Who needs private sector experience in a “hope and change” world? Apparently not too many cabinet members in the Obama administration.

This graphic certainly explains alot.    It would explain the vast growth in government jobs made available, the lack of understanding or concrete plans for generating private sector jobs, and the disdain for capitalism that sits like a never-ending virus in the Obama administration.

Another couple of interesting tidbits:

Among President Obama, his Vice President and 15 Cabinet officers, number with military experience:  2 (Gates at Defense and Shinseki at Veterans Affairs).

Number of lawyers:  8.

This is the change that NO ONE was waiting for!

Even though Obama is clearly setting a new low standard here, in a broader sense, this graph also depicts how far from their constituents many in Washington can be, even as far back as 1909.  I mean don’t you think at least a comfortable majority of public sector experienced individuals should be a common statistic in cabinet picks?  But that hasn’t happened much in the last 100 years. 

I’m sure the Founders didn’t much count on “career politicians” and lawyers running our country.  Seems in the last hundred years, only Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, and both Bushes understood the need for a big dose of private sector experience when running this country….

(H/T: The American Thinker - Private Sector experienc in Obama’s cabinet…graph of the day)

American commanders-in-chief apparently tend to have extremely small penises. I’m obviously in no position to know for sure (though perhaps Michaele Salahi is), but how else can you explain presidents’ unending need to prove their manhood through meaningless and ultimately counterproductive warfare?

Maybe it’s guilt, since recent presidents also have been “men” who managed to avoid military service themselves. Or maybe they feel shame because of their common inability to produce male offspring who might carry on the family name (or, in the case of George H. W. Bush, shame because of the males who will carry it on).

Whatever the reason, presidents do love their toy soldiers. And those soldiers generally remain willing to risk life, limb and marriage, guided by a combination of patriotism, presidential lies, and a lack of economic options (thanks in part to an economy hampered by war spending).

Instead of pulling his Johnson, so to speak, to turn Afghanistan into another Vietnam, Obama should be pulling troops out of that unwinnable conflict. Through withdrawal he could be the first president since Jimmy Carter not to go out of his way to kill people to prove he’s a tough guy, and maybe in the process avoid being a one-term president. Of course we all know what a wuss Amy’s dad was.

Krauthammer says is plain and simple, with no “counterpoint” from the rest of the panel:

It’s ten o’clock. Do you know where your politicians are ?

(Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush)

With the other undead?

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: chriswiththebat via Advanced Lol Builder

» Recaption This!

» View All Captions

The AP has a nice article on what is a consistent trend throughout voter history — the rise of third parties at times when voters are unhappy. The article discusses Governor’s race in NJ between Democratic Incumbent Jon Corzine, Republican candidate Chris Christie, and Independent Chris Daggett. In NY’s 23rd District, the GOP candidate (Dede Scozzafava) was forced out of the race by surging Conservative Party candidate, Doug Hoffman. Scozzafava then endorsed her former Democratic opponent, Bill Owens.

Does this mean America is headed for a new era, the end of the two party stranglehold on political power? Sadly, I’ll have to say no.

Now, I’m not saying no because I hate third parties — quite the opposite. If my young voting record is any indication (and my independent party affiliation), I advocate third parties aggressively. However, I’m a realist above all, and while I believe that a few third party candidates may make inroads here or there, this will not be a permanent phenomenon.

Historically, third parties have been strongest when there is discontent in the nation. Look at Teddy Roosevelt, who harnessed the power of the Progressive movement into his Bull-Moose party, fighting with former friend and Republican candidate William Howard Taft, paving the way for a Wilson presidency (Wilson won with only 41.8% of the popular vote).

George C. Wallace took 46 electoral votes in 1968, playing at divisions in the electorate over de-segregation (Wallace opposed de-segregation). Nixon would win that election with 301 electoral votes, but, interestingly, only little more than half of the popular vote (he got 31,710,470 votes whereas Vice President and Democratic candidate Hubert Humphrey got 30,898,055, and George Wallace got 9,906,473). An incredibly close race with a third party siphoning votes by playing to the divisive issue of the time.

Looking back to 1948, Strom Thurmond won 39 electoral votes as the segregationist, socially conservative Dixiecrat, again taking advantage of the racially divisive time period. Thurmond carried Southern states, most likely taking votes from Democratic candidate Harry S Truman (back when the South was solidly Democratic, pre-LBJ days) who still clinched a narrow victory over Thomas Dewey.

More recently, in 1992, Ross Perot gained about 19% of the popular vote, but no electoral votes. Perot’s focus on the economy, during a recession and after 12 years of Reagan-Bush, gained him a large amount of votes, even after he withdrew and then re-entered the race. However, and this is instructive as to the lot of third parties in America, Perot’s 1996 run for the Presidency was decidedly less successful. Why? Because Clinton absorbed many of the Perot voters with his economic agenda. Perot was the answer to growing discontent with both parties (the Republicans in power — Reagan and Bush — had more than tripled the national debt and the economy was in recession, and the Democrats were also saddled with a reputation of big government and larger spending), but once Clinton took office as a “New Democrat” and began the process of balancing the budget and leading the way out of recession, many voters who were discontented with the two main parties then supported Clinton. In effect, he neutralized the Perot voters, and brought them over to his side for the 1996 election.

This is the historic role of third parties in America — the answer to discontent with both the two major parties. They run, they siphon off enough votes to make the major parties recognize the growing movement in America, and then the major parties absorb their views to neutralize them and pacify the electorate. When was the last time you saw someone running on the Bull-Moose or Dixiecrat or Know-Nothing ticket? These movements don’t often survive past a few elections at the most, because their views have been taken on by one of the major parties (Perot) or their views become out of step or fall out of favor (such as the racist Dixiecrat and Know-Nothing parties). Or because people are frightened to vote third party.

Which leads us to the 2000 election. Discontent spread over various things (the Monica Lewinsky affair and Gore’s subsequent attempts to disassociate himself with Clinton, the false image of Gore perpetuated by opponents (for instance, he never said he invented the internet), and the conservative bend of the Clinton-Gore “New Democrats’” on various economic issues like deregulation and free trade), which lead to an extremely tight race in which Gore won the popular vote of the American people, but lost the election after the Supreme Court decided Bush won Florida. Ralph Nader, running as a Green Party candidate, was the answer to much of this dissatisfaction. He posed a progressive alternative to the Gore “New Democrat” and the “Reagan Conservative” Bush, and won 2.74% of the popular vote.

Viewed as the spoiler that caused Gore to lose (though Gore actually won the popular vote, as noted above), Nader would have no substantial effect in later elections. Essentially, I believe, the thought process became “a third party cannot win and can only hurt my second choice candidate, so I have to vote for one of the two major parties”. Also, the 2000 did not have the extremely large issues that dominate politics today (terrorism and the economy — the 2000 election was pre-9/11 and the economy was not in a recession). The stakes may seem higher now than they did in 2000.

