Showing posts with label George W. Bush. Show all posts
Showing posts with label George W. Bush. Show all posts

Sunday, November 23, 2008

His Masters Voice


Two Lame Ducks. Harper and Bush. One has a minority government the other a lame duck administration. Bush will be leaving in less than sixty days. Harper will continue to listen to his masters voice and be the ventriliquists dummy for Bush. It is a strange case of political seance, Harper continues to channel his inner Bush promoting free trade as the solution to the capitalist crisis. In a unabashed and unashamed bit of historical revisionism he claims that protectionism caused the Great Depression, failing to mention that while this exasperated the capitalism melt down the real solution was state intervention rather after the so called free market failed to self correct.

"Removing protectionist barriers and easing trade restrictions was a big factor in ushering in this extraordinary era," said Harper, referring to recent years of unparalleled economic growth. "We cannot allow ourselves to turn back." Harper said the Great Depression was prolonged by poor managerial choices on the part of governments that included shrinking the existing banking systems, raising interest rates and building barriers in a failed attempt to save jobs. These are the kinds of practices that need to be avoided in the present economic climate, he said, and Harper also urged other countries to take a look at their pasts when making decisions on how to move forward. "As we enter a period we have not seen in the memory of virtually anyone alive today, we must be good students of history -- and not just recent history," he said.

Harpers decision to push for a Free Trade deal with Colombia is another example of continuing on the Bush agenda, despite his masters own failure to succeed in pushing a similar American deal through congress. And Harper will have a fight when he brings it to parliment for approval. Colombia's record of human rights violations, state attacks and murder of political and trade union activists, their support for right wing death squads cannot be reformed by bi-lateral trade deals. Colombia's largest export is cocaine, the irony of a free trade deal with the Law and Order Harpocrites is delicious.

"In a time of global economic instability free trade is more important than ever," Harper said in a statement.
"By expanding our trading relationship with Colombia, we are not only opening up new opportunities for Canadian businesses in a foreign market, we are also helping one of South America's most historic democracies improve the human rights and security situation in their country."
U.S. President George Bush, arriving in Lima Friday, has made a free trade agreement with Colombia a priority for his last two months in office.
Harper acknowledged that Colombia faces many challenges, particularly in security. Colombia is the world's biggest supplier of cocaine according to the CIA, despite efforts from both their government and the United States.

Colombia's ties with the US could be severely damaged if Congress does not approve a planned free trade deal, the country's vice-president has warned. Francisco Santos Calderon told the BBC that a US failure to sign the pact would be a "slap in the face" to a strong ally.
The trade deal was signed two years ago by leaders of the two nations.
But US Democrats oppose the deal and have used their Congressional majority to block its passage. Mr Santos told the BBC that he did not believe that the deal would be passed during the remaining days of the Bush administration - and that he was not optimistic for its future under President-elect Barack Obama.
He said it was critical that the incoming administration saw US-Colombia relations "not in the context of what special interest groups want but in the light of our long-term relationship".
"Not approving the free trade agreement would be certainly a slap in the face to the strongest strategic ally that the US has in the continent," he said.
But Mr Santos played down the significance of the "Plan Colombia" US military aid package - worth more than half a billion dollars annually - aimed at fighting drug production

And China too has signed a Free Trade agreement with Colombia, which simply proves bireds of a feather and all that, both regimes are autarchic, militarist. In China's case it is her imperialist objective to act as a trading partner with whomever the U.S. fails to or takes exception too.

China, Colombia agree to strengthen cooperation

And let us not forget that we have been through all this before. Free Trade exasperates the crisis of capitalism it is not a solution to that crisis as Herr Doctor Professor Marx explained 160 years ago.

