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Racism in America & The Nobel

         It's there, still not all that disguised, and it's as ugly ever. Last November that was to have been wiped off the pages of history, or so it seems, but it has grown into a festering sore that is both shameful and provides a glimpse of the hatred still out there.

         The American President was given the Nobel Prize for Peace . One would think that quite an honour, to the man, certainly to the office, and to the nation. Instead we see hate. It's gone to far, and it's getting more mean spirited by the day. No matter how often the "nattering nabobs of negativity" cry Race as if it might be havoc, he still was awarded the Prize.

       Deal with it people, its pathetic that in this century, racism is tolerated, and says much about my fellow citizens, most negative.

       POTUS is a male born in the state of Hawaii, to a white mother and black father. He was the cool guy in school, called Barry by his classmates, smart as a whip, and said to be a good basketball player He became a lawyer, entered politics, and the rest is history.  No matter what the hue and cry might be, colour did not define the man. His character defines him. Just deal with it.

      The President is black, that much is obvious, but you don't get do overs based on colour. He is your President, and perhaps you should show the man the respect deserves.

Fla. GOP: Obama to spread socialism in schools ( and I'm the Easter Bunny )

AP: 3 August 2009
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. —

Florida's Republican Party chairman is objecting to President Barack Obama's plans to give a back-to-school address next week, saying Obama's real motive is to indoctrinate students with his "socialist ideology."

It points out the parents of those students belong back in the classroom, if only to learn what socialism is, and what the other political jargon they blithely toss about actually mean. Until then they remain garden variety racists, who likely couldn't tell you what Brown v. Board of Education actually means, nor do they care, they just want an all white country and will go to ludicrous length's to make it happen.

This should come under the heading " They should know better " or "yet another Glen Beck fan defends racism".

Obama's Socialist Policies Cripple America
The Daily Targum
Serving the Rutgers Community Since 1869
> Opinions
By Jimmy Winters
Published: Thursday, September 3, 2009
Updated: Thursday, September 3, 2009

"The United States of America has come to a significant turning point, and what happens in this president’s term, without any doubt, has the potential to change the very fiber of the land of the free. President Barack Obama’s administration and Congress are stepping up their secular progressive efforts — government-owned corporations, government-owned health care, redistribution of wealth, increased taxes, more social programs, etc. — with the ultimate goal of terminating this capitalist society and establishing a socialistic state. They would like nothing more than to empower the government to coddle each and every one of its citizens from birth to death, taking away innate initiative and incentive to work. Those are definite. The only variable is the people; only you have the power to make sure this crippling end never comes about."
Link to above opinion

Reverse Bank Robbery

Monday 31 August 2009
by: Dean Baker
for: The Guardian UK

No wonder America's banks are making profits again: the US government is bribing them to borrow its own money.

Most of us work for a living, the rest are bankers. These days the news is filled with great tales about how America's banks are coming back.

Even that giant corpse Citigroup is showing signs of life. Its stock is now selling for more than five times the lows it hit earlier this year. Its market capitalization is up near $57 billion, a bit more than the $45 billion that the government lent them through the Troubled Assets Relief Program, or TARP. Some are even expecting that the government will make a profit on its Citigroup investment.

Torture, Gitmo and Who Knew What, and When

The 13 Bush Officials Who Made Torture Possible
By Marcy Wheeler, Salon. Posted May 22, 2009.

The Bush administration's Torture 13. They authorized it, they decided how to implement it, and they crafted the legal fig leaf to justify it.

Originally published on Monday, May 18, 2009 by Salon.com

On April 16, the Obama administration released four memos that were used to authorize torture in interrogations during the Bush administration. When President Obama released the memos, he said, "It is our intention to assure those who carried out their duties relying in good faith upon legal advice from the Department of Justice that they will not be subject to prosecution."Between 9/11 and the end of 2002, the Torture 13 decided to torture, then reverse-engineered the techniques, and then crafted the legal cover. Here's who they are and what they did.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Just when you think that Administration could go no lower, along comes a lower rung, first the denials, and the snarkinest politician in recent memory goes on record .... Was he only following orders ? Who issued the orders , and why did he seem to go so far as ordering torture ?

see washington note

Syrians blame U.S. in deadly blast on Iraq border

Published: October 26, 2008

BAGHDAD: An explosion on Sunday killed nine construction workers and wounded 19 others near the border of Iraq and Syria, the police in Anbar Province said.

