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April 29, 2004
From a Reader
Thanks for this site and thanks for making the TRUTH available to me whenever I want it.
As you stated to me via a past e-mail (paraphrased): "I was a Libertarian... now I am not and do not even vote." I have thought about that for a long time and that's what has finally happened to me. My voting card is in a landfill somewhere, now I'm waiting to 'not go get my nat'l id card'. I guess I have evolved into a root striker but I wish the people that I knew would listen to some ideas. Oh well, I guess most people only care about watching football and going to the movies. I'll keep trying though."
Posted by Rob at 09:08 PM | Comments (167) | TrackBack
Declare Victory and Leave
Marines in Fallujah began packing up gear and loading heavy trucks Thursday, saying they had been ordered to leave the southern industrial zone that they have held for weeks and pull away from the city.
Posted by David Wiggins at 07:03 AM | Comments (226) | TrackBack
April 27, 2004
US Army Desperate for Resupply
The U.S. military is demanding the return of five howitzers that two Sierra Nevada ski resorts use to prevent avalanches - saying it needs the guns for the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Posted by David Wiggins at 05:14 PM | Comments (244) | TrackBack
Remind Me Again Who Hates Freedom...
From the Tri-City Herald: "U.S. Secret Service agents were in Prosser[,Washington,] on Friday afternoon to interview a 15-year-old art student about political drawings he had shown his Prosser High School teacher.
"The student turned in several sketches keyed to the war in Iraq as part of an art class assignment to keep a notebook of drawings, said Kevin Cravens, a Richland friend of the student's family.
"The most controversial one showed a man in what appeared to be Middle-Eastern-style clothing with an AK-47 rifle.
"He was holding a stick with the oversized head of President Bush on it. The student said the head was enlarged because it was intended to be an effigy, Cravens said. The caption called for an end to the war in Iraq.
"Another sketch showed Bush dressed as a devil and launching a missile. The caption read 'End the war -- on terrorism.'"
So depicting violent acts in protest of a violent act is cause for calling in the Secret Service?! It's fine and dandy (and even patriotic!) to cheer on the president and his violent campaign against Afghans and Iraqis, but daring to suggest that violence is warranted in response to a murderous campaign is cause for investigation by the feds.
Somebody is feeling very insecure these days, and it ain't the kid who drew the pictures. You know, until FDR any citizen could walk up to the White House door and knock. Now legitimate protest--by drawing pictures!--is cause for a visit from the G-men. I wonder why presidents feel so insecure anymore. It couldn't be their policies; could it? Nah. Obviously this kid hates freedom.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:33 AM | Comments (302)
April 24, 2004
The Just-Us System in Action
State attorney: Videotaped beating of prison wards not enough for prosecution.
"After both youths are face-down and unresisting, the video shows one counselor repeatedly punching one of the wards in the head. A second counselor, after subduing his ward, appears to kick the youth in the head.
A third employee sprays the wards with pepper spray, including after they are subdued. And a fourth appears to shoot one of the unresisting youths with a paintball gun loaded with pepper spray pellets. Two other employees later allegedly filed false reports about the incident.
San Joaquin County prosecutors concluded there was no reasonable likelihood of obtaining a conviction against the employees."
If you or I were actually CAUGHT ON TAPE beating someone, it'd be a slam-dunk case. Think about that.
Posted by Andy Henke at 06:46 PM | Comments (241) | TrackBack
April 23, 2004
NY Times Flubs Again
Thursday's New York Times misidentified GOP Senate candidate Pete Coors as a Ku Klux Klan member who murdered a black sharecropper.
How many major errors can a newspaper make within 12 months and still be taken seriously by people?
Posted by Andy Henke at 04:07 PM | Comments (212) | TrackBack
Government caused 9-11
Ron Paul in the House, 4/22:
[The Iraq invasion] is not a question of resolve, but rather a question of wise policy. If the policy is flawed and the world and our people are less safe for it, unshakable resolve is the opposite of what we need . . .
. . . we still do not have armed pilots in the sky. Instead of more responsibility being given to the airlines, the government has taken over the entire process. This has been encouraged by the airline owners, who seek subsidies and insurance protection . . .
Unfortunately, the biggest failure of our government will be ignored. I’m sure the Commission will not connect our foreign policy of interventionism – practiced by both major parties for over a hundred years – as an important reason 9/11 occurred. Instead, the claims will stand that the motivation behind 9/11 was our freedom, prosperity, and way of life. If this error persists, all the tinkering and money to improve the intelligence agencies will bear little fruit.
Posted by George F. Smith at 10:22 AM | Comments (111) | TrackBack
A Trojan Horse for More Regulation
Paul Weyrich, normally a sensible conservative (and one occasionally outspoken about the GOP's abandonment of conservatives), sees "a burst of sun shining through all this gloom"--"this gloom" being the latest HIV scare in the porn industry.
"What is the 'burst of sun'?" you ask.
Is it, possibly, that the porn industry will be shut down for a significant length of time? Is it that Americans will recognize the dangers inherent in promiscuity?
No, my friend, the "burst of sun shining through all this gloom" is that the FDA may finally be going to force condom makers to put warning labels on their products! Believe it or not, there is already a law on the books requiring this, but the FDA has thus far not enforced it. Now that enforcement appears to be in the cards, Weyrich thinks conservatives should be ecstatic:
"This is an important victory in that it represents an effort by Congress to make sure its will is respected and science is not subverted. More importantly, alerting users that condoms provide incomplete protection against STDs, particularly HPV, is an important victory for the truth."