Finally, as Ralph Nader has noted before (I’ll search for the link to the interview), it is extremely difficult to unify a third party, which (like any other party) boasts an intellectual diversity of members. Splintered into various segments, often on a state level instead of a national level, a party may be successful in gaining some elected seats here or there, but without a unifying force it probably won’t translate to a broader single movement that will redefine the political spectrum.

Looking at what has occurred before as a guide, these third party candidates may have scattered success as voters become disillusioned with the Obama Administration but are stilling unwilling to vote for the contemporary Republican Party (dominated as it is by its radical elements — think Limbaugh, Palin, ‘birthers’, and ‘death panelists’), but they will most likely not change the political landscape in the long-term. If the economy picks up, and things start looking better (or if the Republican Party retains its extremist views), these voters may return to the Democratic fold. If the Republican Party recreates itself into a party of intellectual conservatism and jettisons its fringe elements and evangelical base that frighten away moderate voters, then it will likely gain these independent-voters.

Last Friday we had the good fortune to get a head’s up from Lord Christopher Moncton. If you haven’t seen that video yet, start here: http://wp.me/pxG9Z-cf Then we learned from him on Monday Maurice Strong played a vastly important roll in all this http://wp.me/pxG9Z-cn and http://wp.me/pxG9Z-cv  which lead to an epiphany http://wp.me/pxG9Z-cz involving Agenda 21, which was discussed earlier here  http://wp.me/pxG9Z-8X . Thursday we learned about the Club of Rome, a powerful group of people including American ex-presidents and other world leaders, top business people and other “trusted” figures, and saw a video that spelled out their agenda and how it morphed into Agenda 21. You may watch the video here http://wp.me/pxG9Z-cH  Referred to in the video were two books. These books were controversial when published, but over time the authors, The Club of Rome, were able to “mainstream” them through lies, fake science, and indoctrination of our youth. I have provided free copies, as available, for you here:

Limits to Growth (”cliff notes” version – could not find full version in pdf)

 http://tinyurl.com/yk97v6e

Limits to Growth Revisited (30 year update)

 http://www.sustainer.org/pubs/limitstogrowth.pdf

The First World Revolution

http://www.archive.org/details/TheFirstGlobalRevolution

Other important documents I have offered along the way this week:

Here is the Minority Report, paid for by our own government, and given to our Congressional Members telling them why this science is bogus. Arm yourself with the real facts.  http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=83947f5d-d84a-4a84-ad5d-6e2d71db52d9

Here is the UN Document on Agenda 21 : http://www.un.org/esa/dsd/agenda21/

Here is the Cap & Trade legislation (HR 2454) which passed in the House: http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h2454/show 

This is a chart from Liberty For Life detailing how insidious undue influence from these shadow organizations really are. You must print this .pdf chart and refer to it as we go through learning about what’s really going on. http://www.libertyforlife.com/nwo/2009Chart.pdf  This will illustrate the connections between The Council on Foreign Relations, Trilateral Commission and Bilderburg Group, showing how much they have infiltrated our government and educational institutions and just who these people are - many of whom, you already know.

Friday we learned about the impact of the Trilateral Commission on Agenda 21 and COP 15: http://wp.me/pxG9Z-d3  where we learned the following:

President George H.W. Bush later talked openly about creating a “New World Order”, which has since become a synonymous phrase. This paper attempts to tell the rest of the story, according to official and unofficial Commission sources and other available documents….  http://tinyurl.com/35vtw2 

“The technotronic era involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled society. Such a society would be dominated by an elite, unrestrained by traditional values. Soon it will be possible to assert almost continuous surveillance over every citizen and maintain up-to-date complete files containing even the most personal information about the citizen. These files will be subject to instantaneous retrieval by the authorities. “  - Zbigniew Brzezinski, 1972, from book ”Between Two Ages” – free pdf of book: http://tinyurl.com/yhsfo3x

Sovereignty.net illustrates the timeline toward Global Governance with clickable links and is a very good resource for learning more about what got us to this point in our history. Timeline to Global Governance  http://www.sovereignty.net/timeline.html

Another of these groups is the Bilderburg Group- Here an introduction from The History Channel:

The Bilderburg meeting for 2008 was held in the US. Remember during the campaign when candidate Barack Obama ditched reporters who he had herded on his plane, then turned up missing along with Hilary Clinton? Well, that is because they wanted to attend the Bilderburg meeting without the press knowing about it. They are both members. From HongPong.com comes the following: http://tinyurl.com/yhry4nf

LiveLeak.com – Bilderberg Attendee List 2008
Chantilly, Virginia, USA
5-8 June 2008

CURRENT LIST OF PARTICIPANTS

Honorary Chairman
BEL Davignon, Etienne Vice Chairman, Suez-Tractebel

DEU Ackermann, Josef Chairman of the Management Board and the Group Executive Committee, Deutsche Bank AG
CAN Adams, John Associate Deputy Minister of National Defence and Chief of the Communications Security Establishment Canada
USA Ajami, Fouad Director, Middle East Studies Program, The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, The Johns Hopkins University
USA Alexander, Keith B. Director, National Security Agency
INT Almunia, Joaquín Commissioner, European Commission
GRC Alogoskoufis, George Minister of Economy and Finance
USA Altman, Roger C. Chairman, Evercore Partners Inc.
TUR Babacan, Ali Minister of Foreign Affairs
NLD Balkenende, Jan Peter Prime Minister
PRT Balsemão, Francisco Pinto Chairman and CEO, IMPRESA, S.G.P.S.; Former Prime Minister
FRA Baverez, Nicolas Partner, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP
ITA Bernabè, Franco CEO, Telecom Italia Spa
USA Bernanke, Ben S. Chairman, Board of Governors, Federal Reserve System
SWE Bildt, Carl Minister of Foreign Affairs
FIN Blåfield, Antti Senior Editorial Writer, Helsingin Sanomat
DNK Bosse, Stine CEO, TrygVesta
CAN Brodie, Ian Chief of Staff, Prime Minister’s Office
AUT Bronner, Oscar Publisher and Editor, Der Standard
FRA Castries, Henri de Chairman of the Management Board and CEO, AXA
ESP Cebrián, Juan Luis CEO, PRISA
CAN Clark, Edmund President and CEO, TD Bank Financial Group
GBR Clarke, Kenneth Member of Parliament
NOR Clemet, Kristin Managing Director, Civita
USA Collins, Timothy C. Senior Managing Director and CEO, Ripplewood Holdings, LLC
FRA Collomb, Bertrand Honorary Chairman, Lafarge
PRT Costa, António Mayor of Lisbon
USA Crocker, Chester A. James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic Studies
USA Daschle, Thomas A. Former US Senator and Senate Majority Leader
CAN Desmarais, Jr., Paul Chairman and co-CEO, Power Corporation of Canada
GRC Diamantopoulou, Anna Member of Parliament
USA Donilon, Thomas E. Partner, O’Melveny & Myers
ITA Draghi, Mario Governor, Banca d’Italia
AUT Ederer, Brigitte CEO, Siemens AG Österreich
CAN Edwards, N. Murray Vice Chairman, Candian Natural Resources Limited