Local witnesses said they believed the blast was caused by American shelling, but Major General Tariq al-Youssef, the provincial police chief in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar, which borders Syria, said that could not be confirmed.

When They Pick Up the Phone at 3 AM, What Will They Say? - CounterPunch Diary

When They Pick Up the Phone at 3 AM, What Will They Say?
Alexander Cockburn
Weekend Edition
March 29 / 30, 2008

America's tragedy is that we have three neoliberals left in the presidential race, at a time when, as Martin Wolf correctly pointed out in Wednesday's Financial Times, neo-liberalism has collapsed. The bailout by the Fed of Bear Stearns sounded the death knell for 30 years of deregulation.

How have McCain, Clinton and Obama adjusted to the new facts of life, at a moment when the entire system is still tottering?

The Republican, John McCain, has confirmed his own low estimates of his grasp of economic policy by announcing that he is opposed to any strengthening of financial regulation to prevent the shenanigans that caused the subprime and "securitization" catastrophes which have provoked the current credit crisis. At a moment when the costs of federal bailout and the incoming recession are certain to require a big increase in the US government deficit, he wants to cut spending.

The remainder of the remainder of article is here LINK

Literary Frauds Strike Again ... and Again

By John Dolan,
AlterNet.
Posted March 8, 2008.

A Valley Girl masquerades as an L.A. gangster and a Catholic woman says she's a Jew raised by wolves. Why do people keep falling for such frauds?

Say you meet me at a party and I tell you that when I was 7 years old, I killed a full-grown military officer, then ran off and was nurtured by a pack of wolves. Would you believe me or begin edging away quietly, keeping the snack table between us at all times?

Or say I'm a healthy-looking, articulate young white woman, and I tell you I used to work for the Bloods in L.A. -- a full-time gun-strapped gangbanger. Would you believe me or laugh in my unbruised, orthodontured face?

*** From the highly lauded publications, this is an inexcusable as it would be in a High School newspaper. No High School paper I've heard of hasn't an editor who would have published, then fact checked.
There is no reason whatsoever for journalistic travesties, much less two bit cons, passing themselves off as a gangbanger in LA, while living in the suburbs, who also claims to be an author. And that's all it is, a travesty in the form of a lie following lie.
Where did the line between truth and fantasy blur ? Why does anyone fall for this ... from editors, publishers, and then on down the line? Is it sloppiness, an intellectual deficit, or merely easier. I rauther suspect the later.

Limbaugh Trying to Tear GOP Apart

By Eric Boehlert,
Media Matters for America
Posted February 15, 2008

Hey, GOP, that's quite a Noise Machine you've constructed. Now good luck trying to dismantle it.

Rush Limbaugh, the marauding Frankenstein's monster of the Republican Party, is on the loose again, causing all kinds of political damage with his signature off-balance swings. But as has become his custom recently, the pain from Limbaugh's rampage is being felt by his creators -- his enablers -- inside the GOP.

*******
There's really nothing to add, other than to remind the GOP, "Hey guy's, you created him."

Army Blocks Public's Access to Documents in Web-Based Library - washingtonpost.com

"Army Blocks Public's Access to Documents in Web-Based Library

By Christopher Lee

Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 21, 2008; Page A13

The Army has shut down public access to the largest online collection of its doctrinal publications, a move criticized by open-government advocates as unnecessary secrecy by a runaway bureaucracy.

Army officials moved the Reimer Digital Library behind a password-protected firewall on Feb. 6, restricting access to an electronic trove that is popular with researchers for its wealth of field and technical manuals and documents on military operations, education, training and technology. All are unclassified, and most already are approved for public release.

Castro Resigns

"Havana (AP) -
Fidel Castro, ailing and 81, announced Tuesday he was resigning as Cuba's president, ending a half-century of autocratic rule which made him an icon in the world of communism and a relentless opponent of U.S. policy around the globe."

How many US Administration have proclaimed an end to the Embargo, when Castro steps down? It would seem as if the United States of America hasn't the Cajones to so much as keep it's word. Castro has indeed stepped down, yet the Embargo remains, punishing only the Cuban people.

"President Bush said he hopes the resignation signals the beginning of a democratic transition, though he doubted that would come about under the rule of another Castro."

