Irregular Times Diaries: Unfit Discussion

The Reuters headline reads:

Wall Street bets on stimulus after job cuts

and all of a sudden the worrying thought occurs to me: Are we rewarding job cuts? Is it that corporations are learning that, if they’ll go on and cut enough jobs so that people believe in the reality of an economic crisis, the government will then come along and then give them lots of money?

Are we encouraging corporations to kick people to the curb?

Want to know what’s wrong with proposition 8? Ask Simon the Political Tiger.

It’s a matter of the Constitution, see. The Constitution guarantees equal protection under the law to all people. That means that the law has to give everyone equal status, without discrimination. That includes same-sex couples. If heteros get to marry, then homosexual couples need to be given that same right.

No state has the right, through its legislature or through an electoral proposition, to overrule the Constitution’s equal protection clause. Prop 8 tries to do just that - and that’s what makes it an insult not just to same-sex couples, but to all Americans who believe in the freedoms and rights that the Constitution guarantees.

I am quite disgusted right now.

Democrats to let offshore drilling ban expire

Democrats to let offshore drilling ban expire

By ANDREW TAYLOR, Associated Press Writer 15 minutes ago

Democrats have decided to allow a quarter-century ban on drilling for oil off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to expire next week, conceding defeat in a months-long battle with the White House and Republicans set off by $4 a gallon gasoline prices this summer.

House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, D-Wis., told reporters Tuesday that a provision continuing the moratorium will be dropped this year from a stopgap spending bill to keep the government running after Congress recesses for the election.

Republicans have made lifting the ban a key campaign issue after gasoline prices spiked this summer and public opinion turned in favor of more drilling. President Bush lifted an executive ban on offshore drilling in July.

“If true, this capitulation by Democrats following months of Republican pressure is a big victory for Americans struggling with record gasoline prices,” said House GOP leader John Boehner of Ohio.

Democrats had clung to the hope of only a partial repeal of the drilling moratorium, but the White House had promised a veto, Obey said.

The House is expected to act on the spending bill Wednesday. The Senate is likely to go along with the House.

“The White House has made it clear they will not accept anything with a drilling moratorium, and Democrats know we cannot afford to shut down the government over this,” said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “We look forward to working with the next president to hammer out a final resolution of this issue.”

While the House would lift the long-standing drilling moratoriums for both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, a drilling ban in waters within 125 miles of Florida’s western coast would remain in force under a law passed by Congress in 2006 that opened some new areas of the east-central Gulf to drilling.

Just last week, the House passed legislation to open waters off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts to oil and gas drilling but only 50 or more miles out to sea and only if a state agrees to energy development off its shore. It quickly became clear that measure would not get the 60 votes needed in the Senate.

Republicans called that effort a sham that would have left almost 90 percent of offshore reserves effectively off-limits.

The Interior Department estimates there are 18 billion barrels of recoverable oil beneath the Outer Continental Shelf, about half of it off California.

While the ban on energy development will be lifted if the Senate goes along with the House action, it doesn’t mean any federal sale of oil and gas leases in the offshore waters — much less actual drilling — would be imminent.

The Interior Department’s current five-year leasing plan includes potential leases off the Virginia coast but probably would not be pursued unless the state agrees to energy development. And the state is unlikely to do so without Congress agreeing to share federal royalties with the state.

The congressional battle over offshore drilling is far from over. Democrats are expected to press for broader energy legislation, probably next year, that would put limits on any drilling off most of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Republicans, meanwhile, are likely to fight any resumption of the drilling bans that have been in place since 1981.

John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, has promised to make offshore oil drilling a priority if elected president. He has called for developing the oil and gas resources along all of Outer Continental Shelf and for the federal government to share royalties with states who go along with drilling.

Democratic presidential rival Barack Obama has said he would support limited drilling in certain areas — possibly the South Atlantic region — if it is part of a broader energy plan to shift the U.S. away from oil to alternative fuels and more energy efficiency.

The debate over offshore drilling is not expected to subside in the first months of the next presidency — no matter who sits in the White House.

Lifting the drilling ban gives considerable momentum to the underlying bill, which includes the Pentagon budget, $24 billion in aid for flood and hurricane victims and $25 billion in loans for Detroit automakers in addition to keeping the government open past the Oct. 1 start of the 2009 budget year.

But Democrats decided not to use the must-pass measure as a battering ram to carry an extension of unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless past White House veto promises, prompting grumbling among some lawmakers. Efforts to boost food stamps and give states billions of dollars to help with Medicaid bills also fell through.

But the measure would double, to $5.2 billion, funding for heating subsidies for the poor, Obey said.

The measure also would provide more than $600 billion to fund the 2009 budgets for the Pentagon, Homeland Security Department and the Veterans Affairs Department. Nine other spending bills for the 2009 budget year starting Oct. 1 remain unfinished.

Bush had threatened to veto bills that don’t cut the number and cost of pet projects known as “earmarks” sought by lawmakers in half from current levels or cause agency operating budgets, taken together, to exceed his request. Obey said, however, the White House would reluctantly sign the measure.

Democrats have shown themselves to have all the spine of a wet noodle. They’ve got control of Congress and yet they’re still letting Republicans have their way? They’re letting the ban on offshore drilling expire even though we know that all the drilling in the world will do next to nothing to help?

Can we fire all these bastards? Something is very, very wrong when you’ve got one party that’s as red as a stoplight and the only alternative to that way of thinking has turned a pretty dark shade of pink.

With all the talk about Sarah Palin and her latest question-evasions, I thought the economy has been getting less than it’s needed share of coverage. After all, just a couple of days ago the stock market was in a crisis, the DOW dropped around 400 points in a day, AIG pretty much went bankrupt, and gold set a record for most gain in a single day by ground from around $740 bucks a troy ounce to $860 a troy ounce.

More Americans are focusing on the economy, a place where John McCain has admitted he sucks at and Sarah Palin has established herself to be incapable of balancing a budget.

So for this crisis, what is Bush’s solution? Set aside 700 billion dollars to buy shit assets without a plan to have that money paid back.

Here, I’ll let you read for yourself.

Bush team, Congress negotiate $700B bailout.

Bush team, Congress negotiate $700B bailout
By JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS and DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writers 33 minutes ago

The Bush administration asked Congress on Saturday for the power to buy $700 billion in toxic assets clogging the financial system and threatening the economy as negotiations began on the largest bailout since the Great Depression.

The rescue plan would give Washington broad authority to purchase bad mortgage-related assets from U.S. financial institutions for the next two years. It does not specify which institutions qualify or what, if anything, the government would get in return for the unprecedented infusion.

Democrats are pressing to require that the plan help more strapped borrowers stay in their homes and to condition the bailout on new limits on executive compensation.

Congressional aides and administration officials are working through the weekend to fill in the details of the proposal. The White House hoped for a deal with Congress by the time markets opened Monday; top lawmakers say they would push to enact the plan as early as the coming week.

“We’re going to work with Congress to get a bill done quickly,” President Bush said at the White House. Without discussing specifics, he said, “This is a big package because it was a big problem.”

The proposal is a mere three pages long, but it gives sweeping powers to the government to dispense gigantic sums of taxpayer dollars in a program that would be sheltered from court review.

“It’s a rather brief bill with a lot of money,” said Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., the Banking Committee chairman. “We understand the importance of the anticipation in the markets, but we also know that what we’re doing is going to have consequences for decades to come. There’s not a second act to this — we’ve got to get this right.”

Lawmakers digesting the eye-popping cost and searching for specifics voiced concerns that the proposal offers no help for struggling homeowners or safeguards for taxpayers’ money.

The government must bail out the financial system “because if we don’t, it will have a tremendous impact on American consumers, homeowners, taxpayers and the rest,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in San Francisco.

But, she added, “We cannot deal with this unless this bailout helps families stay in their homes.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev. said “we cannot allow ourselves to be in denial about the threat now facing the world economy. From all indications, that threat is real, and the consequences of inaction could be catastrophic. Every single American has a stake in preventing a global financial meltdown.”

The proposal would raise the statutory limit on the national debt from $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion to make room for the massive rescue.

“The American people are furious that we’re in this situation, and so am I,” the House’s top Republican, Ohio Rep. John A. Boehner, said in a statement. “We need to do everything possible to protect the taxpayers from the consequences of a broken Washington.”

Signaling what could erupt into a brutal fight with Democrats over add-on spending, Boehner said “efforts to exploit this crisis for political leverage or partisan quid pro quo will only delay the economic stability that families, seniors, and small businesses deserve.”

Bush said he worried the financial troubles “could ripple throughout” the economy and affect average citizens. “The risk of doing nothing far outweighs the risk of the package. … Over time, we’re going to get a lot of the money back.”

He added, “People are beginning to doubt our system, people were losing confidence and I understand it’s important to have confidence in our financial system.”

Neither presidential candidate took a position on the proposal. GOP nominee John McCain said he was awaiting specifics and any changes by Congress.

Democratic rival Barack Obama used the party’s weekly radio address to call for help for Main Street as well as Wall Street.

Their language reflected a tricky balance that politicians in both parties are trying to strike, just six weeks before Election Day: Back a plan that doles out hundreds of billions to companies that made bad bets and still identify with the plight of middle-class voters.

Besides mortgage help and executive compensation limits, Democrats are considering attaching middle-class assistance to the legislation despite a request from Bush to avoid adding items that could delay action. An expansion of jobless benefits was one possibility.

Bush sidestepped questions about the chances of adding such items, saying that now was not the time for posturing. “I think most leaders would understand we need to get this done quickly, and you know, the cleaner the better,” he said about legislation being drafted.

Treasury officials met congressional staff for about two hours on Capitol Hill on Saturday. Discussions centered on how the plan would work, and Democrats proposed adding the executive compensation limits and new foreclosure-prevention measures. Details of those changes were not available Saturday, as staff aides worked to draft them. Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson conferred by phone for about 20 minutes in the afternoon, gauging how the negotiations were unfolding.

Among the key issues up for negotiation is which financial institutions would be eligible for the help. The proposed legislation doesn’t make it clear, leaving open the question of whether hedge funds or pension funds could qualify.

The proposal does not require that the government receive anything from banks in return for unloading their bad assets. But it would allow the Treasury Department to designate financial institutions as “agents of the government,” and mandate that they perform any “reasonable duties” that might entail.

The government could contract with private companies to manage the assets it purchased under the rescue.

Paulson says the government would in essence set up reverse auctions, putting up money for a class of distressed assets — such as loans that are delinquent but not in default — and financial institutions would compete for how little they would accept.

I understand the need for quick action in a case like this, but trying to rush through a bill of 700 BILLION dollars with only two days of debate and thus far no assurances that John Q is gonna be able to keep a roof over his head and little or no stipulations as to getting the money back aside from Bush’s word that “we’ll get a lot of it back over time”? Yeah, considering his track record I’m less than reassured.

Actually, I’m horrified.

Oh, I just loved the part about the national debt. From $10.6 trillion to $11.3 trillion if the bill passes. Whoopie.

In other news; 40 people in a Pakistan hotel were killed by a suicide bomber.

First thing I see when Yahoo pops on is this little gem of a story.

Bush to lift executive ban on offshore drilling

By BEN FELLER, Associated Press Writer 24 minutes ago

In another push to deal with soaring gas prices, President Bush on Monday will lift an executive ban on offshore drilling that his stood since his father was president. But the move, by itself, will do nothing unless Congress acts as well.

The president plans to officially lift the ban and then explain his actions in a Rose Garden statement, White House press secretary Dana Perino said.

There are two prohibitions on offshore drilling, one imposed by Congress and another by executive order signed by former President Bush in 1990. The current president, trying to ease market tensions and boost supply, called last month for Congress to lift its prohibition before he did so himself.

But Perino said Bush no longer wants to wait. She pinned blame on the leaders of the Democratic Congress, noting that no action has been taken on this issue.

“They haven’t even held a single hearing,” Perino said. “So we are going to move forward, and hopefully that will spur action by the Congress.”

Asked if Bush’s action alone will lead to more oil drilling, Perino said, “In terms of allowing more exploration to go forward? No, it does not.”

The president, in his final months of office, has responded to record gas-prices with a series of proposals, including more oil exploration. None would have immediate impact on prices at the pump, according to White House officials, who say there is no quick fix. But starting action now would help, they say.

Bush’s proposal echoes a call by Republican presidential candidate, Sen. John McCain, to open the Continental Shelf for exploration. Democrat Barack Obama has opposed the idea and instead argued for helping consumers with a second economic stimulus package including energy rebates, as well as stepped up efforts to develop alternative fuels and more fuel-efficient automobiles.

“If offshore drilling would provide short-term relief at the pump or a long-term strategy for energy independence, it would be worthy of our consideration, regardless of the risks,” spokesman Bill Burton said in a statement. “But most experts, even within the Bush administration, concede it would do neither. It would merely prolong the failed energy policies we have seen from Washington for thirty years.”

Congressional Democrats have rejected the push to lift the drilling moratorium, accusing the president of hoping the U.S. can drill its way out a problem.

Bush says offshore drilling could yield up to 18 billion barrels of oil over time, although it would take years for production to start. Bush also says offshore drilling would take pressure off prices over time. In addition, the president has proposed opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for drilling, lifting restrictions on oil shale leasing in the Green River Basin of Colorado, Utah and Wyoming and easing the regulatory process to expand oil refining capacity.

Congressional Democrats, joined by some GOP lawmakers from coastal states, have opposed lifting the prohibition that has barred energy companies from waters along both the East and West coasts and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. A succession of presidents, from Bush’s father — George H.W. Bush — to Bill Clinton, have sided against drilling in these waters, as has Congress each year for 27 years. Their goal has to been to protect beaches and coastal states’ tourism economies.

Surprise, surprise, an oil barron is gonna lift a ban on offshore drilling and then lay the blame on the Democrats.

“I didn’t wanna do it, they MADE ME do it!” Schoolyard reasoning from our Commander in Theif.

And Obama wants another round of checks? A wonderfully bad idea, if you ask me. Throw money at the problem and see it go straight into the oil companies’ pockets rather than actually providing a meaningful solution to the problem.

Something simple occurred to me this morning: I don’t see any evidence that Barack Obama has gained any voter support as a result of his decision to vote for the rotten FISA Amendments Act.

I’ve been online a lot, looking at what people have to say. I’ve seen a whole lot of Democrats saying that they’re withdrawing support from Barack Obama. I’ve seen some Democrats say that they’re angry, but that they can’t bring themselves to not vote for Obama. I’ve even seen a few ignorant voters say that they don’t understand what the big deal about the FISA Amendments Act is.

You know what I haven’t seen? I haven’t seen any Republicans or independent voters say that they were going to vote for John McCain, but now, because of the FISA Amendments Act, they’re going to vote for Barack Obama. I haven’t seen one single comment like that.

It seems that Obama has abandoned his principles, broken his promise, betrayed the Constitution, and lost a lot of Democratic supporters - all without making so-called “swing voters” like him any more than they did before.

Stupid move, Barack.