Let's not forget that it also a victory for those who think government should micromanage every aspect of our lives, something conservatives used to oppose.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:17 AM | Comments (104)
April 22, 2004
A True Patriot
From Rob Robertson: "Michael (8), and Madeline (6), woke up at 4:30 in order to make the trip to Lexington to watch the reenactment of the opening of the Battle of Lexington and Concord. A large crowd had already gathered by the time we got there, but we had a great spot on the road to watch the redcoats approach; the tension of first hearing the drums, and then the fife, and finally seeing the bright red uniforms instilled a sense of fear and anticipation that lingered across the years. From their perch on Mom and Dad's shoulders, the kids were able to watch the brief skirmish, and later we visited the home of the noble patriot Jonathan Harrington. Whenever you hear someone talking nonsense about how American troops in Iraq are 'fighting for your freedom,' tell them about a true patriot who gave his life not for 'America,' but for its cause; liberty."
http://www.poetry-archive.com/l/the_battle_of_lexington.html
Posted by Rob at 08:13 PM | Comments (226) | TrackBack
Bush Freedom Fighters Will Include Draftees
Jerome Tucille writes:
While most of us are preoccupied with the latest tales of mayhem and destruction emanating from Iraq, the Bush administration is quietly paving the way for the re-imposition of the ultimate form of slavery: a military draft to provide additional fodder for the so-called War on Terror. Without much fanfare, $28 million has been added to the 2004 Selective Service System (SSS) budget to prepare for a military draft that could start as early as June 15, 2005.
Of course, the draft will go over much easier if the U.S. suffers another terrorist attack, which Bush is doing his best to provoke.
Posted by George F. Smith at 09:59 AM | Comments (285) | TrackBack
US Admits to Violating the Geneva Convention in Iraq
"The U.S. military does not deny shooting at ambulances. But it blames the resistance fighters. U.S. marines spokesperson Lt Eric Knapp says his forces have seen fighters loading weapons into ambulances from mosques in the area."
From: Fallujah Cannot even Bury its Dead
Posted by Andy Henke at 07:38 AM | Comments (184) | TrackBack
April 21, 2004
9/11 Could Have Been Prevented
"From Richard Clarke to Condoleezza Rice, the security establishment agrees on one thing: the attacks of September 11, 2001, could not have been prevented by counterterrorist measures.
"Maybe, maybe not. But if that is correct, it doesn’t get the Bush administration and its predecessors off the hook. The very inability to prevent terrorism is a powerful argument against the interventionist polices they followed for decades.
"If there is no way to stop a decentralized network of suicidal killers from murdering innocent civilians using low-tech means, that is all the more reason to stay out of foreign hornets’ nests. The Founders of this country were right. Intervention leads to trouble."
(Link courtesy Antiwar.com.)
Posted by Mike Tennant at 03:28 PM | Comments (182)
Ha!
From this week's Onion homepage:
Libertarian Reluctantly Calls Fire Department
CHEYENNE, WY—After attempting to contain a living-room blaze started by a cigarette, card-carrying Libertarian Trent Jacobs reluctantly called the Cheyenne Fire Department Monday. "Although the community would do better to rely on an efficient, free-market fire-fighting service, the fact is that expensive, unnecessary public fire departments do exist," Jacobs said. "Also, my house was burning down." Jacobs did not offer to pay firefighters for their service.
Posted by Lee McCracken at 02:03 PM | Comments (222) | TrackBack
The Top 19 Dumb Statements
Dumbness and lies pollute the country's airwaves almost every time a politician speaks. Trying to find the 19 most offensive comments in a given week is not easy, but Harry Browne managed to do exactly that. Who issued these dumb statements? You get three guesses, and the first two don't count.
Posted by George F. Smith at 10:57 AM | Comments (196) | TrackBack
April 20, 2004
Vote Kerry for Smaller Government?
"Republicans have long claimed to be fiscal tightwads and railed against deficit spending. But this year big-spending George W. Bush and the GOP Congress turned a budget surplus into a $477 billion deficit. . . .
"Complaints about Republican profligacy have led the White House to promise to mend its ways. But Bush's latest budget combines accounting flim-flam with unenforceable promises. So how do we put Uncle Sam on a sounder fiscal basis?
"Vote Democratic."
So writes Doug Bandow in "A Conservative Case for Voting Democratic" at Fortune.com. Bandow's point is that divided government tends to restrict spending and bring about reform, whereas unified government tends to expand spending and impede reform. The "reforms" Bandow describes are not exactly earth-shattering, but at least his discussion of spending is on the mark.
Of course, there's always the nonvoting option, which might even be better still.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:17 PM | Comments (200)
Looking at the World Through Blood-Colored Glasses
Hot off the presses, a story based on a CPA memo written in early March destroys everything the war-lovers would have us believe about the "liberation" of Iraq:
"Iraq's chances of seeing democracy succeed, according to the memo's author—a U.S. government official detailed to the CPA, who wrote this summation of observations he'd made in the field for a senior CPA director—have been severely imperiled by a year's worth of serious errors on the part of the Pentagon and the CPA, the U.S.-led multinational agency administering Iraq. Far from facilitating democracy and security, the memo's author fears, U.S. efforts have created an environment rife with corruption and sectarianism likely to result in civil war."
In other words, just like government screws up everything at home, so it screws up everything abroad.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 10:54 AM | Comments (202)
You DARE to Question Der Fuehrer?!
How dare those reporters ask Bush tough questions during his press conference last week! So says Les Kinsolving at WorldNetDaily.com.
Kinsolving lets other editorialists do most of his talking for him, but he finds it simply outrageous that the press would try to get the president to admit that he bears any responsibility for 9/11 or that the war on Iraq not only was a bad move to begin with but also is getting worse by the day.
As usual, he turns to FDR as his presidential role model:
Can you imagine what President Franklin Delano Roosevelt would have done if there were – at any of his post-Pearl Harbor press conferences – any such questions as those asked of President Bush? Such as:
"Mr. President, could you tell us what mistakes you made with regard to Pearl Harbor?" (Which FDR would have probably answered: "Yes. I have just made the bad mistake of calling on you for a question that, if answered, would give aid and comfort to the enemy.")
This would have been a good question to ask. Better yet, someone should've asked FDR how his actions had provoked the Japanese into firing the first shot and why he deliberately kept his foreknowledge of the attack from his commanders in the Pacific.
FDR, on occasion, ordered reporters who asked outrageous questions to go stand in a corner – or even sit on a stool wearing a dunce cap.
So this is the way you want the president of a free country, with a free press, to behave: treating the press as school children, humiliating them if they ask a question he doesn't like? Thanks a lot, Les.
And when the Chicago Tribune and New York Daily News exposed a leaked top-secret contingency plan to send millions of our troops to Europe to fight Nazi Germany, he ordered one of their reporters: "Front and center!" where he pinned a medal on his lapel: Nazi Germany's Iron Cross.
