That Loki lurking in the 12th is also a trickster. I'm on edge Morgana.

Lovely music as always Morgana.

Oh boy!

http://www.mediabistro.com/fishbowldc/

Morgana,
You always paint such a compelling word picture!
my thoughts are with you on the loss of your dear friend. Hoping you are doing well!

Having just read the last post on Nancy's thread, No, with the link to Capital Hill Blue, describing the pRez's increasingly unpredictable behavior.................................................................
Given the aspects you have outlined in your article for the new moon, I wouldn't miss Cspan's live broadcast from the WH state dinner tonight, ( 7pm EST) involving G & Laura, Charles & Camilla. George's sun will be affected by Saturn, Camilla's too ? ( also Cancer) Charles, I'm pretty sure, has his birthday in the early degrees of Scorpio, and is PASSIONATE about environmental issues. And Laura's birthday is Fri. if I'm not mistaken!
C & C are visiting all the Administration's sensitive spots; Kofe Annon, Ground O, New Orleans, Homeless people in SF,
Having witnessed pRez rudely setting Laura aside and striding out ahead leaving her in the dust, exiting Airforce One Mon. AM, in front of the cameras.............I'm wondering if he will do a melt down tonight!
After re-reading my last post, I promise! to edit my writing, before I hit the post button. My left hand lags behind my right on the keys............scrambling the words..................symptomatic of lack if right brain hemosphere stimulus??? I'm using the left brain more in doing the library work.
And now I am going to go take a HOT SOAKY BATH!
The plumber Al, lived in Medford Lakes NJ, ( pop 5,000.) a decade before I moved there, isn't that a coincidence!!!
Sharon,
I had forgotten that you started out in NJ! You wrote a very concise assessment of the state!
PQ My Tarot card for the month of Nov. is 3 of cups. Finally!!!

Pat C....I've been on edge since Sunday....today I realized that I have been sensing stuff and kind of turned off to what the reality is....well, this is all about Scorpio right now (my rising). Looked at the RawStory page and burst out laughing about the bad lasagna that felled the massive amounts of security people in Argentina for a conference (including GWB's guys)....well, it was over in 12 hours, but I still lauged. But not funny about Florida....seems the catagory 3 hurricane may have been more...and as usual, the elderly, minorities and infirm are getting the biggest hits. Are these people as totally incompetent (Bush, Fema, etc) as they come off? it is just incomprehensible that this level of stupidity exists...we are spoiled after having the Big Dawg in charge, with his even bigger brain. He should have been president for life...

LAWYERS SAY BOLTON'S CHIEF OF
STAFF WAS CIA OFFICIAL NAMED
IN LIBBY INDICTMENT... SOON...Raw Story!

Thanks for placing another great article Morgana.

Juan Cole has written about Harry Reid
http://www.juancole.com/

Hey, Morgana, that was poetry!
I thought Reid's powerplay happened before the new moon. I'm glad to hear i was wrong!
thanks!
mimi

Treasongate Bigger than Watergate

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ucru/20051101/cm_ucru/biggerthanwatergate

Poll: Cat-Killer Fritz wants to know if you support his use of the "nuclear option." Do go vote:
http://www.volpac.com/index.cfm?FuseAction=Home.Home&PollsPoll_id=9

(Just posted, but it didn't seem to take, so here we go again.)

Poll: Cat-Killer Frist wants to know if you support his use of the "nuclear option." Go vote.

http://www.volpac.com/index.cfm?FuseAction=Home.Home&PollsPoll_id=9

Well, dang!

Meanwhile:

Morgana, whoo-hoo! Great article. Oh, it's so wonderful to be out from under the bed. Thanks so much!!

Talk about Mercury wanting the truth told, Morgana! I read yesterday that in a talk at some university (sorry to be so specific), John Edwards said his vote on the Iraq attack was wrong--followed immediately by vigorous applause. I just read today that Rockefeller has just said that his vote for the Iraq attack was wrong. If more and more of them continue to state that their vote was wrong, because based on lies and lies and lies from Smirky&Co, I think this thing will come to a head very quickly. First, though, they got to conquer their egos and then they can speak the truth.

I have all my finters and toes crossed shy.

Shy,

I think this is exactly the strategy they've been planning. It started with Kerry's speech at Georgetown last week admitting the mistake. Today he is calling for a withdrawal of 20,000 troops after the holidays.

As they continue to build this strategy toward the election, the lie perpetrated by the administration will loom even bigger as a deliberate manipulation.

They've timed this with the building saga of the falsified intelligence, triggered by the first indictment, which gives it all legitimacy. It should be interesting as it all gathers force when Mars goes direct toward the Spring. Anyone interested in the game of politics can find a lot to observe as this unfolds.

Morgana,

I like your images of cold and heat...fuel, energy and warmth and the bare truth. Interesting, the Saturn in Leo in the hidden eighth and all that drama behind closed doors. We definitely have a tale of suspense as the embers glow.

More of this deceitful administration's secret plans coming to light. They have lied to us again....withholding is a lie as far as I am concerned.
The C.I.A. has reported that they have been maintaining with our tax dollars secret prisons which began after 9/11 attack. See today's Washington Post written by Dana Priest

Further developments...The Corporation For Public Broadcasting has completed their conservative infiltration of PBS and NPR as of today. Tomlinson has stepped down (previously),but is still on the board. Sign petition to have him removed.
http://www.mediacitizen.blogspot.com

If the above link doesn't work, try this:
http://www.freepress.net/press/release.php?id=103
on the findings on Tomlinson's investigation being withheld from the public. You have to look around for the petition though, back, forward, or home, it is there on the right side.

To add to the conversation about troop levels, any troop levels, the BBC reported at the half/hour news that the Iraqi Government has called all former soldiers of Sadaam's military back to service. Amazing!

I had a wild thought.

I don't usually engage in Scorpionic hocus pocus, but under the circumstances this new moon....

Uranus is now turning and going direct until June. Uranus... URANIUM... could the fantasy uranium (mutual reception with Neptune) from the dark continent be the poison that gets them?

Shy, jm, and others...on the Dem's changing their mind about their war vote... Barbara Boxer spoke on this issue specifically on the Diane Rehm show this morning. What a magnificent lady. Listen free...it's worth it.

To posit that the war in Iraq is about OIL is disingenuous. It is a far greater, and more insidious international matter, as Cindy Sheehan has acknowledged.

You might say, to paraphrase that great indicted co-conspirator, that, er, the roots of the aspens are knotted together, and their limbs turn in sync...

Diane Feinstein, said it ( CNN today) to Wolf Blitzer.
Specifically; on hindsight with recent evidence, she has had 2nd thoughts about her vote for the war. Thats why it was necessary to do the secret Senate meeting move yesterday.
The senate investigation part 2 needs to be completed and the results made known to the American Public.
AS did Senator Kennedy.
Howard Dean has been saying it for at least a week.
So they DO have a strategy after all !!!!!!

The WH dinner........They showed too little, but you can see the guest list & menue on Cspan.org.
The entire Bush extended family was there, except young Barbara. That includes Marvin , Neil, Doro & spouses!
And young Ms Chaney had a female ( guest)
Tom Brokaw, & Kelsey Grammer were sell outs, uh attendees...... as were Leiberman & Hadassa, Jane Harman ? ( I thought she was one of the "good Dems")
Interestingly...nothing the Clintons have done is OK; but Laura chose to use the Clinton China.
There was a very loud & enthusiastic protest crowd in Lafayette Park across the street. I couldn't see signs or understand what they were chanting.
Larry King is going to interview President Carter @ 9:00. He's going to say it too!
PQ

He has a new book about politics! No wonder he has been missing in action.
PQ

Last I heard, the oil being pumped out of Iraq is unmetered. Now, imagine that! And once you've imagined that, imnagine why. And once you've imagined that, imagine who benefits.

With this kind of crowd, always follow the money.

Pat QOP, I am curious and have wondered for a while why you spell Cheney's name as Chaney. Are you being funny, ala "Lon Chaney" the 'Mummy" funny?

posted at Americablog:
Thank you
by US Senator Harry Reid (D-NV) - 11/02/2005 07:58:00 PM

This afternoon my office has been inundated with flowers, balloons, cards and good wishes. I wanted to say thank you all. You support means the world to my staff and me.
In addition, I am happy that so many people understand how important yesterday was. Democrats have been demanding answers on the pre-war intelligence for two years. Now Republicans have finally agreed to complete the investigation that will provide the answers to these vital questions so we all can know the truth about why we went to war in Iraq.
From the bottom of my heart – thank you.
- Harry Reid

Hi Dawn, if you are refering to my comment , "The 2,027 lives sacrificed in the sands of Iraq for OIL are embodied in those embers." The OIL in the sentence was Bushco's acronym for Operation Iraqi Liberty/Liberation, or some dang thing.

You are so right on! It is far more than oil, though that is a powerful draw. Geeze where hasn't he got his sticky fingers ?

Morgana, and now it is 2,032 lives of Americans (and 150K Iraquis?)

Judi G,
It "Chaney" is an unconscious pun! I didn't realize I was doing that, but I certainly appreciate the irony!
PQ

I didn't realize until this week that John Conyers is the politician who hired Rosa Parks, after her sit down on the bus.
Also he appeared frequently in the old film clips from the Cater Admin. they showed on Larry King Live.
PQ

Somebody forgot to tell Laura to remove her Halloween fright mask.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x5250092

TOO FUNNY!! Thank you for the smile shy. (-:

Pat C., Funny? Man, those are some scary pics. She even makes Caramello look good.

I see your point. It's so strange to see them so dressed up and wearing such faces. Too much medication, or just scared to death, or overwhelmed?

I see your point. It's so strange to see them so dressed up and wearing such faces. Too much medication, or just scared to death, or overwhelmed?

Pat C., in Laura's case I'll betcha it's all three. Lookit what she's married to and lives with. Arrrrrgh!

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/13065085.htm

In Katrina's aftermath, FEMA chief mused about his future

snip..

Here is verbatim text of some of the e-mails released Wednesday:

"My eyes must certainly be deceiving me. You look fabulous - and I'm not talking the makeup!" - Cindy Taylor, FEMA deputy director of public affairs, to Brown, commenting on Brown's TV appearance on the morning of Aug. 29, when Katrina hit.

Brown's response: "I got it at Nordstrom's. Email (FEMA spokeswoman Lee Anne) McBride and make sure she knows! Are you proud of me? Can I quit now? Can I go home?"

An hour later, Brown e-mailed Taylor: "If you look at my lovely FEMA attire you'll really vomit. I am a fashion god."

"Is this your last hurrah? I'll be in DC the end of next week and would love to see you. Suspect you might still be in La/Ms etc - especially knowing how much you love to hang around DC/DHS/NAC etc." - Betty Guhman, a colleague who just left Homeland Security (DHS), to Brown on Sept. 1.

Brown's response: "Last hurrah was supposed to have been Labor Day. I'm trapped now, please rescue me."

"Sir, I know that you know the situation is past critical. Here some things you might not know. Hotels are kicking people out, thousands gathering in the streets with no food or water. Hundreds still being rescued from homes.

"The dying patients at the DMAT (disaster medical assistance team) tent being medivac. Estimates are many will die within hours. Evacuation in process. Plans developing for dome evacuation but hotel situation adding to problem. We are out of food and running out of water at the dome, plans in works to address the critical need.

"FEMA staff is OK and holding own. DMAT staff working in deplorable conditions. The sooner we can get the medical patients out, the sooner we can get them out.

"Phone connectivity impossible." - Marty Bahamonde, FEMA regional director, to Brown, describing the situation in New Orleans on Aug. 31.

Brown's response: "Thanks for update. Anything specific I need to do or tweak?"

The fake teacher/librarian sleeps with that creep and knows his secrets. Why she looks so lobotomotomized.

BTW, IMHO DU has slid downward in a major way. Alot of real patriots fled after Truth Is All was banned. He was uncovering election fraud. Now Kathy Dopps another person uncovering fraud was banned too. DU is funded by the DLC the banned ones are finding out. Watch out. The informative talking went to sophmoric jokes ala Pickles looking really scary and look at all those posts to respond. Lots of new names with 1000+ posts (yeah right).
Skinner went way down in my eyes.

Heads up Sally, while I was out of a computer I checked in at the library and noticed the hacking once again. Be aware of who shows up ALWAYS just before you are hacked. It's now obvious. Call me paranoid, however, I'm not a chump. Take the example of Kos and DU funded by the DLC.
All that glitters.......

http://villagevoice.com/news/0544,schanberg,69551,6.html

Patching Things Up
The press gets a second chance on the CIA leak case

The foundations of the Bush White House, now revealed as never before by the desperation and foolishness of the CIA leak and its cover-up, had always been built and regularly shored up with the shaky materials of imagery and carnival barker salesmanship. Now, as its mirrors and magic tricks are exposed one by one, its flailing propaganda machine tries to sell the press and public the line that the criminal charges are piddling and should not be taken seriously. The charges are very serious—because they grow out of a bloody war we are suffering through that was not necessary. The core of the CIA leak case is the Iraq war. As the press goes about unraveling it, none of us should lose sight of whence it sprung. The war is why the case is important.

The special prosecutor must proceed, appropriately, to deal with the crimes he has cited so far in the case—perjury, obstruction, false witness. But the press has a different job ahead: to probe deeper into and explain how these charged felonies were the direct offspring of the Bush administration's attempt to cover up falsehoods and distortions it told the American public and Congress to scare them into supporting the war. The press's obligation to the public now is to aggressively revisit and brush the cobwebs from those lies, while people are paying better attention than they did during President Bush's selling of the war.

More....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/02/AR2005110203165.html

Senate's Closed-Session Move Borne Out of Daschle's Strategy

t took Democrats about five seconds to trigger the parliamentary move that forced the Senate into a rare closed session this week, but it was more than a year in the planning.

The final decision to employ the tactic, which infuriated Republicans and exacerbated partisan animosity, was made in the Democratic leader's second-floor Capitol office Monday night, in a small gathering of his lieutenants. Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) considered the strategy to be so sensitive that only four of his colleagues knew what he intended when he entered the Senate chamber at 2:25 p.m. Tuesday, party aides said yesterday.

More...

http://www.antiwar.com/engelhardt/?articleid=7892

The Forgotten War in Maysan Province
by Michael Schwartz and Tom Engelhardt

Tom Dispatch

Since Guardian correspondent Rory Carroll was briefly kidnapped in Baghdad and the paper recalled its reporters while it reviewed the situation, there has a lively debate in the English press about the nature and limits of Western reporting in Iraq. Carroll himself, since being freed, has insisted that Iraq remains a story more capable of being covered than most people realize; that even "Green Zone" journalism has a positive side; and that "hotel journalism" is not the essence of what's happening if you're a press journalist:

"When asked about the suggestion that British journalists in Iraq just report from their hotel rooms, Carroll said: 'I get quite annoyed when that perception is reinforced. For TV crews it is mostly hotel journalism, because they are bulkier and more visible than print people – they have to travel in big convoys, and their insurance and bureaucratic rules are such that it's a huge deal for them to leave the hotel. The print guys, and this applies to all the other British papers, we get out of the hotel pretty much every day. Our security is contingent entirely on invisibility, which is why we try to blend in.'"

More...

Here goes Blair...

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=2185062005
Question of judgment: Blair left bloodied as Blunkett is driven from office again

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=2185972005
Tories have their 'coronation' as Goldie becomes leader unopposed

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=2186172005
Rebels smell blood as resignation leaves premier in trouble

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=2187102005
Minister 'dealt with businessman after Cabinet return'

She's off the get her marching orders....

November 3, 2005
Mrs. Clinton Plans a Trip to Israel to Discuss Security With Sharon and His Aides

By RAYMOND HERNANDEZ

WASHINGTON, Nov. 2 - Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's aides said on Wednesday that she was planning to go to Israel next week to discuss American-Israeli relations, in a trip that may help her strengthen her support among Jews in New York as she faces re-election next year.

The visit by Mrs. Clinton, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, will include meetings on security issues with top Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Shimon Peres, the deputy prime minister. In her meeting with Mr. Sharon, Mrs. Clinton plans to discuss developments stemming from Israel's withdrawal from Gaza and to reiterate her condemnation of remarks made by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran calling for the destruction of Israel.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/03/nyregion/metrocampaigns/03hillary.html?ei=5090&en=0da6cc71e4aac1cb&ex=1288674000&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss&pagewanted=print

bhakti,

"Be aware of who shows up ALWAYS just before you are hacked. It's now obvious."

Do you mean at the library or at home?

Libby has new lawyers who are known for going to trial rather than cutting deals. He has waived his right to a speedy trial, and has been given a date in February for a status hearing. His attorneys are going to need security clearances so I guess the months will be used for that as well as gathering all the paper work it will take to drag this out.

Fitzgerald has said that the trial, once it is in process, will take about two weeks.

http://firedoglake.blogspot.com/2005/11/how-do-you-plead-guilty-or-not-guilty.html

Pretty good update on the Libby goingson.

Poll: DO you think Smirky&Co will get "back on track"? (Whatever that means.)

Go vote; you'll feel better about the company you keep.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3080261/#survey

Morgana, great one-two punch. Nancy's article was equally hard hitting. Oh that these bunch of thugs would be hog tied together, put in the trough and fight one another to get loose of their intricate bonds.

But. . .they've got all got more moves than Imelda has shoes.

Finally am up to date with new 'puter and a new email address (which took forever to negotiate since it's through our local, rural phone company) Though i'm still on dial up, the new computer makes it seem as though i've acquired dsl. :)

It's so great to see so many back and posting. This is very much like family; an exceptionally bright family at that.

Farrout/aka Karen

Another Frightening GOP move to become the only voice in America ~ They are close ~ very close to accomplishing their goal of a soviet syle state.

Big GOP Donors Looking To Buy Knight Ridder

Knight Ridder Reporter Warns of Hostile Takeover--with Political Twist

As reports swirl that KR could or should be sold, under new pressure from what he calls a "pro-GOP" big investor, a longtime Philly Daily News scribe charges that this would be "bad news" for the chain--and all of American media.

By Will Bunch

PHILADELPHIA (November 02, 2005) -- As you probably know if you're a newspaper junkie, and may not know if you're a normal human being, a Florida-based investment group -- with zero fanfare -- has bought up 19% of the stock of Knight Ridder, Inc., the owners of the Daily News and the Philadelphia Inquirer, not to mention the Miami Herald, the San Jose Mercury News, and a bunch of other big names in the dead-tree world.

Continued ~ http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/shoptalk_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001432946

More on Cheney and torture connection

Cheney's staff backed policies that led to prisoner abuse: ex official

WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Vice President
Dick Cheney's office was responsible for directives which led to US soldiers abusing prisoners in
Iraq and
Afghanistan, a former top State Department official charged.
ADVERTISEMENT

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State
Colin Powell, told National Public Radio he had traced a trail of memos and directives authorizing questionable detention practices up through Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's office directly to Cheney's staff.

snip

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20051103/pl_afp/uspoliticsjusticeiraq_051103182259

Those are two amazing articles. The attempt to rid the country of any form of free press, and an invesigation of Cheney brought on by Colin Powell.