Immunity, immunity, immunity. I am sick of hearing members of Congress talk about how important it is to protect telecommunications corporations by giving them legal immunity. They say that there ought to be retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies that broke the law by handing over huge amounts of private information about the personal communications of millions of Americans to George W. Bush.

Why? Why should telecommunications companies be placed above the law? Why should they be given a get out of jail free card when they break the public trust?

What about us - you know, the customers? Why aren’t members of Congress worried about protecting us?

The telecommunications corporations promised to keep our personal information secret. They entered into legal agreements with us, guaranteeing that we could use their communications services in private, without worrying that people would be able to look through our emails, listening to our telephone calls, and watching us surf the web.

Yet, that kind of spying against us Americans is exactly what the telecommunications corporations did, and it’s what they continue to do. It’s one of the kinds of spying against Americans that now will continue under the FISA Amendments Act.

But, the members of Congress who voted for the FISA Amendments Act don’t seem to care about that. They don’t care that millions of Americans were illegally betrayed. No, all they care aut is the comfort of the big telecommunications corporations.

Luckily, there are a few members of the House of Representatives who have had the integrity to speak up for us, the American people, the customers of the abusive telecommunications corporations. One of those members of Congress is John Hall, who represents the Hudson River Valley in the House of Representatives.

After reading the text of the FISA Amendments Act, Congressman Hall spoke on behalf of the right of customers whose private lives were invaded to seek justice in a court of law:

“The rule of law lies at the core of America’s founding principles, and the language in this bill was too weak to ensue that any breach of our laws that may have occurred under the warrantless wiretapping program will be fully addressed. It is not appropriate to deny Americans the right to pursue these matters in court, or to short-circuit the judicial review that lies at the heart of our system of checks and balances, which is the bedrock of our Constitution. Accordingly, I voted against this bill.”

Thank you, John Hall, for showing that there is at least one member of Congress who remembers that the Constitution was written to protect people, not corporations.

I just quit MoveOn. It isn’t because I disagree with their politics. It’s because they have compromised their politics.

Just yesterday, I got an email from MoveOn expressing their opposition to H.R. 6304, the FISA Amendments Act. That’s the right stand, because the FISA Amendments Act is a terribly abusive law that violates the Constitution and breaks trust with the American people. It allows massive, unrestrained spying programs by the government against American citizens, without any search warrant or any form of probable cause required.

The people who voted for the FISA Amendments Act won’t tell you this. They’ll tell you that the powers granted under the bill are just fine, and there’s nothing to worry about. But, have you actually read the legislation? Don’t believe what they tell you until you’ve read the bill yourself.

It’s bad enough that 105 Democrats in Congress turned coat and joined forces with George W. Bush to pass the FISA Amendments Act. What’s worse is that Barack Obama has announced he will join them. Barack Obama is betraying the supporters who helped him win the Democratic nomination.

What about MoveOn? They’re pretending nothing has happened. They’re moving ahead with fundraisers for Barack Obama.

That’s not the kind of politics that MoveOn is supposed to stand for. That’s why, until they repudiate Barack Obama or convince Barack Obama to change his position, I have quit MoveOn.

I encourage you to do the same. Here’s the short message I sent to Moveon explaining why I’ve quit.

“Barack Obama just endorsed the FISA Amendments Act. MoveOn says it’s against that law, as it should. It’s a betrayal of the Constitution and an abuse of our trust. Barack Obama should lose the endorsement of MoveOn because of this betrayal. When MoveOn repudiates Barack Obama, I will rejoin MoveOn. Until then, I will not be with you - and no bake sales for Obama.”

It’s official. Terror has been identified by the President of the United States as one of the government’s tools in its supposed War on Terror.

Explaining why he vetoed legislation from Congress that would have explicitly outlawed waterboarding and other forms of torture, George W. Bush said that “The bill would take away one of the most valuable tools on the war on terror.” With that statement, President Bush is on the record as saying that torture is regarded by his White House as among the “most valuable tools” against terror.

Americans who know how to think will regard this statement as strange, given that the purpose of torture is to encourage compliance through the creation of terror.

So, the Bush White House is using terror as a tool in the War on Terror. That suggests to me that the War on Terror is not really a war against terror at all. We ought to call it a War For Terror or a War Of Terror instead.

The real moral values of the Republican Party are demonstrated in brutal, sadistic form in the last federal budget proposed by George W. Bush.

The federal budget President Bush proposes for 2009 begins a program of cutting 196 billion dollars from Medicare health care benefits for the elderly and extremely impoverished Americans.

Why would the Republicans do such a cruel thing? Well, part of that money taken away from Medicare will go to pay for policies that make rich Americans even richer.

But, some of the money the Republicans will save by cutting Medicare benefits for senior citizens will go to pay for something even more inhumane. The Republicans propose using some of the money taken away from Medicare to pay for a new generation of nuclear bombs.

What do we need new nuclear weapons for? Terrorists cannot be defeated with nuclear missiles. Nuclear weapons are designed to kill civilians by destroying entire cities, vaporizing them, melting them, burning them into nothing more than radioactive cinder and ash.

These are the moral values of the Republican party: Less medicine for the sick, and more nuclear weapons to kill people by the millions.

This isn’t about getting tough, or being fiscally conservative. It’s inhumane. It’s just plain insane.

The Republican Party agenda, led now by George W. Bush, and to be continued by John McCain, leads on a path of fear and destruction.

America can do better. We must do better.

Do you doubt how serious a threat to American freedom it is that Congress is about to pass the FISA Amendments Act, unamended, and allow the President of the United States to spy against Americans’ emails, telephone calls and Internet use without any requirement to justify the spying, and without any congressional oversight? Don’t just listen to the warnings of us liberals over here at Irregular Times. Listen to the financial conservatives over on Wall Street.

Here’s what Rex Nutting, the Washington Bureau Chief of Marketwatch, has to say about the consequences of the passage of this law:

“If Al Qaeda is fighting us because they hate our freedoms, as President Bush often says, then they’re winning the war.

Pretty soon, we won’t have any more freedoms for them to hate.

Scratch the Fourth Amendment off the list of freedoms that we thought we had.”

Marketwatch is not some progressive publication like The Nation. It’s “a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dow Jones & Company”.

When Wall Street fiscal conservatives ring the bell of alarm about the imminent loss of American freedom, it’s time for even optimistic skeptics to listen, and move to action.

The Senate is due to vote on the FISA Amendments Act any time now. Get out of your chair and tell your senators to vote NO.

The number of the congressional switchboard is (202) 224-3121.

Many in the corporate world are having a knee jerk reaction to support the Republican proposal to, through the extension of the Protect America Act in the FISA Amendments Act, give telecommunications companies legal immunity from the assistance they have given to the government in conducting massive electronic spying operations against American citizens while those operations were against the law. Their automatic impulse is to support the Republican Party. In this case, however, to do so is directly in contradiction to their economic interests.

Corporations do have a responsibility to the government - to follow the law. Corporations also have responsibilities to their customers, to honor their privacy agreements. If corporations show that their legal agreements with customers no longer have any weight, what basis is there for trust in the marketplace any longer?

It is absolutely to claim that America can only be secure from terrorism when the government is allowed to conduct massive electronic spying operations against American citizens AND businesses without any judicial review or congressional oversight. In fact, America cannot be secure from terrorism when power over communications is so centralized that free and open communication within and between corporations and citizens is limited by self-censorship. A nation of citizens afraid to talk to each other openly is a nation where no one, including the government can know what is going on.

The FISA Amendments Act legislation goes far beyond reasonable reform. It is a threat to the independence of business from government and to the liberty of the individual citizen.

No one can conduct business when they aren’t assured of private communications. If people in business believe that government spies may be eavesdropping upon any of their electronic conversations, innovation, cooperation and sales will grind down until they are excruciatingly slow. Without the ability to secure proprietary information, all the competitive advantages built up over the last 15 years through the development of electronic communication would come to naught.

The FISA Amendments Act would indeed give legal immunity to corporations like AT&T, Google and Yahoo, for cooperating with the federal government in spying against Americans’ private communications. However, that legal immunity is no protection. In fact, such immunity would strip corporations of any legal justification for refusing to cooperate with government electronic spying programs.

If the FISA Amendments Act, no company could guarantee its customers privacy. That would have a chilling effect on all business, not just individual communication.

The American economy cannot function without freedom of speech, the right to free assembly, and the protection from unreasonable search and seizure. That’s why American business ought to come together with civil libertarians and demand that the FISA Amendments Act be voted down by the United States Senate.

En lieu of the recent posts on the main blog about the FISA ordeal, I thought I should share this little story I came across when I logged on to Yahoor today.

(Link)

Senate delays eavesdropping vote
By PAMELA HESS, Associated Press Writer2 hours, 39 minutes ago

The Senate on Thursday signaled support for granting legal immunity to telecommunications companies that helped the government conduct warrantless eavesdropping, a sign that the contentious provision may be headed for approval next week.

On a strong 60-36 vote, senators rejected an amendment that would have killed the immunity provision and strengthened the powers of a secret court to oversee the surveillance of phone calls and e-mails that involve people inside the United States.

Further action on the legislation was delayed until Monday, pushing Congress closer to a Feb. 1 deadline for enacting a new law. If a new law is not signed by the president by then, some eavesdropping practices that are now legal would be prohibited.

The Bush administration is insisting that any new law also protect from potentially crippling civil lawsuits those telecommunications companies that helped the government eavesdrop on Americans after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, R-Nev., blamed Republicans for the delay, saying they were trying to block a series of amendments majority Democrats sought to offer.

“It appears the president and Republicans want failure. They don’t want a bill,” Reid said.

The draft bill, written by the Senate Intelligence Committee, would update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The law, first enacted in 1978, dictates when federal agents must obtain court permission before tapping phone and computer lines inside the United States to gather intelligence on foreign threats. Agents may tap lines outside the country without court oversight.

It was the second time in six weeks the Senate had taken up the FISA modernization bill, only to see action stymied. Reid abruptly closed down debate in December when it became clear the Senate couldn’t finish work before the holiday break.

Most vexing to the intelligence agencies, without an extension of the law the government would return to needing individual court orders to listen in on any communication that passes through U.S. telecommunications switches and computer servers — even those that are between people who are outside the country. This is not required by FISA, according to legal experts, but became the practice over time to provide firms with legal protections.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-Texas, and Judiciary Committee Chairman Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., on Thursday proposed extending the existing law for 30 days to buy the Senate additional time to produce a bill. The House completed its version of the bill last fall.

In a move to resolve the immunity issue, the key impasse on the legislation, the White House ended months of resistance Thursday and agreed to give House members access to secret documents about its warrantless wiretapping program.

The Bush administration is trying to persuade the House to agree to retroactively shield from liability those companies that helped the government eavesdrop on Americans without the approval of the FISA court. About 40 such civil lawsuits are pending against telecommunications firms, and the administration says if the cases go forward they could reveal information that would compromise national security. It also contends that the companies could be bankrupted if the lawsuits are successful.

The companies were helping the administration carry out the so-called Terrorist Surveillance Program, a still-classified effort that intercepted communications on U.S. soil without oversight from the FISA court from Sept. 11, 2001, to Jan. 17, 2007.

Reyes and Rep. Pete Hoekstra of Michigan, the top Republican on the House intelligence panel, requested access to the White House documents in May. House Democrats say they will not support telecom immunity without seeing them first. Some senators were given access to the documents last fall.

The documents include the president’s authorization of warrantless wiretapping, Justice Department legal opinions going back to 2001, and the requests sent to the telecommunications companies asking for their assistance.

I’m trying really hard to be surprised these days…really hard…

The Bush Administration is threatening to veto legislation that would improve health care at Native American reservations and would require that federal contracts active on those reservations pay people fairly.

Why? Who would the Bush White House do such a cruel thing, especially just as the American economy is heading into the gutter again?

“The Bush administration said in a statement that the labor provision would violate long-standing administration policy,” says an official Bush Administration statement.

Long-standing administration policy? What long-standing administration policy? Oh, yeah, the long-standing policy of the Bush Administration to screw over American workers whenever possible - whether they’re Native Americans or not!

Equal opportunity cruelty. How reassuring.

Bush veto of child health bill sustained
By KEVIN FREKING, Associated Press Writer 14 minutes ago

House Democrats on Thursday failed to override President Bush’s veto of their pre-election year effort to expand a popular government health insurance program to cover 10 million children.

The bill had bipartisan support, but the 273-156 roll call was 13 votes short of the two-thirds majority that supporters needed to enact the bill into law over Bush’s objections. The bill had passed the Senate with a veto-proof margin.

The State Children’s Health Insurance Program now subsidizes coverage for about 6 million children at a cost of about $5 billion a year. The vetoed bill would have added 4 million more children, most from low-income families, at a cost of $7 billion annually. About 600,000 adults also participate in the program.

To pay for the spending increase, the bill would have raised the federal tax on cigarettes from 39 cents to $1 a pack.

“This is not about an issue. It’s about a value,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said just before the vote. “For the cost of less than 40 days in Iraq, we can provide SCHIP coverage for 10 million children for one year.”

Forty-four Republicans voted to override Bush’s veto; that was one fewer than the number of GOP members who voted Sept. 25 to pass the bill. Only two Democrats voted to sustain Bush’s veto, compared with six who had voted against the bill. The two were Reps. Jim Marshall of Georgia and Gene Taylor of Mississippi.

“We won this round on SCHIP,” White House press secretary Dana Perino said. She said a million-dollar lobbying campaign by several labor unions and advocacy groups to turn enough Republican votes for a successful override did not work.

Bush, anticipating that the veto would stand, has assigned three top advisers, including Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt, to try to negotiate a new deal with Congress.

“It’s now time for us to get to the hard work of finding a solution and get SCHIP reauthorized,” Leavitt said. “We also have a larger task, to provide every American with the means of having an insurance policy.”

Republican opponents of the bill said it would encourage too many middle-income families to substitute government-subsidized insurance for their private insurance. The bill would have given states financial incentives to cover families with incomes up to three times the federal poverty level — $61,950 for a family of four.

“That’s not low-income. That’s a majority of households in America,” said Rep. Wally Herger, R-Calif.

The bill said that illegal immigrants would remain ineligible for the children’s program, but Republicans seized on a section that would have allowed families to provide a Social Security number to indicate citizenship. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, said it is too easy to get a false number, which would give an opening for thousands of illegal immigrants to enroll.

But Democrats said the bill’s original focus remained intact. States would earn bonuses for signing up low-income children already eligible for the program but not enrolled.

“Under current law, these boys and girls are entitled to their benefits,” said Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich. “Continuing to not provide them with coverage is a travesty.”

Bush has recommended a $1 billion annual increase, bringing total spending over five years to $30 billion — half the level called for in the bill that he vetoed.

Some public opinion polls indicate support for expanding the program. Sixty-one percent said Congress should override Bush’s veto of a bill expanding the program, according to a CNN-Opinion Research Corp. poll released Wednesday. Blacks were more likely than whites to favor overriding Bush’s veto.

