There she goes again! Cap'n Sally always spells it out so smoothly and thoroughly. And she always indicates the best direction for us as we try to manifest our better human potential. Thanks so much, Cap'n Sally!

Somebody took an April Fool's poll. Michael Jackson came in first, Snarly tied with Paris Hilton for second, and Smirky came in third. I just knew you'd all want to know:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060331/od_afp/usaprilfooljackson_060331221533

This eclipse just keeps on giving.

Ohps. Too bad.

* [Shiavo psychic] Frist Has Lost The Respect Of GOP Colleagues… http://www.time.com/time/columnist/klein/article/0,9565,1179318,00.html

Ohps. Too bad again.

* BLACKBURN, England (AFP) - [Lizard] Rice was to head back from her trip to NW England after a visit which shaped up as a public relations nightmare. ... http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060402/wl_afp/britainusricediplomacy_060402015813

Shy and Joanna you have given me two big belly laughs to go to bed on. Cheney must be happy this is the first time ever that his poll numbers have been above the Chimp. and Joanna, the Frist article just struck me hilarious, they've bought their own spin and they don't know who or what they are or are supposed to be. Now get this, I just heard on my local news that "Condi and Jack Snow (from Britain) made a surprise visit to Iraq to tell them that the PATIENCE of the US and Britain is growing thin, and we have almost done all we can do for them and they must pick a coalition soon." Can you believe that? We've done as much as we could for them? Do these people believe this stuff?

Ahh... speaking of the Lizard & pinkie Brit...

* A Strategy of Massacres - The Mustafa Mosque Massacre was No Accident or Error

Events in Iraq are giving the lie to [regime] claims that all it wants to do is create a stable, democratic Iraq, & then leave.

The US assault on the Mustafa Mosque, & the deaths of, variously, 16 insurgents or 37 unarmed worshippers (depending upon whether you believe the Pentagon or Iraqi police), has prompted calls from the Iraqi govt for the US to hand over control of security in Iraq to the local govt.

Now, if this is what the US govt is trying to do anyway, [rez regime] & the Pentagon s/b very happy. They've just been told, pretty clearly, that they're no longer wanted & they can pack up & go home, right?

But they're not doing it.

Why?

Because [rez regime] has no intention of leaving Iraq, particularly in the hands of its elected Shi'ia-led leadership. Note also that the Iraqi "govt," supposedly sovereign (remember all that talk of handing over sovereignty 2 yrs ago?), is asking the US to turn over control of security in the country to it, not telling it to. Note also that bush & the US ambassador to Iraq have told the country's Shi'ia leaders that they don't want the elected pm-designate, Ibrahim al-Jafari, to be pm.

Some sovereignty!

The truth is that the US is running Iraq from the giant US Embassy compound in the Green Zone, & the Iraqi "govt" remains a puppet regime. The truth is also that the US has been spending billions of dollars not on Iraq reconstruction, which in any case is not being phased out if it ever was being attempted, but on bldg several large, permanent military bases inside Iraq, from which the US has no intention of budging in the foreseeable future. (Want to guess where some of that "missing" $9 billion in US reconstruction money has really gone?) ...
i http://www.counterpunch.org/lindorff03302006.html

* Fitzgerald will seek new WH indictments

It may seem as though it's been moving along at a snail's pace, but the 2nd part of the fed investigation into the leak of covert CIA agt Valerie Plame Wilson is nearly complete, with attys & govt officials who have remained close to the probe saying that a grand jury will likely return an indictment against one or two sr [rez regime] officials. ... In lengthy interviews over the w/e & on Mon, they said that Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has started to prepare the paperwork to present to the grand jury seeking an indictment against WH Dep Chief of Staff kRove or Natl Sec Adviser sHadley. ... http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_644.shtml

This is a poignant plea from this journalist at the Miami Herald, to the Democratic Leadership, it should be blown up to giant size and sent to the DLC, DCCC, DNC and to the Democratic Caucus in Congress, because this is what we, out here, so desperately want.

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/robert_steinback/14209857.htm

Barbara, I still can hardly believe my good fortune in finding this place and it's round the clock exchange of astrological knowledge. Such a great thing to look forward to.

And Sally, thank you ever so much for this exquisite cosmic town hall. I get the feeling that you really and truly care about this hapless human family. Would that our political leaders did.
And you have the great sense to know that if we act naturally and given time, we might eventually come around to our better selves.

What I find very interesting is the Mexican Saturn in Cancer opposite our Pluto in Capricorn. Mex's Saturn indicates destiny lessons about nurturing and caring for her own. So she's foisted the job on this Cancer country who now has problems of her own. I will be watching as Pluto comes to our Pluto and opposes the Mex Saturn, all the while energizing all that composite Aries and the issue of independence and taking care of ones self. Then of course, the Uranus in Aries transit. I think there are about 11,000,000 illegals in the country now and it is an age old way to survive for so many. Mexico will have to look at her responsibility as Pluto comes to her Saturn and things tighten in the US.

It is a phenomenal amount of Neptune in the eclipse chart and I see it as a prelude to the upcoming and important Saturn/Neptune opposition. Neptune dissolves and I think so many illusions will vaporize on all sides.
I've always thought that Iran/Contra has been a continuing saga as these are the same players, and they are about to meet their destiny.
And the corporations are living a pipe dream if they think they can continue in this fantasyland of excessive growth. There was a time when wages were low enough for them and still enough for workers to survive, but no longer. Murdering us would not be cost effective, and starving us would lead to rampant disease, also not cost effective. And that would be an end to their madly consuming customers. So the living wage issue should be a biggie. And the tax structure. The lack of creativity is definitely a large problem. Maybe that will be the thing that influences the ones that will survive.

I think as the old dreams come to an end, new ones will emerge during this planetary cycle, which is why it is such good advice to keep the ideals we would prefer in mind at this time and even start to experiment with them.

Aries is life's kick off point and the energy of the thrust is almost unfathomable. I always think of a germinating seed and the tiny leaves that have the force to crack the earth to get to the light. That thrust gets behind so many expressions in Aries time, and sometimes we don't know exactly where to stick it, which leads to complications. Still, it is magnificent in its pure flaming energy.

More on the disolution; (change from solid to liquid form)
I'm melting............................cackle!
Did anyone else watch Q & A on C-span: with Brian Lamb interviewing Karen Kwiatkowski? ( It's rerunning right now)
She WAS an Eisenhower Repub. and worked for Douglas Feith in the Pentagon. The Iraq desk was beefed up in summer 2002, with neocons
She is sitting there with Brian, reciting all the stuff we have been, searching for, digging up On-line for several years!
She's rattling it all off from intimate knowledge! She worked with Larry Franklin ( sentenced to 12 years for the APIAC scandal) She liked him a "wild & crazy guy"!
Verification is sublime!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The blue herons are back! These prehistoric looking birds are flapping around practically in my back yard!
PQ

Thank you Sally for the above! ( memory jog! eclipse on my venus)
I was in a plane flying to Cap d'Ais France to paint a mural for the then Treasurer of the Nat Gallery of Art.
The dollar devalued while I was in the air. Fortunately my client was willing to renegotiate the price of the job. But it was the beginning of my difficult cycle! But the energy has shifted with this months 8o aries eclipse.
Sorry to personalize this, but dosn't the study of astrology, begin with he effects of the planets, on individuals? I am sharing to be helpful to those who are learning the science. If I am wrong to do so I will stop.
PQ

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/03/business/03labor.html?th&emc=th

Labor Shortage in China May Lead to Trade Shift

SHENZHEN, China — Persistent labor shortages at hundreds of Chinese factories have led experts to conclude that the economy is undergoing a profound change that will ripple through the global market for manufactured goods.

The shortage of workers is pushing up wages and swelling the ranks of the country's middle class, and it could make Chinese-made products less of a bargain worldwide. International manufacturers are already talking about moving factories to lower-cost countries like Vietnam.

At the Well Brain factory here in one of China's special economic zones, the changes are clear. Over the last year, Well Brain, a midsize producer of small electric appliances like hair rollers, coffee makers and hot plates, has raised salaries, improved benefits and even dispatched a team of recruiters to find workers in the countryside.

That kind of behavior was unheard of as recently as three years ago, when millions of young people were still flooding into booming Shenzhen searching for any type of work.

A few years ago, "people would just show up at the door," said Liang Jian, the human resources manager at Well Brain. "Now we put up an ad looking for five people, and maybe one person shows up."

For all the complaints of factory owners, though, the situation has a silver lining for the members of the world's largest labor force. Economists say the shortages are spurring companies to improve labor conditions and to more aggressively recruit workers with incentives and benefits.

The changes also suggest that China may already be moving up the economic ladder, as workers see opportunities beyond simply being unskilled assemblers of the world's goods. Rising wages may also prompt Chinese consumers to start buying more products from other countries, helping to balance the nation's huge trade surpluses.

"The next great story in China is how they are going to move out of the lower-end stuff: the toys, textiles and sporting goods equipment," said Jonathan Anderson, an economist at UBS in Hong Kong. "They're going to do different things."

When sporadic labor shortages first appeared in late 2004, government leaders dismissed them as short-lived anomalies. But they now say the problem is likely to be a more persistent one. Experts say the shortages are arising primarily because China's economy is sizzling hot, tax cuts have helped keep people working on farms, and factories are continuing to expand even as the number of young Chinese starts to level off.

More...

Good morning Pat!!

General Anthony Zinni (ret) is on C-Span here. That's not too bad either!

ttp://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_kent_wel_060402_protectionism_v__exp.htm

Protectionism v. Exposure-ism-- The Realities of "Free Trade" In An Undemocratic World

"America's growing trade deficit is selling the nation out from under us...our country's net worth is now being transferred abroad at an alarming rate. A perpetuation of this transfer will lead to major trouble." Warren Buffett

Missing amongst discussions of trade policies today are any examinations of the corrupt origins of GATT/NAFTA and its on-going lack of democratic process. Clearly, however, no discussion of trade policy can be either relevant or honest without discussion of the capital-controlled, origins of GATT-NAFTA and its enclosure of the vast wage-earning majorities.

In effect, GATT/NAFTA is no less than a coup d’etat by capital, as chronicled in "The Selling Of Nafta" and revealed in polls in 1993 indicating that up to 87% of the people did not then agree with NAFTA. Missing during the entire election of 1993 was any discussion of trade policy by the candidates. Yet immediately after the election, what occurred (amidst a media blackout) was a midnight-style passage of this most important treaty only five days after the election.

Thus, a wholesale re-writing of trade policy - with its crippling loss of tariff freedom and economic sovereignty in a very disparate and undemocratic world - was voted upon by no less than 100 lame ducks, and by a Congress ignorant of both the content, and the effects, of this seminal legislation. In any case, with both GATT/WTO and NAFTA we do not elect our trade representatives nor do we have a National Initiative process by which the people might bypass a bought and paid for Congress, and implement smarter, and more democratic, trade policy.

In short, when you begin with a corrupt process you can only get a corrupt, undemocratic, unwanted, and now widely protested globalization Clearly, if we had a National Initiative, GATT-NAFTA would have been history within a year or two of its devious inception. Unfortunately, no capital-controlled society (like the USA) wishes to give you this basic freedom. In addition, capital’s corporate media has created an information enclosure in which free trade is blameless, unchangeable, and impervious to any democratic processes. We, the people, are simply to await its rapture and banish those nasty protectionists.

As a result of this chicanery and economic fascism, what we have now is forced trade with the greater slave – i.e., one, set to benefit employers alone and hollow out the work and social progress of centuries. Now well down the road to abject dependency, we no longer have the freedom not to trade, nor to adjust horrendous trade imbalances with compensating-incentivizing tariffs. In short, we are forced to reward the greater slave and his worst-of-world conditions, and to compete on the downside rather than the upside.

More...

Just for fun (and to know you're among many), go vote in this poll:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/04/02/bolten.job.ap/index.html

Good morning, Pat QOP. I always love to hear from you.

I have always experienced Aries as the sign of fair play, of people and times when honesty and lack of pretension are held in highest regard. I have found a lack of guile in Aries that is very refreshing.
I personally love a time when people speak their minds openly. I don't find this pugnacious although I suppose it can become that when the instincts repeatedly come up against the spirit of "civility" that masks devious and cruel intenetion. I would always rather be called an SOB or some other name by an Aries than be treated politely by some later sign and have my reputation besmirched by that same "more evolved" type in a way that I can't defend.
Considering the nodal opposition I believe that the more we, collectively, tell "it" as it is for us the stronger and healthier our relationships will be. Right now we need a lot of unadorned truth. Civility has deteriorated into lying and deceit and blessedly now we can say that.

OH!! and.... thank you so much for the article, Sally and for creating this space for all of us to gather and share and grow.
Personally I feel this Aries n node/eclipse so strongly that this is the first year I am not complaining because "they" stole my hour of sleep.

clymela, good points! I've never known an Aries to mince their words, and those that I have known have certainly backed up their words with action.

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

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/04/02/mccain-falwell/

McCain Says Jerry Falwell is No Longer an ‘Agent of Intolerance’

Huh... I have no intention whatsoever to accept that we need "rulers" of any sort. Real leaders are always nice, but not rulers. We don't need "rulers." Old ways/old days. No rulers. Rulers are out, group designated leaders are in. ;O)

That's correct, Pat C! Those "trade agreements" are about as "legal" as making corpos a "person" with full or more "individual rights"... an "off-the-cuff" adendum by a legal aide.

It's just infuriating Joanna. How many crimes can one country absorb and remain standing?

We might even be more grown-up than we thot. Rulers have never had to grow up... they "rule" by edict, not by consensus. Real leaders, esp cultural creatives, may be a whole lot more mature but do loathe using force to get their way... part of being grown-up.

Here is a fairly sane thought on what is in effect, globalization.

Maria Luisa Tucker | Viva La Immigration Debate

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040206H.shtml

Yesterday, as eight states recognized Cesar Chavez Day as an official holiday, some groups recalled Chavez's memory in their own fight for legislation that would provide 11 million undocumented immigrants with a path toward citizenship. Maria Luisa Tucker finds the debate to be a reflection of Chavez himself; like the complex man, immigration reform it is not a simple issue.

She gets it.

Hahahahahaaaaa!! McCain is another looney in the bin. He's not either a "ruler" OR a leader. He's a screen upon which OTHER loonies project. He's out.

We can hope Joanna!!

...........

An Average Joe's Spectacular Lies
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040306J.shtml

Just popping in to post ... hope everybody is well .... Noam Chomsky article ... he's great.

http://www.alternet.org/story/34321/

* Spiritually Incorrect: The subversive comedy of Alan Clements

"Spiritually Incorrect: In Defense of Being Human," is an edgy, hilarious look into the human condition, deconstructing with daring wit & satire the pantheon of contemporary sacred spiritual & political cows. In so doing, he takes no prisoners, & even offers himself up to the firing squad. His show is a thrill ride that careens off track into the hall of mirrors, then surfaces as a clown laughing thru the tears.

It's comedy that ignites conscience, delivered with the anguish of a broken heart howling about propaganda & the awe-full world of paradox. Mercifully, it offers laughter as redemption. It's a drive-by-shooting that stops in for a milkshake & a hug; at the heart of it all is compassion.

It's comic tragedy at its best. If you can't catch one of Alan's live shows, his just-released DVD is a must, buy it from web site at: WorldDharma.com. Proceeds to to raise awareness of Aung San Suu Kyi, Burma's Nobel Prize winner who has been under house arrest for 12 yrs. Her captors wld take her out, & not for dinner, if they cld get away with it.

Spiritually Incorrect is great grassroots art. May the word spread like a prairie fire. - Brock Noyes

As to the comments in previous thread about the possibility of nuclear attack in Texas on Easter Sunday, i didnt think it made much sense since the bushes would probably be at their "ranch" for the holiday. Well . . . http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Texas_paper_Some_say_protestors_make_0402.html
kind of convenient to get that info out now well ahead of time!?!?

Joanna, I think you might be right about McCain. Russert really put him in the fire yesterday and McCain was dancing as fast as he could and not dancing too well. They also had General Zinni on and he was great. Russert let him talk and talk he did about the incompetence that got us into this war and the lies. He said Rumsfeld should be fired and anyone else who was responsible for this. He also said "we cannot leave these people with the mess we created."

What we have here is the disillusionment of Neptune in Leo (1914) and Pluto in Leo (1940) when we (the people) gave our power away to the illusion of illusion. Since 1914 we have been enthralled with the pictures on the big screen, whether it's movies, sports, or TV. We've gone to the movies and pretended to be what we saw, we agreed to pay more and more to those who would entertain us, we loved dress up and the glitz, we swollowed whole the marketing and spin and sound bites replaced intelligence and we bought it. Oh how we loved the Kennedy's and nearly everyone has seemed dull since them.

The beginning and the end of energies in Astrology are weak, that's why they're called critical degrees. Think about it, when you start a project you might be full of energy but you're not sure what you're doing and mistakes are made, at the end of a project you're tired and it's hard to give your best.

That's just an analogy of what we are experiencing with the end of Pluto in Leo generation and so we have this group of moronic petty tyrants, they don't know who they are or what they believe. They do like to pretend and play dress up. Well, pretending is coming to an end in this country and perhaps around the world as we begin to daily see the reality of our world. People are getting very tired of spin passing for policy. This administration is very fond of telling us all the time that it's a new world since 9/11, how right he is, but it's really a "new world." What went before, and that means politics as usual, same old faces, same tired excuses and the people's response to them is gone, corporate way of doing things is gone and they do know they're floundering, like the rest of us they don't know what to do with it.

Pluto in Capricorn will trine the Uranus/Pluto in Virgo generation of the 60's and they will be coming to the fore of leadership. Virgo is a workaholic, clean, healer, feminine, nit picky, detail oriented and in the beginning of their reign they will be demanding, insist on a badly designed health care system (eventually they will get it right they are very sensitive to criticism) they will clean up the environment and they won't care what it costs us. This is just a little of what the Virgo generation will do, and in the beginning they will make mistakes cause they are at the beginning of the project, but they will for sure make us "get real." At least "real" from their perspective. Work and corporations will take on God like status instead of the movie screen, but then will begin to break down as Pluto moves toward the end of Capricorn.

We are frustrated because we are reaching the end of our Leo generation and we know life is changing for us, and change is frightening because we don't know where we are going. Just as our generation reached the zenith of our "Leo" power and we felt comfortable to an extent until it all started breaking up, so will the Virgo generation reach a level of comfortablness at their zenith and we will lose some warmth along the way as a human race. Part of what we are experiencing now is Virgo knocking on the door and the generation gap.

* A line of storms spun off high winds and howling tornadoes today, killing at least 24 people and leaving a swath of shredded buildings and homes across six states. Twenty people were killed in northwestern Tennessee, 12 of them in Dyer County. Dyer County Sheriff Jeff Holt said his county saw "absolute total destruction of homes." http://www.cnn.com/2006/WEATHER/04/03/midwest.tornadoes/index.html

Joanna, and we are in at least the 27th day of rain in SF bay area....depressing as hell, and worse, as Morgana has mentioned. The weather patterns ARE changing again. CA had a drought for most of the 1970's into the 1980's. Now we resembel Seattle! People wonder how we here in SF can stand the idea of living in earthquake land....but I wonder how people can stand the yearly tornadoes, hurricanes, etc..(maybe because I heard too many stories from my Oklahoma born dad about the tornadoes...they are scarier to me than earthquakes)

Sally, McCain is and always has been ....what, a disappointment? that is what I would call him, to be gentle. He has not met his challenges....he is a disappointment as a human being.

But this is a great article.

And did you see that headline? That Jesse Helms has dementia....ya think?????

Well, he isn't a Pluto in Leo generation person; and our generation isn't over yet, as it ran from 1938 to 1958....and I would bet it is including some quite long lived persons. But politicians...they are a special breed. I would say, evolving is not what the majority of them do and we are seeing that now. In the Howe/Strauss book The Fourth Turning they address this (our) group....as the 'prophet' generation. And it ain't pretty at all.... and I think pols really represent that appelation quite well.

glad you finally got this up....

Sorry Judi, I didn't make myself clear. I'm not talking about individuals with the Leo generation, I'm talking about the movement of the energy as it overlaps. We are already seeing the Virgo energy in our high technology beginning when Pluto in Scorpio was in a sextile to itself in Virgo, the rise begins when Pluto goes into a trine and technology will take on a whole new meaning. I don't mean the Leo individual people will fall, it's the Pluto in Leo energy that begins to fall giving rise to a new energy. Balance really takes off when Pluto goes to Aquarius and trines itself with the Libra phase.

Lots of links here to info about CAFTA/NAFTA/DISASTA. Oh, lordy, but this stuff is seriously ugly:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x827670

Terrific Sally. This sums it up: "We need to focus on the fact that we all belong to the sisterhood/brotherhood of mankind and ignore the fallacious and phony class wars governments continuously use to keep us all separated from sharing and getting along."

We can choose what we wish to do with this potent Aires energy available to us. But, we've always been able to CHOOSE. We can hold onto and feed our shitty thoughts or we can investigate, intuit, innovate and honor our s-elves and one another; our samesness and our diversities.

That's very powerful stuff thare shy. Wow.

Sally, you mentioned you wished there was another word rather than 'elite' to describe those in power today. 'Self entitled' might be a more accurate way of describing them since that about sums them up in a succinct, obviously self-descriptive sort of way.

Pickled bushaholic et al won't have any mature response to ANY of the weather disasters either... never has, never will, eh judi? And there're plenty more coming up where they came from... (where's the natl guard when you need them... oh, illegally in Afghanistan & Iraq where they've been edicted INTERnatl guard) Besides that, the cities... waaaay too much pavement.

Lossa rain in Calif... lossa mud slides. All those "multimillion" dollar abodes... sittin on dirt... ready to be mud... ready to slide... ready to be domino theory. ;O)

hello all-
here's the best story yet--was Barbara Bush's father actually ALIESTER CROWLEY?

As usual, read and decide for yourself, but boy, this is some good stuff, true or not.....

http://cannonfire.blogspot.com/2006/04/george-w-bush-barbara-bush-and.html

Also, please note the original post date(4/1/06), but enjoy.

Poll: Who has the most control over immigration?

You'll be among friends here, too.

http://www.cnn.com/CNN/Programs/lou.dobbs.tonight /

Uh-oh, it seems the wingers have discovered a problem with voting machines (at least those owned by a certain group in SA):
http://www.suntimes.com/output/sneed/cst-nws-sneed02.html

WhaddaHOOT!!!!!