ON THE QUESTION OF FREE TRADE

Public Speech Delivered by Karl Marx

before the Democratic Association of Brussels January 9, 1848

We have shown what sort of brotherhood free trade begets between the different classes of one and the same nation. The brotherhood which free trade would establish between the nations of the Earth would hardly be more fraternal. To call cosmopolitan exploitation universal brotherhood is an idea that could only be engendered in the brain of the bourgeoisie. All the destructive phenomena which unlimited competition gives rise to within one country are reproduced in more gigantic proportions on the world market. We need not dwell any longer upon free trade sophisms on this subject, which are worth just as much as the arguments of our prize-winners Messrs. Hope, Morse, and Greg. For instance, we are told that free trade would create an international division of labor, and thereby give to each country the production which is most in harmony with its natural advantage. You believe, perhaps, gentlemen, that the production of coffee and sugar is the natural destiny of the West Indies. Two centuries ago, nature, which does not trouble herself about commerce, had planted neither sugar-cane nor coffee trees there. And it may be that in less than half a century you will find there neither coffee nor sugar, for the East Indies, by means of cheaper production, have already successfully combated his alleged natural destiny of the West Indies. And the West Indies, with their natural wealth, are already as heavy a burden for England as the weavers of Dacca, who also were destined from the beginning of time to weave by hand. One other thing must never be forgotten, namely, that, just as everything has become a monopoly, there are also nowadays some branches of industry which dominate all others, and secure to the nations which most largely cultivate them the command of the world market. Thus in international commerce cotton alone has much greater commercial than all the other raw materials used in the manufacture of clothing put together. It is truly ridiculous to see the free-traders stress the few specialties in each branch of industry, throwing them into the balance against the products used in everyday consumption and produced most cheaply in those countries in which manufacture is most highly developed. If the free-traders cannot understand how one nation can grow rich at the expense of another, we need not wonder, since these same gentlemen also refuse to understand how within one country one class can enrich itself at the expense of another.”

SEE:

Colombia Deal Dead

Armes sans frontières

The New Market States

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Friday, November 14, 2008

Huh?

NEW YORK, Nov. 13 /Standard Newswire/ -- The following text is of remarks by President Bush on Financial Markets and the World Economy:

History has shown that the greater threat to economic prosperity is not too little government involvement in the market - but too much.

Huh?

Hoover proves lack of government involvement led to the Great Depression. Here is Republican historical revisionism in it most blatant stupidity.Right wing American ideologues whether Republican, Conservative or Libertarian all try and avoid this obvious fact instead blaming the Smoot Hawley Act which was protectionist for the long Depression. In fact it was Hoovers hands off approach to the markets for three years that created the spiral downward. Smmot-Haweley and protectionist measures in Europe only agrivated that downward rush.

Bush, the Republicans, heck the liberals and the Libertarians in America live in a cloud cookoo land, one that imagines an artisan/farmer free market, free of monopolies, cartels and special business interests tied to the state. A time that is a fiction, a myth, of American Capitalism.

Ain't ever been such a creature nor is it the nature of American Capitalism and Imperialism.

Bush admits that capitalism is in a crisis; Faced with the prospect of a global financial meltdown
nations have responded with bold measures, and at Saturday's summit, we will review the effectiveness of our actions. This crisis did not develop overnight, and it will not be solved overnight.

And his solution is to keep on keeping on, capitalism is great, yep it has crisis, but heck its still the best system ever devised by humans.

This is a decisive moment for the global economy. In the wake of the financial crisis, voices from the left and right are equating the free enterprise system with greed, exploitation, and failure. It is true that this crisis included failures - by lenders and borrowers, by financial firms, by governments and independent regulators. But the crisis was not a failure of the free market system. And the answer is not to try to reinvent that system. It is to fix the problems we face, make the reforms we need, and move forward with the free market principles that have delivered prosperity and hope to people around the world.
Like any other system designed by man, capitalism is not perfect. It can be subject to excesses and abuse. But it is by far the most efficient and just way of structuring an economy. At its most basic level, capitalism offers people the freedom to choose where they work and what they do, the opportunity to buy or sell the products they want, and the dignity that comes with profiting from their talent and hard work. The free market system also provides the incentives that lead to prosperity – the incentive to work, to innovate, to save and invest wisely, and to create jobs for others. And as millions of people pursue these incentives together, whole societies benefit.


A nation that gave the world the I-Pod which is manufactured in China. Because as Reason magazine announced in 1999 that the world of the 21 Century was no longer America as the producer nation but America the consumer/service industry nation. A predicition that failed to understand that this would ultimately lead to a credit crisis, when a nation fails to produce value but rather lives on the value produced by others and lent to them.