___

On the Net:

Information on the bill, H.R. 976, can be found at http://thomas.loc.gov/

(This version CORRECTS in the second paragraph `two-thirds that majority supporters’ to `two-thirds majority that supporters …’)

Yeah, here’s a surprise.

I still find republican hypocrisy rather amusing. It’d be downright funny if it didn’t harm so many people.

I caught this when I came online today and it got me to grin a bit.

[b]Dems: Override children’s health veto[/b]
By MARY CLARE JALONICK, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 51 minutes ago

Democratic Sen. Max Baucus of Montana asked his colleagues on Saturday to override President Bush’s veto of legislation that would expand a popular children’s health insurance program.

“Every Republican must decide whether they will stand with the president and his veto, or stand with our children and their right to a healthy future,” Baucus said in his party’s weekly radio address.

House Democrats have scheduled for this week a vote to override the president’s veto of legislation that would increase spending for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program by $35 billion over five years. Bush has called for a $5 billion increase.

The effort is not expected to succeed. An override requires a two-thirds majority in the House and Senate, and the earlier House vote fell about two dozen votes short. The Senate approved the increase by a veto-proof margin.

The program provides health insurance to children in families with incomes too great for Medicaid eligibility but not enough to afford private insurance. Bush has said the bill is too costly, goes beyond the program’s original intent and shifts too much insurance burden onto the government rather than private providers.

Baucus, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said Tuesday that Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt had called him seeking to compromise on the bill, but he refused.

“We want to prevail,” Baucus said then.

He said Saturday that the president is telling millions of parents that they don’t deserve the same basic care for their kids that Bush had for his.

Are the Democrats finally growing a spine? Maybe not, but I still hope they can override this veto.

Why be in denial? People who believe in a cause believe in it, act on that belief and the belief can be inferred from their actions.

It should be obvious to everyone, after today, as it has been obvious to many of us since the initial vote on the war, nearly five years ago now, that the Democrats always have favored the war, and there has never been any fundamental change in their attitude.

The vote in February to fund the war, and the current vote, speak louder than words.

Senate approves $150B in war funding

By ANNE FLAHERTY

Thwarted in efforts to bring troops home from Iraq, Senate Democrats on Monday helped pass a defense policy bill authorizing another $150 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

RED DAVE

The worthlessness that is the Democratic Party was exhibited in clear view today.

Congress passed a resolution 341-79, condemning MoveOn for placing an advertisement in a newspaper.

Last time I checked, there was still freedom of speech. Last time I checked, there was still freedom of the press.

Last time I checked, the Constitution still forbids spying against American citizens without a search warrant, and torturing prisoners, and imprisoning people without a fair and speedy trial.

So, is this what the Democratic majority of Congress has delivered us? Condemnation of MoveOn for its legal activities, but nothing to stop George W. Bush - not even a censure resolution?

Why the hell should I ever vote for a Democrat ever again? They’re spineless wimps.

Oh, but I suppose I don’t count. I suppose I’m just one of those on the liberal fringe that believes that nobody is above the law. I guess that makes me a kooky radical these days.

Bush: Kids’ health care will get vetoed

By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 4 minutes ago

President Bush again called Democrats “irresponsible” on Saturday for pushing an expansion he opposes to a children’s health insurance program.

“Democrats in Congress have decided to pass a bill they know will be vetoed,” Bush said of the measure that draws significant bipartisan support, repeating in his weekly radio address an accusation he made earlier in the week. “Members of Congress are risking health coverage for poor children purely to make a political point.”

At issue is the Children’s Health Insurance Program, a state-federal program that subsidizes health coverage for low-income people, mostly children, in families that earn too much to qualify for Medicaid, but not enough to afford private coverage. It expires Sept. 30.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers announced a proposal Friday that would add $35 billion over five years to the program, adding 4 million people to the 6.6 million already participating. It would be financed by raising the federal cigarette tax by 61 cents to $1 per pack.

The idea is overwhelmingly supported by Congress’ majority Democrats, who scheduled it for a vote Tuesday in the House. It has substantial Republican support as well.

But Bush has promised a veto, saying the measure is too costly, unacceptably raises taxes, extends government-covered insurance to children in families who can afford private coverage, and smacks of a move toward completely federalized health care. He has asked Congress to pass a simple extension of the current program while debate continues, saying it’s children who will suffer if they do not.

“Our goal should be to move children who have no health insurance to private coverage — not to move children who already have private health insurance to government coverage,” Bush said.

The bill’s backers have vigorously rejected Bush’s claim it would steer public money to families that can readily afford health insurance, saying their goal is to cover more of the millions of uninsured children. The bill would provide financial incentives for states to cover their lowest-income children first, they said.

Many governors want the flexibility to expand eligibility for the program. So the proposal would overturn recent guidelines from the administration making it difficult for states to steer CHIP funds to families with incomes exceeding 250 percent of the official poverty level.

You heard it, folks. Bush keeps flappin’ his gums about how important the kids are but when it comes right down to it what is his message?

Fuck the little bastards.

As I look at the issue of the possible relationship between a new Total Information Awareness program in the National Security Agency and the sudden urgency with which the Protect America Act was passed, the thing that piques my interest is the timeline of events.

I searched Google News for information related to FISA. Before July 25, I find nothing much. There’s nothing from the Bush Administration about an urgent need to “reform” FISA in order to expand the authority of Alberto Gonzales to spy against Americans. Zilch. When FISA is mentioned, it’s in articles that slam Bush and Cheney, or call for the impeachment of Alberto Gonzales.

On July 22 and 23, the only articles you’ll read about FISA have to do with the FISA World Rowing Championship for people under the age of 23 in Scotland. There’s no push at all from the White House to reform FISA. No urgency. No special terrorist threat. No need for new legislation.

Then, all of a sudden, on July 25, that changes. On July 25, United Press International publishes an article saying that Congressman John Boehner, out of the blue, is supporting a bill introduced on July 24 by Republican Heather Wilson that was like the first draft of the Protect America Act. It’s H.R.3138, given the cumbersome title: To amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to update the definition of electronic surveillance.

Electronic surveillance, huh? What else happened on July 24 to do with electronic surveillance? Oh, yes - U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker issued a ruling saying that the government’s effort to stop a lawsuit by the state governments of Connecticut, Maine, Missouri, New Jersey and Vermont, demanding had no merit… except for possibly the claim that state secrets were at stake, and that claim would be judged in the August 15 hearing. Those 5 states were seeking information about how the privacy of their citizens had been violated by telephone companies like AT&T, in collaboration with the NSA.

Judge Vaughn Walker refuses to kowtow to the Bush White House, the case is going forward, and Judge Walker announces that he will make a decision about whether what the Bush team calls “state secrets” can be revealed on August 15.

Boom! All of a sudden, it’s a full court press by the Bush White House saying that Alberto Gonzales must be given new spy powers… exactly the kind of spy powers it is alleged in the states’ lawsuit that he is already using. Furthermore, George W. Bush insists, mysteriously, that Alberto Gonzales must be given the new spy powers, which include the power to keep all information related to the spying sealed and secret, before Congress goes into its August recess. September will be too late, Bush says.

George W. Bush, who never met an August vacation during the War On Terror that he didn’t like, all of a sudden insists that if Congress doesn’t give Alberto Gonzales exactly the spy powers that Bush says Gonzales needs, he will call a special session of Congress to force them to pass the Protect America Act, not in September, but in early August.

I don’t see a smoking gun. There is no memo I have seen that says “We need to get the Protect America Act passed, because Judge Walker’s decision will force us at that hearing on August 15th to reveal our giant computer database spying program gathering the personal details of Americans’ habits on the Internet.” However, I see a gun, and not too far away from it, I see a wisp of smoke rising into the air. Maybe someone was smoking, or burning incense, but it looks mighty funny to me.

It’s a fascinating theory, this idea that the Protect America Act was rushed through to protect a Total Information Awareness program. It provokes questions, and reconsiderations of some moments in Bush Administration history.

The question that comes into my mind is this: Given what we know about the tenacity with which the Bush White House has held onto its powers, no matter now outrageous the claims to power are, how likely is it that George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Alberto Gonzales just relinquished the Total Information Awareness program, as they appeared to do at the time, back in 2002? Not likely at all. It’s just not in the character of the Bush White House.

In fact, as was pointed out a while ago here, the Total Information Awareness program never died. It just went underground in the National Security Agency.

Oh, connection! The National Security Agency is where the alleged warrantless wiretapping that the Protect America Act is supposed to legalize was taking place.

The question that now rests most heavily upon my mind is this: How do we test the hypothesis? What are some of the pieces of information that would prove or disprove it?

Barring that, what are some of the pieces of information that would strengthen the Hepting v. AT&T hypothesis, without going so far as to prove it?

Help save Salvia in Illinois, Time is running out fast!!! Email our Governor or better yet fax, if you have a fax machine 

If Fax:  Address Fax to Governor Rod Blagojevich, subject line: Citizens request that you line item veto:  HB0457: page 7 LRB095 04451 RLC 26428 b and remove Salvia from the bill.  Governor at the following fax numbers:  217-524-6262 or 312-814-4862

This is what to fax or email the Governor: (COPY AND PASTE THE BELOW)

Governor Rod Blagojevich:  Citizens request that you line item veto:  HB0457: page 7 LRB095 04451 RLC 26428 b  and remove Salvia from the bill.  

Citizens request that you line item veto:  HB0457: page 7 LRB095 04451 RLC 26428 b and remove Salvia from the bill.  Salvia is not a plant that should be considered for this bill.  If you make this plant illegal not only will you be eliminating 100,000 of dollars a year in tax revenue to the state of Illinois, you will be shutting down businesses and putting people out of work.  Salvia is currently used in shaman rituals, religious ceremonies and for healing both by lisc. and holistic doctors and practitioners.  The plant has antioxidants, is a natural anti- depressant, is being used and researched to treat bipolar disorder,alzheimer’s (because it unlocks memory and helps recall), is being used to benefit suffers of rheumatism and joint pain, to aid others overcome severe drug additions and treat severe depression (documented in medical studies has been successful where other medications have failed), it has also be used to ease depression related to PMS and new cutting edge research of biosynthesis and medical applications of rosmarinic acid has been held promising. Hundred’s of thousands who could be helped by the benefits of Salvia will be left to suffer.  Medical research is very hopeful about how it can assist in a greater understanding of the brain. The state would also be rejecting alternative religions, cultures and societies that hold this plant SACRED, yes SACRED (American Indians, Shaman faiths, Alternative faiths and societies and peoples who immigrated from South and Central America into the US, use it to Salvia to commune with the Holy Mother and the Divine (God) and many of these people are in the US and Illinois.  It would cost Illinois taxpayers millions to police salvia.  People would illegally grow it, sell it, without the tax benefits going to our schools, roads, hospitals, cities and townships. Press accounts of efforts to ban Salvia often quote law enforcement and government officials who exhibit an inaccurate knowledge of the plant’s effects. Salvia has a nondescript appearance (being in the same genus as cooking sage), can be grown in a small space, has no odor and requires no elaborate lighting set-up. For these reasons, criminalization is likely to affect only the commercial sale of the plant, and not its private cultivation, which would be very difficult to police and extremely costly to tax payers.  

Citizens request that you line item veto:  HB0457: page 7 LRB095 04451 RLC 26428 b  and remove Salvia from the bill.  Salvia divinorum has begun to be researched and documented by a number of companies and universities on the medicinal applications of Salvia.  Including antioxidants, as a natural anti- depressant, use against rheumatism and joint pain, to aid others overcome additions and treat severe depression where other medications have failed (these cases have already been medically documented), to ease depression related to PMS and new cutting edge research of biosynthesis and medical applications of rosmarinic acid.  But if salvia is made illegal, it will greatly reduce the amount of research needed and treatment protocols that may result in ending the suffering of 1000’s of individuals.  Salvia is in no way a stimulant, a sedative, a narcotic, nor a tranquilizer.  Medical research has great hope for this plant. Be cautious about outlawing plants when you have yet to uncover its medicinal value.  For example, we have just found out in newly released medical research of another plant that has been crucified as a drug in the US for decades and is currently illegal in most states, yet NOW been proven by medical research that it slows and even stops the growth of tumors and may be especially beneficial to breast cancer research.  Thousands of women die each year from Breast Cancer and could have been saved had people who did their research, stopped and considered the long-term affects on medicine and society and got informed.  Thousands more could benefit from the treatments using Salvia.  Salvia has never caused anyone harm and does not have 1/10 the negative side affects of cigarettes, tobacco, alcohol or many, many prescription drugs (we know why no one bans them, money and lobbyist).  Thousands upon thousands die from addictions to tabacco and alcohol every year–yet not one tries to band these because it is big business.  Lastly, under the Federal Analogue Act, salvia fails to meet the “chemically similar” criteria and thus is not subject to the analogue act provisions.

SALVIA DIVINORUM should be available for all those over the age of 18. STOP THE WITCH HUNT AND BE THE GOVERNOR OF REASON AND LEAD THE WAY! 

Please also email the ACLU acluofillinois@aclu-il.org, please pass on to friends

Subject: Save Salvia in Illinois

Everyone, time to unite. Illinois Governor has the power to line veto anything on a bill, which might just save Salvia. If you go to my website at: https://www.thecountrygoddessshop.com/displayProductDocument.hg?productId=3141 

In the middle of the page, you will see where you can email the Governor and save salvia. I have provided everything, what to email him, the bill number and the line number for salvia. Help us save it. Losing it will not only mean loosing salvia and a loss to the medical, spirtual and shaman community but will mean many jobs lost in Illinois (such as employees working in my store), businesses closing and lost tax revenue. Even if your not from Illinois, still send it, he could help save salvia in other states. 

Please help us save Salvia, Send this email to as many of your friends and customers as you can and ask them to do the same. Please help save Salvia. Also, please email information on the link to the ACLU in Illinois for discrimination against religions and loss of civil liberties.  Thank you for you assistance.  Please also email the ACLU acluofillinois@aclu-il.org, please pass on to friends.  Thank you, we really need all the support we can get. 

I caught this on Yahoo news a couple minutes ago and once again I find myself angry and indignant with our appointed leader. I would say that it’s hard to believe, but then again unless it’s something to help save lives or improve quality of life he’ll rubber stamp it. Get troops out of Iraq? Research to save lives? Can’t have that now, can we?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070620/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_stem_cells

Bush to Veto Stem Cell Bill

By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer 13 minutes ago

Pushing back against the Democratic-led Congress, President Bush intends to veto a bill Wednesday that would have eased restraints on federally funded embryonic stem cell research — work that supporters say holds promise for fighting disease.

At the same time, Bush will issue an executive order directing the Health and Human Services Department to promote research into cells that, like human embryonic stem cells, also hold the potential of regenerating into different types of cells that could help treat illness.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said Tuesday that Bush would outline an initiative that could make federal funding available for research on additional “pluripotent” stem cells — ones that can give rise to any kind of cell in the body except those required to develop a fetus.

The president has accused majority Democrats of recycling an old measure that he already vetoed and argued that the bill would mean American taxpayers would — for the first time — be compelled to support the deliberate destruction of human embryos.