Oh my gosh. I just reel most of the time.

Let us also not forget that in terms of the history behind this 'american royalty' family, as well as the royalty visiting here, lies a beilief in eugenics. So it is not surprising also that there is so little regard for the poor, elderly, disenfranchised and minority communities which we have seen happening (visibly) since Katrina....

That thought had ocurred to me too judi. Ugh.

I came across this and I find it really interesting too.

Novak was using Robert Hanssen as a source and confident.

What a patriot....

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/hanssen/

An FBI insider and admitted spy

Since 1985, FBI agent Robert Philip Hanssen was a mole inside the FBI, accused of spying for the former Soviet Union and then for Russia in exchange for cash and diamonds. Hanssen pled guilty on July 6, 2001, to 15 counts of espionage and conspiracy charges in exchange for federal prosecutors agreeing not to seek the death penalty. The 58-year-old Hanssen was sentenced to life in prison without parole on May 10, 2002. The case has led to new security procedures at the FBI, which was harshly criticized after Hanssen's actions were discovered.

More....

http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/robertnovak/2001/07/12/166016.html

The Hanssen Mystery
Three and half-years ago, I reported that a veteran FBI agent resigned and retired after refusing a demand by Attorney General Janet Reno to give the Justice Department the names of top secret sources

WASHINGTON -- Three and half-years ago, I reported that a veteran FBI agent resigned and retired after refusing a demand by Attorney General Janet Reno to give the Justice Department the names of top secret sources in China. My primary source was FBI agent Robert Hanssen. Disclosing confidential sources is unthinkable for a reporter seeking to probe behind the scenes in official Washington, but the circumstances here are obviously extraordinary. The same traitor who delivered American spies into the Kremlin's hands was expressing concern about the fate of intelligence assets in China. When my source was revealed as a spy, my first fear was that I had been the victim of disinformation by a truly evil man. I wrote my column of Nov. 24, 1997 only after other officials confirmed Hanssen's account. Nevertheless, I now wanted to make doubly sure and rechecked my report's validity. I did so, and several sources -- including one FBI agent who would not speak to me in 1997 -- totally confirmed what I had written. I am absolutely convinced that Hanssen told me the truth. Then, why break a reporter's responsibility to keep his sources secret? I wrestled with this question for months and finally decided that my experience with Hanssen contributes to the portrait of this most contradictory of all spies. Furthermore, to be honest to my readers, I must reveal it. In mid-November 1997, critics were accusing the Justice Department of covering up 1996 campaign scandals. I was informed by Hanssen that Ray Wickman, head of the FBI's intelligence unit monitoring Chinese operations, was ordered in Reno's name to turn over secret sources in his Chinese account. Wickman refused to surrender this information, resigned from the FBI and retired from the government in September 1997.

More...

Hey all-
Just heard froma friend that Alito's confirmation hearings have been postponed until Jan 9 2006, which in my mind, means Harry Reid has won again, and the Dems get a chance to keep the spotlight focused squarely on the pre-Iraq war intel fixing.

Yup, I just heard the same thing Garry.

Pat C....I actually don't quite understand the Novak story....but I am glad I'm not the only one thnking evil thoughts about eugenics.

The Grand Square going on right now ..... what will that mean for all of this? The postponement of the Alito hearings (getting out of the hot kitchen) appears to me to be at least a week of energy sitting in one place and not going anywhere while stuff gets figured out. When the Sun moves out of the square we still have a major T square in fixed signs for quite a whie, I guess....

The GOP best keep its grubby hands off Knight Ridder! KR owns my hometown paper, the Akron Beacon Journal. It has been a fairly respectable left-of-center paper. But all we need is for it to become morphed into some kind of grotesque, Murdock-esque, celeb-obsessed, flag-waving, Bush-loving, bible-thumping infotainment rag.

Good grief. How much more of this right-wing "greed-and-fear-conquers-all" rampage must we endure?

President Carter Slams Bush's policies!

WASHINGTON — Former President Jimmy Carter said Thursday that "fundamentalism" under George W. Bush has resulted in a "dramatic and profound and unprecedented change" in American policy that threatens the United States at home and abroad.
Carter, who is promoting a new book critical of Bush, faulted the Bush administration for "an unprecedented and overt ... merger of the church and state, of religion and politics."

At a breakfast with reporters sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor, Carter, 81, diverged from a time-honored practice in which ex-presidents refrain from criticizing those currently holding the office. He acknowledged making mistakes when he was president from 1977-81, and at one point declared: "I can't deny that I am a better ex-president than I was a president."

But he said Bush has made such significant changes to U.S. foreign policy and human rights doctrine, resulting in precipitous declines in the country's standing abroad, that he felt compelled to write "Our Endangered Values." It is Carter's 20th book since he was defeated for re-election by Ronald Reagan in 1980.

...

He said the natural "arrogance" of second-term presidents is exacerbated by a fundamentalism under Bush that causes many of his supporters and those who work in his administration to believe that "I am right because I am close to God (and) anybody who disagrees with me is inherently wrong, and therefore inferior."

--
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-11-03-carter-bush_x.htm

Talk about Jupiter in Scorpio. Seems the truth is coming out now with a vengeance. Amen, Jimmy!

NEO,

Jimmy has a Moon in Scorpio, talk about vengeance. remember the snub at the Pope's funeral? And many other attempts to degrade his reputation.
Looks like Jupiter will be rounding up his little army.

Chavez ready to challenge Bush

Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, emboldened by thousands of anti-American protesters, is getting a rare chance to stand up to his adversary, President Bush, with promises to keep the president from reviving talks on a free trade area stretching from Alaska to Argentina.

The two men were to arrive in Argentina for the fourth Americas summit on Thursday, the same day Venezuela is staging a mock U.S. invasion of its own territory. The event is the latest exercise intended to prepare soldiers and civilian volunteers for what Chavez says is a possible attack by American troops.

U.S. officials deny any such plan, but Chavez says it's best to be ready — just in case. With tensions rising between the two nations, Chavez and Mr. Bush will likely see each other Friday at the summit's inauguration — after Chavez addresses a rally of mostly anti-Bush protesters. The two leaders are not scheduled to meet one-on-one, but they will both be taking part in the same summit sessions.

Chavez has joked about whether Mr. Bush is afraid of him, saying he might sneak up and scare Mr. Bush at the summit. Mr. Bush has brushed aside Chavez's attempts to turn the summit into a showdown, saying he is focused on announcing job creation programs and promoting free trade in the region.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/11/03/world/main1007146.shtml

I like Chavez' staged "American" attack on Venezuela. It's a brilliant move that puts the world on notice and the NeoCon Bush misadministration on the defensive. The US political Left has much to learn from this man.

I agree, jm. Bush's numbers are still in freefall (upper to mid 30s) while Rove and Cheney remain under withering pressure and scrutiny (Saturn). The Bush WH itself even realizes now how much of a liability Rove has become, and they are becoming increasingly desperate to have him cut loose. Even if he somehow remains on staff with his security clearance revoked, it will be in a very reduced role. He won't even be a shadow of the influential figure he has been up until now. That's gotta hurt.

The timing of astrology never ceases to amaze me.

Grand square in scorpio has turned up another rt-wring pornopuritan... um, "literary" endeavor, this time by scooter libby.

* Scooter Libby's Erotic Literary Past

As if things cldn’t get any worse [not "wrose" enuf] for Scooter Libby, the New Yorker has turned up an embarrasing dirty novel written by Scooter in 1996 entitled “The Apprentice.” in reality, it wld have been better named “The Aristocrats” considering the lurid nature of the work, which incl scatology, bestiality, pedophelia, bestiality with pedophelia, scatology with bestiality & so forth. Some of the prized passages: ... http://hammeroftruth.com/2005/11/01/scooter-libbys-erotic-literary-past/

New Moon in scorpio brings out more...

* Manila: 5 Marines accused of rape

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/asiapcf/11/03/ppines.marines.rape/

http://news.inq7.net/nation/index.php?index=1&story_id=55418

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1627466,00.html

This is just excellent! Psychically I have had the words "strip mine the planet" sitting, threatening, ominously in my mind since before the 2000 election.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?emx=x&pid=33201

Mark Engler on the War Woes of Business

The Bush administration, with its crony corporations in tow, essentially sallied forth into the world with the collective mentality of a plunderer, ready to strip mine the planet. While its plans for global -- and energy -- domination (as well as the military conquest of space) have been aimed at forever, its business plans seemed more focused on tomorrow and the day after. For a while, it looked as if the President and his friends might even make back to Crawford for a life of Mai Tais and brush-cutting without the economic chickens coming home to roost. This now looks less likely.

Mark Engler takes up a distinctly under-attended subject -- just how bad for business (at least as measured by the post-Cold War presidencies of Bush the Elder and Bill Clinton) this administration might prove to be. He also explores the question of whether significant sectors of the business community will turn on the administration's war in Iraq and allied policies. Though largely forgotten, it happened once before -- in the Vietnam era. Tom

Bush's Bad Business Empire

Making the World Unsafe for Microsoft and Mickey Mouse

More...

OMG, it just gets more and more outrageous: RawStory:
Fox News paid for DeLay's travel to DC
$14,000 paid for trip to appear on Fox News Sunday after indictment.
----------also at Raw Story:
Krugman does Dowd: Lampoons Bush in 'Imperial nudity'

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman will take his column to new anti-Bush heights Friday with a column that ventures into the satirical landscape of liberal doyenne Maureen Dowd, newsroom sources tell RAW STORY.

The column is tenatively titled "Defending Imperial Nudity." Here are a few quick excerpts.

Hans Christian Andersen understood bad rulers. "The Emperor's New Suit" doesn't end with everyone acclaiming the little boy for telling the truth. It ends with the emperor and his officials refusing to admit their mistake.
Advertisement

Fox News repeatedly played up possible finds of imperial clothing, then buried reports discrediting these stories. Months after the naked procession, a poll found that many of those getting most of their news from Fox believed that the emperor had in fact been clothed.

Helen Thomas, the veteran palace correspondent, opposed the suit project from the beginning. When she pointed out that the emperor's clothes had turned out not to exist, the imperial press secretary accused her of being "opposed to the broader war on nakedness."

At the Radio and Television Correspondents' annual dinner, the emperor entertained the assembled journalists with a bit of humor: he showed slides of himself looking under furniture in his office, searching for the nonexistent suit. Some of the guests were aghast, but most of the audience roared with laughter.

It concludes: "And they all lived happily ever after -- in the story. Here in reality, a large and growing number are being killed by roadside bombs."

Yipeeeee!

Three new polls out about Bush's ratings:

CBS 35%

ABC 39%

AP 37%

Looks like he hit the Trifucta.

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

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/04/politics/04broadcast.html

Broadcasting Ex-Chairman Is Removed From Board

By STEPHEN LABATON
WASHINGTON, Nov. 3 - Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, the former head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, was forced to step down as a member of its board on Thursday evening.

The move came after the board began reviewing a confidential report by the inspector general of the corporation into accusations about Mr. Tomlinson's use of corporation money to promote more conservative programming.

They included Mr. Tomlinson's decision to hire a researcher to monitor the political leanings of guests on the public policy program "Now" with Bill Moyers; his use of a White House official to set up an ombudsman's office to scrutinize programs for political balance; and secret payments approved by Mr. Tomlinson to two Republican lobbyists.

More...

* Rumsfeld is making millions off of bird flu pandemic http://thebluestate.typepad.com/my_weblog/2005/11/rumsfeld_to_mak.html

Here's a nice bedtime story....

The Imminent Demise of the Republican Party: Part Two
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1102-26.htm

Sounds like even "upper management" has about had it with Bush, Cheney, the NeoCons and Co. When business starts looking bad from even ***their*** perspective, one has to wonder how much longer it'll be before Bush, Cheney and Co. get sent packing back to their makeshift ranches.

Is Wayne Madsen really a reliable source??

November 3, 2005 -- Open letter to Patrick Fitzgerald from one-time James Bath (Dubya's Texas Air National Guard and partner) business associate:

Dear Mr. Fitzgerald,

            I am writing to advise you that I have evidence that debunks Bush administration claims that your indictment of Vice President Cheney’s Chief of Staff is evidence that the outing of CIA undercover agent Valerie Plame was not a conspiracy, but rather an isolated incident carried out by a rouge administration official.  I am living proof that both Bush administrations have a sordid history of launching brutal attacks against uncorrupt Americans when the Bushes believe that their political ambitions are in jeopardy.  Based on my experience, I can assure you that what the Bush administration did in the Wilson/Plame matter amounts to little more than “business as usual”.   

ttp://waynemadsenreport.com/
By Bill White. It was his website that told about W's awol 2 years ago. No longer available!!!!!

Discouraging............... I was reading this in the library, just before closing, and saying "Oh my God"
The old man waiting around for his Grandaughter to finish on the computer, came over & asked what I was reading.
When I told him; he vehemently rejected the awol part of the story. He was really interested to learn about Salem Bin Laden's plane crash in Texas, and his investment in Bush's oil business, Then he started a rant , how he has served 48 years in the US Navy, & the FBI checked up on him every 5 years, proving that Bush couldn't have gotten away with awol!
I told him he of all people, he should be offended woth the curruption in DC with the Bush crime family. The Grwandaughter joined in ast that point and I dropped the 9/11 bomb.............she looked at me & said "You're crazy!" Whoops, I found out that she attends Machias Valley "xtian school!
They are seriously invading Downeast Maine!!!!!!!
Meanwhile the pRez's ratings are down to 37% today!
I find it impossible to be stifled!!!!!!!!
Maybe I should buy Scooter's book & volunteer to read to the xtian kids at that school????????????
My tarot card for the month is 3 of cups, It's starting out mote like the Chariot!!
PQ

I began yesterday reading a yellowed copy of the Camden Courier Post, found in the loft, Oct 15 1990 Headline.....Leonard Bernstein dies at 72 ( why I kept the paper?) and lower right front page............
Report: S & L went broke after loan to Jeb Bush! $4 mil out of the taxpayers to make good the loan on a Miami property!
Not related to the civil charges of Neil Bush's,"improper behavior" re: S & L Silverado! ( $1 mil out of taxpyers pockets.)
These 2 crooks enjoyed buffalo medallians in the PEOPLE"S HOUSE, Thues night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It has my scorpio moon smoldering!!!!!!! Saturn isn't working hard enough!!!
PQ

Oops broke my promise!
That should be "with the corruptian" & The Grandaughter
joined in at that moment.
Sorry PQ

Pat QOP--
When W was supposed to be in the army, his father was then a senator and he(GHWB)'s the one who pulled strings to get W into the TANG(Tx Air Nat.'l Guard). I think that combination could pull off an AWOL if anyone on the planet could.....just my 2 cents!!!

"Camden Courier Post, Oct 15 1990,
Report: S & L went broke after loan to Jeb Bush. $4 mil out of the taxpayers to make good the loan on a Miami property."

And now he's the Governor of the State of Florida.

http://tinyurl.com/baok8

"Camden Courier Post, Oct 15 1990,
Report: S & L went broke after loan to Jeb Bush. $4 mil out of the taxpayers to make good the loan on a Miami property."

And now he's the Governor of the State of Florida.

http://tinyurl.com/baok8

Thanks Pat C,
Will use the material!
PQ

My pleasure Pat QOP!

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

Washington, D.C. - President George W. Bush and the current Administration have now borrowed more money from foreign governments and banks than the previous 42 U.S. presidents combined.

Throughout the first 224 years (1776-2000) of our nation's history, 42 U.S. presidents borrowed a combined $1.01 trillion from foreign governments and financial institutions according to the U.S. Treasury Department. In the past four years alone (2001-2005), the Bush Administration has borrowed a staggering $1.05 trillion

http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2005/11/3/222056/646

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

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/04/opinion/04bearden.html?pagewanted=print

November 4, 2005
Op-Ed Contributor
When the C.I.A. Played by the Rules

By MILT BEARDEN
TODAY the Supreme Court justices are expected to debate whether they will hear a case involving a Yemeni named Salim Ahmed Hamdan, who is accused of being Osama bin Laden's driver. A federal appeals court found that Mr. Hamdan, who was captured in Afghanistan in 2001 and is being held at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, was not entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions; he has appealed to the high court.

If the court does not choose to review the appellate court's decision, and then overturn it, America's national security will be endangered. I say that based on my experience as the senior American intelligence officer during the final three years of the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1986 to 1989). And I also feel that our intelligence agencies and military commanders should make clear to the Bush administration that our country's most fundamental commitments of humanitarian treatment have long been extended to the Afghan battlefield.

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

Laura Rosen has news at War and Piece:

November 03, 2005

Italian Defense Minister Martino summoned. A reader in Rome sends word that the Italian "Minister of Defense, Antonio Martino, has been convoked to appear before the Copaco. The oversight committee does not feel that the government’s role has been sufficiently clarified."

http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/002986.html

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

http://tinyurl.com/8vcou

Italians Deny Role in Iraq Uranium Dossier
By ARIEL DAVID, Associated Press Writer
Thu Nov 3, 6:18 PM ET

Italy's spy chief denied on Thursday that Italian intelligence had any hand distributing a dossier that claimed Saddam Hussein tried to buy uranium in Niger, Italian lawmakers said.

Enzo Bianco, chairman of an oversight committee on secret services, told reporters that the intelligence chief, Nicolo Pollari, and Gianni Letta, a top aide to Premier Silvio Berlusconi, briefed a dozen top lawmakers after a newspaper report alleging Italy had passed the dossier to Britain and the United States knowing that it was a fake.

Bianco said the officials denied that SISMI, Italy's secret service, "ever had a role in the dossier that was supposed to have demonstrated that Iraq was in an advanced phase of possession of enriched uranium."

The United States and Britain used the claim that Saddam Hussein was seeking uranium in Africa to bolster their case for the war. The intelligence supporting the claim was later deemed unreliable.

Commission member Sen. Massimo Brutti told reporters after the closed-door session that that the commission was told that the Italian secret services warned the United States in January 2003 that the dossier was fake.

But later, the senator called The Associated Press to retract that statement. He said that the commission was not told that the Italians had warned the Americans.

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

http://firedoglake.blogspot.com/

Masquerading as First Amendment crusaders, the Wall Street Journal is already trying to mess with Patrick Fitzgerald's case. As Atrios would say, unleash the waaaaaahhh:
Thanks to the disastrous New York Times legal strategy, the D.C. Circuit of Appeals dealt a major blow to a reporter's ability to protect his sources. Prosecutors everywhere will now be more inclined to call reporters to testify, under threat of prison time. And if Mr. Libby's case goes to trial, at least three reporters will be called as witnesses for the prosecution. Just wait until defense counsel starts examining their memories and reporting habits, not to mention the dominant political leanings in the newsrooms of NBC, Time magazine and the New York Times. "Meet the Press," indeed.
"Dominant political leanings?" Since when did the WSJ have a problem with abject capitalism?