Free market capitalism is far more than an economic theory. It is the engine of social mobility – the highway to the American Dream. It is what makes it possible for a husband and wife to start up their own business, or a new immigrant to open a restaurant, or a single mom to go back to college and begin a better career. It is what allowed entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley to change the way the world sells products and searches for information. And it is what transformed America from a rugged frontier to the greatest economic power in history - a nation that gave the world the steamboat and the airplane, the computer and the CAT scan, the Internet and the I-Pod.

Bush went on to defend capitalism, specifically post WWII American Capitalism, which itself is not a free market economy, but one of protectionism combined with state capitalism of the Military Industrial Complex. America subsidizes its aircraft manufacturerers, its agribusiness cartels, its auto industry, and has since WWII. To hear the President proclaim the glory of free markets and free peoples, is to also deny the hisorical reality which is American Capitalism. He further equates Japan's economic boom with American Capitalism, when in reality it is the result of State Capitalism. Japan used the Military Industrial Banking model for its development.

Ultimately, the best evidence for free market capitalism is its performance compared to other economic systems. Free markets allowed Japan - an island nation with few natural resources - to recover from war and grow into the world's second-largest economy. Free markets allowed South Korea to make itself one of the most technologically advanced societies in the world. Free markets turned small areas like Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan into global economic players. And today, the success of the world’s largest economies comes from their embrace of free markets.

South Korea which itself is an other model of State Capitalism, with Military and Finance capital under a pro-USA military dictatorship finally evolving into a manufacturing fordist economy modeled on the success of Japan. As for Singapore and Hong Kong these two islands of free market economies are ruled by dictators, proving that capitalism can function without democracy.

Meanwhile, nations that have pursued other models have experienced devastating results. Soviet communism starved millions, bankrupted an empire, and collapsed as decisively as the Berlin Wall. Cuba, once known for its vast fields of cane, is now forced to ration sugar. And while Iran sits atop giant oil reserves, its people cannot put enough gasoline in their cars.


Oh sure free markets really work well, except Cuba is rationing sugar because they cannot compete with American subsidized sugar and the American led economic boycott of their country. No free market here.

As for the Soviet Union it collapsed because it lost the military race under Reagans expansion of military spending, the USA Military Industrial Complex defeated the Soviet Unions Military Industrial Complex. Capitalism did not defeat Communism, rather the American model of State Capitalism proved to be more flexible than the autarchic command economy model used in the Soviet Union. Unfortunately China proves that this autarchic command model can be flexible, and now American Capitalism is beholden to China for its national debt.

But Bush was not the only one to proclaim that Capitalism may be melting down but its still not the problem. In listening to their Republican masters voice, our own Finance Minister and PM echoed Bush's doctrine that capitalism has not failed.

In a piece in the Financial Times, meanwhile, Mr. Flaherty too had rare kind words for the invisible hand, downplayed grand global financial architectural plans and suggested that reform -- like charity -- should begin at home. "The open market system did not fail in this crisis," he said.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is expected to join U.S. President George W. Bush in a defence of free-market capitalism and resistance to international calls for dramatic re-regulation of financial markets.


The ruling class recongizes that capitalism has once again failed, the bubble burst, the market crashed, what goes up must come down, the business cycle has not been superceded by globalization. The elephant in the room is socialism. The Republican Libertarian argument is to let the market decide, except contrary to their Libertarian dogma that market has come cap in hand to its State to bail it out. Opps. Guess real capitalism does not like the discipline of the marketplace. In attempting to not bail out the working class who is really suffering from this crisis with record home foreclosures, record unemployment and the very real threat of the meltdown of America's core manufacturing centre; Michagan, Bush and Harper need to couch the argument as a question of state intervention. The strawman they set up is to equate state capitalism, state intervention as socialism. Which it is not.

Capitalism cannot continue as it is. Temporary fixes like increased regulation, government bailouts etc. are not a solution to the crisis nature of capitalism. Socialization of capital is what is required. The fact that workers create captial, not business which only produces 'jobs', without workers capitalism collapses. This was clearly seen in Alberta last year during the height of the boom, when neither for love nor money could businesses find enough workers.
The result was many small businesses, you remember them they are the core of the economy according to Bush and Harper. closed.

Workers create captial, they circulate that capital by home purchases and by consuming the products they produce. They fund capital through their pension and benefit plans, pensions are called institutional investors in Wall Street, one of the largest sources of capital available currently.