DNK Eldrup, Anders President, DONG A/S
ITA Elkann, John Vice Chairman, Fiat S.p.A.
USA Farah, Martha J. Director, Center for Cognitive Neuroscience
Walter H. Annenberg Professor in the Natural Sciences, University of Pennsylvania
USA Feldstein, Martin S. President and CEO, National Bureau of Economic Research
DEU Fischer, Joschka Former Minister of Foreign Affairs
USA Ford, Jr., Harold E. Vice Chairman, Merill Lynch & Co., Inc.
CHE Forstmoser, Peter Professor for Civil, Corporation and Capital Markets Law, University of Zürich
IRL Gallagher, Paul Attorney General
USA Geithner, Timothy F. President and CEO, Federal Reserve Bank of New York
USA Gigot, Paul Editorial Page Editor, The Wall Street Journal
IRL Gleeson, Dermot Chairman, AIB Group
NLD Goddijn, Harold CEO, TomTom
TUR Gö?ü?, Zeynep Journalist; Founder, EurActiv.com.tr
USA Graham, Donald E. Chairman and CEO, The Washington Post Company
NLD Halberstadt, Victor Professor of Economics, Leiden University; Former Honorary Secretary General of Bilderberg Meetings
USA Holbrooke, Richard C. Vice Chairman, Perseus, LLC
FIN Honkapohja, Seppo Member of the Board, Bank of Finland
INT Hoop Scheffer, Jaap G. de Secretary General, NATO
USA Hubbard, Allan B. Chairman, E & A Industries, Inc.
BEL Huyghebaert, Jan Chairman of the Board of Directors, KBC Group
DEU Ischinger, Wolfgang Former Ambassador to the UK and US
USA Jacobs, Kenneth Deputy Chairman, Head of Lazard U.S., Lazard Frères & Co. LLC
USA Johnson, James A. Vice Chairman, Perseus, LLC
SWE Johnstone, Tom President and CEO, AB SKF
USA Jordan, Jr., Vernon E. Senior Managing Director, Lazard Frères & Co. LLC
FRA Jouyet, Jean-Pierre Minister of European Affairs
GBR Kerr, John Member, House of Lords; Deputy Chairman, Royal Dutch Shell plc.
USA Kissinger, Henry A. Chairman, Kissinger Associates, Inc.
DEU Klaeden, Eckart von Foreign Policy Spokesman, CDU/CSU
USA Kleinfeld, Klaus President and COO, Alcoa
TUR Koç, Mustafa Chairman, Koç Holding A.S.
FRA Kodmani, Bassma Director, Arab Reform Initiative
USA Kravis, Henry R. Founding Partner, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
USA Kravis, Marie-Josée Senior Fellow, Hudson Institute, Inc.
INT Kroes, Neelie Commissioner, European Commission
POL Kwasniewski, Aleksander Former President
AUT Leitner, Wolfgang CEO, Andritz AG
ESP León Gross, Bernardino Secretary General, Office of the Prime Minister
INT Mandelson, Peter Commissioner, European Commission
FRA Margerie, Christophe de CEO, Total
CAN Martin, Roger Dean, Joseph L. Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto
HUN Martonyi, János Professor of International Trade Law; Partner, Baker & McKenzie; Former Minister of Foreign Affairs
USA Mathews, Jessica T. President, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

INT McCreevy, Charlie Commissioner, European Commission
USA McDonough, William J. Vice Chairman and Special Advisor to the Chairman, Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.
CAN McKenna, Frank Deputy Chair, TD Bank Financial Group
GBR McKillop, Tom Chairman, The Royal Bank of Scotland Group
FRA Montbrial, Thierry de President, French Institute for International Relations
ITA Monti, Mario President, Universita Commerciale Luigi Bocconi
USA Mundie, Craig J. Chief Research and Strategy Officer, Microsoft Corporation
NOR Myklebust, Egil Former Chairman of the Board of Directors SAS, Norsk Hydro ASA
DEU Nass, Matthias Deputy Editor, Die Zeit
NLD Netherlands, H.M. the Queen of the
FRA Ockrent, Christine CEO, French television and radio world service
FIN Ollila, Jorma Chairman, Royal Dutch Shell plc
SWE Olofsson, Maud Minister of Enterprise and Energy; Deputy Prime Minister
NLD Orange, H.R.H. the Prince of
GBR Osborne, George Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer
TUR Öztrak, Faik Member of Parliament
ITA Padoa-Schioppa, Tommaso Former Minister of Finance; President of Notre Europe
GRC Papahelas, Alexis Journalist, Kathimerini
GRC Papalexopoulos, Dimitris CEO, Titan Cement Co. S.A.
USA Paulson, Jr., Henry M. Secretary of the Treasury
USA Pearl, Frank H. Chairman and CEO, Perseus, LLC
USA Perle, Richard N. Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
FRA Pérol, François Deputy General Secretary in charge of Economic Affairs
DEU Perthes, Volker Director, Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik
BEL Philippe, H.R.H. Prince
CAN Prichard, J. Robert S. President and CEO, Torstar Corporation
CAN Reisman, Heather M. Chair and CEO, Indigo Books & Music Inc.
USA Rice, Condoleezza Secretary of State
PRT Rio, Rui Mayor of Porto
USA Rockefeller, David Former Chairman, Chase Manhattan Bank
ESP Rodriguez Inciarte, Matias Executive Vice Chairman, Grupo Santander
USA Rose, Charlie Producer, Rose Communications
DNK Rose, Flemming Editor, Jyllands Posten
USA Ross, Dennis B. Counselor and Ziegler Distinguished Fellow, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
USA Rubin, Barnett R. Director of Studies and Senior Fellow, Center for International Cooperation, New York University
TUR ?ahenk, Ferit Chairman, Do?u? Holding A.?.
USA Sanford, Mark Governor of South Carolina
USA Schmidt, Eric Chairman of the Executive Committee and CEO, Google
AUT Scholten, Rudolf Member of the Board of Executive Directors, Oesterreichische Kontrollbank AG
DNK Schur, Fritz H. Fritz Schur Gruppen
CZE Schwarzenberg, Karel Minister of Foreign Affairs
USA Sebelius, Kathleen Governor of Kansas
USA Shultz, George P. Thomas W. and Susan B. Ford Distinguished Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University

ESP Spain, H.M. the Queen of
CHE Spillmann, Markus Editor-in-Chief and Head Managing Board, Neue Zürcher Zeitung AG
USA Summers, Lawrence H. Charles W. Eliot Professor, Harvard University
GBR Taylor, J. Martin Chairman, Syngenta International AG
USA Thiel, Peter A. President, Clarium Capital Management, LLC
NLD Timmermans, Frans Minister of European Affairs
RUS Trenin, Dmitri V. Deputy Director and Senior Associate, Carnegie Moscow Center
INT Trichet, Jean-Claude President, European Central Bank
USA Vakil, Sanam Assistant Professor of Middle East Studies, The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University
FRA Valls, Manuel Member of Parliament
GRC Varvitsiotis, Thomas Co-Founder and President, V + O Communication
CHE Vasella, Daniel L. Chairman and CEO, Novartis AG
FIN Väyrynen, Raimo Director, The Finnish Institute of International Affairs
FRA Védrine, Hubert Hubert Védrine Conseil
NOR Vollebaek, Knut High Commissioner on National Minorities, OSCE
SWE Wallenberg, Jacob Chairman, Investor AB
USA Weber, J. Vin CEO, Clark & Weinstock
USA Wolfensohn, James D. Chairman, Wolfensohn & Company, LLC
USA Wolfowitz, Paul Visiting Scholar, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
INT Zoellick, Robert B. President, The World Bank Group

