Tag Archives: Bush

The world’s first lesbian head of state

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Johanna SigurdardottirIceland’s PM marks gay milestone Yes, this is truly historic just like Barack Obama’s arrival into power was for the US. But Iceland, like the US, is now under a collapsing capitalist economy directed by total Big Business control of their country. The pain and suffering that Iceland is now undergoing with its national economic collapse will only in the most slightest manner ever be alleviated just because a Lesbian now heads up their government.

It is the same with us in the US. Seeing Barack’s Black face in the White House will not in any way change the fact that his economic policie, and those of the Democratic Party he heads up now, are essentially the same economic policies the Bush Administration delivered to us previously. Sure, Barack’s ugly mug is certainly now better to look at than Bush’s, Cheney’s, Rumsfeld’s, Rice’s even uglier mugs that have become so to us, after 8 years of having to stomach them all the time. But so? That will hardly help the growing ranks of unemployed, under housed, and under cared for people in this country.

Congratulations, Johanna. However Iceland needs much more leadership than your Social Democratic caretaker government will ever deliver. It will take more than that to truly change the world from a road of total collapse, Iceland included. And in America, we will need more than Barack Obama’s face to look at in DC to protect us from Big Business as usual.

Obama in Afghanistan- $40,000 for the lost lives of 15 people?

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‘U.S. commanders on Tuesday traveled to a poor Afghan village and distributed $40,000 to relatives of 15 people killed in a U.S. raid, including a known militant commander. The Americans also apologized for any civilians killed in the operation.’ See the Associate Press report US pays $40,000 after 15 Afghans die in raid for their entire report on the ‘collateral damage’.

Question is, is this how Obama thinks he can wins hearts and minds in Afghanistan? If not, then why is he moving more US troops to occupy that country? Why does he continue to use the US military to bomb civilian areas? This is nothing more than a continuation of Bush’s military policy.

Barack Obama appears to pull US back from using threats of war with Iran

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islam peace“I have Muslim members of my family.
I have lived in Muslim countries… the largest one, Indonesia. And so what I want to communicate is the fact that, in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I’ve come to understand is that regardless of your faith – and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers – regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams.”Obama reaches out to Iran with message to Muslims

With these words, Barack Obama appeared to be pulling the US government back away from the Bush policy of actively seeking direct confrontation (war) with Iran. This certainly is a good development though, as the Iranian government says, it is too soon to say whether this is just rhetoric or real change on the part of the new leaders in charge of the US government? Unfortunately, the dangers of further war will increase if the US government continues to bomb Pakistan and Afghanistan and to increase yet more the number of US troops occupying Afghanistan.

US media campaign to help Pentagon defend its use of torture on POWs

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George Bush on water boardingThere is a growing effort to defend the use of torture on POWs by the US military, and it centers around the Pentagon’s and the corporate media’s effort to convince the American people that some Guantanamo inmates have become terrorists post discharge. These POWs were discharged because they were found to be innocent of ‘terrorism’, but now the Pentagon and US media want to paint a picture of US military incompetence, all to bolster a campaign to defend those that tortured these POWs when they were at the US run torture concentration camp called Guantanamo (Gitmo).

The corporate media campaign is based on utterly superficial and flimsy ‘evidence’, which is because basically it is Pentagon propaganda and lies. The following gives a link to this so-called ‘evidence’ printed out today in The Christian Science Monitor and scattered throughout today’s US propaganda industry’s coverage of the issue of ‘closing down’ Guantanamo. Ex-Guantánamo inmates return to militancy in Yemen

What is seen quickly, is that all the ‘evidence’ comes from the Saudi government, a dictatorship heavily invested into torturing prisoners. The fact that the US corporate media and the Pentagon turn these American held POWs to these world class criminals and then has the utter gall to report their stewardship over these prisoners as virtual reality and TRUTH really takes the cake! In fact, it is an endorsement of the Saudi torture regime itself, and a use of this foreign torture regime to help justify US military torture in place under Bush, and now Barack Obama.

Per the ‘evidence’ of the Christian Science Monitor stuff, all of the evidence of a supposed return of POWs found innocent and released to supposed criminal activity comes from the word of Saudi government spokesmen! Sick!

Much of American society wants to find a way to justify using torture on other people. They revel in it, and have spent years pretending that torture is not happening, torture is not torture, and in a myriad of ways supporting the use of torture while pretending not to be. This is the latest effort on their behalf by the Pentagon and corporate media, and is utterly a ghost fantasy script written for them, with the aid and assistance of one of the most reactionary regimes in the world, the Saudi Arabian government. This fact alone shows how unembarrassed much of America is about its own criminal use of torture, and this campaign may be used by Barack Obama to step back from actually even making he effort to clean up the US government’s world image by transferring Guantanamo POWs elsewhere?

The use of torture runs deep inside the entire American business of jailing and abusing its own population, too. Guantanamo hardly even begins to be the tip of the iceberg at this point, in uncovering and terminating abuse of prisoners of any kind. We are a very sick country, and many resist the CHANGE needed to turn things around. It is certain that we have a very long way to go to even begin to address these issues, let alone change things for the better. Do not let the corporate media’s lies on behalf of Pentagon use of torture convince you to change your views. America, you simply are not under any sort of threat from ex-jailed Guantanamo POWs.