The Canada Pension Plan fund said Wednesday it ended its latest quarter with a loss of more than $10 billion in the value of its assets, primarily because of the stock market turmoil that has battered share prices around the world.
But president and CEO David Denison said Canadians shouldn't worry that the loss will affect their current or future retirement benefits.
"This fund is designed to be able to withstand this short-term market volatility that we are living through, quite frankly better than any other fund in this country," Denison said in an interview with The Canadian Press.


Here is the true source of capital the working class blue, white and green collar, that produce and consume. And it is the means to change capitalism, the use of workers productive value matched by their pension funds and the corporate pension liabilities which are owed them, with capital from public pension funds, workers can then fund the corporations and run them themselves.

In Quebec there are labour funds as well as the Cassie Popular, the credit unions which have enormous reserves of workers capital to be able to use for promoting workers control of industry. In the rest of Canada workers whose credit unions are mimicing banks, need to take control of them and use this vast reserve of capital to invest in worker controled industries.

With the socialization of capital under workers control, the question of bail outs and regulation of the market become moot.

This is the socialism that Bush and Harper fear. This is why they distort the definintion of socialism equating it with state capitalism and command economies. Which socialism never was about. It is about the need to socialize captial to benefit those who create it; the working class.

It is the working class who are the real investors in capitalism, not those investors on Wall Street who play the market. The working class exists because of capitalism and capitalism exists because of the working class. As this crisis deepens and government intervention fails to stop the melt down, the only solution that will become clear is the need for socialization of capital under workers control.


SEE:
STFU 'W'
October Surprise Was The Market Crash
No Austrians In Foxholes
CRASH
The Return Of Hawley—Smoot
Canadian Banks and The Great Depression
U.S. Economy Entering Twilight Zone
What Goes Up...
Wall Street Mantra
Bank Run

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Saturday, November 08, 2008

ROFL

Rolling On the Floor Laughing......
"Many Canadians might be surprised by this statement," Wilkins told The Canadian Press. "But I would submit to you that Canadians are going to miss George Bush more than they think they are."
Nah, all we have to say is Na-Na-Hey-Hey Goodbye. Even the Conservatives have gotten into the act....
Anonymous Conservatives described with glee how they were relieved by the prospect of aligning themselves with a popular American administration, and freed of the unwanted association with Bush.
Unwanted association? Gee considering how much the Harpocrites sucked up to Bush most Canadians would say they were joined at the hip.

See:
Daddy's Boy
Americans Recognize Canada
Canada Who?


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Tuesday, October 28, 2008

STFU 'W'



If I was generous I would say that poor George W. spent the last year as the American economy tanked, viewing the pending crash through rose coloured blinders. As you have read here for the past two years I have predicted the pending crash that brought the market tumbling down last month. It was simple to read in the tea leaves of market excess, or market 'exuberance' as Greenspan called it. But for George W. it was all about denial. The market fundamentals were strong he asserted right up to a few weeks ago. America he had claimed for months is NOT in a recession, denying the obvious. In January oil began its upward spiral, and America was in its third month of downaward spiral. America was in a recession everyone knew it, only George continued to deny it.


Like WMD, which he beleived existed in Iraq, he also believed there was no recsssion, and hence no problem with the market, despite the year of declining housing prices and the ensuing subprime crash.


So it should come as no surprise that the guy who lied to the American people about WMD, could easily lie to himself, and hence the American people, about there being no recession.


Unlike the first U.S. President named George who created the myth of the Honest Presidency, with the allegorical fiction about the cherry tree, this President George has put to bed that myth. While the first George confessed to chooping down the tree this George denies there was a tree.


And so he should not be surprised that over the past three weeks every time he has assured Americans that they need not panic about a market crash, the market responds by crashing further.


It's poetic justice.


Everyone now accepts that W is either a compulsive liar, or a self-deluded fool. What a condemnation the market makes everytime W opens his mouth.


Someone should tell the lame duck to sit down and shut up.



President Bush Speaks on Ailing Economy
Friday Address Marks 10th Time Bush Has Recently Spoken About Volatile Markets
Oct. 10, 2008



President Bush tried to reassure the nation today that the economy is strong enough to weather the current crisis, but by the time Bush stopped speaking nine minutes later, the market had dropped another 107 points.


