Election determines fate of nation
------------------------------------------------------------

Published in the Daily Record on Oct. 6

By Mathew Manweller


In that this will be my last column before the presidential election, there will be no sarcasm, no attempts at witty repartee. The topic is too serious, and the stakes are too high.

This November we will vote in the only election during our lifetime that will truly matter. Because America is at a once-in-a-generation crossroads, more than an election hangs in the balance. Down one path lies retreat, abdication and a reign of ambivalence.

Down the other lies a nation that is aware of it's past and accepts the daunting obligation its future demands. If we choose poorly, the consequences will echo through the next 50 years of history. If we, in a spasm of frustration, turn out the current occupant of the White House, the message to the world and ourselves will be two-fold. First, we will reject the notion that America can do big things. Once a nation that tamed a frontier, stood down the Nazis and stood upon the moon, we will announce to the world that bringing democracy to the Middle East is too big of a task for us. But more significantly, we will signal to future presidents that as voters, we are unwilling to tackle difficult challenges, preferring caution to boldness, embracing the mediocrity that has characterized other civilizations.

The defeat of President Bush will send a chilling message to future presidents who may need to make difficult, yet unpopular decisions. America has always been a nation that rises to the demands of history regardless of the costs or appeal. If we turn away from that legacy, we turn away from whom we are.

Second, we inform every terrorist organization on the globe that the lesson of Somalia was well-learned. In Somalia we showed terrorists that you don't need to defeat America on the battlefield when you can defeat them in the newsroom. They learned that a wounded America can become a defeated America. Twenty-four-hour news stations and daily tracing polls will do the heavy lifting, turning a cut into a fatal blow. Except that Iraq is Somalia times 10. The election of John Kerry will serve notice to every terrorist in every cave that the soft underbelly of American power is the timidity of American voters. Terrorists will know that a steady stream of grisly photos for CNN is all you need to break the will of the American people. Our own self-doubt will take it from there. Bin Laden will recognize that he can topple any American administration without setting foot on the homeland.

It is said that America's W.W.II generation is its 'greatest generation'. But my greatest fear is that it will become known as America's 'last generation.' Born in the bleakness of the Great depression and hardened in the fire of W.W. II, they may be the last American generation that understands the meaning of duty, honor and sacrifice. It is difficult to admit, but I know these terms are spoken with only hollow detachment by many (but not all) in my generation. Too many citizens today mistake 'living in America' as 'being an American.' But America has always been more of an idea than a place. When you sign on, you do more than buy real estate. You accept a set of values and responsibilities.

This November, my generation, which has been absent too long, must grasp the obligation that comes with being an American, or fade into the oblivion they may deserve. I believe that 100 years from now historians will look back at the election of 2004 and see it as the decisive election of our century. Depending on the outcome, they will describe it as the moment America joined the ranks of ordinary nations; or they will describe it as the moment the prodigal sons and daughters of the greatest generation accepted their burden as caretakers of the City on the Hill."

Mathew Manweller is a Central Washington University political science professor

Kerry's false plan for peace
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October 22, 2004


WASHINGTON -- The centerpiece of John Kerry's foreign policy is to rebuild our alliances so the world will come to our help, especially in Iraq. He repeats this endlessly because it is the only foreign policy idea he has to offer. The problem for Kerry is that he cannot explain just how he proposes to do this.

The mere appearance of a Europhilic fresh face is unlikely to so thrill the allies that French troops will start marching down the streets of Baghdad. Therefore, you can believe that Kerry is just being cynical in pledging to bring in the allies, knowing that he has no way of doing it. Or you can believe, as I do, that he means it.

He really does want to end America's isolation. And he has an idea how to do it. For understandable reasons, however, he will not explain how on the eve of an election.

Think about it: What do the Europeans and the Arab states endlessly rail about in the Middle East? What (outside Iraq) is the area of most friction with U.S. policy? What single issue most isolates America from the overwhelming majority of countries at the United Nations?

The answer is obvious: Israel.

In what currency, therefore, would we pay the rest of the world in exchange for their support in places like Iraq? The answer is obvious: giving in to them on Israel.

No Democrat will say that openly. But anyone familiar with the code words of Middle East diplomacy can read between the lines. Read what former Clinton national security adviser Sandy Berger said in ``Foreign Policy for a Democratic President,'' a manifesto written while he was a senior foreign policy adviser to Kerry.

``As part of a new bargain with our allies, the United States must re-engage in ... ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. ... As we re-engage in the peace process and rebuild frayed ties with our allies, what should a Democratic president ask of our allies in return? First and foremost, we should ask for a real commitment of troops and money to Afghanistan and Iraq.''

So in a ``new bargain with our allies'' America ``re-engages'' in the ``peace process'' in return for troops and money in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Do not be fooled by the euphemism ``peace process.'' We know what ``peace process" meant during the eight years Berger served in the Clinton White House -- a White House to which Yasser Arafat was invited more often than any leader on the planet. It meant believing Arafat's deceptions about peace while letting him get away with the most virulent incitement to and unrelenting support of terrorism. It meant constant pressure on Israel to make one territorial concession after another -- in return for nothing. Worse than nothing: Arafat ultimately launched a vicious terror war that killed a thousand Israeli innocents.

``Re-engage in the peace process'' is precisely what the Europeans, the Russians and the United Nations have been pressuring the United States to do for years. Do you believe any of them have Israel's safety at heart? They would sell out Israel in an instant, and they are pressuring America to do precisely that.

Why are they so upset with Bush's Israeli policy? After all, isn't Bush the first president ever to commit the United States to an independent Palestinian state? Bush's sin is that he also insists the Palestinians genuinely accept Israel and replace the corrupt, dictatorial terrorist leadership of Yasser Arafat.

To re-engage in a ``peace process'' while the violence continues and while Arafat is in charge is to undo the Bush Middle East policy. That policy -- isolating Arafat, supporting Israel's right to defend itself both by attacking the terror infrastructure and by building a defensive fence -- has succeeded in defeating the intifada and producing an astonishing 84 percent reduction in innocent Israeli casualties.

John Kerry says he wants to ``rejoin the community of nations.'' There is no issue on which the United States more fails the global test of international consensus than Israel. Last July, the General Assembly declared Israel's defensive fence illegal by a vote of 150-6. In defending Israel, America stood almost alone.

You want to appease the ``international community''? Sacrifice Israel. Gradually, of course, and always under the guise of ``peace." Apply relentless pressure on Israel to make concessions to a Palestinian leadership that has proved (at Camp David 2000) it will never make peace.