AT THE MEETING:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=MAR20090526&articleId=13738

 

Shortly after the meetings began, Bilderberg tracker Jim Tucker reported that his inside sources revealed that the group has on its agenda, “the plan for a global department of health, a global treasury and a shortened depression rather than a longer economic downturn.” Tucker reported that Swedish Foreign Minister and former Prime Minister, Carl Bildt, “Made a speech advocating turning the World Health Organization into a world department of health, advocating turning the IMF into a world department of treasury, both of course under the auspices of the United Nations.” Further, Tucker reported that, “Treasury Secretary Geithner and Carl Bildt touted a shorter recession not a 10-year recession … partly because a 10 year recession would damage Bilderberg industrialists themselves, as much as they want to have a global department of labor and a global department of treasury, they still like making money and such a long recession would cost them big bucks industrially because nobody is buying their toys…..the tilt is towards keeping it short.”

 

After the meetings finished, Daniel Estulin reported that, “One of Bilderberg’s primary concerns according to Estulin is the danger that their zeal to reshape the world by engineering chaos in order to implement their long term agenda could cause the situation to spiral out of control and eventually lead to a scenario where Bilderberg and the global elite in general are overwhelmed by events and end up losing their control over the planet.”

On May 21, the Macedonian International News Agency reported that, “A new Kremlin report on the shadowy Bilderberg Group, who this past week held their annual meeting in Greece, states that the West’s financial, political and corporate elite emerged from their conclave after coming to an agreement that in order to continue their drive towards a New World Order dominated by the Western Powers, the US Dollar has to be ‘totally’ destroyed.” Further, the same Kremlin report apparently stated that, “most of the West’s wealthiest elite convened at an unprecedented secret meeting in New York called for and led by” David Rockefeller, “to plot the demise of the US Dollar.”

  

Bilderberg’s Plan in Action?

 

Reorganizing the Federal Reserve

 

Following the Bilderberg meeting, there were several interesting announcements made by key participants, specifically in regards to reorganizing the Federal Reserve. On May 21, it was reported that US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner “is believed to be leaning heavily towards giving the Federal Reserve a central role in future regulation,” and “it is understood that the Fed would take on some of the work currently undertaken by the US Securities and Exchange Commission.”

On Wednesday, May 20, Geithner spoke before the Senate Banking Committee, at which he stated that, “there are important indications that our financial system is starting to heal.” In regards to regulating the financial system, Geithner stated that, “we must ensure that international rules for financial regulation are consistent with the high standards we will be implementing in the United States.”

 

Bloomberg reported that, “The Obama administration may call for stripping the Securities and Exchange Commission of some of its powers under a regulatory reorganization,” and that, “The proposal, still being drafted, is likely to give the Federal Reserve more authority to supervise financial firms deemed too big to fail. The Fed may inherit some SEC functions, with others going to other agencies.” Interestingly, “SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro’s agency has been mostly absent from negotiations within the administration on the regulatory overhaul, and she has expressed frustration about not being consulted.”

It was reported that “Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was set to discuss proposals to change financial regulations last night at a dinner with National Economic Council Director Lawrence Summers [who was also present at Bilderberg], former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker [also at Bilderberg], ex-SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt and Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard University law professor who heads the congressional watchdog group for the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.” The Federal Reserve is a privately owned central bank, owned by its shareholders, consisting of the major banks the make up each regional Fed bank (the largest of which is JP Morgan Chase and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York). This plan would essentially give a privately owned bank, which has governmental authority, the ability to regulate the banks that own it. It’s the equivalent of getting a Colonel to guard a General to whom he is directly answerable. Talk about the fox guarding the hen house. It is literally granting ownership over the financial regulator to the banks being regulated.

Are things beginning to make a little more sense to you yet? Have you printed the pdf chart from Liberty For Life yet?

Have you seen, then that Barack Obama and Bill Clinton (Hilary too) are members of Bilderberg? Did you notice that Bill Clinton is also Trilateral and Council on Foreign Relations groups as well.  George HW Bush and Jimmy Carter belong to the Trilateral Commission and Council on Foreign Relations. Gerald Ford was Bilderberg and Council on Foreign Relations.  Those are just the recent presidents complicit in the purposeful demise of our sovereignty.

Are you also aware, that just like the history of the Bilderburg, our Federal Reserve began the same way. Allow me to once again recommend the book Creature From Jekyll Island by G. Edward Griffin. Amazing the similarities. And you do know “The Fed” is a banking cartel and not an agency of our federal government, don’t you? More on them in the weeks ahead. Back to the article linked above:

Following the Bilderberg meeting, “President Obama has asked Congress to authorize $100 billion in loans to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to help create a $500 billion global bailout fund,” which would give the IMF the essential prerogative of a global treasury, providing bailouts for countries in need around the world. Further, “the bill would allow the IMF to borrow up to $100 billion from the U.S. and increase the U.S. fiscal contribution to the IMF by $8 billion.” Elaborating on the program, it was reported that, “World leaders began on the global bailout initiative, called the New Arrangement for Borrowing (NAB), at the G-20 summit in early April. The president agreed at that time to make the additional funds available.” Obama wrote that, “Treasury Secretary Geithner concluded that the size of the NAB is woefully inadequate to deal with the type of severe economic and financial crisis we are experiencing, and I agree with him.”

With the G20 decision to increase the usage of IMF Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), forming a de facto world currency, it was recently reported that, “Sub-Saharan Africa will receive around $10 billion from the IMF in Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to help its economies weather the global financial crisis,” and that, “As part of a $1.1 trillion deal to combat the world economic downturn agreed at April’s G20 summit, the IMF will issue $250 billion worth of SDRs, which can be used to boost foreign currency reserves.”

Recent reports have also indicated that the IMF’s role in issuing SDRs goes hand in hand with the Bilderberg discussion on the potential collapse of the US dollar, and, “Transforming the dollar standard into an SDR-based system would be a major break with a policy that has lasted more than 60 years.” It was reported that, “There are two ways in which the dollar’s role in the international monetary system can be reduced. One possibility is a gradual, market-determined erosion of the dollar as a reserve currency in favor of the euro. But, while the euro’s international role – especially its use in financial markets – has increased since its inception, it is hard to envisage it overtaking the dollar as the dominant reserve currency in the foreseeable future.” However, “With the dollar’s hegemony unlikely to be seriously undermined by market forces, at least in the short and medium-term, the only way to bring about a major reduction in its role as a reserve currency is by international agreement.” This is where the SDRs come into play, as “One way to make the SDR the major reserve currency relatively soon would be to create and allocate a massive amount of new SDRs to the IMF’s members.” This is, interestingly, exactly what is happening with Africa and the IMF now.