So, according to Les, the press ought not ask difficult questions of any president during wartime. (He fails to mention that this contingency plan was drawn up before Pearl Harbor, with the understanding that getting the Japanese to fire the first shot would drag America completely into the war in both Europe and the Pacific, which is what FDR wanted to do.) We should all just fall in line behind the Fuehrer. It reminds me of the Spike Jones song "Der Fuehrer's Face":
When der Fuerher says, "Ve is ze master race,"
Ve "Heil! (*raspberries*) Heil! (*raspberries*)" right in der Feuhrer's face!
Not to love der Fuehrer is a great disgrace,
So ve "Heil! (*raspberries*) Heil! (*raspberries*)" right in der Feuhrer's face!
Posted by Mike Tennant at 08:56 AM | Comments (309)
April 19, 2004
Wrong again, Mark
This morning I read Mark Morford’s column, “How to Gag on the Passion” on the San Francisco Chronicle’s website, and I felt compelled to comment. Please understand that this is NOT a defense of “The Passion,” for I haven’t even seen the movie (and probably won’t bother until it comes out on video). That being said, I was struck by the following passage:
“…and if Jesus came back right this minute and was made to sit through this film, he would sigh gently, shake his short, shaggy hair (long hair was forbidden by Jewish law -- wrong again, Mel), and, you know, hold a nice seminar or something.”
I find it interesting that Mr. Morford would accuse Mel Gibson of being “wrong” for portraying Jesus with long hair on the grounds that such was forbidden by Jewish law. As a professional journalist who is familiar enough with the life of Jesus to feel qualified to publicly label the movie as “revisionist” in his column, surely Mr. Morford is aware that, according to the Bible, Jesus broke numerous Jewish laws on numerous occasions, spoke out against numerous Jewish laws on numerous occasions, and in at least one instance interfered with the carrying-out of said laws. Given Jesus’ apparent disregard for Jewish law, why does Mr. Morford feel justified in citing the director of the movie as “wrong” for portraying Him in defiance of one of those laws?
Did Mr. Morford intentionally make an intellectually dishonest statement in his column for the sake of insult, or was he merely commenting upon something that he honestly had no knowledge of? Either way, it looks to me like very poor journalism, and a true discredit to the author.
Posted by Andy Henke at 10:18 PM | Comments (112) | TrackBack
A Child Who WAS Left Behind
Today's "Ask the White House" featured some of the most inane, ridiculous questions I have ever heard; and, of course, my intelligent ones were rejected. I think this one has to take the cake, though:
I just noticed that Independence Day is now the 5th of July. I know a lot of seemingly more pressing matters are at hand, but please pass on to the President that, to me, the idea of moving Independence Day to the 5th is absolutely outrageous.
Hey, dummkopf! The 4th falls on a Sunday this year; hence, the official holiday is on the 5th.
By the way, Card explained this and then added: "Iraqi people will have a new Independence Day this year!!!" That sounds about right. They'll have as much freedom as we do.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 04:45 PM | Comments (111)
Get Your Kicks on Route 66
Everything is going just swimmingly in Iraq. The people have been liberated, and they are showering their liberators with flowers. Or maybe not.
"In a bid to end guerrilla attacks on its supply lines, the US yesterday banned civilian traffic on some of Iraq's most-used highways and declared them free-fire zones.
"All vehicles not belonging to the US military will be fired on according to US military command."
Now there's liberation for you! Don't try to go to work or visit Grandma, or you will be shot. It's easy to see that the Iraqis are better off now than they were under Saddam.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:30 AM | Comments (304)
Runaway Moms
(By Nicholas Strakon): On April 18, Ben Stein was a guest on an NPR
investment-advice show, and the host asked him a few things that
were irrelevant to the subject matter, including what he thought
about the staying power of Britney Spears. Stein said some nice
things about Miss Spears but went on to declare that, with
Mother's Day coming up, we should be more worried about
whether "we" were properly taking care of the "young mother" in
the military who was hunkering down in Iraq "with machine-gun
fire coming over."
In response to that sentiment, one is tempted to point out that if
"we" really wanted to "take care" of such young ladies, "we" sure as
hell wouldn't have sent them to Iraq.
But in fact they sent themselves. They were not conscripted. And for
a young woman to abandon her children in order to don the colors
of the world's most powerful criminal gang, and help that gang
invade and occupy a foreign country -- murdering other mothers
and their children along the way -- well, as an act of heedlessness
and immorality it just about leaves me speechless.
As is so often the case when I try to comment on today's American
society, I can only fall back on profound understatement: Such a
young woman is not the sort of mother whom Mother's Day was
founded to honor.
Reposted by permission from The Last Ditch at www.thornwalker.com/ditch © 2004 WTM Enterprises. All rights reserved.
Posted by Rob at 12:30 AM | Comments (417) | TrackBack
April 18, 2004
Heroic War and Tax Protesters Shut Down Federal Building
"OAKLAND -- Sixteen anti-war protesters were arrested Thursday after staging a "die-in" inside the lobby of the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building to protest spending tax money to pay for the Iraqi occupation and aid to Israel.
Following a rally featuring speeches, slogans and colorful banners outside the federal building in downtown Oakland, a group of protesters chanting slogans and clutching tax forms smeared with red paint locked arms and laid down in a circle inside the lobby.
As private security guards rushed to lock the doors to the federal building on Clay Street, the crowd, which swelled to about 300, pounded on the glass entryway chanting, "Occupation is a crime from Iraq to Palestine."
The protest shut down the federal building for several hours and frustrated dozens of people who had appointments Thursday afternoon with federal agencies, as well as last-minute tax-filers in need of forms and other help.
"This is an awful, messed-up day to do this," said Robyn Hubbard of Oakland, who came to the federal building to file for a tax extension. "It's very inconvenient, very frustrating."
Read the rest here.
Posted by Andy Henke at 03:46 PM | Comments (327) | TrackBack
April 17, 2004
How best to subvert the law?
Show it to the people oppressed by it!