I've heard this several times today, it's going to be Scooter vs. the press. Hey Tweety, hey Pumpkinhead, they're calling you liars. Maybe you ought to think about that before you let the likes of Deborah Orrin float her right-wing tabloid bilge unchecked all over your network, okay?

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

http://www.citizenspook.blogspot.com/

TREASONGATE: Let's All Take A Deep Breath And Reexamine The Facts

Yesterday I published an explosive article (see below) about David Corn misquoting Fitzgerald. The reader comments here as CS, Democratic Underground, Rigorous Intuition and various other forums were polarized to the extreme. I respect that, and I respect that people are angry at me for attacking Wilson and Corn's credibility. Others who are receptive to my point of view praised and defended my reporting.

I do not want CS to be a blog that divides people. That is why the comments are totally uncensored and open. Even the comments which are filled with profanity, vitriol and spin are welcome. Thank you all for posting here and elsewhere. The comments are the best part of the blogosphere.

I'm not a professional reporter. Until publishing this blog I had no experience as a journalist or political commentator. I don't want to be a paid reporter. I am a reader of blogs and a news junkie who has experience as a lawyer and an investigator. That's as far as I want to go. I don't want to be known. I don't want to be a talking head. I just want to get to the truth.

the grand cross is bringing riots everywhere, soon to become a catalyst for martial law. My daughter is in Paris :( everyone send good vibes that way for me, will ya please? And it looks like South America is going to be hotter than normal this weekend. I wonder when & where it will catch on here?

I love it, Pat C --- your use of the phrase "trifucta" regarding Bush's low poll numbers in the 3 networks!!!!!!

I've never seen 'trifecta' used that way before --- what a great pun!

Regarding all of this corruption being so easily covered up and forgotten - I think Neptune is showing us the terrible results of accepting a superficial, illusionary view of reality as opposed to truth.

Politicians & the business world have access to all the mass communication marketing tools in the world to fool the people and keep them fooled and distracted. The fact that it's difficult enough to see true motives, whether in our private or public lives, doesn't help. The public is thus fooled by the glitz and their foolish (patriachal?) reverance for authority figures, and doesn't want to do the work involved in actually finding and remembering the facts and track record - the world is way to busy for that effort (and besides there is just so much conflicting information out there, so much sophistry, too). So often people vote blind, or for anybody but so-and-so, so the Bush election, in addition to being stolen, was also due to a backlash vote against Clinton and this opportunity was exploited by masters of artifice and politics. It would help if we had more physical evidence. Watergate was a small robbery but there were witnesses, fingerprints, dedicated investigative journalists, and, eventually, TAPES. We need actual physical evidence for all of this to stick. At the same time, with the help of people like Reid and Fitzgerald, Conley (the Downing Street Memo && more), Waxman, Waters, ex-pres Carter, the Wilsons, Dennis Kuccinich, Cindy, Richard Clarke, and the others who are speaking out, we ARE slowly building a picture of truth and, hopefully, revealing a world where truth and caring are more important than greed and power, and murder and corruption are more pornographic than adultry on the spectrum of hurtful acts. The recent natural "catastrophes" are also a great equalizer and highlight the importance of kindness and generosity and temporality of material things. As far as the right to abortion issues goes, there must be a way that Conservatives and Liberals can meet in the middle somewhere. I can't imagine that too many if any women have abortions lightly but they will continue to have them as a last resort. As far as this parental permission for minors referendum in CA, I can see the thinking behind that in theory, but the truth is that some parents are ridgid and abusive so their kids cannot turn to them. Manditory couseling from either psychological or balanced religious healers might be a better way to go. Possibly, if the right to abortion was not such a divisive issue, this country would not be so polarized. But I do believe that at a point farther down the road, this strong Neptunian emphasis on the nature of illusion vs. truth just may bring us to a higher plateau of truth and spirituality. (I apologize for the length of this, Sally, I try to balance my contributions by keeping them short more often than long).

Mark Crispin Miller's exchange with Kerry who finally thinks the election is stolen.

http://tinyurl.com/7ctk5

Thanks for the great post Sharon!

A security expert Mark Russinovich, discovered that a stealth rootkit had been put on his computer by Sony. The technology used to install this stealt rootkit is the same techniques that hackers use. To make matters worse, according to Mark, the code was very sloppily written, which left the computer vulnerable to hackers. Computers could even be rebooted remotely. In addition, if you tried to remove the rootkit, it would disable your CD drive and sometimes even crash your system. The software does crash XP Media Center systems.

Sony's response was less than acceptable. There is talk of class action lawsuits and individual posters are stating that they would not buy any Sony products in the future.

Where did this stealth software come from? On a music CD that Mark purchased from Amazon. For more information, check out any or all of the following:

text goes here

Dwight Silverman's TechBlog -- There are 2 separate threads on this issue on this blog.

The Washington Post had two articles yesterday.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/02/AR2005110202362.html?referrer=email

http://blogs.washingtonpost.com/securityfix/2005/11/sony_raids_hack.html?referrer=email

Likewise, eWeek and Wired, see URLs below.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1838294,00.asp This article contains information on what Microsoft may be considering to fight this growing problem.

http://www.wired.com/news/rants/0,2350,69467,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_5

FBI has arrested a 20-year-old Los Angeles man on charges that he used viruses to take control over 400,000 computers and use them as a giant install base for spyware

Rootkits and other hacker techniques are the tools used to get control of home computers.

Libby's Lying Habit

A closer look at Scooter Libby's leaking and obstruction reveals a pattern of deception designed to conceal the actions of the White House.

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051104/libbys_lying_habit.php

Contemptable

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Senator_Kerry_rebuffs_claim_he_said_1104.html

Senator Kerry rebuffs claim he said election was stolen

A spokesman for Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) vehemently denied that the
senator had told a popular liberal author and journalist that he
believed the 2004 election was "stolen" in response to queries from
RAW STORY.

The author, New York University professor Mark Crispin Miller, told
Democracy Radio the senator had told him at a fundraiser Friday that
he believed the election was stolen after Miller offered Kerry a copy
of his new book, Fooled Again. Miller said that he was invited to the
event by Peggy Kerry, the senator's sister.

Kerry's campaign quickly denounced the claim.

"I know Mr. Miller is trying to sell his book and he feels
passionately about his thesis but his recent statements about his
conversation with Senator Kerry are simply not true," spokesperson
Jenny Backus said. "The only thing true about his recollection of the
conversation is that he gave Senator Kerry a copy of his book."

Miller told Democracy Radio Kerry "told me he now thinks the election
was stolen. He says he doesn't believe he is the person that can be
out in front because of the sour grapes question. But he said he
believes it was stolen. He says he argues with his democratic
colleagues on the hill. He said he had a fight with Christopher Dodd
because he said there's questions about the voting machines and Dodd
was angry."

Miller was shocked to hear of Kerry's denial.

"I call that contemptible," Miller told RAW STORY. "That's completely false."

More....

OY!

New Poll
53% Support Impeachment if Bush Lied

http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_david_sw_051104_53__of_americans_sup.htm

and

http://www.zogby.com/Soundbites/ReadClips.dbm?ID=11982

PatC, if that poll is corect, what the heck are we waiting for?

We KNOW he lied.

Janet, the congress. sigh

There are riots six blocks from the summit in Argentina. Anti Bush mostly.

Pat C., Janet, and Others, If news media and polling associations are getting 53% yes for impeachment than I do not believe that the hold up is due to Congress being held by Republicans. That is just an excuse they use. We are the one's who put them in the jobs they have. They are there to serve us, we the people. If the trend continues they will be forced to address the issue, as demanded by their constituients. The question itself would not have been touched a year ago, by anyone, but is beginning to take hold. "On Point" did a program last evening titled "IMPEACHMENT". The words impeachment and conspiracy were expressed as quite common usage. Iran-Contra was a conspiracy, Watergate was a conspiracy. Listen free on line. It was a good show. This morning on Diane Rehm's, "Weekly News Roundup," a journalist, Elenor Clift, for "Newsweek" used the word impeachment twice quite nicely during the course of questions/explanations. A very civil program that doesn't sway into too much unconventionality. I have heard, but have not confirmed, that low approval ratings are grounds for impeachment. We must apply pressure non-stop. If you have not signed on the request that Rove be dismissed you can do so on
http://www.thepetitionsite.com
Sign for Bush too. The petitions are in any number of places.

Dick Cheney is in my home state, Michigan, this afternoon on a fund raiser. Wouldn't you think those contributers would think twice about their political investment? He expected to raise one million dollars. Cheney's approval rating according to huffingtonpost is 18%, Congress not much better at 28%.

Beverly, I'm trying, believe me, I'm trying.
................
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/scripts/printer_friendly.pl?page=/dean/20051104.html

A Cheney-Libby Conspiracy, Or Worse? Reading Between the Lines of the Libby Indictment
...............
http://www.energybulletin.net/7707.html

Petrodollar Warfare: Dollars, Euros and the Upcoming Iranian Oil Bourse

http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/110405EA.shtml

The Time to Act Is Now
By Al Gore
Salon.com

Friday 04 November 2005

The climate crisis and the need for leadership.
It is now clear that we face a deepening global climate crisis that requires us to act boldly, quickly and wisely. “Global warming” is the name it was given a long time ago. But it should be understood for what it is: a planetary emergency that now threatens human civilization on multiple fronts. Stronger hurricanes and typhoons represent only one of many new dangers as we begin what someone has called “a nature hike through the Book of Revelation.”

As I write, my heart is heavy due to the suffering the people of the Gulf Coast have endured. In Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, and particularly in New Orleans, thousands have experienced losses beyond measure as our nation and the world witnessed scenes many of us thought we would never see in this great country. But unless we act quickly, this suffering will be but a beginning.

More…

Well, I’d say Harry Reid is loaded for bear.

http://www.tnr.com/blog/theplank?pid=3261

snip…
—More dramatically, Reid also made it clear that he believes the delay in the Senate Intelligence Committee’s investigation of prewar Iraq WMD—the underlying issue behind Tuesday’s closed session—is entirely attributable to Vice President Dick Cheney. “Nothing happens regarding intelligence gathering … unless it’s signed off on by the Vice President,” he said. “[Senate Intelligence chairman Pat] Roberts couldn’t do it”—i.e., Roberts couldn’t conduct a full investigation without Cheney’s approval. When I asked Reid whether he meant to state so flatly that Cheney was personally and directly stalling the Intelligence Committee’s work, he didn’t pause a beat. In fact he almost stood from his chair. “Yes. I say that without any qualification … Circle it.”

More…

poor widdle baby......
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7617.shtml

sorry AW'ers,I can't help myself..........

This is a pieced together video, but is a true picture of dear old dubya....

http://www.astroworld.us/archives/000541.html#000541

London is supposed to be bombed today at 4, not sure what time standard is being used. http://www.financialoutrage.org.uk/5th_november.htm

Peg,
We are curious about your last post. It f=drove us to the enclopedia to read up on English history.
Are there any othewr references to it online?
PQ

Morning AW's...

Bush orders staff to attend ethics training White House counsel to give ‘refresher’ course

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9917101/

snip snip snip

How can you refresh something you don't have ? Jiminy Crickets your either ethical or not? It's isn't something you refresh. OMG gotta love these Bible Thumpers.

Well, at best there are amateurs in the White House, at worst treasonous criminals.

Remember remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot...

A poem the children repeat every Guy Fawkes Day -
Nov. 5

History of Guy Fawkes Day from today's Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/flash/0,5860,1605605,00.html

Oh that's really excellent wv.

RE WH "refesher course on ethics" conducted by WH counsel. Prolly the only purpose is to instruct them on how to do all the things they do better so they don't get indicted. Know what I mean?

Yup.

9 Nights of Rage

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/110505Y.shtml

Nearly 900 vehicles were torched and 250-plus people arrested as French police desperately battled the country's worst rioting for decades, which has now raged for nine consecutive nights.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/04/AR2005110401892_pf.html

Democrats: Probe Can't Be Rushed
Panel to Begin 'Phase Two' of Inquiry Into Prewar Data
By Walter Pincus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 5, 2005; A06

The Republican staff director of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence said yesterday that the next phase of the panel's probe of prewar intelligence on Iraq could continue for weeks, after key Democrats on the committee complained there is still much investigative work to be done.

More...

From Jo over on Salon:

iirc, when Reid queried Roberts about the amount of investigative work that had been done, the answer he got was virtually 'zero' - and Roberts answered Reid's query as to whether or not Cheney was responsible for the holdup in the affirmative, without shame or embarrassment.

"... Speaking on the Senate floor Tuesday, Reid said the Libby indictment showed "how this administration manufactured and manipulated intelligence in order to sell the war in Iraq and attempted to destroy those who dared to challenge its actions."

to which Roberts replied:

"I told Harry (Reid), I was shocked," Robert said. "We had been good friends. We always got along fine. All of a sudden I'm being accused of things I found remarkable. It just isn't the way to conduct business."

and

"... "It is worth noting that just 10 days earlier, the chairman had released a committee schedule through the end of the year that did not contain one meeting on Phase II," Rockefeller told reporters.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/13087624.htm

So, Roberts is shocked? At what? Does he think the Repubs have the corner on hardball? I think Reid was a wrestler in his younger days. He's quite ready to roll.

Matthew's message is particularly good this month.
WOW!
http://www.matthewbooks.com

Pat C., dear, I know you are trying. Please don't be offended if I came accross as a know it all. I am so tired of hearing David Corn, who should know better, and other Democrats talk about the infeasibility of impeachment. Also the stooge John Fund continue to say that no indictment was made against the original claim, therefore, no crime committed. The Senate's approval of reducing medicare, medicaid, and food stamps just has me heartbroken. The poor are being hit again. I didn't realize there was anything left to take from them. People are already choosing between their medicine or food and going without one or the other. Our collective compassion must help to address this issue. It's so sad that something so heartless could take place in this country.

If we haven't all signed for impeachment, please do so. Maybe this won't be the way their removal goes, but I feel we have to keep asserting our power as a grass roots effort.
http://votetoimpeach.org

Thanks, Morgana and thanks All for the wonderful article, other insights and links.

Here's my tinfoil hat theory--The Daily Show must have an undercover agent as one of Bush's advisors. How else to explain what I just heard on CNN: Bush has ordered his staff to take an ethics seminar.

The ethics seminar spin, is just THAT! SPIN! If you hang new curtains; outsiders can't see how filthy the house is inside!
Beverly,
It makes me want to cry too. As does the terrible plight of the earthquake victims. Where are Bill & Poppy now?????
I have been demanding impeachment of my 2 Female Repub. Senators for months now. ( On the phone to their aids) Every time they vote with the establishment on an issue, I call. Also I state I will vote against them! I don't even need a prompt from Move-On at this point!
They are beginning to "get it" a little. They voted against drilling in Anwar, and against cutting funds to medicaid/ medicare, the other day. ( Havn't been able to verify details as the vote wasn't posted yet.)
Another thing that made me want to cry, was Charles & Camilla, walking safe & welcomed through the mess that is the 9th ward in NO, and tasting food at the organic farmers market in Merin county! There were no brutish looking thugs in sight to protect them from our citizens. Or cops in riot gear with tazers.
By contrast, our leader in another country, looked terrified, grinding his teeth, and needed fences to keep him safe!
Those with evil thoughts & deeds toward others, fear the same from them!
TheFrench riots are very bad news........I'm sure all our "thinking challenged citizens" are watching, with a lust for vengance. It will serve as a platform for using violence AGAINST dissenters, in this country, and provide a reason to want martial law to keep us "safe". Ethics seminars forgotten!!
PQ

Really disappointed in 2005, that with all the scandals this crooked, corrupt shrub and his cronies continued to survive. Would like to ask
Sally if the MAGIC year for us is going to be 2006
when we say good riddance to these crooks once and for all time to come.

Perhaps this will be the nail in the coffin of these evil thugs? If true and proven accurate this information looks like a sure fire criminal offense to me ~Impeachable Offense~

Smoking Gun on Manipulation of Iraq Intelligence? 'NY Times' Cites New Document

NEW YORK ~ Ever since the Democrats briefly closed the U.S. Senate from view earlier this week, to protest alleged Republican foot-dragging in probing Bush administration pre-war manipulation of intelligence, the press has been asking: So what new evidence do the Democrats have in this matter?

CONTINUED~
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001434737

News media making a BIG hullaboo about France's problems with minority muslims is a lot of hogwash. Its like kettle calling the pot, you're
balck. So called very progressive USA is not an iota, ahead of France in these race matters or relations or for that matter poverty among blacks,
hispanics or minorities etc. Its a whole lot of bankum by the press here. Only difference is that
minorities and poor have shown the GUTS in France
saying WE won't take this garbage anymore, while here it is all a LOT of garbage TALK and NO action
or guts. Gimme a break. In these matters, USA is worse off at least hundred times than France ever
ISW.

Want to smile? Take a look at the CNN Bob Lang cartoon.

http://www.cnn.com/POLITICS/analysis/toons/2005/11/04/lang/index.html

Looks like they might have learned a lesson from that Galileo thing.

VATICAN: FAITHFUL SHOULD LISTEN TO SCIENCE

VATICAN CITY - A Vatican cardinal said Thursday the faithful should listen to what secular modern science has to offer, warning that religion risks turning into "fundamentalism" if it ignores scientific reason.

Cardinal Paul Poupard, who heads the Pontifical Council for Culture, made the comments at a news conference on a Vatican project to help end the "mutual prejudice" between religion and science that has long bedeviled the Roman Catholic Church and is part of the evolution debate in the United States.

CONTINUED~

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051104/ap_on_sc/vatican_science;_ylt=ArcsQGTdfNaK.E3pCFdHgWOs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3ODdxdHBhBHNlYwM5NjQ-

Raj,
What I find chilling, is that, the faschists here, will USE the French rioting, for their own patriotic, P R "mumbo jumbo""fear tactics" to further stiffle the koolaid marinated masses!
Out of one face we celebrate Rosa Parks, and out of the other; we condemn the brown skinned muslims to torture murder & worse!
We've now killed over 2,000. of our own country men, to avenge the death of 3,000. on 9/11.
Maybe we should start writing our newspapers asking, if when we reach 3,000. troop deaths in the war, have we satisfied an "eye for an eye" and a tooth for a tooth" mission".
One commentator on CNN actually likened the demonstrations in Argentina and the riots in France, to the beginnings of the French & American Revolutions. Wonder how long that person will have a job??????

