research and see if they are the same, but educated guess says yes!)
B. Feb. 1925 issue is a journey through Africa; Cairo to Cape Town, by Author Felix Shay and his wife. He refers to the Africans as "boys"; comments on how enthusiastic they are to swim, any time possible. ( Could it be they are a little overheated from carrying Mr. Shays baggage?) The little woman found a perfect solution to cross a croc infested river!
Let the "black boys" carry her over on their shoulders!!!!!
If published today, a majority of people would boycott it!
Then there is the advertisement by the National Lead Company ( March 1924 ) Caption: Tons of lead roll along every avenue! (" If you wish to read more about this WONDER METAL we recommend an number of books on the subject.")
You could buy a car for $1,000 or less., Campbell's soup was just .12c a can and no genetically modified corn syrup, or high fructose, and the ads provided work for real live professional artists! Most of them are beautifully done!
Some good with the bad......................

Maybe we have so much to deal with because we are ready to do it!!!!!!!!!!!

Judi G,
How horrible your experience of being tied to a tree and beaten as a child! And what a stunning lesson to have been anbswewred by the Universe!
I had an ancestor who was tied to a tree in a graveyard, by her teacher, and left overnight! ( in Childbury Carolina.) That would be LITTLE MISTRESS CHICKEN, ( which I didn't post, several threads back, after the mention of that name in connection with was it 10 Downing Street?)
She was discovered by a young black slave, who, sneaking through the graveyard without a passport to be off his plantation....., with a jack-o-lantern for protection from "Hants"scared her so she screamed and then lost her voice.
According to the Colonial Dames of South Carolina, who wrote the story for the Youth COmpanion originaly.............the slave Money, showed great integrity and went for the search team he
could hear in a distance and led them to her, rather than melt into the darkness safe form punishment. He was rewarded instead and led the group that "drummed the school master out of town", facing backward on a mule, stripped of his wig and coat. ( symbols of his position in life!)
She married Benjamin Simons of Middleburg Palantation, Cooper River, and in March 1763, was innoculated against smallpox!
My Great Aunt Catherine Chicken Hort gave me the little booklet, after I was kept after schoool by my mentally disturbed 3rd grade teacher, who forgot me and went home!
At dinner time my Mother and the Principle of the school found me diligently sanding, ( mars in caporicorn) the deep grove in the school desk I had been accused of making! ( generations of children deep!)
Like you Shy, I am deeply offended by the stupid, clueless, offenses against children, of the adults in society..and when they are stopped, more of the adult population will be, able to function rationally!
Eric is doing well.
Thanks, for the continued white light surrounding him!!!!!
PQ

Forgot...Grizzly I totally agree!
PQ

800,000 Children Face Starvation in Niger

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/article301244.ece

Think of what the cost of 1 day of war in Iraq
could have done for these children. Where are the
voices of Laura, Hillary, Lynn Cheney, etc.

Well, they're busy, dammit. They are searching for sex scenes in videos and books; but the violence, they are okay with that.

Laurie, your strength is admirable. Please take things slow and be good and kind to yourself as well, especially if you have the need to grieve. We are with you, supporting you. May you and your family members be enveloped in G-d's protective Light, and may you all be held in a space of powerful love.

Laurie, and all, this is a high quality site for people who do no study in depth the uses of homeopathic remedies.

http://novahomeopathic.com/

They are combination remedies which can be of great help through crisis.

Blessings to you.

Grizzly, I know it's hard for people to see or accept that the Democrats aren't much different that the Republicans. My comments on the Clintons have nothing to do with the "blue dress" it has to do with two things 1. Nafta and 2. a family here in Colorado who are right wing conservative, very wealthy, and a heavy contributor to the right wing think tanks. The head of that family told me after the last election that they knew they could not win the next election (the GOP) and were backing Hillary because the Clintons have always been highly supportive of and believed in The New World Order. I didn't believe him but waited to see if the media and the GOP started slowly and quietly supporting Hillary and they have. I have been watching to see what her voting record was and it's not all that liberal, she is openly in favor of this war plus several other things pointing to a seamless exchange between Bush and Clinton.

This is a game, a political game and the game is right in front of us if we but pull back from our anger at Bush and look at the game. We (people) are the pawns moved around the board and the more we identify with a "party" and not watch to see what the "person" is doing, the more a part of the game we become.

Tsunami warning issued for Indian Ocean and the coast of India from a 7+ earthquake.

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/asiapcf/07/24/tsunami.warning/

Tsunami warning issued for Indian Ocean

Sunday, July 24, 2005 Posted: 1640 GMT (0040 HKT)

(CNN) -- A tsunami warning has been issued for the Indian Ocean, sparked by an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.3 located in the Nicobar Islands, India, the Japan Meteorological Agency said Sunday.

"There is a possibility of a destructive local tsunami in the Indian Ocean," the agency said in a written statement about the earthquake, which struck at 12:02 p.m. ET.

In an hour or less, a tsunami could hit all coasts of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands of India and, in Indonesia, the Indian Ocean coast and Malacca coast of Sumatra.

The U.S. Geologic Survey measured the quake at a preliminary 7.0 magnitude and said it was centered about 690 miles southwest of Bangkok.

Here is a link to a site that most of you probably already have. At least we can do a little something on a daily basis every day of the year.

http://www.thehungersite.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/CTDSites

bob

Sally, your 6:10 am post was amazing, right on & long overdue. Sometimes I wonder what people actually get out of this site. I mean, the astrology is incredible because ya'll know your stuff, but in order for it to be helpful & effective, it necessarily has to be rooted in a spiritual foundation. So many people are so mired in the mundane, materialism of this world and it becomes very difficult to see the forest for the trees. I appreciate your reminders very much.

Thanks so much, Bob, for listing that site. With all the crazy stuff going on in the world today which we have little or no control of it's nice to find something that we actually can do that will effect some good. Especially liked that there was a link to Animal Rescue sites also. Thanks so much for listing this - I shall pass the site on to others as well.

It starts with a trickle..

Republican Opposition to Iraq War Growing
Now There Are Nine
by Kevin Zeese
First it was Walter Jones (R-NC) who began to speak out in favor of an exit strategy for Iraq. Now there are nine. This is still a trickle – but it is a growing one. And as the support for the war decreases, evidence of the failure of the occupation and the increased risk the occupation poses to security at home becomes more apparent, this trickle could develop into a pounding river.

More:

http://www.antiwar.com/orig/zeese.php?articleid=6730

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4711121.stm

US anti-war grannies face justice
Elderly members of a US anti-war group called the "raging grannies of Tucson" are due in court following a protest at an Arizona military recruitment centre.

They have been accused of trespassing after entering the centre earlier this month, saying they wanted to enlist.

The group, mostly women in their 60s and 70s, said they wanted to go to Iraq so their grandchildren could come home.

An army spokeswoman says the protesters were not serious about enlisting and were harassing recruiters.

Nine people - five elderly activists and four journalists - are due to appear in court on Monday.

The Raging Grannies, who are associated with the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, have held protests outside the Tucson recruitment centre every week for three years.

'Serious'

On 13 July the group decided to enter the premises.

We would like to replace our young who are in the firing line
Pat Birnie
Raging Grannies of Tucson
"We went in saying we were here to enlist, but they didn't believe us," Pat Birnie, a spokeswoman for the group, told the BBC News website.

"We read a statement, sang songs, and then we left."

Ms Birnie, 75, said the protesters were well outside the centre when police arrived and said they were trespassing, a criminal offence.

She said the charge was an "overreaction", and that the grannies had been serious about joining the army.

"We would like to replace our young who are in the firing line," Ms Birnie said.

Nancy Hutchinson, an Army spokeswoman in Arizona, told AP news agency that those opposed to the Iraq war should contact their legislators rather than bother recruiters.

"They need to direct their frustrations at people who have the power to change things," she said.

http://tinyurl.com/dg8pu

Chad Tidings

By Richard Cohen

Another hanging chad has dropped. His name is John G. Roberts Jr., and he undoubtedly will turn out to be opposed to abortion rights, affirmative action, an expansive view of federal powers and a reading of the Constitution that takes a properly suspicious view of the state's embrace of religion. In these and other matters -- the death penalty, for instance -- he is expected to substantially reflect the views of George W. Bush, the man who nominated him to the Supreme Court, because that was what the election of 2000 and its sequel were all about. You hang enough chads, and you get to change the Supreme Court.

My predictions on how Roberts will vote when he (almost certainly) gets to the court are not based on a close reading of his scholarly writings -- there are almost none -- or a parsing of his decisions as an appellate judge. It is based entirely on the supposition that Bush has taken the ideological measure of his nominee and has been assured by others that Roberts is a conservative, maybe deeply so. The White House in turn has passed that message to conservative groups. They all gave praise. "The president is a man of his word," said the very important Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. "He promised to nominate someone along the lines of a Scalia or a Thomas, and that is exactly what he has done." God save us all.

More...

GOP Candidate Calls For Impeachment...

http://www.rutlandherald.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050721/NEWS/507210422/1002/NEWS01&template=printart

Statement on Shooting in Stockwell St

Following the aborted bombing in London yesterday the capital is in a high state of alert. Armed police are patrolling throughout the city. Today police shot dead a man they claim was linked to yesterday's events and police marksmen fired shots in Harrow Road.
We don't want the situation to develop where the city is so tense that the police are inclined to shoot first and ask questions afterwards. The police should release all information about this shooting in order to reassure the Muslim community in particular who may fear they are being targetted.

In this weeks Guardian ICM poll 64% of people said that Tony Blair bore responsibility for the London bombings. The Chatham House report and the government's own Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre both linked the bombings directly with the Iraq war. Stop the War will continue our campaign to bring those repsponsible for that war to account and to bring the troops home. Those who have died in Iraq and in London deserve nothing less.

http://www.stopwar.org.uk/

http://www.chomsky.info/articles/199607--.htm

ZNet | Foreign Policy

Resort To Fear

by Noam Chomsky; Tehelka; July 21, 2005

The resort to fear by systems of power to discipline the domestic population has left a long and terrible trail of bloodshed and suffering which we ignore at our peril. Recent history provides many shocking illustrations.

The mid-twentieth century witnessed perhaps the most awful crimes since the Mongol invasions. The most savage were carried out where western civilisation had achieved its greatest splendours. Germany was a leading centre of the sciences, the arts and literature, humanistic scholarship, and other memorable achievements. Prior to World War I, before anti-German hysteria was fanned in the West, Germany had been regarded by American political scientists as a model democracy as well, to be emulated by the West. In the mid-1930s, Germany was driven within a few years to a level of barbarism that has few historical counterparts. That was true, most notably, among the most educated and civilised sectors of the population.

ZNet | Politics

The Record of Judge John Roberts

by Gene C. Gerard; July 22, 2005

President Bush has nominated Judge John Roberts to replace Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1979, Mr. Roberts was a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist. He went on to serve in the Reagan administration as an assistant to Attorney General Smith and as an associate White House legal counsel. He also served as deputy solicitor general in the administration of Mr. Bush’s father. He was in private practice until 2003 when he was confirmed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Many people hoped that Mr. Bush would appoint a moderate Republican in the mold of Justice O’Connor. Unfortunately, Judge Roberts is a solid conservative. While his legal record will be reviewed intently over the course of the next few months, his role in the following cases will likely take center stage.

http://www.zmag.org/content/print_article.cfm?itemID=8354§ionID=76

From Bullwinkle925 at DU:

Please sign the petition (linked) urging your Congressional members
to support Congresswoman Barbara Lee's 'Resolution of Inquiry' introduced into the House on 7/21/05 regarding the Downing Street Memo. We need to have our voices heard in Washington - especially to those on the REPUBLICAN side of the aisle - as to the importance of this issue to us and to our nation.

www.democrats.com/peoplesemailnetwork/50

I think this is the article Sharon referred to
in an earlier post.

http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2005-07/21pilger.cfm

This is a great article about the irresponsibality of the media in regards to the
Israeli/Palestinian problem...from someone who's
been there....

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/media/sides.html

Fanning the Hysteria About Iran
NPR Leads the Charge to War
By Mike Whitney
CounterPunch
August 31, 2004

“We are ready to do everything necessary to give guarantees that we won’t seek nuclear weapons.”
– President Mohammad Khatami
When did “liberal” NPR become a champion of American aggression against Iran?

Listeners to National Public Radio are increasingly apt to criticize the “rightward shift” in the station’s news coverage. The August 30 “Morning Edition” program, however, reached a new low for slanted journalism and for making the Bush Administration’s case for war with Iran.

The commentary titled “US Presses UN Agency on Iran Nuclear Program” was a textbook example of propaganda dressed up to look like unbiased reporting.