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/displaycode?section=bpc&group=25001-26000&file=25631-25633
I showed this asinine bit of socialist trash to My Best Pal, the bartender/owner of the local watering hole, and she was stunned at how over-regulated she actually was. Things got even better when she expressed a desire, after a recent break-in, to get a pistol for protection. When I explained what she'd have to go through to get one (permits, classes, etc.) here in our lovely People's Republic, she reacted with downright outrage. I am afraid, however, that she will be discouraged now from getting one, which is, of course, the point: victim disarmament. Make it hard to get, and fewer will bother to get it.
VIVE L'ETAT!
Posted by Patrick Yancey at 06:56 PM | Comments (1)
April 16, 2004
Elegant Headline
The entire axis of evil encapsualted in a few short words.
Bush, Blair Unified on Israeli Plan, Iraq
Posted by David Wiggins at 04:58 PM | Comments (103) | TrackBack
War Is Peace, Failure Is Success
You've got to hand it to the Bush administration: They're tops at keeping everyone in the administration on the same erroneous page.
"The chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff said Thursday that the deadly insurgency that flared this month is 'a symptom of the success that we're having here in Iraq' and an effort to undermine the country's transition to self-government," according to the Washington Post.
I wonder. . .if our entire military in Iraq were wiped out and Baghdad taken over by the "insurgents," would that mean the campaign was a roaring, unqualified success?
Posted by Mike Tennant at 11:43 AM | Comments (431)
Get the Door, It's the Government
"It's dinnertime, and you're hungry and tired, so you pick up the phone and order your favorite pizza. But you might have just landed yourself a lot more than pepperoni and cheese.
"If you owe fines or fees to the courts, that phone call may have provided the link the state needed to track you down and make you pay."
Yes, folks, it's not even safe to order a pizza anymore. Big Brother is everywhere. Read the whole article here.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 10:11 AM | Comments (308)
April 15, 2004
Your Choices This Fall
The other day on the radio, I heard that John Kerry's favorite president is Abraham Lincoln. If I remember correctly, Bush keeps a bust of Lincoln in the Oval Office. So here are your choices this fall:
A Yale alumnus and member of Skull & Bones who worships Lincoln, or a Yale alumnus and member of Skull & Bones who worships Lincoln. Either way, things are looking up for the State.
Posted by Rob at 10:13 PM | Comments (311) | TrackBack
Oliver Stone: Castro Apologist
It's nice to see a reporter with cojones. In this Slate interview, Ann Louise Bardach needles Oliver Stone for sucking up to Fidel Castro while filming his hagiography--sorry, objective documentary--of the despot.
Some excerpts:
ALB: Let me ask you about the part [in the film] where Castro's in front of eight prisoners charged with attempting to hijack a plane [to Miami]. He says to them, "I want you all to speak frankly and freely." What do you make of that whole scene, where you have these prisoners who happened to be wearing perfectly starched, nice blue shirts?
OS: Let me give you the background. He obviously set it up overnight. It was in that spirit that he said, "Ask whatever you want. I'm sitting here. I want to hear it too. I want to hear what they're thinking." He let me run the tribunal, so to speak.
ALB: But Cuba's leader for life is sitting in front of these guys who are facing life in prison, and you're asking them, "Are you well treated in prison?" Did you think they could honestly answer that question?
OS: If they were being horribly mistreated, then I don't know that they could be worse mistreated [afterward].
ALB: So in other words, you think they thought this was their best shot to air grievances? Rather than that if they did speak candidly, there'd be hell to pay when they got back to prison?
OS: I must say, you're really picturing a Stalinist state. It doesn't feel that way. You can always find horrible prisons if you go to any country in Central America.
ALB: Did you go to the prisons in Cuba?
OS: No, I didn't.
***
ALB: Now, when you were talking to the prisoners who tried to hijack a plane, one told you he was a fisherman, and you said, "Why then didn't you take a boat?" Why did you ask that?
OS: Well, it seemed to me that if they were familiar with boats, it seemed to be the best way.
ALB: Did you know that in Cuba there are virtually no boats? The boats that are used for fishermen are tightly controlled. One of the more surreal aspects of Cuba, being the largest island in the Caribbean, is that there are no visible boats.
OS: I see.
Oliver Stone no doubt sees himself as a daring truth-teller, but when face-to-face with an honest-to-God Stalinist dictator, he falls to his knees like...well, you get the picture.
Posted by Lee McCracken at 03:51 PM | Comments (225) | TrackBack
Finally Someone in Power Speaks the Truth!
It's a sad commentary on the state of America today that a man regarded by almost all Americans as a murderous criminal (and rightly so) makes more sense than the president of the United States.
From the latest bin Laden tape:
What happened on September 11 and March 11 are your goods returned to you so that you know security is a necessity for all and we do not accept that you monopolize it for yourselves, and knowledgeable nations will not accept that their leaders risk their security.
Be aware that if you describe us and our actions as terrorism then you should describe yourselves and your actions that way as well.
Our actions come in response to your actions of destroying and killing our people in Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine. . . .
Under what grace are your victims innocent and ours dust and under which doctrine is your blood and our blood water? Reciprocation is just and he who starts is more unjust. . . .
I offer a truce to them (Europe) with a commitment to stop operations against any state which vows to stop attacking Muslims or interfere in their affairs, including (participating) in the American conspiracy against the wider Muslim world.
Now, do these sound like the words of a man who blindly "hates freedom" or of one who has legitimate grievances against the West? He's even offering to leave Europe alone if Europe will leave Muslims alone.
Meanwhile, back in Washington, our president can't even speak coherently at a scripted press conference and just keeps digging us into a deeper hole, doing bin Laden's recruiting for him.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 11:04 AM | Comments (313)
The Body Count Game
Bush's defenders say Iraq is not Vietnam because nowhere near as many Americans have been killed in the current debacle. The magic number is 58,000 -- that's 58,000 American dead in Vietnam, give or take a few hundred. Who cares how many Asians died, just as no one seems concerned about how many Iraqis have perished. Are the Iraqis as indifferent to their loss of life as we are?
As long as the American numbers are low enough, preemptive war is an acceptable, if not a moral, policy. Unless those numbers include the neocons themselves or their sons and daughters. But they take steps to ensure their interests are kept out of harm's way. The body count applies to the followers, not the leaders.
Matt Taibbi writes:
When this whole mess is over, I'm sure we can expect more of the same. With half of Mesopotamia turned to glass, we will build a sunken wall to our boys and give an Oscar to the first director with enough balls to do Saving Private Lynch. We have no shame in this country.