The man shouldn't be casting stones in his house of glass, of posturing as a freedom loving man, when he was the first President anointed by the Supreme Court, top heavy with Republicans.

"Castro temporarily ceded his powers to his brother on July 31, 2006, when he announced that he had undergone intestinal surgery. Since then, he has not been seen in public, appearing only sporadically in official photographs and videotapes and publishing dense essays about mostly international themes as his younger brother consolidated his rule."

Call it Remembrance of Things Past colliding with present day. The Bush brothers are nothing more than bad news, who've forgotten the lessons taught by the Kennedy brother's. Guess that's easier than stepping up to the plate, and keeping their word.

Energy around the Globe:Wilson Quarterly

Wilson Quarterly
Energy around the Globe
Cover story, Centerpoint,
February 2008

Policymakers across the globe confront the challenges of balancing energy, economic, and environmental interests. The cost, availability, and sustainability of energy resonate on every level, from nation to industry to individual.

Breaking the Drug Taboo: Group of Traumatized Veterans Get Experimental Ecstasy Treatment

By Scott Thill,
AlterNet.
Posted February 11, 2008.
An experimental study that treats PTSD veterans with the drug MDMA could make life after war a lot more livable.

Enter the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), and its currently funded trials using 3,4-methylenedioxy-N-methamphetamine -- otherwise known as MDMA, or ecstasy -- to treat post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Although the U.S. Army had carried out lethal dose studies of MDMA back in the 1950s, work which was not classified until the close of the 1960s.....

--------------------------
That should work ... Why not add LSD to the list of drugs to try in those with PTSD? Qualude .. Mescaline .. there are so many other drugs to try .

The MDMA Homepage

LSD and Psilocybin Research

LSD Studies With Autistic Children

Revisiting Issue, U.N. Chief Clarifies Death-Penalty Stance

By Warren Hoge
Published: January 12, 2007

United Nations, Jan. 11 — Ban Ki-moon, the new secretary general, sought Thursday to change the impression he left in his first public utterance as United Nations head last week about his position on the death penalty.

U.S. Seeking Execution for 6 in Sept. 11 Case

By William Glaberson
Published: February 11, 2008

Military prosecutors have decided to seek the death penalty for
six Guantánamo detainees who are to be charged with central roles in the Sept. 11 terror attacks, government officials who have been briefed on the charges said Sunday.

The officials said the charges would be announced at the Pentagon as soon as Monday and were likely to include numerous war-crimes charges against the six men, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the former Qaeda operations chief who has described himself as the mastermind of the attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people.

Bush Keeps War Cost Under Wraps

By Maya Schenwar
t r u t h o u t | Report
Friday 08 February 2008

President Bush's 2009 federal budget, released Monday, does not declare how much funding the administration expects to need for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan next year. The omission appears to break a law that requires the inclusion of the year's total war funds in the annual budget plan.

The administration's budget includes an "emergency allowance" of $70 billion, but states that more money will be requested once the war's "specific needs" are determined.

Starting with just a partial sum may leave the door open for the largest war price tag yet, according to Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell, who said at a press conference last week that the $70 billion would "handle much of the first quarter of '09." A year of such "quarters" would total $280 billion - almost two times the president's original war request for 2008

Blackwater's Blood Money; How Much for a Dead Son?

By Aadel Faiq and Brian Ross
ABC News
Friday 08 February 2008

Blackwater works behind the scenes to settle with survivors and victims' families of the September 16 shooting.

The father of a 9-year-old Iraqi boy killed by Blackwater security guards says the company has offered to build a monument and make an unspecified cash payment to compensate him for the death of his son, Ali.

The boy was one of 17 civilians killed when Blackwater security guards, escorting a diplomatic convoy, opened fire at Baghdad's Nisour square Sept. 16.

While a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C. investigates the deaths, Blackwater has been operating behind the scenes in Iraq to settle with the survivors and families of the dead.

Bhutto's Party Disputes Scotland Yard Report on Her Death

By Carlotta Gall
The New York Times
Saturday 09 February 2008

Karachi, Pakistan - The party of Benazir Bhutto insisted Friday that she was killed by gunfire, despite a report by British investigators that supported the government's view that she was killed when the force of a suicide blast caused her to strike her head.

Bush Goes After FOIA

Posted by Liliana Segura,
AlterNet at 5:28 AM on February 7, 2008.