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/us_ints/ir-whitney.html

Sharon,

I read your comments above re Pilger's article. I also read Pilger's article. Then I researched suicide bombing in Israel and Ariel Sharon's activity in Israel circa 1999 - 2001. See below. I can find only one incident of a suicide bombing (through google) in Israel prior to Sharon's actual election, and that was 22 Dec 2000. There's a timeline of violence in Israel I have linked to below. I also found several other links, same thing... only one incident of a suicide bombing before Sharon's election. [There is another in Jerusleum --- but that's not legally Israel). In fact, the articles I read indicated Sharon won overwhelming election because his predecessor's administration was in shambles (Barak). I would also add that although Sharon was not IN office in December of 2000, he was Chairman of Likud and campaigning for PM. I bring this information only because I have the greatest of confidence in Pilger's reporting. He is a Pulitzer Prize winner and has been in the forefront of the reporting of the invasion and war in Iraq, along with Robert Fisk. I can find no evidence online to substantiate your claim that there was a year of suicide bombings in Israel prior to Sharon's ascendency to PM. It may be there, I just cannot find it.

It is the understanding of most analysts that the suicide bombings began in earnest after Sharon's threatening visit to the Temple Mount in fall of 2000 (as I stated upthread, this is documented in the 9/11 Commission Report). Muslims interpreted the visit as a threat to tear down the Dome of the Rock so that the Temple alleged to be beneath it could be "rebuilt." The visit was seen as a political move to ensure his election. Again, I do not intent to offend anyone. My intent is to bring information. I bring this only because of your post regarding your email to John Pilger and his article. Namaste
------------------

Following the election of Ehud Barak as Prime Minister in May 1999, Ariel Sharon was called upon to become interim Likud party leader following the resignation of Benjamin Netanyahu. In September 1999, he was elected Chairman of the Likud. He also served as a member of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee in the Knesset.

In a special election held February 6, 2001, Ariel Sharon was elected Prime Minister. He presented his government to the Knesset on March 7, 2001.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/biography/sharon.html

http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/terrorism/terrisrael-5.html

A Synopsis of the Current Situation
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip live in an odd and oppressive limbo. They have no nation, no citizenship, and no ultimate power over their own lives.

Since 1967, when Israel conquered these areas (the final 22 percent of mandatory Palestine), Palestinians have been living under Israeli military occupation. While in some parts Israel has allowed a Palestinian “autonomous” entity to take on such municipal functions as education, health care, infrastructure and policing, Israel retains overall power.

http://www.ifamericansknew.org/cur_sit/index.html

Sharon - You're right! Pilger is wrong.

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15979

In October 1983 it took only two suicide explosions —one killing 241 American servicemen, mostly Marines, and the other killing 58 French paratroopers—to force the Americans and the French out of Lebanon. It wasn't until ten years later that the first Palestinian suicide bombing took place.

Yea, verily... the Dominator grabs all public space for itself... such as NPR & Palestine.

THE PARTNERSHIP & DOMINATOR MODELS:
Seven Basic, Interactive, & Mutually Supporting Differences

COMPONENT: 1. Gender relations(1) -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : Females/males are equally valued in the governing ideology, & stereotypically “feminine” values such as nurturance/nonviolence can be given operational primacy. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: The male is ranked over the female & the traits & social values stereotypically associated with “masculinity” are valued more highly than those associated with “femininity.”

COMPONENT: 2. Violence -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : Violence/abuse are not structural components of the system, so that both boys/girls can be taught nonviolent conflict resolution. Accordingly, there is a low degree of social violence. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: A high degree of social violence/abuse is institutionalized, ranging from wife-&-child beating, rape, & warfare to psychological abuse by “superiors” in the family, the work place, & society at large.

COMPONENT: 3. Social structure -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : The social structure is more generally egalitarian, with difference (be it based on gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, or belief system) not automatically associated with superior or inferior social &/or economic status. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: The social structure is predominantly hierarchic (2) & authoritarian, with the degree of authoritarianism & hierarchism roughly corresponding to the degree of male dominance.

COMPONENT: 4. Sexuality -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : Mutual respect/freedom of choice for both females/males are characteristic of mate selection, sexual intercourse, & procreation. Primary functions of sex are the bonding between female/male thru the give & take of mutual pleasure, & the reproduction of species. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: Coercion is a major element in mate selection, sexual intercourse, & procreation with the erotization of dominance &/or the repression of erotic pleasure thru fear. Primary functions of sex are male procreation & male sexual release.

COMPONENT: 5. Spirituality -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL: The spiritual dimension of both women’s & nature’s life-giving & sustaining powers is recognized & highly valued, as are these powers in men. Spirituality is linked with empathy/equity, & the divine is imaged thru myths & symbols of unconditional love. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: Men & spirituality are ranked over women & nature, justifying their domination/exploitation. The powers that govern the universe are imaged as punitive entities, be it as a detached father whose orders must be obeyed on pain of terrible punishments, a cruel Mother, or demons/monsters who delight in arbitrarily tormenting humans, & hence must be placated.

COMPONENT: 6. Pleasure & pain -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : Human relations are held together more by pleasure bonds than by fear of pain. The pleasures of caring behaviors are socially supported, & pleasure is associated with empathy for others. Caregiving, lovemaking & other activities that give pleasure are considered sacred. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: The infliction or threat of pain is integral to systems maintenance. The pleasures of touch in both sexual & parent/child relations are associated with domination/submission, & thus also with pain, be it in the so-called carnal love of sex or in submission to a “loving” deity. The infliction &/or suffering of pain are sacralized.

COMPONENT: 7. Power & love -- PARTNERSHIP MODEL : The highest power is the power to give, nurture, & illuminate life, symbolized since remote antiquity by the holy chalice or grail. Love is recognized as the highest expression of the evolution of life on our planet, awa the universal unifying power. -- DOMINATOR MODEL: The highest power is the power to dominate/destroy, symbolized since remote antiquity by the lethal power of the blade. “Love” & “passion” are frequently used to justify violent/abusive actions by those who dominate, as in the killing of women by men when they suspect them of sexual independence, or in “holy wars” said to be waged out of love for a deity that demands obeisance from all.

(1) Please note that the terms "femininity" & "masculinity" as used here correspond to the sexual stereotypes socially constructed for a dominator society (where masculinity is equated with dominance/conquest, & femininity with passivity/submissiveness) & NOT to any inherent female or male traits.

(2) As used here, the term "hierarchic" refers to what we may call a domination hierarchy, or the type of hierarchy inherent in a Dominator model of social organization, based on fear & the threat of pain. Such hierarchies should be distinguished from a 2nd type of hierarchy, which may be called an actualization hierarchy. An example from biology is the hierarchy of molecules, cells, & organs in the body: a progression toward a higher & more complex level of function. In social systems, hierarchies of actualization go along with the equation of power with the power to create & to elicit from oneself & others our highest potentials.

-- R Eisler, human relations theorist & author of The Chalice & the Blade.

Thanks for the reference, wv. And thanks for your research, Jo. I agree with both of you that it is important to establish some context of fact.

My reference came from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_bomber

under "Range of Opinions," paragraph 2:

"The Palestinian suicide bombings are, for some individuals, more challenging to assess. In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there was a steady and continuous deployment of suicide bombers in 2000 following the collapse of the Camp David II summit between the PLO and Israel. In response, Israel mobilized its army in order to seal off the Gaza Strip and re-occupy the West Bank, placing it under military rule with the area patrolled by tanks. The Israelis also began a campaign of targeted assassinations to kill militant Palestinian leaders, using jets and helicopters to deploy high-precision bombs and missiles."

Although the above response of Israel may sound like an over-reaction when considered out of context, in the context of some 640 suicide attacks, it may be more understandable. Nevertheless, I do not support the policy of the Sharon government.

Also, regarding the '67 war, I may be wrong, but I'm under the impression that Israel was attacked and only "captured" the territories under those circumstances.

I love "The Chalice and the Blade" and the concepts of Eisler. Thanks for copying them here, Joanna (I assume you copied them and didn't type it!) My sister-in-law got our book club to read it last year. My hope is that it would get the attention and exposure it deserves.

In the midst of all the "stuff" going on in our world, here's a gentle respite.

http://www.lightmovie.com/thelight/TheLight.html

w w w . h a a r e t z . c o m

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

Last update - 16:49 24/07/2005
Peres: No chance of clinching peace without dividing J'lem
By Haaretz Service

Vice Premier Shimon Peres said on Sunday that there was no chance of reaching a "conclusive agreement" with the Palestinians unless Israel partitioned Jerusalem and ceded the West Bank city of Hebron.

Peres, speaking to Israel Radio, also said the Gush Etzion settlement area would not be returned to the Palestinians under any future peace accord.

The Labor Party chairman said he believes "there is no chance of reaching a conclusive agreement with the Palestinian Authority without giving back Hebron and dividing Jerusalem."

But he added that "no one believes Israel will give back Gush Etzion [under any future agreement with the Palestinians]."

Labor has been Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's key political ally in his bid to implement the disengagement plan.

During the Labor premiership of Ehud Barak in the late 1990s, it was reported that Barak had put out feelers to the Palestinians over possible ways to divide Jerusalem, the eastern half of which Palestinians envisage as the capital of a future independent Palestine.

Jaycee. Beautiful, just beautiful. I am going to play this again right before I go to bed. Thank you.

The Beirut Express

By mid-June, the Iraqi forces had been given 306 million rounds of ammunition, roughly 12 bullets for each of Iraq's 25 million people. But when one senior American officer involved was asked whether the Americans might end up arming the Iraqis for a civil war, he paused for a moment, then nodded. "Maybe," he said.

New York Times
If It's Civil War, Do We Know It?
July 24, 2005

There are several recent articles on the Iraq War that are probably worth a read -- that is, if you're the kind of person who likes to slow down and gawk at horrible car crashes on the freeway. Even the New Pravda is getting into the act, as the above quote, from John Burns, one of the paper's Baghdad correspondents, signifies.

More of this thought-provoking piece at
http://www.billmon.org/

WOW!!!!!
A MUST READ FROM TOMFLOCCO.COM--ANOTHER SMOKING GUN FROM 9/11, FOLLOWING THE MONEY:

http://www.tomflocco.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=112&mode=&order=0&thold=0

details Poppy's involvement and will help you realize why W. was "installed" as Prez....

really nice Jaycee. I've added it to my favorites, gonna play it every morning to start my day off.

Jonathan,

Looking for more postings related to astrology? Here’s a link and an excerpt to an eye-opening treatise on the USA chart.

~snip~

“It seems to me your ‘average American Joe’ thinks ‘Spells’ are things that only happen in Disneyland Movies, or in children’s Storybooks, and certainly not in the real world of business and politics. But our Wizard friend, Gandalf, would like to point out that when a Wizard wants to make a Spell he might, like the United States Government, create a PENTAGON; but unlike our Government, a Good Wizard will make sure his magical PENTAGON is oriented in the proper way to serve the Good of all.

He would make it clear that our Joint Chiefs Of Staff sit in a five sided Pentagon that is blatantly oriented toward the reverse of the Good and the furtherance of Mr. Bush’s fiendishly favorite word, Evil! Yes, a Pentagon is a Pentagram is a Five-Pointed Star, symbol of Man standing with legs and arms outstretched and head erect: 2 legs, 2 arms, 1 head = 5 pointed star, the Pentacle.

The Good Wizard aligns his head and the top of his Star to the North Pole of the Earth where the electro-magnetic currents pour down from the surrounding Van Alan Belts, where the Pole Star resides alongside the great, coiled, Dragon of Stars known as Draco. And by doing so, the Good Wizard works in harmony with the FORCE of Divine Nature.

But an ‘evil’ Wizard, a Saruman, aligns the top of his Star and the force of his head with the South Pole where the Coalsack floats by the Great Magellanic Cloud, and his spread legs align his genitals to the incoming electrical FORCE from the North Pole. Thereby, the ‘evil’ Wizard reverses the order of Nature and openly displays his intent to use Her forces for his own, self-propagating pleasures.

He taps into the Cosmic Creative forces pouring onto Earth for his own personal ends, and not for the natural collective good. He works a Dark Spell.

The forces wielded by the Joint Chiefs Of Staff at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia are not aligned with the collective good of this Nation, this World, or this Earth.

The building is negatively aligned with its ‘head’ facing South.

The Pentagon Building needs to be taken down because it is misaligned, because it is not the target of terrorists, it is actually a magical edifice specifically created to wreak the terror of Black Magick on the planet. [ Jose Arguelles pointed all this out in his book, The Transformative Vision, years before he became famous for the Harmonic Convergence. ]

http://starpathvisions.com/politcalastrology.html

I'm sorry --- that's my post above at 2:21 pm

Okay, I'm going to try again, apparently my computer doesn't like my name.

I knew it was you. :-)

Pat C.,
My gr/grandmother told me never to play 'poker' - she said 'anyone can read your thoughts in your face' - so I guess my 'face' shows even in cyberspace! :-) [she was a Gemini also! there were only two of us, on my maternal side, until my baby sister gave birth to one about 19 yrs. ago... no family can handle more than one a generation, apparently!]