* bush cutting back visits to Crawford ranch amid protests, paper to report

Since last summer [rez]'s visits to Crawford TX have been "less visible," which some experts link to demonstrations of antiwar protesters held nearby his ranch, according to an article set for the Waco Tribune-Herald in Mon editions.

According to the Tribune-Herald, the police chief of Waco has said [rez-rot] will not be celebrating Easter there with his family, as he has done in the past. Not everyone agrees that the protesters have kept [rez] away. Some just point to his busy schedule.

The report, by Dan Genz, points out that since protesters have staked out what bush used to call his "little slice of heaven," [rude-rez] has not hosted foreign officials or even held a news conference there.

Excerpts from the forthcoming article:

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Texas_paper_Some_say_protestors_make_0402.html

I apologize for being late to the party, since I assume this has already been asked and answered, but does anyone have the chart for Venezuela?

* End of the rich man’s era?

If you live in a gated community with a house listed at over $1 mn, this isn’t for you — & maybe, just maybe the coming decades will be more for the average American, & less about you.

Not that anyone wants to punish you for success; it’s just that you are detached from the problems of ordinary people: the cost of med care, a job or pension that might disappear, drug-related crime. We may be about to turn sharply on socio-political hinges to the urgent concerns of the average citizen, much like a similar swing in the decade & a half following the turn of the last century. ... http://www.annistonstar.com/opinion/2006/as-editorials-0402-bayerscol-6d01s3432.htm

Shy, the only date I have for Venezuela is

9/22/1830 12:00noon Caracas

Goldensilence: SELF-ENTITLED

Brilliant, I love it and shall use it from this day hence. That is a perfect word to describe those who want to think of themselves as "elite."

Thank you, Cap'n Sally, for the Venezuela info. I'll go astrodienst it.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/03/AR2006040300870.html?referrer=email

A federal jury today found Zacarias Moussaoui eligible to die for his role in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, concluding that Moussaoui’s lies to federal agents paved the way for the deadliest terrorist strike in U.S. history.

The unanimous verdict in U.S. District Court in Alexandria means that Moussaoui’s death penalty trial will now move to a second phase, in which prosecutors will try to persuade jurors to vote for execution while defense lawyers seek to spare his life.

Reading the verdict outside the courthouse, court spokesman Edward Adams said, “By this verdict, the jury has found that death is a possible sentence in this case.”

Earlier, the jury of nine men and three women sent a note to U.S. District Judge Leonie M. Brinkema saying they had come to a decision on whether Moussaoui was eligible for the death penalty for his role in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist plot.

More….

Oh, my! I'm no astrologer, so do keep that in mind when reading this. Venezuela's progressed moon (that means The People, correcto?) is fast approaching their natal (and progressed) Chiron. Also, transiting Pluto is in the middle of their natal Mars-Sun opp, the Sun being at 29 Virgo on the MC and mars at 25 Pisces on the IC. Their progressed sun is now about 25 of Pisces. And, they seem to have about 27 deg Sagittarius rising. Of course, there is much much more. Art, Cap'n Sally, Morgana, Pallas, any comments?

Pat C., the Supremes refused to consider the Padilla case today, too:
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040306B.shtml

Now what? At 2:58 pm, Josh Marshall posted this on talkingpointsmemo.com
"I think Atrios has them dead to rights. The administration is refusing to release this year's Social Security report, apparently in violation of federal law."

I'm not sure shy, but I think they are refusing to hear anything to do with Executive power. I heard something on the radio, but I'm not too sure yet how far they've gone with that.

........

http://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/watch/ww0148.html

Uranus square the ascendant.

EFFECTIVE THIS MONDAY AFTERNOON FROM 415 PM UNTIL MIDNIGHT EDT.

TORNADOES...HAIL TO 2.5 INCHES IN DIAMETER...THUNDERSTORM WIND GUSTS TO 80 MPH...AND DANGEROUS LIGHTNING ARE POSSIBLE IN THESE AREAS.

THE TORNADO WATCH AREA IS APPROXIMATELY ALONG AND 100 STATUTE MILES EAST AND WEST OF A LINE FROM 35 MILES NORTHEAST OF MARTINSBURG WEST VIRGINIA TO 40 MILES EAST OF MYRTLE BEACH SOUTH CAROLINA. FOR A COMPLETE DEPICTION OF THE WATCH SEE THE ASSOCIATED WATCH OUTLINE UPDATE (WOUS64 KWNS WOU8).

REMEMBER...A TORNADO WATCH MEANS CONDITIONS ARE FAVORABLE FOR TORNADOES AND SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS IN AND CLOSE TO THE WATCH AREA. PERSONS IN THESE AREAS SHOULD BE ON THE LOOKOUT FOR THREATENING WEATHER CONDITIONS AND LISTEN FOR LATER STATEMENTS AND POSSIBLE WARNINGS.

OTHER WATCH INFORMATION...CONTINUE...WW 146...WW 147...

DISCUSSION...STRONG TROUGH WILL SWING EWD ACROSS MID ATLANTIC STATES THIS EVENING PROVING VERY FAVORABLE SHEAR AND TO SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT OF SEVERE STORMS FROM THE APPALACHIANS EWD. TORNADO THREAT WILL INCREASE EWD AS INITIAL STORMS ENCOUNTER MORE FAVORABLE LOW LEVEL SHEAR AND GREATER MOISTURE/INSTABILITY AS THEY SPREAD EWD.

AVIATION...TORNADOES AND A FEW SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS WITH HAIL SURFACE AND ALOFT TO 2.5 INCHES. EXTREME TURBULENCE AND SURFACE WIND GUSTS TO 70 KNOTS. A FEW CUMULONIMBI WITH MAXIMUM TOPS TO 500. MEAN STORM MOTION VECTOR 24035.

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

That is an awesome Du thread shy.

thanks for clarifying Sally.....in a strangeway, I am out of step with most of my own generation, as I was born during a couple of month period when Neptune retrograded back into 29 Virgo....and my interests were always with health and psychology while all the people around me were experiementing with Neptune in Libra -marriage and partnerships! That never interested me AT ALL!

Speaking of the effects of the Aries point solar eclipse last week, my real estate friend (who was a staunch repub until suddenly she is working to elect a local good guy DEM out of San Mateo County by cold calling for him! She is suddenly totally in awe of all the powerful female dems supporting this guy (he is a good one)....DiFi, Boxer, Anna Eshoo, everyone except Pelosi so far) told me today that an extraordinary event happened in her BIG and well known real estate office (Sally...you have this company in Denver, too)....2 female agents got into a cat fight IN THE OFFICE...it started with an Asian agent taunting another agent about pregnancy, at which point the taunted agent hauled off and hit this Asian woman across the face....all of this acompanied by 'Fu**** B**** from both of them...the assist. ofice manager called the police, and the two agents (I didn't get if they were with clients or not) ran downstairs and to the parking lot where lots of engine gunning then went on...! Boy! is that ARIES or what!!!! My frined's husband was so shocked he told all his pals at the Elks Club...! that part really cracks me up.

Pat C....the tornado thing....oh that really is so damn scary, especially since it looks as if this isn't the ordinary path of tornados. I do believe we probably have the melting ice caps AND don't forget the huge solar flares that happened last summer to blame....they were really huge. Possibly this is a kind of cyclical pattern.

Joanna....end of the rich man's era? I would think so...our last real 'rich man era' was the 1890's thru the period in the beginning of the 20th century. (That is when my mother's family had the bucks)...what is that, maybe 24-30 years of over the top consumerism? That came from banking, oil, infrastructure (building, railroads, new inventions, expansion in that era). That was also the beginning years of the Neptune/Pluto conj. in Gemini. That cycle lasts 500 years. The previous start was the beginning of the Renaissance....!

It occurred to me that beings Venezuela is a virgo sun, that it may be a forefront in world doings when pluto moves into capricorn & in accord with the pluto in virgo folks moving into power per Miss Sally. And with Venezuela, south & central america. Mexico's Fox had better get its paws out of bushaholic's... you know, pants... & focus its attn to its own yard.

Shylurker, I have been fascinated by south america for the last couple of years....some of the artists who do the work I do and who are represented by my rep out of Ohio live down in Brazil....I was sent pictures of this incredible place they live in, and was ready to move....it is San Luis, Brazil, on the horn of Brazil, right on the Atlantic. But politically, what the southern americas are doing is fascinating. And what if they are doing exactly what the Colonies did in 1770's....throwing off the colonials? Pluto aiding and abetting this!

And with that Venezuala chart....Uranus is going to be there on the 25 Pisces degree around Feb 2010....what do you think, real revolutionary movement then?

Garry...the Crowley article is explosive....and doesn't Babs Bush LOOK an awful lot like Aleister?

Everybody--Buzzflash is posting info that Riverbend is nominated for the British Sam Johnson book prize for non-fiction book.

http://www.buzzflash.com

This is good news--talk about the truth coming out! Nothing could be better than Riverbend gaining an even larger audience worldwide.

I'm a tellin' you.
Those Pluto in Leos need a better costume designer. I could help them out if I weren't so busy with my own costume problems.
And so many Republicans have these high pitched androgen deficient whiny begging voices that drive me out of the room repeatedly. Can't hack it. Bush has ended everything he's said with a question mark. He keeps asking me about freedom. I can't help him anymore. I wish he'd just go figure it all out by himself.

I've thought about this so much. The melodramatic swan song of the P in Leos we are now witnessing in Washington. I think it reached its pinnacle in the Clinton years since all of them...William Jefferson, Hillary, Al, and Tipper... had the Saturn/Pluto conjunction I believe. They were like rock stars trashing the White House. It could easily have been the Sex Pistols or the Animals up there trying to govern.

The book hasn't been written yet on the Saturn/Plutos who thought the universe was theirs and theirs alone. The sad realization of limitation has come to many of them with this 2nd Saturn return, although a few are doing well in the spotlight.
They reached one of their many bottoms with the Rove obsession with Hillary affair. This is government? That was disgusting.
A would-be Shakespearean drama has turned into a special education class, I fear. Or the Three Stooges, if even that good. I still want my ticket money back.

The signs of the Virgo takeover are all over the place. The demand for organic food is increasing exponentially. I got a mailer from Sam's Club announcing their new organic line. Health is becoming big business (Virgo/Cap). Watch for integrative medicine to take off. Maybe we'll be talking about homeopaths rather than homosexuals.
Saturn will transit Virgo soon and add more impetus. The comparative humility and busy-beeness of Virgo might be a welcome change at first.

After the hideous entertainment spectacle they made out of an invasion of a country, I'm ready for something else. The Neptune opposition to Saturn should dissolve the last remnants of this show. I almost became a film maker, and if I had, I surely would not hire any of them.

Shy, the Venezuela chart doesn't look too good in fact quite explosive. With the progressed Sun on their Mars and Pluto going back and forth over it and progressed Moon squaring their Uranus on top of that their progressed and Solar Arc aspects are grim and add up to some kind of explosion within their country.

I do appreciate your taking the time and going to all the trouble to look at Venezuela's chart, Cap'n Sally. I am very disheartened at your prognosis. I so want the Venezuelan people--who've been kept so down for all those centuries--to achieve some peace and prosperity for themselves. Oh, sigh!

Um... ahem... haruumph, jm. I have a pluto/saturn conj & there're millions & millions of us that are working for social justice. You must mean some other pluto/saturn conj folks, yes? ;O)

...in leo... Chaaa!

Of course, Joanna. I've got one too!

Mebbe we're all too much thinking in terms of violence when we see energy-generating aspects. During the Clinton years, there wasn't all that war fear. Mebbe Venezuela will use that energy to really get a lot done... it doesn't have to be awful or negative. And since he's working with the majority of the people instead of the closed-up hard "self-chosen," that's an excellent indication there'll be a lot of flexibility imo. Virgo knows how to work... great for mars.

That's what I thot, jm! You're certainly not awful & wasteful but very creative & resourceful! Fascists just have a real hard time being flexible you think? ;O)

I will say this. I was always aware of the destructive and creative potential of this configuration. I've held off and worked slowly at developing the talent that comes with this thinking that patience and time should be applied before exercising the power that it contains. That's why I thought those aforementioned pols were not going to fare well since they were too abortive. Now Gore seems to be taking it seriously and it will be interesting to see what he does.
I Don't know what you've done, but I think by waiting patiently for the spotlight, the chances for using it well in the socially responsible way, are much better. How to blend the tremendous ego desires with that responsibility is quite a challenge and I think it takes maturity.
This is it though, this second return. Time to get out there.

Yes, absolutely yes, Joanna, on the flexibility. Fascists are not exactly yogis.

Shy, it may be sad but true that nothing of value is birthed without the pain of that birth. It's true they've been held down a long time and they've put up with so much, with the Moon involved I would expect things to explode and then find their way back to peace and prosperity. I've said this before, but we forget I think, Pluto destroys all that is fake or standing in the way of self-actualization and authenticity and while coming back will put something better in its place if we work at it. Venezuela has the opportunity to spin away all that kept them down but it won't walk away on its own. This chart does not deny peace and prosperity, not at all, it just says it won't be right now.

Oh, thank you for the kind words, Cap'n Sally. You can only call 'em as you see 'em. I am very aware of my ignorance, but I did have an uneasy feeling just seeing what I saw in that progressed chart with my ignorant eyes. Well, we'll just have to keep hoping for the people of Venezuela--and all oppressed peoples all over the world! Again, many thanks.

1946 was the first year of the Saturn/Pluto conjunction in Leo, and it was in August that is began. Clinton is at the end of August, it is about a 10 degree applying spread...so in a sense, Clinton represents the BEGINNING of that conjunction. Hillary has the conjunction at 5 degrees separating....this really does represent the birth of the Yuppies. It was only 46/47/48 when it operated. AND I also think it means that those lucky enough to have that conjunction will transform or die....

So I mean, how do you explain Dick Cheney?
hahahah....

How the GOP Became God's Own Party

By Kevin Phillips

Now that the GOP has been transformed by the rise of the South, the trauma of terrorism and George W. Bush's conviction that God wanted him to be president, a deeper conclusion can be drawn: The Republican Party has become the first religious party in U.S. history.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12617.htm

===
Injustices of the West Against The Arab World

Lecture By Robert Fisk

Fisk is more determined than ever to prosecute a case against the injustices of the west against the Arab and Muslim world. Agree with him or not, his presentations are suffused with passionate belief in change for the better. This talk was recorded recently in Sydney, as part of the Sydney Ideas 2006 public lecture series organised by the University of

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12611.htm

===
America's war on the web

By Neil Mackay
Investigations editor

IMAGINE a world where wars are fought over the internet; where TV broadcasts and newspaper reports are designed by the military to confuse the population; and where a foreign armed power can shut down your computer, phone, radio or TV at will.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12609.htm

===
Government in secret talks about strike against Iran

By Sean Rayment, Defence Correspondent

It is believed that an American-led attack, designed to destroy Iran's ability to develop a nuclear bomb, is "inevitable" if Teheran's leaders fail to comply with United Nations demands to freeze their uranium enrichment programme.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12603.htm

===

De Lay will not run for Congress again!
Damn, I guess that seat is out of play for the Dems.

That's wonderful & great news, Roderick... where'd you find that?

Shy,

Venzuela's Ascendant IS 26 Sag so they are in the midst of a massive change of "personality" - if the ascendant represents the country's personality and that of the people - - they have been quite assertive for awhile - nevertheless it seems to be valid that there is trouble of several kinds ahead - Chavez certainly will be in danger, and I don't know their history of earthquakes and tsunamis and volcanoes (most of the western/pacific coast of all of South America is volcanic) but as Pluto and Uranus aspect that Mars and the Natal IC(4th house cusp) of the land of Venezuela - I think they'll have more than war to worry about - I think it's very likely the earth under their feet will be moveing and spouting fire. That is not to say there won't be war (trace the progressed Moon back to its natal place and it straddles the 12th house cusp of a secret yet known enemy) and financial attacks over the oil represented by Mars in Pisces.

Yes, breaking news, delay dropping out of race knowing he'll lose.

Roderick, why do you say this?

"Damn, I guess that seat is out of play for the Dems."

Isn't there a Texas dem who could get the seat?

Here's one place. ;O)

* Sources: DeLay to leave House re-election race
Former majority leader to announce move Tue

DeLay will drop out of his re-election race, two [necroporn] congressional sources told CNN Mon. DeLay was forced to step down as Hse maj leader last year after being indicted in his home state of TX. DeLay told Time maga Mon that he & his wife, Christine, had been prepared for an election battle, but that he decided Wed to spare his suburban Houston dist the mudfest to come. [I'll bet... so kind all of a sudden]

"This had become a referendum on me," he told the mag. "So it's better for me to step aside & let it be a referendum on ideas, [necroporn] values & what's important for this dist." (Full story) DeLay was calling supporters/colleagues Mon night to tell them of his decision ... was expected to announce his departure at a news conf Tue morning. ... http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/04/03/delay.election/index.html

Thanks, Pallas, for looking at the Venezuela chart. Chavez is stepping on some very big toes and I do fear that the people of Venezuela will pay if/when the big toes put on big boots and stomp around down there. Y'know what I mean.

Pallas1800: Isn't there a Texas dem who could get the seat?

Roderick: Maybe but I think that the stench that is currently engulfing DeLay would made that seat easier for a Dem to claim and the possibility of DeLay returning to a leadership position could have turned off Republican voters in other close races.

to bad Anne Richardson is sick-

maybe Moly Ivins could be talked into running -
she'd give em hell and I bet she'd have a good chance to be elected.

Who is a potential democratic winner for his seat?
Anybody know?

This seems to be the only democratic senator with any guts - and who also remembers there's a Constitution.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,190226,00.html

Feingold for President.

I live just off the coast of Venezuela. I'm pretty sure the US is using my island as a staging post to keep an eye on or attack Venezula.

PS - Venezula (and the Orinoco Delta) may have more oil reserves than Saudi Arabia!

Oh my gosh Mars, I can't believe this administration would be that stupid and yet nothing they have done thus far would indicate they could respond in a sane manner. No wonder Chavez is making deals with Russia and China. If the time for the Venezula (12:00 noon) is correct (but I have my doubts) but with a 26 Sag. asc and Pluto on that Asc. but in a trine to the natal Saturn, I think they might get out from that because I believe Russia and maybe China would back the US off. I do worry about Chavez personally however. A friend of mine just returned from there and she said things were somewhat better than they were a few years ago, is that true? She said there was a great deal of building going on. What do you think of Chavez, in this country, as you know, there are mixed reviews. From my perspective he seems to be the best hope of Venezula thus far, but that is just my perspective and I don't know how the people there feel.

So Tom Delay is an Aries. Did someone mention something about an Aries eclipse?

Peculiar delay's particulars: 4/8/47 - 9:47 pm CST - Laredo TX

Clymela: Sorry I didn't respond to your post. This last weekend was the first clear-sky weekend around here in a while, so I just had to get away. Thank you very much for your post; and please, never put yourself down as a "redneck" or ever look down on yourself. Working-class people made this country what it is. I admire that your spirit is still intact in spite of life's hardships. May God bless you and your family.

To Marta:
Some comment you made above had a tinge of hostility toward Mexicans and Cubans. If that wasn't the case, please accept my apologies. I jumped the gun.
Regarding people signing up for benefits when they're not entitled to, I think that's a gop myth. Why would anybody want to live on such a tight budget? I've read that those benefits are fit for a homeless person. Besides, illegals are not entitled to anything here in Texas. Texas is a very stingy place, yet our property taxes are sky high. We may not have state income taxes here, but they make up for that with a myriad of other taxes attached to everything, even the air we breathe, literally.
I met a Chilean lady in college. She was very pleasant. I'm glad to hear from you. You sound like a courageous woman by the way you've handled your life. More power to you.
I could sense the xenophobia currently in effect building several years ago. The right-wing websites are exploding with hate. Don't they know that hate is harmful to a person's health? The corporations are outsourcing jobs and bringing in foreigners to take over high tech jobs. I live in Austin, TX, and I've seen Dell's buses filled with Hindus taking them to work. But Americans don't complain about that. I know that the culprits are Dell and the other hi-tech companies; I'm not gonna attack the innocent Hindus.
In a related matter, I read somewhere that Asians (Asia is such a large continent, does that include all the other nationalities sharing that vast space?) are entitled to business loans subsidized by the US gov't. No wonder we get boatloads and planeloads coming here, and not all of them legal. But the right-wing and some lefties are only concerned about Mexican immigrants, and accuse them of some Aztlan plot to take over the land. That is insane. No one I know has ever heard of Aztlan. Some time ago, a long article in Austin-American Statesman revealed that American employers place ads in the interior Mexican papers asking illegals to come to the US, and promising them jobs. No wonder the illegals are coming in hordes.
At just about any restaurant I go to there are Latino employees doing the cooking, etc. Even one of the "Japanese" chefs was a Latino. Recently, I left my sweater at an Indian restaurant. My husband tried to pick it up, but everyone there spoke only Spanish and my hubby had to call me to translate. The same week, I went to a cajun restaurant for lunch and, outside, the manager was posting a handwritten sign in Spanish looking for workers. I told him "you misspelled that." A minute later, the manager came to my table and asked me to give him the correct spelling, and I did. Afterwards, I fell terrible because I had just contributed to the illegal alien problem by helping this unscrupulous employer. And when we go to the most expensive restaurants, it never fails that there is a long table filled with Hindus. After seeing the Dell buses, I can't help wondering, and I may subconsciously or even openly resent it; but ultimately, I recognize that it is all a ruse to lower American salaries, and refuse to fall for the xenophobic trap.

DeLay to announce resignation today around 9 am--what does the chart for this event show?

Hillary's no shoo-in with this crowd
By Tina Daunt
Times Staff Writer

April 4, 2006

Depending on whom you talk to in Hollywood these days, Hillary Clinton is either too conservative, too polarizing, too famous, too stiff or — keep this to yourself! — too sexy.

And those are just the opinions of the celebrities who vote Democrat. (Don't even ask what the few Republicans had to say.)

Once the darling of the industry's liberal set, Clinton has come under attack from some as she starts to line up support for what many feel will be a run for the presidential nomination. But that's not unusual for Hollywood — it's almost like a rite of passage, says veteran Democratic strategist Bill Carrick: You haven't really made it as a politician here until the stars line up to kick your tires.