The President's attack on the Freedom of Information Act is his latest attempt to preserve state secrecy.

Remember that time the Office of Drug Control Policy told a student that it would take 200 years to file his FOIA request?

"Please note that the General Counsel is predisposed," the letter read. "Consequently, we must enlarge to June 22, 2207 the time provided for his final determination." (Or as Wonkette put it: "ODCP Promises to Get Back to You in the Far Future, If Man is Still Alive.")

AlterNet: Health and Wellness: Only One Candidate Can Achieve Universal Health Coverage

By Paul Krugman,
The New York Times.
Posted February 7, 2008.

Hillary's plan would insure nearly twice as many people as Obama's.

The principal policy division between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama involves health care. It's a division that can seem technical and obscure -- and I've read many assertions that only the most wonkish care about the fine print of their proposals.

The principal policy division between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama involves health care. It's a division that can seem technical and obscure -- and I've read many assertions that only the most wonkish care about the fine print of their proposals.

But as I've tried to explain in previous columns, there really is a big difference between the candidates' approaches. And new research, just released, confirms what I've been saying: the difference between the plans could well be the difference between achieving universal health coverage -- a key progressive goal -- and falling far short.

Bombs Away ! There Goes the Village

Bombs Away Over Iraq
By Tom Engelhardt,
Tomdispatch.com.
Posted February 4, 2008.

The U.S. recently dropped 100,000 pounds of bombs on a small village in Iraq to combat 'al-Qaeda' -- part of the growing air war in Iraq.

UK denies deal with Taliban: Or The Working Definition of "Silly Buggers"

UK denies deal with Taliban
Web posted at: 2/5/2008 7:6:17
Source ::: AFP

LONDON • Britain said yesterday it was not "engaged" with the Taliban, after a report that relations between London and Kabul have soured due to a secret British plan to train former Taliban fighters.

In a report from the Afghan capital, the Financial Times said senior figures in President Hamid Karzai's government were furious at the proposal to set up a military training camp for 2,000 Taliban militants who wanted to switch sides.

Documents detailing the plan were allegedly unearthed when two diplomats, one from the United Nations and another from the European Union, were detained in southern Afghanistan in December last year and later expelled.

Bhutto Willed Husband as Successor, Was Warned

Web posted at: 2/6/2008 1:59:17
Source ::: AFP
Naudero, Pakistan
The party of slain Pakistani opposition leader Benazir Bhutto released her will to the public yesterday to prove that it names her husband as her political heir.

"I would like my husband Asif Ali Zardari to lead you in this interim period until you and he decide what is best. I say this because he is a man of courage and honour," said the will, unveiled at the Bhutto home in southern Pakistan."

"I fear for the future of Pakistan. Please continue the fight against extremism, dictatorship, poverty and ignorance," it says.

The Pakistani government and the United States Central Intelligence Agency have blamed Baitullah Mehsud, an Al Qaeda-linked tribal warlord, for Bhutto's murder in a gun and suicide bomb attack.

In a posthumously published autobiography, Bhutto says she was informed that groups including Mehsud's and another led by a son of Osama bin Laden were targeting her.
--------------------------------------------------------------

Zardari not in running to be PM, says aide
Web posted at: 2/5/2008 6:48:57
Source ::: Internews
Karachi
• The widower of slain former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and co-chairman of Pakistan Peoples Party, Asif Ali Zardari, will not hold the post of prime minister if his party wins a majority in this month's parliamentary elections and forms the government.

Bhutto was warned of threat
Web posted at: 2/5/2008 6:48:2
Source ::: AP

London •
In an autobiography being published after her assassination, Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto says she was warned that four suicide bomber squads would try to kill her, one led by Osama bin Laden's 16-year-old son.

The People vs. Thomas A. Swift : Muckracker Report

February 4, 2008 – There has been no shortage of news coverage lately pertaining to police deployment of Tasers. Headlines such as Hearing Impaired Man Tasered by Police[1], Healthy Man Dead After Trooper Tasering[2], the infuriating Tasered at his home: the Shawn Hicks story[3], and the infamous Don’t Taser me Bro video have ignited much unwelcome scrutiny for the proponents and manufacturers of these devices.