There's a current post up at starpath (July 20, 2005) --- be sure you have your coffee before you check it out --- that along with Garry's post above has rendered me in the fetal position... don't think I will be posting anymore today... have to recharge my batteries, find some hope somewhere... [one of the posters at DU commented he might 'go inward' if indictments don't appear soon...]

Having a difficult time 'not getting caught up in the drama'... anyone else dealing with this? Like trying to remain standing in gale force winds, huh?!

http://starpathvisions.com/AmericaCossroads.html

OK Here's the fine print on Roberts............as told on ABC 'BUSINESS NEWS".
Roberts will be the only eXtreme, with business litigation experience; particularly in **tort reform**!
There you have it!!!! The final puzzle piece, that completes the picture! Forget Roe vs Wade, it's a red herring! He will finish off any hope the 'little people have of getting a fair shake!
I intend to call Spector & Lehey, as well as Collins Snowe.

From my viewpoint............the first thing I noticed about this creeping fascism...was the groceries. About 15 years ago. And I have been watching & boycotting when I could, as well as sharing my observations to perfect strangers in the grocery store. ( receptivity 50%. enlightenment? 15% ) It has turned into a nightmare! Last night on the spur of the moment I wanted tomato soup for dinner. At the local grocery store limited choice! Campbells, Store brand ( Hannaford; Belgian Co ) contained high fructose corn syrup! 3rd ingredient on the list.............Amy's Kitchen, none but it was $2.39 a can, and not condensed so 1/2 the amount of soup. I bought the Campbells mindful of that 12c a can ad in the old Nat Geo, without high fructose corn syrup! It was there in a can of Chicken noodle with Tara Lipinski's picture on it........1998? when she won the gold medal? ( It is my pencil can!)
It's nice that I can still stand on Pennsylvania Ave and speak my mind.....( sort of), but I have lost the "FREEDOM OF A HEALTHY DIET"! TO THE CORPORATE PIGS.
I know I know....this fall I will cook up a big vat of tomato soup & freeze it!
But bottom line.I have way more to do than I have time or energy to do it now..................& being one of the Betty Crooker generation, ( less work for Mother) ( & a taurus sun!!!) basically the "boyz" are stealing painting time from me!
And now I will go sow wild flowers to cover my disastrous giant bowl! Hopefully with the moon & mars in aries.the flowers will be militantly agressive and have the pioneer spirit!!!!!!!
PQ

Ooophs, forgot to tell you Justin has posted a new column. If this pragmatic, Libertarian feels this way --- shoot, I may start sucking my thumb.

---------

~snip~

"Two points leap out at the reader – or, at least, this reader – quite apart from the moral implications of dropping nukes on Iran. The first is the completely skewed logic: if Iran has nothing to do with 9/11-II, then why target Tehran? As in Iraq, it's all a pretext: only this time, the plan is to use nuclear weapons. We'll wipe out the entire population of Iran's capital city because, as Paul Wolfowitz said in another context, "it's doable."

The other weird aspect of this "nuke Iran" story is the triggering mechanism: a terrorist attack in the U.S. on the scale of 9/11. While it is certain that our government has developed a number of scenarios for post-attack action, one has to wonder: why develop this plan at this particular moment? What aren't they telling us?

I shudder to think about it.

The more I look at it, and the more I think of it, the more I sense a monumental evil casting its shadow over the world, and I have to tell you, it makes me wonder how much more time I want to spend on this earth. In my more pessimistic moments, I doubt whether we can avoid the horrific fate that seems to await us just around the next corner, the next moment, looming over the globe like a gigantic devil stretching its wings and blotting out the sun.

It seems to me that the question of whether life is really worth living anymore is inextricably bound up with the question of whether or not these madmen can be stopped. If not, then the only alternative is to live it up while we can and laugh defiantly in the face of the apocalypse. Why write columns, why comment at all, if we can't have any effect on the outcome? On the other hand, some ask

"Surely the New York Times and the Washington Post can find a lede here: 'US has plan to nuke Tehran if another 9/11.' Can we get at least a bloody story out of this?"

Might I suggest another lede?: "Armageddon approaches." Or perhaps, for the literary-mind secularists among us: "After many a summer dies mankind."

http://antiwar.com/justin/

Hope? Ohhh sweet, sweet universe... what serendipity! I started my ramblings through cyberspace with the 'Elf' at starpathvisions and his analogy of Hobbits and the Ring, and ended with this from Justin... full circle (ring), don't you think? Is there a message there? You bet your sweet bippy there is!!!

"This, it seems to me, is the only reason for hope: a strategy of doing an end run around the mass media. We must mount a last desperate attempt to stand athwart the apocalypse shouting "No!" The alternative doesn't bear thinking about.

Never for a minute did any of us who founded Antiwar.com imagine we would one day be front and center in a twilight struggle to protect the country and the world from such a monumental evil, and yet here we are, a band of hobbits up against all the dark powers of Mordor. Without getting any more melodramatic than is absolutely unavoidable, I can only note that we've come a long way on our quest to rid the world of this particular Ring of Power, and the battle seems to be reaching some sort of dramatic climax. As to whether or not the Cheney-neocon-War Party axis of evil will be defeated in the end, no one can confidently predict at the moment. Yet one thing does seem clear: as long as Antiwar.com is around, we have at least a fighting chance."

----------

Right Justin... and as long as those of us at astroworld are sending out ripples in the pond, we have a fighting chance. So, get those fingers tapping, send out the word... we will be heard! Get them ba#$%rds out of Washington... impeach, indict the lot!!!

As we look at history, we know there has been corruption down through the ages. This is an undeniable aspect of money and power...but kings and leaders have been taken down and removed from power(sometimes to be replaced by governments that are just as corrupt). I remember from my readings on Taoism that the man of the Tao is not political.

I choose to believe in divine justice and the fact that there ARE honest, virtuous, honorable people like us in positions of leadership, including in the military and CIA. I believe these people are working hard, in front of and behind the scenes, and biding their time. Sometimes they make compromises with the intent of making their move when the time is right. Things ARE coming to a head.

In the 60s, it was the youth who lead the charge. The youth of the 60s were brough up on TV just like the youth of today are brought up on TV and video games, yet people arose against the injustice. I have to believe this will happen again. People ARE beginning to see through Bushco.

Nothing is really every totally predictable. Don't assume anything but lets continue to be vigilant and activists.

Have faith.

With love,
Sharon

Thank you "calm Sharon" I was thinking tomato soup was pretty petty. posted simulataneously with Garry & Jo's posts.
I WILL plant those wildflowers...........................
instead of crawl under my bed!
PQ

Jo, I know you're having a rough time trying to find some"thing" to hang onto. I've wanted to give you "some"thing, but I so hesitate because all "this" is so very personal how we handle it. I guess I'll just say that, not that it makes much sense. Or I could provide my own outlook: No matter what happens, it's all impermanent. This planet is not the be-all and end-all to the universe, and though these events are making us too sad for words, and our actions seem for naught, we can have personal faith that the greater good of mankind is being served. Maybe we can't see it (the big picture), and maybe we won't experience it in our current lifetimes, but we can continue to live, love, and laugh in the moment of now. This is all I can think of to offer any comfort, sorry it's not much. Hug, Peg

Peg,

I don't believe in permanence. But while I'm in school I'll do the curriculum. That is, I will try to "do" what I can while in the world, not of it.

Our nation is at a crossroads. We may be about to nuke another country. I'm not looking for something to hang onto, I'm looking to spread the word, to stop this insanity.

I seem to have disturbed the comfort level here.

Namaste

no Jo, I'm not in any way uncomfortable, and I appreciate your proactivism. I guess I misread your words, and thought you needed a pick-me-up. Like I said, it's all very personal how we handle this "stuff", and your feelings jumped out at me. I misread people all the time, but my intentions are good :)

As long as you continue being yourself, Jo, feel free to "disturb the comfort level". And, with regards to the insanity of the World we've chosen to be born into, I just keep repeating "this, too, shall pass". On some Great Cosmic Benchmark, everything is happening for a reason and, usually, it's to educate us and help us to figure out who we "are" and who we "aren't". Once the sheeple truly realize that "their" Gov is doing despicable things in "their" name, they will decide they "aren't" that and start shouting for change. But great change often happens at a glacial pace.

I often comfort myself with the fact that 20, 30 years from now (when I'm an older person), history will look back on this time period and wonder aloud 'what in the Hell happened?" And Bush and his bunch will go down in everlasting Infamy. And, of course, Bush has to live out the rest of his days as one of the most despised pResidents in American History. Not an easy load to bear, I'm sure.

Just my 15 cents. :-)

hey all---
Sorry to "bring down the room"(although I suspect the blame for that lies in the Cancer full moon) with my earlier post, but I just find the whole labyrinthine story of 9/11 fascinating and I would one day like to see it exposed as the "false flag"/illegal power grab that it was.

I was here at work on 9/11, listening as the events unfolded, never for a minute believing that
a.) we IMMEDIATELY knew who was responsible afterwards but
b.) we didn't have sufficient warning to act in our own defense.
This logic(hey, I'm an AQUARIUS, okay? lol)led me to realize we either knew about it and allowed it to happen or we did it to ourselves.

And another thing---I've never felt insecure or unsafe in America since then, no matter where I've been.

Maybe I'm delusional, but I think once the real lockdown starts to become clearer to those with more limited observational skills, the red(state)necks will bring out their guns and the thugs in govt. will be in for it.(I know my folks in rural TN have enough guns and home canned goods to last a while and my Dad is thinking about re-digging his well for the water, which I have encouraged.)

Call me a pollyanna too, if you must, but I believe good WILL WIN over evil, ultimately--we may not see it in this lifetime, but with enough good karma, we will see it eventually.

Namaste all and white light and stay positive--whatever vibes you send into the universe will return to you threefold!!!

On the light side.............
28,000 year old artifact, an ancient phallus gives clues to our cultural development!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4713323.stm

And more David Podvin!
http://smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=22065&mode=&order=0
PQ

Whaat did the moon look like the day your were
born?

When you've finished reading the info, click on the Moon icon near the bottom of the page and see what the moon looked like the nite you were born.
Birthday Calculator

From Salon

The hidden horrors of Abu Ghraib

Last Friday was the deadline set by a federal judge for the Pentagon to release a stash of photographs and videotapes showing graphic proof of the abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The government ignored the deadline. Instead, in a secret brief filed with the court, it argued -- as it has done ever since the ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act request for the photos last year -- that it shouldn't have to release the evidence.

Nobody knows what the government's latest argument is, but it may have something to do with the hit President Bush's flowery rhetoric may take if pictures of "freedom on the march" are shown to the world. As Editor & Publisher points out in a nice compilation of public comments about the secret images, we haven't yet seen the worst of Abu Ghraib. Not by a long-shot.

Donald Rumsfeld said last year that the images in question are "hard to believe," and that what they show "can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel and inhumane." And here's what Lindsey Graham, the Republican Senator from South Carolina, said of the pictures after they were screened for members of Congress last year: "The American public needs to understand we're talking about rape and murder here. We're not just talking about giving people a humiliating experience... We're talking about rape and murder -- and some very serious charges."

Seymour Hersh, the New Yorker writer who was one of the first reporters to see the pictures, has offered even more graphic descriptions. At an ACLU convention last year, Hersh said: "Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."

No senior Pentagon official has so far lost his or her job over what happened at Abu Ghraib. Is it any wonder, then, that they're so zealously hording every bit of evidence of the horrors that occurred there?

Reporting from Brooklyn:
There was a bomb scare this morning at the Commerce Bank branch in Downtown Brooklyn (banks and court houses all around) on my way to eat breakfast and then run errands. Street closed off. Got no bad vibes so had breakfast on that corner where everyone who ws evacuated hung out until they gave an all clear.
So tired of the bs.

I experienced 911 live and in gloriuous color. It was no movie on TV for me. And after that life was to be lived in the NOW. Not in any future. I hope we can all have a future together and retain peace. But, if it is my turn to go, off I go, to me that is Gawd's will. I try to remain humble about thinking I can control possible outcomes. Still, I have a cool 'off the Earth plan' if it does come up and wish to go out joyous and not afraid.
Also been doing more fun things to balance and hold the joy in my body. Started doing some performance art with other artist friends in Brooklyn. And still lead chant with the musicians as my yoga service on Tues nites. Great ways to balance my intellectual side of writing, painting, marketing and teaching. Became fully blown out creative-wise and proud of it on 911 when I learned to live more in the NOW.