Hillary's no shoo-in with this crowd
By Tina Daunt
Times Staff Writer

April 4, 2006

Depending on whom you talk to in Hollywood these days, Hillary Clinton is either too conservative, too polarizing, too famous, too stiff or — keep this to yourself! — too sexy.

And those are just the opinions of the celebrities who vote Democrat. (Don't even ask what the few Republicans had to say.)

Once the darling of the industry's liberal set, Clinton has come under attack from some as she starts to line up support for what many feel will be a run for the presidential nomination. But that's not unusual for Hollywood — it's almost like a rite of passage, says veteran Democratic strategist Bill Carrick: You haven't really made it as a politician here until the stars line up to kick your tires.

Have no idea how link got left out...

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-hillary4apr04,0,4415383.story?coll=la-headlines-entnews

April 4, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor

The Wall That Keeps Illegal Workers In
By DOUGLAS S. MASSEY
Princeton, N.J.

THE Mexican-American border is not now and never has been out of control. The rate of undocumented migration, adjusted for population growth, to the United States has not increased in 20 years. That is, from 1980 to 2004 the annual likelihood that a Mexican will make his first illegal trip to the United States has remained at about 1 in 100.

What has changed are the locations and visibility of border crossings. And that shift, more than anything, has given the public undue fears about waves of Mexican workers trying to flood into America.

Until the 1990's, the vast majority of undocumented Mexicans entered through either El Paso or San Diego. El Paso has around 700,000 residents and is 78 percent Hispanic, whereas San Diego County has three million residents and is 27 percent Hispanic. Thus the daily passage of even thousands of Mexicans through these metropolitan areas was not very visible or disruptive.

This all changed in 1992 when the Border Patrol built a steel fence south of San Diego from the Pacific Ocean to the port of entry at San Ysidro, Calif., where Interstate 5 crosses into Mexico. This fence, and the stationing of officers and equipment behind it, blocked one of the busiest illicit crossing routes and channeled migrants toward the San Ysidro entry station, where their numbers rapidly built up to impossible levels.

Every day the same episode unfolded: the crowd swelled to a critical threshold, whereupon many migrants made what the local press called "banzai runs" into the United States, darting through traffic on the Interstate and clambering over cars.

Waiting nearby were Border Patrol officers, there not to arrest the migrants but to capture the mayhem on video, which was later edited into an agency documentary. Although nothing had changed except the site of border crossings, the video gave the impression that the border was overwhelmed by a rising tide of undocumented migrants.

In response to the ensuing public uproar, the policy of tougher border enforcement was expanded to all of the San Diego and El Paso area in 1993 and 1994. So migrants began going to more remote locations along the border in Arizona. In 1989, two thirds of undocumented migrants came in through El Paso or San Diego; but by 2004 two-thirds crossed somewhere else. (My statistics on Mexican immigration come from a study I have been undertaking with financing from the National Institutes of Health since 1982.)

Unlike the old crossing sites, these new locations were sparsely settled, so the sudden appearance of thousands of Mexicans attracted considerable attention and understandably generated much agitation locally. Perceptions of a breakdown at the border were heightened by news reports of rising deaths among migrants; by redirecting flows into harsh, remote terrain the United States tripled the death rate during border crossing.

Less well known is that American policies also reduced the rate of apprehension, because those remote sectors of the border had fewer Border Patrol officers. My research found that during the 1980's, the probability that an undocumented migrant would be apprehended while crossing stood at around 33 percent; by 2000 it was at 10 percent, despite increases in federal spending on border enforcement.

Naturally, public perceptions of chaos on the border prompted more calls for enforcement and the hardening strategy was extended to other sectors. The number of Border Patrol officers increased from around 2,500 in the early 1980's to around 12,000 today, and the agency's annual budget rose to $1.6 billion from $200 million. The boundary between Mexico and the United States has become perhaps the most militarized frontier between two nations at peace anywhere in the world.

Although border militarization had little effect on the probability of Mexicans migrating illegally, it did reduce the likelihood that they would return to their homeland. America's tougher line roughly tripled the average cost of getting across the border illegally; thus Mexicans who had run the gantlet at the border were more likely to hunker down and stay in the United States. My study has shown that in the early 1980's, about half of all undocumented Mexicans returned home within 12 months of entry, but by 2000 the rate of return migration stood at just 25 percent.

The United States is now locked into a perverse cycle whereby additional border enforcement further decreases the rate of return migration, which accelerates undocumented population growth, which brings calls for harsher enforcement.

The only thing we have to show for two decades of border militarization is a larger undocumented population than we would otherwise have, a rising number of Mexicans dying while trying to cross, and a growing burden on taxpayers for enforcement that is counterproductive.

We need an immigration policy that seeks to manage the cross-border flows of people that are inevitable in a global economy, not to repress them through unilateral police actions.

Douglas S. Massey, a professor of sociology at Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, is the author of "Beyond Smoke and Mirrors: Mexican Immigration in an Age of Economic Integration."

WV,

do you have a link for that article please?

http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?emx=x&pid=73753

Noam Chomsky on War Crimes in Iraq
Returning to the Scene of the Crime

The Tragic Irony of John McCain's Faustian Bargain (142 comments )

A lot of people are angry at John McCain -- and with good reason. His contemptible performance on this week's Meet the Press was enough to make any sentient person's blood boil.

For a dose of this ire, check out georgia10 at Kos who proclaims "the death of McCain the Maverick", Paul Krugman who raises the notion that McCain has become "a cynical political opportunist", Cenk Uygur who says McCain "is a shell of his former self." and Rachel Sklar who slams his "transparent political backtracking."

But I come here not to condemn John McCain but to weep for him.

Watching a true American hero hang a For Sale sign on his principles is a profoundly sad thing. Especially for me.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/the-tragic-irony-of-john-_b_18409.html?view=print

This falls under the category of weird science. http://www.sas.org/tcs/weeklyIssues_2006/2006-04-07/feature1p/index.html -- a Rumsfled wetdream. In fact, Dr. Pianka may be one of the few scientists who have gained admittance to the whitehouse. I also wonder if this is part of the PNAC? (Twisted sense of humor this morning.)

http://www.wcpo.com/news/2006/local/04/03/blackwell_shares.html

Blackwell bought Diebold stock in 2005

Blackwell Held Shares In Election-Machine Maker

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell revealed Monday he accidentally invested in shares of voting-machine manufacturer Diebold Inc. last year, a period when he was sued by other manufacturers over contracts that Diebold was up for. In a required ethics filing, Blackwell, who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor, said his investments are directed by an accountant and financial adviser without his knowledge or help, "similar to a blind trust."

He said a manager of his investments account at Credit Suisse First Boston bought 178 shares of Diebold stock at $53.67 per share in January 2005. Blackwell said the manager did not follow instructions to avoid such investments.

He said 95 shares were later sold at a loss but he still held 83 shares until discovering them and liquidating them Monday, also at a loss. He discovered them while reviewing his 2005 investments to prepare for Monday's filing with the Ohio Ethics Commission, a form required of all statewide candidates.

"While I was unaware of this stock in my portfolio, its mere presence may be viewed as a conflict and is therefore not acceptable," Blackwell said in a letter dated Monday included in his filing.

January 2005 also was the month Blackwell ordered that counties should use optical-scan voting machines rather than more expensive touch-screen systems. The company predicted it would earn less money in 2005 because of Blackwell's decision.

That didn't stop Texas-based Hart Intercivic Inc. from suing, saying the order left two rivals, Diebold and Election Systems & Software, eligible for bidding. Blackwell reversed his decision in April and announced a deal with Diebold of $2,700 per touch-screen machine.

More..

Jo

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/04/opinion/04massey.html

They have changed the way you look at the NYTimes
today

Hmmmm, that man should have a little talk with the border patrol, north and south, about the cut in funding and people. It's dramatic.

Karen, wow!

Sex tourism thriving in Bible Belt minutes ago

By Verna Gates and Mickey Goodman

ATLANTA (Reuters) - In a sleazy hotel room, "Brittany," then aged 16 and drugged into oblivion, waited for the men to arrive. Her pimps sent as many as 17 clients an evening through the door.

A "john" could even pre-book the pretty young blonde for $1,000 a night, sometimes flying in and then flying out from a nearby airport.

None of this happened in Bangkok or Costa Rica, places that have become synonymous with sex tourism and underage sex.

It took place in Atlanta, the buckle of the U.S. Bible Belt, where the world's busiest passenger airport provides a cheaper, more convenient and safer underage sex destination for men seeking girls as young as 10.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/04042006/6/n-usa-sex-tourism-thriving-bible-belt.html&printer=1

WV,

I can't get behind the sub wall, but I found this link, which has some graphs and some more info...

http://www.ilw.com/articles/2005,1207-massey.shtm

Karen, you may want to read this diary at dKOS... seems there is some smearing of the doctor going on...

---------

Ominous New Developments

by DarkSyde

Tue Apr 04, 2006 at 04:35:58 AM PDT

Several members of the Texas Academy of Sciences (TAS) have reportedly been receiving harassing, in some cases threatening, e-mail or phone calls over the last 24 hours, ostensibly because of the gross misunderstanding and/or intentional smearing of University of Texas professor Eric Pianka.

[Link] A University of Texas biology professor has been targeted by talk radio, bloggers and vitriolic e-mails -- including a death threat -- after a published report that he advocated death for most of the population as a means of saving the Earth.

To briefly review, DR Pianka of the University of Texas has been giving lectures on population dynamics and speculating on possible agents of pandemic. Some person or persons, at least one of which has since had a change of heart, picked up on this and somehow came to the erroneous conclusion that Pianka was advocating or actively engaged in engineering deadly pathogens to kill up to 90 percent of the world's population. One even bragged that he had reported Pianka to the Department of Homeland Security as a possible terrorist threat.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/4/4/73558/61378

Hey Jo! I'm laughing myself silly because the growing controversy over Pianka's comments is coincidental to this http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article12609.htm (I believe wv posted this link above) about planting information on the internet favorable to US (PNAC) goals.

It's still not beyond belief (to me) that spreading a viral agent (aka bird flue, etc.) has not been considered as a tool for thinning the population. While Pianka may have been slandered by Mims, who was there to record the presentation? Apparently the camera was disengaged during Pinak's presentation. So, what IS the truth? And who will tell it?

Back down the rabbit hole. . .:)

Little Moon, you are sweet. Thank you, and no, I don't have anything against Cubans or Mexicans, both nationalities whom I adore. They have to be the sweetest, FUNNIEST, loudest (the cubans) in the world. I work almost exclusively in the hispanic market which is why I know a little about this stuff because my clients tell me ... My two best friends are Cuban and the other one is from Mexico. And we three discuss these same issues all the time. We are all americans, no matter where we were born. Naturally, these are delicate subjects and they are touched upon with respect, with kindness, and trying to understand.

For me it is especially difficult because it is my nature to root for the underdog and for those less privileged. But what we see happening alot here in Miami is fraud and a sense of over entitlement. One example is people who make too much money to qualify for medicaid applying for it by lying about their income so they don't have to pay for private insurance. This happens ALOT. My cousin just arrived here and couldn't afford private insurance. Hey, no problem! She found out exactly how to fill out the form and what to say and yada, yada, yada from another person who had already done it and had been told, don't worry, everybody does it. And, much to my horror, was going to do it until I sat her down and explained that it's FRAUD! And she shouldn't DO IT! That it's wrong! Her husband makes $50k a year (or did when they first arrived - now he has group insurance through his employer). But this is the stuff that goes on and this is the reason that our social systems are breaking under the strain.

Anyway, as a result of this and probably many other issues, now Florida wants to cut benefits. So who suffers in the end? The people who most need it. A few years ago, up until rules were made to end the practice, many cubans would bring their elderly parents to live with them in Florida. Why? To put them on medicaid. As a result the system was almost bankrupted. The end result, Floridians who had lived here all their lives and contributed to the system saw their benefits cut.

I don't know what the answers are and I know that these are merely examples and I don't lump everybody into these categories. But it's the age old adage ... a rotten apple spoils the bunch.

In the end, these are the things nobody wants to talk about ... and when they are spoken of people are called names and told they're prejudiced (sp?). It's time that the truth be spoken. Nothing is going to change until we start speaking plainly. Political correctness has gotten confused with sweeping the truth under the rug and not confronting unpleasantness. We no longer know how to dialogue and exchange thoughts without exchanging insults. In the end the conversation ends with nothing accomplished.

Thank you for your kindness Little Moon. I really appreciate it.

On another note, I wonder how Cybear is doing ????

marta, sadly, too many do not see the huge train coming down the track. Race is an old trap, and it effectively distracts from what this administration, an agent of corporate hegemony, are doing. If they succeed, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights all these people have been so use to quoting will be quaint historical documents. We aren't far from it, and there are few eyes to see.

http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/04/04/epa_campaigning.php

EPA Campaigning?

When President Bush named Stephen Johnson to head the EPA, he made much of the fact that Johnson was a scientist and that he would “place sound scientific analysis at the heart of all major decisions.”

People are still wondering what kind of “scientific analysis” was behind Johnson’s recent decision to headline a $300-a-head fundraiser for Republican congressional candidate Rick O’Donnell in Denver—in what has been described as perhaps the most hotly contested congressional race this year.

The fundraiser invitation—“Subject: Fundraiser with Administrator of EPA Stephen L. Johnson for Rick O'Donnell this Thursday”—itself has raised eyebrows because it is technically a violation of the Hatch Act to use a federal official’s title in a political capacity. The invite came from a lobbyist with the Greenberg Traurig firm (famous for its alumni Jack Abramoff and Michael Scanlon).

The EPA has disavowed any wrongdoing in the matter, even though several reporters contacted Johnson’s staff in advance to inquire why he was attending an event that, at the very least, appeared to be legally suspect.

The Denver Post disclosed last week that the small group who attended the March 9 fundraiser included the coal, oil and gas industries—essentially a rogue’s gallery of the biggest polluters in Colorado—lobbyists eager to buy private access to a guy who, in theory, regulates their businesses.

"This just smells,” says Colorado Democrat Diana DeGette. “Regular people don't get this kind of access to the head of the EPA." She said she and other members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee are considering filing an ethics complaint.

Links within text

Clymela: Sorry I didn't respond to your comment. I went away for the weekend. Clymela you sound wonderful. Never put yourself down because of your "working-class" heritage. What is that anyway? Most people have to work. Working-class people made this country great; always be proud of that. Bless you and your family.
Jo: Thank you for your compliment. I'm glad you're posting regularly once again. Please don't go away again.
Marta: I thought I detected some tinge of hostility toward Mexicans and Cubans. My mistake, I apologize. I had a Chilean classmate in college; very nice and classy lady. It's nice to learn about your background. You sound like a very courageous and determined lady. More power to you.
Regarding benefits, Texas is the stingiest state in the nation. This is not a good place for the poor, the elderly and the disabled. Illegals are ineligible to get anything.
Austin is a high-tech mecca. I've seen the numbers of what I perceive to be people with H-1B visas increasing. The Dell buses are full of those seemingly foreign workers, but Americans don't complain about that. They're going for the weakest link instead.
Last week, I stopped for lunch at a Cajun eatery. The manager was posting a sign in Spanish outside the window looking for workers. I told him "you misspelled that" (I couldn't resist/My virgo moon at work). Later he came to my table and asked me for the correct spelling. Now I feel bad that I unwittingly helped this employer in his quest for cheap labor. The same week, I left my sweater at an Indian restaurant. The next day my husband went to pick it up; he was sent to the back of the restaurant to talk to the workers. They were all Latino and no one spoke English. My hubby had to call me on the phone to translate.
There was an article in the local paper that stated that American corporations place ads in interior Mexico's newspapers asking for workers to come to the US, with the promise of jobs. No wonder the illegals are coming in hordes; they already know who's hiring even before they embark on their perilous journey.
The political motto to stir the masses used to be "It's the Economy Stupid." Now the new motto should be: "It's the Employers/Corporations Stupid."
Regarding the Aztlan conspiracy. That's a right-wing myth. No one I know has ever heard of such insanity. The one strange website the wingnuts keep referring to has a bird's eye view logo of a masonic pyramid on its webpage. That should tell you something.

Sorry for the rewrite. I thought my post last night didn't go through. C'est la vie.

Weather Update....rained like crazy this morning....the rain closed hyw 17 in San Jose/Santa cruz (Morgana's territory)...my son in law is stuck on the highway there. (Morgana, he builds cell sites for Cingualr and was walking jobsites in San Jose)....

On a hunch this morning I ran a progressed chart for my daughter....and found she has Pallas and Mars conjunct in her progressed at 26' Sag. More CG and Pluto....she is supposed to have surgery on friday....for problems associated with childbirth...fistula/abscesses of the anal area. Could it get any more Plutonian?

whoops...forgot to post that those progressions are squaring her natal pluto at 26 Virgo. This is, of course, true of her generation (born. 1969)....the first Pluto square. So all you who are that age, this is happening a bit earlier than the first square did for my generation (mine was at 40), which was about 4 years later. And if you think about it, it isn't all that bad. If you had been born with Pluto in a sign which takes 20 years to make a transit, followed by a couple more 20-30 year transits, you'd be an old person before getting any of THOSE particular benefits....(I happen to thinnk it IS a benefit to have a Pluto transit)

So..deLay is getting HIS pluto Saturn heads up now? Surely he has something nefarious going on....an alternative of somekind which is allowing him to give up his seat....I'd bet big dollars, if I had any.

And I'm sure you'd win Judi.

To All,

Nick Lampson is the Democratic challenger to Tom DeLay's district 22 in Texas.

As far as I know he is still in the running but NPR reported this afternoon that it is not only a bad day for DeLay, but Lampson as well.

The reason being that oddles of money (millions) was expected to be received by Lampson in an effort to defeat DeLay since he is reviled by so many. They were willing to put up large amounts of money to see him defeated. All of that has changed now and Lampson's prospects are up in the air right now.

However, he has held previous congressional seat/s before DeLay's illegal re-districting cut him out from District 9, I believe. He moved to the 22nd district specifically to run against DeLay. Also....He Is Very Popular in Texas.
Don't you think his success will be depend on who will replace DeLay?

I posted his birthday on Nancy's site earlier in the year prior to the Texas primary. I will look for it when I get home and repost here. I have no time of birth though.

here is his site with an update
http://lampson.com

I have pretty much caught up with my reading here since the 31st of March when I took some time off. Thank you everyone for your comments. I read them all.

Sally, I saw your comments previously about swearing and foul language and am clear about that but also noticed a couple of posts about "talking too much personal stuff and not enough astrologically".....about savior complex and such. Can I ask you about your feeling or wishes about talking personally. Do we do this too much? Sometimes it is very hard to remain just fact based. Could you clarify please. Does anyone else have similar questions or concerns.

Beverly! So great to hear from you. How are things going? Are you settling in to the job now? I do hope so.

Beverly, I don't know how Sally feels but I think sharing personal experiences helps us understand astrology and how it affects each of us. And it also helps to maintain some small degree of sanity. I have never actually met any of you but I consider the people on this board as friends. I don't think we should put too many restrictions on conversation as long as we are civil. We always come back to the astropolitical element. Maybe Sally and others feel differently and I will abide by whatever restrictions are placed here but I might spend more time under the bed like shylurker used to.

Tom DeLay is going to greener pastures for sure. Into the Lobbying bidness I dare predict. It's probably one of the most powerful and lucrative work in our country.

Being an open ended type of work there are no rules one must follow to enter the lobbying field. No conflict of interest rules to impede or restrict. The only question in my mind, is who will he be working for?

Teresa, I absolutely agree with you and feel that we are all kindred spirits. I love the astrology, politics, and the personal sharing as well. Thank you for responding to my question.

Skylurker: I just love you! You are one of the most thoughtful and gracious people here! I am getting on but at $7.50 hour must keep looking. Michigan's minimum wage will go up to $7.00 in October, 2006 with additional increments phased in over a 2 year period. I will be just $.50 over minimun wage at that time if still there. I can't figure out if we were threatened with our jobs going to China in a meeting this a.m., but the pospect was mentioned and also about how much more cheaply the work can be done there! Amazing.

Golden, I think DeLay will end up with a new career in lobbying too but would rather him spend a few years in prison first to get the hang of ethics and morals. Don't you think he will work in the oil/gas/energy lobby? But with all "that" drying up, he may find something else more lucrative. He can pick and choose, I'm sure. He seems suited to gas/oil/energy though.

Beverly, I too hope he does time. But even if he is convicted he's been so valuable and would continue to be valuable to the neo-cons that Bush is sure to pardon him. It would surprise me if he does time, even if convicted.

DeLay will never change his stripes. Even in his announcement he claimed God was guiding him and he tried to make it look like he's being too thoughtful of the constituents to drag them through the mud (that others will fling at him).

Oil is a high probability, but maybe he'll work for something that will benefit the Carlyle Group and directly impact the fortune of the Bush family, like lobbying for weapon companies. He would have to be grateful for being pardoned.

Sally, do you see anything astrologically regarding the 4th paragraph in this Bob Chapman article? I'm afraid to even quote the sentence.
http://www.theinternationalforecaster.com/trainwreck.php?Id=116&PHPSESSID=249a4bc8f778fe963e6bad80772fce28
But if it's true, that means no war with Iran!

Little Moon

That is a clear and well stated article. I think he's right. The Iran bluff has been something to further upset us, I think. I even have thought that they are in on the game. The Iranian Shia are now in power in Iraq, Halliburton is doing business in Iran, and the cast of characters go along way back as business partners in the international money schemes, Iran Contra included.
This also verifies my feeling that Bush is entirely under the gun. Plans are always having to be adjusted and business is paramount. Things are changing.

There is a new film coming out about the Masons and illuminati and how they used the creation of America as an experiment in setting up a pradise on earth. They used countless mystical techniques, but they aren't stupid, and I think they realized long ago that they failed, and now are trying to keep some economic control. You can't use spirutual secrets for these nefarious goals. It never works.

The new development is that they are no longer working in secret. Too many people know about them now and the number is growing. The cat is out of the bag and I think we will be going forward into unknown territory with a slightly expanded consciousness. The powers behind the thrones are confused now, I believe, as they also will have to experiment in this new paradigm. I think given this confusion, we all have an opportunity to shape events as power is always shifting beyond any human control.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060417/mulvaney

¡No Más! No More!