Following the previous nine times the president specifically addressed the economic crisis, the market ended the day on an upturn on five occasions and closed down the other four.

What the G-7 Should Be Doing To Fix the Financial Crisis

TIME - 10 Oct 2008

Global stock markets were sending an unmistakable signal too: panic. The Dow Jones industrial average finished its worst week ever, off about 22%. On Friday, the market swung wildly, dropping 500 points on three occasions, then vaulting into positive territory before coughing up its gains in the last half-hour of trading to finish the day down 128 at 8,451. The NASDAQ managed a small gain. But European and Asian markets were pummeled again.



DOW PLUNGES 733 POINTS ; Worst Decline Since 1987
Thursday, October 16, 2008
When President Bush speaks, many listen - but apparently investors haven't been reassured by his many speaches about the market meltdown this month.



SEE:



No Austrians In Foxholes



CRASH



Black Gold



The Return Of Hawley—Smoot



What Goes Up...



Wall Street Mantra



Bank Run



U.S. Economy Entering Twilight Zone



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Saturday, October 27, 2007

Environmentalists Caused Wildfires


So said Mike Brown, ex-head of FEMA during the Katrina debacle, on FOX News. He blamed the California wildfires on environmentalists; he claimed they opposed selective burns of brush and bush areas. While he stated that it is only natural for people to want to move into wilderness areas, including those prone to wildfires. Talk about Republican spin.

Yep environmental issues are behind the wild fires but not environmentalists. As Californian's are finding out that old adage Think Globally (warming ) Act Locally (put out wild fires). And the excuse that the fires were arson does nothing to halt the fact that they were fueled by Santa Ana wind's and as a result of climactic changes brought on by Global Warming.

Al Gore though art avenged.


SEE:

Black and White

Blaming Others




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Thursday, October 25, 2007

Black and White

What a difference it makes in America if you are rich, white and live in California, rather than poor, black and live in New Orleans.

Bush Travels To California To See Fires
President Bush flew to fire-ravaged California Thursday with promises of federal help, supportive words for those who've lost home and businesses and thanks to overworked firefighters.


After Katrina he failed to visit New Orleans until the anniversary of 9/11. Weeks after the hurricane hit. And then it was for another photo op like 9/11.


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Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Blaming Others

The reason for the failures in Iraq are not George Bush's fault they are the fault of others.
Just whose brilliant idea was it to disband the Iraqi army? The former U.S. boss of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, says President Bush knew about and supported his plans to dissolve Saddam's military, according to letters he released to the New York Times yesterday.

Annoyed that Bush was quoted in a recent book as suggesting that he had gone a bit Rambo out in the desert, Bremer disclosed his spring 2003 correspondence with the president.

The impetus for Bremer's action was Bush's interview with Robert Draper, author of the new book "Dead Certain," in which the president sounded as if he had been taken aback by the decision.

"The policy had been to keep the army intact; didn't happen," Bush told Draper. When Draper asked how he had reacted when the policy changed, Bush replied, "Yeah, I can't remember. I'm sure I said, 'This is the policy, what happened?'"

Rumsfeld also serves as a major, if absent, character in today's sweeping USA Today investigation tracking the Defense Department's slowness to equip the troops in Iraq with protective gear like body armor and devices to jam signals from detonators.

Even as the president and Pentagon officials claimed they were doing all they could to get these items for the soldiers, the paper digs up documents suggesting that "the military cut or underfunded several programs and moved so slowly and grudgingly that members of Congress" had to step in with "extraordinary measures."

Interviewed officials complained of a refusal among top military brass at the beginning of the war to believe that the fighting would be anything but brief. Once things started to get bogged down, there was a "peacetime mentality" guiding acquisition of "up-armored vehicles," the paper reports.

In one particularly striking example, Pentagon officials "balked at pleas from battlefield commanders and their own analysts to provide the lifesaving MRAP, or Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicle, for patrols and combat missions." Only after Rummy left and Robert Gates took over did the Pentagon embrace the MRAP.

Draper's account of the bulk of Bush's presidency sheds light on a loyal and secretive inner circle that, at least privately, was not always on the same page. Draper tells of an April 2006 dinner at which Bush asked aides for a show of hands on whether his divisive defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, should be fired.

The vote: 7-4 to get rid of him, with Bush siding with those who wanted him kept on for the time being. Rumsfeld was replaced after the elections that fall switched control of the House and Senate to Democrats.