BTW , Daiai Lama was both spiritual and secular leader of Tibet. I believe he was political and still is. Being in the TAO to me means you are aware at all times of the One of All. Period. There was a saint in India. Kamapatra, who earned money as a prostitute but never forgot the All That Is. Limitations first in our mind need to become aware of, then we can be more free to really be giving while on earth. Leave something positive for someone else. These old farts in gov't leave nothing for a young person to look up to.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9565.htm

West's Policies Must Change

By Eric Margolis

07/24/05 "Toronto Sun" -- -- Having witnessed the first London transit bombings on July 7, last week's fizzled bombings, exactly two weeks later, brought both nasty deja vu and deep relief the attacks only disrupted transit and badly frayed nerves.

Thursday's incidents intensified the fierce war of words that has raged in Britain for the past two weeks over who was to blame for the original attacks.

Canadians should pay close attention because their latest dispatch of troops to Afghanistan, accompanied by much chest-thumping, makes them a potential target for attack.

Britain's PM Tony Blair claims the young British-Pakistani men who staged the July 7 bombings were motivated by a rabid, misguided view of Islam, and incited by fanatic imams preaching a cult of hatred against the west.

snip

Americans threaten America. Americans who:
· commit the greatest of all crimes, wars of aggression.
· destroy homes, cities, hospitals and schools.
· burn, rip, smash, maim and kill hundreds of thousands of people.
· expose civilians as well as American soldiers to the cancerous and baby-deforming radioactive dust of DU-weapons.
· torture. Systematically!
· tear the guts out of the Bill of Rights and deny American citizens basic freedoms and the possibility of justice.
· control what books we read, what sites we surf to, what items we buy and what calls we make, while placing themselves above accountability.
· steal elections.
· refuse to join the rest of the world in taking responsibility for the environment.
· take from the many and give to a few rich.
· throw people in jail and deny them the right to due process.
· send Americans to poor distant countries to kill and get killed, to maim and get maimed.
· aggravate the poverty and misery of tens of millions of Americans by using public resources in enterprises of conquest and destruction.
· swell prisons with Americans.
· spread fear and insecurity

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9553.htm

Richard Crouter: Grief for British, but none for Iraqis? ( or Egyptians - wv)
Richard Crouter

Published July 24, 2005

NORTHFIELD, MINN. -- I've been stunned these last few days by the juxtaposition of American reactions to the July 7 terrorist attacks in London, where 59 died, and the huge July 17 attack of a single suicide bomber in Musayyib, Iraq, where 71 people died.

The attacks in London hit us like a mini-9/11, our horror augmented by their occurrence in a kindred Western country. We know the stories and names of the people of all walks of life, including tourists, who were wantonly struck down in London. Our distress is heightened by hearing and reading eyewitness accounts in our own mother tongue.

Would that we all knew Arabic fluently and had it streaming into our kitchens and living rooms. If we did, I doubt that we could live with ourselves as Americans. Musayyib's dead are not known by name and are never seen. They count only as statistics, human lives dispensable for the sake of an allegedly greater good. But what happened in Musayyib last weekend has occurred all over Iraq on a daily basis, ever since we declared victory in 2003. The equivalent would be random daily bombings all over the United Kingdom over the last two years.

http://www.startribune.com/dynamic/story.php?template=print_a&story=5521390

I'm immersed in my daily battle with myself trying to decide whether to continue looking at this horror or to turn away.

The desperation of our current government's behavior is an indication that they don't have real control. They would like everyone to believe they do. They look more and more frantic to me, and that's a sign of the end.

But that's a small part of the whole thing. It's the old microcosm/macrocosm scenario. We're too immersed in our current reality to see it clearly. We're inside of the experience desperately looking here and there to get a perspective. We try to peer into the future with incomplete success. We want to come to a peaceful meadow or soothing lake, and we want a rest. Somehow we can find these things within all of this if we love ourselves and allow the pleasure in. We have rituals to help us, if we allow them expression. We have the rhythm of our breath if we use it to calm us.

It's just like our own bodies which are invaded continually by destructive forces. We wage a constant battle chasing and devouring microbes, poisins, viruses, etc. It never ends, but we do quite well as you can see.

The larger world is no different, and although many people now believe we are losing the battle against disease, that is unlikely. We are just too involved in the struggle to see the outcome. so I guess we have to go on faith.
But this is the nature of the dense, material dimension that gets so much of our attention. It is very difficult to manage.

We have to recognize the continued existence of these forces, I think, and work on a personal level to triumph. Eventually this will translate to collective well being. Even though we don't know when.

Maybe it is our obligation to heal and perfect ourselves first within this framework as an antidote to the poisin, and that has something to do with how we react to and manage what our senses perceive in the world around us. How we deflect, build our immunity, and continue in the natural course that life takes aginst illness, which will always come and go. We want to recognize the sickness but we shouldn't keep picking at the wounds, either. There are soothing balms and time. There is a natural equilibrium that balances these opposing forces in the universe. This world is not dominated by evil. It only appears that way. Maybe our fear gives it more power. And maybe our fear is just getting a workout now.

As POQ put so perfectly upthread, as she knows something about personal pain and collective at the moment:

"Maybe we have so much to deal with because we are ready to do it!!!!!!!!!!!"

"poison"

Today, Senator John Kerry; Senator Carl Levin, Ranking Member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; and 24 other Senators formally requested that Congress investigate the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame’s identity — a leak a senior administration official described at the time as “meant purely and simply for revenge.”

“Americans deserve a Congress that holds Washington accountable for the truth about our national security. Can anyone argue with a straight face that Congress has time to look at steroid use in baseball but doesn’t have the will to provide congressional oversight of the leak of a CIA agent’s name? It’s long past time to stop putting politics ahead of the public good, get to the bottom of a national security breach and restore credibility to Washington,” said John Kerry, who authored the letter.

~snip~

Sincerely,

Senators Kerry, Levin, Stabenow, Schumer, Lautenberg, Rockefeller, Reed, Feinstein, Dorgan, Harkin, Kohl, Durbin, Carper, Salazar, Boxer, Inouye, Corzine, Wyden, Mikulski, Obama, Murray, Bayh, Johnson, Clinton, Sarbanes, and Landrieu.

UPDATE:
Note - 7 signers of the letter are members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence: Rockefeller, Levin, Feinstein, Corzine, Wyden, Mikulski, Bayh. (Rules of Procedure: 1.3 - A special meeting of the Committee may be called at any time upon the written request of five or more members of the Committee filed with the Clerk of the Committee.) Could this possibly lead to a deeper investigation into this issue? "

http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=57

Note: Joe Biden's name is missing from list above.

August is going to see FIREWORKS here and abroad.
Indictments are in the pipeline for delivery in
August for corrupt tom delay and the rogue rove
traitor etal. So that's going to be FUN in August.
Middle east may erupt as sharon tries to dismantle
the gaza settlements and sharon better watch his back 24/7.

Besides, remember the cons ann culter and the ilk
media predicting 2 months ago that the liberal
government and PM in Canada will fall. How WRONG
these self proclaiming (rotten) 'right' were completely WRONG?

Suddenly in a Hurry
There's not going to be any timetables. I mean, I've told this to the Prime Minister . . . Why would you say to the enemy, you know, here's a timetable, just go ahead and wait us out? It doesn't make any sense to have a timetable. You know, if you give a timetable, you're conceding too much to the enemy.

George W. Bush
Joint Press Conference With Iraqi Prime Minister
June 24, 2005

___________________
A joint US-Iraqi committee is to set the conditions under which US troops will hand over security in the war-torn country to Iraqi forces, paving the way for a US exit, the US embassy said.
"The joint task force will establish criteria and conditions that will help determine when Iraqi security forces ... will be capable of assuming full responsibility to secure Iraq," ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said in a statement ...

"The prime minister has directed that the task force meet within the next week and report back to him with their plan in 60 days," the ambassador said. (emphasis added)

Agence France-Presse
Joint US-Iraqi task force to set terms for US troop exit
July 25, 2005

Posted by billmon at 05:02 PM

Senator Reid's website now has a nifty automatic clock on the number of days down to the second hand on Plamegate...check it out online.... http://democrats.senate.gov/leak.html
CIA Leak Case By the Numbers

Number of days after the article outing Ambassador Wilson's wife appeared that the White House required its staff to turn over evidence relating to the leak: 85

Approximate hours between then-White House Counsel Alberto Gonzalez's advance notification to White House Chief of Staff Andy Card that he would require staff to turn over evidence relating to the case and formal notification to staff of that requirement: 12

Minimum number of times an Administration official leaked classified information about the identity of Ambassador Wilson's wife: 11

Minimum number of times after the beginning of the Justice Department's investigation that White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan claimed Karl Rove was not involved: 5

Number of press conferences since evidence linking Karl Rove to the leak was made public where Press Secretary McClellan has refused to comment on the case, citing an ongoing criminal investigation: 7

Minimum number of hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate accusations against President Clinton involving the "Whitewater" case: 20

Total hearings held by Senate Republicans to investigate the leak of the covert identity of Ambassador Joseph Wilson's wife: 0

http://democrats.senate.gov/leak.html

Feingold (by himself - No McCain) Proposes Ethics Bill:

http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/editorial/index.php?ntid=48059

I think the Dali Lama is an exception, Bhakti. He is a both a spiritual leader and the leader of a country who has the welfare of his people in mind. We need someone like that to lead us!!!! And that person would have to be protected somehow against smear campaigns.

And what else would you expect from this Republican...

HILLARY CLINTON TO SUPPORT BUSH COURT NOMINEE

**Exclusive**

Senator Hillary Clinton has confided to associates that she intends to vote FOR Bush Supreme Court nominee John Roberts, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

Unless some unforeseen development occurs around Roberts, Clinton will throw her support behind confirmation, says a top source.

"Look, we're not thrilled President Bush is in office and gets to make these choices," said a top Hillary source, "but we have to make the best of the situation until the next election!"

With her support of Roberts, Clinton ignores pressure from the reactionary-activist wing of the Democrat party.

"She is simply doing what is right for the country, not MOVEON.ORG," the Clinton insider explained.

Developing...

jm...if you had put another 's' in there, we would have had 'fish' in french...nice post....

Garry....re your Tom flocco article post, do you remember (and everyone else) about Catherine Austin Fitts and Solari? She has intimated that GHWB when he CIA dir. had her mother murdered....

Well, this is about the head of Dillon Read and involvment in 9/11....
well, Catherine, back in 1988, was managing director of Dillion Read before she was appointed to be assist. sec of HUD, where she unvovered the money laundering scheme going on. ANd it was both administrations, Bush I and Clinton....

Slowly but surely the hydra is revealed....piece by piece.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2005/04/11/LI2005041100879.html

What Did the President Know?

    Now that special prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald is said to have expanded his investigation into the leak of a CIA agent's identity to encompass a possible White House cover-up, what the president and the vice president knew would appear to be much more relevant.

    Fitzgerald interviewed both President Bush and Vice President Cheney more than a year ago, at what seemed at the time like the tail end of his investigation into the leak of CIA agent Valerie Plame's identity.

    Bush and Cheney were not placed under oath - the reasoning apparently being that they had no direct involvement in the potential criminal activity under investigation: the leak itself. We don't know much about either interview, beyond the fact that Bush had his personal attorney at his side.

    But now Fitzgerald's investigation appears to have turned its focus to discrepancies in the testimony of White House senior adviser Karl Rove and vice presidential chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby. Fitzgerald may be trying to determine whether evidence exists to bring perjury or obstruction of justice charges.

    And that raises the issue of what - if anything - Rove and Libby told Bush and Cheney about their roles.

    So does that mean Fitzgerald might call Bush and Cheney to testify before the grand jury - under oath? Might he even have done so already? We have no idea, of course, because the White House isn't saying anything at all about the investigation anymore.

    Either way, the CIA leak story is taking on more and more of the trappings of the classic Washington political scandal - the saving grace for Bush being that his party controls Congress, and that thus far, Republicans have closed ranks behind him.

    But get ready for more and more talk about the parallels between this story and the Clinton intern scandal - and of course, Watergate.

More...

wanted to add this other thing on the London fiasco....

Was a "Bomber" Superimposed onto Metropolitan Police Surveillance Camera Photo?
http://hardnewsnow.com/

http://www.globaltalknetworks.com/forums/showthread.php?t=14833
A photo of one of the people implicated as suicide bombers turns out to be that
of a 16 year old who is still very much alive.

http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/7/23/192934/969

Torturing the Constitution
By Jack Balkin | bio
From: Supreme Court Watch
Executive power is the hidden issue in the fight over the Supreme Court.

In the past five years President Bush has pushed hard to maximize his power and limit any oversight, either by Congress or by the courts. Last week Senators Graham, McCain and Warner signaled that they wanted Congress to regulate how the Administration will conduct its military tribunals, who the President can detain as an enemy combatant free from the constraints of the ordinary justice system, and what kind of interrogation techniques the military can use both at Guantanamo Bay and at the secret CIA detention centers around the world.