Ethiopia fails at task US gov set for it

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Ethiopia says it has finished pulling its troops out of Somalia failing at the task of pacifying Somalia that the Pentagon had set for it. Who knows the details of the secret details that led to Ethiopia acting as mercenaries for the US government, but what is known is the total destruction inside Somalia that has ensued because of this US government terrorism against that poorest of countries.

Now, Barack Obama is in the process of trying to get the United Nations gang to once again act as Pentagon troops and to go into Somali and continue to destroy the future of that poor country. The UN has done such a knock out bang up job in keeping Haiti in similar dire conditions, I guess? The US government, like Israel, seems to specialize in picking on the poorest peoples of the planet, and that says something about the American people themselves, does it not?

One thing is absolutely clear by now, and that is that Barack Obama no more respects the national sovereignty of other countries than Bush did. Africa will have bleak prospects ahead under this new US government, which refuses to just leave Africa alone rather than to ‘manage’ it.

Obama The Sweeper Man

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street-sweeperWhat a dirty image the US government now has after 8 years of the Bush Klan in power alongside their sidekick cohorts, the Democratic Party assisting alongside and to the side. But now the sidekick has the reign in the White House at hand once again, or is it just a broom?

Where to hide all Dubya’s dirt? Perhaps Obama can get the European Union to help him out some? That would be so nice… Take some POWs, they are free to all ‘responsible parties’! Closing out sale on POWs held at Gitmo! Show some kindness now!

Meanwhile the US government campaign of terrorism goes on unchecked as Barack bombs Pakistan, Barack moves troops to Afghanistan, Barack talks tough to Iran…. and so on. We will be tough, tough, tough.

Now to the economy where some major sweeping of America’s public image needs to be done but fast. Barack will sale the growing bankruptcy of Federal Treasury to, to the American people. We”ll give you $300, Old Timers on Social Security! We’re going to look for better ways to give you pennies as we give the top corporations tens and hundreds of billions! Get on board and help us out with the Give Out Express! Don’t worry about the National Debt, you can pay for that later! Everybody qualifies for this credit card! Zero down, Zero percent interest! It’s cleanup time!

Sweep, Sweep, Sweep! It’s time to clean the dirt on the stained American image everywhere! The Sweeper Man is now in D.C. and look how clean he plans to make it all? Sparkle and Shine! Drop a bomb here or there, but do it judiciously, not like say?… Israel in Gaza just did. Need a trillion? …Just come and get it! Bombs away, Guys!

Obama The Sweeper Man. We all wish him well to a certain extent, but we know just what and who he is sweeping for. Not the POWs. Not the American working class. Not the Black Community even. He’s sweeping for Them, the guys who paid him to sweep. This place is a mess they say, and we do agree!

Who’s The Sweeper Man sweeping for though? This I think you probably know already…. since it is not for you and me. But is it just the dirt that needs to do? To me, it looks like the furniture and house itself have gone bad? I don’t see how you can clean this mess up by just sweeping the worst of it under the rug? …. a raggedy rug at that.

AIPAC equals treason!

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“If I were an Arab leader, I would never sign an agreement with Israel. It is normal; we have taken their country. It is true God promised it to us, but how could that interest them? Our God is not theirs. There has been anti-semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They see but one thing: we have come and we have stolen their country. Why would they accept that?”
–David Ben Gurion, first Israeli Prime Minister

Nazis executed parents in front of children in Gaza.

UN investigator Richard Falk (a Jew) says Israel committed war crimes in Gaza, compares it to Warsaw Ghetto.

Visualize Nuremberg. Israel already budgeting lawyers for war crime trials. PM Olmert even appointed a Justice Minister who’s only job will be to defend Israel from War Crime charges.

Just one of hundreds of accounts of NAZI war crimes in Gaza.

State Dept. celebrates departure of “Wicked Witch of the West.”

Hey Gazans: Come meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

Obama stops pretending, and reveals he’s just Bush in blackface. He agrees that the President can spy on anyone he wants, without a warrant. Allthose silly people, who assumed “change” meant change for the better.

NSA analyst reveals what we all suspected: Dictator Bush wasn’t just spying on suspected terrorists, but on all Americans.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Jan 24 notes, thomasmc.com.

Obama restores Federal funding to family planning clinics

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Obama reverses Bush abortion-funds policy Now let’s see what he has in hand to help deal with the current catastrophic mess called the US Medical System? As the layoffs build up, there is not much time left to ‘reform’ the misdelivery of public health care.

Barack Obama resembles Gerald Ford more than he does Lincoln

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Gerald FordToday’s Denver Post print edition headline reads U.S. closes door on Guantanamo, torture. Of interest is how their internet version of this headline has changed the verb tense from ‘closes’ to ‘closing’. Yes, well it amounts to about the same thing, kind of? Well but is it a closed book, or not? That question has to be asked because Gerald Ford supposedly closed the book on Watergate, which was where a President acted in a criminal manner but was left entirely free from facing any criminal charges! The President will be stopped (after his criminal acts become just too obvious and exposed) but is simply above the law, was how the message was left later to be read by the likes of Dubya Bush and Dick Cheney.

Yes, Barack Obama wants to clean America’s image up and closing Guantanamo’s detention unit down is key to that. But he also wants to sweep the dirt under the rug and get on with it, so to speak. There is no evidence that he plans to prosecute anybody for the crimes they committed by running this Federal torture camp, and this is what makes us look on these seemingly positive moves with a huge amount of scepticism.