Mike Whitney: 'Drifting towards a Police State'
Posted on Saturday, November 05 @

William Greider: 'All the King's media'
Posted on Saturday, November 05 @

http://smirkingchimp.com/
PQ

No trade deal at Americas summit

The final communiqué set out the two opposing positions

Leaders of 34 nations from across the Americas have failed to find a compromise on a regional free trade zone at their summit in Argentina.

Talks continued beyond the scheduled end of the gathering, as supporters of a US-led proposal sought to set a date to begin detailed negotiations.

The US faced opposition from five Latin American countries, which said the plan could damage their economies.

The final document contained an appendix with the two rival statements.

With most leaders - including US President George W Bush - already gone from the two-day talks, their representatives signed an annexe to the summit's final declaration with rival viewpoints on the initiative.

More http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4410190.stm

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

The FBI's Secret Scrutiny

In Hunt for Terrorists, Bureau Examines Records of Ordinary Americans

By Barton Gellman

Washington Post Staff Writer

Sunday, November 6, 2005; Page A01

The FBI came calling in Windsor, Conn., this summer with a document marked for delivery by hand. On Matianuk Avenue, across from the tennis courts, two special agents found their man. They gave George Christian the letter, which warned him to tell no one, ever, what it said.

Under the shield and stars of the FBI crest, the letter directed Christian to surrender "all subscriber information, billing information and access logs of any person" who used a specific computer at a library branch some distance away. Christian, who manages digital records for three dozen Connecticut libraries, said in an affidavit that he configures his system for privacy. But the vendors of the software he operates said their databases can reveal the Web sites that visitors browse, the e-mail accounts they open and the books they borrow.
More...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/05/AR2005110501366.html

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

Watch That Pea

What the administration is doing while you’re watching Scooter & Sammy.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_john_m___051104__b_watch_that_pea__b.htm

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

Scientist's suit a blow to press shield
Wen Ho Lee wants reporters to reveal sources who alleged he was a spy

ttp://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/11/06/MNGE0FJU6012.DTL

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

Report Warned Bush Team About Intelligence Suspicions

By DOUGLAS JEHL
WASHINGTON, Nov. 5 - A high Qaeda official in American custody was identified as a likely fabricator months before the Bush administration began to use his statements as the foundation for its claims that Iraq trained Al Qaeda members to use biological and chemical weapons, according to newly declassified portions of a Defense Intelligence Agency document.

The document, an intelligence report from February 2002, said it was probable that the prisoner, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi, "was intentionally misleading the debriefers" in making claims about Iraqi support for Al Qaeda's work with illicit weapons.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/06/politics/06intel.html?pagewanted=print

Sally, you might have heard the details on this--seems some time ago I read that the Denver public library had started a practice of erasing computer records of books when checked out books were returned. Then, if the government came looking, they would see what books you had out now, but not what you checked out last time.

I wish all libraries would do that. However, my computer guru tells me (if I understand him correctly) that it is hard to completely erase anything on a computer without wiping the whole thing--operating system and all.

The answer is for everybody to check out "subversive" books. I suppose they can't arrest all of us.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-enron5nov05,1,4403597.story?coll=la-headlines-business&ctrack=1&cset=true

Enron Prosecutors Cite Pattern of Deeds by Lay
The Enron ex-chairman denied knowledge of subordinates' activities in 1987, as he did in 2001, a government filing says.

Pat QOP - I don't think the "eye for an eye" theory applies to our troops over in Iraq, because I'm sure the administration knows that the higher the death toll, the less popular the President will become. The troops are just pawns in this game. What you have to look at, is how many Afghans, and Iraqis have been killed, and that number is at least 10 X the 3,000 that were killed in 9/11. The newly trained Iraqi police force & army are just acting as cannon fodder to satisy the administration's claims that the Iraqis are ready to handle the security of their own country, because they are even less equipped than the Americans to withstand the onslaught of the suicide and roadside bombs of the insurgents; so they are paying a far greater price with their lives in a war that they didn't ask for.

On another note, what does eveyone here think of Warren Beatty & Rob Reiner teaming up against Schwarzenegger? It seems that Beatty is not interested in running against Schwatzy though. I think he has his eyes on a bigger prize - the next presidential election.

Frank Rich: The Mysterious Death of Pat Tillman :

This administration just loves to beguile us with a rollicking good story, truth be damned. The propagandistic fable exposed by the leak case - the apocalyptic imminence of Saddam's mushroom clouds - was only the first of its genre. Given that potboiler's huge success at selling the war, its authors couldn't resist providing sequels once we were in Iraq.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10895.htm

A MUST READ eye-opener for those of you who think
the Democrats will save us...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-gilroy/white-house-in-chaos-_b_10159.html

The reality of Britain's reliance on torture

I will tell you what torture means.

By Craig Murray

It means the woman who was raped with a broken bottle in both vagina and anus, and who died after ten days of agony. It means the old man suspended by wrist shackles from the ceiling while his children were beaten to a pulp before his eyes. It means the man whose fingernails were pulled before his face was beaten and he was immersed to his armpits in boiling liquid.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10892.htm

Missing the Bus: When Conscience Bows to Calculation

By Niranjan Ramakrishnan

There is nothing less risky than praising a dead icon. There is nothing more risky than standing with a living one who, to use John Kerry's words for Rosa Parks, "speaks truth to power".

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10888.htm

UK: MPs unite for inquiry into Blair's conduct over Iraq:

TONY BLAIR is set to face an unprecedented parliamentary inquiry into his conduct in the run-up to the Iraq war.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1859669,00.html

Marooned :

Bethlehem, a place of Christian pilgrimage for centuries, will soon be encircled by Israel's security barrier. Is the town to become no more than a museum among ancient shrines?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,1607870,00.html

Who knows, you may be next!

The FBI's Secret Scrutiny: Bureau Examines Records of Ordinary Americans:

The burgeoning use of national security letters coincides with an unannounced decision to deposit all the information they yield into government data banks -- and to share those private records widely, in the federal government and beyond.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10891.htm

Iraqi Girl Blog: Riverbend: Congratulations Americans:

American and British sons and daughters and husbands and wives are dying so that this coming December, Iraqis can go out and vote for Iran influenced clerics to knock us back a good four hundred years.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10890.htm

Rummy's bird flu bonanza:

No sooner are indictments being handed down to I Lewis "Scooter" Libby, but a new scandal is surfacing, every bit as outrageous and ultimately, likely also criminal.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/GK04Aa01.html

Source of Forged Niger-Iraq Uranium Documents Identified

By ELAINE SCIOLINO and ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

Italy's spymaster identified an Italian occasional spy named Rocco Martino on Thursday as the disseminator of forged documents that described efforts by Iraq to buy uranium ore from Niger for a nuclear weapons program, three lawmakers said Thursday.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10875.htm

Source of Forged Niger-Iraq Uranium Documents Identified

By ELAINE SCIOLINO and ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

Italy's spymaster identified an Italian occasional spy named Rocco Martino on Thursday as the disseminator of forged documents that described efforts by Iraq to buy uranium ore from Niger for a nuclear weapons program, three lawmakers said Thursday.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10875.htm

All Problems Bleed from America's Wound

By Brian Bogart

Making and selling weapons has been America's top industry since 1950, that we have sustained this weapons-based economy by supplying more than 200 wars in 55 years, and that some 310,000 companies and 400 colleges are on the Pentagon's ever expanding payroll.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10882.htm

Over at americablog.org, they have the following quote posted:
"I think the administration is making a terrible mistake in opposing John McCain's amendment on detainees and torture," Hagel, R-Neb., said on "This Week" on ABC. "Why in the world they're doing that, I don't know."
Well, I don't know either but Sen Hagel and the others might ask if Snarly wants to use torture as another way to "fix" intelligence. Most people will sooner or later tell their torturers whatever it is the torturers want to hear just to get them to stop the torture. What a bunch of . . . .

Vote. CNN vote on unspeakable atrocity: Should there be a CIA exception to a proposal to prevent torture of non-US detainees? http://www.cnn.com/

CNN just can't ask a simple direct question, huh, JoannaO? As in, "Should the CIA be allowed to torture people?"

My appologies to the board. My "eye for an eye", was total sarcasm! I didn't mean it seriously. The irony of it is that, the "Murikan reptilian minds", criticize the Middle Easterner for their evil vengeful behavior, with out being able to recognize it in themselves! I have encountered 5 people this week who feel perfectly justified in killing "towel heads" ( and their Mothers & kids) because of the 3,000. who died on 9/11.
Newspaper suggestion was a bad one because, it wouldn't carry there either.
This is why I am not running for any office! Not expressing myself well.
I personally am bowed with the burden of the the Iraquis killed, because, nothing I could do before the war started, made any difference!
PQ

Pat QOP, I knew exactly what you meant and I made a couple of grim chuckles in response, followed by a deep sigh. Not to worry.

Thanks Shylurker.
Good posts WV
PQ

We Americans are like recovering addicts after a four-year bender
Bush made his white constituency feel good about themselves, but no longer. Citizens are rediscovering democracy

Naomi Wolf
Monday November 7, 2005

Guardian

In the US comic strip, Peanuts, there is a little boy who is always followed by a cloud of dust. Wherever he goes, his cloud follows him. George Bush can't shake his personal cloud. The until recently eerily untouchable president has now lost his mojo. The man to whom the entire US press corps has been on its knees for four years is finally in the doghouse.
It is almost a cartoon of karma. First, hurricane Katrina hit - and the sight of black and brown bodies floating in what had been the streets of a US city, of babies crying for water, of old people shrouded in their wheelchairs seemed to rip right through the collective fantasy of US goodness and infallibility constructed by Dick Cheney and his cabal and hyped by a crotch-strapped Bush in a flightsuit.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5327268-103677,00.html

Britain and the US
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Delayed dispatches

Editorial
Monday November 7, 2005

Guardian

If an ambassador is sent abroad to lie for his country, does he tell the truth when he returns home? There is certainly no reason to doubt the accuracy of Sir Christopher Meyer's account of his five years representing HMG in Washington, the top of the tree for any British diplomat, even under a highly presidential prime minister who can talk directly to the White House without leaving Downing Street. Sir Christopher's book, of which we publish extracts today, covers the fateful period of the run-up to the war in Iraq in March 2003 - an event which on many counts must now be judged a disastrous failure for British policy.
The significance of DC Confidential is that a senior player in the daily interaction between the US and its most intimate ally argues that things did not have to turn out that way. From his unique vantage point on Massachusetts Avenue, the ambassador saw that although Britain's reputation in a traumatised US soared to "stratospheric new heights" after the 9/11 al-Qaida attacks, the prime minister was unable to translate it into real influence on the Bush administration. Occupation of the moral high ground was thus of no practical value.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5327262-103682,00.html

Blair on the hot seat....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/

For almost two decades, Alan Greenspan has exerted a profoundly negative influence on the American economy. As Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, it has been his job to regulate monetary policy in a way that helps the common citizen. Yet rather than fulfilling his responsibility, Mr. Greenspan has implemented policies that benefit multinational corporations while imperiling the long-term economic health of the United States.

http://makethemaccountable.com/podvin/more/051031_AWhoreForTheAges.htm

PQ

Who knows, Pat QOP, maybe Greenspan has been fulfilling his responsibilities--to the corporate world. We don't matter any more except as sources of income as we dutifully pay our taxes and as cannon fodder for all their lovely wars. Sigh.

From Capitol Hill Blue

The Rant

GOP Leaders to Bush: 'Your Presidency is Effectively Over'
By DOUG THOMPSON
Nov 4, 2005, 08:13

A growing number of Republican leaders, party strategists and political professional now privately tell President George W. Bush that his presidency "is effectively over" unless he fires embattled White House advisor Karl Rove, apologizes to the American people for misleading the country into war and revamps his administration from top to bottom.

"The only show of unity we have now in the Republican Party is the belief that the President has failed the party, the American people and the presidency," says a longtime, and angry, GOP strategist.

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/printer_7617.shtml

Friday's (Nov 4th)citizenspook posting has a good analysis of what Fitz is up to....

http://www.citizenspook.blogspot.com/

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/051114fa_fact

At the end of a secluded cul-de-sac, in a fast-growing Virginia suburb favored by employees of the Central Intelligence Agency, is a handsome replica of an old-fashioned farmhouse, with a white-railed front porch. The large back yard has a swimming pool, which, on a recent October afternoon, was neatly covered. In the driveway were two cars, a late-model truck, and an all-terrain vehicle. The sole discordant note was struck by a faded American flag on the porch; instead of fluttering in the autumn breeze, it was folded on a heap of old Christmas ornaments.
The house belongs to Mark Swanner, a forty-six-year-old C.I.A. officer who has performed interrogations and polygraph tests for the agency, which has employed him at least since the nineteen-nineties. (He is not a covert operative.) Two years ago, at Abu Ghraib prison, outside Baghdad, an Iraqi prisoner in Swanner’s custody, Manadel al-Jamadi, died during an interrogation. His head had been covered with a plastic bag, and he was shackled in a crucifixion-like pose that inhibited his ability to breathe; according to forensic pathologists who have examined the case, he asphyxiated. In a subsequent internal investigation, United States government authorities classified Jamadi’s death as a “homicide,” meaning that it resulted from unnatural causes. Swanner has not been charged with a crime and continues to work for the agency.

More...

The Wal-Mart 22
by Jonathan Tasini

With Democrats lining up to support Wal-Mart, why should voters believe they have any intention of challenging corporate power?

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20051107/the_walmart_22.php

It's early on the West Coast, but geeze louise, what part of Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and the American Gulag's has he missed ? The pResident is seriously out of touch with reality.

'We do not torture,' president says

INSIDE POLITICS
Bush defends detainees policy
'We do not torture,' president says

Monday, November 7, 2005; Posted: 12:30 p.m. EST
(17:30 GMT)

PANAMA CITY, Panama (AP) -- President Bush vigorously
defended U.S. interrogation practices in the war on
terror Monday and lobbied against a congressional
drive to outlaw torture.

"There's an enemy that lurks and plots and plans and
wants to hurt America again," Bush said. "So you bet
we will aggressively pursue them but we will do so
under the law."

He declared, "We do not torture."

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/11/07/bush.torture.ap/index.html

Psychopathic?

http://dailykos.com/story/2005/11/6/13376/7516

GOP tries to disenfranchise WA voters with false challenges
Using the 2004 gubernatorial election saga as an excuse, the Republicans have filed challenges to nearly 2,000 voter registrations within King County – Washington State’s most populous county, and a Democratic stronghold.

Just days before this Tuesday’s general election, thousands of voters have received letters in the mail informing them that their right to vote is being challenged by the Republican Party of King County.

[...]

King County Republican Vice Chairman Lori Sotelo recently filed challenges to nearly 2,000 voters within the county, claiming that she had “personal knowledge or belief” that those voters did not live at their registered addresses.

[...]

Since Thursday, a firestorm has ensued and the county elections division has been deluged with phone calls from angry voters who assert their registrations are being falsely challenged.

"President Bush was greeted by ten thousand demonstrators screaming 'get out Bush, get out Bush.' And that was here at the airport before he left." --Jay Leno, on Bush's trip to Argentina

"The president's trip to Argentina has ended badly: He's coming back. His visit there in Argentina was greeted as expected. There were thousands of people rioting, flipping over cars, smashing store fronts, signs saying Bush go home, which is nothing compared to what would have happened if he had shown up in Detroit at Rosa Parks' funeral. Yeah, he didn't go to that, because he's about as popular with black people as a chicken that just sneezed." --Bill Maher

"Samuel Alito, who is widely agreed to be conservative, intelligent and competent, and President Bush said he would be willing to overlook those facts this time." --Bill Maher

"The president might be trying to scare us. His speech had the Bush stamp all over it. He said prevention comes down to a few simple things, like covering your mouth when you leak, making sure your intelligence is cooked thoroughly, and remember that we're fighting the bird flu over there, so we don't have to fight it over here" --Bill Maher

"President Bush is in South America. When he landed, he said 'Oh my god, John Edwards was right, there ARE two Americas!'" --Jay Leno

"Here's the good news, yesterday President Bush announced his plan to fight the bird flu. The bad news? There's only enough doses for the Red States." --Jay Leno

"President Bush's popularity here at home has slipped to 35%. His popularity is so low that he may be forced to get his own show right here on NBC." --Jay Leno

The Democrats forced a Senate shutdown to discuss the weapons of mass destruction issues with, I guess, the other senators. And it's because they want more transparency in government . . . so they had to make sure we didn't hear anything. As the closed-door session was going on, Republican leaders had gathered outside in the hallway to vent. Said Sen. Bill Frist, "The United States Senate has been hijacked by the Democratic leadership . . . once again, it shows the Democrats use scare tactics . . . they have no principles, they have no ideas . . . they have no conviction." Adding, "Our party, on the other hand, I think we're gonna have a lot of convictions." -- The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

Pat Queen of Pentacles, I can really emphathize with your "inability" to change the course of our rush to war in Iraq. I felt the same way, feeling every time I heard a newscast that the fervor was overwhelmingly pro-war. I felt that this was all inaccurate and ethically wrong. My feelings were based on listening to the "other side"...people such as Scott Ridder, AIEA, Hans Blix, and some of the retired generals who were apposed to the war in Iraq. Also publications such as "Mother Jones" and "The Nation." How they have all turned out to be right. I also felt the American sanctions against Iraq made Sadaam impotent in every respect of his leadership. But here is my problem now. I am having great inner difficulty with those pro-war people who are now or have lately changed their minds. Everything they needed to know was "out there" if they had only sought it out. We need to somehow enlist the help of developing our critical thinking skills to aid us in these difficult times. It is extremely hard for me to embrace their abrupt change of mind and heart. I must do this though for the sake of our country but wish to remind them of their careless oversights, eventhough I know it would just add more ire to our collective efforts to build a better country/world. All sides have issues to forgive.

Garry, I read Spooks update yesterday afternoon. There is SO MUCH suspicion about his credibility and just "who he is." Did you read the postings? I don't know what to think about him anymore. What do you think?

Carl Hiaasen on Abramoff:
"The glistening slime trail left by lobbyist Jack Abramoff leads to an infamous homicide scene in South Florida."

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/carl_hiaasen/13083011.htm

Good Lord, they may be good for something, after
all!

November 7, 2005

When Cleaner Air Is a Biblical Obligation

By MICHAEL JANOFSKY

WASHINGTON, Nov. 6 - In their long and frustrated efforts pushing Congress to pass legislation on global warming, environmentalists are gaining a new ally.

With increasing vigor, evangelical groups that are part of the base of conservative support for leading Republicans are campaigning for laws that would reduce carbon dioxide emissions, which scientists have linked with global warming.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/07/politics/07air.html?pagewanted=print

Dear Astroworlders: Please help reverse the Congressional bill to cut food stamps, medicare, and medicaid for the low wage earners, sick, and poor by signing the petition which will automatically contact your representative and senators. They have surpassed the required signatures, but we need to send a strong message to reverse this totally destructive measure.
www.moveon.org
See the Reverse "Robinhood" on the home page on the right side. Thanks to all.