“The president supports and encourages stem cell research — including using embryonic lines — as long as it does not involve creating, harming or destroying embryos,” Fratto said. “That is an ethical line that should not be crossed.”

Democrats made the legislation a top priority when they took control of the House and Senate in January, but they don’t have enough votes to override Bush’s decision.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid appealed to Bush on Tuesday not to veto the bill. He said the measure acknowledges the ethical issues at stake and offers even stronger research guidelines than exist under the president’s current policy.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi used Bush’s veto threat as a reason to send out an e-mail letter soliciting contributions to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee to help elect more Democrats.

“By vetoing a bill that expands stem cell research, the president will say `no’ to the more than 70 percent of Americans who support it, `no’ to our Democratic Congress’ fight for progress, and `no’ to saving lives and to potential cures for diseases such as diabetes and Parkinson’s,” Pelosi wrote. “He will say `no’ to hope.”

In light of the veto, Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., who planned to be at the White House event, sought support for a stem cell bill he is sponsoring. It has passed the Senate but has not yet been taken up by the House.

“My stem cell bill, which passed the Senate with broad bipartisan support, offers a clear alternative for our colleagues in the House to significantly expand federally funded stem cell research, while ensuring no taxpayer dollars are used for the destruction of human embryos,” Coleman said.

Coleman urged Democrats who favored the bill Bush was to veto to get behind his legislation.

“Those who support the stem cell research bill … are at a definitive crossroads,” he said. “Do they seek to advance lifesaving research for millions of Americans suffering from serious disease or do they, in fact, prefer to keep stem cell research at a political stalemate? ”

This will be the third veto of Bush’s presidency. His first occurred last year when he rejected legislation to allow funding of additional lines of embryonic stem cells — a measure that passed over the objections of Republicans then in control. Earlier this year, he vetoed legislation that would have set timetables for U.S. troop withdrawals from Iraq.

Opponents of the latest stem cell measure insisted that the use of embryonic stem cells was the wrong approach on moral grounds — and possibly not even the most promising one scientifically. They cite breakthroughs involving medical research conducted with adult stem cells, umbilical cord blood and amniotic fluid, none of which involve the destruction of a human embryo.

The science aside, the issue has weighty political implications.

Public opinion polls show strong support for the research, and it could return as an issue in the 2008 elections.

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared in Hanover, N.H., this week with a child who has diabetes and a paralyzed 23-year-old to urge Bush not to veto the bill. Last month, the issue was a topic at a debate with Republican presidential hopefuls in California.

The bill Bush is vetoing passed Congress on June 7, drawing the support of 210 House Democrats and 37 Republicans. That was 35 votes fewer than needed to override a veto. The Senate cleared the bill earlier by a margin that was one vote shy of the two-thirds needed to overcome Bush’s objections.

According to the National Institutes of Health Web site, scientists were first able to conduct research with embryonic stem cells in 1998. There were no federal funds for the work until Bush announced on Aug. 9, 2001, that his administration would make the funds available for lines of cells that already were in existence.

Forget the talk about the tenth Illinois casino. Proposed legislation now before the Illinois house would triple Illinois gambling, including the creation of a downtown Chicago casino.

While casinos can be very profitable, they are harmful to economic development. Restaurants are the hardest hit when a new casino opens, although expenditures in other sectors decrease also. Casinos can make more than half of their income from non-gaming revenues, including hotel and restaurant facilities on the premises. According to a study by E L Grinols and J D Omorov reported in the Spring 1996 Illinois Business Review:

Restaurants in many states, including Illinois, have reported that their revenues dropped as much as 50 percent in response to the opening of a nearby casino, and many restaurants have closed.

The social costs from gambling to the surrounding community can also be high. Costs associated with bankruptcy, debt, criminal justice costs, and other consequences of gambling problems can cost the community somewhere between four to eleven times the amount of tax revenue they bring in, depending on which study you look at.  Gambling impoverishes whole communities.

And once a gambling enterprise is let into the state, it doesn’t go away. Although the racing business ceased being profitable long ago, the taxpayers of Illinois are still subsidizing that industry to keep it from going out of business.

Gambling is not good for business and it’s not good for Illinois.

The bill is being discussed in the Illinois house this week. This is the time to contact your representative. You can find the contact information for your Illinois state representative here. If you don’t know your district you can find it here.

At the end of last week, 86 Democratic members of the House of Representatives joined the Republicans. They voted to support George W. Bush, and give Bush the power to continue the Iraq War with no strings attached.

Back in 2006, is that what we elected the Democrats to a majority of Congress to do? No, the Democrats were elected to Congress in order to stop the war.

The Democratic members of the House that you see below voted for war at the end of the week, just before the Memorial Day weekend, hoping that we would all just forget about their treachery. No such luck for them. Now, at the beginning of the next week, we are calling them out.

The following Democrats in Congress decided to support George W. Bush instead of representing their constituents. They do not deserve to be re-elected in 2008.

Jason Altmire of Pennsylvania
Robert Andrews Andrews of New Jersey
Joseph Baca of California
Brian Baird of Washington
John Barrow of Georgia
Melissa Bean of Illinois
Shelley Berkley of Nevada
Marion Berry of Arkansas
Timothy Bishop of Georgia
Dan Boren of Oklahoma
Leonard Boswell of Iowa
Rick Boucher of Virginia
Allen Boyd of Florida
Nancy Boyda of Kansas
G. K. Butterfield of North Carolina
Dennis Cardoza of California
Christopher Carney of Pennsylvania
Ben Chandler of Kentucky
James Clyburn of South Carolina
James Cooper of Tennessee
James Costa of Californa
Bud Cramer of Alabama
Henry Cuellar of Texas
Susan Davis of California
Lincoln Davis of Tennessee
Norman Dicks of Washington
John Dingell of Michigan
Joe Donnelly of Indiana
Chet Edwards of Texas
Brad Ellsworth of Indiana
Rahm Emanuel of Illinois
Bob Etheridge of North Carolina
Gabrielle Giffords of Illinois
Kirsten Gillibrand of New York
Charles Gonzalez of Texas
Bart Gordon of Tennessee
Gene Green of Texas
Stephanie Herseth Sandlin of South Dakota
Baron Hill of Indiana
Ruben Hinojosa of Texas
Timothy Holden of Pennsylvania
Steny Hoyer of Maryland
Steven Kagen of Wisconsin
Paul Kanjorski of Pennsylvania
Dale Kildee of Michigan
Ron Kind of Wisconsin
Nick Lampson of Texas
Rick Larsen of Washington
Sander Levin of Michigan
Dan Lipinski of Illinois
Tim Mahoney of Florida
James Marshall of Georgia
James Matheson of Utah
Michael McIntyre of North Carolina
Kendrick Meek of Florida
Charles Melancon of Louisiana
Harry Mitchell of Arizona
Alan Mollohan of West Virginia
Dennis Moore of Kansas
John Murtha of Pennsylvania
Solomon Ortiz of Texas
Collin Peterson of Minnesota
Earl Pomeroy of North Dakota
Nick Rahall of West Virginia
Silvestre Reyes of Texas
Ciro Rodriguez of Texas
Mike Ross of Arkansas
Dutch Ruppersberger of Maryland
John Salazar of Colorado
Allyson Schwartz of Pennsylvania
David Scott of Georgia
Joseph Sestak of Pennsylvania
Heath Shuler of North Carolina
Ike Skelton of Missouri
Vic Snyder of Arkansas
Zachary Space of Ohio
John Spratt of South Carolina
Bart Stupak of Michigan
John Tanner of Tennessee
Gene Taylor of Mississippi
Bennie Thompson of Mississippi
Mark Udall of Colorado
Peter Visclosky of Illinois
Timothy Walz of Minnesota
Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida
Charles Wilson of Ohio

Pro-war Democrats, every one. Remember how they betrayed the promise of 2006. Support the Democratic primary challengers against them.

The following United States Senators have decided to do the right thing. They have decided to vote against the Democratic leadership’s plan to allow George W. Bush to continue the war in Iraq with no strings attached:

Chris Dodd*
Russ Feingold
John Kerry
Bernard Sanders

*You may not know this, if you only pay attention to the front runners, but Senator Chris Dodd is running for President in 2008. Give his campaign a second look today.

Give the campaigns of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama a mouthful. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are waffling. Their backbones are wobbling. They say that, gosh, they just aren’t sure whether it’s a good idea to vote against an open-ended, no-restrictions reapproval of the war in Iraq.

What the hell are Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton thinking?!?

Sadly, it’s all too familiar what the other Democratic senator running for President, Joseph Biden, is thinking. Senator Biden is thinking that now that Joseph Lieberman is an independent, he has a shot at becoming George W. Bush’s new favorite Democrat. He deserves the nickname Blank Check Biden.

Joseph Biden says he will vote in favor of reapproving and refunding the war in Iraq, giving George W. Bush exactly what he wants.

Don’t just look at the campaign rhetoric of the Democratic candidates for President. Look at their actions. The actions of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and Joseph Biden this week show that their opposition to the Iraq War is weak. They’re looking like posers who say that they’re against the war in Iraq, but won’t lift a finger to do anything about it.

Shame on them. We need stronger leadership than what they have to offer.

To say that I’m indignant over this bit of news would be an understatement. I support a woman’s right to chose under any circumstances, and I find the idea that there’s not even a provision for a woman’s health to be…deplorable, to say the least.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070418/ap_on_go_su_co/scotus_abortion

Justices uphold abortion procedure ban

By MARK SHERMAN, Associated Press Writer1 hour, 9 minutes ago

The Supreme Court’s new conservative majority gave anti-abortion forces a landmark victory Wednesday in a 5-4 decision that bans a controversial abortion procedure nationwide and sets the stage for further restrictions.

It was a long-awaited and resounding win that abortion opponents had hoped to gain from a court pushed to the right by President Bush’s appointees.

For the first time since the court established a woman’s right to an abortion in 1973, the justices said the Constitution permits a nationwide prohibition on a specific abortion method. The court’s liberal justices, in dissent, said the ruling chipped away at abortion rights.

The 5-4 decision written by Justice Anthony Kennedy said the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act that Congress passed and Bush signed into law in 2003 does not violate a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion.

Siding with Kennedy were Bush’s two appointees, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, along with Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

The law is constitutional despite not containing an exception that would allow the procedure if needed to preserve a woman’s health, Kennedy said. “The law need not give abortion doctors unfettered choice in the course of their medical practice,” he wrote in the majority opinion.

Doctors who violate the law could face up to two years in federal prison. The law has not taken effect, pending the outcome of the legal fight.

In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the ruling “cannot be understood as anything other than an effort to chip away at a right declared again and again by this court.”

Dr. LeRoy Carhart, the Bellevue, Neb., doctor who challenged the federal ban, said, “I am afraid the Supreme Court has just opened the door to an all-out assault on” the 1973 ruling in Roe. Wade.

The administration defended the law as drawing a bright line between abortion and infanticide.

Reacting to the ruling, Bush said that it affirms the progress his administration has made to defend the “sanctity of life.”

“I am pleased that the Supreme Court has upheld a law that prohibits the abhorrent procedure of partial birth abortion,” he said. “Today’s decision affirms that the Constitution does not stand in the way of the people’s representatives enacting laws reflecting the compassion and humanity of America.”

It was the first time the court banned a specific procedure in a case over how — not whether — to perform an abortion.

Abortion rights groups as well as the leading association of obstetricians and gynecologists have said the procedure sometimes is the safest for a woman. They also said that such a ruling could threaten most abortions after 12 weeks of pregnancy, although Kennedy said alternate, more widely used procedures remain legal.

The outcome is likely to spur efforts at the state level to place more restrictions on abortions.

“I applaud the Court for its ruling today, and my hope is that it sets the stage for further progress in the fight to ensure our nation’s laws respect the sanctity of unborn human life,” said Rep. John Boehner (news, bio, voting record) of Ohio, Republican leader in the House of Representatives.

Jay Sekulow, a prominent abortion opponent who is chief counsel for the conservative American Center for Law and Justice, said, “This is the most monumental win on the abortion issue that we have ever had.”

Said Eve Gartner of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America: “This ruling flies in the face of 30 years of Supreme Court precedent and the best interest of women’s health and safety. … This ruling tells women that politicians, not doctors, will make their health care decisions for them.” She had argued that point before the justices.

More than 1 million abortions are performed in the United States each year, according to recent statistics. Nearly 90 percent of those occur in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, and are not affected by Wednesday’s ruling. The Guttmacher Institute says 2,200 dilation and extraction procedures — the medical term most often used by doctors — were performed in 2000, the latest figures available.

Six federal courts have said the law that was in focus Wednesday is an impermissible restriction on a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion.

“Today’s decision is alarming,” Ginsburg wrote in dissent for the court’s liberal bloc. She said the ruling “refuses to take … seriously” previous Supreme Court decisions on abortion.

Ginsburg said the latest decision “tolerates, indeed applauds, federal intervention to ban nationwide a procedure found necessary and proper in certain cases by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.”

Ginsburg said that for the first time since the court established a woman’s right to an abortion in 1973, “the court blesses a prohibition with no exception safeguarding a woman’s health.”

She was joined by Justices Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens.

The procedure at issue involves partially removing the fetus intact from a woman’s uterus, then crushing or cutting its skull to complete the abortion.

Abortion opponents say the law will not reduce the number of abortions performed because an alternate method — dismembering the fetus in the uterus — is available and, indeed, much more common.

In 2000, the court with key differences in its membership struck down a state ban on partial-birth abortions in a challenge also brought by Carhart. Writing for a 5-4 majority at that time, Justice Breyer said the law imposed an undue burden on a woman’s right to make an abortion decision in part because it lacked a health exception.

The Republican-controlled Congress responded in 2003 by passing a federal law that asserted the procedure is gruesome, inhumane and never medically necessary to preserve a woman’s health. That statement was designed to overcome the health exception to restrictions that the court has demanded in abortion cases.

But federal judges in California, Nebraska and New York said the law was unconstitutional, and three appellate courts agreed. The Supreme Court accepted appeals from California and Nebraska, setting up Wednesday’s ruling.

Kennedy’s dissent in 2000 was so strong that few court watchers expected him to take a different view of the current case.

Kennedy acknowledged continuing disagreement about the procedure within the medical community. In the past, courts have cited that uncertainty as a reason to allow the disputed procedure.

“The medical uncertainty over whether the Act’s prohibition creates significant health risks provides a sufficient basis to conclude … that the Act does not impose an undue burden,” Kennedy said Wednesday.

While the court upheld the law against a broad attack on its constitutionality, Kennedy said the court could entertain a challenge in which a doctor found it necessary to perform the banned procedure on a patient suffering certain medical complications.

The law allows the procedure to be performed when a woman’s life is in jeopardy.

The cases are Gonzales v. Carhart, 05-380, and Gonzales v. Planned Parenthood, 05-1382.

Bush does it again. Everyone remember when King Shrub II got John Bolton jammed into the UN? Welp, he’s repeated his antics only this time with Belgium. Let’s read, shall we?