White House aides who wanted Rumsfeld out were privately dismayed when retired generals called publicly for his ouster, fearing that would steel Bush's resolve to keep his defence chief, the book says.

Bush, without addressing that meeting, suggested to the author that the ex-generals did get under his skin. "My reaction was, 'No military guy is gonna tell a civilian how to react,"' he said.

Just like his failure to deal with Hurricane Katrina.

The latest book published about George W Bush reveals that the US president was not fully engaged in key policy areas, including the disbandment of the Iraqi army and the build-up to Hurricane Katrina.

At a briefing at his Crawford ranch the day before the hurricane made landfall, Mr Bush was "gassed" after an 80-minute bike ride and asked no supplementary questions following a briefing from advisers. He merely assured them the federal government was prepared to help.


SEE:

Daddy's Boy




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Daddy's Boy


So come January 2009 what will Ex-President Bush be thinking about? His failed war in Iraq? His failed war on Terrorism? All the homes not built in New Orleans? Crumbling American infrastructure? Nope. True to form he will be thinking of how he can make a buck off being an Ex-Pres. Just like Daddy does. And of course he has to keep up with the Clinton's.

After he leaves office, President Bush is quoted as telling Draper that he wants to build what he calls a "Fantastic Freedom Institute" in Dallas. He describes it as being a place where young leaders can come, write and lecture.

But first, Bush tells Draper, he wants to make some money to "replenish the ol' coffers,” noting he can make "ridiculous” money on the lecture circuit.

“I don't know what my dad gets. But it's more than 50, 75 [thousand] … Clinton's making a lot of money," the president is quoted as saying.

Given his failed presidency the only place that would welcome him on the lecture circuit is Albania.




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Sunday, September 02, 2007

Bush Apologizes to Witches


Good news Wicca has been officially recognized by the U.S. Military as a religion.
In this BBC report an update on the recent recognition of Wicca as a religion by the U.S. military.



Pagan branch gains strength

31 Aug 2007

Image: Pagan branch gains strength
Small Video Icon

Followers of Wicca, a branch of paganism, have stepped up efforts for recognition of the religion.
Of course considering the U.S. military operates from the Pentagon, itself a form of Pentagram, and uses the Star on as its symbol on its equipment, perhaps they realized how silly this was. Or perhaps their reluctance was that they were afraid of being outed as a Satanic conspiracy like poor old Procter and Gamble.

A Wiccan military family who got dissed last week by President Bush when he was meeting with military families who lost loved ones in Iraq, gains an apology from the Pres.

Americans United for Separation of Church and State today commended President George W. Bush for his apology to a Wiccan war widow who was excluded from a private meeting with veterans and their deceased family members in Nevada earlier this week.

Roberta Stewart, whose husband Sgt. Patrick Stewart was killed in combat in Afghanistan, was not invited to meet with Bush and other family members of soldiers who have died in combat. Other members of Sgt. Stewart's family were invited to the meeting.

"He apologized for the exclusion and the error that was made and said that he admired me for my spirit and thanked me for accepting his apology and said that he hoped he would have the opportunity to someday meet me," Stewart continued. "I was very pleased with the way the conversation went, very pleased that he did call and put this right."

Lynn asked Stewart if the president touched upon her Wiccan faith. She replied that the president told her that "he would not discriminate against someone because of their religion."

Unlike other Born Again Christians who are still at war with the Old Religion.

The Return of the Old Gods: A Challenge to Green Evangelicals
Just as they are against secular society which allows Wicca and other alternative religions to flourish in spite of Christian Hegemony.



See:

Gone to Croatan

Whitman Wicker Man

The Wicker Man Review

Wicca

Pagan




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Monday, August 27, 2007

Gonzo

With the exit of Karl Rove, Alberto Gonzales had no reason to stay on and impede investigations into Rove's alleged role the political firings of Justice Department attorneys.

Gonzales Quits After Months of Turmoil Over Firings


And with both of them gone their is no one left to talk to Congress.

``Alberto Gonzales was never the right man for this job. He lacked independence, he lacked judgment, and he lacked the spine to say no to Karl Rove. This resignation is not the end of the story. Congress must get to the bottom of this mess and follow the facts where they lead, into the White House.'' - Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

``The resignation of Alberto Gonzales had become inevitable. His situation was a distraction to the Department of Justice and its attempt to carry out its important duties.'' - Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M.