Posted by George F. Smith at 09:35 AM | Comments (372) | TrackBack
What to do when you KNOW
the shit is about to hit the fan? GET OUT
Russia's ominous Iraq exodus
By Sergei Blagov
"Whatever the veracity of claims and counter-claims, Russia and Iraq have maintained military ties for decades. Between 1958 and 1990, Iraq was one of the world's largest importers of weapons systems from the Soviet Union. During those three decades, the Soviet government in Moscow supplied Iraq with 4,630 tanks, 5,524 armored vehicles, 725 anti-tank missile systems, 325 air-defense missile systems, 1,593 portable "Igla" air-defense missiles, 1,145 military aircraft and 41 naval vessels, according to Russian media reports. The total bill reportedly amounted to more than $30 billion. Upgrading these arsenals could provide Russia with a number of lucrative deals. "
Posted by David Wiggins at 08:24 AM | Comments (327) | TrackBack
April 14, 2004
Bush Says We're Not an Imperial Power
According to Bush, we're not an imperial power, as nations such as Japan and Germany can attest. Right. Just ask Germany and Japan, which still have U.S. military bases in their countries some six decades after the end of World War II.
Read Jacob Hornberger's article.
Posted by George F. Smith at 02:21 PM | Comments (377) | TrackBack
The Evil Income Tax
Sheldon Richman writes:
"In all the public discussion of the income tax, the key fact gets lost: It’s your money. You work for it. You earn it. It’s your property. Only you have a right to it. You never freely agreed to surrender it.
"We’ve come a long way since small tea and stamp taxes fueled revolutionary thoughts in our forefathers."
Maybe former IRS Special Agent Joe Banister can lead a revolution.
Posted by George F. Smith at 01:53 PM | Comments (440) | TrackBack
The Myth of National Defense
Others might already be aware of this, but I just discovered today that the Mises Institute has put the entire text of H.H. Hoppe's new book The Myth of National Defense online here. This book contains essays from libertarian luminaries like Rothbard, Joseph Stromberg and Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn, discussing various aspects of the state, war, and how defense could be provided in a free society.
Posted by Lee McCracken at 01:14 PM | Comments (202) | TrackBack
Nuclear Power Would Solve Many Problems
Donald W. Miller, Jr., MD, writes:
. . . Not only are low to moderate doses of ionizing radiation not harmful, low doses of radiation are good for you. It stimulates the immune system and checks oxidation of DNA through a process known as " radiation hormesis " – and thereby prevents cancer. . . .Compared to coal and hydroelectric dams, nuclear power is the safest and cleanest way, from an environmental standpoint, to produce electricity. And the fuel it uses, uranium, is more abundant than fossil fuels (or rivers left to be dammed). . . .
Chernobyl is unique. That kind of accident will not happen in any other nuclear power plants because all the reactors currently in operation around the world are placed inside a containment building (Chernobyl was not). The reactor core meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979, which happened when its core cooling system failed, also produced a lot of radiation; but the containment building the reactor was housed in kept it from being released into the atmosphere, and there were no injuries or deaths. . . .
On the Columbia River System, in my part of the world, 75 people died building the Grand Coulee Dam. Failure of the Teton Dam on a tributary of the Snake River near Idaho Falls (in 1976) killed 14 people, obliterated one town (Wilford), severely damaged several others, and caused $3 billion (2002 dollars) in property damage. The energy released when this dam ruptured was the equivalent of ten (20-kiloton) atom bombs, and it caused the greatest flood in North America since the last ice age. . . .
Per amount of electricity produced, hydropower causes 110 fold, coal, 45 fold, and natural gas, 10 fold more deaths than nuclear power. As Petr Beckmann, founding editor of Access to Energy , shows in his book The Health Hazards of Not Going Nuclear , nuclear power is the safest source of energy in all aspects, not excluding terrorism and sabotage, major accidents, and waste disposal. . . .
There is another way to get oil for our automobiles and airplanes, which would eliminate the need for the United States to import any Middle Eastern or Central Asian oil. American entrepreneurs are marketing a new technology called a " thermal conversion process " that can make oil out of various agricultural, industrial, and municipal wastes; and nuclear power is the best source of electricity to run it. . . .
The many billions of dollars our government is spending occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, to ensure a continued supply of fossil fuels, would be much better spent building nuclear reactors. . . .
A very worthwhile read!
Posted by George F. Smith at 12:38 PM | Comments (314) | TrackBack
April 13, 2004
Proposed War Crimes
"If they're trying to find a peaceful way out of this, great. But at this point, there seem to be few options other than to get innocents out and level it, wipe it clear off the map," said 1st Lt. Frank Dillbeck, scanning the city's outskirts with binoculars during a relative lull in fighting.
Posted by David Wiggins at 07:35 PM | Comments (322) | TrackBack
Former Special Agent Fights IRS
Former Special Agent Joe Banister hasn’t paid his taxes since 1999 - the year he threw away a promising career to devote his life to a higher cause: defeating the IRS. Article by Chris Bushnell.
Posted by George F. Smith at 05:13 PM | Comments (442) | TrackBack
Flatten Fallujah, But Don't Touch Rummy
Drudge reports that a group of Florida Democrats has placed a newspaper ad which states, among other things:
And then there's Rumsfeld who said of Iraq "We have our good days and our bad days". We should put this S.O.B. up against a wall and say "This is one of our bad days," and pull the trigger.
This was not the wisest political move, and naturally it has the GOP shills on talk radio in a self-righteous uproar. These, of course, are the same people who recommended razing Fallujah, who thought murdering Uday and Qusay Hussein was too good for them, and who praised Israel for its recent assassination of Sheik Yassin.
Furthermore, let's suppose some Americans had suggested taking out Saddam Hussein's defense minister during the Iraq war, or perhaps Hermann Goerhing during World War II. Would any Americans be upset about this? Of course not! In fact, they would cheer it on because they would rightly see those men as agents of evil, ordering death and destruction. Since Rummy, on the other hand, is on the side of All That Is Right And Good, demanding his death as retribution for all the death and destruction (of both Americans and Iraqis) that he has caused is absolutely beyond the pale.