Eisenhower, too, eventually stopped the McCarthyite witch hunt from going further forward, but then continued to wage the Korean War that resulted in millions going to their deaths. He kept the Cold War going full tilt, and much of the world worried that the ‘cold’ would become a hot war with nuclear weapons begin launched. In fact, Eisenhower’s military command thought long and hard about nuking China. So looking at the edicts coming out from Barack Obama on his first day about supposedly moving to end the torture regime of the Bush Administration should not be looked at with rose tinged glasses on.

Suspected U.S. missile attacks kill 18 in Pakistan At the same time as Barack is supposedly ending US government torture of POWs, his Administration is continuing the bombing of targets that hit civilians in Pakistan as often as not. Further, the bombing raids are a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty, same as the continued now Barack Occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan are, too.

While nobody can expect Barack Obama to reverse all that Bush’s Klan instituted with DP loyal assistance in just one or two days, let alone one or two weeks, there still is really no reason to assume that Barack has any plan to do so… EVER. In this sense, Barack Obama resembles Gerald Ford much more than he resembles Abraham Lincoln. Eventually this will become rather obvious but for now the liberal euphoria continues. They are being led around on their leashes by the corporate media and Barack, but what we are actually seeing so far is Barack Obama pardoning Bush and his gang for crimes committed.

The league of Southern Gentlemen cons

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Senator Ted Kennedy suffers seizure at inaugural luncheonDC- Look at the old ambulance chasers!

Senator Ted Kennedy was EMT’d out of the inaugural luncheon, seen off by concerned friends Senators Kerry, Dodd and Hatch. Wait a minute — Senator Orrin MoFo Hatch?! Has the DC mutual admiration society no standard?

It may be that having to address your debate opponent as “the right honorable so-and-so from such-and-such” keeps disagreements from devolving into fist fights. On the campaign trail, this convivial artifice translates into referring to your rival as “my good friend.”

What does it mean, all these lawmakers, being best buds? Do they disagree on matters of principle, or is it a tomato – tomahto charade? Maybe the fundamental values of these civic minded gentlemen millionaires aren’t so far off.

If you ascribe to the notion that left battles right for the opportunity to hold the government accountable to its subjects, you already know that the difference between liberals and conservatives is more than academic. It’s not about the Federalist Papers any more. In DC today, you’re either an idealist, or you’re a crook.

We can give the Democrats their unfettered majority chance to show of what political mettle they are made. But eight years of Bush and his compliant Congress have shown the Republicans to be crooks.

Crooks are a scourge of human nature, fair enough. But do you mean to count a one among your best friends?

If Ted Kennedy were the champion he pretends, or likewise were Kerry or Dodd, they’d have kicked Orrin Hatch to the curb like the morally unambiguous cretin he is. If anyone has thwarted a Democrat’s legacy, it’s the earache-inducing reprobate Senator from Utah.

The poetry of kick-the-can in the rain

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Refrigerator magnet poetryI hate random stream of consciousness when you can tell the author thinks they’re building to something. It’s so, so tedious. Such was my reaction to officially-described poet Elizabeth Alexander, who recited a piece she composed for the inauguration of the First Black American President. I’ll just note Alexander is a professor at Yale, the alma matter of Bush, Kerry, et al the Skull and Bones secret society.

If there’s anything that makes me crankier than war criminals being hugged, saluted, and wished a bon voyage, it’s applause for crappy poetry.

The awful result begins with noise –a cacophony which Alexander captures with brute mimicry. When she describes uniforms as common as tires and hems, of course I’m going to object. Why not add Coca-cola while you’re pandering to product placement?

Repairing done, Alexander moves on to people of disparate means “trying to make music.” Maybe a tenured African-American studies professor wouldn’t know, no one tries to make music. It doesn’t even take a non-musician to make music, without having to try. Obviously you’re confusing music with poetry.

It may be that Alexander’s challenge was corrupted by the insincerity of the “we have overcome” moment, where a half-black man’s ascent to figurehead is taken as penultimate achievement of the underground railroad. It comforts me to see artistes fall flat when they dip their quills in propaganda.

Here’s the whole drippy thing. Hate the ambiguously half phrase.

Praise song for the day.

Each day we go about our business, walking past each other, catching each others’ eyes or not, about to speak or speaking. All about us is noise. All about us is noise and bramble, thorn and din, each one of our ancestors on our tongues. Someone is stitching up a hem, darning a hole in a uniform, patching a tire, repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.

A farmer considers the changing sky; A teacher says, “Take out your pencils. Begin.”

We encounter each other in words, words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, “I need to see what’s on the other side; I know there’s something better down the road.”

We need to find a place where we are safe; We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain, that many have died for this day. Sing the names of the dead who brought us here, who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges, picked the cotton and the lettuce, built brick by brick the glittering edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle; praise song for the day. Praise song for every hand-lettered sign; The figuring it out at kitchen tables.

Some live by “Love thy neighbor as thy self.”

Others by first do no harm, or take no more than you need.

What if the mightiest word is love, love beyond marital, filial, national. Love that casts a widening pool of light. Love with no need to preempt grievance.

In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made, any sentence begun.

On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp — praise song for walking forward in that light.

The Godless God fearing Americans

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What is all this Goddamn pomp? “Non-believers” got a mention in Barack Obama’s inaugural address, dead last after Christians, Muslims, Jews and Hindus, even though they rank second, and even though church abstainers actually comprise the majority of Americans. Yet even this second day, mentions of God, Lord, and prayer, continue ad nauseum. Talk about disrespect.