Dear Astroworlders: Please help reverse the Congressional bill to cut food stamps, medicare, and medicaid for the low wage earners, sick, and poor by signing the petition which will automatically contact your representative and senators. They have surpassed the required signatures, but we need to send a strong message to reverse this totally destructive measure.
www.moveon.org
See the Reverse "Robinhood" on the home page on the right side. Thanks to all.

Voting tomorrow in NJ for Gov. and house.

The gov campaign was/is very, very nasty, and I can honestly say I am not thrilled with either candidate. Corzine hasn't exactly convinced me he isn't just like all the other big money players. And frankly, besides who did whose wife, what is the actual difference between them, Forrester and Corzine? Guess I will have to vote party platform. I would distrust the long arm of the Rethug regime if a Rethug became governor.

Stay safe.

Hey Bev-
ANY spook is suspect and good on you for suspecting him--however, I find his legal analysis
pretty sound, at least to my limited experience in the law.

Anyone else think citizenspook's legal analysis is good or bad?

Yes, Garry, I find Spook's legal analysis riveting in the way he tries to uncover what is being implied under the surface. I do trust his legal opinion and will continue to read him but the input of other's have really confused me. However, there are some very thought provoking, intelligent comments from the posters. Many people question Madsen's reporting but he was an important voice in Congressional 9/11 investigations. He really works for the NSA??? I saw posted somewhere recently. I don't know, but he seems o.k. to me and enjoy reading his site.

Veteran admits: Bodies melted away before us.

By RAI

The Americans are responsible for a massacre using unconventional weapons, the identical charge for which Saddam Hussein stands accused. An investigation by RAI News 24, the all-news Italian satellite television channel, has pulled the veil from one of the most carefully concealed mysteries from the front in the entire US military campaign in Iraq.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10901.htm

===

NOTE TO READERS.

I am working on the video RAI report detailed in the article above.

I should have it online
( http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10907.htm ) by 2pm PST

In the Name of Democracy

American War Crimes in Iraq and Beyond

By Jeremy Brecher, Jill Cutler and Brendan Smith

The possibility that high U.S. officials may be guilty of war crimes and may be preparing to commit more raises questions that few Americans have yet faced. These questions go far beyond technical legal matters to the broadest concerns of international security, democratic government, morality, and personal responsibility.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10905.htm

Al-Qaeda threatens Iraq mayhem unless US-led assault halted :

"The organisation has decided to give the apostate government and itsmaster 24 hours to end their campaign against the Sunni people. After that they will only see from us the worst and something that's going to make the earth tremble under their feet," warned the statement signed in the name of spokesman Abu Maisara al-Iraqi.

http://www.africasia.com/services/news/newsitem.php?area=mideast&item=051107152350.lrfi7k1q.php

Thanks Pat QOP for that response. Usually after saturday, I get on PC/Blog etc. only on monday, hence the belated acknowledgement from my side.
Since on that subject, I'd also bring in Mugabe
and his actions in Zimbabwe condemned by holier
than thou world at large. But what Mugabe is doing
there is being perpetuated here and in the so called VERY developed western Europe, Australia etc. by the cons and repugs there, who don't give a damn about the underpriviliged(barbara bush name
tagging them as underpriviliged in New Orleans/ Houston).Mugabe stole elections in Zimbwe and his
disciple here-smirky shrub stole it here not once
but twice. Mugabe bulldozed the poor/ underpriviliged there, here the cons take the food stamps, safety nets for the under priviliged.
Only difference is that what Mugabe does, you can
capture in pictures, but what the cons do to the poor here, you can't put it in photos. That's all the difference, if any one with an iota of brain can comprehend.

Tomorrow we elect a new governor in VA. Will it be Kaine (Democrat) or Kilgore (No Millionaire left behind Republican. If the people put that d_ _ n Repub in, we deserve what we get. The race is very close, or so says the MSM.

I'm getting up early and voting. Wonder if it will do any good?

Patricia

Beverly, I appreciate your support! Most of the ones who were "unknowing" have awakened around here. The 5 I encountered last week were among the hard core ineducable!
I was betting a lot of money on that poor scared white rabbit the Iraqi Ambassador to the UN. I could tell he was being honest when he said there were no WMD In Iraq. I was glad that he and his family made it safely to Kuait!
I will do the Move-On petition.
Beasley,
After watching the debate between Corzine & Forrester on Cspan;I almost wrote a letter to the NJ papers this AM.....but
like you.............couldn't decide! Forrester is unbearably self righteous! And he must have learned his rude non-stop talking directly from Karl Rove!) After googling both..I realized that He was working on the state budget under Thomas Kean, ( who endorses him) during the years my taxes more than doubled, forcing me to sell out & move! He talked about returning NJ to the good old days before corruption. How would he know? He didn't even arrive there until 1975. I grew up there, and my Uncle was a State Senator,( D ) ( for one term until he was reapportioned, and stepped down, ) There were terrible rumors about him being caught in the kitchen sink humping a chippy! He was the Uncle who taught my Brother & me that stealing was wrong, when we came home with 2 pumpkins from the truck parked outside the cannery!at age 7 or 8.
He & My Aunt were the closest couple that I have ever seen, he has gone right downhill since her death a few years ago. And we lived down the street from them at the time, They had 6 kids & we ( 3) ran in & out all the time. I can't think WHEN he would have done such a thing.
He never ran for office again, but I bumped into that story again, when I was painting murals at the Jersey shore, for a
Mafia outfit, the year the gambling casinos opened in Atlantic City!
On the other hand, last summer, when I was helping Eric pack up and having an awful time with the crooked landlord...Corzine's office was within walking distance, from his apartment; and it was Senator Lautenburg's aids in the Cmaden office who were gracious and helpful! So I didn't write that letter! ???????
Challenge of this week? The heater has died in the library, I was warned to wear warm cloithing for the next 3 days!
Mars, neptune, and now sun in scorpio, direct T to my sun, when will it end????
PQ

Patricia, Kaine is now nine points ahead!

Yippee! I couldn't bear to look today. Gives me hope.

Here is a link on Kaine.

http://www.wtopnews.com/index.php?nid=213&sid=615112

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/11/7/11819/9522

Italian Satellite TV to Broadcast Evidence of US Use of Chemical Weapons on Civilians

Italian media going full-bore on the Bush Administration. After its revelations on the subterfuge behind the Nigergate forgeries, documentary evidence of the use by US troops of phosphorus and a new formulaton of napalm [MK77] on the Sunni civilian population will be broadcast tomorrow on international satellite TV. Global coverage of the atrocity, folks.

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

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/05/AR2005110501267_2.html

"... Levin said he first obtained the DIA document as part of his continuing investigation as an Armed Services panel member into intelligence activities that took place within the office of Undersecretary of Defense Douglas J. Feith after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Feith's Office of Special Plans undertook a review and analyses of prewar al Qaeda intelligence.

Levin said Friday that he was not aware whether the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, on which he also serves, has the document. That panel did not have the DIA document in July 2004 when it completed its Phase 1 report on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs."

Video: English Version from Italian TV: US Chemical Weapons Attack on Iraqi Civilians

Related: Flashback: Weapons of Mass Destruction Employed by US to Imolate Falluja - Graphic

http://www.livejournal.com/users/mparent7777/4236736.html

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9962376/

Fox News hit with sexual harassment lawsuit
EEOC suit claims company retaliated against former worker for complainin

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Boston_Globe_to_report_U.S._cutting_1107.html

Boston Globe to report U.S. cutting diplomatic ties with Syria

If ever there will come a day when law and order reign in this country, I see no other alternative than for us to bring the entire Bush Cabal and its War Party cronies to all stand trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, at the International Criminal Court.

Otherwise, this great experiment of the "United States" is finished, and many dark days lie ahead for a world in which the twisted evil festering within the hearts of people like Bush Sr and Dubya, Jeb, Cheney and Rumsfeld, becomes the law and order of the day, in place of the hopes and dreams of better men who sometimes fumbled about, and often fought for what they gradually found within their lives to be the greater good.

I completely agree NEOBuckeye, what is and has happened to the US and our values and ethics is overwhelming. It didn't happen when George Bush took office, the ground in America had become soft enough for this kind of evil to take root. It's been there, we just didn't see it and if we did see it growing over the last 50 years or so, we didn't know what to do. Fear is a powerful motivator and deep seated in the human race and the GOP knew how to exploit it. But we do have to stand up to this before too long and exorcise it from the heart of this country.

Happy Birthday Pat C!!
im wishing you a wondrous year...looking at this fixed cross and thinking perhaps it is the study spokes of the wheel that will carry you into a year of grand possibility.
Happy birthday deerheart, may you walk in beauty, see the pattern.
warm thoughts flowing around you
tseka

Sally and NEOBuckeye, i concur and it goes far beyond what is and has been happening in the US we are just the current moment in a repeating pattern that has been going on for a couple of millenia. Same power groups just shifting here, there as their scent grows strong enough for us to root out. And when they leave our neighborhood and move on we grow complacent...exciting times.

Happy Birthday from me, too, Pat C.

Adding to the beautious wishes from Tseka, may your life be completely filled with abundance and ongoing Blessings, wonder, joy and miracles. You are such a beautiful and intelligent woman.

Adding my voice to the growing chorus: May all 365 days that lie ahead of you be filled with hope and joy, Pat C.

Pat C.....happy birthday to Youuuuuu....and many more.

I have not posted much because of a week long headache....and this last week, every two days or so, one of us of my extended family gets the Noro virus (stomach flu) that is going around...my granddaughter last night, right on the heels of my son in law, who was right after his mother, who was just after me, who was just after my daughter, who was just after her son, who followed up right after my soninlaws' sister and her husband....vomiting, diarrhea (for some, at the sae time!) and muscle pain, a headache that lasts about 3-4 days. It is the same thing that hit cruise ships a few years ago...

I could only skim headlines because of the headache...and of course, I got some work for the first time since August right in the middle of it.....so now I need to go do that.

Today is the day to vote in CA to defeat all the propositions which Ahnold is using to concentrate his own power....including one which would give him the power to cut budget items on his own, not to mention a reapportionment bill to give the power to retired judges and not the legislature....and I won't even go into the dog fight over conflicting drug bills and the abortion notification bill....

I think we get so tired sometimes of trying to stem the tide of this power grab....there seems to be no concerted help from the democratic power in DC....and we all end up feeling like the little boy in Holland with his finger in the dike.

I wish Warren Beatty WOULD do something about getting into politics...he has been a close study of it for 40 years....long enough, I'd say, to get his feet wet.

Did you see the article from Raw Story about the woman in VA who is an investigator for Sen. Grassley on the Abramoff issue who was beaten by a man with a baseball bat in her driveway? My....lets make America safe from foreign terrorists, huh? But let the domestic ones do anything they want...

My apologies to those of you who get MoveOn.org's newsletter , but couldn't help thinking this should be posted:
Join the Rapid Response Network!

Rapid Response Network (RR) is a nationwide volunteer organization that acts as "first responders" to biased, imbalanced or factually inaccurate media coverage. At its heart, RR is a vehicle for engaging "We the People" in our democracy. As the influence of television news and media conglomerates increases, citizens have less opportunity to participate in the national dialogue on issues dramatically affecting our lives. RR's work represents opportunity to restore a continuous American conversation, from coast to coast and into the smallest hometowns.

Unique among media watch networks, RR is organized into national, state and county groups. This structure provides the power of national resources and organization with the effectiveness that can only be achieved by acting at a local level. Using tools provided through RR, neighbors speak with neighbors.

The network seeks out opportunities to engage the media on issues of importance, then notifies the volunteer base with Action Alerts. Volunteers respond with letters, emails, and phone calls. Our goal is to ensure that the public discussion remains productive, honest, and fair. We seek to encourage informed citizenship, the ultimate check and balance to hold government accountable to the people.

Want to get involved? Sign up now!

http://www.rapidresponsenetwork.org/us/signup
___________

Sorry...that was from Democrats.com, not MoveOn!

Voice of the White House November 7, 2005

TBR News.org – November 7, 2005

“The media has reported a week ago that 2,000 U.S. military personnel had been killed since 2003 in Iraq and Afghanistan. Actually, the persistent rumors are that the actual toll is much higher. Around the Monkey Palace, no one gives a flying f--- about this matter. They are too intent on saving their jobs or protecting Bush and Cheney for the same reason.

The dead and mangled are only a footnote to history and one the White House staff doesn’t give a damn about. The Iraqi resistance is well aware of the impact that the growing death tolls can and do have on the American public and like the Viet Cong, they are killing more and more men in more and more sophisticated ways (aided and abetted by outside sources) so as to pressure Bush to withdraw.

http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/print.asp?ID=3793

Voice of the White House November 4, 2005
TBR News – November 4, 2005

“The upper echelons of the Bush Administration are now in a state of numb terror over the arrest of I. Lewis Libby. This is not because he might implicate Karl Rove, the President’s indispensable political advisor but because of something much more dangerous to the entire Administration. Last weekend, I went sailing on the Chesapeake Bay with an old friend of mine, now a senior U.S. military officer who serves in Washington in an elevated position. Out on the water, away from possible snoopers, he told me something that is more incredible, yet believable, than anything the nutty bloggers can come up with.

It seems that the Bush Administration, at its highest levels, to include the following people in specific but not in general (aides, assistants, family members and so on):

Richard Cheney, U.S. VP
Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense
John Ashcroft, U.S. AG
Lt.Gen Michael V. Hayden, USAF, Director of NSA
George Tenet, DCI

http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/print.asp?ID=3793

Happy Birthday Pat C! It won't be difficult to remember your special day, since today is my daughter's birthday as well.

wv, posted a link above, an article by Tom Gilroy, Huffington Post. It resonated with me and wonder if any of you read it?

Despite all the skeletons in the collective Skull and Bones' closets, we are hearing unabated rhetoric. These folks will not go quietly into that good night. Their belief systems are so rigid that they WILL do anything to obfuscate the law, the one the rest of us, and most of the world, obeys.

I keep coming back 'round (at least in my mind) to those accounts of Atlantis where the ruling power knows a disaster is looming, and leaves. Those same entities are now present again. They've been given the opportunity to correct and transcend their former errors. The lure of power, however, has trapped them again.

I often wonder my own part in this collective re-experience. Like many of you i've been politically active and outspoken. Yet, i continue to doubt that contribution. Yes, i'm discouraged, but also wonder if i'm supposed to be paying closer attention to my own, everyday acts. While i cannot exactly clarify this, i believe paying attention to simple acts somehow magnifies the energy necessary for earth's and humanity's healing.

karen/farrout

rawstory has just posted the amazing letter from Cat-Killer Fritz about tracking down and punishing the source of the leak that Smirky&Co are running a series of gulags in Eastern Europe. Our country is truly being run by maniacs.

Oh, this speaks volumes. Apparently, Trent Helmet-Hair Lott has just said that the person who leaked the info about the gulags was a Repug Senator. Hahahahahaha.

Happy Birthday Pat C may it be peaceful and pleasent for you.
I'm pretty sure that Sally has a Scorpio birthday too. May you receive what you want on your special days.

Neobuckeye and Sally...Do you remember 1998 when Clinton was President and the economy was great? The poor were making it to middle-class level, birthrate was dropping, middle-class were going to college and getting great jobs, more people could buy their own homes....remember that? Now in 2005, people are concerned if they can grow enough food in their gardens to live on, have a good source of water to drink, a way to keep warm in the winter, some skill or things to trade for food? It's shocking! How could this happen in the USA? In a mere six years the economy is so horrible that people are concerned about their survival???
The Republican agenda had been ready and in action by the time Reagan came into office to begin the legal reversal of the economic way of life for the majority of Americans. With dubya and his people from GW41, they have seemingly destroyed our future. But don't give up on changing things, not only back, but to better and different than it was. I really believe that the VAST MAJORITY of America is ready to vote out the criminals running the country no matter what scare tactics they use. This years elections and issues are just as important as 2006 will be at getting rid of those louses.
I voted today (Seattle) and none were republicans.

I understood from Dana Priest's article that it was unidentified CIA personnel that were giving her the story over fear's of possible future retaliation against them, our soldiers, country, and legal ramifications thereof.
Once again, it is the right of the American people to know what it's government is doing, that Frist and Hatch want to squash. They say it compromises our security?????
Did you all hear Pat Roberts on C-Span talking about how the leak investigation is compromising our national security, and quote "Just imagine how this must look to our soldiers." Implying that we are not supporting them or the President while we are pursuing this Congressional investigation.

Shylurker, this is the purpose of their "ethics" classes. Ethics for them is "don't tell anyone what we are doing." There is going to be a big clamp down, but I don't think they know where all the "leaking" is coming from, or what sewer system has the leaks.

Pat C, I hear VA has some voting problems, oh my. Well I figured Kilgore would win when Bush went there and made his "credibility" stand as a referendum on his popularity. I hope someone fights it all this time. Even if Kilgore does win, VA will be screaming at him within months.

Some poster over at DU (they're all anonymous, supposedly) just said the leaker was Pat Roberts. My apologies for my mirth.

Happiness begins when you stop caring....

wv, you posted the same url twice...the second one is for the first article....could you repost?

What's up with Negroponte not backing Cheney?
http://www.upi.com/SecurityTerrorism/view.php?StoryID=20051107-015539-8991r

Democrats plan an assault on GOP’s push for budget vote
http://thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/News/Frontpage/110805/dems.html

Many headlines at Tom Paine to read.
http://www.tompaine.com/newsworthy/

Yes, wv, I even went to the tbr site to find the article about the boat cruise to no avail. I would like to read it too. Thanks.

Wow. Over at talkingpointsmemo.com, Joshua Micah Marshall just posted a nice little article on this hilarious mess they've gotten themselves into with the Eastern European gulag matter. Just look at this last paragraph

"Let them investigate Republicans, Democrats; let them take it before judges. Whatever. Lies beget coverups which beget more law breaking into a spiralling cycle. The executive is in corrupt hands. Nothing will change till that does."

Beverly, I found the archive page...just go down and click on Nov 4 for the article from inside the White House at truthseeker...
http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/category.asp?id=41

Thanks Judi g, Unrelated to this article, a caller asked Lionel (Air America) last night about "why don't we rely more, get more intelligence from Isreal on WMD (then and now, since if anyone would know, they would) since they are the premier in intelligence gathering in that area. Excellent question, but Lionel seemed stumped although usually always aware and responsive. I have often wondered the very same thing. Makes me wonder what all they have gathered since 9/11.

Looks like Prop 2 in Texas has been approved. The ban on gay marriage is written into my state's constitution. A sad day for Texas...