Bush Bypasses Senate to Name Ambassador

Bush bypasses Senate to name ambassador
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer 38 minutes ago

President Bush named Republican fundraiser Sam Fox as U.S. ambassador to Belgium on Wednesday, using a maneuver that allowed him to bypass Congress, where Democrats had derailed Fox’s nomination.

The appointment, made while lawmakers were out of town on spring break, prompted angry rebukes from Democrats, who said Bush’s action may even be illegal.

Democrats had denounced Fox for his donation to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth during the 2004 presidential campaign. The group’s TV ads, which claimed that Sen. John Kerry exaggerated his military record in Vietnam, were viewed as a major factor in the Massachusetts Democrat’s election loss.

Recognizing Fox did not have the votes to obtain Senate confirmation in the Foreign Relations Committee, Bush withdrew the nomination last week. On Wednesday, with the Senate on a one-week break, the president used his power to make recess appointments to put Fox in the job without Senate confirmation.

This means Fox can remain ambassador until the end of the next session of Congress, effectively through the end of the Bush presidency.

“It’s sad but not surprising that this White House would abuse the power of the presidency to reward a donor over the objections of the Senate,” Kerry said in a statement.

Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, said he plans to ask the Government Accountability Office to issue an opinion on whether the recess appointment is legal.

Recess appointments are intended to give the president flexibility if Congress is out for a lengthy period of time, such as the four-week adjournment in summer. But Dodd said the law was not intended to circumvent lawmakers’ approval.

“This is really now taking the recess appointment vehicle and abusing this beyond anyone’s imagination,” said Dodd, a candidate for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination. “This is a travesty.”

Bush also used his recess appointment authority to make Andrew Biggs deputy director of Social Security. The president’s earlier nomination of Biggs, an outspoken advocate of partially privatizing the government’s retirement program, was rejected by Senate Democrats in February.

Presidents since George Washington have made appointments during congressional recesses to fill positions in the executive and judicial branches. Bush has used the authority more frequently than some — but not all — of his most recent predecessors, making 171 so far, compared with 140 for President Clinton over two terms, 77 by his father in one term and 243 by President Reagan during two terms.

Some of Bush’s more notable recess appointments include John Bolton as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Bolton arrived at the U.N. in August 2005 after being appointed during a congressional recess because he twice failed to be confirmed by the Senate. Still unable to get Senate backing, he stepped down in December.

Others include include William Pryor and Charles Pickering (news, bio, voting record) as federal appeals court judges, in 2004, and Otto Reich as an assistant secretary of state, in 2002.

Fox, a 77-year-old St. Louis businessman, gave $50,000 to the Swift Boat group. He is national chairman of the Jewish Republican Coalition and was dubbed a “ranger” by Bush’s 2004 campaign for raising at least $200,000. He is founder and chairman of the Clayton, Mo.-based Harbour Group, which specializes in the takeover of manufacturing companies.

Fox has donated millions of dollars to Republican candidates and causes since the 1990s.

In answer to questions about the Swift Boat donation, Fox has said he gives when asked, insisting he was not involved with the writing of the ad scripts and never saw them before they aired but had been aware of the general thrust of the group.

Fox issued a statement saying he is “delighted and honored” to accept the ambassadorial appointment.

“As the son of a man who fled Europe to find freedom and a better life, I am especially humbled by the opportunity to return to that continent as this nation’s representative,” he said.

Made you look, fundamentalists!

No, I’m not talking about the end of the world of evangelical Christian mythology, the rapture that is supposed to leave a bunch of empty cars on the freeway in Arkansas as a precursor of Satan’s wrath on Earth. I’m talking about Iraq.

The end times of the Iraq War are nigh!

The following short statement was released by Senator Russ Feingold today: “The President says he supports our troops, yet he wants to keep them in the middle of an Iraqi civil war indefinitely. We cannot afford to continue the President’s disastrous Iraq policy, which has weakened our national security and undercut our fight against those who attacked us on 9/11. The bill Majority Leader Reid and I have proposed gives the President the time and the funding he needs to safely redeploy our troops from Iraq by March 31, 2008.”

Let March 31, 2008 be the time of the second coming… of peace. I’m surprised, but impressed, that Senator Feingold has the support of Senator Harry Reid for this legislation to set a firm end for the Iraq War before one year from today.

Oh, how I wish Russ Feingold were running for President in 2008.

I’m still waiting for the Library of Congress to release the text of Feingold and Reid’s legislation.

I wish I could say that I heard the news this morning with disbelief. Sadly, it’s become all too believable.

The Democrats in the House of Representatives have come up with a plan to end the war a year and a half from now.

Look, this plan is better than not ending the war at all, but why have it end a year and a half from now? I mean, if the Iraq War needs to be ended because it isn’t working now, what good will it do to have the war go on for another year and a half? What possible good could be accomplished from that?

Nothing good for the soldiers trapped over there. Nothing good for Iraq.

Something very good for the Democrats. See, the deadline to have American soldiers out of Iraq would be September 2008. Think hard now. What else is happening in the autumn of 2008?

That’s right: The elections. It’s not just the presidential election time. It’s also time for congressional elections.

So, the last American soldiers would leave Iraq just in time for Democrats to get credit for ending the war, but not with enough time for the Democrats to be blamed if things go to hell in a handbasket as a result.

This plan is an example of political maneuvering of the worst kind.

I want the war to end, just like most Americans do. I do not want the war to be stretched out a year and a half more by the Democrats for the sake of political gain.

Nancy Pelosi ought to be ashamed of herself.

A post was made here earlier today at the Irregular Times Diaries by someone calling herself lilmiss. Lilmiss wrote that we ought to vote for John McCain for President in 2008 because McCain is a man “who will stand his ground”.

Stand his ground? John McCain? Sadly, Senator McCain is more like a man who ground his stand.

Senator McCain’s stand used to be that he was against torture. Sadly, in 2006, John McCain ground that stand to a pulp when he voted for the Military Commissions Act.

John McCain did a classic flip flop when he supported the Military Commissions Act. You see, John McCain was against it, before he voted for it.

First, John McCain made a big deal about how he could never support the Military Commissions Act because it legalized torture, and he would never, ever support that. Then, he Mccain met with George W. Bush to negotiate an acceptable compromise. McCain emerged with what he said was a compromise that would not allow torture, but then, over the weekend, the Senate Republicans changed it all right back so that torture would be legalized by the new law once again.

Then, John McCain voted for it anyway. John McCain voted for torture.

John McCain talks about principles, and doing what’s right, but talk is cheap. Watch what John McCain actually does. When the going gets tough, John McCain grounds his stand.

Tim Holden is a Democrat who sits in Congress and isn’t worth much at all. Occasionally, he votes the right way on a piece of legislation, but more often, he votes like a stinking right wing Republican, and when Tim Holden goes the wrong way, he causes a lot of damage. His regressive right wing legislative score is higher than his progressive record.

The latest and greatest example: Democrat Tim Holden abandoned the mainstream of the Democratic Party to join forces with George W. Bush and vote in favor of the Military Commissions Act.

Don’t know about the Military Commissions Act? Well, let me inform you: This new law, signed into effect by President Bush just yesterday, revokes habeas corpus, ends enforcement of the Geneva Conventions, gives amnesty to George W. Bush for any war crimes he has committed, sets up kangaroo courts to replace our system of justice, and gives the President the power to throw anyone into prison without crimnal charges and without any explanation to anyone.

How could Tim Holden do it? How could he do such a horrible thing? How could he betray us in such a dramatic fashion?

The answer is depressingly simple: Tim Holden doesn’t have anyone opposing him for re-election in 2006, so he can afford to be as dirty and nasty as he wants to be. There was no Democratic primary challenge to Tim Holden in 2006, and Matthew Wertz, the Republican opponent to Tim Holden, withdrew from the race. So, there was no one to hold Tim Holden accountable.

Democrats of Pennsylvania’s 17th congressional district, in Dauphin County, Lebanon County, Schuylkill County, Berks County and Perry County, please do NOT support Tim Holden for re-election in 2008. Tim Holden has betrayed the Democratic Party over and over again. Don’t take it lying down. Find someone, a real Democrat with solid progressive values, to challenge Tim Holden in 2008, and restore the good name of Pennsyvlania’s Democrats.

Here’s a riddle for New Jersey Democrats: What happens when you allow an incumbent politician to go unchallenged?

Don’t worry. There’s no trick to this riddle. The answer is all too obvious: The politician loses all sense of responsibility to the people.

Rob Andrews proves the point. He’s the Democratic incumbent in the House of Representatives for New Jersey’s first congressional district. At the close of this autumn’s session of Congress, Rob Andrews served his constituents very ill indeed.

Rob Andrews abandoned the mainstream of the Democratic Party and voted for the Military Commissions Act. The Military Commissions Act does the following:

We at Irregular Times used to have a nice campaign bumper sticker for Maine Democratic Congressman Mike Michaud. It was there for Michaud’s supporters to find online, and put on their cars to help spread the word that the people in Michael Michaud’s district supported him.

No more.

Mike Michaud betrayed Maine today. Mike Michaud betrayed Democrats today. Mike Michaud betrayed all America today when he voted for H.R. 6166, a bill that revokes the right of habeas corpus, legalizes torture, gives George W. Bush retroactive immunity from prosecution for war crimes and provides blanked immunity to other war criminals, allows secret evidence to be used against suspects, removes the right to a speedy trial, and even gave police the right to enter your home and search through your things without getting a search warrant.

Shame on you, Michael Michaud, for voting for this piece of totalitarian, anti-freedom legislation. You no longer have the support of Irregular Times.

That means that now, whenever voters in Maine search for the name Michael Michaud on Google or in the CafePress search engine, they will find the following new bumper sticker design where the old pro-Michaud bumper sticker used to be.

We’ll be taking this action for all the Democrats in the House of Representatives who voted for HR 6166 today. This issue is bigger than partisanship. It’s about the values of the Revolution of 1776. It’s about defending American freedom from tyranny.

After posting this on this other website I frequent, I felt it was too much for me to keep it only on one site. I’m reposting everything I’ve written there with just a few alterations that address that board specifically.

Before logging on, I had to sit for a while and seriously consider whether or not to post this. It’s a link to a flash video and I feel I should give Echolette credit because she sent me this a long time ago after she and I had a discussion about Pit Bulls, more specifically American Pit Bull Terriers, and back then I couldn’t watch it without crying.

I know, it’s unmanly for me to admit that I cried when I saw it but fuck all that shit, it’s the truth.

I bring this topic up because recently my dad and I adopted two stray dogs off the streets, the first of which was a female American Pit Bull Terrier whom my dad named Leona.

I feel I should tell the story of how we came about to adopting her.

For a long time (all my life, in fact) I had been bugging my parents for a dog. I’ve always been a cat person, always loved cats, always will love them. However, I had always felt that I was missing out on something when it came to cats and dogs and I’d always wanted a pet dog. I have three favorite breeds and I came about them in different ways and at different times.

My first love has been the Siberian Husky. The first time I saw it as a little kid that breed struck me as the most beautiful on earth. Everything about them was gorgeous from their eyes to their coats. I’ve been around a few of them and I’ve found them to be a good dog to have as a pet, so long as you don’t own other small animals and have a fence that’ll go down a few feet.

The second dog I’ve got on my favorites list is the German Shepherd for many of the same reasons as the Siberian Husky. But I think the real reason I was drawn to that type of dog was from watching the movie K-9 with Jim Belushi and Jerry Lee. That dog cracked me up. Recently my dad took me to one of his friend’s and he and his wife owned a pure blood German Shepherd named Queen. That dog was a goof, as long as you threw her tennis ball she’d adore you.

My third favorite dog was the Pit Bull. My friend Tim owned a Pit Bull named Dro and I had been around them off and on for a long, long time. The first time I met Dro I was scared shitless, not because I had heard all the bad news about Pit Bulls but because here’s this 80 pound mass of drooling dog and he’s wantin’ to jump on me. Being still in my early to mid teens I was scared shitless of that dog for a long time. The first time I’d met him, Tim opened the door and I swear it would have turned into a scene right out of Marmaduke if he hadn’t caught Dro by the collar. In all the years that I knew him he never once tried to bite me and only bit one person, that being a woman who surprised him at the wrong moment.

After my initial shock it took me a long time to keep from tensing up when I’d see him. How long you ask? Days? Weeks? Heh, try years. At first it was a grudging pet once in a while but he was persistent and so lovable that I finally started playing with him. Yes, that old dog won me over and it damn near became that I’d spend more time with that dog than I would with Tim.

He had a few quirks that made him lovable, one of which was this one time he took Tim’s mom for a drag down 19th street. I’m not talking walking along and tugging her after him, I’m talking she was off her feet and he was dragging her along behind him. You might be thinking “Oh, that’s not right” but all Tim’s life I never looked at her as a good mother so I was busting up when I heard about that little stunt.

Another of the things he would do that was so endearing was that he would start howling whenever we would sing “Happy Birthday” or when Tim would play “Beautiful” by Christina Aguilera. That dog had some since in him after all.

Now Tim’s uncle had been at war with his neighbors for a long time for whatever reason and normally I wouldn’t mention that had it not been for the fact that Tim was living with his uncle during this time. One day, Tim was coming home from his friend’s place when he saw everyone was out back and there was an animal control truck out front. He went into the backyard and found Dro in the neighbor’s back yard, cowering in their dog house with blood running down his face. The neighbors had called in saying he was a mad dog and because my state has a No Tolerance law, all a dog (Pit Bull) has to do is be accused of being rabid or trying to attack someone and it’ll be put down. To this day we are convinced that his neighbors attacked Dro then had him put down.

I think the bloody pipe laying by his neighbor’s back porch had something to do with that suspicion. To this day I miss Dro, but he was the dog that won me over into liking Pit Bulls.

Now, a few months ago my dad told me about a stray dog in the neighborhood that was scared of it’s own shadow. I asked what kind it was and he said he didn’t know. The way he kept talking he made it out to be a small dog and with a rare exception, I hate small dogs. Most of them are toe biters to me. After I asked him about it, he was saying “No, no, it’s a large dog. Looks kinda like a boxer.”

Anyway, I hadn’t seen this dog at all for about a week or two after dad told me about it until one day we were leaving and I saw this black dog in our next door neighbor’s yard looking curiously over at me. First second I saw it I said to myself “That’s a Pit Bull.” I told my dad this and he refused to believe me and I kept pressing the subject because I knew I was right, damn it. He kept telling himself and everyone else that it was a boxer/lab mix and I just gave him a look like that let him know I wasn’t buying it and would say that he was full of shit. After a few weeks of drilling it into his head he started saying “She might have some Pit Bull in her” and I was just thinking “duh.”

It wasn’t until one of his friends who had raised Pit Bulls said that she was a Pit Bull without a doubt and that was all it took to convince him and here I am sitting here furious and thinking “WHAT THE FUCK HAVE I BEEN SAYING FOR THE LAST TWO FUCKING MONTHS?!” Just…motherfuck, he won’t listen to me just because I’m his son. I guess in his eyes I’m still a little baby shitting my diaper and don’t know what I’m fucking talking about so I have to tell his friends to tell him.