©2004 Washington Post Writers Group

RELIGION and how it is being used to deceive the masses Covenant,
Sword & Arm of the Lord It was one of several doomsday, survivalist
cults in America. Even before the days of Jesse James, groups like
these hid out in the Arkansas-Missouri Ozarks & Ouachitas. Geography
played the central inducement for locating in thickly forested back
country. DOOMSDAY PROPHECIES The Ozarks are honeycombed with
thousands of caves. The rough terrain, coupled with a great climate
and excellent growing season, make it most attractive for outlaws and
cults. Water is plentiful; springs pop up out of the ground every
few feet. Some of the spring water is still fit to drink; delicious
in fact. So, cults gravitate toward Arkansas and Missouri. Cults were
prominent throughout history, not unique to any period. Something
about human nature gives birth to far-fetched conceptions about the
universe, existence and the future. Cults However, for a cult to
grip an entire nation, especially the world's superpower of the 21st
century, is incredible. Unfortunately, that's where we are, folk.
The Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord formed its own village which
was named "Silhouette City" -- near Harrison, Arkansas. The
Covenant, Sword, and Arm of the Lord They were anti-Semitic
doomsdayers who believed its militia could forestall the advance of
evil, global forces controlled by infidel Jews. Do you see how Osama
bin Laden's group is similar? Hate for Jews is common -- from Nazis
to Al Qaeda to American survivalists. Al Qaeda is like all other
cults past and present. For it doesn't matter the religious
mainstream base; cults revolve around a leader which casts the
outside world as "evil." Bush and BinLaden are the same in this
regard. The "us vs. them" view of the world is the foundation of all
false doctrine, and their leaders become the lone "voice of God."
Bush's claim four days ago to the Amish community, "God speaks
through me" is most alarming. AmeriVoice His message speaks
of "CULT" rather than sound reasoning. Zionism is also a false
doctrine, although opposite in poles. It revolves around the premise
that Jews are "God's only chosen" and therefore all others are
subhuman. The neocons who designed the war against Iraq and
subsequent entanglements are followers, for the most part, of the
Zionism cult. Timothy McVeigh was consumed with hate for the Jews.
Where do you think he got his start? McVeigh associated with a
survivalist cult on the Arkansas-Oklahoma border 30 miles from
Fayetteville, my home. It was called "Elohim City" and got its start
from "Covenant, Sword and Arm of the Lord." Elohim City --
Extremism in America You may ask, "Why didn't the FBI investigate the
group more fully?" Well, same reason the 24 Bin Ladens were allowed
to fly out of the US after 9/11 without questioning. In Mena,
Arkansas, another cult claimed to have heard from God. The command?
Not to step foot out of the farmhouse until "raptured" at the Second
Coming of Christ. Disciples stockpiled what they believed were
essential supplies to last -- for they were assured by their cleric
Jesus was soon to appear. Their children were jerked out of school;
that's what brought the law down on them. Most committed suicide.
Cult members tend to follow their leader to their deaths. As the
cult leader's mind deteriorates, he/she gravitates toward premature
death -- his/her own. Taking one's own life is one matter, but a
cultist sees his life as inclusive of the followers. He "owns"
them. Thus, 914 followers of Jim Jones downed lethal Kool-Aid at
their prophet's command. Hitler committed suicide as he saw his
nation fall, but he took others with him. The Hale-Bop Heaven's Gate
cult in California ended the same as others. When Bush uses the
possessive "MY country," he means it. It is cult-like. Not like
singing "My country tis of Thee." How many statements can you recite
where he used the strong possessive to describe America? Cult leaders
also feel they exclusively have the power to make decisions over life
and death matters. They DECIDE who is guilty and who is not. The
legal system is just an obstruction. Congress just gets in the way.
Why? Because Bush hears directly from God what's right or wrong,
good or evil, innocent or guilty. Bush ignoring the constitutional
checks and balances puts him into another class: The cult president.
Some call it the "Messianic Complex." GW Bush first claimed that God
spoke to him directly while sitting in his mother's church in
Houston -- informing him that he was called to be the next
president. Don Evans (Commerce Secretary and close friend) confirms
the report in USA TODAY. Bush has repeated the claim on several
occasions. Bush feels he's on a "MISSION from God" to eradicate
dictatorships all over the world, and has so stated. Only the
mentally blind cannot see; dumbed-down America cannot remember. Click
here: 'On a Mission From God': The Religious Right and the Emerging
American Theocracy - Maureen Farrell at BuzzFlash.co According to
Newsweek, "As he prepared to run, in 1999, Bush assembled leading
pastors at the governor's mansion for a 'laying-on of hands,' and
told them he'd been 'called' to seek higher office." And as Bob
Woodward wrote in BUSH AT WAR: "The President was casting his mission
and that of the country in the grand vision of God's Master Plan,"
wherein Bush promised, in the President's own words, "to export death
and violence to the four corners of the earth in defense of this
great country and rid the world of evil." "Bush's flirtation with End
Times rhetoric makes some suspect that he actually perceives himself
as God's instrument," Gene Lyons noted, and his sentiment was echoed
in former Nixon aide Charles Colson's observation that, "Some wonder
if the president might be influenced by evangelical teachings that
envision an end-of-the-world battle between Israel and its enemies.
It would be dangerous for a president to take a particular theology
like that and apply it to world events." Bush's Call to Prayer -
Christianity Today Magazine George W. Bush told a Houston, Texas,
Baptist church that he believed that he had been chosen by God to be
a good steward of the nation. In San Antonio, Texas, Alamo City
Christian Fellowship pastor David Walker says that as a group of
local church leaders prayed over George W. Bush they felt a divine
presence anointing the occasion. "We felt God's presence and that He
might do something for the nation," he recalls. As Bishop Ray rode
the bus up the coast of the Florida political battlefields, he summed
up what many evangelical leaders today are feeling, regardless of
political perspective: "I knew that Bush has been placed here by the
sovereignty of God. Either he has turned his heart to God or God
knows his heart will turn. First, I would advise him to unashamedly
indicate that he seeks the nation to pray for our direction." So you
see, my friends, we live in probably the most dangerous time in U.S.
history. Our nation has been mesmerized by a cult leader who is
determined to fulfill his Messianic mission to initiate wars without
end in the name of God. The only thing we can do effectively is
spread the word. America is under the spell of false doctrine. It
is NOT a Christian doctrine, but has all the markings of anti-
Christian. Bush's assertions are in direct conflict with Jesus'
teachings. We are one huge Hale-Bop cult, an enlarged Branch Davidian
Compound, one collective Covenant, Sword & Arm of the Lord, one giant
Jonestown. Wake up, America! CAPTAIN'S LOG, Startdate 7.7.04 "I'm so
glad we got a president that prays!" Last night I learned of a
friend's son visiting acquaintances down at Dallas this week. They
were in a children's hospital where the acquaintance is an intern.
Somehow the conversation got around to Michael's movie, and the Texas
acquaintance abruptly turned around and asked, "But aren't you glad
we've got a president in the White House who prays to God before
making decisions?" My friend's son said he about gagged. Haven't
other presidents prayed? On the other hand, the difference is what
Ron Reagan, Jr., pointed out in his father's eulogy: "True leaders
don't wear their religion on their sleeves." God bless Ron Reagan,
Jr.! Christ even taught against making a show of "godliness." He
advised praying in private, in the secret of your closets, so prayer
would mean something and not just a "photo-op." Pharisees made a
display of religiosity. Christians of the early Church didn't,
because they followed the teachings of Jesus Christ. Big
difference. "And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the
hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in synagogues and in
the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I
say unto you, they have their reward." "But thou, when thou prayest,
enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy
Father which is in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret shall
reward thee openly." Matthew 5:5-6 (words of Jesus Christ) Bushoviks
act like their man is the first to ever honor God. No, he's the
first to ever DISHONOR Him. He's made a mockery of Christianity;
he's violated Christ's teachings which warn of piety and self-
righteousness. He's invoked the name of "God" at every opportunity;
thus he's committed sacrilege. Jesus taught "inclusiveness." Bush
teaches "exclusiveness." Jesus taught "grace." Bush
promotes "condemnation" and "wrath" by using the world's strongest
military to punish whomever he judges "evildoers." He's taken on
the mantle of supreme judge — where life and death matters are solely
in his hands. Do you recall the execution of Carla Faye Tucker?
Remember Bush laughing after she was executed, then mocking her?
Ronald Reagan, Jr., spoke of George Bush's behavior: Click here:
Interview: Reagan On Bush - Ron Reagan, Jr - Interview RR: We reveal
ourselves in small moments, and one of those small moments that
didn't get nearly the play it should have was the Carla Faye Tucker
incident. Carla Faye Tucker had committed a terrible murder when she
was a much younger woman and crack-addicted and her boyfriend was
involved in it; he got a life sentence, and she ended up on death row
in Texas. While on death row she converted to Christianity, she was
born-again, and all accounts are that she turned her life around, and
was doing good works in prison like teaching and counseling people.
She asked to meet with George W. Bush before she was executed, not to
plead for her life, she said, but to discuss with him issues related
to the death penalty. He understandably refused to meet with her. The
execution went ahead. And when Bush was asked by the conservative
journalist Tucker Carlson shortly thereafter what he thought Carla
Faye Tucker might have said to him in that meeting had it taken
place, he put on a squeaky little voice and said, "Please don't kill
me! Please don't kill me!" Now, it takes a special kind of guy to
ridicule a woman he's just put to death. If that doesn't demonstrate
a lack of gravitas, as well as a lack of dignity and self-respect, I
don't know what does. This is a man who had already spent some years
now as the governor of the state, had presided over executions
before, and should've realized that putting somebody to death is
serious business, not an occasion for frat-boy humor. So--experience,
aptitude, temperament: I think Bush falls short in all three. The
look on Bush's face as he mocked her! "`Please,' Bush whimpers, his
lips pursed in mock desperation, `don't kill me.'" -Talk Magazine,
Sept. 1999