The Administration was so incensed by this possibility that it threatened to veto the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2006 if it included any such provisions. How dare Congress require any degree of procedural fairness in military tribunals, how dare it limit the President's power to throw people (including American citizens) in military prisons without a hearing, and how dare it tell the President that he may not engage in cruel, inhuman and degrading interrogation practices!

http://www.spiritualcinemacircle.com/public/freetrial/?af=22&ndrx=99

Spiritual Cinema Circle

Found this on DU

Congress plans to scrutinize Plame-related issues

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/president/bush/arti... /

Notice the spooky last paragraph, snipped below: Republican Senator Pat Roberts is gonna INVESTIGATE FITZGERALD.

(For the sheer self-serving hypocrisy of this GOP move, see TPM at http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/week_2005_07_...

Congress plans to scrutinize Plame-related issues
By David Morgan | July 25, 2005

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congress will conduct a series of hearings on national security and espionage issues raised by the CIA-leak controversy surrounding senior Bush adviser Karl Rove, officials said on Monday.

* * * .

The chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence could hold hearings on the use of espionage cover soon after the U.S. Congress returns from its August recess, said Roberts spokeswoman Sarah Little. Little said the Senate committee would also review the probe of special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who has been investigating the Plame case for nearly two years.

Pat C.,

I'm confused about this... dKos has a diary on it, and now TPM... but I found this from Democrats and posted it upthread at 10:25 pm

---------

Today, Senator John Kerry; Senator Carl Levin, Ranking Member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations; and 24 other Senators formally requested that Congress investigate the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame’s identity — a leak a senior administration official described at the time as “meant purely and simply for revenge.”

“Americans deserve a Congress that holds Washington accountable for the truth about our national security. Can anyone argue with a straight face that Congress has time to look at steroid use in baseball but doesn’t have the will to provide congressional oversight of the leak of a CIA agent’s name? It’s long past time to stop putting politics ahead of the public good, get to the bottom of a national security breach and restore credibility to Washington,” said John Kerry, who authored the letter.

[see more upthread at10:25 pm]

So what gives here? Lots of folks worried that there will be an effort to provide immunity for Rove, Libby --- and maybe narrow Fitzgerald's scope... but 26 Democratic Senators signed the letter and 7 signers of the letter are members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence: Rockefeller, Levin, Feinstein, Corzine, Wyden, Mikulski, Bayh.

Hello all,
It seems our JR for the Supremem Court denied he was part of the Federalist Society. So the White House demanded apologies from all news outlets who said JR was a member of the Federalist Society.

Today's Washington's Post came back with proof that JR HAD BEEN, in fact, a member of the Washington branch of the Federalist Society...he had been on their steering committee. So I ask, rhetorically, what was so important that he had to deny this now? Did he lie, did he forget, did Bush tell him to deny this...?

Moveon.com had the blurb. I wrote Olberman, ABC, Chris Matthews, etc.

'Just World News' by Helena Cobban

An admirable vision from Israel

Gershon Baskin is someone I like, respect, and admire a lot. He's a Jewish Israeli, quite forthright in his espousal of his version of the Zionist ideal. Moreover, unlike a lot of "Zionists" who sit in the United States and tell other Jewish people to go live in Israel, he actually "made aliya" to Israeli himself and has been living with the risks that that entailed ever since.

Gershon has a very moving op-ed in the Jerusalem Post today, in which he states his personal values very clearly:

Zionism was not about conflict with our neighbors. It was about creating a just, progressive and humane society based on "Jewish values" for Jews to live and prosper, both in spirit and in substance. Real Zionism accepted the reality that non-Jews would always live within our midst. This was expressed with both eloquence and finesse in Israel's Declaration of Independence. That Declaration has always served, for me, as a kind of statement of intent and of the values upon which this state and this society rests, or should rest.

ZIONISM is not about occupying the West Bank and Gaza. The continuation of the settlement enterprise is an act of suicide for the Zionist dream. It is not only about demographics. It is perhaps even more so about values, morality and lessons that we, as Jews, should understand better than anyone else.

More at link: http://justworldnews.org/

OK. So Roberts says he wasn't a member of the Federalist Society because he never paid dues.

This according to a story by The Guardian on Line from today's BuzzFlash.

So once again, we have 1/2 truths...more parsing.

Damn it!

Hey WV, here's more proof we need to abandon Hillary--the title says it all:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/krwashbureau/20050725/ts_krwashbureau/_bc_hillary_wa_1

And hey Judi Gemini--thanks for that post and the email too!!!! I do remember Ms. Fitts now that you mentioned her and I hope the post I made helps reveal and shop off a few hundred if not ALL of this evil hydra's heads.

For anyone interested in more reading connecting GHWB and Clinton, please read the book titled "Compromised: Clinton, Bush and the CIA" by Terry Reed & John Cummings, available on Amazon(isbn 1561712493). Quite an eye-opener....

that should have been chop, NOT shop...the poster regrets the error....

So, some of (and of course not all) our Dem senators are FINALLY going to do something and try to provide some ^#$@*#* oversight as constitutionally mandated, and attempt to hold this administration accountable for its treasonous behavior. WOW! it must really be Christmas in July or something similarly strange.

Do these people have any clue whatsoever about the extent of our current national emergency, especially with Darth Lucifer Cheney now evidently running amok, having his generals plan a NUKYULAR assault on Iran after providing the cover of a second conveniently planned and executed "TERRIST" attack on U.S. soil?? As many people are starting to belatedly realize, these people are totally @#*5%$!* insane (its getting harder and harder to control my language here, but in respect for Sally I will continue to do so) and need to be stopped NOW. How to do it? Unfortunately, aside from expedited indictments for SERIOUS crimes by Fitzgerald, I really don't have a clue. I mean I wouldn't want average Americans to get all worked up so that they might be late or too tired for their shopping trip to Wal-Mart or anything so radical. Perish (pun intended) the thought!!

As you can see this is now one angry grizzly! My apologies.

Re the blocked release of photos and more importantly --- the ongoing torture of detainees, including women and children, at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo and other facilities --- two actions are pending in the Senate that need our support. We can do more than talk about our outrage, we can let these Senators know we support their efforts to checkmate der Fuhrer in the Cheney Administration. Note Sen Levin's plans to call for an independent commission.

GOP Senators Ready Detainee Amendments
- By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer
Monday, July 25, 2005

Senate Republicans planned to push ahead with legislation regulating the treatment and interrogation of terrorism suspects in U.S. custody, despite a White House veto threat.

The Bush administration, led by Vice President Dick Cheney, is working to kill amendments that GOP Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina want to tack onto a bill setting Defense Department policy for next year.

McCain, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam, and Graham, a former military lawyer, planned to introduce their amendments this week, said Senate aides who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to let their names be used. Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner, R-Va., has been working with McCain and Graham on the legislation.

The aides said the measures have not been toned down even though White House lobbying against them intensified late last week.

~snip~

Democrats — led by Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee — plan to introduce an amendment that would set up an independent commission to review detention and interrogation practices at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2005/07/25/national/w120317D59.DTL

Garry -

That story on Hillary just backs up everything I
think about her and the DLC. It is NOT a centerist
group and anyone who thinks so is not dealing with
a full deck. They are a bunch of faux Republicans
and will not get my vote, ever!

I listened and watched Tony Blair's news conference
this morning. He still has his head up his butt -
and still denies that Iraq has anything to do with
the London bombings. Go figure!

54% of the British public disagrees.

I saw a retrospective on Watergate a few years after it happened, and in it I recall a trenchant comment that it never would have become the major news story it did, had it not been the 'dog days' of summer. In other words, congresscritters were in recess and there wasn't much policy-wise to report on, so they (MSM) kept raking over the traces of what they did know.
Well - - here we go again!

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-072505dnc_lat,0,4442905.story?coll=la-home-headlines

Clinton to Direct Creation of Democrats' Agenda
By Ronald Brownstein
Times Staff Writer

2:50 PM PDT, July 25, 2005

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The Democratic Leadership Council, an organization of influential party moderates, named Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton today to direct a new initiative to define a party agenda for the 2006 and 2008 elections.

The appointment solidified the identification of Clinton, once considered a champion of the party's left, with the centrist movement that helped propel her husband to the White House in 1992. It also continued her effort, which has accelerated in recent months, to present herself as a moderate on issues such as national security, immigration and abortion.

In her new role, the New York Democrat immediately called for a truce between the DLC and liberal elements of the party, which have engaged in a ferocious war of words over the Democrats' direction since President Bush won reelection in November.

"Now, I know the DLC has taken some shots from some within our party and that it has returned fire too," she told a gathering of the group here. "Well, I think it's high time for a cease-fire, time for all Democrats to work together based on the fundamental values we all share."

WV,

An overwhelming 85% believe Iraq tied to London bombings --- I've seen that figure, yesterday and today at numerous sites - here's one:

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_objectid=15775722&method=full&siteid=94762&headline=war-on-britain--85--blame-bombs-on-war-in-iraq--name_page.html

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5247544-103677,00.html

Challenge, don't emote
In times of uncertainty, journalism of the left must not accept the status quo

John Kampfner
Tuesday July 26, 2005

Guardian

Shortly after 9/11, I laid a wager with a colleague about when the serious media would tire of the new seriousness. It did not take long - I think it was a couple of weeks before the broadsheets (or whatever they are called now) were publishing in-depth pieces about Nigella Lawson and domestic deification. The national conversation had resumed.
One of the great challenges of anyone who seeks change - journalist, politician or other - is to deal with anger and frustration, to know when to turn up the temperature and when not. Unlike the right, whose smugness is now greeted as a titillating post-political fashion statement, good journalism of the left (I apply the definition in its widest "liberal" context) must always challenge. It should never accept the status quo or take answers from officialdom at face value. In doing so, it lays itself open to some common criticisms: that it is obsessed by victimhood and blame culture; that it would never be satisfied, whatever is done; and - the most painful charge of all - that it is forever glum.

Space Shuttle Discovery launched at 10:39am EST.

Sally has been repeating a message over and over, and I think I'm finally getting it. She said upthread:

"...They've had us (the people) focus on the Clinton (for or against) the the Bushes (for or against) now they are trying to put Senator Clinton in the WH, and we will turn back to the Clintons again, and there is not one ounce of difference between the Clinton's and the Bush's. It will be the exact same agenda, globalization, New World Order. Not until Pluto goes into Aquarius will we be able to see the response of "we the people."

I have come to agree completely with this comment. And, if we examine what we are saying to each other, we will perhaps understand that our expectations of 'Democrats' is unrealistic, regardless of who the politician or potential candidate is. Howard Dean says 'don't pay attention to the DLC... they don't get votes. Well, excuse me? I thought Dean was going to have a chance to reform the Democratic Party. Now comes the DLC to say Hill will plan the agenda for the party. Where does that leave Dean, who already is ignored by the Corporate Media (State Press)?

#1 Has America become a 'corporation'? Has it become fascist? In other words, corporatism? {"Fascism should rightly be called Corporatism as it is a merge of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini)

#2 Has big business taken over the government? Has government become a business? Dubya said during his campaign of 2000 that he would run the government like a business (well, that should have been a big red flag! He has FAILED at numerous businesses!)

#3 If Corporate America is indeed a business, a corporation, with a CEO in the Oval Office... can't the 'corporation' put anyone in as CEO? What does 'party affiliation' have to do with anything anymore? Is that a 'smokescreen'? In other words, as Sally comments, in the New World Order, the agenda remains the same.

#4 Surf the net... most of the real left blogs refer to NYT as New Pravda, to the House of Representatives as Chamber of People's Deputies, to the Imperial Senate, to some of the other 'left' blogs as 'centrist' (along with H.Clinton), to 'centrist' as Right (hello! the Right has moved to Fascism! the Democrats have moved to the Right of Center!) etc., etc.

#5 The Cheney Administration (and it IS Cheney who is in charge) is gearing up for complete control. Won't matter who is in the WH in 2008, the machine will be in place. Don't forget Homeland Security controls FEMA, all local law enforcement.

#6 If we don't indict, impeach these folks --- you fill in the dots.

#7 As Sally said upthread:

"...I don't think Rove or Libby will see jail time even if they did lie to the FBI (the Martha Stewart crime) and if they don't we need to scream to the high heavens and remind people that Martha did do jail time for the same crime Rove and Libby are suspected of committing."

#8 So, pin a note to your 'fridge, to your pillow, to your toothbrush - WHEREVER! Hold their feet to the fire... get these fascist pigs indicted!

Namaste

As it has many places, it's been beastly hot here but I awoke to rain and a blessed 62 degrees before the 100's return later this week. I also awoke to a hot and on fire internet. Grizzly, thanks for controlling your language, but I do like the @#$%5*&, and would match them. Not having missed a step, the "attack" machine of this administration is in full throttle.