But this is not a rant post.

The first time I saw this dog it was clear she had been abused. She was all skin and bones, terrified of everyone, and had even chewed her leash in half to run away and was dragging it behind her when she came to our block. Everyone on our corner took pity on her. The Vietnamese people who live on the corner let her stay in a dog house in their back yard. My dad took to putting some of our cat food out for her at night because it was during the closing winter months when she came to us and was still kinda chilly. He had taken to befriending her and it took a month before she warmed up to him. I took her a week to get used to me.

After a while we had not only coaxed her into our yard but also onto this old couch we have outside.

Heh, that couch was her first real security zone and once she got on it you couldn’t get her off short of picking her up and carrying her off. She was also curious about new places and really enjoyed seeing our jungle of a back yard.

After that, it took her another month and a half before she would even stick her nose inside the door. She was terrified of about everything, but she eventually came inside and staked out a spot by the front windows.

For a long time that was her spot and she’ll still go over there from time to time.

I think it was around then that we’d officially adopted her.

But since then she has come a long way from when we’d first met her. She’s still a little skittish around people, but she won’t bolt at the first sight of them. She can also be fairly lazy and a regular couch potato when inside. She’s taken to sleeping in the recliner I enjoy sitting in (that hussy) and she’s really good with kids.

People are drawn to her to such an extent that it’s really a sight to behold.

Now some of you may be wondering why I’m posting this on a political website but I feel that the subject of Pit Bulls are very much a matter of both personal beliefs and politics since the introduction of Breed Specific Legislation.

BLS is a law that will restrict or ban pit bull type dogs and list them as “vicious animals.” People say that it’s in their nature to be mean. They say that they’ll just suddenly snap without warning or that they’re more prone to biting than any other dog. This is an image that has been trotted around in the media and is largely untrue. This has become so prevalent that San Francisco has enacted a mandatory spaying/neutering of Pit Bull type dogs and Denver has enacted an outright ban and started seizing Pit Bulls from their owners and having them put to sleep.

People miss identify all sorts of dogs and will call them Pit Bulls because of their general appearance. People have said right and left that Leona looks like a boxer but the only reason she does is because her ears and tail haven’t been cut off. Because of that, more often than not people will think she’s some other breed. It is the flip side of this reason that people lump all these different dogs into the Pit Bull heading.

I have come to find out that Pit Bulls were bred to be aggressive towards other animals but friendly towards humans. However, when raised around other animals they’ll generally be a sweet and even tempered kind of dog.

Now I come to the original reason I created this topic.

I’ve been telling you all about my experiences with American Pit Bull Terriers so you can understand my point of view as an owner of one of these dogs and maybe get an idea of my own experiences with this breed.

When I created this post I did so after watching again that flash video Echolette sent me so long ago. For me, it has become even more…relevant.

I want to pass it along to everyone here but I feel the need to warn you, if you have the same attitude towards these animals as Echo and me, this video and the images in it will be burned into your memory for a long time. I urge you to see it, but if you’re squeamish go ahead and click the back button on your browser.

The Pit Bull Problem

I saw this linked from one web site I frequent to another that I visit less often, and I felt it was worth showing to everyone here. When I saw where this happened, I arched an eyebrow but in truth I wasn’t surprised. I have the misfortune of living in the same state so I know quite well what these people are like.

But, without farther adieu, I present you with the story written by Chester Smalkowski along with a foreword from the American Atheist News editor.

The original post can be found here.

JUST ANOTHER SALEM
by Chester Smalkowski

Web Posted: July 8, 2006

From the AANEWS Editor: Below, we are reproducing, “as is” and
un-edited, the account circulating on the internet and the
democraticunderground.com web site penned by Chester Smalkowski and
aptly titled “Just Another Salem.”

It is his personal story about the ordeal he and has family have been
swept up in after their daughter, Nicole, refused to join a prayer
circle during a basketball game at their local high school. Nicole,
instead, recited the “godless” Pledge of Allegiance.

From there, events went out of control. Chester Smalkowski and family
members attempted to hold a conversation with the high school
principal. That turned into a physical altercation, Mr. Smalkowski was
arrested under a battery of charges, and the authorities offered to
dismiss the case if the Atheist family fled the state.

monthly special American Atheists joined in the subsequent criminal
case, and Chester Smalkowski — battling incredible “Bible Belt” odds
in the courtroom — was found innocent of the charges. News of that
can be found on the American Atheists web site..

Edwin Kagin (ekagin@atheists.org), National Legal Director for
American Atheists, is preparing a federal action which will touch on a
number of issues in the Smalkowski case including violations of this
Atheist family’s civil rights.

Chester Smalkowski vented his thoughts about this experience on a
blog. AANEWS is reproducing this story for the benefit of our readers,
unedited and in its original format. This conveys the honest,
emotional, “from the heart” sentiments of Mr. Smalkowski, and
constitutes one man’s recollection of an agonizing experience due to
religious intolerance and fanaticism.

American Atheists welcomes support so that we may continue our efforts
on behalf of Chester Smalkowski and his family.

There are lessons to be learned. Perhaps the most important, though,
is that “it can happen here,” in America, in the year 2006.

— Conrad Goeringer,
AANEWS - American Atheists

JUST ANOTHER SALEM

The bailiff took the piece of paper from the foreman of the jury and
handed it to the Judge. He opened the paper and while staring at it he
nodded. The courtroom was silent and the jury stared straight ahead.

I have been in many situations where my life or limb were on the
line but I was still in the game and had a hand to play. But not here,
here I just sat waiting for the verdict.

Though I worried about being sent away for five years on bogus
charges, my dread was the Christian mob. They knew I must be found
guilty in order to slow or stop the civil case being filed in Federal
court. Since the start of my daughter’s stand against the public
schools disregard for the law of the land, it was imperative to run us
out of the county to make any civil action non valid. With me in jail
for five years running my family out would be a whole lot easier, or
so they might have thought.

The courtroom was packed for it is the Bible belt. There was no
love in this courtroom.

The loving Christians brought their children to hear the verdict.
They brought the town. They brought ministers. I even saw another
Judge in the back of the room. The Judge who in an earlier hearing
while slapping an inch thick stack of papers on his bench saying with
a list of witnesses this big you had better be a good boy. It was lies
then, it was lies now and the DA knew it! (She was later forced to
hand over a written statement she denied for over a year existed!)
People prayed openly for a conviction. Many holding their bibles.
During the trial the Prosecutions side of the courtroom was packed.
Only my son and Edwin Kagin’s wife, Helen sat behind me, but now there
was not enough room in the whole courtroom.

Yet now the so-called victim, the 325 lbs victim, the ex Marine,
hurrahs, was nowhere to be found. Neither was the woman assistant
district attorney anywhere to be found. Whose vindictive, bogus case
this was from the start.

What sort of place is this?

Well this is not the place for a little debate in a coffee shop
with the sweet salt air rolling up from San Francisco bay. This is a
place where the children write on their schoolbooks the south will
rise again. This is a place where they say that black people caused
slavery! Where they burn rock CD’s. Mormons are the tools of Satan.
That my daughter is gay cause only homosexuals vote for Kerry and
Christians vote for Bush. Atheists worship Satan! Where religious
fanaticism is fused with political rhetoric and political leaders
pander to this madness. This place has a sickness, a malignant disease
and it is spreading. Edwin saw it first hand.

There has not been many a trial with a Not Guilty verdict in this
county for years. The head DA is good friends with the self-righteous
in the courtroom and greets them all by name. You know the type.

Many old women in the courtroom are taking notes. Others have been
taking notes at every hearing for the past year and a half! They
strain to listen not wanting to miss one juicy word. With the pens and
pads they write continuously. The pads shaking with every push of the
pen. Even writing down what my children spoke amongst themselves.

Blue gray haired old Christian spinsters bitter for wasting all
those fruitful years now just waiting for those pearly gates. These
are truly the wicked. You have seen them before. With their bogus
self-righteousness they strut and sneer. How far we have not come.

Others had walked out into the hall and warned a police witness
saying that justice must be served, that justice better be served. The
judge called a hearing on the threat.

He warned the crowd that if it happens one more time he would have
no choice but to throw out the case. He was between a rock and a hard
place. He knows my lawyers are watching and the loving Christians are
out for my blood, and they are watching too. The law, elections and
politics were all in play. The Judge left the court for his chambers
and stayed away for a quite awhile.

The Christians, the loving Christians! Praying to a God whose wings
are dripping in the blood of innocent men, woman and children down
through the ages. Truly hypocrisy is one of their commandments and the
blood of the innocence one of their sacraments!

Christian against Christian, Christian against Moslem, Christian
against Mormon. Basically Christian against anyone or anything that
challenges their pathetic little fairy tale.

Go to any Indian reservation and see the lies and broken promises
by a country with “Under God” in their pledge.

I assume I need not have to explain about the loving hymns sung in
church on Sunday and beatings of black slaves on Monday. But on Monday
night the good old Master has a little tippy toe over to slave huts
for a little brown sugar. While the queen of the manor is in the
master bedroom past out on an opium tonic. Praise the Lord!

Well that was then but now the court was about to hear the verdict.
There was a feeding frenzy about to begin with the dirty little
atheist and his family put in their place with him in jail and the
family run out of town. Like the teacher told my daughter “This is a
Christian country and if you don’t like it get out!”

I could hear my heart beat in my ears and I dreaded the cheers from
the righteous mob that were about to begin. The pain of having my
family being in the front row to witness this swirling cesspool of
hatred come to its inevitable end with my head on a pike, sucked the
air right out of my lungs.

It was truly just another Salem. Different time and place. Same
characters with new names. Oh, no gallows or big oak tree this time.
But if they could they surely would. How far we have not come. I know,
I already said that but do you really understand what a tragedy it
means? The whole universe is ours if we want it but instead we must
gravel in the dirt having to debate the obvious.

I have been standing against injustice most of my life. It is my
nature. I am a child of the 60’s and proud of it. But what of my poor
family? They stood so proud and strong. They are tougher than I will
ever be. I had told them do not cry. Do not give these bastards any
satisfaction. I told my wife if I see you cry I will surely loose it.
I said it is in the Federal courts we will set things right and send
that wall higher than it has ever been. On the wall behind us was a
painting of the signing of the Declaration.

The judge handed the verdict to the clerk. The only sound was the
paper. The paper in the clerk’s hands with the hand written words that
spelled my doom, my family’s fate and the inevitable cheers from the
Christian mob.

With my guts in my throat and no air to breathe. The court clerk
read the decision of the jury.

We the jury find the defendant:

On the charge of Aggravated Assault and Battery:
Not Guilty!

On the charge of Assault and Battery:
Not Guilty!

On the charge of Assault:
Not Guilty!

On the charge of Battery:
Not Guilty!

Not a word, not a sound. The lynching had been cancelled. I took my
first free breath in almost two years. I looked at the jury and mouth
the words thank you. I gazed at the floor as floodgates opened, I
dared not move my head that others might see. Charley don’t cry, but
free air has its effects.

With all their praying, lies, crooked cops, warning that justice
better be done, packing the courthouse with their followers, Even a
teacher on the jury who had taught at the Hardesty School. (Our motion
to take her off the jury denied.) Not guilty was still the outcome.
The evidence was obvious. This was a bad case. And 12 men and women
had the guts.

From the start of this legal fight my lawyers said Atheism must be
kept out. That it was a no go in the Bible belt. I was just adamant
that Atheism be brought in. For it is the reason. It was the motive
for all the lies and hate. I felt it was about time that this dirty
little secret of hate, persecution, Christian madness and hypocrisy is
brought out into the light of day. When I told my lawyers this they
all gave me the same bewildered stare.

So one by one, I dropped one lawyer then two. Then I had a hard
time in finding another one. My third lawyer was still trying to
convince me to keep my atheism out even up till the day of the trial.
I still said no. Somewhere along the line I talk to the ACLU out of
San Francisco. Who let me know my first civil lawyer was not telling
me the whole story. I was advised by them and many others to complain
to the Bar about him.

You see he never told me that the prayer in itself is illegal. That
the schools in this area were not following the state and federal
funding guidelines. When I asked him after finding out from the ACLU.
He said yes it is against the law.

I told him I want to have it stopped. He told me he would not for
he was a Christian and he believed there should be school prayer. His
statement floored me for it bordered on madness. I said what you
believe and what you do for a client is two different things and that
you took an oath. He still refused.

It did not matter to him that I had already given him $10,000
dollars. He knows we are not rich. So I wrote a letter to him to
complain about his refusing to take my daughters civil case where it
should have gone from the start. And I asked for my money back. He
sent me a bill for another $5000 saying it was the charge for reading
my letter and wasting his time.

In my search for a civil attorney it became clear that no one would
touch this case. In all of Oklahoma I could not find an attorney. My
criminal attorney said he would look at it but only after I paid him
his $15000 for the criminal case. He sent me a letter that the funds
for the criminal were coming too slow and suggested that I seek other
counsel for the civil matter. But even after he got his $15000 he
would only take it if I paid him more. (Now that I have won the
criminal case he wants on the civil. Suffice to say he is off the
civil!)

Eventually I contacted the American Atheist, which was referred to
me by Edward Tabash, who was referred to me by a Mr. Robert Tierman. I
told them my problem in finding an attorney willing to take church and
state case in which the people are blatantly breaking the law. Yet no
one will take it. American Atheist, being out of another state, could
not refer me to anyone. But they said they would try to help. The ACLU
out of Oklahoma City refused. They sent me some standard letter. It
really hurt that I did not even rate a return call or a reason. I felt
betrayed, lost and confused.

Was this the United States? Where freedom reigns?

The whole family was under constant stress. Police trying to get
search warrants to the property by having ex-employees file false
statements. Other cops trying to hire ex-cons to beat me up. The whole
town knows of it! The Sheriff trying to have my bond pulled by the
bail bondsman when there was no legal way to do it. My kids have been
out of school since November. Principal’s son saying should he get a
gun when he sees my daughter and my son. DA has yet to reply to our
concerns. The Department of Human Services comes to my place saying
they received a complaint that I starve my kids. It was even obvious
to them the charge was bogus.

We have become very good at using back roads. The police follow us
around. Traffic tickets that when challenged were dropped in court.
Not to mention the stares and whispers, the betrayal from employees,
one of my healthy dogs dying. Brush fires starting up upwind.

An FBI agent even said, “You aren’t kidding”. When it was obvious
someone followed us and was watching our meeting out in the middle of
nowhere. I was told about a few things. All I can say is that some of
the crooks out here now charged with crimes wore badges and guns! But
he could not help my family and me. Not without witnesses willing to
come forward. One scared witness left the state. The last words she
spoke to me were, Chuck I don’t want to end up dead in a ditch!

Just what you would expect life to be like out here in the Bible
belt!

The roller coaster of emotions we went through every minute, every
day. It was truly a hell. There were days we spoke little. Other days
we spoke late into the night. You get to a point you become numb, but
it doesn’t last. For it is all aboard and you are on the roller
coaster again.