I only see opposite stances between George and Jesus. George is for
wars; Jesus is for peace. George is for locking people up; Jesus is
for setting them free. George is for making a show of religion;
Jesus is for making it sacred, just between the person and God.
George is for death and destruction; Jesus is for life and
construction. George is for divisiveness; Jesus is for bringing all
into the fold — even the one lost sheep. George favors the rich;
Jesus favors the poor. George is for lies and lying to keep people
in the bondage of fear and oppression; Jesus is for TRUTH and
allowing the TRUTH to set men free. It's clear. "The thief comes not
but to steal, kill, and destroy. But I have come to give you life
and life more abundant." Jesus Christ. THE DAY BUSH STARTED THE WAR
Remember the day Bush announced war? Many people probably didn't
recognize parts of Michael's `Fahrenheit 9/11' at the beginning and
then later in the movie where George Bush and others of his
administration were "grooming" for the big announcement. Of course,
Bush was preparing to make a speech, but others of his closest
advisers were preparing to make the media circuit to "spin" the war.
Thus, we saw Wolfowitz (Deputy Secretary of Defense) using spit to
smooth down his hair, Condi Rice and others spiffing up for world
cameras. The day was March 19, 2003, a day that will live in infamy.
Where did Michael Moore get his "live feeds" of Bush's team grooming
for cameras the day of the announcement? It turns out that the BBC,
the British, "accidentally" let the cameras roll prematurely.
Hilarious! GetRealList - "George's little antics" - Observations on
Bush from a Canadian expatriate Bush's roving eyes would have meant
little had they not been in motion just before he declared war on a
sovereign nation. That was Michael's point! I'm afraid the audience
overlooked the significance. A Canadian journalist reported Bush's
behavior that day: On the day the war began, March 19, 2003, he gave
the air of joviality before giving the most important speech
effecting mankind in a generation. Canadian journalist Kevin Lowe
was at the White House at the time and reported: "Like some class
clown trying to get attention from the back of the room, he started
mugging for his handlers. His eyes darted back and forth impishly as
he cracked faces at others around him. He pumped a fist and self-
consciously muttered, `FEEL GOOD!' which was interestingly sanitized
into the much more and assertive, `I'm feeling good' by the same
Washington Post. He was goofing around, and there's only one way to
interpret that kind of behavior just seconds before announcing war on
Iraq: the man is an idiot." Closeup of the Mad Dog So, you see our
concerns why Bush should not be in office. He is a disgrace to this
country. A year BEFORE his call to war against Iraq, he made these
remarks which were reported by TIME: Excerpt from TIME ON-LINE: "F--k
Saddam! We're taking him out!" Those were the words of President
George W. Bush, who had poked his head into the office of National
Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. It was March 2002, and Rice was
meeting with three U.S. Senators, discussing how to deal with Iraq
through the United Nations, or perhaps in a coalition with America's
Middle East allies. Bush wasn't interested. He waved his hand
dismissively, recalls a participant, and neatly summed up his Iraq
policy in the short phrase. The Senators laughed uncomfortably; Rice
flashed a knowing smile. The President left the room. (Michael
Elliott and James Carney, "First Stop, Iraq," Time, on-line edition,
March 23, 2003) ( The Consortiumnews.com ); ( Wayne Madsen: The
Siege of Washington ); ( gabeanderson.com: life: March 28, 2003 )
And yet he claimed a year later he hadn't decided until the March 19,
2003 date. No, he had planned to invade Iraq seven years earlier.
All events were staged leading up to it. He looked at war as a game,
where the "pawns" (poor American kids) were sent into battle against
someone who threatened his daddy, against a nation which happened to
have the second largest oil reserves. The pricetag thus far is around
$300 billion. What if that $300 billion would have been used to
develop a secret special commando unit that would be used to sneak
into Iraq and snatch Saddam out without damaging Iraq and killing
30,000 of its people? Bush says it couldn't have been done, but
who's he but a well-known LIAR? No, Bush's objective was war, and the
reason for war was simple: To galvanize political support in the U.S.
for his grand-plans for one-party rule, corporate control, war
profiteering for his rich defense contractors, and the elimination of
opposition. Andrew Card, White House Chief of Staff, admitted the
Iraq war was TIMED for the mid-term 2002 elections. It was
introduced the day after Labor Day 2002 to fit Karl Roves scheme to
force America into a one-party state. CNN.com - Marketing Iraq: Why
now? - September 12, 2002 Weak Democrats fell for it. Thus, TREASON
was allowed to slide through the cracks. Controlling all branches of
government What does it mean when Republicans control all branches of
government? It means: (1) No investigation can be initiated to
examine wrongdoing and corruption by the White House. The idea can't
even make its way out of committee, because Republicans control all
committees. (2) The Judicial Branch will not prosecute wrongdoing or
check unconstitutional acts committed by the White House. Note
Cheney's secret energy meetings — how the Supremes threw it back to a
lower court to delay action until AFTER election. Note Ashcroft's
behavior — how absolute power is within his grasp because there is
no "check" to authority. (3) Changing and "re-interpreting" laws,
treaties, regulations, and basic constitutional rights are trademarks
of this administration. And there is NO resistance from Congress —
BECAUSE it is controlled by the same party. And then there are the
gawd-awful right-wing judges Bush attempts to appoint. If Democrats
balk and filibuster, Bush just waits until Congress is out of session
to put them in office anyway — unapproved of course. Special rules
allow him to break constitutional restraints in "emergencies," and
his team of lawyers have "re-interpreted" "emergencies" to mean
anytime Bush wants. Do you get the picture? Yes, Bush is a TYRANT.
There is no getting around it. He intentionally breaks laws, and
when he can't break them, he just "re-interprets" them. "Torture?
No problem! Just look for a loophole in international agreements,
then fry those raghead *******s — literally." Then he weasels out of
every scandal. Because there's no "check" from Congress — just a pat
on the back from such notable friends s Tom DeLay and Bill Frist. If
Nixon would have been so "blessed" with one-party rule, there would
have been no Watergate and he would have served out his term.
Americans would never have heard of the scandal and would never have
known their democracy was in danger. Heck! Nixon's face might have
made it upon Mount Rushmore! So, John Dean (White House Counsel under
Nixon) knows what he's talking about when he states, "WORSE THAN
WATERGATE. The secret presidency of George W. Bush and Richard B.
Cheney is far worse than during Watergate, and it bodes even more
serious consequences." Read John Dean's book; it'll make your hair
stand on end. More another day.... Please keep researching and
writing. We share more effectively when we know what we're talking
about. To ALL: The following are repeats from July. The subject is
RELIGION and how it is being used to deceive the masses. L.A.
CAPTAIN'S LOG, Stardate 7.20.04

And here's another cut-n-paste to match.


Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 11:31:38 -0400
Subject:FW: Voting and Counting - Krugman on Palast investigation


VOTING AND COUNTING
by Paul Krugman
from the New York Times

October 22, 2004 - If the election were held today and the votes were
counted fairly, Senator John Kerry would probably win. But the votes won't
be counted fairly, and the disenfranchisement of minority voters may
determine the outcome.

... Last week I described Greg Palast's work on the 2000 election,
reported
recently in Harper's, which conclusively shows that Florida was thrown to
Mr. Bush by a combination of factors that disenfranchised black voters.
These included a defective felon list, which wrongly struck thousands of
people from the voter rolls, and defective voting machines, which
disproportionately failed to record votes in poor, black districts.

One might have expected Florida's government to fix these problems during
the intervening four years. But most of those wrongly denied voting rights
in 2000 still haven't had those rights restored - and the replacement of
punch-card machines has created new problems.

After the 2000 debacle, a task force appointed by Gov. Jeb Bush
recommended
that the state adopt a robust voting technology that would greatly reduce
the number of spoiled ballots and provide a paper trail for recounts:
paper
ballots read by optical scanners that alert voters to problems. This
system
is in use in some affluent, mainly white Florida counties.

But Governor Bush ignored this recommendation, just as he ignored state
officials who urged him to "pull the plug" on a new felon list - which was
quickly discredited once a judge forced the state to make it public - just
days before he ordered the list put into effect. Instead, much of the
state
will vote using touch-screen machines that are unreliable and subject to
hacking, and leave no paper trail. Mr. Palast estimates that this will
disenfranchise 27,000 voters - disproportionately poor and black.

A lot can change in 11 days, and Mr. Bush may yet win convincingly. But we
must not repeat the mistake of 2000 by refusing to acknowledge the
possibility that a narrow Bush win, especially if it depends on Florida,
rests on the systematic disenfranchisement of minority voters. And the
media
must not treat such a suspect win as a validation of skewed reporting that
has consistently overstated Mr. Bush's popular support.


Excerpted from the New York Times. See Palast's entire report in this
month's Harper's Magazine. Greg Palast, author of the New York Times
bestseller, the Best Democracy Money Can Buy, is investigating the vote in
Florida for BBC Television Newsnight and Harper's. Palast's
documentary of
his BBC investigations, "Bush Family Fortunes," has just been released in
DVD. For more information on the film or the voting investigation,
go to
http://www.GregPalast.com

DNC ELECTION MANUAL: CHARGE VOTER INTIMIDATION, EVEN IF NONE EXISTS
------------------------------------------------------------

The Kerry/Edwards campaign and the Democratic National Committee are advising election operatives to declare voter intimidation -- even if none exists.