I hope Raj is correct and there will be indictments in August. I am confused as to why that investigation seems to be stalled right now, does it depend on Judith Miller's information? I was reading a time-line the other day and saw where David Kelly of London died or was murdered the same week that Valerie Plame was outed and they went after Joe Wilson and Judith Miller figures prominently in both cases.

We have waited for so long for "corporate complicit" Democrats do something, help Conyers, Boxer and Wellstone and the Black Caucus while the DLC is doing all they can to put a lid on this administration for this administration. We are entering dangerous times for this nation and we will need to stop looking at "parties" and look at individuals. I don't think we are at a point of developing a new party, but in time that is what will happen I think.

FOCUS | Women on Losing End of Iraq Constitution
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072605Z.shtml

Jo....funny, I just got an email which I came to post for you....and read your excellent list. I fear that the corporatacracy has been in place quite a long time....and it will be modeled (or is modeled) on the communist model (corporations as 'the people')....and only for corporations to be in charge. Orwell was writing about it 60 years ago, science fiction has been writing about the future forever....and we have come back to the future now. My astro teacher (and I was really angry about it) said that he knew Bush would win because of the aspects putting these people in power.....for the next what, 84 years?

Can we look astrologically at what that would look like? It just seems that fascists are attracted to all control systems....and are seizing the energy in order TO control....and why is the energy happening like that? What ARE the aspects? When do systems fail (1917....think about what happened in Russia when the people toppled the monarchy, and then what happened in 1990...). Sally, you are doing such a fine job of all of the interpretations....I think now we really have to look at what Capricorn means, what Pluto really means, and how long it will be before Pluto enters Aquarius...when, when????

Oh Jo.....so sorry, but look what's acoming your way:..Sally this is long, but I won't be posting for the rest of the day...going to SF to the Legion of Honor to see an artist's studio tour of murals done which are copies of works the museum owns!

ANyway it looks like left wing angst is not unlike rightwing angst....

Today's "Marriage Made In Heaven" news...
Bush to host summit promoting corporate gifts to religious charities
(WHITE HOUSE) President Bush says he'll hold a White House summit next
spring to encourage corporations and foundations to give more money to
religious charities.
Bush announced the summit as he and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met
with 17 leaders of black churches and community groups.
Jim Towey, who heads the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community
Initiatives, says his staff checked the policies of the top 50 Fortune 500
companies and found that 17 percent of their foundations ban or restrict
donations to religious organizations.
Towey says next year's summit will show how corporate donations can be
targeted to support religious groups' social work instead of their worship
http://www.kvia.com/global/story.asp?s=3638353&ClientType=Printable
http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=96695&page=1

S. Carolina Targeted for Christian State

South Carolina Could Be Destination for Christian Exodus

By Dean Schabner

- Cory Burnell has given up on ever seeing the U.S. government adopt a
conservative Christian agenda, so he and others who share his beliefs are
trying to take matters into their own hands.

Burnell, 28, is one of the founders of ChristianExodus.org, a group that
hopes to gather conservative Christians for a series of mass moves to South
Carolina. The goal is to bring enough voters to the state to establish a
government based on the Ten Commandments and conservative Christian values.

And if the federal government doesn't like it, Burnell said he and the other
members of the board have not ruled out the possibility of the state
seceding from the United States.

They are hoping to have people move to the state in groups of 12,000. Though
the group currently has just about 600 members, Burnell said it has been
only been in existence for a few months, and he is hoping to have 50,000 to
70,000 supporters in South Carolina by 2016.

But the transformation of South Carolina won't have to wait that long, he
said.

"We'll be able to begin the debate with the first wave," Burnell said.

What put them over the top, Burnell said, was seeing what the Republicans
have done since they gained control of the White House and both houses of
Congress, even with a supportive majority on the Supreme Court.

He pointed out that abortion is still legal, No Child Left Behind has
resulted in spending on public schools "exploding," a Ten Commandments
monument was ordered removed from an Alabama courthouse and there has been
no progress on getting a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage.

"About a year ago we were sitting down and we saw that the Republicans had
no intention of fixing anything," he said. "They're not conservative, so we
were at the end of our rope. We thought, 'We need to do something serious
here.' "

It was around that time that a group of libertarians were announcing their
Free State Project — a call for libertarians to move to New Hampshire, where
they will work within the political system to reduce the size and scope of
government.

• Read About the Free State Project.

Burnell liked the idea, and his first thought was to join them in their move
to the state that decorates its license plates with the motto "Live Free or
Die." But then he and the others had second thoughts.

"We can't agree with libertarians on everything — drugs, for instance," he
said. "So we realized we needed to do something like that for Christians."

The group turned its attention on the Bible Belt, first narrowing the field
to Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina.

"On the Christian issues, we know how those states vote," he said.

To help narrow the field to one, the board of ChristianExodus.org considered
other issues, though, such as the geographic size of the states and the fact
that of the three, only South Carolina has an ocean coastline.

Burnell and the others also looked at a University of North Carolina study
of Southerners' attitudes that said 10 percent of Southerners replied they
believed the South would be better off as an independent nation, and that
support for that view was highest in South Carolina — roughly 20 percent.

Of the three, South Carolina is the only one that was among the 13 original
states, and is listed in the Treaty of Paris, which ended the Revolutionary
War, as a sovereign nation.

"We could lay out that it has the right to independence if it asked for it,"
he said.

The current leaders of the state say South Carolina has plenty to attract
anyone, including the members of ChristianExodus.org, but they would rather
the group not bring ideas of splitting from the United States.

"We've got a very unique quality of life here in South Carolina, so it's not
surprising that folks would want to come here," said Will Folks, spokesman
for Gov. Mark Sanford. "As for secession, we've tried that before and it
didn't work out so well."

If anyone needs reminding of that, Folks said, they only have to look at the
state capitol building in Columbia, where the scars from the shelling by
Gen. Sherman's Union troops are still visible.

Though Burnell emphasized in an interview with ABCNEWS.com that he only sees
secession as a last resort, in a posting on the Web site of the South
Carolina League of the South he seems more focused on that goal.

"The only Southern nationalist organization I have found with an ETI
[estimated time of independence] is the South Carolina League of the South,
which, according to state director Robert Hayes, is determined to be free of
the union within 20 years," the posting says. "I think we can move this date
closer to the present with a managed emigration." According to an article in
a recent issue of Intelligence Report, the Southern Poverty Law Center's
journal on hate groups, there are higher concentrations of "antigovernment
extremists" in parts of South Carolina than anywhere else in the United
States, other than parts of the Ozarks and northern Idaho.

In his interview with ABCNEWS.com, though, Burnell said the first option
would be to remain within the United States, with a move to secede if
Washington interferes with what the new majority of people in South Carolina
want.

"Our end goal is we put people in power like Judge Roy Moore in Alabama, who
really understand the Constitution," he said, referring to the former
Alabama Supreme Court chief justice who repeatedly came into conflict with
federal authorities over a Ten Commandments monument he placed in a court
building. "We might be able to achieve that within the Union. I know we have
plenty of supporters on the ground there and thousands of supporters in the
League of the South."

That connection to the League of the South, a Killen, Ala.-based group
trying to revive the values of the antebellum South, has raised questions
about whether ChristianExodus.org has any racist intent — a charge Burnell
flatly denies, both about his own group and about the League of the South,
of which he is also a member.

"ChristianExodus.org is entirely colorblind," he said. "We have no position
on race. One of the members of our research committee is of mixed race.
There are members of the League of the South who are black."

The League of the South is listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty
Law Center, an organization that monitors extremist groups, but Burnell said
that is based on a misunderstanding of what the heritage of the Confederacy
is, and the identification of racism and slavery with the South alone.

"Racism and slavery are American problems," he said. "People want to defend
the positive things as well. There are a lot of positive things about the
South, like states' rights."

Lumping ChristianExodus.org with racist groups might be guilt by
association, though, according to Jack Kay, a professor of communications at
Wayne State University who has studied the radical right.

"If you really look at the rhetoric of Christian Exodus, it's not white
separatist at all," he said. "On the contrary, the rhetoric is the very
opposite of the white supremacist, and seems to be very inclusive."

He said, though, that he doesn't expect Burnell's group to be any more
successful creating a conservative Christian state than white separatists
have been trying to create an Aryan nation in parts of Idaho and Montana.

"For groups to be effective in getting their message out, they really have
to be in control of the process and they have to have a clear message," he
said. "This group has not developed a cohesive vision of what the future is
going to be like."

But Burnell said the message has already gotten a positive response, and he
believes the movement will only gain strength, especially because so much of
the support ChristianExodus.org is receiving is coming from people in the
Northeast and upper Midwest, he said, not the Bible Belt.

"What we found was that Southerners don't feel as persecuted for being
Christians," he said. "They're not having homosexuals coming into their
children's health classes and telling their kids that homosexuality is a
reasonable life choice."

Burnell himself actually lives in northern California, having moved there
recently from Texas. But because he believes that same-sex marriage will
soon be made legal in every state, abortion will never be banned and God
will not be brought back into the classroom, Burnell thinks Christians will
realize that if they want to live in a state where their faith is upheld,
they will have to do what ChristianExodus.org is proposing.

"We're ahead of the curve on this," he said. "There are so many changes
occurring in this country so fast, that whereas it seems like an
impossibility today, the political landscape we're going to see in five to
10 years is going to make it a possibility. We're not unreasonable nut
cases. We're the good guys here."

Jo

You are indeed a wise Goddess. I worship at your
feet.

Judi-

Burnell is only 28, and green behind the ears.
Hasn't had his first Saturn return.
I think he should leave South Carolina alone,
and Move to Mississippi with Trent Lott.

These people are dangerous....

http://www.christianexodus.org/

wv,

Let them move to SC and secede from the US. Be interesting to see what happens when their roads begin to crumble or a hurricane devastates a community. No Fed Gov to turn to for $$$ help!

Oh, and thank you for telling me I'm "not dealing with a full deck" because I happen to admire Hillary. Much appreciated.

Jonathan, I don't think WV was talking about you, I just think he has very serious questions about the DLC and Hillary Clinton based on tracking her record. This was on DU and I thought it raised some interesting questions, because it has looked if several Democrats have been giving this administration a bye on too many issues, and have supported this administration in shocking ways.

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

"This is why we Democrats need a vibrant, engaged Populist/Progressive Left to counter these tactics, or we will never win an election again, no matter how many scandals erupt they won't get the the heart of the damage Rove's ideas and practices have done because mainstream established Democrats allowed it to go on and flourish. And they are still at it with Will Marshall, Hillary and Bill Clinton and Joe Biden, Lieberman, Bayh and the rest all marching in lock step. From 2003 New Yorker interview with Rove."

.......................................................................

The Controller: Karl Rove is working to get George Bush reelected, but he has bigger plans.
by Nicholas Lemann
"Profiles," The New Yorker Magazine
May 12, 2003

In our last interview, I tried out on Rove a scenario I called "the death of the Democratic Party." The Party has three key funding sources: trial lawyers, Jews, and labor unions. One could systematically disable all three, by passing tort-reform legislation that would cut off the trial lawyers' incomes, by tilting pro-Israel in Middle East policy and thus changing the loyalties of big Jewish contributors, and by trying to shrink the part of the labor force which belongs to the newer, and more Democratic, public-employee unions. And then there are three fundamental services that the Democratic Party is offering to voters: Social Security, Medicare, and public education. Each of these could be peeled away, too: Social Security and Medicare by giving people benefits in the form of individual accounts that they invested in the stock market, and public education by trumping the Democrats on the issue of standards. The Bush Administration has pursued every item on that list. Rove didn't offer any specific objection but, rather, a general caveat that the project might be too ambitious. "Well, I think it's a plausible explanation," he said. "I don't think you ever kill any political party. Political parties kill themselves, or are killed, not by the other political party but by their failure to adapt to new circumstances. But do you weaken a political party, either by turning what they see as assets into liabilities, and/or by taking issues they consider to be theirs, and raiding them?" The thought brought to his round, unlined, guileless face a boyish look of pure delight. "Absolutely!"

http://bnfp.org/neighborhood/Lemann_Rove_NYM.htm

Sally,

I know wv wasn't talking about me, but blanket generalizations can be dangerous. It's almost like saying all Democrats are weak or all Republicans are dishonest. Of course neither of those statements are true, but generalizations like that are unfair. So, for wv to casually declare that if you support Hillary or the DLC (and I don't know that I do or not) then you're not playing with a full deck is not an entirely accurate or fair statement.

Words have such immense power. I always try (and sometimes fail) to use mine with care.

http://www.newsforreal.com/

New Labor to Old Labor:
"Bye"

I hope folks over at the DNC are paying close attention to what's going on in Chicago this week.