And why are atheists and agnostics named in the negative? Why aren’t they called rationalists? Churchgoers should be called reason disabled. What a farce. Are Americans to believe that Obama and his wife, Harvard grads, are religious? And which of the shysters of DC can be considered spiritual?

I’m watching the service at the National Cathedral, which, taking into account the time zones, is eating well into Obama’s first day in office. Assembled are a bunch of pharisees, a disproportionate sampling for certain, to voice their prayers for our lawmakers. Where were they when Bush and cronies were in attendance?

NOTE:
Was Obama’s multi denominational ceremony representative of American believers? Let’s have a look at the distribution of the 20 religious leaders attending the National Prayer Service, as they relate to their corresponding population segments, in descending order of size:

5 PROTESTANT EVANGELICALS, representing 27% of the US population:
Rev. Sharon Watkins, president, Disciples of Christ in North America
Rev. Andy Stanley, North Point Community Church
Rev. Suzan Johnson-Cook, Believers Christian Fellowship Church
Rev. Cynthia Hale, Ray of Hope Christian Church
Rev. Jim Wallis, Sojourners

7 MAINLINE PROTESTANTS, 21%
Katharine Jefferts-Schori, presiding bishop, Episcopal Church
Rev. John Bryson Chane, Washington Episcopal Bishop
Rev. Samuel Lloyd, dean of the cathedral, Episcopal Church
Canon Carol Wade, cathedral’s precentor
(Note: Episcopalians represent !.3%, but are third richest group)
Rev. Otis Moss Jr., father of pastor, Trinity United Church of Christ
Kirbyjon Caldwell, Windsor Village United Methodist Church
Rev. Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, Reformed Church in America

2 CATHOLICS, 22%
Donald Wuerl, Washington Catholic Archbishop
Rev. Francisco Gonzalez, auxiliary bishop, Washington archdiocese

1 MUSLIM, at 3%
Ingrid Mattson, president, Islamic Society of North America

1 each, HINDU and ORTHODOX, in sum 1.7%
Uma Mysorekar, president, Hindu Temple Society of North America
Archbishop Demetrios, primate, Greek Orthodox Church in America

3 JEWS, at 1.5% (but richest)
Rabbi Jerome Epstein, United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Rabbi Haskal Lookstein, Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun
Rabbi David Saperstein, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism

(Is that AIPAC’s influence extending to America’s Christians?)

How about that corpulent Saddleback creep Rick Warren, reciting a completely forgettable invocation at yesterday’s inauguration?

Unheard by the masses was Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson’s earlier invocation, which was fathoms deeper than any of these high priests. HBO didn’t air it in their coverage of the Sunday inaugural buildup, but it’s available on Youtube. Here’s the transcript:

A Prayer for the Nation and Our Next President, Barack Obama
(Opening Inaugural Event, Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC, January 18, 2009)
By The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson,
Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire

Welcome to Washington! The fun is about to begin, but first, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.

O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will…

Bless us with tears – for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women from many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.

Bless us with anger – at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.

Bless us with discomfort – at the easy, simplistic “answers” we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth, about ourselves and the world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.

Bless us with patience – and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be “fixed” anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.

Bless us with humility – open to understanding that our own needs must always be balanced with those of the world.

Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance – replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences, and an understanding that in our diversity, we are stronger.

Bless us with compassion and generosity – remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable in the human community, whether across town or across the world.

And God, we give you thanks for your child Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.

Give him wisdom beyond his years, and inspire him with Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for ALL the people.

Give him a quiet heart, for our Ship of State needs a steady, calm captain in these times.

Give him stirring words, for we will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.

Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.

Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.

Give him the strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.

And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking FAR too much of this one. We know the risk he and his wife are taking for all of us, and we implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand – that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity and peace.

AMEN.

Compare and contrast to Rick Warren’s pop Sunday School simpleton-centric tripe. Transcripts have been posted online, discreetly correcting Warren’s 44/43 arithmetic error.

Almighty God, Our Father, everything we see and everything we can’t see exists because of You alone. It all comes from You, it all belongs to You, it all exists for Your glory. History is your story. The Scripture tells us, ‘Hear, oh Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one’ and You are the compassionate and merciful one and You are loving to everyone You have made.

Now today we rejoice not only in America’s peaceful transfer of power for the 44th time, we celebrate a hinge-point of history with the inauguration of our first African American president of the united states. We are so grateful to live in this land, a land of unequaled possibility, where a a son of an African Immigrant can rise to the highest level of our leadership. And we know today that Dr. King and a great cloud of witnesses are shouting in heaven.

Give to our new president, Barack Obama, the wisdom to lead us with humility, the courage to lead us with integrity, the compassion to lead us with generosity. Bless and protect him, his family, Vice President Biden, the Cabinet and every one of our freely elected leaders.

Help us, oh God, to remember that we are Americans. United not by race or religion or by blood, but to our commitment to freedom and justice for all. When we focus on ourselves, when we fight each other, when we forget you, forgive us.

When we presume that our greatness and our prosperity is ours alone, forgive us. When we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us. And as we face these difficult days ahead, may we have a new birth of clarity in our aims, responsibility in our actions, humility in our approaches and civility in our attitudes—even when we differ.