A 66-page mobilization plan to be issued by the Kerry/Edwards campaign and the Democratic National Committee states: "If no signs of intimidation techniques have emerged yet, launch a 'pre-emptive strike.'"

[HIGHLIGHT OF ELECTION DAY MANUAL, NOVEMBER 2004. CLICK FOR IMAGE .JPG FILE]

The provocative Dem battle plan is to be distributed in dozens of states.

One top DNC official confirmed the manual's authenticity, but claimed the notion of crying wolf on any voter intimidation is "absurd."


==================================================================

Democrat playbook opened to criticism
------------------------------------------------------------
Leaked page reveals push to use tactic of 'pre-emptive strike'

By Peggy Lowe, Rocky Mountain News
October 15, 2004

Democrats got caught with their election playbook open Thursday when a leaked page was published urging operatives to lodge a "pre-emptive strike" of claiming voter intimidation, whether it's true or not.

Gleeful Republicans quickly called a press conference after the page from The Drudge Report went online, in which they denounced "a new low in gutter politics" that "played the race card."

"They want to rile up the minorities to denounce tactics that do not exist," said Ted Halaby, chairman of the Colorado GOP.

Halaby said it was "a criminal act to falsely allege something that does not exist." He called on the state Democrats to "denounce and renounce" the manual's teachings.

But Democrats, who verified as authentic the page from a playbook called "Colorado Election Day Manual: A detailed guide to voting in Colorado," said they must be pro-active to assure that minorities and all others are not scared away from the polls.

Sue Casey, head of the Kerry-Edwards Colorado campaign, said the Republicans are also happy to plant a negative story to detract from what reporters should be writing about.

"Look what we're talking about today instead of the fact that George Bush lost three debates and is fading, instead of not having health care, instead of having a disaster in Iraq," she said.

The manual, at http://www.drudgereport.com, instructs operatives to hunt for Republican scare tactics that could keep voters from the polls. Democrats have claimed for decades that the GOP does that because low voter turnouts generally help Republican candidates.

"If no signs of intimidation techniques have emerged yet, launch a pre-emptive strike," rule No. 2 says.

Then, the manual says the operatives should issue a press release "reviewing Republican tactics used in your area or state." They should also quote "party/minority/civil rights leadership as denouncing tactics that discourage people from voting."

Indeed, a press release from the Colorado Democrats on Wednesday looked straight out of the playbook.

After Secretary of State Donetta Davidson and Gov. Bill Owens, both Republicans, said anyone caught defrauding the voter registration process would be prosecuted, the Democrats shot out a statement decrying Davidson's and Owens' remarks as "voter intimidation."

The release also quoted two minority elected officials: Rick Garcia and Michael Hancock, both city councilmen. But Casey said she first saw the playbook on Thursday morning, the day after they had issued the press release.

"The first time I saw it was today after reporters called. We sort of looked at each other and said 'Gee, we did all the right things,' " she said.

But Casey also defended what she had said in the Wednesday statement, saying Owens and Davidson sent a message to voters that said, "be careful . . . If you are found ineligible you won't vote."

The Democrats message is much different, Casey said.

"We believe in democracy," she said. "We believe every person who is eligible should be able to vote. We think we should send the message: be confident. If you're eligible, go vote."

Late Thursday, Owens dismissed Casey's charge, telling a group of President Bush backers at a gathering at the Denver Diner that Casey was simply playing by the Democratic playbook. He said he's highly concerned about news reports about people registering to vote dozens of times.

"We're not trying to intimidate anybody," Owens said. "I'm encouraging Coloradoans to go to the polls. I want it to be a fair and honest vote, not skewed by somebody who registered 35 times."

What the document says

A page from the Democrats' "Colorado Election Day Manual: A detailed guide to voting in Colorado" appeared on the Drudge Report.

• Chapter 2 says: "If no signs of intimidation techniques have emerged yet, launch a pre-emptive strike."

• Operatives are directed to issue a news release "reviewing Republican tactics used in your area or state."

• They should also quote "party/minority/ civil rights leadership as denouncing tactics that discourage people from voting."

Date: Wed, 20 Oct 2004 22:16:30 -0700
Subject:Sidney Blumenthal: America's hidden vote




Comment
America's hidden vote

Sidney Blumenthal
Thursday October 21, 2004
The Guardian

Passing almost without notice earlier this month, the public release
of The Civil Rights Record of the George W Bush Administration - the
official staff report prepared by the US Civil Rights Commission -
whose submission is required by federal law, was blocked by the
Republican commissioners. None the less, it was posted on the
commission's website:
"This report finds that President Bush has neither exhibited
leadership on pressing civil rights issues, nor taken actions that
matched his words."

Bush has held the Civil Rights Commission in contempt since its June
2001 report on Election Practices in Florida During the 2000 Campaign.
Then it concluded: "The commission's findings make one thing clear:
widespread voter disenfranchisement - not the dead-heat contest - was
the extraordinary feature in the Florida election ... The
disenfranchisement of Florida's voters fell most harshly on the
shoulders of black voters."

Vast efforts to mobilise or suppress African-American, Hispanic and
Democratic voters have already reached a greater level of intensity than
in any modern campaign. The Republicans in Ohio, for example, have
attempted to toss out new Democratregistrations because it was claimed
they were written on the wrong weight of paper, a gambit overruled by a
federal court. From Pennsylvania to Arizona, a Republican consulting
firm is discouraging new Democratic voters from getting on the rolls.

Meanwhile, the Democratic party has more than 10,000 lawyers deployed to
defend against voter suppression, 2,000 stationed in Florida; civil
rights groups are sending out more than 6,000 lawyers. Bush v Gore
remains an open wound; and now the battle over voting rights, over
democracy itself, is being fought again.

Since 2002, when Republicans exploited terrorism to besmirch the
patriotism of Democrats in the midterm elections, what can only be
called a new Democratic party has been summoned into existence by
extra-party groups. More than 100,000 activists are tramping through the
precincts. In Ohio alone, more than 300,000 new Democratic voters have
been added, Cecile Richards, director of America Votes, told me. These
registrations of literally millions of new voters did not just happen;
they were organised.

The polls, nearly all showing a dead-even race, fail to account for
the new voters, who have no past records. They do not measure those
for whom a mobile is their main phone - 6% of the population - who
will vote Democrat by a margin of two-and-a-half to one.

The Democracy Corps poll, however, filters in newly registered voters.
Four months ago, the newly registered made up only 1% of the sample.
One month ago, they comprised 4%. Now they are at 7% and rising. And
they will vote for Kerry over Bush by 61% to 37%.

Bush's job approval has fallen now to 47 in this poll; presidents
below 50 always lose. Bush has not campaigned in Ohio for three weeks,
though he plans to stop there this week. Unemployment continues to
rise in the state. "There is no other explanation for his absence,"
says Stanley Greenberg, Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign pollster, "other
than his numbers go down when he's there. His position on jobs is
implausible."

Democracy Corps research shows that best-case arguments for either
candidate shift no voters. The deciding factor will be turnout: the
higher the turnout the larger the vote for Democrats.

Since September 11 infused Bush with a mission, he has evoked hovering
angels, crusades, mushroom clouds, evildoers, shades of a universe of
death. His imagery induces a dynamic of paralysis before the threat
and fervour in embrace of his absolute reassurance and power. Dread
without end requires faith without limit.

Yet Bush found himself on the defensive when the New York Times
reported on the closed gathering of his campaign contributors, where
he revealed his radical programme for his second term - rightwing
capture of the supreme court, privatising social security, turning
over national land to the oil companies, more tax cuts. Kerry was
prompted to raise these issues. And Bush whined that Kerry was
practising "the politics of fear". The next day Dick Cheney projected
terrorists exploding nuclear weapons within the US, and offered Bush
as saviour from looming apocalypse.

"No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting
and reasoning as terror," wrote Edmund Burke. But not even the eve of
destruction will stifle turnout.

· Sidney Blumenthal, a former senior adviser to President Clinton, is
Washington bureau chief of salon.com

You gonna give up the copy / paste on Nov. 2 there Rory? Or will you innundate this forum with the insignificant opinions of various right-wing pundits for another 4 years? :rolleyes: :p

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

MAN GIVEN CRACK COCAINE TO REGISTER VOTERS ARRESTED IN OHIO

Mon Oct 18 2004 13:26:03 ET

October 18, 2004

The Defiance County Sheriff's Office arrested Chad Staton, age 22, of Stratton Ave., Defiance, on a charge of False Registration, in Violation of Section 3599.11 of the Ohio Revised Code, a felony of the fifth degree.