The U.S. can do no wrong--at least as long as a Republican is president.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 02:00 PM | Comments (228)
G-Men Against Gmail
The free market comes up with a spiffy new innovation, and guess who wants to be the first to stand in the way of it. Of course, it's the government!
Google is offering a free e-mail service which allows users to have up to one gigabyte of online storage, which certainly sounds like a good idea.
However, a California state senator wants to put a stop to it because it puts ads in the messages based on key words.
Psst! Senator! How do you think Google is going to pay for the service and all that extra storage? Hmm??? This stuff doesn't just materialize out of thin air, you know. Do you think consumers would rather sift through a few ads or pay for their e-mail? Actually, some might prefer the former and some the latter, but why not let them make their own decisions? No, better to force your one-size-fits-all central plan on them all.
Of all things, both this senatrix and "European groups" want to block Google's service because of "privacy concerns!" Yes, the same people who routinely violate our privacy in the name of fighting crime or terrorism or racism or whatever are soooooo concerned that a free, voluntary e-mail service might violate it because it puts ads in the e-mails or doesn't allow customers to delete messages permanently.
The market giveth, and the government taketh away.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:41 PM | Comments (332)
Shouting "Fire!" in a Crowded War Room
You can increase government spending to unheard-of heights, crack down on people's constitutional liberties, lie about reasons for going to war, and do a dozen other things that previously would not have been considered conservative and still remain in good stead with American conservatives today. The one thing you cannot do, however, is oppose George W. Bush's war, as evidenced by today's poll on WorldNetDaily.
Question: Have anti-war protestors gone too far with their opposition to the Iraq war?
The number-one answer, given by 48.77% of respondents, is "Yes it's time for some prosecutions for sedition."
Number two, at 28.28%, is "Yes, the anti-Americanism is bordering on treason."
Not until we get to number three, "No, the concern is legitimate, and we still have freedom of speech in the U.S.," do we see anything resembling conservatism of old--and that answer got a whopping 5.05% of the vote!
That is followed by three more "Yes" variations.
Yes, folks, these are the same conservatives who claim to be the defenders of the Constitution, who favor "strict constructionist" judges and limited government. Just don't speak out against a Republican war, or you will find their vaunted constitutional fealty has its limits.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 08:32 AM | Comments (314)
April 12, 2004
Saddam's Army Back in Charge
In an effort to toughen the Iraqi forces, Abizaid said the U.S. military will reach out to former senior members of Saddam's disbanded army — a reversal in strategy
AMAZING yet sadly predictable
Posted by David Wiggins at 09:45 PM | Comments (320) | TrackBack
The Triumph of Psueudoconservatism
Here's a good piece from Counterpunch on the degeneration of conservatism away from any kind of principled position.
"In nominal control of the presidency, both houses of Congress, and the Supreme Court, so-called conservatism is as dominant at present as liberalism was in 1964. Yet the intellectual deterioration in the movement is so evident that it may be appropriate to consider the proposition that as a political platform, the so-called conservative movement is no longer conservative in any principled or systematic sense."
Posted by Lee McCracken at 09:55 AM | Comments (325) | TrackBack
April 11, 2004
The Easter Masquerade
"Religion's alleged harmony with science is a fraudulent masquerade, extending only insofar as religious dogmas are not called into question," writes Keith Lockitch.
To get the rules right for predicting Easter each year, Pope Gregory XIII called on some of the leading astronomers and mathematicians of his day, including Nicolas Copernicus.
Copernicus came up with a method of prediction that assumed the earth moved about the Sun, putting him at odds with the Church's common sense view. Church officials didn't take his science seriously but accepted his method for its convenience.
A little later Galileo said Copernicus was right. It wasn't just a convenient assumption, but a description of reality - the earth really did orbit the Sun.
"That the Church persecuted Galileo for defending the Copernican theory is well known. Less frequently acknowledged is the utter hypocrisy of that act: the Church persecuted Galileo for defending the very ideas on which its Easter reform depended.
"In 1992, Pope John Paul II grudgingly admitted--350 years too late--that his predecessors had been wrong."
Posted by George F. Smith at 03:10 PM | Comments (213) | TrackBack
April 10, 2004
More service and protection from Officer Friendly...
Boy, I feel so much safer flying after reading this!
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20040410/D81RLHA00.html
Posted by Patrick Yancey at 05:22 PM | Comments (282) | TrackBack
April 09, 2004
Instant karma
http://apnews.myway.com//article/20040407/D81Q7UVO0.html
Posted by Andy Henke at 05:42 AM | Comments (283) | TrackBack
April 08, 2004
To serve and to protect?
Well, another blow is struck here in lovely San Bernadino county for public safety!
Moseying by the local watering hole this afternoon (on my way to pick up ammo), I was startled to see My Best Pal, the bartender, making a "No Smoking Allowed" sign, which none had been posted before now, since the owners took the exceptionally clear-eyed and liberty-minded view that the smoking ban was and is, to be blunt, stupid. I asked if this was now policy, and was assured that the sign would not be enforced, nor would the ashtrays be taken up. I then asked why the hell she was wasting Magic Marker on such foolishness, then, and I was told that a lady (?) deputy sheriff who had developed a crush on her, after finding out she was in a relationship, had started saying things like, "Boy, I'd hate to have to call the ABC board and tell them non-employees are here after 2 am," and, "Are those ashtrays under the bar?"
I have to ask what sort of quagmire these poor people have wandered into through no fault of their own. Can it be possible that, one day, citizens vulnerable to persecution by prosecution will be obliged to render favors, sexual or otherwise, unto Caesar's legions on demand? Some would say this day has long passed, but how widespread will it become? San Bernadino County is well known as one of the most corrupt in the nation, let alone the state, but this can happen anywhere that criminality is manufactured by legislative decree. If I stand around in the bar after closing, not drinking alcohol, what the hell business of the ABC board is it? I do not choose to run the gauntlet of pigmobiles which have taken to staking out the premises, preferring instead to allow my fellow patrons to decoy them off. The owners, so long as they do not serve me booze, are in no way violating the law, but their entire business and livelihood is placed in jeopardy by a vindictive, spiteful, badge-wearing shrew who, instead of taking her rejection as a adult, chooses to hit back with the bludgeon of law. The law is, indeed, an ass, and it is rapidly becoming the road to a piece of ass, as well.