My poor family. They were standing tall. But they would not even be
in this place if it were not for me and my bright idea about
centralizing our business. We all missed the desert. The free open
Mojave Desert. My family did not ask for this. They deserved better. I
saw them all suffering.

Many a night I would sit in the barn alone with a pint of scotch
and look at the high beams and the rope on the wall.

Then out of the blue my wife received a call from Ellen Johnson who
said they had a lawyer that can help us, an Edwin Kagin who is their
legal director. Well I called him up, and our civil case is up and
running.

Edwin Kagin also by my request came to my criminal case for the two
cases are obviously interrelated. There were also other reasons.

Simply stated without Edwin Kagin, Ellen Johnson and American
Atheist I would be in jail now, or worse. Without them, we would have
no federal case on separation of church and state. The only group, the
only lawyer that would stand with my family and me to protect the wall
and not cringe at me wanting to put atheism as part of my defense.

In Edwin’s opening statement American Atheist magazine was shown.
The crowd almost rioted. He explained that Atheism was not a dirty
word and that it was a conclusion. That my family and I are not devil
worshippers. We just have no Gods. It was the basis of the case. It
was the danger. It was the truth. Yet the only lawyer to go there
freely was Edwin Kagin.

In a world where superstition is the norm and those who seek
another path are ridiculed or worse. Being an atheist takes guts.
Freedom is never freely given. The good fight is always there.

Oh you can hide yourself in the latest sitcom or have one or two
more scotch and waters but the good fight is still there. You can run
to your malls and buy yourself crazy with credit card frenzy. But the
good fight is still there. You can look away and deny allegiance. But
the good fight is still there. These are the times that try men’s
courage. You can debate till you’re blue in the face. It will not
change a damn thing.

Our forefathers are on our side in this fight. Trust me. From Adams
to Madison to Jefferson and Paine they all knew the dangers of a
Theocracy. They wrote the Constitution to assure it. And within the
federal courts we can protect this nation from a Theocracy.

The wall between the church and state must stand. But the wall is
being battered and cracks now appear. The Christians are at the gate
attempting to breach the wall and send us back down the road to an age
of darkness, bloodshed and fear. My family and myself are willing to
stand and fight the good fight. If we lose some skin, so be it. We
have no more else to give. We are financially done. Thanks to American
Atheist, Ellen Johnson and Edwin Kagin for the first time we do not
fight alone.

Please stand together with us and fight the good fight. The fight
that our forefathers began. Lets make the wall so high between Church
and State that they who wish to tear it down will know better and be
content with staying in their churches.

For freedom has never been free! There can be no freedom for all if
the wall does not stand.

The wall must stand.

Chuck, Nadia, Nicole, Czeslaw and Bridgette Smalkowski

Help Us Grow

Straight people of the world this post is for you, it is in no particular order and just a little informational piece that you might find interesting. Numerous court hearings have been held on the issue of same-sex marriage recently both in the United States as well as over seas. In light of these events I thought you might like to know what your government has said about you.

I’ll start with New York as it is my home state and I would like to address my fellow New Yorkers for a few moments. In New York State the highest court voted down same-sex marriage by a vote of four to two.

“. . .the Legislature could rationally decide that, for the welfare of children, it is more important to promote stability, and to avoid instability, in opposite-sex than in same-sex relationships. Heterosexual intercourse has a natural tendency to lead to the birth of children; homosexual intercourse does not. . .The Legislature could also find that [heterosexual] relationships are all too often casual or temporary. It could find that an important function of marriage is to create more stability and permanence in the relationships that cause children to be born. . .” - NYS Court of Appeals Decision (pages 5 and 6)

So lets take a look at that, shall we? The New York State Court of Appeals more or less says that heterosexual men are so careless and frivolous that they require a legally binding contract in order for them not to abandon the women who they will ineviably get pregnant and their offspring. As for heterosexual women, the court apparently believes that they are so free with themselves that they are all too likely to casually have kids (perhaps the nine month waiting period was removed without my notice). In addition the court finds that heterosexual people exist almost solely to produce offspring. Therefore, if you are unable to have children, uninterested in having children, or too old to have children you do not matter in the eyes of New York State. Don’t worry, you have a lot of company (For instance the one million plus New Yorkers who identify as LGBT lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender).

In Indiana a similar decision was handed down.

“The Plaintiffs assert that there are three possible, but ultimately unreasonable, reasons for the legislative classification: to promote procreation and child-rearing by both natural parents, to promote the traditional family unit, and to promote the integrity
of traditional marriage.” - Indiana Court of Appeals

But wait! Traditional marriage? How do we define this “traditional marriage”? If what I’ve read is correct traditional marriage was an institution in which African American couples couldn’t marry, inter-racial couples could not marry, and women had no rights? Hey, if it works for all of you it works for me, but somehow I
think there might be a few people with something to say about traditional marriage, just a hunch.

Other rulings against same-sex marriage have come down in Georgia, London, and Washington. Washington State recently upheld a DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) which is a piece of legislation that defines the words “marriage” and “spouse” to exclude same-sex couples. With a vote of five to four. By 2004 33 states had amended their constitutions and passed these acts (as written by B.A. Robinson of Religious Tolerance.org).

DOMA bills are extremely important to the straight community because being gay is just so much fun that if same-sex marriage was legal all of you heterosexuals would say “To hell with opposite-sex marriage, I think I’m going to go out and do that!” (Not that I can blame you with a divorce rate of something like 50% and celebrities like Brittany Spears getting married and then getting it anoled the next day, if that was my choice would probably explore my other options as well). It’s a good thing we have DOMA bills to uphold the sanctity of marriage and keep all you frivoulous, lechers, nymphos, and machines of procreation on track. Otherwise the human race would die out like the dinosaurs. Of course, we could focus on teens who have babies in bathrooms and throw them in trash cans but hey, we have more important things to think about, like stopping homosexual marriage which is threatening the children and the straight people of the world.

(age 18)

What would you do with ten thousand dollars?

Ten thousand dollars every year is all that minimum wage workers get

I want you to indulge yourself in a fantasy for a moment. Imagine that you got ten thousand dollars. What would you do with it?

Would you buy a used car? Would you get one of those fancy new big HD flat screen plasma television sets with a DVD player and a year’s worth of digital cable television to watch? Would you take a vacation?

No, you would do none of those things. If you just got ten thousand dollars for an entire year’s worth of work, you wouldn’t have enough money to get any of that stuff.

Welcome to the life of the minimum wage worker. People who work minimum wage jobs full time get just $10,712.00 per year - and that’s only if they don’t take a single day off as a holiday or sick day.

What would you do if you got ten thousand dollars, like they do? You’d struggle just for food and shelter.

Yet, for the ninth year in a row, the United States Senate has refused to raise the minimum wage.

Why? They say it’s bad for business.

Is asking Americans to live on only $10,000 per year good for business?

I write this while on the edge of sleep, so forgive me if I seem to ramble.

For quite a while I’ve been dwelling over the liberties that we’re losing. All sorts of things but most of all I find that political dissent these days has more of a chance of getting you locked up than it did just ten years ago. Back in the ’60’s people would be locked up for protesting against the government but the difference is that back then you would get a trial. We’ve seen now that you don’t even have to be a dissident to be locked up without trial or the expectation that you won’t be tortured. I have been thinking about this for a while but I’d just made a comment in Jim’s $5 Dollar Donation post saying that Abbie Hoffman would be proud and that sparked an urge to look him up on Wikipedia. I found a quote that went well with what I had been thinking about.

“You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.” ~ Abbie Hoffman

That made me think about the things I’ve heard and read about over the last few years. Conservatives saying that disagreeing with Bush is paramount to treason; people being interviewed by the Schutzstaffel…erm…I mean Secret Service (one SS is as good as the other) because of their bumper stickers or posters that are hanging in their private homes; blatant spying against American citizens, and now an anti-flag burning amendment.

If one uses Abbie Hoffman’s words as a guide, the United States is no longer a truly free country.

That said, I want to call attention to the actions of the Bush Administration during the past few years. At their height they were constantly screaming about how we were going to be attacked…any minute now. Every day they’d say that and shout “9/11!” and damn near every American would jump and stand in line giving the Bush Administration anything they wanted and doing it with a smile. And thinking about that and how they’re still using 9/11 for political vote whoring and still going on and on about how we’re about to be attacked by evil doers, it has brought me to the quote I shall leave everyone with.

“Naturally the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia, nor in England, nor in America, nor in Germany. That is understood. But after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.” ~ Hermann Göring

Good night,
~Damen

Yesterday, the United States Senate joined the House of Representatives in voting for legislation that makes English the only official language of the United States of America, and authorizes the denial of government services to anyone, even American citizens, who do not speak English.

This is not just nationalism. It is hateful nationalism. It is nationalism fueled by ethnic-based hatred.

There is no real crisis in immigration. There is no real problem with people choosing what language they want to speak.

The real crisis is hatred. Our government is now encouraging a gigantic wave anti-Hispanic hatred. Watch out! When the truth about the war and about the programs to spy on us citizens gets too much for the government to handle, they come out with a new campaign of hate. Most Americans seem to be loving it.

Hispanics are the new scapegoats in George W. Bush’s War on Terror. We’re told to fear the Hispanics, to hate them for not surrendering their own culture to join ours, and so the Republicans, with some significant help from the Democrats, are now beginning to say that it is the Hispanics who are the real danger to America, and that if only it weren’t for the Hispanics here, speaking their dirty Spanish language, America could be great once again. So, they propose a series of measures to purge America of Hispanic influence, to make America ethically pure once again…

Does this not seem familiar to anybody here? Come on! The Hispanics are beginning to play the same role for our right wing government that the Jews played for the Nazis. The White House and Congress are making Hispanics the ethnic scapegoat, the group to blame for everything that goes wrong, and they must be purged, purged, purged…

We need to stop this anti-Hispanic campaign of hate!

America is descending into right wing nationalist fascism. Pay attention!

We have government spies used against us. We have the use of war as a political tool to create unity behind our leaders. We have the military being used within our borders for law enforcement. We have the special powers for corporations beloved in fascism. We have ethnic-based hatred, and the beginning of cultural purges. We have our own leaders telling us that we need to give up some of our freedoms for the sake of the Homeland.

Wake up, America! Can’t you see what’s happening?

This is history repeating itself. Don’t just watch it. Push back, damn it! Push back hard.

I recently posted an article on communism and socialism and one of the recent visitors to this website left a comment in that post.

In response to one of Comrade Stalin’s flippant remarks in which he has to say

Our Peoples Health care will make sure you could see a doctor Free.
(Of course doctors will receive a Government salary set by me, so
can’t say about quality).

This is another argument I always see against communism and by extension, universal healthcare. However what these people fail to see is that all it would take to ensure quality healthcare for everyone in the USA (yes, that includes you, Bill Gates), is to just take maybe five or ten percent from the military budget. A few billion here and there and everyone can have a decent level of healthcare. And, quite frankly, I think healthcare should be available to everyone, not just those who can afford it.

And now I foresee people screaming at me “If we reduce the military funding we won’t be able to stop the axis of evil!” Bullshit. We already spend more money on the military than the rest of the planet combined, so a few billion ain’t really gonna make much of a difference. Shit, if we cut the military spending by half we could solve all of our domestic problems and most of the problems of the rest of the world. But no, the Navy has to have their new Super Carriers, the Airforce has to get it’s next squadron of F-22s, the Marines just can’t survive without their XM8s and XM-29s and gods forbid the Army has to give up it’s next batch of Abrams tanks and Apache helicopters! Why, without these things, we can’t fight the evil doers! Want to see how utterly fucked up the military budget is? Take a look here.

You honestly telling me that without a fraction of that we can’t fight the evil doers and ensure a standard of medical care? Are you fucking insane?

Never mind that the trillions of dollars we’ve spent on a pointless war could have funded a fucking transatlantic tunnel from New York to England. For the price of the Iraq war, we could have had fucking quality healthcare, funding for cancer research, planned parenthood, AIDS research, as well as being able to feed all the starving children. Yes, I’m going to throw out the christian fundamental belly-achin’ when they see something they don’t like “WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN!?” Are these people really telling me that they would rather give the military bottomless funds in the exchange for the illusion of security (a huge advanced army didn’t stop some loons from flying themselves and civilians into those buildings, did it?) rather than give their kids the very real security of healthcare when they need it? When I see christian fundamentalists bitchin’ about homosexuality and sex in the media and start screaming WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN! yet remain silent when the proposal for universal medical care is shot down in congress I have to clench my teeth to keep from screaming at the ceiling because of these sexually repressed homophobes. According to these people, they’d rather let the children die of a preventable illness because they can’t afford the shot but god forbid these youngsters see a couple of dudes swapping saliva!

People say that universal medical care paid for by the government won’t be of the best quality, then tell me why fucking Cuba has a medical and education system that’s second to none? Why is it that most of the civilized world will provide healthcare to it’s citizens free of charge while the USA tells it’s citizens to go die in the gutter. Tell me why the USA has a oh-so-much better system than Cuba, the UK, Canada, etc, etc, etc. Tell me why it’s better to let insurance decide which life-saving treatments it will pay for but not others? Why is Viagra covered in insurance, but not abortion or heart transplants? Yeah, great system of ours. The best of quality in healthcare…but only if you can afford it, otherwise we just have to stabilize you, then boot you out and bill you $50 bucks for an aspirin.

Tell me all of that and tell me against why communism is so bad and capitalism is so great.

~ Damen

There are a few things I question about American ideals in general. Well, let’s not beat around the bush, there are a lot of things I question about American ideals. But one thing has always been at the top of my questions: Why do so many Americans hate communism?

Now I know the history about communism and socialism and I know about the two most notorious nations to claim these as their economic systems. Respectively Russia and Germany. And I can understand how the history of those two nations would give communism and socialism a bad name. But the more I’ve come to learn, the more I see a difference and how people mistake Communism with Stalinism. Communism in and of itself is, to the best of my understanding, an economic system in which the wealth is distributed evenly and the means of production is owned by the state and the nation becomes a classless society. Socialism is the economic system in which the means of production is controlled by the workers. I have to ask myself; what is so bad about that?

Around the 1950’s, a fella came into office by the name of Joseph McCarthy and he gained support by whipping up Americans into an anticommunist frenzy. He equated a communist with being a traitor. Doesn’t that go against the constitution and the intention of the founding fathers that you should be free to practice whatever political view you have as well as whatever religious view you have?

More to the point, I have to ask myself; what is so great about capitalism? We live in a capitalist nation (violently capitalist in my opinion) and what has it brought? A few individuals gain wealth at the expense of the masses. The majority of the population is left to struggle or else starve while 1% of the population lives in a mansion that can be as large as a city block and a property line that’ll stretch from here to the west coast. The vast minority of people living in this country get access to the finest medical care available while the majority are left without treatment and basically left to die; gods forbid they need a surgery like a heart transplant. Those upper crust people also have the money to be able to buy votes from politicians to keep the minimum wage from being raised, then reward them with nice jobs once they’re out of office. The CEO of an oil company gets 400 billion dollars in a retirement package while the average guy gets…AARP. Yeah, that’s real equal. To me, the system of capitalism is little more than a modern usage of the ancient European ideas of nobility. The lords of the land (the wealthy 1%) make money from the peasantry (the other 99%) while doing almost none of the work. The only difference here is that the lords have no obligation to protect their peasants. In fact, come war time, they’ll do whatever it takes to keep from fighting.