The SheriffÕs Office alleges that Staton filled out over 100 voter registration forms that were fictitious. Staton was to be paid for each registration form that he could get citizens to fill out. However, Staton himself filled out the registrations and returned them to the woman who hired him from Toledo, Ohio. Deputies allege that Staton was paid crack cocaine for the falsified registrations.

Defiance Deputies along with Toledo Police Department detectives conducted a search warrant of a residence on Woodland in Toledo, believed to be the home of the woman who hired Staton to solicit voter registration. Officers confiscated drug paraphernalia along with voter registration forms from the home. The occupant of the home, Georgianne Pitts, age 41, advised law enforcement, along with Ohio B.C.I.&I., that she had been recruited by Thaddeus J. Jackson, II, of Cleveland, to obtain voter registrations. Pitts admitted to paying Staton crack cocaine for the registrations in lieu of money.

A business card provided by Pitts indicated that Jackson is the Assistant NVF Ohio Director of the NAACP National Voter Fund.

The initial complaint received by the Sheriff's Office came from the Defiance County Board of Elections. The Board had received the 100 plus registration forms from the Cuyahoga Board of Elections that had been submitted to the Cuyahoga Board by the NAACP National Voter Fund.

Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 06:10:57 -0700
Subject:Dowd: Casualties of Faith


OP-ED COLUMNIST


Casualties of Faith
By MAUREEN DOWD

Published: October 21, 2004

WASHINGTON

When I was little, I was very good at leaps of faith.

A nun would tape up a picture of a snow-covered mountain peak on the
blackboard and say that the first child to discern the face of Christ
in the melting snow was the holiest. I was soon smugly showing the
rest of the class the "miraculous" outline of that soulful, bearded face.

But I never thought I'd see the day when leaps of faith would be
national policy, when the fortunes of America hung on the possibility
of a miracle.

What does it tell you about a president that his grounds for war are
so weak that the only way he can justify it is by believing God wants it?
Or that his only Iraq policy now - as our troops fight a vicious
insurgency and the dream of a stable democracy falls apart - is a
belief in miracles?

Miracles make the incurious even more incurious. People who live by
religious certainties don't have to waste time with recalcitrant facts
or moral doubts. They do not need to torture themselves, for example,
about dispatching American kids into a sand trap with ghostly enemies
and without the proper backup, armor, expectations or cultural training.

Any president relying more on facts than faith could have seen that
his troops would be sitting ducks: Donald Rumsfeld's experiment -
sending in a light, agile force (more a Vin Diesel vehicle than a
smart plan for Iraq) - was in direct conflict with the overwhelming
force needed to attempt the neocons' grandiose scheme to turn Iraq
into a model democracy.

J.F.K. had to fight the anti-papist expectation that his Oval Office
would take orders from heaven. For W., it's a selling point. Some
right-wing Catholics want John Kerry excommunicated, while
evangelicals call the president a messenger of God. "God's blessing is
on him," the TV evangelist Pat Robertson says, adding, "It's the
blessing of heaven on the emperor."

Mr. Bush has shown all the evangelical voters who didn't like his
daddy that he gets, as Mr. Robertson puts it, "his direction from the
Lord."

When Paula Zahn asked the televangelist Tuesday whether Mr. Bush, as a
Christian, should admit his mistakes, Mr. Robertson said he'd warned a
self-satisfied Bush about Iraq: "The Lord told me it was going to be
(a) a disaster, and (b) messy."

Mr. Robertson said, "He was the most self-assured man I ever met."
Paraphrasing Mark Twain, he said Mr. Bush was "like a contented
Christian with four aces. He was just sitting there, like, I'm on top
of the world, and I warned him about this war. ... And I was trying to
say, Mr. President, you better prepare the American people for
casualties. 'Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties.' "

W., it seems, really believes he's the one. President Neo. (And his
advisers are disciples. That's why Condi Rice so willingly puts aside
her national security duties to spread the Bush gospel in swing
states, and why Karen Hughes raced to impugn Mr. Robertson's veracity
after he described his chilling encounter with W.)

W.'s willful blindness comes from mistakenly assuming that his desires
are God's, as if he knows where God stands on everything from
democracy in Iraq to capital-gains tax cuts.

As Lincoln noted in his Second Inaugural Address about the Civil War,
one can't speak for God: "The Almighty has His own purposes."

Mr. Bush didn't just ignore Mr. Robertson's warning - he ignored his
own intelligence experts, who warned before the war that an invasion
of Iraq would spur more support for political Islam and trigger
violent conflict, including an insurgency that would drive Baathists
and terrorists together in a toxic combination.

As Michael Gordon wrote in his Times series this week on blind spots
in the strategy to secure Iraq, the Bush crew engaged in an
astonishing series of delusions: assuming they could begin a
withdrawal of troops 60 days after taking Baghdad; enabling the
insurgency to flourish; abolishing the Iraqi military and putting
American lives at risk; misreading the obvious reaction to an American
occupation of a Muslim country.

C.I.A. officials were so clueless they wanted to sneak hundreds of
small American flags into Iraq before the war started so grateful
Iraqis could wave them at their liberators. The agency planned to film
that and triumphantly beam it to the Arab world.

The president has this strange notion that his belief in God means
detailed and perfect knowledge of everything that God wants. He may
wish to keep his head stuck in the Iraqi sand, but he may discover
that the Almighty has His own purposes.

E-mail: liberties@nytimes.com

Hypothetical - is your support for your candidates rooted around their policy or their ideology?

Simply put - Bush does nothing differently than we all know him... but instead of being Christian he is Jewish, Atheist, or Muslim. Would your support for him change???

Would your impressions of his policies change or is your center of gravity driven by a particular association? Where are your bias?

From what I can tell from this board there seems to be a lot of them.

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

It depends on who wins.

Who You Vote for Matters," Warns Kourpias


George J. Kourpias, President of the Alliance for Retired Americans, reminds older Americans, "The person you vote for on November 2 for President will have tremendous influence on your lives and those of your children and grandchildren for years to come so who you vote for matters. The race is between two men -- President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) -- who have diametrically opposite positions on the two most important issues affecting retirees -- Social Security and Medicare. While no one, especially seniors, questions the importance of national security," says Kourpias, "the candidates' positions on these two issues must be of primary concern when we enter the voting booth. Bush supports 'privatizing' Social Security, while Kerry opposes any form of privatization. On the issue of Medicare, Bush is opposed to allowing the government to negotiate for lower-priced prescription drugs and allowing the importation of safe, FDA-approved drugs from Canada. Kerry supports
both." Kourpias urges all voters -- not just seniors -- to "look carefully at the records of both candidates before casting your ballots because who wins will determine the kind of America we will have in the future."

Coyle Calls Election "A Referendum on Bush"
"George W. Bush is the incumbent so it is fair to make the presidential election a referendum on his stewardship," says Edward F. Coyle, Executive Director of the Alliance for Retired Americans. Here's an brief analysis of how Bush has handled the job:

Depleted funds intended to shore up the Social Security Trust Funds by enacting still more tax cuts
Rammed a costly Medicare overhaul bill through Congress that does little to provide most seniors with affordable and accessible drugs
Took no steps to avert or diminish a shortage of flu vaccine despite warnings by the Government Accountability Office in 2001, and again in 2004, of a possible flu vaccine supply shortage
Championed tax cuts for the wealthy with millions of Americans out of work
Justified a costly war without an "exit" plan based on inaccurate information
Appointed cabinet members and judges with proven records of insensitivity to civil liberties, affirmative action, a woman's right to choose and environmental regulatory safeguards
Failed to provide sufficient funds to make it possible to meet the "No Child Left Behind" standards

What Alliance Activists Can Do
With the election less than two weeks away, it is essential that activist members of the Alliance for Retired Americans increase their efforts to get out the vote. Here are three things activists can still do:

Make Phone Calls. Call family members, friends and neighbors and remind them to vote.
Take a Senior to Vote. Call the senior housing complexes in your area and offer to drive residents to the polls on November 2.
Canvass the Streets. On Election Day, go door-to-door and encourage people to vote.

For information on how you can make a difference in key states, visit http://www.retiredamericans.org/keystates.

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

I thought it was funny as all get out!

They couldn't even hit her with a large pie when they were just inches from her.

Just like most effeminate liberal men the attackers threw like little girls.

This time the attackers were lucky and only had to deal with the police, next time they may not be so fortunate.

Inmates 'Have A Plan' To Run The Asylum

October 20, 2004

While the people of Afghanistan are celebrating their first democratic election and the Iraqis are taking their first steps to democracy, the great thinkers in the Democratic Party are still polishing up their conspiracy theories about the war to liberate Iraq.