Posted by Patrick Yancey at 09:08 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
How to Answer a Question Without Answering the Question
Are you sitting down for this, folks? The White House actually answered one of my questions today. Well, they didn't really answer it; they just used it as an opportunity to grandstand.
Up today was Margaret Spellings, Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, who was supposedly taking questions on the president's education and job training initiatives. Here is our exchange:
Mike, from Pittsburgh, PA writes:
President Bush has repeatedly stated that he doesn't believe that Washington has all the answers to our nation's problems. How does that stated belief jibe with new federal education requirements, spending, and programs, all of which share the underlying assumption that the solution to our problems does indeed come from Washington?
Margaret Spellings
President Bush is asking that we get results for the federal tax payer dollars that we invest on various fronts.
For example on Monday of this week he laid out a plan to reform the Workforce Investment (WIA) system.
Through the program we spend about 4 billion dollars in job training for adult and dislocated workers – only a small number -- about 200, 000 people actually get training through this program.
The President proposes to give states more authority and flexibility to serve workers in their states so long as there is accountability for the number of workers placed, the retention rates in jobs and the earnings made.
We at the federal level have mandated various programs with lots of strings attached and have required layers of bureaucracy to administer the system. The President’s plan will get resources to workers who need training more quickly.
The President believes that we should be getting results for the money we spend at the federal level. There are many areas where we have agreed up goals by state, local and federal officials.
Such as having all children reading on grade level by the end of third grade. It is important for the federal government to articulate and support goals like this with the resources invested.
As you can plainly see, she didn't really answer my question other than to blather on about the great programs the president has and why they are so necessary and must be enforced while tossing in an occasional nod to state flexibility. My even tougher questions were, of course, ignored.
Here are some of the questions that were answered:
1. What is your typical day like in the White House?
2. I am so proud of our U.S. Soldiers and the patriotism they possess. My heart and prayers go to them and their families. In addition, I am praying for President Bush and the leaders of our country in this time of unrest and the many decisions they must make for our country. I would like to know if there is a web-site that I could send e-mails to the troops thanking them for serving, and to encourage them during this time? Thank you again for serving our country.
3. What is the status of the "workforce reinvestment and adult education act of 2003" ???
4. Why wont president Bush come to our school but he will go to other schools?Our school has never had anyone famouse at it.well if he desides to tell him to come to Kerens,tx
5. Hi, I don't have a question, but I do want to let you know that there is a very special person in our home that supports President Bush 100.... my husband Steve Carlile. He is a native Texan, and is very strong and I mean strong and clear on what he stands for. He loves his country and loves what Pres. Bush stands for, (he was proud to see him in his felt hat in the beginning of his presidency, as Steve has one of those too). He doesn't have alot of money and can't support President Bush with a 2,000 donation, but believe me you will never find a better citizen of the US and of Texas. Steve would tell Bush that he needs to stay the course, that it takes guts to keep going and finish the job in Iraq.
Thanks for taking the time to read this email, as I know that you all have more to do than read email from ordinary (little) people as myself. I have heard the news media put it that way, we are the little people and you all are the big people.
Ms. Spellings closed the session by saying: "Thanks for the great interest and intelligent questions that you asked." If she thinks most of the questions she answered today were intelligent, well, she needs some education herself.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 03:20 PM | Comments (133)
Peaceniks for Bush?
That's John Laughland's argument in this week's Spectator:
"A patrician grandee with a pleasing mix of liberal and patriotic views might seem to many Americans a welcome relief from the bellicose Texan with his faux swagger and his team of men who seem to have ‘military-industrial complex’ written across their menacing foreheads. But if anti-war Americans do elect Kerry for that reason, they will have duped themselves. Warmongering will be worse under Kerry than under Bush, and real peaceniks should therefore vote for Dubya."
Posted by Lee McCracken at 11:55 AM | Comments (209) | TrackBack
April 07, 2004
A Noid in the Hand Is Worth a Paranoid in the Bush
Condoleezza Rice was scheduled to make a speech on national security on September 11, 2001. Due to the events of that day, the speech was never delivered. Rumor has it that the speech was about missile defense, not terrorism. The 9/11 Commission wants to see the speech--a speech which would have been delivered publicly were it not for the attacks. What is the White House response?
"The White House has refused to provide the independent commission investigating the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks with a speech that national security adviser Condoleezza Rice was to have delivered on the night of the attacks touting missile defense as a priority rather than al-Qaida, sources close to the commission said Tuesday."
Why? Withholding the speech can only cause more harm than good to the administration. If the speech was about missile defense, so what? Rice just has to say to the commission, "We made a bad call there," or "Well, yes, missile defense was a priority, but so was al-Qaeda." Why act so Nixonian in your paranoia unless you either have something to hide or are paranoid?
It almost makes you long for the days of Bill Clinton, who was at least entertaining while attempting to stonewall investigations.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 11:04 AM | Comments (201)
April 06, 2004
Punishing the Whole Class for a Few Troublemakers
Joseph Farah, Christian, has the answer to the problems in Fallujah:
The temptation of Americans is to be too cautious. That approach can only result in more American blood being spilled. The U.S. should give the leaders of Fallujah a chance to turn over all those who participated in the bloodletting, all those who cheered them on, all those who kicked the mutilated and charred bodies of the Americans who were there on a mission of mercy – bringing food to the forsaken city. I have no expectations that Fallujah's elders will make the right call, do the right thing. And when they fail to do so – say, in the next few days – the U.S. should pound Fallujah like it has never been pounded before.
We should not try to gain an international consensus for this action. We should not apologize for it. We should not restrain our Air Force and our artillery batteries from wreaking devastation. We should not expose our ground troops to unnecessary risks.
In other words, we may need to flatten Fallujah. We may need to destroy it. We may need to grind it, pulverize it and salt the soil, as the Romans did with troublesome enemies.
All of this follows a paragraph in which Farah makes it clear that "[n]ot all of the Iraqi city's population, or even most of them, bear responsibility for the despicable, cowardly attacks on four U.S. civilians murdered, mutilated, incinerated and hung from a bridge over the Euphrates River." Apparently, the whole town must be punished for the actions of a few.