Help us to share, to serve and to seek the common good of all. May all people of good will today join together to work for a more just, a more healthy and a more prosperous nation and a peaceful planet. And may we never forget that one day, all nations, all people will stand accountable before You. We now commit our new president and his wife Michelle and his daughters, Malia and Sasha, into your loving care.

I humbly ask this in the name of the one who changed my life—Yeshua, Esa, Jesus, Jesus—who taught us to pray:

Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

Obama delivers Bush 3rd inaugural address

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Ft Carson GWOT Fallen Soldiers MemorialWhat did Barack Obama say at this morning’s inauguration that Bush hasn’t said in shorter mouthfuls?

Obama brought up the Goddamn War On Terror, without labeling it “so-called,” and aimed at the usual suspect evildoers. And he’s embraced Neoliberal Globalization like it’s cod liver oil.

Not only that, apparently America is unrepentant. Also, bring it on.

“Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. …

“We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.”

On the subject of our economy, Obama wants to sidestep the rampant corruption and lay the blame on the American people’s resistance to globalization:

“Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age.”

Then he wants to pick fights with the Third World which dares criticize the legacy of colonialism and ongoing oppression of globalism. Pitting their meager voices against the resources of world banking:

To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy.

Elaborating on what help the West offers:

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow;

Can that be anything other than a plug for big agra, and the international privatization of water?

But mostly Barack Obama’s theme was Kennedy’s and Bush’s, ask not what your country can do for you, yada yada.

How dare he? Millions of us contribute our efforts, our dollars, which they are still soliciting, to put Obama in office, and he has the nerve, in his inaugural address to call upon the American people for sacrifice. It’s up to them, us, to bring change.

He’s got a paycheck now, his friends and colleagues have jobs, it’s time for them to snap to. They’ve been sent to Washington, not to tell us they’re going to be stymied, that they’ve got to compromise with the corporate right, but to say Yes We Can. And they better Goddamn do it. There is no consensus to reach on health care, or the environment, or war. Compromise with immorality is like cheating a little, or stealing a little.

What I wanted to hear from Obama, is “yes I can, yes I will, thank you America, now I’m going to deliver for you.”

Zionism is Nazism with a yarmulke

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Israel plans propaganda offensive, to convince the world that they were the victims of the Gaza genocide!

Visualize Nuremberg. Israel warns top military officers not to travel abroad, as they might be subject to arrest for war crimes and crimes against humanity over the genocide in Gaza.

NeoNazi Zionist rally in NYC calls for “wiping out” the Palestinian people. The only real difference between Israel and Nazi Germany, is Nazi Germany only lasted 12 years.

Should the US Pull the Plug on Israel? by Chuck Spinney

They hanged Mussolini, didn’t they? If Obama ignores the crimes of the past, the GOP will just repeat them in 8 years. [video]

“An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it.”
–Mohandas Gandhi

I was tempted to headline today’s page with WE SURVIVED GEORGE W. BUSH, but sadly there are all too many of us just barely hanging on. How many of us will survive the disastrous course of the Bush administration remains to be seen. I’m cynical about Obama (having once been fooled into believing in Bill Clinton), but secretly I do desperately hope that he can change American politics.

w-years-comic

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Jan 20 notes, thomasmc.com.

In other news…

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Bush is on his way back to Texas, Preston Hollow in Dallas to be exact… aboard Air Force One
 
Seems that even though he and his Merry Band of Thieves stole every last real dollar in the known world, he’s still such a cheap son-of-an-ugly-bitch that he can’t pay his own way home, and is once again bumming a free ride off the Taxpayer Account.

As he was getting on board the Marine Helicopter to take him to Andrews AFB the crowd started chanting “Nana na na, hey hey hey, GOODBYE”

Miss Johnnie says Dallas is going to smell real bad now.

(it usually does anyway)

Israeli troops to withdraw by tomorrow?

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Warsaw GhettoWell. So does this mean the Knesset were doing Bush one last ass-kissing or does it mean the “Emergency” declared wasn’t actually as much of a big deal as they let on? Were they really “fighting for their life” or was it just politically timed?

according to Huffington Post Israeli troops out of Gaza by the inauguration.

Which is Tomorrow.

So did they actually find the Yellow Cake Uranium, the Anthrax, Smallpox and all that Nerve Gas?

O, THAT’S RIGHT, THIS WAR WASN’T PROPAGATED SPECIFICALLY ON THOSE PARTICULAR LIES… MY BAD…

so, Mr Haddad, you’re the expert, or so you keep telling us, and Your government whichever one it happens to be, signed on to those lies, so… maybe YOU can tell us where all the Iraqi WMDs are… because the most highly trained experts in the British and U.S. Armies haven’t found them.

Or if you want to tell us that the business in Israel is in no way related, we’ll understand.

We won’t believe you, but we WILL understand.

By the way, that image is a mirror image of Warsaw Ghetto.

Mr Haddad and the rest might contend that it’s not like that at all, but they would once again only be mouthing the trash their Masters tell them to say.

ZIONISM IS TERRORISM!

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“The current Israeli government ruthlessly and cynically exploits the continuing guilt among gentiles over the slaughter of Jews in the Holocaust as justification for their murder of Palestinians. My grandmother was ill in bed when the Nazis came to her home town. A German soldier shot her dead in her bed. My grandmother did not die to provide cover for Israeli soldiers murdering Palestinian grandmothers in Gaza.” —Sir Gerald Kaufman, Jewish member of British Parliament

Jewish protesters shut down Israeli consulate in Los Angeles in support of Gaza.