I saw that, Dave, and it just made me sick. I wonder about the possibility of getting a constitutional amendment re personal privacy. That would cover so many hateful issues that the Repugs disguise with lipstick. I.e., misogyny = "right" to life, homophobia = marriage strictly as between a man and a woman and on and on.

But do take heart, Dave. It appears we won the governorship in VA.

Happy Birthday Pat C,
Dem Govs in Va. & NJ a nice present. Sends a nice message!
Too bad Bush wasted the fuel to go to Va. last night!

I am so Pissed with CNN! Anderson Cooper doesn't have the maturity to do a news show. Or as the new kid on the block he doesn't have the weight to formulate his own programing?
Oh here's the redhead on Anderson Cooper.. Kept us waiting for 1 boring hour!...........................
Still waiting........................
Dave I'm sorry about Texas! We called it the opposite here in Maine; I think. They called it so fast I'm not sure.
PQ

THANK YOU!!! I so appreciate all the beautiful wishes for my birthday! What a wonderful surpirse to come here tonight and see birthday wishes for me. Wow!

Kaine won in Virginia!!!! It's one of the best birthday presents I could have gotten today. If Kilgore had won...what a differnt world it would have been....whew! It's like a birthday for Virginia too!

(((((Hugs to all you wonderful Astroworlders.))))))

Dave, I'm so sorry. Things can change, or maybe there will be a further brain drain from Texas as gays leave for friendlier places. I do hope it changes in time.

I am celebrating the triumph over my cynicism tonight. I am not just sick for Texas, I am deeply saddened by their narrow and ignorant stand, thank god not everyone is Texas is like them. I was so sure VA and NJ would fall to the GOP through crooked voting machines that I couldn't even bring myself to do any kind of charting on the states. I am so thrilled to be wrong, wrong, wrong. Congratulations to everyone in all the states who won a victory today for America.

Let us have hope.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1635925,00.html
We Americans are like recovering addicts after a four-year bender

Bush made his white constituency feel good about themselves, but no longer. Citizens are rediscovering democracy

In the US comic strip, Peanuts, there is a little boy who is always followed by a cloud of dust. Wherever he goes, his cloud follows him. George Bush can't shake his personal cloud. The until recently eerily untouchable president has now lost his mojo. The man to whom the entire US press corps has been on its knees for four years is finally in the doghouse.
It is almost a cartoon of karma. First, hurricane Katrina hit - and the sight of black and brown bodies floating in what had been the streets of a US city, of babies crying for water, of old people shrouded in their wheelchairs seemed to rip right through the collective fantasy of US goodness and infallibility constructed by Dick Cheney and his cabal and hyped by a crotch-strapped Bush in a flightsuit.

More....

Let us have hope.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1635925,00.html
We Americans are like recovering addicts after a four-year bender

Bush made his white constituency feel good about themselves, but no longer. Citizens are rediscovering democracy

In the US comic strip, Peanuts, there is a little boy who is always followed by a cloud of dust. Wherever he goes, his cloud follows him. George Bush can't shake his personal cloud. The until recently eerily untouchable president has now lost his mojo. The man to whom the entire US press corps has been on its knees for four years is finally in the doghouse.
It is almost a cartoon of karma. First, hurricane Katrina hit - and the sight of black and brown bodies floating in what had been the streets of a US city, of babies crying for water, of old people shrouded in their wheelchairs seemed to rip right through the collective fantasy of US goodness and infallibility constructed by Dick Cheney and his cabal and hyped by a crotch-strapped Bush in a flightsuit.

More....

Congratulations Callifornia!!

ttp://www.latimes.com/

No, No, No, No, No, No, No, No

YYYYYESSSSSS!

Dogging the governor, as it has for months, was the California Nurses Assn., which organized a luau at the Trader Vic's in the same hotel. As Schwarzenegger's defeats mounted, giddy nurses formed a conga line and danced around the room, singing, "We're the mighty, mighty nurses."

Yep, Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhnold sure got stung yesterday! And, Dave, I read that the vote in TX just might have invalidated all marriages. Oh that would be such sweet karmic justice.

The wording on Prop 2 in Texas is very bad indeed. It defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman and then bans Texas from recognizing any relationship "identical or similar to" said definition. See the problem? If they really wanted to ban gay marriage, the amendment should have read "other than or similar to." Make sense? By banning anything IDENTICAL to said definition, they ban whatever it is they have just defined. Hence the amendment actually bans recognition of any and all marriages or anything like them.

Of course, no judge is going to interpret the amendment this way. But it sure makes the original authors look stupid. (But we knew this already.)

Well, Dave, stupid is as stupid does. Or stupid does as stupid is, or . . . Whatever! Yes, the creators of that initiative were indeed pretty stupid. Or maybe not. Maybe they're a secret cult that doesn't believe in marriage, period.

Happy Birthday too Sally....not sure which day???????
pRez is about to hand out medals of freedom in the rose garden
Bets anyone?
PQ

The candy-ass SOB is not fit to be Commander in
Chief.

Bush's War on Veterans

November 9, 2005
By Mary Shaw

On Friday, November 11, Americans will observe Veteran's Day. This is a day set aside to honor our war veterans. I cannot think of a more worthy purpose for a holiday.

Now let me guess: this Veteran's Day, George W. Bush will strut his way into a specially choreographed photo opportunity and smirk and say some carefully crafted yet predictable and hollow-sounding words about how the American people appreciate the sacrifices that our veterans have made in the noble quest to defend freedom and democracy.

And he will be right. We the people do appreciate the sacrifices that our veterans have made.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/articles/05/11/09_veterans.html

Oh my gosh! It's Cap'n Sally's birthday, too?

Well, happy happy birthday Cap'n Sally. You are a wonderment!

Sally's birthday is a week from Friday...

Happy almost birthday Sally!

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/08/opinion/08tue1.html?incamp=article_popular_1&pagewanted=print

"After President Bush's disastrous visit to Latin America, it's unnerving to realize that his presidency still has more than three years to run. An administration with no agenda and no competence would be hard enough to live with on the domestic front. But the rest of the world simply can't afford an American government this bad for that long."

Sorry, Sir Christopher, he wasn't even in with a shout
Blair had no leverage on Iraq with Washington's neocons - but, like Wilson over Vietnam, he did have a choice

Simon Jenkins
Wednesday November 9, 2005

Guardian

If I were Tony Blair I would report Sir Christopher Meyer to the Press Complaints Commission. Meyer's revelations in this week's Guardian must embrace invasion of privacy, breach of confidence and breaking a professional contract. He might even be vulnerable to a charge of profiting from the proceeds of a war crime. But Blair would be wasting his time. Meyer is not just the ex-ambassador to Washington. He is chairman of the Press Complaints Commission. The man has serious protection. Amazing country, Britain.
Call me old-fashioned, but I still find something queasy in public officials ratting on their bosses while the latter are still in office. How should a prime minister regard an official's advice when he knows that it may appear as a Guardian scoop if he fails to heed it? Mandarins are getting too big for their boots. They want it all: private-sector pay, gongs, bonuses, inflation-proof pensions at 60, Oxbridge headships and no-censorship clauses for their memoirs. Sooner or later someone will stop it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5328928-103677,00.html

Happy belated b'day Pat C. I've been outside doing grounds cleanup on this unusually warm November day and haven't been reading the posts. WE WON!!!! Hee hee hee. Kaine is the new governor, even though I knew the people in the county I live in would vote for Kilgore and sure 'nuff they did. Too bad......

Patricia

Things are definetely "OUT OF WHACK"! There is a giant blue heron out back in the stream. He late in migrating out of here!
3 hotels Raddison, Hyatt, & Days Inn, in Jordan bombed! The PM of Jorden's car is parked outside of the Hyatt. At the same time explosions in Bhagdad. Guess it's time to visit Aljezeera website.
Never a dull moment!
PQ

> PHOENIX FIVE EARTH CHANGES BULLETIN

> November 7, 2005 by MW Mandeville (Black Canyon City, Arizona)

> BULLETIN ITEM: For Your Votescam Dossier: A Toe-curler About The Industry Of Counting Votes
>
> MWM: Quick, easy, essential read to firm up your deep skepticism about Democracy in the U.S. and the legality of Bush
>
> http://nightweed.com/usavotefacts.html
>
> 20 Amazing Facts About
> Voting in the USA
>
> by Angry Girl
>
> Nightweed.com

> printable version
>
>
> Did you know....
>
>
> 1. 80% of all votes in America are counted by only two companies: Diebold and ES&S.
>
> http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diebold
>

>
> 2. There is no federal agency with regulatory authority or oversight of the U.S. voting machine industry.
>
> http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0916-04.htm
>
> http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html
>
>
>
>
> 3. The vice-president of Diebold and the president of ES&S are brothers.
>
> http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/private_company.html
>
> http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html
>
>
>
>
> 4. The chairman and CEO of Diebold is a major Bush campaign organizer and donor who wrote in 2003 that he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year."
>
> http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/28/sunday/main632436.shtml
>
> http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=1647886
>
>
>
>
> 5. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel used to be chairman of ES&S. He became Senator based on votes counted by ES&S machines.
>
> http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2004/03/03_200.html
>
> http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/031004Fitrakis/031004fitrakis.html
>
>
>
>
> 6. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, long-connected with the Bush family, was recently caught lying about his ownership of ES&S by the Senate Ethics Committee.
>
> http://www.blackboxvoting.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=26
>
> http://www.hillnews.com/news/012903/hagel.aspx
>
> http://www.onlisareinsradar.com/archives/000896.php
>
>
>
>
> 7. Senator Chuck Hagel was on a short list of George W. Bush's vice-presidential candidates.
>
> http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_28/b3689130.htm
>
> http://theindependent.com/stories/052700/new_hagel27.html
>
>
>
>
> 8. ES&S is the largest voting machine manufacturer in the U.S. and counts almost 60% of all U.S. votes.
>
> http://www.essvote.com/HTML/about/about.html
>
> http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html
>
>
>
>
> 9. Diebold's new touch screen voting machines have no paper trail of any votes. In other words, there is no way to verify that the data coming out of the machine is the same as what was legitimately put in by voters.
>
> http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0225-05.htm
>
> http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/041020evotestates/pfindex.html
>
>
>
>
> 10. Diebold also makes ATMs, checkout scanners, and ticket machines, all of which log each transaction and can generate a paper trail.
>
> http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0225-05.htm
>
> http://www.diebold.com/solutions/default.htm
>
>
>
>
> 11. Diebold is based in Ohio.
>
> http://www.diebold.com/aboutus/ataglance/default.htm
>
>
>
>
> 12. Diebold employed 5 convicted felons as consultants and developers to help write the central compiler computer code that counted 50% of the votes in 30 states.
>
> http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,61640,00.html
>
> http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/10/301469.shtml
>
>
>
>
> 13. Jeff Dean was Senior Vice-President of Global Election Systems when it was bought by Diebold. Even though he had been convicted of 23 counts of felony theft in the first degree, Jeff Dean was retained as a consultant by Diebold and was largely responsible for programming the optical scanning software now used in most of the United States.
>
> http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0312/S00191.htm
> http://www.chuckherrin.com/HackthevoteFAQ.htm#how
>
> http://www.blackboxvoting.org/bbv_chapter-8.pdf
>
>
>
>
> 14. Diebold consultant Jeff Dean was convicted of planting back doors in his software and using a "high degree of sophistication" to evade detection over a period of 2 years.
>
> http://www.chuckherrin.com/HackthevoteFAQ.htm#how
>
> http://www.blackboxvoting.org/bbv_chapter-8.pdf
>
>
>
>
> 15. None of the international election observers were allowed in the polls in Ohio.
>
> http://www.globalexchange.org/update/press/2638.html
>
> http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/10/26/loc_elexoh.html
>
>
>
>
> 16. California banned the use of Diebold machines because the security was so bad. Despite Diebold's claims that the audit logs could not be hacked, a chimpanzee was able to do it! (See the movie here: http://blackboxvoting.org/baxter/baxterVPR.mov.)
>
> http://wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,63298,00.html
>
> http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4874190
>
>
>
>
> 17. 30% of all U.S. votes are carried out on unverifiable touch screen voting machines with no paper trail.
>
> http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/28/sunday/main632436.shtml
>
>
>
>
> 18. All -- not some -- but all the voting machine errors detected and reported in Florida went in favor of Bush or Republican candidates.
>
> http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,65757,00.html
>
> http://www.yuricareport.com/ElectionAftermath04/ThreeResearchStudiesBushIsOut.htm
>
> http://www.rise4news.net/extravotes.html
>
> http://www.ilcaonline.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=950
>
> http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0411/S00227.htm
>
>
>
>
> 19. The governor of the state of Florida, Jeb Bush, is the President's brother.
>
> http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/news/local/7628725.htm
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10544-2004Oct29.html
>
>
>
>
> 20. Serious voting anomalies in Florida -- again always favoring Bush -- have been mathematically demonstrated and experts are recommending further investigation.
>
> http://www.yuricareport.com/ElectionAftermath04/ThreeResearchStudiesBushIsOut.htm
>
> http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/policy/story/0,10801,97614,00.html
>
> http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/tens_of_thousands.html
>
> http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1106-30.htm
>
> http://www.consortiumnews.com/2004/110904.html
>
> http://uscountvotes.org/
>
>
> NOTE: Please copy the above list and distribute freely!
> LET THE FACTS BE KNOWN! Thank you!
>
> Want a cheap, fair, reliable, and efficient alternative? It exists!
> Check out the Swiss Voting System
> at http://www.swissvs.org
>
>
> DECEMBER 2004 GALLUP POLLS
> 1 in 5 Americans believe the elections were fraudulent.
> That's over 41 Million Americans.
> You are NOT alone!

>
> []

How funny of you to post that Pat QOP---it's usually about this time that I see (I'm not making this up) SEAGULLS IN TENNESSEE!!!We all know TN is about as landlocked as it gets. Are they merely stopping by on their way elsewhere? No idea....

but yep, there's usually a good flock of 'em down by the McDonald's (a guess here) mooching french fries.....they sure must get hungry flying all that way to eat at Mickey D's...lol

And congrats to all the states that went blue yesterday...alos, here's hoping TX women see the "amendment" that passed yeaterday as a chance to get out while they can...lol

http://makethemaccountable.com/podvin/more/051109_FeelTheBurn.htm

FEEL THE BURN, GIRLYMAN

snip...

The turning point in Arnold’s fortunes did not actually occur when the unions decided to go for his jugular, but shortly thereafter. Once the anti-Schwarzenegger campaign started, there was the inevitable reaction from the usual right wing suspects. Talk radio hosts screamed indignantly that liberals were proving themselves to be vicious bullies. The Republican Party issued statement after statement decrying the vile slander of it all. The mainstream media disparaged the union effort as “outrageous propaganda”. And Schwarzenegger was so irate that at one point it seemed certain he would deploy the National Guard to invade Poland.

This is the stage of the scenario where liberals typically dissolve into tears and promise never again to transgress, but the unions deviated from the script. When the head of the teacher’s association was scolded because her ads were making conservatives collectively hold their breath and turn blue, she responded with an eloquence that was transcendentally beautiful: “I don’t care.”

The three magic words. Had Al Gore or John Kerry possessed such command of the English language, George W. Bush wouldn’t have stood a chance.

More...

Judith Miller is "retireing" from the NYT

http://www.gawker.com/news/judith-miller/the-end-judy-miller-retires-136284.php

Garry,
Are the seagulls so far inland to avoid stormy weather at the coast? I have observed that manuver here in Maine. They don't go THAT far inland but do shelter away from the coast.
There is a lobster boat sheltered in the little cove 2 doors down from me, so I guess we will have stormy windy weather tomorrow! I love it when I can stand in my yard & see lobster boats! It's "wetlands" and I can't see the bay from my house ( lower property taxes) but it is waterfront on the eastern seaboard!
What do you think about the elections yesterday WV? I was afraid the voting machines would do their dirty work! Do you think they were off guard? or did they expect the hubris to carry them?
PQ

Ever been to Mono Lake? It's on the eastern side of the Sierras, past Yosemite National Park and almost to the Nevada line. Seagulls are always there.

Pat C, That Podvin article was particularly enjoyable! He is soooooooooo right ( I mean correct!)
Somewhere last night in my ramblings I came across an article that the Dems took a lot of local elections on Long Island, traditionally a conservative bastion!
PQ

There are loads of seagulls in Colorado.

Birds seem to do so well. I think they adapt easily and have varied flexible diets.

Poll: DO you approve or disapprove of the job (huh??) Smirky is doing?

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/CNBCTV/Promos/P135620.asp?ShowResults=1&HasVotedTwice=

Pat QOP

The elections - since I was able to listen to
Kilgore in VA I realized what a bloody idiot he
was and deserved to be whipped. As for Corizine
it will be interesting to see whom he appoints to
replace him, and if it is someone who can win in
2006. In New Jersey politics it is hard to tell.
Having lived in California for 40 years, it was good to see them regain some of their sanity. But
what can you say about a state that give us Arnold, Reagan, S I Hayakawa, and George Murphy
as governors, president and senators. Had I lived
in NYC, I too, would have voted for Bloomberg.
Ferrer looks like a ferret, and had about as much
chance of winning. He has no vision nor presence.
The California Republican congressional delegation
is made up of more losers than you can count on
both hands. We need a Progressive Party - the
Democrats don't deserve another turn, although I
might vote for Mark Warner, but NEVER Hillary!

Republicans Blink on Drilling in Alaska

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111005Z.shtml

House GOP leaders agreed last night to strip plans to permit oil drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and in the offshore continental shelf from their massive $54 billion budget-cutting measure, probably securing the votes to pass the measure today.

Just received an email from a friend who shared this little ditty. Go to Google. Type in the word failure. Click on "i'm feeling lucky" instead of the regular search. I needed a good laugh and i got one. You will too.

karen/farrout

Theocracy Watch

High Crime? You betcha!

http://www.theocracywatch.org/women2.htm

See The War Against Women along the way here.

Hey all-
just wanted to post a few items I saw on cloakandagger.de and conspiracyplanet.com yesterday & today--
namely, that those hotel bombings in Jordan occurred on 11-9
(or 9-11 reversed) AND that the Muslim riots only occurred in NATO countries that opposed the Iraq invasion....interesting tidbits, no? Pretty much shows us who's behind those things.....

Yeh Garry,
And on CNN this AM they are speculating.......setting the stage ........for a reappearance of bin Laden, via message, or videotape.
Another birthday this month!

Happy Birthday U.S. Marine Corps
Also My Grandaughter's Birthday!
http://www.ksbitv.com/hellooklahoma/1960317.html
Anyone know the birthdate of the other armed forces??? Ie; Coast Guard Pices Neptune ruled?
Airforce Gemini, ? Libra?, Aquarius?
PQ

WV,
I hope NJ has another 'lurking Lautenburg"
Just a reminder.............Corzine was invited to the Bilderburg, last year, 2004!
PQ

I'd forgotton about this web site until I read somewhere that the White House is suing them for using a buzzard in the great seal.