Way to go, Joe. I'm sure the man you claim as your savior, who told us to love our enemies and turn the other cheek when they strike us, is proud to count you among his followers.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 09:34 AM | Comments (212)
The Voters Who Knew Too Little
What a surprise! The White House may not be finished vetting the 9/11 Commission's report until after the election!
The chairman of an independent commission looking into US counterterrorism activities prior to the September 11 attacks said he could not guarantee that the panel's report will be released before the November presidential election because of a protracted White House vetting process.
Frankly, I think Bush has this election sewn up already since Kerry is the most uninspiring presidential candidate since Al Gore (or maybe even Bob Dole), but you can be sure he'll do everything he can to make certain he stays in the White House. After all, he likes being called "Mr. President." (See previous entry.)
(Link courtesy the Drudge Report.)
Posted by Mike Tennant at 08:59 AM | Comments (304)
That's MISTER Emperor to You!
John F. Kerry isn't the only presidential candidate with a sizable amount of well-documented arrogance. Here's the current president at a press conference yesterday:
THE PRESIDENT: Let me ask you a couple of questions. Who is the AP person?
Q I am.
THE PRESIDENT: You are?
Q Sir, in regard to --
THE PRESIDENT: Who are you talking to?
Q Mr. President, in regard to the June 30th deadline, is there a chance that that would be moved back?
(Link courtesy the Drudge Report.)
Posted by Mike Tennant at 08:53 AM | Comments (104)
April 05, 2004
Waiting In Line on the State
Thank goodness the U.S. post office has some private competition. Otherwise, they might let us line up out of the door and around the building instead of just eight to ten deep. As it was, they had two of four windows open in the middle of the day with two guys standing in the other two windows doing something mysterious and pretending not to see any other customers standing in the room. Still, I can't help thinking if they'd gotten me out of there five minutes earlier, I might have made it into the motor vehicle administration building which locked its doors at 4:30 this afternoon, just the time I was pulling into the parking lot.
Posted by Robert Jackson at 11:41 PM | Comments (106) | TrackBack
Who's on the far right?
Traditionally, the political left consists of communists, socialists, and liberals -- any position that advocates big government. We should now include neocons. We should also include facists such as Hitler, Mussolini, and Franklin Roosevelt.
On the right would be paleoconservatives and libertarians, those who believe in limited government.
If an example of the extreme left is a communist or neocon, what would be an example of the extreme right?
Paul Hein provides an answer, as well as a clear dissection of left - right, in his article.
Posted by George F. Smith at 10:20 AM | Comments (109) | TrackBack
April 02, 2004
No So Fast, Guv'nor
I'm no fan of speeding fines, but here's just one more instance of one set of rules applying to the little people and another set applying to the ruling elites:
"[Pennsylvania] Gov. Ed Rendell is 'fessing up to reports that he was driven at speeds in excess of 100 mph in his state limousine."
Rendell originally issued a non-denial denial, saying he wasn't aware of this, even though his car has been clocked at those speeds nine times (which means he probably was driven that fast plenty of other times without being caught). Naturally, the driver of the limo, any of several state troopers, was politely given a pass by his buddies on the force every time this happened. An investigation (read: black hole) is being launched, and Rendell has vowed that it won't happen again.
"[Rendell's press secretary, Kate] Philips said an investigation hypothetically 'might reveal that it's only one person (driver) or it might reveal it's only 96' mph."
Oh, well, if it's only 96 mph, then why is anyone complaining?
"Rendell said the speed level was 'unconscionable' and pledged it won't happen again. He said he accepts responsibility."
And, therefore, what? He accepts responsibility. Does this mean he's going to pay the fines the rest of us would have to pay? Does it mean his limo drivers will lose their licenses? No, it just means he thinks saying this will make it go away.
Rendell sounds like a perfect presidential candidate.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 04:07 PM | Comments (254)
March Madness, Murder, and Mayhem
Yessirree, the capture of Saddam really did the trick!
"March turned out to be the second deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq since the end of major combat operations, according to the Department of Defense," says CNN.
Combine this with the Madrid attacks (and today's failed attempt to blow up another Spanish train), and it's obvious that the takeover of Iraq and capture of Saddam have made us all safer.
Oh, wait. I forgot: Every attack means that the terrorists are becoming ever more desperate, which in turn means we're winning! Silly me.
Posted by Mike Tennant at 01:29 PM | Comments (201)
"No Mercy"
Writing at David Horowitz's frothing FrontPageMag.com, Tammy Bruce, the lesbian ex-NOW president turned neoconservative scold and defender of "traditional values", advocates that we "raze" Fallujah in response to the grisly killings of U.S. military contractors there:
"Fallujah has remained a hotbed of support for the brutal past regime, and for reasons that can only be explained by political correctness, we have not, up to this point, destroyed that base of murder, terrorism and bestial violence.
"I contend it is now time to raze Fallujah."
Now, my dictionary (rather, the internet's dictionary) defines "raze" as "to level to the ground; demolish." And lest you make any mistake as to what Bruce is suggesting, she helpfully reminds us "of what it took to quell the beasts of Germany and Japan in 1945: complete and total destruction."
"There was a reason why we bombed Dresden into oblivion. There was a reason why Berlin was not saved. There was a reason why two atomic bombs had to be dropped on Japan after Hiroshima: they still refused to surrender unconditionally."
It's frankly amazing how quickly the would-be "liberators" of Iraq turn on the purported objects of their beneficience. Don't like your "liberation"? Well, the hell with you; we'll burn your town to the ground.
Bruce invokes two of the greatest war crimes in American histoy as inspiring examples of tough-mindedness and doing what's necessary to get the job done. So much for such "traditional values" as qualms about killing civilians.
"This is war. The people of Fallujah have decided to continue the war, so it should indeed be visited upon them with no mercy."
Notice the grotesque collectivism implied by this statement. "The people of Fallujah" are an undifferentiated mass, and they all--women, children, the elderly, whoever--deserve "no mercy."
I can only hope that the military commanders on the scene are less bloodthirsty than laptop bombardiers and war crimes apologists like Bruce. "The Death of Right and Wrong" indeed.
Posted by Lee McCracken at 12:16 PM | Comments (211) | TrackBack