In this very recent video, G. Edward Griffin, author of Creature from Jekyll Island, explains to us how the Fed is complicit with the demise of the dollar and the reason behind it. As well, he discusses HR 1207 “Audit the Fed” and while noble, may help whitewash the actual goal to abolish the Fed. Bill shown here: http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h1207/show  This is pertinent to the discussion of Agenda 21 and One World Order in that all of the layers of betrayal are working together to the demise of our sovereignty.

One website mentioned in the video http://www.realityzone.com/  has a lot of resource and learning material on it and may be of use to you. An hour long free audio synopsis of the book Creature From Jekyll Island can be found here: http://www.rzyoutube.com/  (in seven segments).  

  Now, allow me to introduce you to the Council on Foreign Relations. This portion is to help you understand why the media is complicit. JP Morgan Chase, founding member of the Federal Reserve, and whose chairman, David Rockefeller is on the Trilateral Commission, Bilderburg Group and yes, Council on Foreign Relations. This video will help explain:    

 Want to know why you aren’t hearing about this on FOX? Now you know. Rupert Murdoch owns Fox. You’ve also learned that much of this revolves around a very few central figures. David Rockefeller, Maurice Strong, George Soros (Bilderburg and Council of Foreign Relations).  

http://www.cfr.org/publication/9903/sovereignty_and_globalisation.html#  

 Author:

 Richard N. Haass, President, Council on Foreign Relations

February 17, 2006
Project Syndicate

The world’s 190-plus states now co-exist with a larger number of powerful non-sovereign and at least partly (and often largely) independent actors, ranging from corporations to non-government organisations (NGOs), from terrorist groups to drug cartels, from regional and global institutions to banks and private equity funds. The sovereign state is influenced by them (for better and for worse) as much as it is able to influence them. The near monopoly of power once enjoyed by sovereign entities is being eroded.

 

As a result, new mechanisms are needed for regional and global governance that include actors other than states. This is not to argue that Microsoft, Amnesty International, or Goldman Sachs be given seats in the United Nations General Assembly, but it does mean including representatives of such organisations in regional and global deliberations when they have the capacity to affect whether and how regional and global challenges are met.

Moreover, states must be prepared to cede some sovereignty to world bodies if the international system is to function.

 

This is already taking place in the trade realm. Governments agree to accept the rulings of the World Trade Organisation because on balance they benefit from an international trading order, even if a particular decision requires that they alter a practice that is their sovereign right to carry out.

Some governments are prepared to give up elements of sovereignty to address the threat of global climate change. Under one such arrangement, the Kyoto Protocol, which runs through 2012, signatories agree to cap specific emissions. What is needed now is a successor arrangement in which a larger number of governments, including the United States, China and India, accept emission limits or adopt common standards because they recognise that they would be worse off if no country did.

 

All of this suggests that sovereignty must be redefined if states are to cope with globalisation.

At its core, globalisation entails the increasing volume, velocity and importance of flows within and across borders of people, ideas, greenhouse gases, goods, dollars, drugs, viruses, emails, weapons, and a good deal else, challenging one of sovereignty’s fundamental principles: the ability to control what crosses borders in either direction. Sovereign states increasingly measure their vulnerability not to one another, but to forces beyond their control.

Globalisation thus implies that sovereignty is not only becoming weaker in reality, but that it needs to become weaker. States would be wise to weaken sovereignty in order to protect themselves, because they cannot insulate themselves from what goes on elsewhere. Sovereignty is no longer a sanctuary.

 

This was demonstrated by the American and world reaction to terrorism. Afghanistan’s Taliban government, which provided access and support to al-Qaeda, was removed from power. Similarly, America’s preventive war against an Iraq that ignored the UN and was thought to possess weapons of mass destruction showed that sovereignty no longer provides absolute protection. Imagine how the world would react if some government were known to be planning to use or transfer a nuclear device or had already done so. Many would argue correctly that sovereignty provides no protection for that state.

 

Necessity may also lead to reducing or even eliminating sovereignty when a government, whether from a lack of capacity or conscious policy, is unable to provide for the basic needs of its citizens. This reflects not simply scruples, but a view that state failure and genocide can lead to destabilising refugee flows and create openings for terrorists to take root.

 

The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s intervention in Kosovo was an example where a number of governments chose to violate the sovereignty of another government (Serbia) to stop ethnic cleansing and genocide. By contrast, the mass killing in Rwanda a decade ago and now in Darfur, Sudan, demonstrate the high price of judging sovereignty to be supreme and thus doing little to prevent the slaughter of innocents.

 

Our notion of sovereignty must therefore be conditional, even contractual, rather than absolute. If a state fails to live up to its side of the bargain by sponsoring terrorism, either transferring or using weapons of mass destruction, or conducting genocide, then it forfeits the normal benefits of sovereignty and opens itself up to attack, removal or occupation. The diplomatic challenge for this era is to gain widespread support for principles of state conduct and a procedure for determining remedies when these principles are violated.

 

The goal should be to redefine sovereignty for the era of globalisation, to find a balance between a world of fully sovereign states and an international system of either world government or anarchy.

 

The basic idea of sovereignty, which still provides a useful constraint on violence between states, needs to be preserved. But the concept needs to be adapted to a world in which the main challenges to order come from what global forces do to states and what governments do to their citizens, rather than from what states do to one another.

A 2008 list of members, along with other details can be found here: http://www.apfn.org/apfn/cfr-members.htm .

You will notice Colin Powell appears on the list. John McCain is a member as well. So you see, we actually had no choice in the last election. Glenn Beck caused quite a stir when he boldly stated there was no difference, other than the speed to which we were hurled into Marxism. Glenn Beck was correct.

We will learn more on this next week. Again, I will post bit by bit daily with a synopsis on the weekend post. There is a lot to absorb here. Take the weekend to go over the information contained in this column and on the links provided. Save the pdf files to your computer as reference material. You will need it to understand what they are doing to us as this progresses.

"Sick puppies" according to former President George H.W. Bush.

The 41st President of the United States joins NewsReal in the goal of “keeping the cable guys honest.”  He has recognized and called out both Rachel Maddow and Keith Olbermann for being “sick puppies” for their vicious style of personal attacks.  We at NewsReal have been pointing out the false journalism of those two since our inception.

Here’s a video with part of his quote and Maddow and Olbermann’s response:

In an interview with CBS radio this week, the elder Bush complained of increased civil discourse in politics.  He blamed media on the Right and on the Left for spurring it on.  He was more than ready and able to call out names on the left.

Bush: “If you want me to name a couple of names, I’ll be glad to do that for you…  Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow.  I mean here are a couple of sick puppies.”

Maddow and Olbermann seem to be clueless as to why Bush would name them as sick puppies.  They can’t seem to think of anything they have ever done wrong.  Olbermann says it is

a sad legacy to a sad presidency.