There's no consensus position, but the Democrats are pretty sure the real reason we went to Iraq was one of the following:

Bush family's connections to the Saudis,
Halliburton,
the Carlyle Group,
something about the Texas Rangers needing more left-handed pitching,
the neoconservatives,
the Straussians,
oil,
the Jews,
oily Jews.
This may be the first time in American history that the decisional calculus for many voters will be: Do I really want to throw my hat in with these crazy people?

John Kerry has called the war with Iraq "a huge mistake, a catastrophic mistake." He said it was no excuse that "Saddam might have done it 10 years from now" – use weapons of mass destruction against Americans, apparently. (New Kerry campaign slogan: "Let Radical Islamic Iraq Be Radical Islamic Iraq!")


The Democrats want Saddam back. I suppose it was only a matter of time for the party that also welcomed back Marion Barry, Ted Kennedy, Barney Frank, Al Sharpton, Frank Lautenberg, Hillary Clinton, etc., etc.

When Bush pointed out that Saddam would still be in power if Kerry were president, Kerry contradicted him, but provided no theory of how Saddam would be gone. Instead, he simply said: "Not necessarily be in power" – and then trailed off into a long-winded explanation of one of those positions on which he's "always been consistent." Maybe Saddam would still be in power – but there would have been an extremely effective and persistent opposition led by brave media pundits!

Speaking of which, where are the feminists on war with Iraq? Cameron Diaz' statement about Bush's policies – "if you think rape should be legal, then don't vote" – would have been perfectly true had she been speaking to an audience in Iraq. These people think it is constructive rape to have sex with your husband. America has just gone to war against a regime for which rape – not date rape, or pseudo-rape, or virtual rape, but real rape – was part of the official policy, and they're against regime-change.

Among his other pointless carping about the war in Iraq, Kerry keeps claiming the military is overextended. His supporters claim Bush has a secret plan to bring back the draft. Whatever happened to all those gays who wanted to join the military? We haven't heard a peep out of them lately. How about rounding up a "Coalition of the Fabulous," Sen. Kerry? And what does his good pal Mary Cheney tell him about that?

With the election a few weeks away, the two main reasons Kerry has settled on for why you should vote for him are: (1) Dick Cheney has a lesbian daughter, and (2) Halliburton!

The highlight of the debates for Moveon.org members came whenever Edwards or Kerry managed to work "Halliburton!" into an answer. Kerry explained he voted against the $87 billion for the troops in Iraq because, "I didn't want to give a slush fund to Halliburton." (Nor equipment to the troops, apparently.) This week, he also tied Halliburton to the flu-shot shortage, telling a Florida audience, "If Halliburton made flu shots, there would be more flu here than oranges."

Edwards raised the Democrats' brilliant "Halliburton!" point, saying: "While [Cheney] was CEO of Halliburton, they paid millions of dollars in fines for providing false information on their company – just like Enron and Ken Lay." Not only that, but Bush and Cheney have offices – just like Enron and Ken Lay. They have employees – just like Enron and Ken Lay. They pay their employees – just like Enron and Ken Lay.

The Party of Ideas is now equating Halliburton with Enron. The only surprise is that Edwards didn't throw in Watergate and Abscam just for good measure.

As even the New York Times admitted the day after the vice presidential debate, "[T]here is no evidence Mr. Cheney has pulled strings on Halliburton's behalf" and "The independent General Accountability Office concluded that Halliburton was the only company that could have provided the services the Army needed at the outset of the war."

Most amazingly, the Democrats have the chutzpah to complain that Bush claimed he was a "uniter" and yet(!), "have you ever seen America more divided?" – as the Democrats' Demosthenes Edwards put it.

This from a candidate (I almost said a "man") whose campaign falsely accused the president of stealing an election, barring a million black voters from the polls, and sending a thousand American soldiers to their deaths just for oil.

Coincidentally, the very day of the vice presidential debate, a gun was fired into a Bush-Cheney campaign office in Bearden, Tenn. – one of a series of violent attacks on Republican offices around the country. (You can tell it was Democrats firing those guns because none of the shots ever hit anything.)

Also that day, a group of liberal loonies stormed a Bush-Cheney office in Orlando, Fla., and ransacked the place. A few weeks earlier, a 62-year-old woman in Manhattan was beaten with a cane by an 86-year-old woman for carrying a Bush-Cheney sign.

On the basis of their own insane, violent behavior toward Republicans, Democrats demand to be put in the White House – so the violence will stop. At this rate, it's only a matter of time before the Kerry campaign announces that anti-Bush insurgents control most of the Bush-Cheney 2004 headquarters, and that the sooner the U.S. pulls out of those quagmires the better.

If only we could get Democrats to show a little of that manly anger toward the terrorists, maybe Americans would be able to trust them with national security

I can't wait for this election to be over with so that pompous blowhards like RB, will wither into their gladhanding good boy clubs where they tell each other how great they all are, and continue to leave the real thinking to the rest of us.
The ONLY TWO PEOPLE ON THE PLANET, that don't say they know that we screwed the pooch in Iraq are Dumby and his henchman,haney, I mean cheney.
RB,get a clue, your guys is going down in Flames,people are turning out in droves to vote. Trust me the people don't want to see this AWOL COWARD steal another election!............Fishy.

http://www.middleeast.org/premium/read.c...xt&standalone=0

From Baghdad
A Wall Street Journal Reporter's E-Mail to Friends
by Farnaz Fassihi*

Iraq is a "disaster" that has deteriorated "into a
raging barbaric guerilla war" that will haunt the
United States for decades.


Being a foreign correspondent in Baghdad these days is like being
under virtual house arrest. Forget about the reasons that lured me to
this job: a chance to see the world, explore the exotic, meet new
people in far away lands, discover their ways and tell stories that
could make a difference.

Little by little, day-by-day, being based in Iraq has defied all those
reasons. I am house bound. I leave when I have a very good reason to
and a scheduled interview. I avoid going to people's homes and never
walk in the streets. I can't go grocery shopping any more, can't eat
in restaurants, can't strike a conversation with strangers, can't look
for stories, can't drive in any thing but a full armored car, can't go
to scenes of breaking news stories, can't be stuck in traffic, can't
speak English outside, can't take a road trip, can't say I'm an
American, can't linger at checkpoints, can't be curious about what
people are saying, doing, feeling. And can't and can't. There has been
one too many close calls, including a car bomb so near our house that
it blew out all the windows. So now my most pressing concern every day
is not to write a kick-ass story but to stay alive and make sure our
Iraqi employees stay alive. In Baghdad I am a security personnel
first, a reporter second.

It's hard to pinpoint when the 'turning point' exactly began. Was it
April when the Fallujah fell out of the grasp of the Americans? Was it
when Moqtada and Jish Mahdi declared war on the U.S. military? Was it
when Sadr City, home to ten percent of Iraq's population, became a
nightly battlefield for the Americans? Or was it when the insurgency
began spreading from isolated pockets in the Sunni triangle to include
most of Iraq? Despite President Bush's rosy assessments, Iraq remains
a disaster. If under Saddam it was a 'potential' threat, under the
Americans it has been transformed to 'imminent and active threat,' a
foreign policy failure bound to haunt the United States for decades to
come.

Iraqis like to call this mess 'the situation.' When asked 'how are
thing?' they reply: 'the situation is very bad."

What they mean by situation is this: the Iraqi government doesn't
control most Iraqi cities, there are several car bombs going off each
day around the country killing and injuring scores of innocent people,
the country's roads are becoming impassable and littered by hundreds
of landmines and explosive devices aimed to kill American soldiers,
there are assassinations, kidnappings and beheadings. The situation,
basically, means a raging barbaric guerilla war. In four days, 110
people died and over 300 got injured in Baghdad alone. The numbers are
so shocking that the ministry of health -- which was attempting an
exercise of public transparency by releasing the numbers -- has now
stopped disclosing them.

Insurgents now attack Americans 87 times a day.

A friend drove thru the Shiite slum of Sadr City yesterday. He said
young men were openly placing improvised explosive devices into the
ground. They melt a shallow hole into the asphalt, dig the explosive,
cover it with dirt and put an old tire or plastic can over it to
signal to the locals this is booby-trapped. He said on the main roads
of Sadr City, there were a dozen landmines per every ten yards. His
car snaked and swirled to avoid driving over them. Behind the walls
sits an angry Iraqi ready to detonate them as soon as an American
convoy gets near. This is in Shiite land, the population that was
supposed to love America for liberating Iraq.

For journalists the significant turning point came with the wave of
abduction and kidnappings. Only two weeks ago we felt safe around
Baghdad because foreigners were being abducted on the roads and
highways between towns. Then came a frantic phone call from a
journalist female friend at 11 p.m. telling me two Italian women had
been abducted from their homes in broad daylight. Then the two
Americans, who got beheaded this week and the Brit, were abducted from
their homes in a residential neighborhood. They were supplying the
entire block with round the clock electricity from their generator to
win friends. The abductors grabbed one of them at 6 a.m. when he came
out to switch on the generator; his beheaded body was thrown back near
the neighborhoods.