I look at the examples of communism and I see a much better way of thinking. A classless society, medical care for everyone, a living wage, a standard of living, education for the poor and so forth.

But what gets me is why, why do so many Americans hate communism? What has given them these anticommunist ideals? Why didn’t Americans rally in the streets after Bush turned down Castro’s offer of 1,500 doctors after Katrina? If communism is so bad, why has Venezuela offered us oil so cheaply after the ecological disasters of the last two years?

People tell me “The USSR broke up and Cuba’s citizens are starving; that’s proof that communism doesn’t work” but to me it’s just proof that communism would work if the most powerful nation on the planet wouldn’t refuse trade with anyone who does business with a communist country.

I write this and I’m not sure if I’ll be investigated by the Department of Homeland Insecurity. Has the McCarthyism of the ’50’s and ’60’s died down enough for me to speak freely about counter-capitalist ideals? I strongly doubt it, but I feel I should use my right to free speech and voice my opinion even if it does go against the status-quo. Isn’t that the essence of liberty? Isn’t that the ideals enshrined in the constitution? Is it really treason for people to search for a better way of life if they keep getting screwed by the current system?

There have been many conservatives and republicans who will, after hearing me voice my liberal opinions, call me a commie. Well shit, if wanting progressive change in the government; wanting the government to ensure a living wage; and feeling that everyone has a right to medical care and education rather than just those who can afford it and let the rest die then yeah, I guess I am a pinko leftist commie. If that’s what being a commie means then I’m as red as a fucking traffic light.

I guess I should sum this up. I don’t understand why so many people hate communism after looking around at what has become of a capitalist country.

For those of you who have been following the discussion in the post I made earlier entitled Bob Smith and the Tree Huggers, you’ll note that USMarine has recently stated that the USA was founded for god and also basically told me to leave the country if I didn’t believe in said god.

Damen,

First off if you dont belive in God, why dont you get out of the country that was founded for him, your contridicting your own ideals, obviously you do belive in him why else would you live in America, hmmm how does it go ” I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to The Republic for which it stands, ONE NATION UNDER GOD, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Yes, that’s all well and good but when you look at history without a handy-dandy set of Bible-Noculars in front of your eyes you’ll see things quite differently.

I have already said this before but it bears repeating because I fear that our good friend USMarine will skip over what I said a second time.

For those who may think USMarine is right and the USA is somehow founded for god I want you all to take a moment to direct your attention to the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights.

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Seems kinda cut and dry there. No religion in the government. Kinda hard to miss, what with it being in the first sentence and all. But apparently USMarine missed it, or he just didn’t really know what it meant. Well, that’s fine, but then he went on to say to Jim

Jim,

Sir, how is that claiming superiority over anyone, I am stating that it would be contridictory to say I dont belive in shoes but yet still wear them every day kinda get where im coming from?, no sir they are the ones that need to “own what they say” if you dont belive this country was founded for God then you dont know history or the pledge of allegiance. nor should you live here.

Now this is a shocker to me. USMarine wants to talk about knowing history? Okay, let’s just take a look at history and see if he’s right, shall we?

In the Treaty of Tripoli (which was signed by John Adams) it states in Article 11:

As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.

There it is, a little something from history which states that the United States is not founded on the christian religion. So one must ask how, if the USA is not founded on the christian religion, can it be founded for the christian god? The answer here is, it’s not.

USMarine also uses the Pledge of Allegiance to justify his stance because it has “Under God” in it. Well, he wants to tell us to look at history? He should look at it first because the Pledge of Allegiance did not have Under God in it when it was adopted in 1892.

A quick search on Wikipedia.org will show you what I mean, but I’ll just save you the time.

Addition of the words “Under God”

Docherty’s message began with a comparison of the United States to ancient Sparta. Docherty noted that a traveler to ancient Sparta was amazed by the fact that the Spartans’ national might was not to be found in their walls, their shields, or their weapons, but in their spirit. Likewise, said Docherty, the might of the United States should not be thought of as emanating from their newly developed Atomic weapons, but in their spirit, the “American way of life.” In the remainder of the sermon Docherty sought to define as succinctly as possible the essence of the American spirit and way of life. To do so, Docherty appealed to those two words in Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. According to Docherty, what has made the United States both unique and strong was her sense of being the nation that Lincoln described: a nation “under God.” He took the opportunity to tell a story of a conversation with his children about the Pledge of Allegiance. Docherty was troubled by the fact that it did not include any reference to the deity. Without such reference, Docherty insisted that the Pledge could apply to just about any nation. He felt that the pledge should reflect the American spirit and way of life as defined by Lincoln.

After the service concluded, Rev. Docherty had opportunity to converse with President Eisenhower about the substance of the sermon. The President expressed his enthusiastic concurrence with Docherty’s view, and the very next day, Eisenhower had the wheels turning in Congress to incorporate Docherty’s suggestion into law. On February 8, 1954, Representative Charles Oakman (R-Mich), introduced a bill to that effect.

Senator Homer Ferguson, in his report to the Congress, March 10, 1954, said that “the introduction of this joint resolution was suggested to me by a sermon given recently by the Rev. George M. Docherty, of Washington, D.C., who is pastor of the church at which Lincoln worshipped.” This time Congress concurred with the Oakman-Ferguson resolution, and Eisenhower opted to sign the bill into law appropriately on Flag Day (June 14, 1954).

A little history lesson and you’ll find that until 1954 the words “Under God” were never mentioned.

What many people fail to remember is that despite what the Founding Fathers may have believed in, whether they were religious or not, they set up a secular government, one of the first in history, and they did it because they knew what happens when you mix religion into the government. When religion is allowed to take part in the proceedings of the government, it will open the door to tyranny. But I think I can do better to quote one of the wiser men of our nation.

It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. ~Thomas Jefferson

Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call to her tribunal every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear. ~ Thomas Jefferson

I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition (Christianity) one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology. ~Thomas Jefferson

~Damen

This is a story I wrote not too long ago for another website. I had made a flippant remark that, when it comes to abortion, this one member of that site had said that he’s against it because a fertilized embryo will become a fully-formed human and therefor to him humans are alive from the time of conception. I has responded with “Saplings will become trees, but that doesn’t stop me from mowing over them. He asked if I were equating trees with humans and I corrected him by saying “No, I’m equating sapplings with a fetus.” He responded by saying “Okay, well, that’s the same thing, as far as I’m concerned.”

The story that follows expands on that line of reasoning.

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Bob Smith and the Tree Huggers

One bright and sunny weekend Bob Smith was getting some much needed yardwork done. As he was pushing his mower across the grass, a blond man with a beard and wearing a tie-dye T-shirt stopped in front of Bob Smith’s house.
“STOP!” the blond man yelled; “Turn off that mower!”
Bob was curious, so he did as the man said. Now that he could hear over the engine, he inquired; “What’s wrong?”
“Don’t you see it?” the man asked and pointed to a patch of ground a few feet in front of the mower.
“See what?” All that he could see was grass.
“That tree you’re about to murder!”
Bob Smith peers long and hard at the patch of ground, but he can not see a tree. He is starting to become convinced that this fellow is a loon; “Buddy, there is no tree there.”
The blond man walked over to the patch of earth, pointing as he went and leaned down until his finger was touching a plant barely a half inch high but visible through the grass; “This tree!” he shouted.
Bob Smith, now looking on in disbelief, turned and glanced at his cherry tree. The plant this man (who Bob was now thinking of as a “Hippie”) was an offshoot of the main cherry tree. He had mowed over many of those saplings before because if he didn’t they would take over his yard and kill off his flower beds.
“That’s not a tree,” he says, “It’s just a sapling. That’s a tree,” He jerked his thumb towards the cherry tree a few feet away.
“It makes no difference,” the hippie said sternly, “A tree is a tree from the moment it sprouts.”
Bob Smith was now tired of this conversation and started up the lawnmower once again, “It’s not a tree, it’s a sapling and I don’t have the time or money required to tend to another tree,” and proceeded to run the lawnmower over the sapling, chopping it in half. The hippie gaped at Bob and said “You wait, we’ll put a stop to this!”

The weekend after next, Bob Smith was pulling his lawnmower out of the garage when he saw a group of people sitting on his lawn and holding signs with sayings like “Lawn Care is MURDER!” and “What about the saplings?!” on them.
“What’s going on here?” Bob Smith asked as he approached the group.
“We’re going to stop you from killing this tree,” the blond hippie from two weeks ago told him. He was wearing a handcuff around his wrist and the other end was laying over another cherry tree sapling.
“This is ridiculous,” Bob said and went back inside to call the police and have this group of people dispersed.
“No, this is serious,” A woman wearing a white T-shirt with a picture of a sprout and a leaf and with ‘Let Me Live’ written across her chest; “We’re stopping a murder!”
An hour later, the police arrived and the crowd was forced off Bob Smith’s lawn. The next day, a Sunday, there was a knock on Bob Smith’s door. When he opened it to see who was there, a television camera and a microphone were forced into his face and cameras started flashing so much he was nearly blinded.
“Mr. Smith!” a female voice called out, “How does it feel to commit a murder?”
“Are you going to kill any more trees today?” a male voice called as a second camera was shoved through the doorway. Bob forced the door shut as more and more cameras and microphones were thrust at him. After another call to the police, and another hour of yelling, the reporters were made to leave. That night as he was watching the 6:00 news, Bob was shocked to see his face featured on Weasel News (We Lie, You Believe) with the words ‘Lawncare or Murder?’ under his picture.
“This crime must end!” the Hippie was yelling into a microphone from what looked to be in Bob’s own neighborhood. “How many more trees will cut down before they even have a chance to grow up and know life?”
After the story gained mass attention, more and more hippies started writing their congressmen demanding something be done. There was such a flood of letters that, even though it was being done by only a minority of people, that small group was so vocal that finally a ban on lawncare was enacted to stop the murder of innocent trees.

Five years later, Bob Smith’s lawnmower was rusting in his garage and his yard was now over run by cherry trees. They had choked out his other flowers and turned his once presentable lawn into a grove so thick it was difficult to get to his car. Because the law passed required him to not only allow the trees to grow, he was made to care for them and was now running into debt from the cost of water and fertilizer. Other people were in the same boat as Bob Smith, trees, weeds, and vines choked yards and the roots were destroying roads and sidewalks. Baseball, football, golf, and soccer games were soon abandoned because it was against the law to cut down trees.

But at least the hippies were happy.

Thanks to Frank Mullen for forwarding to us his copy of a letter sent to him by the staff of Barack Obama on behalf of the United States Senator. In this letter, Barack Obama tries to explain why he has defended George W. Bush, and refused to help Senator Russell Feingold advance a resolution of censure.

Obama’s letter boils down to these two points:

1. President Bush broke the law:

“No president should be allowed to knowingly and willing flout our laws, and I believe the President exceeded his authority with his domestic wiretapping program. The justifications offered – that the president possesses inherent presidential authority under Article II, or was granted that authority in the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force — seem to contradict prior precedent and our constitutional design.”

2. I’m not going to do anything about it, even though the Senate has the authority to legally try the President for his crimes, and censure him or remove him from office.

“Ultimately, this debate must be resolved by the courts.”

Senator Obama, I’m going to put this in plain words so that no one can mistake my meaning: You are being a coward.

It is not the place of the courts to decide whether President George W. Bush broke the law. The Constitution of the United States is very clear on this matter. It is the power of the Senate to put the President on trial for high crimes.

But the thing is, Senator Obama, Russ Feingold isn’t even proposing putting George W. Bush on trial. He’s only calling for a censure. A censure doesn’t require a trial, or a finding by the courts. The Senate has the power to censure the President whenver it finds that the President has behaved in a grossly inappropriate manner.

You know this, Senator Obama, but you refuse to act. Shame on you.

Stop being a coward, Senator Obama. Co-sponsor the resolution by Russ Feingold to censure George W. Bush.

Thanks to Irregular Times for printing Russ Feingold’s resolution to censure Bush.

To the Senate Democrats, thanks for nothing. All the promises the Democrats have given us that, if we just compromise here and there, the Democrats will stand up for us, were just plain lies.

George W. Bush does not have the support of the American people. Why won’t the Democrats respond when he breaks the law?

Bush has declared that he has the right to overrule the law whenever he thinks it’s necessary, but that’s not what the Constitution says. What Bush is trying to do is throw the Constitution out the window, and make the power of the Congress irrelevant.

Only Russ Feingold has the decency and strength of moral character to do the right thing and take a firm stand against Bush’s crimes. Only Feingold has the courage to say NO when Bush breaks the law to use the power of the government against the American people.

No other Senator is coming to Feingold’s side. Not one single Democrat.

John Kerry promised to serve us, but he has failed us. Barack Obama made a pretty speech in 2004, but he is failing us in 2006. Hillary Clinton is failing us. Barbara Boxer is failing us.

Every single member of the United States Senate is taking sides with George W. Bush against the American people.

Why? Because they’re afraid. These Democrats are afraid that if they actually stand for something, they might lose an election. And to them, that’s the worst thing of all. They’re happy to let American liberty wither, just so long as they can keep winning elections.

They’re creeps. These Democrats are out and out creeps, and I’m not going to stand for it any longer.

I will work like hell for Russ Feingold for President in 2008, but any other Democrat who failed to stand up when called to duty? They might as well be Republicans, and they will not get my support.

Yesterday, I wrote about the embarassing fawning of Republican John McCain over George W. Bush last weekend, and McCain’s increasingly weird support for the scheme to hand over operations of American ports to a company owned by the government of the United Arab Emirates. John McCain’s recent actions, I concluded, suggest that he may not be a moderate after all.

Then I took a look at Senator McCain’s broader legislative record, and what I found astonished me. In our legislative scorecard of the US Senate, Senator McCain is shown to have supported progressive legislation only 8 percent of the time, while McCain supported right wing legislation 75 percent of the time. That’s not a moderate record. It’s a record of right wing extremism.

It turns out that we’re not the only ones catching on to the fraud behing the John McCain moderate hype. Over at the Down With Tyranny Blog, there’s a good discussion of the issue of McCain’s false moderation, which is then amended by a comment carrying an op-ed column by Paul Krugman published in the New York Times yesterday, coming to the same conclusion. Krugman calls McCain The Right’s Man.

It’s a coincidence that three separate people came to the same conclusion about John Mccain on the same day, but it shouldn’t come as a surprise. Just a tiny bit of digging into the substance of John McCain’s political career makes it clear that McCain is every bit as much the right winger that George W. Bush is.

For that reason, we’ve added a new section to our No Republicans for President in 2008 political shop. It’s called, simply, Not John McCain for President in 2008. We’ve just started adding to our selection there this morning, but it’s growing fast, so check back soon for more anti-McCain items.