Both cable hosts came up with a few different pathetic ways of counterattacking Bush.  First they mocked the comment repeatedly and acted like it didn’t really matter.  (Of course, they gave this supposedly unimportant topic a full 1/4th of Maddow’s program.)

Next they tried to turn the attack back on Bush with false accusations about the former President’s own use of criticism in his previous elections.  Finally, they said what Bush was really doing was attacking Fox News (and especially Glenn Beck), and that he just had to throw Republicans a bone by mentioning Maddow and Olbermann.

There must be some reason why Bush would mention Maddow and Olbermann by name as sick puppies, right?

Maybe because the two really are sick puppies who often hurl empty and vicious attacks against anyone who disagrees with the far Left. We at NewsReal have shown that many times over.  Just read Tim and Alissa Birkel’s “Spoonful of Saccharine” series about Maddow or David Forsmark’s series “Meltdown with Keith Olbermann”.

In the long run, Bush’s criticism just gives MSNBC something more to use in their battle against the right.  They get to take a couple of shots at the father of the evil Bush 43 and feel the smug self-satisfaction that comes from knowing that at least one famous person has heard of them.

Continuous live coverage link: http://media.www.thebatt.com/media/storage/paper657/news/2009/10/16/News/Continuous.Obama.Coverage-3804989.shtml?reffeature=htmlemailedition

Jimmy, George, Bill, George and Barack.

The only five men walking the earth today who understand the gravity of being the President of the United States.*

They understand its pressures and privileges; they are acutely aware of what it means to be the most powerful man in the free world.

They are also the only five men in the world who understand what it means to be the world’s most coveted prey each and every day they occupy the office of the president.

The trade for being the world’s most powerful leader is also to be its most prized trophy. As an occupant of the office, death alters history.

Of the five of them, four are ex-presidents. Two are democrats. One is a humanitarian peanut farmer regarded as the ineffectual man who was soft on terror. The other a brilliant and charismatic philanderer who allowed a dalliance to define his presidency.

The other two are republicans; father and son, wealthy members of the American aristocracy whose reach and influence cannot be fathomed by most.

Of the four, only one could hope to stem the tide of threats, both casual and otherwise, against the man who now occupies the office.

George the younger is the voice needed to quell those prone to outrageous exclaim in word and deed because he is the only among them who courted the vote of the type of people who would ask in an open forum poll if a President, the leader of the United States, should be killed.

George, W, ‘43, this is where you need to enter the fray. I know you don’t prefer to dabble in politics too much–my guess is that you never had an interest in such things–but the time has come to assert your influence.

Forget politics and ideologies a moment–people are making open threats against the president of the United States and many of them come from your constituency. As a man who held the office, how could you sit silent as people casually threaten this man’s life?

I was in high school on 9/11. When they called an assembly, I thought someone had killed you. You’re a man I neither respected or liked, but in those moments of uncertainty before the real tragedy was revealed, I felt sick. My thought? You do not murder the President of the United States. Whatever the grievance, you do not resort to violence against the president.

Over the years I’ve listened to and dispensed more than a few jokes at your expense, I’ve argued against what I thought to be your other-worldly fuckery, but at no point did I want to see you murdered. Ever.

The seeds you sowed during the days of your president are reaping increasingly strange fruit. The frenzy that you whipped people into; the frenzy that you rode to unprecedented executive powers threatens the man who assumed office after you. The threat has come to one of your own. A president.

*Dick Cheney totally just told me to go fuck myself.

there was great news coming from the united nations the other day, but like the goldstone report, unless there’s teeth to back it up it will fall by the wayside. it seems that finally the united nations is not going to treat the zionist entity with kid gloves any more when it comes to their war crimes and when it comes to their nuclear arsenal. or, this could just be mere hot air. that remains to be seen. in any case, here is what al jazeera reported:

The UN nuclear assembly has called for Israel to open its nuclear facilities to UN inspection and sign up to the non-proliferation treaty.

The resolution, which was passed narrowly on Friday, marked a surprise victory for Arab states and others who have pushed for the move for the last 18 years.

The non-binding resolution voiced concern about “Israeli nuclear capabilities” and urged the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN’s nuclear watchdog, to tackle the issue.

Israel vowed it would not co-operate, saying the measure singled it out while many of its neighbours remained hostile to its existence.

“Israel will not co-operate in any matter with this resolution which is only aiming at reinforcing political hostilities and lines of division in the Middle East region,” said David Danieli, the chief Israeli delegate.

‘Glorious moment’

Israel is one of only three countries worldwide – along with India and Pakistan – outside the non-proliferation treaty (NPT) and is widely assumed to have the Middle East’s only atomic arsenal.

It has never confirmed nor denied that it has nuclear weapons.

Ali Asghar Soltanieh, the Iranian ambassador, whose country’s disputed nuclear programme is under IAEA investigation, said the vote was a “glorious moment” and “a triumph for the oppressed nation of Palestine”.

Speaking later to Al Jazeera, Soltanieh said: “All like-minded, peace-loving countries have always called for a resolution to take measures to push Israel to stop their nuclear weapon programme and adhere to the NPT and put every nuclear installation under the IAEA.

“All countries in the Middle East are party to the NPT – the only non-party is Israel … the resolution was addressed to the only non-participatory [state] in the Middle East.

Tehran was one of the 21 countries sponsoring the measure.

Iran absorbed a setback later when its bid to make legally binding a 1991 resolution banning attacks on nuclear sites failed to win a consensus from the bloc of Non-Aligned Movement developing nations and so was not brought up for a vote.

UN Security Council members Russia and China backed the Israel resolution, passed by a 49-45 margin by the IAEA’s annual member states gathering. There were 16 abstentions.

Western states said it was unfair and counterproductive to isolate one member state and that an IAEA resolution passed on Thursday, which urged all Middle East nations including Israel to foreswear atomic bombs, made Friday’s proposal unnecessary.

Western backing

Before the vote, Glyn Davies, the US ambassador, said the resolution was “redundant … such an approach is highly politicised and does not address the complexities at play regarding crucial nuclear-related issues in the Middle East”.

Canada tried to block a vote on the floor with a “no-action motion”, a procedural manoeuvre that prevailed in 2007 and 2008, but lost by an eight-vote margin.

Diplomats from the non-aligned movement of developing nations said times had changed with the advent of the US administration of Barack Obama, the US president.

“People and countries are bolder now, willing to call a spade a spade. You cannot hide or ignore the truth, the double standards, of Israel’s nuclear capability forever,” the Reuters news agency quoted one diplomat as saying.

“The new US administration has certainly helped this thinking with its commitment to universal nuclear disarmament and nuclear weapons-free zones.”

The non-binding measure was last voted on in 1991, when IAEA membership was much smaller, and passed by 39-31.

the next step should be to force the united states to submit to the iaea as well. and then to destroy all of these nuclear weapons for the potential threat they pose as well as for the environmental and health consequences for those who live in the midst of these weapons. and, of course, as a part of the ongoing genocide of american indians, the united states has made sure that such weapons are placed closes to american indian reservations and communities. brenda norrell has an interesting article in counterpunch on the subject:

When Paul Zimmerman writes in his new book about the Rio Puerco and the Four Corners, he calls out the names of the cancers and gives voice to the poisoned places and streams. Zimmerman is not just writing empty words.