The insurgency, we are told, is rampant with no signs of calming down.
If any thing, it is growing stronger, organized and more sophisticated
every day. The various elements within it-baathists, criminals,
nationalists and Al Qaeda-are cooperating and coordinating.

I went to an emergency meeting for foreign correspondents with the
military and embassy to discuss the kidnappings. We were somberly told
our fate would largely depend on where we were in the kidnapping chain
once it was determined we were missing. Here is how it goes: criminal
gangs grab you and sell you up to Baathists in Fallujah, who will in
turn sell you to Al Qaeda. In turn, cash and weapons flow the other
way from Al Qaeda to the Baathisst to the criminals. My friend
Georges, the French journalist snatched on the road to Najaf, has been
missing for a month with no word on release or whether he is still alive.

America's last hope for a quick exit? The Iraqi police and National
Guard units we are spending billions of dollars to train. The cops are
being murdered by the dozens every day-over 700 to date -- and the
insurgents are infiltrating their ranks. The problem is so serious
that the U.S. military has allocated $6 million dollars to buy out
30,000 cops they just trained to get rid of them quietly.

As for reconstruction: firstly it's so unsafe for foreigners to
operate that almost all projects have come to a halt. After two years,
of the $18 billion Congress appropriated for Iraq reconstruction only
about $1 billion or so has been spent and a chuck has now been
reallocated for improving security, a sign of just how bad things are
going here.

Oil dreams? Insurgents disrupt oil flow routinely as a result of
sabotage and oil prices have hit record high of $49 a barrel. Who did
this war exactly benefit? Was it worth it? Are we safer because Saddam
is holed up and Al Qaeda is running around in Iraq?

Iraqis say that thanks to America they got freedom in exchange for
insecurity. Guess what? They say they'd take security over freedom any
day, even if it means having a dictator ruler.

I heard an educated Iraqi say today that if Saddam Hussein were
allowed to run for elections he would get the majority of the vote.
This is truly sad.

Then I went to see an Iraqi scholar this week to talk to him about
elections here. He has been trying to educate the public on the
importance of voting. He said, "President Bush wanted to turn Iraq
into a democracy that would be an example for the Middle East. Forget
about democracy, forget about being a model for the region, we have to
salvage Iraq before all is lost."

One could argue that Iraq is already lost beyond salvation. For those
of us on the ground it's hard to imagine what if any thing could
salvage it from its violent downward spiral. The genie of terrorism,
chaos and mayhem has been unleashed onto this country as a result of
American mistakes and it can't be put back into a bottle.

The Iraqi government is talking about having elections in three months
while half of the country remains a 'no go zone'-out of the hands of
the government and the Americans and out of reach of journalists. In
the other half, the disenchanted population is too terrified to show
up at polling stations. The Sunnis have already said they'd boycott
elections, leaving the stage open for polarized government of Kurds
and Shiites that will not be deemed as legitimate and will most
certainly lead to civil war.

I asked a 28-year-old engineer if he and his family would participate
in the Iraqi elections since it was the first time Iraqis could to
some degree elect a leadership. His response summed it all: "Go and
vote and risk being blown into pieces or followed by the insurgents
and murdered for cooperating with the Americans? For what? To practice
democracy? Are you joking?" 29 September 2004

* Farnaz Fassihi, a Wall Street Journal reporter sent this report as
an e-mail to friends -

Story by: Farnaz Fassihi

DON'T BELIEVE EVERYTHING YOU READ!!
=================================

That so-called e-mail is plastered all over the internet for quite a while now and has been spammed to everybody and anybody who even remotely might have an interest.

This is the same type of propaganda used by the leftists during the Viet Nam war. It is meant to demoralize the American public, cause confusion and create doubt about the mission and the outcome.

Here is her picture and more:




Education: B.A. in English literature – Tehran University in Iran

Previous work experience: Assistant and translator for Western reporters visiting Iran

Farnaz Fassihi is an activist anti war journalist.
She was writing about how awful Afganistan was during the campaign to topple the Taliban.


"I was about to bear witness to unimaginable misery'
Story by: Farnaz Fassihi - "On Afghanistan"

The white Toyota Corona carrying me and two other journalists bounced down a rocky makeshift road, creating a cloud of dust so intense that we could not see 10 feet ahead of us.

Along the road, children as young as 4 and 5 waved at the car to stop. They were begging for food. In the dead of the Afghan winter, they had no socks or shoes and no warm clothes. Sometimes, the children were joined by men missing arms or legs, victims of land mines, yelling for help.

I swallowed my tears and told myself to be strong.

My colleague reminded me that, as a reporter for the Newark Star-Ledger, I was about to bear witness to unimaginable misery.

Can't we stop and give them a little money? I asked Ahmad, our driver.

No, no, he replied in panic. If we stop, hundreds of people will gather around us. They are starving and they are angry. You may get trampled. It is very dangerous here, miss. This is Afghanistan.

It was mid-November 2001, and a dozen of us had crossed the border from Iran to the northeastern city of Herat. Kabul and Herat had fallen from the grip of the Taliban but war still raged in a 20-mile radius around us. We were nervous, cold and hungry but eager to tell stories from a land the world had forgotten for decades.

That morning, Ahmad was taking us to a nearby refugee camp called Maslakh – or in local lingo, Slaughterhouse. With 200,000 displaced people there, Maslakh was the world's largest refugee camp.

The situation is really bad there, warned Ahmad. I will stay close to protect you. Don't give anyone money. No warning, however, could have prepared me for what I saw.

Within seconds of stepping out of the car, we were engulfed by a thousand men, women and children. They pushed and shoved and grabbed my arm, my hand, my scarf. I lost Ahmad and Jon Naso, the Star-Ledger photographer working with me. Survey, survey, they screamed. The refugees had mistaken us for aid workers and thought we were there to register them and distribute goods.

Journalist, journalist, I yelled back but my voice was lost in their cry for help.

International aid workers evacuated from Afghanistan after the Sept. 11 attacks and had not yet returned when I visited Maslakh. The result was a tremendous backlog in registration and distribution of wheat, blankets and tents. Over 1,200 people arrived in trucks daily and, with no processing system, were forced to camp on the bare ground and go hungry for days and weeks.

They were dying by huge numbers every day.

The wailing sound of children distracted the crowd around me. They ran to see what had happened. I ran after them.I froze when I saw the dead body of a 23-year-old woman on the ground. Her three young children were sobbing and her husband was asking the men to help him bury his wife. She had just died from hunger and cold. Shocked and shaken, I pulled out my notebook and started interviewing the family. I felt that if I didn't thrust myself into reporting I might start crying with them.

Jon had caught up with me, and his eyes filled with tears. He snapped pictures. I frantically took notes.

As I left the camp, an old woman followed me to the car. Her back was hunched and she walked with a cane. She took my hands in her wrinkled ones and looked me in the eye. My daughter, can you get us help? she pleaded. Can you tell the world how we are suffering? In tears, I nodded and told her that was the only reason I was there.

I am often asked why I do what I do. My non-journalist friends and my family are puzzled about why I risk my safety and endure hardship in places like Afghanistan, Israel, the West Bank and Iraq.

Yes, I tell them, I do it because it is intoxicating to see the world as a journalist, to witness history in the making. It also led to my new job as the Wall Street Journal's Middle East correspondent. But, most important, I do what I do because I believe that somehow my stories will make a difference.

Iraq is not the same as Afganistan.

Afganistan + Taliban + Al Qaeda = 911
Iraq=???????????????????????????? OIL?
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October 18, 2004
OP-ED COLUMNIST


A War Without Reason
By BOB HERBERT

"Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof,
the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud."

- President Bush, Oct. 7, 2002

There should no longer be any doubt that the war in Iraq is an
exercise in lunacy. It was launched with a spurious rationale, the
weapons of mass destruction, which turned out to be a fantasy
relentlessly stoked by obsessively hawkish middle-aged men who ran and
hid when they were of fighting age and the nation was at war.

Now we find that we can't win this war we started. Soldiers and
civilians alike are trapped in the proverbial briar patch, unable to
move around safely in a country that the warmongers thought would be
easy to conquer and then rebuild.

There is no way to overstate how profoundly wrong they were.

Our troops continue to die but we can't even identify the enemy, which
is why so many innocent Iraqi civilians - including women and children
- are being blown away. The civilians are being killed by the
thousands, even as the dreaded Saddam Hussein is receiving first-class
health care (most recently a successful hernia operation) from his
captors.