In the past week, the defense ministers of both Uruguay and Argentina have declared that their governments plan to cut ties with the US Army’s School of the Americas. The Montevideo newspaper La República quoted Uruguay’s defense minister explaining her country’s position in an article published Thursday, and Argentina’s defense ministry has issued a statement to The Nation confirming that the lone Argentine soldier currently training at the SOA will be the country’s last to enroll there. These developments represent two of the strongest indications to date that the people of Latin America have come to view the SOA as a destabilizing force and a gateway to human rights atrocities.

Since its founding in 1946, the SOA—now located at Fort Benning in Georgia and renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation—has trained more than 60,000 Latin American soldiers in commando and psychological warfare, counterinsurgency techniques and intelligence-gathering. The Pentagon has acknowledged the school’s use of field manuals advocating torture in the past, and UN commissions and research organizations have linked SOA graduates to many of the region’s most heinous massacres, assassinations and torturous interrogations over the years. Graduates from Uruguay and Argentina figure prominently into this sordid history, from Uruguayan soldiers linked to kidnappings and torture through Operation Condor to the notorious Argentine dictators Roberto Viola and Leopoldo Galtieri.

More….

My other thought was that Iran was in on it but the Neocons were double crossed somewhere in this complicated web of greed, revenge, and fear.

Add this to the pot...from my local newspaper:

"Iran announced its second major new missile test within days, saying Sunday that it has successfully fired a high-speed torpedo capable of destroying warships and submarines.
The Iranian-made torpedo called the Hoot has a speed of 223 miles per hour. That would make it three or four times faster than a normal torpedo and as fast as the world's known fastest, the Russian-made VA-111, developed in 1995.
The new weapon could raise concerns over Iran's naval power in the Gulf"

My sources say that Iran has a whole cache of new weapons they would be delighted to try out and that their potential control of the Gulf could be huge. It's hard to know the facts, and we, the people, especially are used to the dark.
Our best weapon is to stay alert, control our fear, and try to learn the facts.

Poll about health care (MA is going to make health coverage mandatory). Very important. Right now you click on the "vote" sign in the main story block. Do go vote:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/

April 4, 2006 -- DeLay implicated in Florida gangland hit of casino boats owner. Former GOP Majority Leader Tom DeLay's surprise announcement that he will resign from Congress in a few weeks and not stand for re-election after winning the GOP primary in his Houston area district came after a bombshell was dropped in the Broward County, Florida trial of former John Gotti hit man Anthony "Big Tony" Moscatiello for the February 2001 gangland slaying of Sun Cruz casino boat owner Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis. Moscatiello is on trial with Anthony "Little Tony" Ferrari and James "Pudgy" Fiorillo in the murder of Boulis.

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

WV...remember I said there would be an earthquake, volcano, and a tsunami in Wash DC from Mar 25 thru June? I wonder which one covers delay...

On the personal front, a few hours after I posted about the pluto square with my daughter, tied into her Mars/Pallas at 26 Sag, and just after getting off the phone with the hospital concerning what she needed to know about the procedure, she fell down the stairs from the kitchen into the garage (again - she did it 2 years ago also)...she tripped on one of the kid's scooters, bounced into the eliptical machine, and landed on one knee. She laid on the floor until the pain subsided and then called me (I had the kids)...she had big bruises and is sore all over, but no sprains or breaks.

2 weeks ago, on the lunar eclipse, my pendulum said be careful of a major fall down stairs (I live up a steep flight of concrete stairs, 18 of them)....I have been extra careful. Seems it wasn't me...so far anyway. And she said the same thing I did when I sliced my two index fingers....it just seem to happen in slow motion, and there was nothing she could do, but just watch it happen...

So...it sure seems like Mars/Pluto is operating....

To relate this on the political front....suppose this pluto square is operating on some of these players right now....I wonder if the revealing of all of this ugly underbelly of crime with delay, abramoff, the mafia, etc...is to the active participants the same as what my daughter and I experienced....like watching yourself having an accident, in slow motion, and unable to do anything about it....if delay gets sucked into the criminal hit then I would say that a cushy lobbying job may not materialize either.

BTW...the advertising business has taken such a huge hit....speaking of slow motion accidents. from my rep in Ohio:
I just spent the day sending out e-mails to Detroit. The amount of art directors fired up there must have been 30%. 40 some odd of 96 at BBDO alone. They handle Chrysler.

I know that 40% of Hal Riney was laid off in SF.

I think this is indicative of something going on which is still not really public...part of it is technology changes, the way business is advertising. But all these profits businesses are supposedly making....you'd think some of it would be returning....but it isn't. Does this tie into the NAFTA question? Or is it just a sea change of how things are advertised.. (the golden group of 18-40 males....forget females, they still are not being mined much....and over 40? forget it....would just love to know if it is something more than just a change in technology....and not something more sinister.

Little Moon, thanks for posting the article at 11:02 above, because it confirms a Wayne Madsen story I posted a couple of weeks ago which said in essence that Milosevic was murdered because he simply "knew too much" on the Illuminati/globalists/elite(s).

That you did, Garry! Oh, and "Howdy!"

JudiGem, here's more dirt surfacing:
http://www.tampabays10.com/news/news.aspx?storyid=28228
And we can guess with confidence (though we'll have to wait and see) about the political party to which he belongs.

Little Moon, all I can tell you about the "4th paragraph" is the US wants to go to war with Iran, I don't think they will this year, but it's not above him to go in 2007 (late) I think it would be suicide, China and Russia would not let that happen, war with Iran makes no sense.

Not to mention the ground swell of Islamic fundamentalist movement...uniting Shi'a with Shi'a across Iran and Iraq.

On the other hand, Israel the Scorpion of the desert will attack just about anything but the back end of a yellow bus...and even that is fair game these days...

The planets on Israel's chart are pretty heavy right now...the transits don't bode an easy time for the next couple of years. And when Israel has problems it does what most of us do, it scapegoats...builds a propaganda swirl of disinformation and then attacks...

Sigh...when will we ever, ever learn...
This is not even a good cosmic joke. This is a one liner that has failed for thousands and thousands of years...and yet, here it is again...all around us.

Rioting in Borough Park Brooklyn tonight! Police roughed up a 75 yr old Hassidic man for a traffic violation! And the neighborhood protested.
Looks like Paris on TV! More eclipse stuff!
And they are marching in protest of the Yankee stadium
rebuild in the Bronx. Looks like folks are fed up with everything..............if they can be focused to march against the heart of the problem!??????
Does anyone else remember an article from last year, about what Iran would do if attacked? They hyave these Russsian made missiles ( capable of foiling radar) And their shoreline is hills, good place to shoot missiles from!) They can control the entrance to the Persian Gulf. Wish I could post the link,but it's on the ol;ld computer.
PQ

* ...Much of the discussion in the comments on my Israel posting centered on Josh Bolten, bush’s new chief of staff. The AP has an article today speculating about the changes he might make. Evidently, rumors have been floating around that Rumsfeld is wearing out his welcome & might be asked to leave. ...

... The funniest thing (it was April Fool’s Day) was that I was marveling over coincidences such as Moon at 9 deg Leo & N node at 23 Sag, degrees that keep coming up in the charts I’ve been analyzing. I had myself pretty spooked – all for nothing. Turns out Bolten’s Moon is in Pisces, his N node is in Capricorn, & his chart overall is far more balanced than the scary Leo stellium that reminded Jill of a slingshot. I will say that I was puzzled by the discrepancy in such an unbalanced chart & accts of Bolten’s career, which overall appears very distinguished but relatively low-key. ... http://pisces-chronicles.blogspot.com/

Joanna, I don't care if it takes Mars to fly over the Moon: Just get that rummy madman out of there. He is killing people. Lots and lots of people.

I apologize for the rant.

I understand completely, shy... they are, however & in general, like shark's teeth... one falls out & another one pops up to take its place. But, their day, as a whole, is over. Blessed Be.

Well, I do hope so, JoannaO. Else, I've got to renovate the entire expanse under the bed so I can go stay there for, like, forever. (Ouida Mae agrees with you.)

Sally wrote:

" What do you think of Chavez, in this country, as you know, there are mixed reviews."

Personally, I think he's very, very smart, but also a hothead. He's certainly going out of his way to goad the Bush Administration. There are a lot of Venezuelans in my country now - mainly middle-to-upperclass anti-Chavez. If you ever see any protests from Venezuela, you'll see a noticeable color difference between the pro and anti Chavez supporters. Everythime the US media refers to him as a "dictator", just remember that he was democratically elected with a larger share of the popular vote than Bush. Twice.

Last year an article from The Mountain Astrologer pointed to the Solar Eclipse of April 8, 2005 (which impacted on Colombia and Venezuela) as signifying a US oil grab in the region.

Also, if anyone has the time, can someone do a chart for my country, Trinidad, 7 miles off Venezula, granted independence from Britan 6pm, August 31, 1962. We've got lots of oil and natural gas, but a shockingly high murder rate and way too much poverty. Was also a big UK/US staging post during WWII.

By the way Bolten and Gonzales were born just a few days apart. Bolten on Aug. 16, 1955, and Gonzales on Aug. 4, 1955. Both of them have huge egos and a need for recognition.

Someone asked me to post my boundaries on the site, I hope they are reading this.

1. No obscenity except in symbols or in an obtuse manner

2. I would ask everyone to look up the difference between dialogue and debate. Everyone has a right to their opinion and it's ok to respectfully disagree and offer another viewpoint but I don't want name calling or baiting, and it really is ok if people have divergent views and opinions. My father used to say "Sally you don't have to throw a hissy fit just because someone disagrees with you."

3. Once in a while someone has said something that was taken wrong or misunderstood by someone else (the written word can do that) You might ask for clarification before indicting someone for what they said.

We seem to have developed a little family here with people who drop in and out, I've enjoyed how the posters welcome newcomers.

We've been here for a few years and while we have a partisan view of the world we have managed to keep our site amazingly free of the nastiness seen elsewhere. We are united in our desire to see a better world and one where a little bit of respect, thoughtfulness, kindness, eloquence and panache still can find a voice.

No wonder I'm here.

MARS, you're right, you have a very resource rich little country, transiting Uranus and Jupiter have just set off your Mars/Jupiter/Neptune trine, that's money and lots of it. The Moon is in Virgo at 27 degrees and Pluto will square it late fall early winter of 2006/2007 and I would say the people might take that opportunity to rise up and demand a portion of those riches because someone is getting plenty from your country and the people will challenge that with the probability of some success. If the time is correct then a great deal will be heard from and about Trinidad next year and I think it will be some positive turns. It seems like a long way away but 2020 sees the beginning of a marked improvement in conditions there with a very long and prosperous road ahead. Trinidad might look toward what they can offer to the outside world to capitalize on their creative gifts.

"There are a lot of Venezuelans in my country now - mainly middle-to-upperclass anti-Chavez"

What does that mean for your country and for Venezuela?

Thank you jm, that was a lovely remark

Sen. Feingold just made a bold statement supporting full marriage equality for gays and lesbian couples (not just the separate but equal civil unions). He's got a strong pair of brass ones. And he's had my vote for a long time. Feingold 08.

I haven't felt this much good Aries energy in years.

The puzzle of the personal is an interesting one.
There is so much to cover and not so much time in our material lives. To try and analyze the correct personal content in our expressions is fruitless since it is so individualistic and others can't usually judge accurately in every case for other people. Each one's need for personal interchange is completely his own.

A Mars in Cancer would make certain we got personal. A Moon there would depend on it for survival. A Venus would adore the intimacy. But a Moon in Aquarius wouldn't, most likely. A Venus in Scorpio, say, square a Saturn in Aquarius would have great struggles with closeness versus detachment. And a South Node in Cancer? The conflict around issues of family and the personal are huge and the need for aloof professionalism and maturity are great. Always struggling with emotional overreaction and childlike responses. A Sun in Cancer unless heavily afflicted is a natural at intimacy and sharing personal stories. It's amazingly diverse.

What is so interesting is the United States of America, who has Sun, Mercury, Venus, and Jupiter in Cancer. But the ruling Moon scampers away into Aquarius, thus creating a great conflict between alienation and closeness. You can see this so easily in the way we transport ourselves isolated in our cars, all the while nurturing ourselves on gargantuan amounts of fast food and sucking continually some fizzy liquid or designer water, and nervously flipping the radion dial for musical comfort or verbal connection. And our love of Dear Abby, a Cancer, who delights us with personal tales that we don't have to really get involved in.
So it is completely natural for Americans to reveal personal things, and also to be conflicted.

But even more indicative is the North Node in Leo in the US chart which loves personal love and the opposition to the South in Aquarius which throws ice onto the Leo fire of intense interpersonal revelation. The mental detached Aquarius who disdains the Leo self immolation all in the name of personal love, sometimes without great thought or caution.

The ideal way to blend these factors is some workable intimacy with our extended human family. Granted, in large groups there will be some who abhor the personal details, but they really can't be prevented. And they come and go as we trip in and out of the purely scientific intellectual airy dry political astrological world. It's a great spicy buffet, in my opinion. And we can pick and choose.

Warmth and intimacy promote healing, so it's probably wise to let it be.

from above............
Bolten and Gonzales on Aug. 4, 1955. Both of them have huge egos and a need for recognition.
Helen Thomas Aug. 4 1920 Winchester Kentucky.

Will the tone of WH press conferences with Bolton in place affect perception/ treatment of Helen in any way?

I've stated before, this site is valuable to me beyond compare! ( Everybody here goes to bed by 8pm except me!!! You.ve all gotten me beyond a very difficult year!
I will be sending some $ Sally as soon as I can, income will be increase with warm weather & return if summer people in the area!

What's Cynthia McKinney's birth time anyone know? Soladad O'Brian is makeing an A** of herself in an interview with McKinney, who is being mini WELLSTONED!
PQ

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060404_robert_scheer_delay_slay/

Robert Scheer: Anti-Christian Conspirators Slay DeLay

BLAME IT on the vast anti-Christian conspiracy. That was the explanation offered by U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay of Texas and his supporters last week for the whirlpool of legal difficulties that finally led the ex-leader of the Republicans in Congress to admit it was time to call it quits.

The convener of a “War on Christians” conference held in the nation’s capital outrageously depicted the former House majority leader’s political plight as the unwarranted crucifixion of a Christ-like leader by God-haters. And, with his trademark gall, the infamously ethically challenged DeLay eagerly embraced this explanation when it was his turn to speak to the adoring crowd.

“We have been chosen to live as Christians at a time when our culture is being poisoned and our world is being threatened,” thundered the Texan pest-control entrepreneur who rose to become one of America’s most powerful politicians. “The enemies of virtue may be on the march, but they have not won.”

Let’s leave aside for a moment the absurdity of right-wing Christians’ persecution complex at a time when their adherents effectively control all three branches of the federal government. What’s even more confusing is how so many enemies of virtue seem to have had a field day operating under poor DeLay’s auspices, including the latest member of his staff to plead guilty to a felony. That would be Tony Rudy, DeLay’s former deputy chief of staff who has now pleaded guilty to a federal conspiracy charge for accepting payments from fellow criminal Jack Abramoff while serving in DeLay’s office, and later working to corrupt public officials and defraud clients.

To be fair to DeLay, it should be noted that as absurd as his religious posturing may appear, it comes at a time when he has been denied the services of his one-time spiritual adviser and former chief of staff. Edwin Buckham, an evangelical minister who turned lobbyist after leaving DeLay’s staff, is now himself mired in potential legal problems stemming from Rudy’s plea bargain. A devastating report by R. Jeffrey Smith in the Washington Post last week reported that Buckham and his wife received a total of nearly a million bucks from the “nonprofit” U.S. Family Network he created as a front group largely funded by clients of Abramoff.

More...

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060403_molly_ivins_global_warming/

Global Warming: What, Me Worry? - Molly Ivins

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/04/AR2

GAO Criticizes Bush's AIDS Plan Abstinence-and-Fidelity Provision Sowing Confusion, Report Says

By David Brown Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, April 5, 2006; Page A03

The requirement that a large fraction of President Bush's global AIDS plan go to promote abstinence and fidelity is causing confusion in many countries and in a few is eroding other prevention efforts, including ones to reduce mother-to-child transmission of the virus.

Those are among the chief conclusions of an 87-page report by the Government Accountability Office that examined the most controversial aspect of the giant AIDS plan, budgeted at $15 billion over five years.

More...

William Fisher: And This Guy Wants to Be President?

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040506Z.shtml

William Fisher writes that this week, we got yet another pitiful lesson in just how craven wannabe presidential hopefuls will be in pandering to their "base." The lesson came from Senator George Allen, who wrote to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to recommend 3-star general Jerry Boykin to be the new head of the Army's Special Operations command.

Sally wrote:

"If the time is correct then a great deal will be heard from and about Trinidad next year and I think it will be some positive turns. It seems like a long way away but 2020 sees the beginning of a marked improvement in conditions there with a very long and prosperous road ahead. Trinidad might look toward what they can offer to the outside world to capitalize on their creative gifts."

Interesting... Trinidad is in the Soccer World Cup this year - smallest country ever to qualify. I'm sure you'll be hearing a lot about us in the coming months.

There is lots of money floating around, but it never seems to trickle down. During the last oil boom in the 70's, billions and billions were stolen by corrupt politicians. We're in the midst of another oil boom and I hope against hope that the population won't let that happen again.

Strange thing about 2020 - the government have a big plan in place called "Vision 2020". Aiming for developed nation status by then. The public treats it as a joke, but maybe they consulted with an astrologer?

Sally also wrote:

"There are a lot of Venezuelans in my country now - mainly middle-to-upperclass anti-Chavez"

What does that mean for your country and for Venezuela?"

Think Cuban exiles in Miami. BTW, our government is VERY Pro US and pro-Bush.

Discovery News Brief

expand

Map of Landslide Area

New Orleans Sits Atop Giant Landslide
By Larry O'Hanlon, Discovery News

March 31, 2006 — New Orleans is at the top end of what looks like a gigantic, slow-moving landslide, according to geologists who have been carefully studying the ground movements in the area.

Amid news that rebuilding the city's levees will cost substantially more than projected, the discovery of a much wider, older cause for the area's rapid subsidence flies in the face of years of policies that have pinned the blame on human activities for most of the area's gradual sinking below sea level.

The pumping of groundwater, levee building, and oil and gas extraction have carried the blame so far, but what's being called "tectonic" subsidence appears to account for 73 percent of all sinking from 1969 to 1971 and 50 percent from 1971 to 1977.

"Not only is southern Louisiana sinking, it's sliding," said

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/briefs/20060327/neworleans_pla.html

Pat Sharp, Gonzales and Bolten have six planets in Leo, and Helen has 4, the huge ego keeps all three with the guts to keep banging on whatever door they focus on. We don't like the Gonzales and Bolten door but we do like Helen's door banging. The other thing is "energy" it most often works differently in women than in men, the right brain in women is more developed and more able to see the big picture, not in all cases but in about 85 percent. Helen has been just as tenacious with all Presidents as she has been with Bush, Helen doesn't play favorites. Clinton went through a period of not answering Helen's questions.

Bolten and Gonzales are just as tenacious in their focus and what they believe.

Sally, i'm curious. Did you have any idea that this site would be such a success (in so many ways) when you first created it?

Despite the occasional temper flare, 99.5% percent of the time Astroworld is inspirational, informative and sometimes just plain fun.

Speaking of fun. . .the following was gleaned from the pages of the Sun magazine -- and a tribute to Pat C's post above about persecuting poor (NOT) Delay

"I was walking across a bridge one day, and I saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump off. So I ran over and said "Stop! Don't do it!. . .There's so much to live for!" He said, "Like what?" I said, "Well, are you religious or atheist?" He said, "Religious." I said, "Me too! Are you Christian or Budhist?" He said, "Christian." I said. "Me too! Are you Catholic or Protestant?" He said "Protestant." I said, "Me too! Are you Episcopalian or Baptist?" He said, "Baptist!" I said, "Wow! Me Too! Are you Baptist Church of God or Baptist Church of the Lord?" He said, "Baptist Church of God!" I said, "Me too! Are you original Baptist Church of God or Reformed Baptist Church of God?" He said, "Reformed Baptist Church of God!" I said, "Me too! Are you Reformed Baptist Church of God, reformation of 1879 or Reformed Baptist Church of God, reformation of 1915?" He said "Reformed Baptist Church of God, reformation of 1915!" I said, "Die, heretic scum," and pushed him off."
Emo Phillips

:)

(A Prelude to Saturn Opposition Neptune?)
Behold the unfolding of a tipping point, the camels back is breaking.

by patcox2 -- from DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x839874

its happening now, right now, slowly at first, starting with Schiavo, the public revulsion at the Social Security plan, then the biggest bomb of all, Katrina, Iraq a constant slow boil all the time, Abramoff and Delay, the ridiculous Medicare drug benefit, it started slowly, but suddenly it has spiraled out of control. The majority of americans have come to accept that Bush is a corrupt and incompetent man.

Bush is over. What you are seeing is a major turning point, a major shift in public opinion. This is going to have a long lasting impact on our society.

Its way too easy to get fixated on minutia, details, to fail to see the forest for the trees. You have to stand way back to see the pattern. There is a lot of confusion. The republicans are completely panicked, leaderless, and desperate. That explains this idiotic idea of raising the immigration issue, something that conflicts their own base, and it explains McKinney, she's a buffoon and they were quick to try to use her as a desperate distraction from their own corruption (but it won't work, trust me, its like trying to bail out the Titanic with a teaspoon).

The public really hasn't digested it all yet, and thats why the democrats appear disorganized, there is not yet a clear direction to organize around.

There is chaos, the public has had this stark black and white picture painted for it for 5 years now, it was told that its all very simple and there's only one narrow path. Having found that is a lie, the people have no direction, they may bolt this way or that like a nervous herd for a while, until the mood coalesces into something more defined.

But thats all just part of the process of a major tipping, a major revolution in perception, a major change in direction.

The important thing is that once this point has been reached, the point of panic, confusion, desperation, its irrevocable. Bush is broken and he can't be put back together again. Its like falling out of love, looking at her or him and saying to yourself "what was I thinking." The shame at having been so wrong is projected back as hate for the person who deceived you. It is truly over for Bush, and not just Bush, he may have weakened his party to the point it will lose it all in November.

Another sign of it is the way the news doesn't even shock anymore, its scandal after corruption after scandal after incompetence, and its become the norm now to hear read and see stories of Bush flip-flopping and waving 9-11 and screwing up and tanking in the polls. And noone cares. If you are too caught up in the details and minutiae, you will be angry that noone cares, but actually, its just anothers sign of how bad things are for Bush that people don't care.