This tickles the hell outta me:

http://www.whitehouse.org/news/2005/110705.asp

Karen...someone at Google search will be reprimanded, I'm sure! That is the equivalent of what we used to do in retail ads....hide the word 'fuck' in the artwork somewhere...someone always got reprimanded!

WV.....Don Perata said this morning about working on the 'infrastructure' of CA that nothing had been done on it since Pat Brown was governor (50 years ago)....well, in that time, most of the governors have been Repubs...so maybe CA will actually now get the message and do some of the work that really needs to get done. As SF Mayor Gavin Newsome said today also....hubris is a very dangerous commodity .... and popularity like Ahnold had and wasted must be viewed by him as a good lesson in humility. Or....when someone hacks off your arm and hits you with it, it is hard to shake hands later on....

Dave....CA has its southern CA conservatives (actually, that and the whole inland part of the state near the Sierras, too) who are mounting yet again another assault on gays and lesbians....the anti marriage for gays statute. And CA is also no longer safe in terms of abortion rights....so watch CA to see which was the wind is blowing.

Thanks goodness Maine came thru. It is funny....this doesn't even affect me personally in any way, yet it just infuriates me that these mean asshole people want to say that they are going to do their utmost to make sure that they have a say over who you can fall in love with....and marry.

I was so p.o'd at John McCain in his appearance on the Daily Show....he is still spouting the official line about "well, Saddam had WMD's somewhere"...and the reason I am so p.o.'d is that my accountant spouts the same stuff...so these are just talking points as usual. Stewart couldn't even shake him loose on the terror and torture stuff ('How does Cheney have the BALLS to press you on the ability to torture"...

If McCain ever had a soul, all that is left is his quick wit....and that is it. But I knew that....I used to live in AZ, and I know the uselessness of him every crossing the GOP line. Gee...Supremes get a job for life, and so do some Senators....

http://www.stariq.com/Main/Articles/P0006706.HTM

For the Week of November 10, 2005

It’s a stop-start-stop-and-then-start-all-over-again week that wrecks havoc on schedules and plans, big and small, as well as nervous systems, old and young. Back up your computer information as you read this, please, and copy your cell phone address book, too. We’re entering a double retrograde maze of delays and the frustration produced by that combined resistance to forward progress is certain to make even the stoic weep.

Here’s the skinny: Mercury goes retrograde on November 14th, and as the retro-experienced know, Mercury’s seemingly backward motion translates into a slo-mo rewind review of paths previously taken. Mercury stays retrograde until the end of the day December 3rd, so don’t rely on forward movement until December 4th. Mercury represents all things related to communication and travel and when it turns around almost everything within that vast domain pivots toward the past, which why a retrograde is the perfect time to finish up what’s already started. Edit, Tweak, and Refine are Mercury’s Retroettes, and their sole mission is to help sort through the details. Unfortunately because most of us tend to suffer from techno-anxiety, we resist or resent this forced concentration on detail, a reaction that only exacerbates the already existing frustration of a thousand necessary or unnecessary retrograde interruptions.

And let’s not forget, Mars is also retrograde and will stay that way until December 10th. Mars and Mercury drive the mechanics of daily life and when they are both focused on the past rather than the present or the future, normal tasks—really simple, easy, these aren’t complicated tasks—morph into experiential lessons in quantum physics. The best way to deal with the frustration is to do whatever it takes to maintain a good attitude.

Wake up and smell the Fascism....

http://www.oldamericancentury.org/14pts.htm

I don't want to be premature with my hope that the Reverse Robinhood budget will actually be reversed, but it has been pulled from the House floor for further modification, etc. next week. According to http://dccc.org/stakeholder
the bill is not getting enough Republican votes....and "is not in line with the sentiments of the people". Good news for now anyway.
In addition there has been objections from moderate Republicans about ANWR drilling which is included in the bill.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/643701.html

Don't count on America

By Yossi Beilin

It never was President Bush's dream to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. On the contrary, since it had been President Clinton's "baby" and everything connected to Clinton is treif as far as Bush is concerned, it was clear from the beginning that he would stay away from the region.

The wealth of the English language makes it possible to attach serious and respectable terms to inactivity. Thus, for example, the decision not to play an active role in finding a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is called "conflict management." In effect, the administration's decision says that as long as the Israelis and Palestinians kill each other at "low intensity," they can be allowed to go on bleeding. If the conflict intensifies, something has to be declared (like the pathetic "Bush vision" of June 2002, or the road map, which was delivered to the sides in April 2003 without any of its initiators or recipients treating it seriously).

Visitors to Washington nowadays cannot get free of the feeling that the administration is stewing in deep depression and wants to be left alone in its domestic political arena, without being troubled by international problems. The hurricane in the south exposed an administration that is incapable of handling it citizens' existential issues and largely abandons the weak and the poor. The blood of American soldiers and civilians continues to be spilled in Iraq, and the huge budget deficit created by President Bush, who inherited a budget without a deficit from Clinton, also contributes to the sense of American weakness - particularly since a large proportion of American foreign debt consists of U.S. bonds held by the Chinese.

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

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

Last update - 14:31 10/11/2005
Where does the wonderful friendship end?
By Shmuel Rosner

There has yet to be an outcry - and it's a shame. The statements made a few days ago by Abe Foxman, the head of the Anti-Defamation League, deserve an outcry. He warned of increasing efforts by Christian rightists to "Christianize America" - a well-known and much-spoken-of phenomenon. Many are warning of it in the name of liberal values, in the name of the American constitutional heritage, in the name of political objectives.

More than a warning against the Christian right, therefore, it appears that Foxman was warning about disregard from the Jews. Why the hell are they keeping quiet? Is it because they don't sense the danger, or are uncomfortable dealing with such a sensitive issue? Foxman believes the danger is tangible - and that the time has come to put together a strategy to counter it. "We may have to come to terms with a number of phenomena that we don't like, but we should agree on where we draw the red line," he said yesterday in a telephone call from California.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/objects/pages/PrintArticleEn.jhtml?itemNo=643703

the above post was from me also...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9973228/

Dover voters oust intelligent design supporters

As federal trial continues, 8 school board members lose their seats

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2005/11/10/chalabi/print.html

Chalabi's curtain call

The White House resets the stage yet again for the notorious Iraqi expatriate who helped cook the case for war.
By Juan Cole

Nov. 10, 2005 | On the street in Iraq, people give nicknames to the big longtime-expatriate politicians whom the Americans brought back to Iraq. They call former transitional Prime Minister Iyad Allawi "Iyad the Baathist" because of his background in that party. And they call Ahmed Chalabi "Ahmed the Thief." How appropriate that Chalabi has again made a splash in a Washington, D.C., that looks increasingly like a kleptocracy itself.

On the surface Chalabi ought to be finished in Iraqi politics. But until Dec. 15, he is a deputy prime minister. His meetings in Washington this week with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney and National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley acknowledge his high political office -- even though not so long ago the Bush administration tried to destroy him. What accounts for the turnabout in his political fortunes in the United States? Credit the shifting political winds in Iraq -- and perhaps yet more savvy back-channel dealings by Chalabi with the Bush administration. It can't be because of his rap sheet, whole reams of pages long.

Pat POQ

If dreams came true, oh, wouldn't that be nice?
As the next governor of New Jersey, Jon Corzine's first job may be to replace himself in the U.S. Senate. Rep. Robert Menendez is thought to be the front runner for the job, but Philadelphia Daily News writer Will Bunch has another idea: Sen. Bruce Springsteen.

-- Tim Grieve

See part of Mr. Chalabi's press conference on
www.canofun.com
Dick Durben gives a pretty good history on Chalabi's "sins." He is asking for a subpeona against him to testify before Congress.

Karen Hughes budget is 6+ million per year to help straighten out our image in the Middle East. Six million to straighten out the mess they created! Incomprehensible! and nothing she does or says will change their minds until we, our government, changes their behavior. Something they are incapable of.

I do not understand why Judy Miller was retired when she should have been fired! Any comments on this from you folks?

Yes! Sen. Springsteen. We used to be neighbors in Medford Lakes ( well across the lake, not next door) I met him in a local art gallery & one of Eric's girlfriends used to babysit for him.
I'd settle comfortably for Menendez.
Funny, I was almost scammed by a prospective tenant who claimed he was Springsteen's road manager. He gave as a reference, an old high school classmate CEO of a big steel company. I think he thought I wouldn't really call him.
I did. He was out of town, but his secratary wiffed a bad smell, called him in Texas & he called me to say the guy was a bad risk!
Oh those were the good old days......earth & water trines working in full gear, nowadays I would have gotten a voice mail and wound up with a bad tenant!!!
Just watched Rove addressing the Federalists club on CNN.
Euu euu, euu......he reminds me of a talking fetus! Never heard him speak before!
For-warned is for-armed Pat C Maybe I'll be bored but get streamlined as per Bahkti's recommendation.
Did you see Dean tonight? He's got it framed pretty well!
PQ

Tried to tune into astroworld yesterday but got this huge 503 on the screen...too much volume...or something. Glad you're all still here.
Pat Robertson warns the people of Dover that they will subjected to the wrath of God because they "rejected" him. Rejected God, I mean.

Corzine worries me. Hope he uses the time to clean up NJ corruption. I endorsed the Dems 'cause I'm terrified of the Repubs from Washington. Now, we'll see.

I also fear Lebanon is going to have a few violent hiccups while this Syrian mess is going on.

Wish I could sound intelligent, but I'm too tired tonight. Planets!

Poll of earthshaking proportions: Is Barbra Streisand's call for Smirky's impeachment out of line?

Arrrrrgh!

http://www.cnn.com/SHOWBIZ/

~Muhammad Ali Looks Bush In The Eye, Gives Him The “Crazy” Twirl~

At the White House, Prizes for 14 Champs~~Medal of Freedom Ceremony Shows Ali as Fast as Ever

By Jose Antonio Vargas
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 10, 2005

Aretha Franklin was teary-eyed, Carol Burnett was teasing, Alan Greenspan was reliably taciturn, and "The Greatest of All Time" stole the show when President Bush bestowed the Medal of Freedom on them and 10 others in a White House ceremony yesterday.

Bush, who appeared almost playful, fastened the heavy medal around Muhammad Ali's neck and whispered something in the heavyweight champion's ear. Then, as if to say "bring it on," the president put up his dukes in a mock challenge. Ali, 63, who has Parkinson's disease and moves slowly, looked the president in the eye -- and, finger to head, did the "crazy" twirl for a couple of seconds.

CONTINUED~
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/09/AR2005110901738_pf.html

Not only have we destroyed culture & antiquities in Iraq, we are letting our own deteriorate!

The world's biggest museum is falling down
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/article326135.ece
But we are spending money for a missile shield!
PQ

I had a dream very early this morning. People of differing nationalities were represented as emerging butterflies. Each nationality was a different kind of butterfly. It was clear to me in the dream that the butterflies of the United States were being abandoned, while other types, in other countries, were being encouraged and nurtured.

The war on the middle class is real and is intended to flatten all emerging Americans. The children of the sixties are considered troublesome and are on the list for removal one way or another. Their children are being spiritually destroyed. There is no more room for anything but the obedient worker.

This is why the country is being flooded with poor people from other countries. They are obedient, and as of now, ask for very little from their employers. Citizenship is being devalued permanently by those who run/own everything.

This was my dream. It may seem as if none of the information is new, but it came in my dream. For me that is most significant.

We'd better do something.

http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?emx=x&pid=35448

Tomdispatch Interview: Ann Wright on Service to Country

[Note to Tomdispatch readers: This is the fifth in an ongoing series of interviews at the site. The most recent of these were: Cindy Sheehan and Juan Cole (parts 1 and 2). This interview also represents the first follow-up at the site to Nick Turse's The Fallen Legion: Casualties of the Bush Administration.]

"A Felon for Peace"

A Tomdispatch Interview with Ann Wright

She's just off the plane from Tulsa, Oklahoma, the cheapest route back from a reunion in the little Arkansas town where she grew up in the 1950s. For thirty years, she and her childhood friends have climbed to the top of Penitentiary Mountain, where the local persimmon trees grow, for a persimmon-spitting contest. ("All in the great spirit of just having fun and being crazy.") She holds out her hands and says, "I probably still have persimmon goop on me!"

More...

Wonder if Smirky would try the same cute antics with Mike Tyson as he did with The Greatest (Ali)?

WOW! Another 9/11 smoking gun?

http://www.arcticbeacon.com/articles/article/1518131/37079.htm

http://books.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5330979-99819,00.html

Indicted Libby's publishers plan 25,000 reprint of 'steamy' novel

Julian Borger in Washington
Friday November 11, 2005

Guardian

Life is not all bad for Lewis "Scooter" Libby, the vice-president's former chief of staff. He has been indicted for perjury but the scandal has done wonders for sales of a steamy novel he wrote a decade ago.
The Apprentice, an everyday tale of bestiality and paedophilia in 1903 Japan, is to be reprinted after the author's newfound notoriety triggered a stampede for secondhand editions.

Amazon.com was advertising copies for $50 (£29) to $2,400 (£1,370) for uncorrected page proofs with an inscription by Mr Libby to somebody named Bob. Now Thomas Dunne Books is planning to cash in with a reprint run of 25,000.

Hey! If a person has nothing better to do with their money, why not buy the works of a twisted neocon? Of course that's just my humble opinion.

Interesting site...

http://www.beyonddelay.org/

More 9/11--this link was on the front page of
rawstory.com:

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635160132,00.html

Oh my heart is broken! I would have voted for Maxine Waters for Pres. If this is true....she's off the list & needs to attend the ethics classes at the WH!
Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) has been a member of the U.S. House of Representatives since 1991, representing the 35th district of California. Her ethical problems arise from her exercise of this power to financially benefit her daughter, husband and son.
PQ

http://www.beyonddelay.org/summaries/waters.php

Front page news in SF this morning....O'Reilly (oh, really?) has called for Al Quiada to blow up SF, starting with Coit Tower....of course, most people in SF are tourists from TN, TX, the midwest or Asia....most native peoples here don't even KNOW who oh really? is....

Robert Scheer was let go by the LA Times today, after 17 years....as the Times consolidates its baland and safte style....

!!! BREAKING - DIEBOLD SOURCE CODE !!!

Dr Avi Rubin is currently Prof of Computer Science at John Hopkins U.

He "accidently" got his hands on a copy of the Diebold software program--Diebold's source code--which runs their e-voting machines. Dr Rubin's students pored over 48,609 lines of code that make up this software. One line in particular stood out over all the rest:

#defineDESKEY((des_KEY8F2654hd4"

All commercial programs have provisions to be encrypted so as to protect them from having their contents read or changed by anyone not having the key... The line that staggered the Hopkin's team was that the method used to encrypt the Diebold machines was a method called Digital Encryption Standard (DES), a code that was broken in 1997 & is NO LONGER USED by anyone to secure prograns. F2654hd4 was the key to the encryption. Moreover, because the KEY was IN the source code, all Diebold machines wld respond to the same key. Unlock one, you have then ALL unlocked.

I can't believe there is a person alive who wldn't understand the reason this was allowed to happen. This wasen't a mistake by any stretch of the imagination. This was a fixed election, plain & simple. [DUH]

This 2nd coup d'etat is either stopped now or America ceases to be. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/10/1172/9052

Well now!!! That should set some butterflies free!

I was just wondering if anyone knows if anything has been done about the source code problem. To my knkowledge, nothing has been done.

This is from Flo:

http://www.infowars.net/articles/november2005/081105birdflu.htm

Killing Two Birds With One Tamiflu Stone

A really excellent article, a must read...

****

The immediately below was posted on http://www.fourwinds10.com/

with a date of 5 Nov 2005 The Threat's Name? S 1873

Senator Richard Burr, http://burr.senate.gov/, of North Carolina has introduced a bill which, if passed, means the end of health freedom, possibly the end of your health and most certainly the end of your right to a trial by a jury of your peers in the all-too-likely event that you or your child have been harmed by a vaccine. The "Biodefense and Pandemic Vaccine and Drug Development Act of 2005" also takes away your right to know what you have been injected with (no disclosure, no Freedom of Information Act suits, none!) and your right to be compensated if that vaccination harms you or a loved one.

1. Write to your Congressmen/women at http://www.demaction.org/dia/organizations/healthfreedomusa/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=678&t=campaigns.dwt to let them know that both the Senate (S1873) and House (HR3970) versions of the bill must be defeated,

2. Call Congress. The Congressional Switchboard is 1-202-225-3121. The operators will connect you with your congressional delegation when you tell them your zip code.

3. Call the White House. Their number is 1-202-456-1414.

Tell the people you speak to that you are adamantly opposed to S1873 and HR3970 since vaccines are dangerous and compulsory vaccination violates your personal rights to self determination.

Pat C, if this is indeed a real story, we will have to see who picks it up at a major level....and the media will not pick it up if it is erroneous. Not saying it is, but geez...somethings occurred to me: I have a friend from high school who is a reporter for Reuter's. He is far more cautious about all of the reports from private sources....in fact, all the journalists seem to want to do is make sure they are not putting on their 'tin foil hats'. Death to the mainstream media to do that....so if it is true, that the source code exists as explained, it will rise to the top....

The Johns Hopkins Diebold source code discovery - is this recent? If it is recent, and valid, has it been picked up by the press? Since the press is no longer so Bush-friendly and CNN, for one, has a much more critical approach to him, wouldn't the press run with this Story, especially if it is true and has been verified?

By the way, speaking of voter fraud, I notice the conspicuous absence of Mike...anyone have any knowledge about him?

I emailed Pallas this week and haven't heard back. Pallas, if you're out there & reading this, please let us know how you are. I'm sure electricity was a problem after Wilma...email, too...my friends and family in N. Dade and Broward were socked by the storm and didn't get power back for weeks. I'm thinking about you, though, and sending you lots of positive loving vibes and white light, as is everyone else here. Knowing you, you are busy volunteering and activating. Hope you're fine. You, too, Mike.

It's from 2004. To the best of my knowledge nothing was reported.

http://www.cnn.com/

Do you think the Bush administration manipulated the prewar intelligence on Iraq?

Go git 'em.

Tin foil helmets may make matters worse.

http://people.csail.mit.edu/rahimi/helmet/

Mary Mapes on Bush's AWOL and truth.

http://www.truthandduty.com/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2005/11/10/DI2005111001414.html

Remember last year someone posted of an attempt, by US to
smuggle in to Iraq WMD's?

http://waynemadsenreport.com/
second post down.
The Brewster Jennings network in Turkey was able to intercept this shipment which was intended to be hidden in Iraq and later used as evidence that Saddam Hussein was in possession of weapons of mass destruction.