Last week, in a story that read like a chapter from an antiwar novel,
we learned that members of an Army Reserve platoon were taken into
custody and held for two days after they refused to deliver a shipment
of fuel to Taji, a town 15 miles north of Baghdad. They complained
that the trip was too dangerous to make without an escort of armored
vehicles. Several of the reservists described the trip as a "suicide
mission."

The military said that was an isolated incident, but there is evidence
of growing dissatisfaction among the troops, many of whom feel they
are targets surrounded by hostile Iraqis -insurgents and ordinary
civilians alike - in a war that lacks a clearly defined mission.

Even the heavily fortified Green Zone, which contains the U.S. embassy
and the headquarters of the interim Iraqi government, was penetrated
by suicide bombers last Thursday. At least five people, including
three Americans who had been providing security for diplomats, were
killed in the attack.

As the pointlessness of this war grows ever clearer, the president's
grand alliance, like some of the soldiers on the ground, is losing its
resolve. When John Kerry, in the first presidential debate, mentioned
only Britain and Australia as he mocked Mr. Bush's "coalition" in
Iraq, the president famously replied, "You forgot Poland."

Poland has 2,400 troops in Iraq. But on Friday the prime minister,
Marek Belka, announced that he will cut that number early next year,
and then "will engage in talks on a further reduction."

Mr. Belka has a political problem. He can't explain the war to his
constituents. And that's because there is no rational explanation.

As for the rebuilding of Iraq, forget about it. Hundreds of schools
were damaged by U.S. bombing and thousands were looted by Iraqis. It's
hard to believe that an administration that won't rebuild schools here
in America will really go to bat for schoolkids in Iraq. Millions of
Iraqi kids now attend schools that are decrepit and, in many cases,
all but falling down - lacking such essentials as desks, chairs and
even toilets, according to the United Nations Children's Fund.

Military commanders are warning that delays in the overall
reconstruction are increasing the danger for American troops. A senior
American military officer told The Times, "We can either put Iraqis
back to work, or we can have them shoot [rocket-propelled grenades] at
us."

The president and his apologists never understood what they were
getting into in Iraq. What is unmistakable now is that Americans will
never be willing to commit the overwhelming numbers of troops and
spend the hundreds of billions of additional dollars necessary to have
even a hope of bringing long-term stability to Iraq.

This is a war that never made sense and now we are seeing - from the
troops on the ground, from our allies overseas and increasingly from
the population here at home - the inevitable reluctance to forge ahead
with the madness.

The president likes to say he made exactly the right decision on Iraq.
Each new death of a soldier or a civilian, each child who loses a
parent to the carnage, each healthy body that is broken or burned in
this war that didn't have to happen, is a reminder of how horribly
wrong he was.

E-mail: bobherb@nytimes.com

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/04/10/con04415.html

October 5, 2004

Ugly

A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Larry Kearney

If God is talking to you and the result is a burned or crushed child,
it's not God you're hearing. If you find yourself taking revenge in
your head on everyone who ever insulted you, however slightly, you are
not one of God's messengers. If the substance of the information you
get from your God is that he requires you to kill in his name, the
information is garbage. If your word from God recommends punishing the
innocent in any way, for any reason, your God is not God at all but
your own mind's sump of resentment, greed and the dream of power.

Is this hard for us to grasp?

If the man on the screen, or at the podium, is telling us that other
human beings have to be killed or tortured to make our God happy, he's
lying. If the woman says that we need to make others, on pain of
death, renounce their God and accept ours, the woman is evil.

If the subject is other than love, we are not hearing the word of God.

And if we act to the misery of children, it were better a millstone—no
reprieve, no debate—to damage a child is beyond the pale. To damage a
child for money is the dead center of evil.

A man in a stone room in Afghanistan has his three children on a
table. He's half-bent and his hands are at odd angles, useless, unable
to touch because they'd flame with the pain of it. Someone has taken a
picture of him with his children who are all dead, from the smallest
with the rosebud hands to the oldest, ten maybe.

Why are they dead?

Because there are forms to be followed and the only thing that it is
not acceptable to invoke in a holy war is the real God, who brings
clarity. When the flames are unleashed and the lies are trotted out,
the only discourse that's beyond the pale is the discourse of the
heart because the heart will say unerringly that this is what we did
before and it didn't work. It not only didn't work, it brought us here
again, on the great plain of the torn, burning children.

The same actions produce the same reactions. If you burn children
their parents are likely to burn yours. Is this a secret?

But oh, they say, we'll win this time and then our children will be safe.

Is that the way it's been? Any examples? Any positive experience out
there of the killing of blameless children? The infliction of terror
and hideous physical pain on the helpless? The long-term postive
benefits for humankind of creating a class of people who writhe in
their heads with the memory of their dead loves?

Look at your own children. Do they deserve what's being done to the
Others, the ones with the wrong parents? No, they don't.

And if we know they don't, and know that what's being done right now,
at this instant, will guarantee that the inflictions will come to them
as surely as the world turns, what the hell are we doing when we stick
on our flag pins and lurch out to kick the asses of the peacemakers,
those worthless *******s who don't want to set fire to our kids?

Don't we get it, at last? Men who will set fire to children at a
distance, for money and a sickly dream of power, will set fire to our
kids for a little more money, a little more power. These men have
contempt for us, and every bloody lie we're willing to swallow
perpetuates their contempt and willingness to kill everything we love,
whether by taking our money, deadening our souls with lies, or
breaking our children to pieces in the street.

I watch this fool's parade of lying Neo Con fascists, vengeful
bureaucrats, small-time think tank illiterateurs, screeching harpies
and shameless thugs, all led by our shallow, vapid, secret, ignorant
and purely evil frat boy sergeant-at-arms, and my head hurts so
terribly I can think of nothing but my children and how it will be for
them left to the tender mercies of these despoilers of God—these evil,
self-satisfied, cowardly lords of a great Dream State of comfort for
the right guys and a crushing iron wheel for the rest of us—slow,
crushing death, you know? The kind they like. The kind that brings a
secret sexual charge with it—a queasy tremor in their hidden genitalia.

But we kill because we're fighting a war on terror, they say.

You can't fight a war on terror because terror is the weapon of those
who have nothing to lose. You can't defeat a man who has nothing to
lose and has been so brutalized himself by his own need for vengeance
and respite that there is nothing he won't do—such as setting fire to
your children.

So we have two antagonists—one is immensely powerful, though
cumbersome, and the other is immensely weak, though swift and cunning.
What do they have in common?

Either will happily burn your children in pursuit of the dream of holy
power.

Again and again and again.

If the subject is other than love, you are not hearing the word of God.

How do you fight terrorism?

You simply stop doing the things that make it a preferred weapon, and
that begins with ceasing to brutalize poor people, here or there.

What do we do in the Middle East? Well, we make it clear to the Arab
emirates that it would be a wonderful thing if Palestine had money and
a viable economy of its own; we contribute to Israel only the money it
will need to help it detach itself from the Palestinian state; we
cease flooding the area with high-tech weapons; we develop
technologies which will ease us away from oil dependency; we speak to
the downtrodden directly, as if they were people, and say that the
guilt of centuries belongs to all of us and that it's time to stop
doing the same things in the hope that just this once the outcome will
be different.

We shun the minor demons of greed and brutality and the unspeakable
monsters who would tell us that both are of God.

And in my rage and utter despair of the ugliness of the killing and
lying and scheming and sheer, stinking hypocrisy that blankets America
like a refinery cloud, I have to say, too, that these rotten, lying
sons-of-*****es need not be killed, or have their children killed.

Because there is nothing in that direction but more of the same.

And because they have souls, each of them, and are therefore capable
of change in the presence of the love they choose to violate.

-- Larry Kearney

A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION

Larry Kearney was born in Brooklyn, New York. He has published four
works of non-fiction, a children's book, and thirteen books of poetry.

Rory, since Plunk posted the same thing you did over at GF, I guess its fair that I post my response to him here. Spin away!!!

It didn't take long to find the information that shows a different picture than you painted. Caveat: I believe this to be true and have put a link that all of you can check for yourselves: (Be sure to copy the entire link into your browser window).

http://www.mediainfo.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_displa y.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000650551

One quote from the article:

After she confirmed writing the letter on Wednesday, Paul Steiger, editor of the Wall Street Journal, stood up for her, telling the New York Post that her "private opinions have in no way distorted her coverage, which has been a model of intelligent and courageous reporting, and scrupulous accuracy and fairness."

Fassihi, 32, covered the 9/11 terror attacks in New York for the The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J. and has also worked for the Providence Journal.

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