Republicans don't bother to defend him anymore, I hope everyone is seeing this, noone defends him anymore. It has become impossible.

The nation has finally reached that point where, as nice and patient and sometimes stupid as the public is, as much as they want to believe things are okay, as much as they want to believe our leaders know what they are doing, it has become clear that Bush is bad, that what he says is not true, that its all lies and fantasies.

His bubble has burst. The emporer is naked, and the people see it now.

When the public changes its mind, things happen. This will be interesting, and exciting.

by patcox2 -- from DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x839874

Participating.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/060405/480/ctgh10504051528

(A Prelude to Saturn Opposition Neptune?)
Behold the unfolding of a tipping point, the camels back is breaking.

by patcox2 -- from DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x839874

its happening now, right now, slowly at first, starting with Schiavo, the public revulsion at the Social Security plan, then the biggest bomb of all, Katrina, Iraq a constant slow boil all the time, Abramoff and Delay, the ridiculous Medicare drug benefit, it started slowly, but suddenly it has spiraled out of control. The majority of americans have come to accept that Bush is a corrupt and incompetent man.

Bush is over. What you are seeing is a major turning point, a major shift in public opinion. This is going to have a long lasting impact on our society.

Its way too easy to get fixated on minutia, details, to fail to see the forest for the trees. You have to stand way back to see the pattern. There is a lot of confusion. The republicans are completely panicked, leaderless, and desperate. That explains this idiotic idea of raising the immigration issue, something that conflicts their own base, and it explains McKinney, she's a buffoon and they were quick to try to use her as a desperate distraction from their own corruption (but it won't work, trust me, its like trying to bail out the Titanic with a teaspoon).

The public really hasn't digested it all yet, and thats why the democrats appear disorganized, there is not yet a clear direction to organize around.

There is chaos, the public has had this stark black and white picture painted for it for 5 years now, it was told that its all very simple and there's only one narrow path. Having found that is a lie, the people have no direction, they may bolt this way or that like a nervous herd for a while, until the mood coalesces into something more defined.

But thats all just part of the process of a major tipping, a major revolution in perception, a major change in direction.

The important thing is that once this point has been reached, the point of panic, confusion, desperation, its irrevocable. Bush is broken and he can't be put back together again. Its like falling out of love, looking at her or him and saying to yourself "what was I thinking." The shame at having been so wrong is projected back as hate for the person who deceived you. It is truly over for Bush, and not just Bush, he may have weakened his party to the point it will lose it all in November.

Another sign of it is the way the news doesn't even shock anymore, its scandal after corruption after scandal after incompetence, and its become the norm now to hear read and see stories of Bush flip-flopping and waving 9-11 and screwing up and tanking in the polls. And noone cares. If you are too caught up in the details and minutiae, you will be angry that noone cares, but actually, its just anothers sign of how bad things are for Bush that people don't care.

Republicans don't bother to defend him anymore, I hope everyone is seeing this, noone defends him anymore. It has become impossible.

The nation has finally reached that point where, as nice and patient and sometimes stupid as the public is, as much as they want to believe things are okay, as much as they want to believe our leaders know what they are doing, it has become clear that Bush is bad, that what he says is not true, that its all lies and fantasies.

His bubble has burst. The emporer is naked, and the people see it now.

When the public changes its mind, things happen. This will be interesting, and exciting.

by patcox2 -- from DU

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x839874

My apologies for the double post, Sally. It timed out the first time, and I should've checked in a separate window to see if it actually did go through.

I hate it when that happens!

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=520682006
The Sinn Fein man who spied for the Brits has been assassinated...and Sinn Fein says it had nothing to do with it....

I wondered when I read the original story of this being revealed (and hearing it discussed on radio/tv) if this would happen.

Bladder in a Dish Saves Patients
AFP

April 4, 2006— Partial bladders grown in a petri dish have been successfully implanted into patients with bladder disease, The Lancet reported on Monday, the first time a complex organ has been mostly replaced with engineered tissue.

The advance paves the way for regenerating failing hearts and other organs. Until now, only simple tissues like skin, bone, and cartilage have been reengineered and transplanted.

Congenital anomalies or disease can cause high pressures in the bladder that may then lead to bad kidney damage. The conventional method for dealing with this is reconstructive surgery, in which tiny pieces of the small intestine or stomach are grafted onto the bladder.

But that technique can have many complications, including disruption of the metabolism and the creation of stones in the urinary tract.

More >> http:///www99.americanexpress.com/myca/onlinepayment/us/action

Karen...loved your post on the baptists on the bridge!

I do feel a bit deflated with all this scorn about giant egos with Leo planets, as I have some heavy duty ones....and of course, jm, I do have the north node in Leo and south in Aquarius....I But then, I am also not operating out of male energy forms. (20 years in therapy brought the revelation that I actually was suffering from TOO LITTLE ego)

The best description I remember reading about Leos is that in order to learn to lead, Leos have to learn to follow. Otherwise, the people turn away from them....the energy isn't about the Leo himself, his 'kingship, or in Bush's case, feeling of being chosen by God', it is about his ability to harness the energies to create leadership worth following.

Yup, NEO... the "shock n' awe" elastic ain't got no more snap. Ready for the Cosmic Compost Pile.

I'm thinking that delay won't be able to get dyed pompadore fundie-type hair jobs in prison... that'd be good.

My fave joke that's similar to the subj dyed pompadored... "You know its a southern fried fundie when it gets its hairdo caught in the ceiling fan." Hahahahahaaaaaa!!!!

I was also remembering the time when some US congress"men" went for a teener drunken joy ride in a US submarine, crashed a Japanese boat, & murdered a couple of Japanese students. Wonder what ever happened with that?

That was me Sally who asked for the clarification on including personal notes. Thank you for elaborating.

Hello all--this is a good page of quotes you might wanna bookmark or add to your favorites:

http://www.madison.com/tct/opinion/column/index.php?ntid=78969&ntpid=0

Wonder if anybody took up O'LIElly's wager? :)

The Peoples' struggle never ends:
http://www.narconews.com/Issue41/article1719.html

Viva Zapata!

Please note that Pat P, The Pisces Chronicles, found new info that give Bolton the following birthdate:
Joshua Brewster Bolten was born on Aug. 16, 1954.

Her recent post "The Yosh Factor" explains her findings at length.
Here is the link:

http://pisces-chronicles.blogspot.com/.

Shy, thanks for posting the narco-news article. This stuff (the taking of land for private interests and screwing everybody who lives in the area) just seems to go on and on and on. It's time it stopped.

From biltud, who has done a lot of research on this over on Salon:

http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/archive.cgi?noframes;read=67428
http://911review.org/inn.globalfreepress/Cleveland_Mystery_comments.html
http://911review.org/inn.globalfreepress/Cleveland_Airport_Mystery.html

Copyright 2001 Bergen Record Corporation The Record (Bergen County, NJ) September 14, 2001 Friday All Editions SECTION: NEWS; Pg. a18 LENGTH: 900 words

HEADLINE: IN RURAL HAMLET, THE MYSTERY MOUNTS; 5 REPORT SECOND PLANE AT PA. CRASH SITE; THE INVESTIGATION

SOURCE: The Record

BYLINE: JEFF PILLETS, Staff Writer

DATELINE: SHANKSVILLE, Pa.

BODY: As investigators continued to search for clues to the crash of United Flight 93, people in this Allegheny Mountains hamlet were talking about a parallel mystery that one man called “the damndest darn thing” he’d ever seen.

In separate interviews Thursday, five residents who live and work less than four miles from the crash site said they saw a second plane flying erratically within minutes of the crash of the Boeing 757 that took off from Newark two hours earlier Tuesday morning.

Susan Mcelwain of Stonycreek Township said a small white jet with rear engines and no discernible markings swooped low over her minivan near an intersection and disappeared over a hilltop, nearly clipping the tops of trees lining the ridge.

It was less than a minute later, Mcelwain said, that the ground shook and a white plume of smoke appeared over the ridge. “It was so close to me I ducked,” Mcelwain said. “I heard it hit and saw the smoke. All I could think of was how close I came to dying. ” About a mile north on Buckstown Road, Dennis Decker and Rick Chaney were at work making wooden pallets when they heard an explosion and came running outside to watch a large mushroom cloud spreading over the ridge.

“As soon as we looked up, we saw a midsized jet flying low and fast,” Decker said. “It appeared to make a loop or part of a circle, and then it turned fast and headed out. ” Decker and Chaney described the plane as a Lear-jet type, with engines mounted near the tail and painted white with no identifying markings.

“If you were here to see it, you’d have no doubt,” Decker said. “It was a jet plane, and it had to be flying real close when that 757 went down. If I was the FBI, I’d find out who was driving that plane. ” Late Thursday afternoon, federal agents who spoke to reporters at the crash site said “there was no evidence as of yet” that a second plane was nearby when Flight 93 plunged into a strip mine.

Earlier Thursday, FBI Special Agent William Crowley said investigators could not rule out that a second plane was nearby during the crash. He later said he had misspoken. He dismissed rumors that a U.S. military jet had intercepted the plane before it could strike a target in Washington, D.C. In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, President Bush’s nominee for chairman of the joint chiefs of staff rejected rumors that the military had shot down the hijacked plane.

“The armed forces did not shoot down any aircraft,” Air Force Gen. Richard Myers said.

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

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP)—Jurors in the trial of accused Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui will be drawn back to the day of the attacks through videos of the burning and collapsing World Trade Center and family pictures of victims.

The pictures would be augmented by dramatic cockpit voice recordings from United Flight 93, as passengers apparently tried to wrest control of the aircraft from hijackers, prosecutors said Thursday. The plane crashed in Pennsylvania, killing 44, including the attackers.

Additional recordings would be played from the cockpit of an executive jet that tracked Flight 93 on Sept. 11, according to written proposals subject to approval by U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema.

(snip)

The government said it would play the cockpit voice recordings from Flight 93 and the executive jet in open court, but asked Brinkema to keep both recordings and their transcripts from dissemination outside the courtroom.

An official for NetJets, a company that sells shares in private business aircraft, confirmed that the plane tracking Flight 93 belonged to the company.

http://www.hollandsentinel.com/stories/080902/new_080902020.shtml

According to Wayne Madsen, Keith Olbermann is under attack; his ratings keep rising and O'Reilly and his ilk want him gone. Please help.
Wayne Madsen Report 4/3:
"Then there is the silly (but apparently well-coordinated) campaign by Bill O'Reilly to have MS-NBC's Keith Olbermann fired. O'Reilly's campaign has now been joined by a web site called Olbermann Watch. The Olbermann Watch was registered on November 29, 2004 by a New Rochelle, NY-based blog called The National Debate that has links to various right-wing blogs, including, you guessed it, the Drudge Report, which received one of Mr. Green's leaked emails. There is enough here that points to a RICO civil suit against these right-wing bloggers and operatives who are engaged in a conspiracy intent on harassing anti-Bush journalists and seeking to have them fired."

JM:
Yes jm, more people are waking from their slumber. I don't know who Bob Chapman is, but he seems to have a lot of inside info. Did you see his latest? Mentions that Jeff Gannon entertained w and Blair. Hey, your astropost flowed like a musical piece. Thank you for that.

Miss Sally: Thank you for your response, 2007 doesn't sound good, especially because US' progressed Mars will go retrograde soon, and I understand that with Mars retro, the aggressor will pay dearly.

Garry: Yes, Yugoslavia was another contrived war by the ptb. I brought this up several years back, but Clinton worship was too strong then; maybe now the people will open their eyes.

To all: Has Bob Barr gone to the bright side? He's defending McKinney, who somebody wants to place in the ejection seat to catapult her into oblivion. She cannot be controlled so somebody wants her out of there. I read that the video footage of the alleged attack is missing.
http://www.ajc.com/today/content/epaper/editions/today/opinion_4433534422fdb1cf000e.html

Wow, I can't believe this got written, let alone published....

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060405/ap_on_re_us/israel_lobby_flap

Little Moon, you're right about the Balkan war, and while I admire a lot of the things Bill C did as Pres, I dislike just as many or more--plus, I'm no Hillary fan and both are too well connected with the Bushistas for any of us to trust...just my opinion, not flame-bating there, peeps! :)

Hey all, check this out--it's Al Franken's opening statement from a recent "debate" with "Ann Coulter"....typically brilliant stuff.....

http://midwestvaluespac.org/blog/156/an-evening-with-ann-coulter-with-full-speech

Spectacle users may get crystal clear vision at flick of a switch

Alok Jha
Tuesday April 4, 2006

Guardian

Spectacle-wearers will soon be able to say goodbye to the humble bifocal lens, trusted friend of ageing eyes. Scientists have developed new flat lenses that can change their focusing power at the flick of a switch, allowing the wearer to change their focus from the horizon to something a few inches away in a split second.
The lenses are made from liquid crystal - a type of material behind modern computer displays which changes the alignment of its molecules when an electrical current is applied, changing properties such as transparency or focal power.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,,329449530-117780,00.html

Believe it or not, justice does sometimes occur these days.
http://www.newsday.com/news/politics/wire/sns-ap-katrina-fraud-plea,0,3362305.story?coll=sns-ap-politics-headlines

Sally,

Correction to the time for Trinidad - apparently the flag was raised at precisely midnught on Thursday 30th August, 1962. Don't know how that changes things.

Also, the coastguardsman whose job it was to raise the flag collapsed at midinight when the flag was about a foot from the top. The job was completed by a policeman. Link here:

http://www.nalis.gov.tt/NationalAwards-Emblems/flag_raising.html

Of course, I see some deeper symbolic meaning in all of this...

Did anyone watch Nightline tonight about the Repug from Colorado named Tom Tancrado?

Was anyone else as upset as I was with his racist scapegoating? It seemed to me that the repugs only identify "American" culture when it's portrayed as white, blond, blue-eyes rich people. He said as that hewas against all this immigration to "save" American culture. What American Culture - lilly-white, rich republican culture?

He said that he didn't want the "balkanization" of American culture, but that is exactly what his retoric would cause.

Thanks for the space to vent. I just others would have seen it.

Just my opinion, but I think the Seinn Feinn (sp?) man was killed by the British. He knew too much. Talks coming up between the Irish/British in a couple of days...

Just like whatshisname Kelly who told the world that the case for WMD's was "sexed up." Suicide! I don't think so.

My Jacob Schwartz class did a comparison study of Saddam Hussein's chart and GWB. One has a Jupiter/Pluto opposition (Hussein), one has a Moon/Jupiter conjunction (Bush). Hussein's chart has his Sun/Uranus in Taurus square Shrub's Asc/Mecury/Pluto. Both will be in aspect to Saturn again soon. The interesting part of all of this is the nodal axes of the two men. Hussein's NN at 17 Sag. And guess where Shrub's SN is? Fire trine, almost exact between the two men's Venus'. George, 21 Leo. Hussein: 21 Aries.

Ha! George, " I love being King." Hussein, "I love being a warrior." Hussein's Pluto (which opposes his Jupiter natally) sits on Shrub' Saturn. A karmic play, NN eats SN and visa versa, Pluto/Saturn/Jupiter...again, and again, and again...

Schwartz thinks Condi will replace Cheney as VP. Hmmmmmm...Schwartz did predict George as Pres. when it was unpopular to do so...the asteroid Washingtonia, etc. But sometimes, I disagree with him. He also thinks Condi will run for Pres.

And then there's homeland security official caught with pornography and hitting on young girls. Used his Home Land Security cell phone to make contacts...

The plots sicken ... Where on earth is Jeff Gannon these days?

Mars, I will take a look at this new time and get back to you tomorrow if that's ok.

Garry, you've found some pretty amazing stuff, and I don't think your references to Hillary and Bill are "flame baiting" at all, that's your opinion.

Travieso, we've been listening to Tancrado in this town for about 5 years now and his one man war against immigrants, the Colorado GOP Gov won't even respond to him.

Shy, hurrah, bring all those charges on, if the courts just keep rolling with what they have on corruption when and where they find it would just be wonderful

Canny Comment from a UK poster...

"Now DeLay is history, but his damage will endure. What was once a proud democratic institution would take an upheaval, & then a decade or more of hard work, to rebuild. And so I'm in mind of a poem I learned many years ago:

They buried the politician today
The crowd it jeered and rang.
But as for me, I wept
For I had hoped to see him hang."

(Well... and I can understand that ;O))

Upheaval is about right. It's going to take a major one to set this government straight. The entire reactionary right-wing movement in power that is carrying us back to the proverbial pre-historic age of the 1950s needs to be thoroughly uprooted, exposed and shattered to pieces. Fortunately, I think that's finally starting to unfold now.

May DeLay's ouster be the beginning of a tsunami that ends with Bush's Impeachment and unconditional removal from office.

* Venezuela's president Hugo Chavez yesterday seized control of a French-run oil field, strengthening his control of the country's vast oil wealth, the lifeblood of his "Bolivarian Revolution" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/04/04/wchavez04.xml

Neo, your post was a pleasure to read. I think this eclipse has kicked off a new cycle symbolised by Delay's Arian action. It's amusing with all that Neptune in the eclipse chart how Delay is crying about the religious persecution he's experiencing, and how ludicrous he appears. I think the Saturn/Neptune is working. The religious right has some inkling now of the suckers they are.
I haven't been upset about the Dems inaction so far. I thought it was necessary and really a good thing as we encountered a sort of Taoist nothingness in our political landscape. I think some changes are afoot. The Saturn/Neptune factor will continue as Saturn transits Leo and the North Node goes into Pisces, joining Uranus and hpoefully triggering more awakening.

Little moon, I love your name. How did you come up with it? It's encouraging to see people wake up little by little. The very day Art posted his article mentioning the 911 rabbit hole, the overnight talk radio show out of Denver's KOA has a couple of men on talking about the government's involvement. This is not a liberal station. Rush Limbaugh is on it. The overnight guy came from a Repub background, is now a Libertarian, but his show is non-partisan. It has a powerful signal reaching across the whole country.
Rick Barber is a good man, disgusted with this administration, intelligent, calm, and logical, and reaches a lot of people of all persuasions. Even a year ago, this couldn't have been broadcast. The people were hushed, not many called in, but the message was loud and clear.

Judi g, I think that's great having a NN in Leo at the top of your chart. Today Saturn went direct, so Leo is definitely in the forefront of the cortex. I'm going to get to work and try to get back later to post some Leo thoughts. I think the time for an important scrutiny of our leadership has come.

Hey Neo! I didn't see your last post. I was referring to the earlier one. What fun!

Well here we go. Saturn/Neptune. Youse guys'll love this.

"The remaining scraps of fog and smoke that masked the character of the Bush government pretty much dissolved with the resignation of Tom DeLay."

From Jim Klobuchar.
aol://4344:1204.fif_flix.9377890.825018146

I mean:

http://jimklobucharwrites.com/index.html

JudiG,
A very astute description of Leo qualities!
The mural biz attracted them, & over the years there were 4 staples who worked with us long term. The woman who painted with me on weekends,after I started running it on my own shared Helen Thomas's birthday. Year?
SHe wouldn't TELL! To do her horoscope I had to hand her the ephemeris to look up her own planetary placements!
Beasley,
Say hi to Jacob Scwartz from me next time you go to class!
PQ

Hello everyone! Everything is going well at the new job. The hours are a little strange, but all in all not too bad. Days can be very long, average or short depending on what I have scheduled. I've been checking in every once and a while and have to say that there have been some interesting things going on.

Barbara B, the possible daughter of AC could be the real deal. Wouldn't that blow peoples minds if it did turn out to be true? It sure looks like it could be by comparing pictures. The resemblance is uncanny and makes sense with her vicious personality. Could this be the B*'s dirty little secret? Good find Garry! Anymore info on that?

More to get caught up on and I'll be popping in when I can. One of he great bennies here is the freedom to cruise the net when I have nothing going on! And that sometimes could be half the day. Once I have my meetings running, I pretty much hang out until they are over!

http://www.firedoglake.com/2006/04/06/bush-authorized-libby-nie-release-to-press/

The latest filing in the Libby case is a doozy, according to the NYSun this morning. If Libby was being truthful in his testimony about this, and if Cheney wasn’t misleading him in his assertion that President Bush authorized Libby to leak selected portions of the NIE to the press (specifically Judy Miller), then I think we’ve discovered a very good reason for Fitz to have met with the President’s attorney just prior to Libby’s indictment.

But that’s the least of the revelation’s implications:

A former White House aide under indictment for obstructing a leak probe, I. Lewis Libby, testified to a grand jury that he gave information from a closely-guarded "National Intelligence Estimate" on Iraq to a New York Times reporter in 2003 with the specific permission of President Bush, according to a new court filing from the special prosecutor in the case.

The court papers from the prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, do not suggest that Mr. Bush violated any law or rule. However, the new disclosure could be awkward for the president because it places him, for the first time, directly in a chain of events that led to a meeting where prosecutors contend the identity of a CIA employee, Valerie Plame, was provided to a reporter.

Which begs the question, what sort of follow-up permission may have been sought from President Bush when Libby’s first disclosure to Judy Miller of the selective release of parts of the NIE didn’t bear fruit in the attempt to discredit Wilson and undercut the Administration’s critics? Or was the permission to out Valerie Plame Wilson already an implicit part of the effort? How intimately involved in all of this was Dick Cheney?

In a court filing late Wednesday responding to requests from Mr. Libby’s attorneys for government records that might aid his defense, Mr. Fitzgerald shed new light on Mr. Libby’s claims that he was authorized to provide sensitive information to the Times reporter, Judith Miller, at a meeting on July 8, 2003. "Defendant testified that he was specifically authorized in advance of the meeting to disclose the key judgments of the classified NIE to Miller on that occasion because it was thought that the NIE was ‘pretty definitive’ against what Ambassador Wilson had said and that the vice president thought that it was ‘very important’ for the key judgments of the NIE to come out," Mr. Fitzgerald wrote. Mr. Libby is said to have testified that "at first" he rebuffed Mr. Cheney’s suggestion to release the information because the estimate was classified. However, according to the vice presidential aide, Mr. Cheney subsequently said he got permission for the release directly from Mr. Bush. "Defendant testified that the vice president later advised him that the president had authorized defendant to disclose the relevant portions of the NIE," the prosecution filing said. If you were Pat Fitzgerald, wouldn’t you want to check directly with George Bush’s lawyer to see if Cheney were telling the truth to Libby at that point — or if he was taking things into his own hands and giving the color of permission from the President that Bush had not, in fact, given with regard to the selective leaking of the NIE? I sure would.