Qatar and Mauritania expel Israeli diplomats and cut all diplomatic ties over NAZI genocide in Gaza.

PictorIal: Germany 1940 = Israel 2009? You decide.

Demonic Nazis use 9 year old boy for target practice.

Reich-wing terrorist Hal Turner threatens to attack crowds at inauguration!

Clueless. Obama says Bush was “a nice guy.”

The Satanic Party: RNC Chair candidate Blackwell (the guy who helped Bush steal the ’04 election in Ohio) says
GOP must block economic recovery, to help Republicans’ chances in the next election.

America organizes going away tribute for George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Jan 19 notes, thomasmc.com.

Barack Obama headed to becoming America’s most disappointing President

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accident-aheadOK, excuse time is now over as Barack Obama takes office, so what does the future actually hold for us? The Democrats can now no longer hide behind the Bush Administration and even though most Americans believe that the Republicans and not the Democrats are responsible for the economic crash, they will now expect results from this new president. He can talk, but can he walk the walk?

But here is the sad state of affairs per Global Insight which is the world’s largest economics organization. The American economy is sinking fast. See New York to lead U.S. in job losses for Global Insight’s analysis of the situation.

Hundreds of thousands of people’s jobs will now go under according to this forecast, and yet Barack Obama’s plan for action looks like a total disaster in the making. Soon enough, even Democratic Party voters will get upset at the disaster unfolding as they watch the Democratic Party give trillions to corrupted and bankrupt businesses while all the while cutting social services needed for the common good. They may well see the US government itself declining into bankruptcy?

Add to this, the Barack Obama plan to continue fighting wars all around the globe as the economy tanks and just keeps on tanking. There is no new game plan from the Democrats and eventually more and more people will begin to catch on. Plus, the novelty of having a Black man as president will hold off criticism only just so long, and then resentment of the Democrats will build up just as it did with Bush. Add to this, people may actually begin to see the relationship between the country’s militarism and the country’s bankruptcy in the making? Yes, I think they will. A bad economy opens people’s eyes.

For that reason it is quite sensible to have real cynicism about the fanfare and media show we will see tomorrow night. The same corporate media that did all they could to make us fans of the Republican show of the last 8 years will be screaming at us to embrace ‘The Change’… ‘The Change’ that is no change. They will try to dazzle us and awe us with superfluities of all sorts of stuff, but the new show looks quite still born at this point though it may take a while for most to realize that? Hope will fizzle quite quick as the whole world sinks into economic depression, America leading the pack. Barack Obama will most likely become America’s most disappointing President, though through the fireworks display little of that future will be foreseen by most during his Inauguration Day ceremonies tomorrow

Barack just cannot deliver the goods (nor has the desire to) to actually bring about this change that is, and will be, absolutely necessary. Yes, though Bush is now truly despised by so many, it may well be that Barack becomes not just disappointing but despised as well? When there are no jobs around, people want to know why? And the answer to that WHY will be…. Barack just did not deliver.

I see sadness and despair, hate and anger ahead. I see people growing fed up with empty promises while the rats continue to get fed.

Redux: Go away! Shoe! Shoe!

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Shoebush flier

Relevant links:
http://shoebush.org/
http://afterdowningstreet.org/downloads/shoebush.pdf

Oh, and the IVAW is in on it too, if any of the Brethren and Sistren from the IVAW or anybody else want’s to contribute my boots to this worthy cause, mainly because I’m broker than broke and can’t afford to send them myself…. contact me, eh?

ISRAEL IS A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY

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israel
Even Nazi Germany couldn’t last forever. Israel exists only due to the largess of the American taxpayer, and with the American economy being what it is, I’m sure there will soon come an end to Israeli parasitism.

Nazis attack UN compound in Gaza.

Nazis now bombing hospitals in Gaza.

Nazi troops using unarmed Palestinians as human shields.

Boycott Starbucks, a supporter of Zionist war crimes.

Robber Barron Heist: Fed chair flat out refuses to tell Congress who they gave $1.2 TRILLION to. [video]

Why is Obama pulling a Bush, and putting one of the creeps responsible for the economic collapse in charge of the Treasury?

“Foreign aid is when the poor people of a rich country give money to the rich people of a poor country.”
–Johnny Hart, BC Comic Strip

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Jan 15 notes, thomasmc.com.

Who is the economy calling stupid?

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Okay, I’ve had enough of our readiness to believe, about the economy, that nobody knows what’s going on. Nobody will tell you what’s going on, is what’s going on.

Even my deepest thinking friend tells me, “Eric, they really don’t know” (The game theorists, the would-be global axis shifters, don’t know.) He may be right, but that’s not who we’re talking about. Between those guys, and you and I, who have no clue about where the economy is going, is a hand-basket courier. That composite abstraction at the handlebars knows the destination, he’s being paid cost-plus for the delivery, and he knows enough to collect his fee in advance.

We thought “it’s the economy, stupid” was directed at George Bush the Senior. Who is/was stupid? I’m finding the syncronicity of Alanis Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill song “Isn’t it ironic?” superlatively ironic. The era when a mass audience un-learned the meaning of irony, was when the joke was really on us.

Today the accepted theme to describe the economy is: nobody knows. I recently heard the governor of Colorado speak to the need for budget cuts in these hard times. He introduced the subject of the economic downturn by explaining, almost as a throwaway foregone conclusion, “Nobody saw this coming.”