CHICAGO, July 25 - The huge split in organized labor has been fueled by stagnant living standards for many workers, by the ascendancy of the service sector and by labor's lack of success in politics and unionizing workers. But as much as anything, the schism reflects the conflicting ambitions of two titans of labor, John J. Sweeney, the president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., and his onetime protégé, Andrew L. Stern, the president of the Service Employees International Union, until now the largest union in the labor federation. (Full Story)

What's going on there is so important it may well decide who will sit in the White House three and half years from now, and the future of the Democratic Party itself.

More...

Jonathan, your 'id' is keeping you on the fence....why not jump down sometime soon ? It will feel good to finally come down on one side or another....or in the middle, if that is what you want. WV wasn't directly insulting you. He is expressing his ideas....it ain't personal....

Double Wow, Sally. Where did you find that New Yorker interview? The Republicans really have pursued this agenda and for the first time I understand why. Lawyers, Jews (with the subset, the entertainment industry/Hollywood), and Labor Unions. I'm going to send this out and archive it.

Maybe someone would post this on DU. It would start a great discussion.

And Jo, Garry, wv, Sally, Judi et al, it now begins to become clear why the Clintons and Bushies are so friendly. I have always thought, however, that the centrist approach worked to a degree. It worked during the Clinton administration and it works because "Conservatives" don't generally accept an extreme, packaged "Liberal/Progressive" agenda. However, they probably will accept a few issues. I think this is the premise Howard Dean works on. In order to winover Conservatives, moderates, fence sitters, he has always positioned himself as Conservative on issues like spending and gun control. What do you guys think of that? It can be a more realistic approach if it isn't a sellout. Then, again, looking like you're selling out can be a part of politics. You give in to get. That's probably what made Clinton so successful, and that's also what drove him to tell John Kerry to say he was against gay unions. I admire Kerry for not compromising on that one.

Gay civil unions, not Gay labor unions...one step at a time. I don't see Jonathan as a fence sitter. He expresses his opinons very succintly.

Thank you, Sharon. My goal, of course, is to sit ABOVE the fence and not choose "sides" because, ultimately, that's what the ubiquitous They want and, in the end, choosing a "side" becomes more a distraction than the issues themselves. And I realize wv's comment wasn't personally directed toward me. But it was a good opportunity to stress the importance of words, of labels, of generalizing whole groups of people. To do so plays into the hands of Them and eventually takes away our Power. And if you take away our Power with distractions (sides, labels, a "you're this and you're that" mentality), we're as good as done!

No harm done. It's a good conversation, in my opinion. :-)

Eventually even people in the middle come down on one side or another. For some reason or another. Personal, usually. Staying above the fray allows people to 'witness' what is happening. It is akin, I think, to being 'out of body'....but usually something comes along to bring us into the fray....what I am saying is a paraphraze, I think, of what someone famous (but who? it was posted here once) about Nazi Germany....I didn't say anything when they came for the writers, artists, the Jews, the gypsies and the homosexuals, etc....and when they finally came for me there was no one left to protest.

Sally,

I would like to compliment you on your extremely astute observation, i.e. we should focus on individuals rather than parties. Hey, Lieberman + Howard Dean are both democrats, but what do they really have in common? John Dean was a rock ribbed repub when he put country before party by saying "there is a cancer growing on the presidency". Patriotism in the best sense of the term, i.e. the willingness to make personal sacrifices to preserve and extend the frontiers of a genuinely free, tolerant, just, and caring society seems to be extremely thin on the ground today.

As I have pleaded many times on this and other boards, if just ONE well respected, credible, and highly visible American patriot "stepped up to the plate" and denounced in no uncertain terms the sheer malevolence, utter incompetence, and downright evil agenda of Bushco, by revealing just several of their many, many dark secrets, there would be a snowball effect that would immediately bury these @#%$#&* beneath an avalanche of public outrage and disgust as you would not believe. That is what we need.

As I've said, this is all about the New World Order and the chaos we feel in the US is happening across the world. It does feel as if we are pawns, but I don't think we know for sure, exactly whose pawns. I don't think many do. I think the Clinton's, like most in politics, want power or the power that goes with Senator, President etc., and are willing to take anyone's advice on how to get that power. The DLC helped Clinton become President (or so they think) in 1992, so it's natural that they would hang on to those ideals given at that time. When a person finally decides to sell their soul to the "devil" for money, fame, power, health, food, jobs, etc. it becomes easier and easier to justify what you have to do in order to attain those goals. We in America justified our enormous appitite for the world's resources decades upon decades ago. All of us did, even the poorest among us.

This is the "great war" spoken of by the Hopi and all ancient tribes across the world. The "great war" is not for land or resources, the "great war" is for the soul of the earth and all who dwell therein. There are no elevated peacekeepers now and usually when great evil arises or an evil person there is another equal balance for the peacekeepers or the voice of peace. There is none now; not this pope, the Dahli Lama doesn't have that great a following, there isn't a country or name of a leader that resonates for people with peace or spirituality. To me that is very interesting and desturbing. It has made me wonder over the last three years if we are to be the peacekeepers.

If it's true, and I believe it is, there is very little difference between the parties. The Democrats are not so stupid to be floundering like this, unless by design. We wonder why they cannot see what we see, they do see it but for some unknown reason they have let it go for over 5 years now. To attach to one party or the other is a mistake, even if we end up voting for someone we don't believe in, we do have to make our voice heard and continue to make it heard no matter what party and continue to follow what is being done in our name.

As far as the Clinton's, who really knows, they are wed to the DLC and we know that. Their sudden friendship with the Bush's, their Republican fundraisers, buddy buddy with Newt Gringrich (he supports them now) well, there is an old saying "keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Perhaps that is what they are doing.

I said in 2003 when asked who had the best aspects on election day of 2004, that it was Howard Dean, but he had to get from "here to there" and I didn't think he would make it. Hillary has to get from "here to there" and her aspects over the next 18 months aren't the best.

Sharon:

I think the idea of putting Hillary "in charge"
of the agenda of the DLC is to sideline Dean. It
appears to me that those "insiders" are afraid of
Dean and want to secure their power base. Like religion, it is all about Power and Money. The DLC
haven't lived up to their past promises, and really represent the "white" majority of the party.
When Republicans start throwing 'fund raisers'
for Hillary, as happened Valentine's weekend, I
think is shows you where they are coming from.
They know that Jeb can't run. Frish and McLain are
losers. Santorum is not going to run, who do they
have left but a bunch of right wing kooks. Hillary
is right up their ally...she will obey!

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9572.htm

The Iraqi Resistance Is Prepared For Ten Year War

Salah al Mukhtar, 61, lives currently in Yemen, but underscores that his stay is a "temporary" one, as he is convinced that one day he will return to Iraq and that it will be to an Iraq governed again by Baath. Arabmonitor obtained a thorough interview with al Mukhtar, one of the top-ranking personalities among the Iraqi émigré community.

By Arab Monitor

07/27/05 Arab Monitor" -- -- Sanaa, July - Is the resistance in Iraq, which we are witnessing, was prepared by former governement or it grew up during the occupation ?

--"The current resistance in Iraq, to be accurate, has not made or prepared by Iraqi government, but by Baath party leadership. At the beginning in the year 2002, the Baath party has completed the training of about 6 million Iraqi citizens to fight urban warfare by the so called Al Quds Army. President Saddam Hussein has managed all preparation, including storing about 50 million of guns, big, medium and small sizes with their necessary ammunition to fight against the occupation for ten years. The groups prepared for a guerrilla warfare has included, beside the Iraqi armed forces, organization called Fedayeen of Saddam, Baath party fighters, as well as kaders of Baath party. In the light of what I have said, you can reach the conclusion that the resistance was prepared mainly by the political leadership of Iraq. Of course, it has used the government apparatus to facilitate the preparation for a guerrilla warfare. After the occupation of Iraq thousands of people have joined the armed resistance: some of them joined Baath party organizations, some others formulated their own organizations. For the time being, we have many different groups fighting against American colonial occupation, and these organizations have different ideological characters, including progressive forces, religious groups, nationalists, but the main organization is the Baathist one. As for the connection among these organizations, I can say that there is a strong coordination and cooperation".

Oh my goodness... I spend the morning cleaning house and then come here to find South Carolina is being invaded!

Well, before anyone moves into South Carolina, they had better have a job... and those are not abundant here... they don't call my neck of the woods 'hard scrabble' for naught! Everyone here works at the 'bumb plant' --- which has been downsizing for ten years now! We don't need anymore bum(b)s here! I can't see 10,000 jobs opening up anytime soon!

Secondly, the folks that have move in are retirees attracted to the weather and the laid back life. They are mostly Republican, but they're not fundamentalist. We do have fundamentalist here, but they're living from payday to payday, like most people, and I'm sure they don't have any spare guest rooms to let! So, let that little twerp talk... all day long if he wants... as the Gov said, succession? We been there, done that! (Still feeling they wounds!) And Jonathan is right, South Carolina is a poor state...

WV, thank you for the praise! Don't know what I did to warrant it, but I'll take it, thank you very much!

to all: there's a Republican blogger who says that Bolton won't be appointed, PERIOD. See below.

http://raggedthots.blogspot.com/2005/07/john-bolton-rip.html

Something to think about...

Monday, July 25, 2005

Conflicts' costs may exceed $700 billion

War in Iraq, Afghanistan saddles U.S. taxpayers with enormous debt, critics say; deficit spending blamed.

By James Sterngold / San Francisco Chronicle

U.S. toll in Iraq

As of today, at least 1,775 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. Since May 1, 2003, when President Bush declared major combat operations in Iraq had ended, 1,636 U.S. military members have died, according to AP's count.

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The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have already cost taxpayers $314 billion, and the Congressional Budget Office projects additional expenses of perhaps $450 billion over the next 10 years.

That could make the combined campaigns, especially the war in Iraq, the most expensive military effort in the last 60 years, causing even some conservative experts to criticize the open-ended commitment to an elusive goal. The concern is that the soaring costs, given little weight before now, could play a growing role in U.S. strategic decisions because of the fiscal impact.

"Osama (bin Laden) doesn't have to win; he will just bleed us to death," said Michael Scheuer, a former counterterrorism official at the CIA who led the pursuit of bin Laden and recently retired after writing two books critical of the Clinton and Bush administrations. "He's well on his way to doing it."

The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a nonpartisan Washington think tank, has estimated that the Korean War cost about $430 billion and the Vietnam War cost about $600 billion, in current dollars. According to the latest estimates, the cost of the war in Iraq could exceed $700 billion.

Put simply, critics say, the war is not making the United States safer and is harming U.S. taxpayers by saddling them with an enormous debt burden, since the war is being financed with deficit spending.

One of the most vocal Republican critics has been Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, who said the costs of the war -- many multiples greater than what the White House had estimated in 2003 -- are throwing U.S. fiscal priorities out of balance.

"It's dangerously irresponsible," Hagel said in February of the war spending.

Democrats have also raised concerns about the apparent lack of an exit strategy and the fast-rising costs, particularly since President Bush has chosen to pay for the war with special supplemental appropriations outside the normal budget process.

Good read!

Are Stupid White Men Really Stupid?

“We have been children long enough. We must now unshackle our minds and begin acting as independent beings.” – Noah Webster, First American Dictionary

By Dom Stasi

07/27/05 "ICH" - - Two framed pictures hang on my office wall. Each is accompanied by a timely message.

The frame atop holds a portrait of colonial patriot Samuel Adams. (Yes, the beer guy. My hero on so many levels.) Below the picture are his words, written at America’s birth: “The liberties of our country, the freedoms of our civil Constitution are worth defending at all hazards; it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors. They purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood. It will bring a mark of everlasting infamy on the present generation – enlightened as it is – if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of designing men.”

When I look at the framed document and I see the idealized portrait - Sam Adams of the set jaw and steely eyes - I feel as though he is reaching across the centuries and speaking directly to me, admonishing me to beware the artifices of designing men.

Then I lower my eyes. What I see lowers my spirits as well. For immediately below the Sam Adams quote hangs another frame. This one contains a front page from the London Daily Mirror. Above the newspaper’s headline floats another picture, this one of a befuddled-looking, newly “reelected” George W. Bush. The headline reads: “HOW CAN 59,054,087 PEOPLE BE SO DUMB?”

More ... worth a read:

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article9573.htm

a wee diversion...stuie talks about Fat Maths...

http://www.stuartwilde.com/Articles/SW_articles_fat_maths.htm

Camille, to say the above is "worth the read" is an understatement. Powerful words, written powerfully and makes one stop and think, think hard. Thank you.

The following is a little long (sorry, Sally) but, hopefully, worth it. I cannot condense it as it came in an email.