Links within text

Garry, be sure to go to bartcop today. There's one in there you'll find very interesting.

Which one Shy? The one about Snarly ebing behind 9/11? I think I saw that on prisonplanet or something. Keep 'em coming. Y'all know I love the "conspiracy" stuff. :)

* Mexico - Ancient Pyramid Discovered Under Site of Crucifixion Re-Enactments http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=1811470&CMP=OTC-RSSFeeds0312

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/04/05/BUGNEI3E4U1.DTL

Bill would profoundly change the Internet

Lawmakers in Congress are scheduled to vote today on a landmark bill that consumer advocates and some of the biggest names in the tech world say would change the Internet as we know it, creating fast lanes and slow lanes for Web access.

The issue of so-called net neutrality, as in network neutrality, is at the heart of legislation that represents the most sweeping overhaul of telecom law since the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

The question is whether network providers like AT&T and Verizon should have the ability to charge some Web sites fees for faster access speeds -- and whether such a two-tier system inherently discriminates against any site that doesn't pony up extra cash.

It also has broader ramifications as the phone companies prepare to flood existing bandwidth with their own video services, potentially creating bottlenecks for other online content.

"The Internet could be fundamentally altered by this," said Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., one of Congress' leading authorities on telecom issues and a ranking member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee's telecom subcommittee.

"The more people learn about this, the more they'll understand we're heading toward a system of informational apartheid," he told me.

Markey said Republican backers of the legislation -- titled the Communications Opportunity, Promotion and Enhancement Act of 2006 -- are expected to prevail in today's subcommittee vote.

A vote by the full House is possible by June, and the Senate is likely to take up the matter shortly thereafter. The bill's chief sponsor, Rep. Joe Barton, a Texas Republican who chairs the Energy and Commerce Committee, has said he expects President Bush to sign it into law by the end of the year.

There are other components to the bill. One would allow phone companies to bypass municipal approvals when rolling out video services (an exemption not offered cable providers). Another would allow cities to develop local wireless networks without first getting the OK from state officials.

More....

The Real Reason DeLay Quit...

http://signs-of-the-times.org/

http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/14279726.htm

Bush faces criticism at forum, won't apologize for surveillance

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - President Bush, told by a critic he should be ashamed of his policies, defended the government's secret eavesdropping program Thursday and said he would not apologize for listening in on the phone and e-mail conversations of Americans talking to people with suspected al-Qaida links.

A man who identified himself as Harry Taylor rose at a forum here to tell Bush that he's never felt more ashamed of the leadership of his country. He said Bush has asserted his right to tap phone calls without a warrant, to arrest people and hold them without charges and to revoke a woman's right to an abortion, among other things.

He was booed by the audience, but Bush interrupted and urged the audience to let Taylor finish.

"I feel like despite your rhetoric, that compassion and common sense have been left far behind during your administraiton," Taylor said, standing in a balcony seat and looking down at Bush on stage. "And I would hope from time to time that you have the humility and grace to be ashamed of yourself."

Bush defended the National Security Administration's survelliance program, saying he authorized the program to protect the country.

"You said would I apologize for that?" Bush told him. "The answer is absolutely not."

More....

GOTCHA!!!!!!!!

Am I still allowed to say "ya lil bastid" !!!!!!

Papers: CHENEY AIDE SAYS BUSH OK'd LEAK

Thursday, April 6, 2006
WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney's former top aide told prosecutors President Bush authorized the leak of sensitive intelligence information about Iraq, according to court papers filed by prosecutors in the CIA leak case.

Before his indictment, I. Lewis Libby testified to the grand jury investigating the CIA leak that Cheney told him to pass on information and that it was Bush who authorized the disclosure, the court papers say. According to the documents, the authorization led to the July 8, 2003, conversation between Libby and New York Times reporter Judith Miller.

There was no indication in the filing that either Bush or Cheney authorized Libby to disclose Valerie Plame's CIA identity.

But the disclosure in documents filed Wednesday means that the president and the vice president put Libby in play as a secret provider of information to reporters about prewar intelligence on Iraq.

The authorization came as the Bush administration faced mounting criticism about its failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the main reason the president and his aides had given for going to war.

Libby's participation in a critical conversation with Miller on July 8, 2003 "occurred only after the vice president advised defendant that the president specifically had authorized defendant to disclose certain information in the National Intelligence Estimate," the papers by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald stated. The filing did not specify the "certain information."

"Defendant testified that the circumstances of his conversation with reporter Miller - getting approval from the president through the vice president to discuss material that would be classified but for that approval - were unique in his recollection," the papers added.

Libby is asking for voluminous amounts of classified information from the government in order to defend himself against five counts of perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI in the Plame affair.

He is accused of making false statements about how he learned of Plame's CIA employment and what he told reporters about it.

Her CIA status was publicly disclosed eight days after her husband, former U.S. Ambassador Joseph Wilson, accused the Bush administration of twisting prewar intelligence to exaggerate the Iraqi threat from weapons of mass destruction.

In 2002, Wilson had been dispatched to Africa by the CIA to check out intelligence that Iraq had an agreement to acquire uranium yellowcake from Niger, and Wilson had concluded that there was no such arrangement.

Libby says he needs extensive classified files from the government to demonstrate that Plame's CIA connection was a peripheral matter that he never focused on, and that the role of Wilson's wife was a small piece in a building public controversy over the failure to find WMD in Iraq.

Fitzgerald said in the new court filing that Libby's requests for information go too far and the prosecutor cited Libby's own statements to investigators in an attempt to limit the amount of information the government must turn over to Cheney's former chief of staff for his criminal defense.

According to Miller's grand jury testimony, Libby told her about Plame's CIA status in the July 8, 2003 conversation that took place shortly after the White House aide - according to the new court filing - was authorized by Bush through Cheney to disclose sensitive intelligence about Iraq and WMD contained in a National Intelligence Estimate.

The court filing was first disclosed by The New York Sun.

Bush's Grand Game:
A "PNAC Primer" UPDATE

By Bernard Weiner
Co-Editor, The Crisis Papers

April 4, 2006

When the Bush Administration keeps hauling out its "we-didn't-know-nothin'" spin -- about Katrina, 9/11, Iraq, torture -- in effect they're using incompetence as their defense. How can you try to censure or impeach us, they're saying, when we didn't know what was happening, what to do or how to do it?

Their incompetence by this time has been well-documented and par for the Bush course. But, as the evidence demonstrates, in each of those cases they knew a lot more than they let on, having received adequate warnings of the scenarios that were about to unfold.

http://www.crisispapers.org/essays6w/PNAC.htm

Poll: Are you surprised that Loose Lips Libby said that Smirky ok'd the Plame leak?

http://articles.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20060406121209990007

Go vote (you'll be interested in how many agree with you).

The fat lady is in the wings and waiting to sing. An end is near, but will Darth Chainsaw take over??? And if he does, what happens if he dies?? Who is next in line???

The eclipse has brought me a lot of new and powerful energies. Anyone else having positive benefits from them? It seems like alot of barriers in my life have been blown to smithereens.

And now, behold! The corpoDems:
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_david_si_060405_wall_street_dems_unv.htm

B*stids all!

(Thing that'll pass, Pallas?)

Trade you a 'k' for that 'g' above, ok?

Hello jm,
And welcome back. It is so good to hear from you again.

I was as usual impressed with your comments on the personal from yesterday morning. It sounds like you put a lot of thought into it or that you had already thought out this issue previously and could share your ideas on it quite readily. You offered such a clarifying perspective. Just want to say thanks.

So, how much do we owe and who owns us?
http://www.economyincrisis.org/congress/foreignfinanceddebt.asp

Gospel of JUDAS discovered! Pluto in Sag/Jupiter in Scorpio at work on Christianity? I believe so.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/06/science/06cnd-judas.html?hp&ex=1144382400&en=d58e9f87384d906d&ei=5094&partner=homepage

'Gospel of Judas' Surfaces After 1,700 Years

An early Christian manuscript, including the only known text of what is known as the Gospel of Judas, has surfaced after 1,700 years. The text gives new insights into the relationship of Jesus and the disciple who betrayed him, scholars reported today. In this version, Jesus asked Judas, as a close friend, to sell him out to the authorities, telling Judas he will "exceed" the other disciples by doing so.

Though some theologians have hypothesized this, scholars who have studied the new-found text said, this is the first time an ancient document defends the idea.

The discovery in the desert of Egypt of the leather-bound papyrus manuscript, and now its translation, was announced by the National Geographic Society at a news conference in Washington. The 26-page Judas text is said to be a copy in Coptic, made around A. D. 300, of the original Gospel of Judas, written in Greek the century before.

Terry Garcia, an executive vice president of the geographic society, said the manuscript, or codex, is considered by scholars and scientists to be the most significant ancient, nonbiblical text to be found in the past 60 years.

Much More: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/06/science/06cnd-judas.html?hp&ex=1144382400&en=d58e9f87384d906d&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Christians will just say Judas betrayed Jesus first and now he's betraying the only true religion, the Chritian Right.

See? It's all part of the War On Chritianity!

Pat C. and All,

Re: Bush Speech today in North Carolina. I heard a brief snippit of it today on "Talk of The Nation."

His abrasive and combative style was as normal but what really bothered me was the overwhelming applaud he received when he vehemently stated that he would not apologize. This is what I don't understand about my fellow Americans. So many of them are "all for whatever the president wants to do, including breaking the law." When, if ever will they draw a line and say enough is enough. I just don't get it. I haven't heard any statistics recently but believe it was quoted at the time the issue broke in the news that 62% Americans think/feel it is O.K. for the president to use warrantless spying.

I will also add that much of his explanation was untrue based upon what individual Senators have already clarified and revealed in hearings and other documents.

Garry, A Minnesota journalist and a Minnesota native/comedian all in one day. They were great articles and will visit Frankens's new site regularly now that I know about it. Does he sound as good to you on the air as he did with the remarks about Coulter? I can't get him in real clear on AA. He's great with Garrison Keillor too!

Beverly,

keep in mind that Dubya's audiences are handpicked... were you able to hear Harry Taylor, that wonderful man who spoke out, stood up and told Dubya how ashamed he was of him?

Beverly, I'm holding in my heart that the audiences are chosen strictly and that those audiences are from the neocon right and they think Jesus guides Bush directly. I'm also holding in my heart that those numbers are babied by the media or whoever has the power to juggle them.

I can not comprehend that there is more than a small group of fanatics who actually have any respect for this administration.

Tom at Salon's TT posted this:

Bush faces criticism at forum, won't apologize for surveillance

NEDRA PICKLER Associated Press

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - President Bush, told by a critic he should be ashamed of his policies, defended the government's secret eavesdropping program Thursday and said he would not apologize for listening in on the phone and e-mail conversations of Americans talking to people with suspected al-Qaida links.

A man who identified himself as Harry Taylor rose at a forum here to tell Bush that he's never felt more ashamed of the leadership of his country. He said Bush has asserted his right to tap phone calls without a warrant, to arrest people and hold them without charges and to revoke a woman's right to an abortion, among other things.

He was booed by the audience, but Bush interrupted and urged the audience to let Taylor finish.

"I feel like despite your rhetoric, that compassion and common sense have been left far behind during your administraiton," Taylor said, standing in a balcony seat and looking down at Bush on stage. "And I would hope from time to time that you have the humility and grace to be ashamed of yourself."

Bush defended the National Security Administration's survelliance program, saying he authorized the program to protect the country.

"You said would I apologize for that?" Bush told him. "The answer is absolutely not." ...

Isn't it strange that he polls at 60% APPROVAL for sticking his nose in our business yet he gets about the same percentage in DISAPPROVAL for his war, his incompetent job, and the economy?

The only reason they're doctoring that poll is because it's the one thing he's done that is illegal beyond any shadow of a doubt. Gonzalez's insistance that he's above the law isn't cutting it.

And of course he isn't going to apologize for anything, ever, under any circumstances. If there's one thing he's super consistent about it's that he NEVER BACKS DOWN. Never. To him that's a sign of weakness just like it is to any bully. Apologies are for sissy men, or to borrow Ahnuld's phrase, for girly-men. And that's exactly why his base adores him. They love macho men, not sissies. Especially the ones who are getting filthier rich than ever.

Thank you Jo and Pat C,

I only heard part of Mr. Taylor's question/comment but have read it out at huffingtonpost.com.

ALL of Bush's audiences are hand picked? ALL OF THEM? If so 'tis truly cowardly in my estimation when you are the leader of the free world as he likes to say. So Mr. Taylor had plans of his own eventhough the "hand picker" thought they were getting a true-blue conservative totally in love with the president? If so, I hope they continue to make these revealing mistakes in spite of the applaud which is so painful for me to hear.

Or does Rove pick these conservative dissenters to make it look as those "when the president speaks and goes against popular will, the people will rethink their opinion and get back in line? I don't know but sound like a Rovian tactic. Almost seems contrived as Mr. Bush has answered a number of "difficult questions" lately.

The "spin" on the new Libby revelations (huffingtonpost.com) about Bush/Cheney authorizing him to release information is that "by the president giving the go ahead to release, the information automatically becomes declassified." This is more than likely what we will be hearing for the next couple of days, if at all. What is all the big deal about????? Why an investigation at all?

He can't declassify (release) the identities of C.I.A. personnel though. Will the pundits talk about that though?

Beverly, I'm delighted. My heart sunk when you got so irritated with the group that you considered walking out. But I was kind of surprised at how feisty your self defense was, and rather impressed.

"Nedra Pickler"?

This is very, very, very, VERY good. Harry Taylor's (sounds like a good American, doesn't he?) remarks to our President today were incredible. The photo is being compared to Norman Rockwell's "Freedom of Speech".

Well, no wonder. Mars in Gemimi has come to the opposition to Pluto in Sag. The North Node in Aries at 4 degrees is exactly trining the Saturn in Leo going direct.

Speak up all great Americans!

Let freedom ring!

Yes, Golden, it is intestering how the polling is so consistent or should I say inconsistent about two issues that are surely related if people would only think about it a little more deeply.

But, just for hope.....
http://www.conyersblog.us

has an entry about conservative David Brook's recent comments about the Democrats taking back the house in 2006. Brooks said that his conservative "insider" are making this claim to him. They are worried that if that were to happen John Conyers will become the Chairman of the House Judicary Committee and investigations and impeachment proceedings will begin to unfold. This is coming from Republicans!

Sally mentioned previously that Conyers might have either an health problems or career/difficulties in the near future. I saw an article a few weeks back about a law suit taken by a former Conyer's staffer against him for manipulating his office/staff concerning babysitting his small children and other related issues. He is 76 and has small children. I would have never quessed that. Not grandchildren, his own children. Maybe this will become a bigger issue.

I would like to see him become Chairman but am not sure if he will actually follow through on impeachment.

jm,
Thank you. Just to clear up, I never considered leaving the group. I only went to cool off a few days until the subject changed. That is how I worded it. A good nights sleep always helps too! Seems like the air is cleared over rest and we can begin again.

Now connect the dots.

Junior vinidctively and playing straight politics to push through his phonied up war, ordered Plame CIA agent outed to punish her husband and make it look like she was the one who was using nepotism to send him on a joy trip, and to make it look like "Wilson had no proper authority nor was he an authority in the manner".

Wilson gets very vocal and gives interviews, talks to lots of people, emails, faxes, phone calls.

the American people find out that junior has been tapping their phones, faxes, emails domestically, lying about it, it's right there on video, and then is forced to admit it, saying yes, I did and I won't apologize for it. And the NSA is not going to reveal who has been wiretapped. That would endanger "national security". (Duh, you dont mind if I ask what national security? And wouldn't it be more truthful to say "it would endanger Junior's lying security?")

Ok. Here's the dots. or rather the straight line
to the truth. Bush refuses to reveal who the NSA has been spying on, because he's been spying on his political enemies. Following me? ala Nixon.

If I were Joe Wilson I would be suing for the release of all the domestic spying done on Joe Wilson, just as other people, including the Quakers and some peace movements are doing.

Because you know, as well as I do, that there are reams of transcripts of everyone Joe Wilson spoke to.

* Do you want to lead FEMA?

With hurricane season fast approaching, it’s not reassuring that [rez regime] can’t find anyone to lead the Fed Emergency Mgmt Agency, formerly headed by Michael Brown of Katrina fashion fame. Turns out a who’s who of qualified people in this field have been approached & said “no thanks.”

Several candidates told The NYTimes they withdrew after deciding the WH wasn’t serious about fixing FEMA’s problems (it’s widely considered one of the worst govt agencies to work for). There’s not just room at the top: Some 500 F-T staff jobs out of 2,500 remain vacant, incl several important mgmt jobs.

The Homeland Security reshuffling & resulting marginalization of FEMA is looking more & more like a disaster waiting to happen.

C’mon, folks, your country needs you. Anybody on this blog want to lead FEMA? http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2006/04/do_you_want_to_.html

This is just awful Joanna. Horrible.

Pallas, I just have no words any more for this broken government.