I thought, really? This is what Americans are satisfied to expect for leadership? Elected authority figures return our system to us, broken, with not a mea culpa, but mea confuso. And we buy it.

For me, this no-comprendo motif doesn’t play well in Adagio. Today DC’s new lawmakers want to know what’s become of the first half of the TARP bailout money, and the good-enough-for-primetime answer is “nobody knows.” Don’t you just want to stand up and beg your fellow audience members for a collective show of incredulity? “NOBODY KNOWS?!”

Whoever pocketed the 350 Billion, KNOWS.

From explanations of the graft in Iraq, we the television public KNOW that just one million dollars in t-bills weighs more than you can get past surveillance cameras.

From nighttime video of the economic collapse in Argentina, documentary footage viewers know it takes a continuous train of armored trucks to do a run on the banks before the public gets there.

By the way, I’m certain Billion is always capitalized, out of respect for its size.

“Nobody knows” where went the 350 Billion? No. Nobody who knows, intends to tell us.

Either way, we don’t get to know, but the distinction makes a difference, don’t you think? The excuse we’re given for not dwelling on this incongruity, nudge nudge wink wink, is that all misdirection is for the sake of consumer confidence.

To look behind the green curtain is to become dis-illusioned. If you explain the slight of hand, instead of building confidence, you throw fuel on consumer doubt.

The better economists opposed the bailout. Hundreds of them signed a petition to tell us what’s going on is a heist. Under George Bush, bankers have been making off with the US treasury. What they couldn’t spend pay themselves to foist a war, or give themselves in tax cuts, they are having to abscond with under cover of an eleventh hour “bailout.”

The best of the honest economists, Paul Krugman, was given a Nobel Prize. At the same time, our president-to-the-rescue is saying he’d consider the advice of “even Paul Krugman,” like Krugman is a fringe opinion.

Do we empower the American public beast with a truer education about what’s happening to their finances, or do we narrow their peripheral foresight like the gangway to the abbatoire?

P.T. Barnum said no one ever went broke underestimating the American public. Barnum saw opportunity and he took it. I’ll bet he wasn’t satisfied to invest his winnings on the advice of the public’s broker.

The economy is tanking because the Bush investment banker free-for-all is over.

The cash heart of the consumer confidence fattened-calf is already in the bloody hands of the high priests. The American consumer is what’s being thrown off the wall. And the communal wealth of America’s middle class can’t be put together again because the pieces which formed Humpty Dumpty’s actual pre-confidence-ballooned size are going to come up missing.

Not missing, exactly. Look at the corporate jets, private skyboxes, enormous estates, private island kingdoms and advance ticket sales of quarter-million-dollar fares into space.

With much recent ballyhoo, George Bush set aside for protection some nature preserves in the Pacific. Unlike Yellowstone, or Yosemite, these parks of azure coral reefs are inaccessible. To you.

Barack Obama’s spread-the-wealth-around campaign lingo had nothing to do with the mad scramble to divvy the pot. Obama represents our non-insider’s reflexive grab for the fewer spoons. If Obama represents a wisening up at all.

Beyond buy low, sell high, here’s an example of how the scam worked: If a $100K house can be made seem worth $500K, a broker gets five times the commission, say $60K instead of $12K, and collects that money in cash. When the cows come home, you’ve got just a house, and let’s admit that value is arbitrary. But the broker is free and clear, his gleaning of a cash value done.

And actually, your house is not even worth the cost to build it. As the democratic capitalist apparatus downgrades, and the wealthy lose empathy for the lower classes, your house is worth just the value of the shelter it provides. Look at the concern they show for your health care. Your well-being, food and shelter wise, is worth only as much as the value you add to your landlord’s pleasure.

Is Charles Manson getting out in 2012? Absolutely!

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Today on the public radio, I heard PRI’s Matthew Bell pose a question for the program The World. “Is President Bush underrated?” His verdict: “Absolutely!” Well the answer wasn’t Bell’s, actually. But the attribution fell outside the sound bite: Bell went on to say: “At least that’s what President Bush believes.”

Now, did the story go on to be about Bush’s delusion? Or his weeble-wobbleness, take your pick? No. It was about whether Bush had been the worst president in the last 50 years. There followed some arguments:

Historians will judge Bush to have been right, etc, etc. “According to Bill Kristol.” Again the attribution was not prefaced, but footnoted. Nor was Kristol disclosed to have been a close friend and Neocon mentor. Etc.

Contrary opinions on the other hand, were introduced oppositely, by citing the source of the voice before the quote. To my ears, this has the effect of dampening the listener’s receptivity to an argument. It muddies the ear-waves to foil a pithy phrase. When you have no intention to deliver a clear sound-bite.

You tell me which grammar communicates the most vitality:

“It’s ALIVE!” says mad scientist and Island proprietor Dr. Moreau.

(or)

Avowed antagonist and legend in-his-own-mind Dr. Moreau says “It’s ALIVE!”

This technique resembles the leeway newspapers have with their headlines. Most readers won’t go past the headline, or read bellow the fold, so a newspaper can take liberties with the headline when there’s an editorial slant to deliver, warranted or not.

The newspaper business was founded for that advantage, and ownership consolidation continues with the mass media, precisely to consolidate that power.