Zimmerman writes of the national sacrifice area that the mainstream media and the spin doctors would have everyone forget, where the corners of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah and Colorado meet, in his new book, A Primer in the Art of Deception: The Cult of Nuclearists, Uranium Weapons and Fraudulent Science.

“A report in 1972 by the National Academy of Science suggested that the Four Corners area be designated a ‘national sacrifice area,” he writes.

Then, too, he writes of the Rio Puerco, the wash that flowed near my home when I lived in Houck, Arizona, on the Navajo Nation in the 1980s. The radioactive water flowed from the Churck Rock, N.M., tailings spill on down to Sanders, where non-Indians were also dying of cancer, and it flowed by New Lands, Nahata Dziil Chapter, where Navajos were relocated from their homes on Black Mesa. They moved there from communities like Dinnebeto. Some elderly Navajos died there in New Lands, not just from the new cancers, but from broken hearts.

Zimmerman points out there was plenty of evidence of cancers from Cold War uranium mining and radioactive tailings left behind, but few studies were commissioned to document it. In the early 1980s, I asked the Indian Health Service about the rates of death around the uranium mines and power plants. No studies were ever conducted, according to the IHS press officer. I was shocked. Fresh out of graduate school with a master’s degree in health for developing nations, I really could not believe it.

This week, Zimmerman released a chapter of his new book to aid the struggles of Indigenous Peoples, after reading about the Havasupai Gathering to Halt Uranium Mining in the Grand Canyon.

As I read his chapter, I am flooded with memories, memories of people dying, radioactive rocks and the deception and censorship that continues on the Navajo Nation.

In the 1990s, USA Today asked me to report on the uranium tailings and deaths at Red Valley and Cove near Shiprock, N.M. In every home I visited, at least one Navajo had cancer and their family members had died of cancer. In some homes, every family member had cancer. In one home, an eighty-year-old Navajo woman looked at the huge rocks that her home was made of. She said some men came with a Geiger counter and told her the rocks were extremely radioactive. Then, on another day, I walked beside the radioactive rocks strewn in Gilbert Badoni’s backyard near Shiprock.

The dust we breathed at Red Valley and Cove was radioactive. When the Dine’ (Navajo) in the south and Dene in the north mined uranium without protective clothing, the US and Canada knew they were sending Native American miners to their deaths.

“Declassified documents from the atomic weapons and energy program in the United States confirm that official secret talks on the health hazards of uranium mining were discussed both in Washington and Ottawa. In 1932, even before the Manhattan Project, the Department of Mines in Canada published studies of the mine at Port Radium, warning of the hazard of radon inhalation and ‘the dangers from inhalation of radioactive dust.’ Blood studies of miners confirmed that breathing air with even small amounts of radon was detrimental to health,” Zimmerman writes.

When I moved to the Navajo Nation in 1979, I was a nutrition educator with the Navajo Hopi WIC Program. I had no intention of becoming a news reporter or an activist. Later in the 1980s, as a news reporter, I reported on Peabody Coal and its claim that it was not damaging the land or aquifer on Black Mesa.

Louise Benally, resisting relocation at Big Mountain said, “These big corporations lie you know.”

No, I didn’t know that then. But I know that now.

Earl Tulley, Navajo from Blue Gap, said something that changed my life. Tulley told me about the multi-national corporations, how they seize the land and resources of Indigenous Peoples, not just on the Navajo Nation, but around the world.

But it wasn’t until I covered federal court in Prescott, Arizona, as a stringer for Associated Press, that I learned of how it all continues. Covering the Earth First! trial in the 90s, I realized that federal judges and federal prosecutors are on the same team. The FBI can manipulate and manufacture evidence, even drive people to a so-called crime if the guys don’t have a ride.

During the federal trial of former Navajo Chairman Peter MacDonald, it became obvious: If you are an American Indian, you can forget about justice. Later, during the trials of American Indian activists it was clear: Federal prosecutors can just write a script and send people to prison.

There are parts of the American justice system concealed from most people: Distorted facts and planted evidence. News reporters seldom learn of the witnesses who receive federal plea agreements and lie on the witness stand. Few people except news reporters, ever sit through these long, and tediously dull at times, federal trials which can go on for months.

A three month trial of American Indians, or environmentalists, will smash any romantic myth about justice for all in the US court system. The bias and politics embedded within the justice system, and the back door deals of Congressmen with the corporations who bankroll them, seldom make the evening news.

Arizona Sen. John McCain and company brought about the so-called Navajo Hopi land dispute, which was actually a sweetheart deal for Peabody Coal mining on Black Mesa. When they emerged from the back door deals, they swiftly went out to throw candy to Native Americans in the parades, claiming they were the best friends of Indian country. Money is the reason the Navajo Nation Council went along with coal mining on Black Mesa. The revenues from coal mines, power plants and oil and gas wells pay the salaries and expense accounts of the Navajo councilmen and Navajo President.

While I was on Mount Graham in Arizona at the Sacred Run, I learned of another part of the story. I learned about Skull and Bones, the Yale secret society. Former San Carlos Apache Councilman Raleigh Thompson told me of the meeting with Skull and Bones. Thompson was there. Thompson told how the Skull and Bones members, including President George HW Bush’s brother Jonathan Bush and an attorney, tried to silence the San Carlos Apache leaders. The San Carlos Apaches were seeking the return of Geronimo’s skull, during meetings in New York in the 1980s. Geronimo had asked to be buried in the mountains on San Carlos.

The more I read from the book Secrets of the Tomb, the more it became obvious that the Skull and Bones members weren’t just seizing money. Their desire was for power. They wanted world domination.

So, now years later, I see the Skull and Bones Society rear its head again in the Desert Rock power plant deal on the Navajo Nation in the Four Corners, protested by Navajos living on the land in the longstanding protest Dooda Desert Rock. Follow the money at Sithe Global and it leads back to Blackstone and a member of Skull and Bones.

Skull and Bones members controlled production of the first atomic bomb, according to Alexandra Robbins, author of Secrets of the Tomb. Zimmerman writes of this time, “The Manhattan Project is inaugurated, physicists are secretly recruited, clandestine outposts spring up in the wilderness, and a fevered race against time ensues to transform abstract theories into a deliverable weapon.”

The proposed Desert Rock power plant would be in the Four Corners, the same “national sacrifice area,” where the Cold War uranium mines, coal mines, power plants and oil and gas wells are already polluting and causing disease and death. The air, land and water are contaminated and the region is desecrated. It is the Navajos sacred place of origin, Dinetah, a fact voiced by Bahe Katenay, Navajo from Big Mountain, and censored.

Navajos at Big Mountain, and the Mohawk grandmothers who write Mohawk Nation News, make it clear: The government initiated tribal councils are puppets of the US and Canadian governments.

Several years before Dan Evehema passed to the Spirit World, relaxing on his couch after protesting in the rain backhoes and development on Hopiland, at the age of 104, he shared truth, speaking through a translator.