Pallas,

Since I first heard about the domestic spying I felt it was spying on political enemies. Did you hear Gonzales today (NPR 7:00 p.m.) talking about under law the president might have, just might have, power to intercept domestic as well as foreign calls. They keep pounding the same message over and over but adding the new twist of domestic spying as well. But Bush spoke today describing his authorization of the wire tapping as foreign calls only.
~~~~~~~
There is quite a ruckus brewing with a press conference Nick Lampson held this morning asking Texas Govenor Perry to call for an immediate election in Sugurland, District 22 since the deadline for the current proceedings ends tomorrow with the subsequent request to DeLay that he resign immediately.

The conference was disrupted by DeLay supporters in which a 69 (70?) year old woman was assulted and is suggesting she may file charges. You can find the e-mail from DeLay headquarters calling for the disruption and further details at:

http://www.dailykos.com

Such continueous, on-going thuggery.

On the hurricane season soon approaching, Nick Lampson's press secretary spoke with Jay Marvin (filling in for Ed Schultz) about the possibility of being without a Representative for TX 22nd if a immediate election were not called. It would mean Texas would be without any representative in the house for six months should Texas be hit by hurricanes.

Beverly,

The exact same thing that DeLay pulled here in Florida during the 2000 Gore recount. He flew himself and aides down to Florida and they stood at the windows and doors of where the chads were being counted - shouting and banging on the doors, riotous, thuggery, yes you said it exactly
"thuggery". ...and so he put them up to the same thing in Texas now.

this is not a government, and it hasn't been since 2000. It's no different than Saddamm's small cadre of thugs or of Hitler's and I dont say that loosely. Thom Hartman had it exactly right in that first article he wrote comparing juniors moves to the rise of Hitler.

Trouble is coming. The more he's exposed the more danger - crisis is coming - and then it will be up to whom the national guard and the army will follow.

Since everything else is being exposed -
I'm wondering when the truth by an insider is going to be exposed about 9-11. We have part of it. An "insider's plane , with no markings, followed flight 93 -- and suddenly there was a big explosion and crash.

Now where's the truth about the World Trade Center buildins?

I dont remember in all my years such a roller coaster ride coming out of DC. Not even the upsets about the captured embassy people during Carter's presidency was like this. Not even Viet Nam was like this. There was more truth even with all the lies, about Viet Nam.

It's horriffic.

Trillion Dollar War

Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz

Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, 63, discusses the true $1 trillion cost of the Iraq conflict. The only people benefiting in this war are Bush's friends in the oil industry. He has done the American economy and the global economy an enormous disfavor, but his Texan friends couldn't be happier

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12634.htm

===
Retired CIA Official Says Bush Is A War Criminal

An in-depth interview with former high-level CIA analyst Ray McGovern; McGovern talks about his work as an advisor to Bush 1 and his belief that Bush 2 is a war criminal and should be tried for crimes against humanity.

Real audio
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12628.htm

Jason Leopold | Evidence Suggests White House Conspiracy

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040606R.shtml

Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald stated in a court filing late Wednesday in the CIA leak case that his investigators have obtained evidence during the course of the two-year-old probe that proves several White House officials conspired to discredit former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, a critic of the administration's prewar Iraq intelligence.

Goldensilence

If Bush isn't as gay as a goose, I'll eat my hat.
There are just too many stories out there that
seem to back it. We still don't know the full story of the Gannon ties. Nor of his boyfriend
that used to be mayor of Chattanoga.

Al Gore and David Blood | For People and Planet

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110008151

Capitalism and sustainability are deeply and increasingly interrelated, say Al Gore and David Blood. After all, our economic activity is based on the use of natural and human resources. Not until we more broadly “price in” the external costs of investment decisions across all sectors will we have a sustainable economy and society.

Comment

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The tethered goat strategy

Amid an internal crisis of credibility, Condoleezza Rice has washed her hands of her department

Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday April 6, 2006
The Guardian

Since the Iraqi elections in January, US foreign service officers at the Baghdad embassy have been writing a steady stream of disturbing cables describing drastically worsening conditions. Violence from incipient communal civil war is rapidly rising. Last month there were eight times as many assassinations committed by Shia militias as terrorist murders by Sunni insurgents. The insurgency, according to the reports, also continues to mutate. Meanwhile, President Bush's strategy of training Iraqi police and army to take over from coalition forces - "when they stand up, we'll stand down" - is perversely and portentously accelerating the strife. State department officials in the field are reporting that Shia militias use training as cover to infiltrate key positions. Thus the strategy to create institutions of order and security is fuelling civil war.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1747911,00.html

jm, welcome back! Sorry, I couldn't respond to your post sooner. It's difficult to post as much as I'd prefer to be doing during the daytime hours, with the corporate whip cracking over my head and all.

I think you may be onto something with the Dems. Although their apparent ineptitude is frustrating now, the seeds that have been planted at the grassroots will eventually germinate and grow to make way for something better. I suspect that will sooner than later manifest as a split between the Centrist DLC/Wall Street/Corporatist Wing, and the emergence of a genuine populist, Progressive/Liberal, perhaps even Radical Left/Green/Environmentalist Wing.

I think the party may eventually split up entirely, the result of the DLC Dems not being "liberal enough", with the Dems' populist Left Wing merging with the Greens to finally form a legitimate Liberal party.

Fortunately, something similar seems to be happening to the GOP as well. The Libertarians and Corporatists seem to finally be growing rather weary of the Christian Fundamentalists, who seem to have almost completely taken over the party infrastructure. I think all of their philosophical differences will take center stage in 2008 in a big brawl over the future of the party, especially if the Republicans lose control of Congress in 2006. This too, could result in a complete party split, with the Libertarians/Rockefeller Conservatives taking one wing, and the Christian Fundies taking another wing, or else leaving entirely to start something along the lines of the "American Christian Fellowship Party".

Beginning of the end for the humpty dumpty on the
throne by stealing as libby says the leak orders
came directly from the very top of the dominoes!

Neo

It would be nice to have more parties, but the
Repugs and Demorats control who gets on the ballot
on the State level, so unless there was a ruling
by SCOTUS allowing it, methinks it would be very
difficult to get by the local scum. A good percentage of the voters would have to sign up as
members of the party the prefer.

Is the humpty dumpty and his assistant(Igor the evil), both on their way from the White House to the jail house?

the "American Christian Fellowship Party".

You just burned holes into my eyes...Stop it, your scaring me.

Rebuilding cash may not arrive until fall
Even if Congress OKs money, residents will wait for processing

http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/frontpage/index.ssf?/base/news-5/1144309513230500.xml

Pallas,

I still say this all goes as least as far up as Poppy Bush. Probably even further, but I'm not sure what good it would do to unearth ol' Prescott's Hitler-Lovin' corpse and ship it off for trial at the ICC. Dead men are most preferred when it comes to keeping secrets.

That said, with things finally closing in on George H. W's spoiled, silver-spooned progeny, it wouldn't surprise me at all if the man pulls a Reagan and "claims" he's been afflicted with mind-voiding Alzheimers, just to keep the hounds of truth and justice off his own back.

Here's another interesting thought: If anyone here watches "24" on Faux (yeah, I know, I hate to admit that I do) the story has just taken an interesting turn in which the fictional U.S. President Charles Logan has been implicated in an international conspiracy involving bio-terrorism, and of course, Middle Eastern Oil. I'll let you decide how those two pieces fit together.

Also, President Logan just so happens to bear an uncanny resemblance to a certain current real life occupant of the White House, right down to the "aw shucks" "mask" of ineptitude running cover for a far more cunning persona. Is this life imitating art, or the other way around?

Actually, Cybear, it might be one of the more desireable outcomes. If we abolish the two Big Tent parties in favor of perhaps four to six smaller parties with each possessing a much more specific social platform by necessity, it will force each of the parties to be far more honest about their political intentions. Any coalitions formed would be obvious and outwardly visible, bringing an end to the "Trojan Horsing" that we see now in the GOP by the Christian Fundamentalists. If they have their own party by whatever label of their choosing, then they will be more easily identifiable by the public.

It's a thought, anyway, though I suppose we have a ways to go yet before we send Congress packing for a proportional/Parliamentary-style government.

Sorry, that was my post. I forgot to enter my name with it.

Neo, since Faux is like the 9th arm of this hydra, it wouldn't suprise me if the White House handed them their scripts...and watch Jack find a way to keep the fake pRes from being implicated--or, it will turn out the faker-in-chief did what he did for some greater globalist "good"....gotta keep the propaganda fresh, ya know....

Remember, the first episode of the X-Files spinoff "The Lone Gunmen"(also on Faux) contained a reference to a plot to fly airplanes into buildings and blame the Muslims.....

NEO, it would be good in a sense that we would really see who is who and what is what, but I think it would divide the country even more. There are a lot of people out there that identify with or as xians out of fear of going to hell. You know the kind who always say, "I'm not going to hell because I'm a christian". Would they be the ones who suppport the party? Or would it be the radicals? Or catholics? More then likely it would be a little of each, which would give a party like that legs to stand on for a while, until they screwed things up more then they are now.

It's just a thought.

I really think our government is on the verge of collapse and we will not see any great change until then.

Neobuckeye,

He is inept.

Being cunning and street smart is far different from having intelligence.

Just for you:

Click here: http://www.imgag.com/product/full/ap/3067907/graphic1.swf

Cybear,

In a proportional parliamentary system, the far fringe parties and interests rarely wield much power or influence, though they may have more of an opportunity to voice their opinions than what they have through our current congressional system.

I think things would settle out after about 15 to 20 years in this country under such a system, hopefully with a solid majority, decidedly Left-leaning, populist, Liberal government, as surviving in the face of resource depletion and environmental upheaval will have precious little room for today's bloviating reactionary neoconservatism.

At any rate, I actually don't believe that the Christian extremists (or any religious extremists for that matter) will continue to wield much power and influence past Pluto leaving Sag for Capricorn in 2008. Even now, some of those movements dating back to Uranus in Sagittarius during the 1980s are finally breaking down, and those that remain most active are the most offensive of the sort that will cast a withering shadow over fundamentalist religion as a whole for a long time.

I think most everyone here knows my spiel on Uranus in Aries Squaring Pluto in Capricorn by now. If the US govt. is going to experience, let's say, the beginnings of a "full-scale overhaul" in favor of something else, for better or for worse, 2012-15 would be a very probable time for it to begin in earnest.

Pallas,

Good point.

I'm shocked, I tell you! Shocked!
Don't miss this one:
http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_sean_gre_060406_with_voting_machine_.htm

ANd when you read that on oped scrolldown to the 13th Top Editorials in left hand column and read Ron Fullwoods,
How to make war on Amrerica without getting caught.
PQ

Is anyone else upset about the Cynthia McKinney business??
The general opinion seems to be that she's a "loose cannon", but having merc.in aries sq mars in cap
( mutual reception) she has my deepest sympathy! ( I would be running for some kind of office otherwise)
I agree that those guarding the capital should be adept at face recognition. Think how many innocents, would be spared the trauma of jail, sentencing, etc. if that was a job requirement.

As a follow up to the Repugs closing ranks over the roiled waters of Cheney's drunken shooting spree, wherein Mr Whittington apologized to HIM..........................and to all those, bowing and scraping before El Emperor, no matter what stupidity/ crime has been committed, makes me want to puke! ..........................................

I was appalled at Nacy Pelosi's too contained self satisfied, preppy, condemnation of her FELLOW DEMOCRAT! ( no wonder they are losing!)
I called her aid in Washintgton and told him I was out of the party unless they pulled it together; and I said Pelosi was like a Vassar Grad with a pot of tea and plate of scones, going over to San Quinton to negotiate.
That she needed to get some street smarts or step down.!!
What was Mc Kinney's crime? DId she premeditate hitting a policeman? Did she cripple him for life?, how bad were his injuries?
McKinney is working for the commonwealth, where recognition of 500 - 1,000 faces that you see on a daily basis, would be a part of your job description in order to be hired. An accepted fact!
Out here in the sticks I have voice recognition of all the ACTIVE Senate and House members, what's their problem? Another swift boat smear!
PQ

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2006/04/06.html#a7814

Harry Taylor blasts Bush

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

These two from Bill Bonet on Salon: Hoo boy!

From Juan Cole’s blog:

The LA Times discusses a seldom-explored subject, the thousands of wounded Iraq veterans. Many of these Vets will need special help the rest of their lives, but the Bush administration has actually cut their medical benefits. And, tricks are used to put them off the books. Some of the wounded stay in the service in Iraq, but head wounds or post traumatic stress disorder often make them discipline problems, and they are given dishonorable discharges, which have the effect of denying them access to the VA hospitals!

http://www.juancole.com/

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

A BBC interview with Khalilzad re the deadlock over who should lead the new government and reduced attacks on US troops:

US 'in talks with Iraq militants'

The US ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, has said US officials have held talks with some groups linked to the Sunni-led Iraqi insurgency.

Mr Khalilzad told the BBC that he believed the talks had had an impact, as the number of attacks on US troops by Iraqi militants had fallen.

But he ruled out negotiating with those he called Saddamists or terrorists.

He also urged Iraq's politicians to break the deadlock over who should lead the new government of national unity.

Iraq's President Jalal Talabani has said the dispute, four months after elections, is one of the main obstacles to political progress in the country. The current prime minister, Ibrahim Jaafari, has rejected growing pressure to resign, saying Iraqis must be allowed to choose their leader democratically.

Kurdish and Sunni parties, and many within Mr Jaafari's dominant Shia alliance, want him to withdraw.

"The national unity government needs the approval of all groups for the prime minister, otherwise how can he lead a national unity government?" Mr Talabani said in a BBC interview.

Contacts

Mr Khalilzad told the BBC's Baghdad correspondent that it was important for Iraq to have a good, competent and unifying government but Iraqi politicians should agree its composition as quickly as possible.

"The patience of the Iraqi people and the international community is running out," he said.

Mr Khalilzad admitted that Iraq was going through a difficult transition and that civil war remained a real risk.

He acknowledged that the US was talking to some groups with ties to the insurgency.

"We are talking to people who are willing to accept this new Iraq, to lay down their arms, to co-operate in the fight against terrorists," he said.

He said he believed the contacts were producing results.

"The number of attacks on the coalition is down. I think last month was the second lowest month of attacks against the coalition."

More...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4885874.stm

From Fergus who has really worked on this issue for years.

It's your world. Understand it! April 2, 2006: The Monitor

KPFT - Pacifica Radio listen online at www.kpft.org . . . in Houston, 90.1 FM . . . . . or, in Galveston, 89.5 FM

6 pm Central . . . 7 pm Eastern . . . . . 4 pm Pacific

ARCHIVES If you miss a show, you can find it on KPFT's archives. ARCHIVES are now at: http://archive.kpft.org

<> 6:00 pm CST -- HEADLINES

<> ~ 6:10 pm CST -- KPFT Local News reporter Lisa Cohen on the Enron trial

Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling PHOTO (1998) -

Lisa Cohen is a KPFT Local News reporter who interviewed authors, activists, and ambassadors before becoming KPFT's Enron trial correspondent. A longtime Houstonian with a background in political science and law, she is the only radio journalist in the courtroom daily for US v. Skilling and Lay.

Lisa will catch us up with the trial, which has run 9 weeks so far in downtown Houston. The federal prosecutors have closed their case, and the defense is about to launch its case. Both Jeff Skilling and Ken Lay are expected to testify on their own behalf, with Skilling expected on the stand as soon as next Wednesday or Thursday.

Monitor co-host Pokey Anderson has a special interest in Enron, having spent a year doing research on it, including work for the book Power Failure by Mimi Swartz with Sherron Watkins.

Add'l Recommended Book: The Smartest Guys in the Room, by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind

Recommended Video: ENRON: The Smartest Guys in the Room

<> ~ 6:35 pm CST -- ANDREW GUMBEL reviews the history of American stolen elections

Andrew Gumbel is a U.S. correspondent for the London newspaper The Independent. Based in Los Angeles, he is the author of Steal This Vote: Dirty Elections and the Rotten History of Democracy in America (Nation Books), in which he documents countless elections stolen by nearly countless methods. Publishers Weekly calls the book a "a riveting and frightening account" of election fraud in America from the 18th century to the present.

Before coming to the United States, Gumbel was stationed mainly in Europe and covered the fall of the Berlin Wall, the collapse of communism in the Soviet bloc, the Yugoslav wars of secession, the rise of the prototype corporate media mogul turned politician, Silvio Berlusconi, and the swinging democratic fortunes of post-Hoxha Albania. He also writes the award-winning American Babylon column for the alternative Los Angeles weekly LA CityBeat.

BOOK: Steal This Vote: Dirty Elections and the Rotten History of Democracy in America

CO-HOSTS: Mark Bebawi and Pokey Anderson.

TIPS or COMMENTS: Write to SundayMonitor@journalist.com

April 7, 2006
Judge Rules in Favor of 'Da Vinci Code' Writer
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 9:48 a.m. ET

LONDON (AP) -- A judge ruled Friday that best-selling author Dan Brown did not steal ideas from a nonfiction book, ending the suspense about whether the novelist committed copyright infringement in his thriller ''The Da Vinci Code.''

High Court judge Peter Smith rejected a copyright-infringement claim by Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh, authors of ''The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail,'' who claimed that Brown's blockbuster ''appropriated the architecture'' of their 1982 book. In the United States, the book is titled, ''Holy Blood, Holy Grail.''

A film based on Brown's book and starring Tom Hanks opens May 19.

''It would be quite wrong if fictional writers were to have their writings pored over
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/books/AP-Da-Vinci-Lawsuit.html?pagewanted=print

Water wars: Acapulco
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-dam07.html

Fiore...Migraphobia

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

Dear Sally,

thank you so much for such a lovely article. I feel all these dinosaurs will disappear starting this year, the dawn of bresaking corporations and end of lies is here, and we shall have a globalization, but this time based on love and harmony...

Sorry to post so little here, as I am so involved with peace and painting. But I often visit and try to catch up with all these lovely posters, so hugs to all !!!

:)

Sorry I meant ' breaking " corporations... Can't even type ! LOL

wv, there's a lot of that type of 'love affair' kind of relationship in the White House, whether it's homosexual or not. The recipient of such devotion is all Bush all the time. And it's not just the Bush women either.

I don't have a birth time for Alberto Gonzales and I'm not good enough in astology to create a composite chart but I do wonder why he is such a huge enabler of Bush. This guy is jaw-droppingly in love with his master!

Alberto R. Gonzales.

AGE-BIRTH DATE -- 49; born Aug. 4, 1955, in San Antonio.

From P Glass

Extremely interesting KPFA Pacifica interview with Ray McGovern- I am listening now as I post-

An in-depth interview with former high-level CIA analyst Ray McGovern; McGovern talks about his work as an advisor to Bush 1 and his belief that Bush 2 is a war criminal and should be tried for crimes against humanity.
Transmission date: 04/03/06 Flashpoints
CLICK PLAY TO LISTEN
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12628.htm
(Listen to the part re Guantanamo)

If anyone wants to sign a thank you note to Harry Taylor for speaking out to Bush here's a site set up specially for that

http://thankyouharrytaylor.org/index.php

The above site is set up by Daily Kos

Thank you Goldensilence. That was fun to do! What a guy!

Just wondering,,,, what is this really interesting time zone we see on posts ? Is that GMT ??

:)

Thank you GoldenSilence too !!

flo, here you go!

http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/

Oh wait a minute! I misunderstood. I thought you were wondering what GMT was. Eeesh.

Sorry flo!

If Jr. authorized the leaks and doesn't think it compromised US security, what does he think compromises the security of this country? Can someone put him in a padded cell and throw away the key?
--------------------------------------------------
White House Declines to Counter Leak Claim

But Bush's spokesman, Scott McClellan, appeared to draw a distinction about Bush's oft-stated opposition to leaks. "The president would never authorize disclosure of information that could compromise our nation's security," Bush's spokesman said.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060407/ap_on_go_pr_wh/cia_leak_27;_ylt=AtykZLqhGviQdbDva6BJPEdqP0AC;_ylu=X3oDMTBiMW04NW9mBHNlYwMlJVRPUCUl

Sorry for the long link.

Israeli gunboats stop Palestinians from fishing

By Stephen Farrell
06/04/2006

Israeli gunboats stop Palestinians from fishing as a communal punishment or to prevent attacks

His nets empty and his fibreglass hull perforated by machinegun bullets, Omar sits glumly on the shoreline contemplating the looming demise of the Gaza fishing industry.

Unable to afford the rising prices of lamb, beef and flour in their sealed-off coastal strip, Palestinians crowd their markets in search of fish. Now that poultry supplies are depleted by the threat of bird flu, the clamour for fish is even greater.

But, confronted by Israeli gunboats in fishing grounds they consider their own, the impoverished fishermen are unable to meet the demand.

The heart of the issue is the continued Israeli control of Gaza's borders, airspace and waters, more than six months after it claimed to have ended its military rule of Gaza by evacuating 8,000 Jewish settlers and all its military bases.

A study by the United Nations' World Food Programme (WFP), released this week, identifies Israeli restrictions on fishing boats as a key factor in the decline of an industry that, it says, could be finished by October 2007.

Pat Sharp,

It has been speculated that McKinney's rampant news coverage was designed to take the focus off of the most recent Plame/Libby/Bush disclosure.

One account I read yesterday stated that she apologized to Capitol Police and that she is facing the possibility of arrest! I wonder why they don't apologize to her. She thought she was defending herself against assult and hit the officer with her cell phone. I didn't know you could be arrested for trying to defend yourself.

Pallas,

I like you would like for someone "inside" to come forward on the truth of 9/11.

But I have often wondered if it would really do any good. Like all other lies that have been exposed incrementally by knowledgeable and credible sources, they get lost in the shuffle and eventually lost from the radar. Like the JFK assasination, even classified documents released 30 years later do not bear the whole thruth. So much is kept secret and the more secrets and cover ups the more conspiracy abounds. What I will never understand is why there is SO MUCH to hide.

Flo, thanks for the hug! and Raj.....it is so nice to hear from you again.

Pallas and Others,

One more thing on 9/11. Should an insider come forward about the truth of 9/11 I do believe it would lend some credibility to the 60% of New Yorkers and others like myself who have felt all along that it was an inside job.

Eric Francis comments that it is inevitable that data could be released that lay the responsibility for 9/11 at the feet of Bush and Cheney and that it could gain public acceptance. Saw this just now on Nancy's starlightnews.com posted by Judith today.

I thought this might bring a chuckle. Went to do an author visit at an elementary school in Queens. There was a special breakfast and a poster for all the guests to sign. The poster was a globe of the Earth. In the midwest part of the US I wrote 'Save the USA from * Bush'. On Europe I wrote 'France rocks!' Then I signed my name in the middle of the Altalntic Ocean. Tee Hee, hope I'm not going to the principal's office.

Any ideas on this indigo lovers? I am noticing the K's and 1 graders not raising their hands to ask questions. I told them to think for themselves and was not going on any further in the workshop until a question was asked. Scary, too much testing and being talked 'at'.

Good for you bhakti!

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

Robert Parry | Did Bush Lie to Fitzgerald?

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/040706B.shtml

If Bush misled the prosecutor about authorizing Libby to brief a reporter, then Bush himself could be open to charges of making false statements or obstructing justice, potential felonies and possibly impeachable offenses.

bhakti, please emaill me.
karen

Pat C, yep! That's why Bush and Cheney "testified" without being sworn in. As many noted then, it was to avoid a perjury charge. My oh my, these guys are sleezy.

Barbara, I think the worst in modern memeory!

Pat C, yep! That's why Bush and Cheney "testified" without being sworn in. As many noted then, it was to avoid a perjury charge. My oh my, these guys are sleezy.

Barbara, this is the first time, well except for Reagan, that an administration so obviously had an agenda, and not one the people would approve, before they ever took office. Worst pResident ever IMO.

Sorry, Pat C and all for the double post. I am trying to peruse the posts on Astroworld and my daughter keeps coming in telling me more details about meeting David Gilmore (Pink Floyd) last night.

bhakti,

your post reminds me of when I was a teen-aged Sunday School teacher of 8-year-olds. At that time I was a Christian, but not a (US Conservative) conventional one.

In class whenever I asked a question, the well-trained children intoned, "Jesus."

I upset the applecart by exclaiming, "Don't just say, 'Jesus'! Think about it!"

I had to quit a few weeks later because I realized I was teaching the children things their parents had not sent them to learn.

Was well on my way to Budhism by then.

Poll: Smirky's leaking.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12209997/?displaymode=1006

I couldn't improve on the wording, so didn't try. GO vote.

Just wondering if I am still welcome here at AW...
Anyone?

I know I made a lot of you angry last week.

Cybear, you silly goose.

...........

From Tom Arthur:

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/LAW/04/07/homeland.arrest/

Co-workers: DHS official had previous pornography incident

April 8, 2006

(CNN) -- A Department of Homeland Security spokesman charged with soliciting a minor over the Internet was disciplined in a previous job after an incident in which pornographic images were seen on an office computer, his friends and former co-workers said.