Under the Gonzales regime Sacco and Vanzetti may not have been hanged for political reasons but they would most certainly have ended up in Gitmo , incommunicado without habeas corpus, while their relatives phones would be tapped illegally.

Covering up for the White House political firings in his department was seen as unimportant, something to sweep under the carpet.
And yet it became his petard.

``I don't think he would have ever had to resign until they were able to hang the U.S. attorneys' firings around his neck ... To me, it could all be written off to miscommunication and bad judgment and probably could have been forgiven until they made a conscious decision to be willing to throw some of the U.S. attorneys under the bus.'' - Fired Arkansas U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins.


Priceless.

Shortly afterward, Mr. Bush acknowledged the resignation and defended Gonzales as a man unfairly vilified by his critics.

"It is sad that we live in a time when a talented and honorable person is impeded from doing important work because his good name has been dragged through the mud for political reasons," said Bush.

But in the end President Bush may have been Gonzales's lone defender. The Attorney General's halting explanations to Congress of controversial actions, such as the mass firing of US attorneys last year, lost him the support of many lawmakers. Some accused him of outright lies. Even many in the GOP thought he seemed to be in over his head.

``I have said for a long time that I thought the president would be best served if the attorney general resigned so I think it's the right thing to do.'' - Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Republican presidential candidate.




SEE:

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US Troops Out Of Iraq April 2008

Despite the White House refusal to accept the Democrats call for troop withdrawals to begin no later than April 2008, the reality is they will begin then. And it is not congress that has set that date, but the Pentagon.

MR. RUSSERT: Tom Ricks and Michael Gordon, you cover the Pentagon, both in an extraordinary way. You’ve heard all the testimony, all the reports that the military is being strained terribly by the war in Iraq. Do you expect that there will be significant troop withdrawals recommended by the leadership in the Pentagon for 2008?


MR. RICKS: Yes. If things go beautifully, better than expected, you’ll see troop drawdowns beginning by April of next year. If things go horribly, you know, much worse than they are now, you’re going to see troop drawdowns beginning in April of next year. They’re going to come down by about one brigade, say about 5,000 troops a month, from April to October of next year.



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Thursday, August 02, 2007

Saddam and the CIA

Why George Bush applauded the murder of Saddam Hussein by his puppet regime in Baghdad. Dead men tell no tales.

Another very good example of a CIA-organized regime change was a coup in 1963 that employed political assassination, mass imprisonment, torture and murder. This was the military coup that first brought Saddam Hussein's beloved Ba'ath Party to power in Iraq. At the time, Richard Helms was Director for Plans at the CIA. That is the top CIA position responsible for covert actions, like organizing coups. Helms served in that capacity until 1966, when he was made Director.

In the quotations collected below, the name of the leader who was assassinated is spelled variously as Qasim, Qassim and Kassem. But, however you spell his name, when he took power in a popularly-backed coup in 1958, he certainly got recognized in Washington. He carried out such anti-American and anti-corporatist policies as starting the process of nationalizing foreign oil companies in Iraq, withdrawing Iraq from the US-initiated right-wing Baghdad Pact (which included another military-run, US-puppet state, i.e., Pakistan) and decriminalizing the Iraqi Communist Party. Despite these actions, and more likely because of them, he was Iraq's most popular leader. He had to go!

In 1959, there was a failed assassination attempt on Qasim. The failed assassin was none other than a young Saddam Hussein. In 1963, a CIA-organized coup did successfully assassinate Qasim and Saddam's Ba'ath Party came to power for the first time. Saddam returned from exile in Egypt and took up the key post as head of Iraq's secret service. The CIA then provided the new pliant, Iraqi regime with the names of thousands of communists, and other leftist activists and organizers. Thousands of these supporters of Qasim and his policies were soon dead in a rampage of mass murder carried out by the CIA's close friends in Iraq.

SEE:


CIA Conspiracies Are Real

Back In the USSA

State Sponsored Terrorism

The Fifth International

CIA,Conspiracy,Princess Di

Pinochet Admits He Did It.

Psychedelic Saskatchewan

Paranoia and the Security State


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