I believe an extreme example of this unscrupulous literary device is the retraction. Newspaper publishers know they can print a falsehood, or an oversimplification, and run a correction in a later issue. Their audience for the former is a hundred fold larger than for the latter.

That’s what I think the public radio hooligans are doing with their manipulative grammar.

Here, I’ll compose an example they can use for Bernie Madoff:

Has Bernie Madoff earned our forgiveness? Absolutely.

At least that’s what Bernie Madoff believes.

Historians will ultimately look favorably at Madoff’s actions.

According to Mistress X, nephew Z, his friends and supporters.

[But] shirtless man, [a critic of Madoff], says Madoff’s scheme to defraud investors will have a lasting impact on… [trailing into complexities which exceed the bound of a sound-bite.]

Ponzi shmonzi. You be the judge.

Israel has always been genocidal

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Israeli and Palestinian sides
Zionist puppet Hillary Clinton declares she will NOT talk to Hamas. So why the Hell is she going to be Secretary of State, again?
 
UN President Accuses Israel of Genocide.

Neo-Nazi Israel planning to demolish hospitals in Gaza.

Nazi troops have already massacred over 1,000 people in Gaza.

More Jewish protests against ZioNazi war crimes in Gaza.

Israel preparing to nuke Iran before Bush leaves office next week?

The Bible is a handbook of genocide. After the exodus, God told the Jews to go into the land and drive the natives out, and to kill every man, woman and child who remained. This is beyond dispute, it is right there in the text. So, one must come to one of two conclusions, either God is a genocidal maniac, or the book is a lie written by genocidal maniacs, to excuse their crimes. Either way, Judaism exists because of genocide, and what Israel is doing in Gaza is just a modern recurrence of what the evil they brought to the region over 3,000 years ago. They believe that they are the only people on the planet who matter, and anything they want belongs to them. No wonder the world keeps driving the Jews out.

“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
–Martin Luther King, Jr.

Enough. It’s time for a boycott. By Naomi Klein

Excerpts from Thomas McCullock’s Jan 14 notes, thomasmc.com.

seeking refuge in Abbey’s country

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Phallic-arches-national-park
Edward Abbey presaged America’s current path to tyranny forty years ago and predicted that the end of American democracy would be coincident with the destruction of the wilderness.

What’s the connection between democracy and wilderness? Personal liberty is a fleeting commodity, according to Abbey, and history has shown that governments invariably move toward totalitarianism. When faced with authoritarian governance, wilderness is crucial because it serves as both a refuge from political oppression and a base for guerrilla warfare. Uprisings in urban settings are too quickly quelled by those with better weaponry, but hidden in mountain, desert or jungle settings, revolutionaries can gain an edge on establishment forces and engage in protracted — sometimes successful — battle. Consider Che in the mountains, the Vietcong in the jungle, Osama bin Laden in a desert cave.

From Desert Solitaire:

Suppose we were planning to impose a dictatorial regime upon the American people — the following preparations would be essential:

1. Concentrate the populace in megalopolitan masses so they can be kept under close surveillance and where, in the case of trouble, they can be bombed, burned, gassed or machine-gunned with a minimum of expense and waste.

2. Mechanize agriculture to the highest degree of refinement, thus forcing most of the scattered farm and ranching population into the cities. Such a policy is desirable because farmers, woodsmen, cowboys, Indians, fishermen and other relatively self-sufficient types are difficult to manage unless displaced from their natural environment.

3. Restrict the possession of firearms to the police and the regular military organizations.

4. Encourage or at least fail to discourage population growth. Large masses of people are more easily manipulated and dominated than scattered individuals.

5. Continue military conscription. Nothing excels military training for creating in young men an attitude of prompt, cheeful obedience to officially constituted authority.

6. Divert attention from deep conflicts within the society by engaging in foreign wars; make support of these wars a test of loyalty, thereby exposing and isolating potential opposition to the new order.

7. Overlay the nation with a finely reticulated network of communications, airlines and interstate autobahns.

8. Raze the wilderness. Dam the rivers, flood the canyons, drain the swamps, log the forests, strip-mine the hills, bulldoze the mountains, irrigate the deserts and improve the national parks into national parking lots.

In a final round of environmental fuck-yous, the Bush administration has offered up significant portions of pristine Utah wilderness to oil exploration. Aside from one notable monkeywrenching incident, the trashing of the American wilderness continues unabated.

Shots from my recent cave-hunting trip to Abbey’s country!

Toyota-Sequoia-offroad-Arches
Back-road-Arches
Arches-original-entrance
landscape-arch-arches
klondike-bluffs-arches
juniper-arches
ice-desert-arches
Marie-tree-hugger-arches
balanced-rock-near-abbey-arches
toyota-sequoia-arches
fiery-furnace-arches
delicate-arch-utah-license
cairns-delicate-arch-trail

Obama to recycle militarism of the Clinton regime

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virtual cannonHillary Clinton Stresses ‘Cooperative Engagement,’ ‘Smart Power’ This supposed ‘smart power’ that Obama’s Hillary will produce in reality is the same Bush-Lite government militarism that Bill Clinton used in his 8 year regime. It produced the set-up for Dubya’s invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan which was the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis through economic warfare, the introduction of the US encirclement of Russia and it’s geopolitical defeat in the Balkans, and last but not least, it produced the Rwandan genocide.

‘Smart Power’? No, it is just more of the same stupidity of a US military-industrial-governmental complex gone completely mad. No CHANGE here, Barack Baby!