Brian Doyle resigned from his Homeland Security Department post Friday, his 56th birthday. ...

... Friends and former co-workers say Doyle was disciplined by Time magazine after he allegedly used company computers to view adult pornography in the publication's Washington bureau office. ...

... Doyle received a formal warning and was required to undergo mental health counseling before returning to work, the sources said. ...

... Homeland Security's failure to uncover the Time incident shows "serious deficiencies in the background clearance process at the Department of Homeland Security," King said. ...

Arrrgh!!

I think my brain has been fried this week. New job stress, long hours, and not enough sleep.

Bill Maher is staying at the hotel this week when he's here for a show. Christopher Titus is there this weekend. He's another social comedian and fellow B* basher. Anyway I met him by fluke, went into one of the meeting rooms to remove some equipment and he was there working out. Talked a while and he's putting me on the guest list for tomorrow night show at the Improv!

Now if I can only luck into meeting Bill Maher...

This is an extraordinary book. It is now quite old, but it is still extremely relevant. It is on-line, though you do have to go through some registration process. Viva!
"The Shark and the Sardines". Guess who is which.
http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=707688

there's something very uncomfortable about reading this....shades of things to come?

"Nepal King Orders Protesters Shot on Sight"

"Policemen arrest opposition party supporters in Katmandu, Nepal, Friday April 7, 2006. Police battled protesters in Katmandu's narrow alleys Friday, using batons and tear gas to beat back stone-throwing students on the second day of a strike called by adversaries of King Gyanendra. "

Friday, April 7, 2006
KATMANDU, Nepal - Protesters in Nepal postponed a demonstration planned for Saturday after the king imposed a curfew and ordered violators shot on sight.

Khadga Prasad Oli, deputy leader of the Communist Party of Nepal, called the curfew "unneccesary, illegal and illogical" and said the protesters would try to hold the rally on Sunday.

Seven main political parties organized the rally to press the king to restore democracy. It was to be the high point of a four-day nationwide strike that ends Sunday.

Protesters clashed with police in Katmandu and surrounding areas on Thursday and Friday. Hundreds of people were arrested and dozens were injured.

The protesters have the backing of communist rebels, who are separately fighting against the king's rule and formed a loose alliance with the political parties in December.

Gyanendra dismissed the government early last year, saying he needed full powers to check the growing communist insurgency, which has killed some 13,000 people since 1996.

The rebels battled government troops in two southwest towns Friday. Details were sketchy, but government buildings were reportedly bombed and the jail attacked in the town of Taulihawa.

Officials said the curfew was in response to information that the rebels would try to infiltrate the rallies and wage terror attacks against government targets.

The curfew began at 10 a.m. Saturday and was to continue until 9 p.m. in Katmandu and two suburbs for security reasons, the government announced on state-run Radio Nepal. Violators would be shot, it said.

"There is no ground for this," Oli said in announcing the rally would be delayed a day.

Authorities have cracked down forcefully on the protests. On Friday, police used batons and tear gas to beat back hundreds of protesters in Katmandu, many of whom who were throwing rocks.

A post office in Katmandu was set on fire Friday, and students at the capital's Tribhuwan University ransacked the dean's office and briefly held several officers hostage.

Ordinary workers, professionals and business owners joined the protest - a sign, the opposition said, of building momentum against the king.

Of the more than 750 people arrested the past three days, 115 were sent to prison under a tough public safety law that allows authorities to jail people without charge for 90 days, Home Minister Kamal Thapa said.

"The government is using minimum force to control the situation," Thapa told reporters.

The rebels have promised not to wage attacks in Katmandu during the strike, but have stepped up attacks elsewhere.

Earlier Friday, the rebels raided two army camps and a police station . They severed communication at the three sites, leaving police with no information on casualties in the raid, a police official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Gyanendra called for calm in a speech broadcast live Friday on national radio and television.

"Let us all pledge today to devote time for establishing permanent peace," he said. "It is the need of today to establish permanent peace."

The remarks were the king's first public words about the daily protests and the escalating violence from communist rebels.

The strike, running through Sunday, shut down public transport in the capital, and hundreds of people walked to work or stayed home. Shops and schools were shut.

Gyanendra says he was forced to seize power in February last year because of the growing communist insurgency, which has killed some 13,000 people since 1996.

Does anybody else get this strange feeling of archaic nonsense? Kingie-thingie, ruler-drooler, head honcho-pancho, #1 Stud-blood, Supremacist-diseaseamist, Big-Boy-bummer, Pushie-bushie... hahahahaaaaaa! All hughly lethal ego-centered nonsense & clap-trap!

Does anybody else get this strange feeling of archaic nonsense? Kingie-thingie, ruler-drooler, head honcho-pancho, #1 Stud-blood, Supremacist-diseaseamist, Big-Boy-bummer, Pushie-bushie... hahahahaaaaaa! All hughly lethal ego-centered nonsense & clap-trap!

"The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance -- it is the illusion of knowledge.' : Daniel J Boorstin:

=
One of the great things about America, one of the beauties of our country, is that when we see a young, innocent child blown up by an IED, we cry. President G. Bush Washington, D.C., Mar. 29, 2006

=
We support the election process, we support democracy, but that doesn't mean we have to support governments that get elected as a result of
democracy. President G. Bush - Washington, D.C., Mar. 29, 2006

=

"Blessed is the man who, having nothing to stay, abstains from giving us worthy evidence of the fact" George Eliot:

=

" To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of the ignorant" Amos Bronson Alcott:

Those ungrateful Iraqis!

By Rosa Brooks:

04/07/06 "Los Angeles Times" -- -- AT LAST, there's consensus on who's to blame for the mess in Iraq: the Iraqis!

From the beginning, there were ominous signs that the Iraqis weren't going to play the game right. More than a few neocon hearts were broken by the Iraqi refusal to greet us with flowers and champagne as we marched into Baghdad, and the snub still hurts. Just this week, Daniel Pipes, president of the Middle East Forum and an unrepentant hawk, complained about "the ingratitude of the Iraqis for the extraordinary favor we gave them: to release them from the bondage of Saddam Hussein's tyranny."

What really rankles most politicos these days is the Iraqis' refusal to get cracking on the formation of a multiethnic government. Four months after the elections, Iraqi factions still haven't come up with a power-sharing arrangement that satisfies all constituencies.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12644.htm

Iran: The Next Neocon Target

HON. RON PAUL OF TEXAS
Before the U.S. House of Representatives

Once again we're unilaterally declaring a pre-emptive war against a country and a people that have not harmed us and do not have the capacity to do so. And don't expect Congress to seriously debate a declaration of war resolution. For the past 56 years Congress has transferred to the executive branch the power to go to war as it pleases, regardless of the tragic results and costs.

Windows Video and transcript

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12640.htm

Robert Fisk on Iraq, Palestine and the Failure of the U.S. Corporate Media :

We speak with one of the most experienced war correspondents in the world today, Robert Fisk - chief Middle East correspondent of the London Independent - about Iraq, Palestinian and Israeli elections, the corporate media and much more

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/07/144219

Robert Fisk on Iraq, Palestine and the Failure of the U.S. Corporate Media :

We speak with one of the most experienced war correspondents in the world today, Robert Fisk - chief Middle East correspondent of the London Independent - about Iraq, Palestinian and Israeli elections, the corporate media and much more

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/04/07/144219

BILLMON

April 07, 2006

The Story of Our Time

The advance of freedom is the story of our time, and we're seeing new chapters written before our eyes.

George W. Bush

Speech at Freedom House

March 29, 2006

-------

The first blast hit near the mosque exit as worshipers trickled out after Friday prayers. Panicked survivors rushed back into the mosque for safety, only to encounter two thudding booms that resounded inside the mosque.
"I saw the bodies and blood covering the walls and ground. Many people died inside. Many died," said Abbas Talib, a 53-year-old gas station attendant whose jumpsuit and hands were soaked in the blood of the dead he carried out. "The ground was all flesh and blood."
Within a few minutes, the sealed-off street resembled a battlefield. Iraqi army vehicles, police cars and ambulances broke the security cordon around the mosque to help carry the casualties.
Survivors jumped over the mosque's fence, fearing more bombs. Injured people in blood-soaked clothes ran through the streets, looking for a place to hide.
"Don't gather in one spot! Don't gather in one spot!" police loudspeakers warned.
Washington Post

Blasts at Baghdad Shiite Mosque Kill Scores

April 7, 2006

http://billmon.org/archives/002374.html

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

Comment lifted from Moon of Alabama re mosque deaths:

Well this ought to clear up (for the folks at SCIRI) any confusion about what the Straw/Rice roadshow was all about. The US is inflaming the potential for civil war to extort their demands on governance, and you can bet your sweet ass that the failure to deliver on those demands will be met with an unrelenting effort to smash Iraq into ever smaller pieces -- which ironically also -- leaves the Iraqi's themselves independent, in the knowledge to put it back together.

Posted by: anna missed | Apr 7, 2006

In Notification of Army Deaths, More Pain :

After Neil Santorello heard the news that his son, a tank commander, had been killed in Iraq, from the officer in his living room, he walked out his front door and removed the American flag from its pole. Then, in tears, he tore down the yellow ribbons from his tree.

http://informationclearinghouse.info/article12641.htm

WV, along the lines of your post...

a nephew and a grand nephew are in this so-called 'Long War' - both are in Afghanistan at the moment... one is career and has been in Iraq twice... the other is a young boy, with a pregnant wife at home.

my granddaughter is here this weekend to say her goodbyes to the brother of her best friend (family couple of houses down)... he is like a brother to her... came out of the Citadel with rank of Lt., now is Captain... has served three tours in Iraq, is taking his wife and two babies to Kansas for three years... he will be in and out of whatever Dubya is stirring up... my granddaughter is in meltdown...

do y'all think we went through some sort of wormhole back in 2000? you know, moved into another dimension, down the rabbit hole? Sure feels like it sometime...

Light and blessings to all...

Cybear
How exciting! If w can access your guest appearance on line let us know!
Bhakti,
It was my sense that the "Indigos" were the Pluto in Scorpio Gen. Certainly the students I had then, when the book came out, ( 6-12) EXPRESSED high creativity and uniqueness. 2 years ago in my girl scout art classes the younger ones were Pluto in Sag, and were more tentative in their approach to creative expression..
Also; the K-1st, age group were born "AFTER THE WORLD CHANGED" on 9/11. Could that make a difference?
Whatever th3e reasons, they are lucky to have you to teach them!
Oops, yes I missed the red herringness of the McKinbney story, but ......it led me to contact Pelosi and look at the results!
So you want to take the gloves off and give the Republicans a fight, Ms. Pelosi?

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/4/5/212735/8096
PQ

April 8, 2006
Op-Ed Columnist

Divine Right of Bushes
By MAUREEN DOWD
WASHINGTON

So the aide turns out to have been loyally following his leader's dictates, rather than going around the boss's back to peddle secret information.

Scooter is a "good Judas," as it turns out, just as Judas himself was, according to a 1,700-year-old Christian manuscript found in the Egyptian desert that asserts that Jesus wanted Judas to betray him, so he entrusted his disciple with special intelligence.

"You can see how early Christians could say, if Jesus' death was all part of God's plan, then Judas's betrayal was part of God's plan," Dr. Karen King, a professor of the history of early Christianity at Harvard Divinity School, told The Times.

Since President Bush seems to see his mission in Iraq as part of God's plan, he must have assumed that getting Scooter Libby to leak parts of a classified document on Iraq to rebut Joe Wilson's charge about a juiced-up casus belli was part of God's plan.

When other officials leak top-secret stuff — even in cases where the whistle-blowers feel they are illuminating unlawful acts — they are portrayed by the White House as traitors who should be investigated and fired.

After The Times broke the story about the president allowing unauthorized snooping in America, W. was outraged. The F.B.I. and Justice Department were sicced on the leakers. "Revealing classified information," W. huffed, "is illegal, alerts our enemies and endangers our country."

Really, W. should fire himself. He swore to look high and low for the scurrilous leaker and, lo and behold, he has himself in custody. Since the Bush administration is basically a monarchy, he should pass the crown to Jenna. She couldn't do worse than this bunch of airheads and bullies.

Patrick Fitzgerald filed court papers indicating that Scooter testified that in 2003, when the White House was getting rattled by the failure to find W.M.D. and by criticism from a former diplomat on the margins of the war scheme, the president authorized Dick Cheney to authorize Scooter to make a one-sided dump of classified information about Saddam's arsenal to The Times's Judy Miller.

Scooter was so concerned about the propriety of the deal that he checked with the vice president's lawyer, David Addington, before he spilled. Addington, whose politics are to the right of Louis XVI, said, go right ahead. Now Black Adder has Scooter's job. Coincidence?

The Bushies once more showed incompetence by creating this elaborate daisy-chain leak and giving it to the one person in journalism who had been roped off from writing about the prewar intelligence, while her editors sorted out problems with her past W.M.D. coverage. Judy never authored an article about what Scooter gave her, either that intelligence or the identity of the woman whom she wrote down in her notebook as "Valerie Flame." (Stripper or spy?)

W. subscribes to the Nixonian theory that when a president does it, it's not illegal — or maybe it's the divine right of kings. God has been pretty active in Republican politics lately: Tom DeLay said God told him to drop out of his re-election race.

If the administration were seriously trying to declassify something in the national interest, wouldn't it have President Bush explain his decision or have his Scottish terrier yip it out from the podium, rather than having Scooter whisper it in Judy's ear?

Instead, sounding very Lewis Carroll, the White House claims that when the president leaks something secret, it's not secret anymore. It's the Immaculate Declassification: intelligence is declassified by passing it on to a friendly reporter.

"The president believes the leaking of classified information is a very serious matter," Scott McClellan said. "And I think that's why it's important to draw a distinction here. Declassifying information and providing it to the public, when it is in the public interest, is one thing. But leaking classified information that could compromise our national security is something that is very serious. And there is a distinction." And thank goodness we have a White House that gets that distinction. Democrats who don't, he sniffed, are guilty of "crass politics."

If W. wants the information out, it's good for the country to make it public. If W. doesn't want the information out, it's bad for the country to make it public. L'état, c'est moi.

That's how we got mired in the Iraq war in the first place. The administration ruthlessly held back classified information that contradicted its bogus case for war, and leaked classified information that supported it.

The Bushies keep trying to manipulate reality, but reality bites back. That's not only crass politics. It's lethal politics. L'état, c'est mess.

http://www.filmstripinternational.com/

China has U.S. anti-missile tech, via transfer from Israel

Special to World Tribune.com
EAST-ASIA-INTEL.COM

Thursday, April 6, 2006
China has developed its own version of the Patriot anti-missile system, according to a Chinese-owned Hong Kong newspaper.

The ground-to-air guided missile system is part of China's air shield that is similar to U.S. Patriot missiles, the March 29 Wen Wei Po reported.

China covertly obtained Patriot anti-missile system technology from Israel during the 1990s, according to U.S. officials.
U.S. intelligence agencies discovered the Israel-China Patriot technology transfer in March 1993.

The transfers came from U.S.-made Patriots sent to Israel to counter Iraqi missile attacks during the Persian Gulf war.

The report described the system's command and control system, vehicles and interceptors.

In 1993, then-CIA Director Robert Gates told The Washington Times, “There is some indication that they [the Chinese] have some of the technology.”

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* WH Ordered Prisoners at Abu Ghraib Sodomized

Wayne Madsen – Wayne Madsen Report April 5, 2006

The GOP's family values. While the mainstream media has ignored the sex perverts who dominate [rez regime], from sr WH officials to lower level political appointees in various fed agencies, WMR has repeatedly reported on what amts to a "wink & nod" cabal of individuals who rep anything but the much-ballyhooed GOP "family values." It helps to explain how a male prostitute managed to gain access to WH press conferences.

[rez regime] appointees have been keeping Maryland police particularly busy. A few weeks after WH domestic policy adviser [closet gay] Claude Allen was arrested for shoplifting from Target & Hecht's stores, Dept of Homeland Sec Brian Doyle, who worked overtime to justify his dept's sky marshals' shooting an unarmed mentally disturbed airline passenger in the back at Miami Internatl Airport, was arrested at his Silver Spring home on 23 counts relating to the solicitation of sex from an undercover Polk County, FL detective posing as a 14 y/o girl. In one of the photos of himself that Doyle sent to the detective, his Dept of Homeland Sec badge lanyard is clearly visible. Doyle also revealed to the detective that he worked at Homeland Sec & provided his official office & cell phone numbers to her.

The news about Doyle broke after Clifton Bennett, the 19 y/o son of AZ's GOP Sen Prez Ken Bennett, was charged with sodomizing 18 boys who were between the ages of 11-14 at an AZ youth camp. Bennett & a friend were charged with sodomizing the youths with broom sticks & flashlights. WMR has previously reported that similar abuse of underage teens at Abu Ghraib was videotaped & the tapes were made available to sr WH staff for "entertainment" purposes. The Taguba Report mentions that prisoners at Abu Ghraib were sodomized by glow sticks.

From WMR, Nov. 18, 2005:

There is good reason for the embarrassment of the Pentagon in the affair. The orders to take the sexually-oriented photos/videos, some of which involve teenage Iraqi boys & girls & sodomization by their guards, came directly from a pedophile & closeted male homosexual ring operating in the WH, according to the intelligence sources. Copies of the tapes/photos were sent directly to the WH for the entertainment of senior members of the [rez] WH, incl officials in the [v-rez]'s office & the Exec Office of [rez].

When the photos at Abu Ghraib became public, the senior military command structure in Iraq "went nuts," according to an individual who witnessed the cover-up of the affair. "They ordered an immediate policy of denial about details of the prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib," said the source. The source added that senior officers were disgusted that lower ranking guards were prosecuted/jailed when the order for the mistreatment came directly from the WH. ... http://thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=4370

Naturally, the above report (awa many other reports/leaks thruout the past 20 yrs) shld give one great concern about hole-y xian, delay's, much lauded for his xian "goodness," orphanage... one of the conduits for children into the "white" supremacists' global sex slavery trade.

Is this a strange way to go or what?!?

* 3 Die After Falling Into Volcanic Fissure

3 Ski Members of Ski Patrol Die When They Fall Into Volcanic Fissure at CA Resort. In this image taken from video by mammoth-snowman.com, personnel gather around a vent during a rescue operation at Mammoth ... http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1819143

Cybear,
I was surprised to see your uncertainty about being here.
Of course you are welcome on my part. You have never made me mad and don't really see how you could have angered anyone.

I don't believe that I have congratulated you on your new position. I am so, so happy for you and hope that it continues in the way that you hope and wish.

Wayne Madsen Report

April 6, 2006 -- Department of Homeland Perversion. Doyle wasn't the only child predator. Department of Homeland Security deputy Press Secretary Brian Doyle, arrested in Maryland for soliciting sex from a Florida undercover detective posing as a 14-year old girl, had company within the department. On October 25, 2005, Tampa-based Homeland Security Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement official Frank Figueroa was arrested at Orlando's Mall at Millenia for exposing himself and masturbating in front of a 16-year old girl in the food court. Figueroa used his federal law enforcement badge in an attempt to avoid arrest. Amazingly, Figueroa had been in charge of the Homeland Security Department's Operation Predator, designed to curb child sexual exploitation and child pornography.

The collection of GOP mug shots are beginning to resemble a large high school year book

It is clear that as reported yesterday by WMR, the Bush administration and the GOP are chock full of pedophiles, sexual harassers, male prostitutes and their clients, and others who display anything but so-called "family values." The leadership of the Religious Right are aware of, condone, and in some cases, participate in these sordid activities.

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Full Moon in Libra
Thursday, April 13, 2006
9:40am PDT
23º 37'

A Full Moon in Libra asks each of us to practice one particular relational skill: the ability to listen attentively and deeply, with an open heart, an open mind, and without interruption or feedback. What will we be listening for? We will attend to the voices of All Our Relations. This includes every living thing, on all planes of existence, on this planet, in our solar system, in our galaxy, and all throughout the multiplicitous universe. When the Moon is full in Libra, the Sun is shining brightly in Aries. The polarity of these two opposing signs represents knowing self in an effort to know others; thereby allowing others to truly know us. The Libra Moon reflects the light of individuality and uses it as the fuel for greater understanding of others. Know thyself and the true nature of all things will be revealed. This year, with Venus (heart), Mercury (mind) and Uranus (awakening) in Pisces, and Jupiter in Scorpio, revelation could come in the form of direct experience of the pure transcendent nature of self and its connection to all sentient beings. The sense of oneness will be palpable on this Full Moon in Libra. Add Chiron and Neptune in Aquarius to the mix and the field of consciousness will become an unlimited playground of knowledge!

http://www.astrowisdom.com/thisfullmoon.htm

Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) is promoting Feingold's censure of Bush with a petition at his site. He hopes to gather enough signatures that he will be able to overcome apathy within the Democratic Leadership about the matter. Please sign up one and all:
http://www.tomharkin.com/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com
For those of you interested.... a couple of recent pictures of Bob Woodruff who states that "it is good to be feeling like my old self again."

Beverly, I was pretty tired and had read some of the old post and some of the new post and just had a weird feeling. I have put in a lot of hours this week and have had very little sleep until last night. Next week looks like a doozy as well. Actually, I'll be hopping until mid June by the looks of it. Thanks for the kind words!

"A Full Moon in Libra asks each of us to practice one particular relational skill: the ability to listen attentively and deeply, with an open heart, an open mind, and without interruption or feedback".

In this vein, I think that we just witnessed one of the most significant events in America in a very long time when Harry Taylor spoke to the President of the United Sates. Even though this country, who is too immersed to see clearly, missed it's impact, I'm sure the rest of the world got it.

This is exactly what democracy is. I couldn't even begin to count the number of people who have been imprisoned and/or executed for this. It would be unthinkable in a dictatorship. And so many people have escaped repression and tyranny in this country. They will never forget it.

No matter if the handlers are now allowing dissent, as has been suggested, the world just saw a common man speak directly to the leader of his country. I was stunned by Harry's question asking the man if he didn't have the grace and humility to feel shame. What a question. There is more power there in this direct confrontation than any gun wielding man trying to rule by force and fear could ever hope to have.

The Moon triggered the Saturn in Leo going direct toward our North Node and the fake king was exposed. Humility was suggested. The fake Town Hall meeting suddenly became real with our Saturn/Neptune factor finally bringing things into focus.

I though Bush handled it well for him, with the Libra Moon coming and also the Mars in Gemini on his North Node in the 11th conjunct Uranus. He asked the frightened nervous crowd to let the man speak. And he did, only interrupting twice, I think.

I've been euphoric since this happened, and I'm glad I had the good karma to be born in a country where speaking up is not punishable by death.

We are trying our best to preserve our freedom and we will succeed.

Thanks Bverly. Since the disappointment in 2004/2005, I have been keeping a low profile. But
I like 2006, since cons and liars are getting caught and getting punished.

Raj, it is good to hear from you again. I've missed your colorful, no-nonsense descriptions, similar to Joanna O's, although both of you have your own style.

What anon said... hope you are well Raj...

jm-

I'm with you on Harry Taylor. The importance of the question having been asked to bush himself and aired on CNN - huge! I can't believe he got in. Makes you wonder if bush is losing some the "loyality" of his flock.

Mubarak says Civil War has started in Iraq...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060408/wl_nm/iraq_dc_22

Saaaaay... no wonder I've always enjoyed Raj's postings so well. ;O)

Poll showing that about half the people in Pasadena have not been paying attention:
It's being freeped and it's very close
http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/?_requestid=2978095

Do go help out the other half.

Howdy-do Raj! Long time no hear.

It starts with the "purging." When groups intimidate civilians into moving to a another part of the country, or town. That is how it was in Lebanon. Armed men terrorizing the civilians. And massacres and rape...humiliation and violence senseless and unimaginable projected to disembowl the last shreds of dignity a human being might have. What the Israelis are doing. What the Serbians did. What we do. The civil war started when that kind of horror started in Iraq.

That was me at 01:04 AM Raj, Jo, Joanna. It's always nice when people check in after they've been gone awhile.

Oh, Beasley, you do speak the truth. The horrible, frightening truth!

I came across an interesting article last nite on Bhutan, that odd little kindom nestled in the Himalayas next to Nepal. This place has always fascinated me. It's only been open to the outside world since 1974.

"The Bhutanese commitment to evironmental preservation is nothing short of inspiring and could serve as a model for the world at large. One anecdote indicates the depth of this commitment. A few years ago, residents of Phobjikha Valley, famous for its migratory cranes, proudly installed electricity in their village. It was soon discovered, however, that some cranes were flying into power lines. So the village tore them down and switched to solar power."

Their approach to government is quite interesting.

"In the best tradition of Buddhist rule, the king is accessible. Any Bhutanese citizen with a grievance can plant him or herself in the path of the royal motorcade, holding a ceremonial scarf called a kopne. His Majesty is compelled to halt and hear the petition. If he feels the case has merit, he refers it to the Royal Advisory Council, the Bhutanese eqivalent of the Supreme Court, the difference being it includes Bhuddist adepts."