It is worth noting that Taser is to a conducted energy device (CED) want Kleenex is to facial tissue. It’s a brand name. It is also an acronym for ‘Thomas A. Swift’s Electronic Rifle’. Invented in 1969 by Jack Cover, it was named after the science fiction teenage adventurer, explorer, and inventor character - Thomas Swift. These devices are also known as conducted electrical weapons (CEW), electro-muscular disruption technology (EMDT), or electronic impulse devices (EID).

A Taser is not considered a firearm because it does not use black powder as a propellant.

Lawlessness grips Kenyan countryside

By Jeffrey Gettleman
Published: February 2, 2008
Nandi Hills , Kenya:

The road from Eldoret to Kericho used to be one of the prettiest drives in Kenya, a ribbon of asphalt threading through lush tea farms, bushy sugar cane and green humpbacked hills. Now it is a gantlet of machete-wielding teenagers, some chewing stalks of sugar cane, others stumbling drunk.

On Friday there were no fewer than 20 checkpoints in the span of 100 miles, and at each barricade - a downed telephone pole, a gnarled tree stump - mobs of rowdy young men jumped in front of cars, yanked at door handles and pulled out knives.

Their actions did not seem to be motivated by ethnic tension, like much of the violence that has killed more than 800 people in Kenya since a flawed election in December.

It was much simpler than that.

AlterNet: Rights and Liberties: Is a Small Island in the Indian Ocean Holding Prisoners in the War on Terror?

"Is a Small Island in the Indian Ocean Holding Prisoners in the War on Terror?

By Robert Verkaik, The Independent UK. Posted February 2, 2008.

The expulsion of the people of Diego Garcia was covered up for years. Now officials block an investigation of its role in extraordinary rendition.
MPs and human rights group have accused ministers of a cover-up over government knowledge of rendition flights and the use of British military bases to hold suspects after the United States launched its war on terror more than six years ago.

Is a Small Island in the Indian Ocean Holding Prisoners in the War on Terror?

By Robert Verkaik,
The Independent UK.
Posted February 2, 2008.

The expulsion of the people of Diego Garcia was covered up for years. Now officials block an investigation of its role in extraordinary rendition.

MPs and human rights group have accused ministers of a cover-up over government knowledge of rendition flights and the use of British military bases to hold suspects after the United States launched its war on terror more than six years ago.

AlterNet: MediaCulture: Fox News Is in for a Very Rough 2008

"Fox News Is in for a Very Rough 2008

By Eric Boehlert, Media Matters for America. Posted January 30, 2008.

From losing the election ratings race to CNN, to watching its favored son Rudy Giuliani fizzle in the primaries, Fox News is in for a bad year.
My guess is that Fox News guru Roger Ailes has been reaching for the Tums more often than usual early in the New Year, and there are lots of reasons for the hovering angst.
Let's take an extended multiple choice quiz. Right now, which of the following topics is likely causing the discomfort inside Ailes' Fox News empire? "
Link

Kenya’s Problem Goes Beyond Ethnicity and Elections:IPS

"POLITICS: Kenya’s Problem Goes Beyond Ethnicity and Elections
Analysis by Najum Mushtaq

Nairobi, Kenya
There is more to Kenya’s post-election violence than a bungled vote count and so-called tribal rivalries. As protests degenerate into organised ethnic violence in Rift Valley towns and countryside, the root-cause of the unrest lies elsewhere."
"We must tackle the fundamental issues underlying the disturbances -- like equitable distribution of resources -- or else we will be back here again after three or four years," former U.N. chief Kofi Annan told journalists in Nairobi’s Serena Hotel Sunday, after talking to survivors of the violence which has claimed over 1,000 lives and displaced some 250,000 people since the December election. "
Link

AlterNet: Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace: The Stimulus Swindle

"The Stimulus Swindle
By David Sirota, Creators Syndicate. Posted January 25, 2008.

Leading figures of both parties seem eager to help limit the debate over 'stimulus' and make the final package a corporate goodie bag.
"Stimulus" -- you've probably heard this nebulous, scientific-sounding word this week. Every politician suddenly wants economic "stimulus," and wants you to think this "stimulus" is unequivocally good."

AlterNet: Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace: Is the Bush Administration Trying to Take Down Fannie Mae?

"Is the Bush Administration Trying to Take Down Fannie Mae?
By Scott Thill,
AlterNet.
Posted January 28, 2008.

The government-backed lender is embroiled in a murky battle."

My best guess is yes.