Read all three Nov 11 posts.
PQ

House Could Alter 19th Century Mining Law

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111105S.shtml

As many as 20 million acres of public land could be sold under a proposed change in mining law that is tucked into a budget bill in the House. At issue is the possible overturning of a congressional ban that has prevented mineral companies and individuals from "patenting," or buying, public land, including some in national forests and parks, at cheap prices if the land contains mineral deposits.

Wonderful reading here, i'm just catching up.

If someone has already posted this interesting site my apologies. The political compass is a six page test which plots your social and economic views to a quadrant grid quite interesting, as is the analysis.
http://www.politicalcompass.org/

Tseka,
That was fun! I'm down there with Nelson Mandala, & the Dali Lama.......................
No suprise there!
PQ

BTW Pat C , I loved your dream of butterflies!
PQ

Last to bed; first up?
Has anyone heard the news about the Walmart controversey over the Greeter saying, "Merry Christmas" vs, "Happy Holidays"?
A xtian complained, because they were saying Happy Holidays, "leaving Christ out of it."
Unhappily the loser in the conflict was the too bright ,too well educated, W associate who responded with an e-mailed accurate, recital of the pagan origins of Christmas ( Santa Claus from the Caucus, yule log from the Visagoths etc,)
I intend to e-mail this story to Lou Dobbs, as well as write to
to the President of the company.
There but for the grace of Godess go I. Unable to find work up to my intelligence, educational, standards, unable to conceal my knowledge in a dumbed down atmosphere!!!!!!!
Good AM AW!
PQ

Read it and laugh or weep or both or whatever!
http://www.thinkprogress.org/2005/07/26/bush-pulls-security/

I'd forgotten all about Smirky's jerking national security clearance from the Senators. We ought to make sure they're all reminded about this.

Pat QOP and tseka, just ecstatic to learn I'm in the best company around!

Good morning!

Pat QOP, I sure do wish it had been happier with all the butterflies fllying free and to great heights. It felt like a warning. This was posted over on Nancy's blog. http://www.palden.co.uk/palden/p4-usa2.html
British Astrologer Palden Jenkins on the decline of the US, and the rise of other nations and regions. It's really excellent.

tseka, I know you can imagine where I came out in that quiz!!!

You know what shy? I'm just happy that I share your company. You have such heart and humorous smarts. You are loved by more people than you know.

This is an important article, I think.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/11/AR2005111101832.html

Asterisks Dot White House's Iraq Argument
By Dana Milbank and Walter Pincus

snip

The administration's overarching point is true: Intelligence agencies overwhelmingly believed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and very few members of Congress from either party were skeptical about this belief before the war began in 2003. Indeed, top lawmakers in both parties were emphatic and certain in their public statements.

But Bush and his aides had access to much more voluminous intelligence information than did lawmakers, who were dependent on the administration to provide the material. And the commissions cited by officials, though concluding that the administration did not pressure intelligence analysts to change their conclusions, were not authorized to determine whether the administration exaggerated or distorted those conclusions.

More...

Shylurker, your dot on or around Pat PoQ?

nice to be in such good company indeed my dot is comfortably snuggled up to the Dalai Lama's.

It's the dreaming season, curious dreams both waking and sleeping...and will grow more so i expect for they always do when mercury goes retro. Is this how it is for others?

Pat C
"Everything Burns 2006" has been the prediction of so many but some of us are thinking that the cycle began at the 2005 summer solstice will peak over Jan and Feb then hold steady for some period until the next summer soltice as a new pattern asserts itself. The financials for the US look less dire as the whole world is now on the same train not just the US. The shift will be easier for some than others.
I've come to believe or maybe it is only a hope that the dire predictions for the US merely focused our attention to a global event.

What i'm thinking of is that in the "south"(india etc) there has been an effort over many centuries to open the "inner" with religion and lifestyle that honors a "correct" path through lack of possession....in the "north" (western) culture it is skewed to measuring one's worth by what one posseses....both are out of balance. The earthquake in Asia points up how necessary it is to build structre and Katrina points out that no matter how much money one has if you don't share it has no value. Both seem like taurean lessons in how we build our home on this planet.
One thing i do expect from Americans is +can do, roll up our sleeves and if you think about it the "eastern" consiousness has already pervaded our society...did you know any/ many buddhits in 1970?

For some of us it is the balancing point for others a tipping point. My thought...hope?

Shylurker,
"10/5/01: Bush Pulls Security Clearances From 92 Senators' fron the article you posted would seem to explain why so many senators claimed they didn't know about events and voted for the Iraq war. I have been so sceptical if we all knew, why wouldn't folks whose job it is to know, not? Well maybe there is actually an explanation. One has to grant these aren't the brightest lights in this country.

So well said tseka. Be assured, I do want that assessment to be the correct one. I yearn for the healing words that so move the people that they DO what is necessary to save the best of what has been gained and what is unifying. I know this sounds llike a childish dream, but it isn't. It's possible.

I do think there are more people now who practice religions of peace. They are not loud, and rarely run for Office though. I do hope that changes, at least the second one.

I am dreaming, awake and asleep.

Well, *blush* only Pat C. can simultaneously flatter and humble a person. Many thanks, dear heart.

I went to a Tibet-Nepal store yesterday and bought a wonderful portrait of HHDL. It is always comforting when he visits here, isn't it? I am reminded of the ancient prophecy that, in this time, the Tibetan people will be spread like ants over the globe and Dharma will come to the land of the Red people.

Earlier in the week I finally found at some import place a wooden Buddha that I could actually afford. A long time ago, I posted this and I'm going to post it again because, with my recent purchase, it is more vividly with me than usual:

"LIVING BUDDHAS. Everybody knows how Coyote Roshi loves to collect Buddhist images. Once a discipline of Rajneesh wrote to him, saying, 'You are always looking for wooden Buddhas. You should come to Indian and meet a living Buddha.'

"Coyote mentioned this letter to his students, and remarked, 'Living Buddhas are all over the place, but a good wooden Buddha is hard to find.'"

I hope I purchased it well enough before the retro Merc.

Source: "Coyote's Journal," edited by James Koller, 'Gogisgi' Carroll Arnett, Steve Nemirow and Peter Blue Cloud, Wingbow Press, 1982, Berkeley.

Poll: Did Smirky&Co mislead the Murcan public about
the Iraq war?

http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20051111105709990020

Shylurker, I'm so glad you came out from under the bed!! There are indeed many Living Buddhas! My parents had a wonderful Laughing Buddha, but alas I have no idea where it is. I've wanted to find one for years. If you know where I can find a good wooden Laughing Buddha, please let me know!

November 12, 2005
Op-Ed Contributor

Our Faith in Science
By TENZIN GYATSO
Washington

SCIENCE has always fascinated me. As a child in Tibet, I was keenly curious about how things worked. When I got a toy I would play with it a bit, then take it apart to see how it was put together. As I became older, I applied the same scrutiny to a movie projector and an antique automobile.

At one point I became particularly intrigued by an old telescope, with which I would study the heavens. One night while looking at the moon I realized that there were shadows on its surface. I corralled my two main tutors to show them, because this was contrary to the ancient version of cosmology I had been taught, which held that the moon was a heavenly body that emitted its own light.

November 12, 2005
Op-Ed Contributor
Our Faith in Science
By TENZIN GYATSO
Washington

SCIENCE has always fascinated me. As a child in Tibet, I was keenly curious about how things worked. When I got a toy I would play with it a bit, then take it apart to see how it was put together. As I became older, I applied the same scrutiny to a movie projector and an antique automobile.

At one point I became particularly intrigued by an old telescope, with which I would study the heavens. One night while looking at the moon I realized that there were shadows on its surface. I corralled my two main tutors to show them, because this was contrary to the ancient version of cosmology I had been taught, which held that the moon was a heavenly body that emitted its own light.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/12/opinion/12dalai.html?pagewanted=print

From Palden Jenken's commentary posted by Pat C:

"At present, things are held in place by a strangely complicit nation, afraid of what might happen if truth emerges and change comes. Not just truth about Bush, but truth about America - a country that permits phenomena like Bush to happen. A recent German letter-writer to Newsweek observed that we can take Bush's first election to be an excusable accident, but re-election means American voters will be held responsible, and anti-Bush feelings abroad will become anti-American. Truth can have a redemptive effect. It just depends which way Americans as a whole choose to go, when the chips come down. America can do a managed retreat or have a big crisis. At present, it looks like a crisis is looming.

What astounds many non-Americans is that the nation is stacked with such intelligent, good-hearted people, yet it has fallen into such a dazed, sleepwalking nightmare. Right-wingers support it, liberals oppose it, democracy has become dysfunctional, and we all know that, in reality, USA is steered by a network of background interests. Yet even they are losing power. We see a stung giant lumbering around, swatting mosquitoes and wasps, falling over things."

Such a powerful and succint summation of where and what we are as a nation.

Green fuel replaces gas – gallon for gallon

November 11, 2005

I’ve seen the future replacement for gasoline, its name is butanol.

In August, I was attending a conference of the International Association of Educators for World Peace at the University of San Francisco, when a 1992 Buick rolled up on campus. The sign on its door read, “Powered by: 100% BUTANOL www.Butanol.com.”

The driver, David Ramey, had just driven from Blacklick, Ohio to the west coast on a fuel that replaces gasoline, gallon for gallon, with no engine modifications. Within a few minutes, Dave had us touching, smelling and burning butanol in small samples he supplied. The first thing I noticed is the absence of black

http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2005/1255

Pat C

Google up Laughing Buddha....lots of Biddhas on
sale...

That should be Buddhas

The Rise Of America's New Enemy

By John Pilger

11/10/05 "ICH " -- -- I was dropped at Paradiso, the last middle-class area before barrio La Vega, which spills into a ravine as if by the force of gravity. Storms were forecast, and people were anxious, remembering the mudslides that took 20,000 lives. "Why are you here?" asked the man sitting opposite me in the packed jeep-bus that chugged up the hill. Like so many in Latin America, he appeared old, but wasn't. Without waiting for my answer, he listed why he supported President Chavez: schools, clinics, affordable food, "our constitution, our democracy" and "for the first time, the oil money is going to us." I asked him if he belonged to the MRV, Chavez's party, "No, I've never been in a political party; I can only tell you how my life has been changed, as I never dreamt."

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article10943.htm

What a great journey that took me on wv. Of course I found the correct one first thing.
http://acc6.its.brooklyn.cuny.edu/~phalsall/images/putai.gif The one my parents had was about two feet tall and was just wonderful. He always stood in a prominent place with his great laugh and guge round belly. I love him!

I kept following links though and there are some wonderful places using the laughing buddah. Thanks for the trip wv!!

Pilger is one of the best journalists on the planet.

Actually the Laughing Buddha in the picture is not exactly the same as I look at it some more, but very close. The one in the picture seems to be simlified a bit.

Palden Jenken & others, it seems to me, has that everlasting boring andro- anglo- macho- deity-centric Fiction of Thinking that says the US is a very special good & righteous nation (chosen by god) & so how could it have descended into almost unbelievable insane cruelty (fave method? fasco-corporatism). Bah. Humbug. It couldn't have done anything but! imo. ALL the increments have always been present (ask for instance the american indigenous peoples for THEIR opinion) & has MANIFESTED in the past on a disgustingly OVERTLY regular basis. At this particular time, the spiritual disease is more obvious is all that's different... there's no glory or medals in it... far, far from it.

Germany, for instance after "WWII," went thru a similar phoney narcissistic rumination... another run-of-the-mill country... operating on an andro- anglo- macho- deity-centric Fiction. I say, No Surprise in either case!! The point: are any of these type of sub-collectives going to grow up! The Planet cannot takes any more abuse & still sustain such eternally self-pitying rotten little sniveling brats. In fact, the time for correction & humility may be long past, over & gone imo.

Mebbe that's what the Laughing Buddha is laughing about... the joke of men's vanity.

A real State of the Union address by bushaholic.

http://www.bushyoga.com/movie.htm

Well there's always been that Joanna. Humanity is a bad mutha....or at least that's the part we experience. The good ones are quiet, and peaceful.

The old Chinese curse holds true for all generations..."May you live in interesting times.". They're all interesting.

All minds are joined. That's all that gives me hope.

There's a T-shirt.

http://www.northernsun.com/n/s/1981.html

It was great fun to take the political test. I am hanging out with Nelson Mandela and the Dali Lama too. Thanks.
It would be fun now (an insightful) to read a physchological profile of each category.

All AWrs will be disappointed in me, particularly tsela, and I am pretty sure I know which question it was that shifted me. I came out with Fidel Castro and Mahatma Ghandi. I am an AW bad girl. I'm still working on it.

tseka, it's the old warrior/revolutionary/Scorpio I guess. I just don't take it all that well when the whole world is at risk....but I'm working on it.

Pat C... you're in great company imo! Castro was a "Hugo Chevez" decades earlier who fought the "white" plutocracy that held the Peoples in virtual slavery. The average ameriCO has also been loaded with negative USian propaganda on Castro for decades... same-old same-old. The Cuban tourists I've met are very happy with things in their island country. But then, they're not the still-whining-from-Florida plutocrats are they.

Yes, but Joanna, I would never have snuggled up with Khrushchev and put missles on the island. That wasn't a good move, you must admit. His enforced demonstrations and cultural restrictions and that's a strict no no for me too. Poor little Cuba. Chavez is more my type I think.

I think they all have clay feet. sigh

Pat C, Hi!....you must have read the questions wrong or clicked on the wrong answer. lol
Ghandi was a peacemaker, a Nobel Prize Winner, was he not? What question/s was it, Pat C., unless too personal to list here.

While I just created my last post to you, I see several more posts from you and others crossing with mine. I was wondering to myself very seriously, but would not ask you, (too personal) if you had a specific Saturn placement, but I see now that you say it is Scorpio. Wouldn't there be more than one question (there would have to be) in order to sway your outcome. One answer wouldn't do it I don't think. I think this is very interesting, that why I am being so persistent about it.

Yea verily, Pat C... however, from Cuba's pov... with the HUGE ameriCO military/corpo establishment rattling invasion plans a mere 90 mi away... the maneuver was obvious enuf & strong enuf & loud enuf to work. Frankly, I can't think of another strategy that would have worked.

Hmmm, Csstro "ahead of his time" so to speak... an aquarian I do believe. ;O)

My impression was that the test people joined the two of them together as social revolutionaries. Anyway, that was the company I was sharing.

I think it was the trade questions. Complete free flow of trade such as we are seeing with the Chinese is damaging to both the Chinese people and the rest of the world. Flooding the markets being used as a weapon. The only place it was addressed was under protectionism....not a popular thing, but they left no other alternative in the questions.

That's my guess.

I took it really late at night. I'll take it again to see if I am still a social revolutionary. :-D))

Joanna, you're right, Castro needed strong friends since he didn't exactly have the well wishes of the US. The problem is, the friend he chose and the tactic used was so inflamitory, the people who wanted him to do well were left with no choice except to protect themselves from him.

(sigh)

Now I really don't want to cause you any sighing Joanna my seesta.

I quickly took the test again, and nothing changed, so I am still the same Pat C. :-D Mahatma Ghandi was a great soul, and I wouldn't mind sharing a cigar with Fidel. I'm going to have to have a little chat with him about a little more love and tenderness for his people. Think he'll listen? ;-)

From the local rag.....

>>More and more Westerners are seeing the fish, fowl, and wild animals around them as something to cherish rather than something to eat.
A Colorado State University study of values concerning wildlife in 19 states indicates a major shift from traditional beliefs that "wildlife is mainly for human use" toward one in which animals should be protected as "part of our extended family"<<

Hej Pat C

i'm siding with Joanna Oregon on the Castro issue i consider him an idealist...he was amazing organizer, free health care! education! and an appreciation of individual freedom on a certain level we could learn from. Look at what he has accomplished in a country with nearly no natural resources and smack up against a huge American military his country remains autonomous...and very influential in the Carribean.

What fascinated me about the test was the idea of the quadrant rather than a cartesian single line left/right. i'm pondering the idea that Dalai Lama is a leftist libertarian by this paradigm and thinking this is an enlightening new way to consider people in a political context.
PS Pat C you could never disappoint me, you are a deerhearted soul who delights me

JM
isn't this neat? My Bobcat and Raven buddies i hang out with will be glad for the news.

tseka,

This is more than wonderful. I've been a vegetarian for 20 years and I love animals. They are our teachers, I believe.
But most importantly it indicates subtle change about cherishing life after all this death talk.
As the top teeters and falls, the bottom is being built anew already.

I like this so much. So very, very much.

Also, if we could veer our attention away from all these human heroes and anti-heroes toward some of the other great creatures around us, such as the gorgeous and prescient ravens, we will do much better.

Well, hey, my dot lands right there between the Dalai Lama and Nelson M.

So...it appears that the talking points for the GOP continues to be the disasterousness of calling names...as the commander in candyass chief is yet again calling dems and leftists and people who actually want to know the truth '

Ja weelllll i have a Cooper's hawk who has discovered a very effective strategy- he chases a dove into the walls of my house then snags his dinner. Doves are ever abundant and the main course for a lot of animals but the bump and then the sweep up of feathers distrubs me. It also reminds that ruthlessness is a natural part of the cycle. Now a Prarie Falcon and Shapshin hawk are imitating him sigh.

Yeah, birds are something else. Strong survivalists. But they keep us company. Their chatter even beats ours.

i am curious if anyone who lives as i do in a fundamentalist/military republican dominated area noted a low voter turn out. My neighbors are very dispirited and both Arnold and Bush are disliked. Though they still are proudly and fiercely fundamentalist/military republican....i'm looking at the information from the test and thinking how we can convince them that there is another definition right-libertarian not right-fascist that better describes them.
And to you all here; would we find this right-libertarian more agreeable to dealwith? could we find bridges between that right and that left?

Deseret Morning News, Thursday, November 10, 2005

Y. professor thinks bombs, not planes, toppled WTC

By Elaine Jarvik
Deseret Morning News

The physics of 9/11 — including how fast and symmetrically one of the World Trade Center buildings fell — prove that official explanations of the collapses are wrong, says a Brigham Young University physics professor.

In fact, it's likely that there were "pre-positioned explosives" in all three buildings at ground zero, says Steven E. Jones.

In a paper posted online Tuesday and accepted for peer-reviewed publication next year, Jones adds his voice to those of previous skeptics, including the authors of the Web site www.wtc7.net, whose research Jones quotes. Jones' article can be found at

www.physics.byu.edu/research/energy/htm7.html.

http://deseretnews.com/dn/print/1,1442,635160132,00.html

I guess I'm focusing on Castro's supressing of the arts and a few other things, but you and Joanna are correct that he is an outstanding and colorful character, a true revolutionary.

I see all living creatures as nations. There is the horse nation, bird nation, elephant nation, tree nation, fish nation, rock nation, human nation, etc. We are equal in spirit and are all joined.

wv, yup. It will be known eventually.