Maybe we Dems are naive (and many of our leaders are too much like the Republicans in their politics), but I thought you all might like to see a summary of the Beaucoup Blues Democratic teach-in held this past Friday in New Orleans, with Jim Dean as keynote speaker. Things ARE happening on at the grassroots level.

snip -
Jim Dean brought his wealth of experience in organizing state conventions to Beaucoup Blues. His keynote speech clarified for all participants that effecting progress "is not an instant-gratification game” and motivated everyone to engage in unrelenting efforts which he promised would net results in the long-term. Despite participating in 25 state conventions, Jim was excited by the quality and innovativeness of the Beaucoup Blues Panels. He was able to participate in our first panel, “African-Americans in Louisiana Politics,” and promised he would encourage such panels exclusively devoted to African-American politics at future state conventions."

There were 4 panel discussions:
1) "African Americans in LA Politics" (self-explanatory)
1) “The Heart of the Party: Why We are Democrats”...sought to define the diverse spokes of the Democratic umbrella...(and included)...an expert on labor, an environment activist, a doctor and former state senator, and a GLBT activist, (who) brought so much clear and impassioned vision for what our shared core values are and how these values are failing to be defined and understood by the Party at large. The panelists advocated that the Party re-ignite its identity as the party of the working class, the party for the poor, the underprivileged, the oppressed, the elderly, children, the party for education and healthcare and the environment, the party that believes in an “XYZ” economic model rather than a trickle down model (as one panelist put it), and above all the party not simply of tolerance but of courageous equal rights.
2) “Taking the Streets”...focused on energizing and mobilizing the base to elect more Democrats and turn Louisiana Blue...Three best practices emerged from this panel – work locally to address basic issues of the people, utilizing words or slogans that people can identify with, clearly define the focus of a project, and find dedicated people even in conservative areas.
3) “Media and Message”...explored how progressives can communicate strategically...Audience participation was amazingly high..."

"Participants walked away with renewed energy and committed to engage in the hard work needed to turn Louisiana blue." Here's a participant comment: “It was crucial to turn the corner from discouragement after last November to a new place of forward, hopeful thinking, of experiencing the force of community empowerment and taking it on with greater ownership and eagerness.”

And from a Truthout article, "Keep Native Waste Off Native Land," which described a conference that included discussion of the new plan to have a private co. (the Private Fuel Storage [PFS] Limited Liability Consortiumship) ship nuclear waste to Skull Valley, Utah, Dennis Kuccinich had this to say:
"The American people...are waiting to be inspired and moved. Will $2 per gallon move them? Maybe not. Will $3? $4? Probably not. But if people make connections between a war against innocent people in Iraq and our energy policy, between moving tons of nuclear waste and our so-called energy policy, between the production of nuclear weapons and our failed energy policy... We're not just talking about protecting sacred land. The whole earth is sacred. The whole earth is sacred! We're talking about reclaiming our humanity. Jamie Cromwell talked about people putting themselves on the line. We have to shake the conscience of this country! WAKE UP! That's what we ought to be telling this country, and we are the ones. We are the messengers. We are the messengers."
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/072605D.shtml

I've never liked politicians so I am not disappointed in the majority of Democrats' behavior. The truth is, we don't really know exactly what's going on and how a party maneuvers successfully around such a potent adversary. They want to pick up seats in '06 and we don't know yet what's going to happen. Kerry is doing a massive amount of fundraising now to get them elected. They stopped Bolton which was a very important move and they recognized the danger fully.
I'm not a politician so I'm going to give them some benefit of the doubt and see if they can pull out of this. I'm going to back off on judgement recognizing the difficulty of their challenge. I'm going to allow them time and space. They are the ones we have now, and I will do my part without agonizing over them and wasting too much energy. I'll put my money behind the best of the lot.

The remarks of Robert Reich, the ex labor secretary, have caught my attention. He says that it is practically impossible, given the economic situation, for the Democrats not to rise again soon.

I believe that the recognition of the truth about the Clintons is the major brakthrough now. It's easy to see the truth about George Bush and act against him, but much harder and more painful to see the truth about the Clintons, who conceal it so well, and who were once worshipped. You can also understand how hard it is for the other side to see the truth about Bush, but they also are coming around. If we all do this, become more discerning, the parties won't matter so much, and we will elect better candidates.

I doubt that it will be Hillary in '08. This is all a game, and she is not a leader. Simply a follower. We are going to need a stronger person in '08. The most telling factor is the Moon/Jupiter conjunction in Capricorn on election day and the Pluto at 29 degrees Sagittarius. This describes our next President, and it doesn't look like Hillary. It looks like a skilled administrator and a wise, serious, and probably honest, trustworthy man.

I've been studying the historical picture lately and found that the elites have never paid the bills. The middle class does that. There must be a lot of philosophical differences among the current crop of rulers.
By obliterating the middle class and turning the people into slaves, they would be causing more problems than if they kept them flourishing and paying, which oddly enough, the middle class seems perfectly willing to do. I can't imagine the destruction of a system that works fairly well, and certainly not by a group of neo empire builders with no practical experience. Let them finish with their folly and we can go on about our business.
As far as I've seen, Cancers (our Cancer stellium country included) are usually good at business and providing security for the whole group. Pluto in Capricorn will opposse the Cancer and probably ultimately strengthen our economic health. If that means a reworking of the class structure, and renewed strength of the middle class, then so be it.

Today, in a win to protect worker’s pension plans, the Senate Finance Committee has agreed to an amendment sponsored by John Kerry “to hold CEOs and corporate executives accountable for ensuring pension plans are solvent.”

Under the Kerry amendment, executives’ deferred compensation is restricted if workers’ pension plans do not have at least 80 percent of the money to pay out promised benefits.

Natives are getting restless... in Afghanistan, that is...

Afghan "Die America" crowds rush U.S. base
by: David Boyle
July 26, 2005 at 17:10:51 America/Los_Angeles

..."We have supported the Americans for years. We should be treated with dignity," said Shah Aghar, 35. "They are arresting our people without the permission of the government. They are breaking into our houses and offending the people. We are very angry."

...One protester, Abdul Rahman, said that if the U.S. forces continued to raid people's houses, Afghans would launch a "holy war against them as we did against the Soviets and Taliban." ..."

http://www.soapblox.net/myleftwing/showDiary.do;jsessionid=1EFA86E74E2C184EA7929B91EF8B06EC.tomcat41?diaryId=731

Dying While Black
Posted by soj.

In English there is a term called Driving While Black, a non-existent “crime” of being a black driver. Today however I’d like to focus on wars, kidnappings and civil meltdown that is ignored or forgotten because the participants are people of color.

On July 7, 2005 a series of four bombs in London was a front page story around the world. While tragic, the death toll was less than 100 people. Yet compare this to other events around the world:

http://liberalstreetfighter.com/ee/index.php?/trifecta/comments/dying_while_black/

"As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there is a twilight when everything remains seemingly unchanged. And it is in such twilight that we all must be most aware of change in the air however slight lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness."

William O. Douglas,

Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice

Sally, with regard to the article I posted above, it blew me away too. I sent it out to several on my email list .. no doubt I'll get some flack for it too as several of my dear old friends are blindfolded Republicans and refuse to "see" the truth in front of them. I've already lost two old friends because our political views are so different and their constant flag waving and persistant "nuke 'em" mentality got too much for me, but taking a chance on this article which I felt really laid it all out in print and had to make you take notice. If only one of them starts to "see" then it will have been worth it. Also, love your articles and insight, though living in a red state here and seeing up close how the "other half" lives and breaths I doubt there is going to be any major change anytime soon. There are just too many of them who have been duped by their churches and they will follow their leaders into the abyss before they admit they were wrong as they think they are lead by "God". How can you deal with that? No matter what the Dems try to do ... "God" is going to be the other team's mascot and who are you going to put up to compete with that?? If none of the horrendous happenings caused by this administration has shocked these people awake then what is it going to take to make them change their minds in the future?? It can't get much worse than it already is .. I wonder just what the jolt is going to be and what price we are going to have to pay to wake these people up. Certainly nothing has so far ... and the next election will just end in the same result which is depressing.

Jo, thanks for the quote from William Douglas. How sad that there is so much truth in that which applies to these times indeed! Thanks for posting that!

I like this lady! If you haven't read her, check it out! Someone referred to her as Juan Cole, w/ comments (meaning you are free to comment on her site)...

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

'GWOT' ended (but not 'won')
Attention all enthusiastic participants in, and perpetuators of, the discourse of "terror"-- your one-time leader Donald Rumsfeld has now abandoned you! Writing in the NYT today, Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker note the following:

In recent speeches and news conferences, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and the nation's senior military officer have spoken of "a global struggle against violent extremism" rather than "the global war on terror," which had been the catchphrase of choice. Administration officials say that phrase may have outlived its usefulness, because it focused attention solely, and incorrectly, on the military campaign.

Well, it only took these guys about 46 months to recognize their mistake... And meantime, they've used the misleadingly constructed concept of the "Global War on Terror" to jerk Americans and others into two major wars and scores of smaller military commitments around the world.

So for those like to be "up-to-date" with the latest conceptual tools coming out of that bastion of intellectual enlightenment, the Pentagon (major irony alert there, folks)... What, you will be asking, is the new discourse of choice?

... And the winner is...

The discourse of "civilization", as presented by Rumsfeld last Friday, when he addressed an audience at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland. According to that NYT report, at that event,

Mr. Rumsfeld described America's efforts as it "wages the global struggle against the enemies of freedom, the enemies of civilization."

The use of the discourse of "civilization" to mask the true content of strategies of global domination is, sadly, as old as globe-girdling colonialism itself. The British used it in Tasmania as they exterminated the indigenous peoples there... The Germans used it in South West Africa as they did likewise... The Spanish used it in Central America as they...

And now, Donald Rumsfeld.

You might think that an administration that has brought us the kinds of abuses that continue in detention centers and military prisons from Guantanamo to Bagram to Baghdad might be ashamed to even mention the word "civilization"??

But no. These guys apparently lack any capacity for either shame or self-awareness. A sad day for "civilization", I would say.

- Helena

http://justworldnews.org/

Camille

I,too, have lost friends because of my opinions.
It bothers me not. Fortunately, for myself and
others, I have no planets in my first house (ego)
so it slides off my back like water off a duck.
In three quarters of a century of living on this
planet I learned a long time ago that if people
have a problem with me, that is THEIR problem, not
mine.
With Mercury in Aquarius, I say what is on my mind. If it bothers anyone, so be it. I feel I am
on my own journey - a spiritual being on a human
journey, and my actions and life are between me and my Maker. So don't worry if your ideas offend
others, half the country offends me.
What will make them see the light and change? God
only knows, but since so many of them believe it
will ba a sign in the heavens, I sincerely hope
it will be Jesus Christ bitch-slappin the crap out
of them. I hope I am alive to witness it.

Thanks, WV, for putting things in perspective! I also had a wake up call when I turned "50" - have started to speak out against things that peeve me (plenty of them) and have stood my ground against this war and lost friends and family because of it - but I now consider that their problem and lessons they have to learn yet on their own journey in this lifetime. So many lessons for so many to learn in such little time! I loved your comment on Jesus coming back to bitch-slap the crap out of them ..and I hope I'm around to see it also! Thanks for sharing that!

Would be interested in everyone's observations on this:

I know maybe a dozen people who have no planets at all in air signs. All of these folks are remarkably subjective--can't stand back and be objective for the life of them.

I know almost as many who have no planets at all in earth signs. None of these have ever bought a house--they all rented (although one did inherit a house but sold it after a few years.)

Strangely, I don't have charts for anybody with no water signs (maybe it is my generation) and I have no charts for people with no fire signs.

Have been looking at the USA chart and notice it is very heavily water and air. The only fire is Chiron and the north node. Yet we (the American public) are so readily inflamed when the war-drums beat. Any thoughts?

Also our only earth placed planets are Pluto and Chiron. I think of earth as a stabilizing influence, which we probably need more of.

Just some late night musings.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1656638

Clinton Angers Left With Call for Unity
Senator Accused of Siding With Centrists

By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 27, 2005; Page A03

Barbara, if you read this, look at the new thread which has been posted....

it is an interesting question you ask....I have planets in all qualities and elements.....my overall ignature is fixed fire, despite being a gemini. My teacher always said that it was the MISSING planets which would be what those people would be dealing with!

We should look at all the people running things....think there might be something going on? And if the USA is water/air...then earth and fire would be our focus.

Barbara, I have no earth in my chart and while I have owned homes I prefer to rent. Judi is right, the focus is on the missing element, you also want to look at the houses the planets fall into, are those houses fire, earth, air or water houses. A preponderance of my planets are in the 2nd, 6th, and 10th house those are all earth houses and while I am great at finding money for businesses or non-profits, I am terrible at making money for myself.

Great 'toons... including a UK Steve Bell.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/cartoons/stevebell/archive/0,14955,1284265,00.html

http://www.danzigercartoons.com/cmp/2005/danziger2465.html

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I think it's normal. Politicians on whole world are exacly the same.