Evehema said the Hopi Sinom never authorized or recognized the establishment of the Hopi Tribal Council, a puppet of the US government.

In the early Twentieth Century, Hopi were imprisoned at Alcatraz for refusing to cooperate with the US. In the latter part of the century, when the threat of forced relocation of Navajos was great, traditional Hopi, including Evehema and Thomas Banyacya, stood with and supported Navajos at Big Mountain. Mainstream reporters don’t like to report these facts, since it deflates their superficial coverage, based on corporate press releases.

As I was being censored out of the news business (at least the type that results in a paycheck) Louise Benally of Big Mountain once again revealed the truth of the times. When she compared the war in Iraq to the Longest Walk of Navajos to Bosque Redondo, she spoke of the oppression and deceptions of the US colonizers, comparing the torture and starvation of this death walk to what the US was doing in Iraq. Benally was censored.

It was more than just a censored story. It was a statement of the times we live in: Hush words too profound to be written. The times had come full circle. Indian people once oppressed by US colonizers were now serving as US soldiers for US colonizers, killing other Indigenous Peoples. Victims had become perpetrators.

During much of the Twentieth Century, Indian children in the US, Canada and Australia were kidnapped. Stolen from their parents, these children were placed in boarding schools. In Canada, the residential schools were run by churches. In all three countries, young children were routinely abused, sexually abused and even murdered.

On the Longest Walk in 2008, while broadcasting across America, we saw the marsh at Haskell in Kansas. Here, there are unmarked graves of the children who never came home. At Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania, we read the tombstones in the rows of tiny graves, the names of the children who never came home.

In the US, Canada and Australia, children were forbidden to speak their Native tongue, which carried their songs and ceremonies. Indian children were beaten, locked in cellars, tortured and raped. Many died of pneumonia, malnutrition and broken hearts. Some were shot trying to escape.

At Muscowequan Catholic residential school in Lestock, Saskatchewan, Canada, a young girl was raped by a priest. When she gave birth, the baby was thrown into the furnace and burned alive in front of child survivor Irene Favel (http://www.hiddenfromhistory.org/ .)

In the US, the young boys who survived were militarized, made into US soldiers. Zimmerman writes that Australia, like Canada and US, carried out a holocaust of Aboriginal peoples. “What occurred in Australia is a mirror image of the holocaust visited on Native Americans. When the British claimed sovereignty over Australia, they commenced a 200 year campaign of dispossession, oppression, subjugation and genocide of Aboriginal peoples.”

Indigenous Peoples around the world targeted by uranium mining, including the Dene in the north, linked to Dine’ (Navajo) in the south by the common root of the Athabascan language. From the Dine’ and Dene and around the earth to Australia, there was a recipe for death for Indigenous Peoples by the power mongers.

The US policy of seizing the land and destroying the air, water and soil is clear in Nevada and Utah. While Western Shoshone fight the nuclear dump on their territory at Yucca Mountain in what is known as Nevada, Goshutes at Skull Valley in Utah are neighbors with US biological and chemical weapons testing.

Zimmerman writes, “Dugway Proving Ground has tested VX nerve gas, leading in 1968 to the ‘accidental’ killing of 6,400 sheep grazing in Skull Valley, whose toxic carcasses were then buried on the reservation without the tribe’s knowledge, let alone approval. The US Army stores half its chemical weapon stockpile nearby, and is burning it in an incinerator prone to leaks; jets from Hill Air Force Base drop bombs on Wendover Bombing Range, and fighter crashes and misfired missiles have struck nearby. Tribal members’ health is undoubtedly adversely impacted by this alphabet soup of toxins.”

Zimmerman makes it clear that the genocide of Indigenous Peoples was not an accident. Indigenous People were targeted with death by uranium mining and nuclear dumping. Indian people were targeted with destruction that would carry on for generations, both in their genetic matter and in their soil, air and water.

One ingredient in the recipe for death is division: Divide and control the people and the land. This is what is happening at the southern and northern borders on Indian lands. Just as the US continues the war in Iraq and Afghanistan for war profiteers and politics, the racism-fueled US border hysteria results in billions for border wall builders, security companies and private prisons.

It comes as no surprise that the Israeli defense contractor responsible for the Apartheid Wall in Palestine, Elbit Systems, was subcontracted by Boeing Co. to work on the spy towers on the US/Mexico border. Militarized borders mean dollars, oppression and power.

The US Border Patrol agents harass Indian people at the US borders, even murder people of color on the border at point blank range. More often than not, the murdering border agents walk away free from the courts.

Meanwhile, the US under the guise of homeland security, seizes a long strip of land — the US/Mexico corridor from California to Texas –including that of the Lipan Apache in Texas. As Indigenous Peoples in the south are pushed off their lands, corn fields seized by corporations, they walk north to survive, many dying in the Southwest desert.

Another ingredient in US genocide in Indian country is internal political division and turmoil: Distract the people with political turmoil, to make it easier to steal their water and land rights. If that doesn’t work, put them in prison. In Central and South America, the mining companies have added another step: Assassinate them.

The US made sure that Latin countries were able to carry out torture and assassinations by training leaders and military personnel at the School of the Americas. Even Chiquita Bananas admitted in court that they hired assassins to kill anyone who opposed the company, including Indigenous Peoples and farmers, in Colombia.

So, when Zimmerman writes of uranium and the sacrifices of Indigenous Peoples, those are not just empty words. They are words that mark the graves, words that name the cancers, words that mark the rivers and words that give rise to names.

To give voice to a name is to break the silence.

Debating with Liberals has got to be the most difficult and stupidest thing I do. I think every time I debate them they end up going off on some tangent and then end up calling me a “kiddo” (among other things). Gee, so much for some intelligent debate!

SERIOUSLY. QUIT CALLING ME A KIDDO. It implies the fact that a kid is not wise or not intelligent enough to debate me like an adult. It pisses me off royally and it just shows that you cannot fully debate me on the issue and instead have to attack me personally. I have had at least 4 people on separate issues call me this and I am really getting tired of it.

I am going to paste a few debates that I’ve had for your enjoyment (some of them are actually ongoing…). All conversations have taken place on Facebook.

Original Post: W H A T ? ? ? http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/142522/texas_students_who_were_kept_away_from_obama_speech_will_be_bussed_to_see_bush_speak/

Kyle Huwer: Good. What makes Obama a better human being to listen to than Bush?
Meike Capps-Schubert: He can speek?
Meike Capps-Schubert: and contray to Bush and me he can build a full gramaticaly correct sentense in english , but I never was the president of the United States of America
Kyle Huwer: When you say, “he can speak” do you mean “he can speak well/eloquently/passionately”?
Cornelia Maier: More Republican bullshit…yeah, grammar is known to be Bush’s foe!!
Kyle Huwer: So when people desire their children to listen to one person over another, that is “Republican bullshit”?
Redjade InHungary: Now you wish to deny others the ability to have and express their own opinion because you may be offended?
Kyle Huwer: Who said I am offended? I am simply asking you, or anyone, to answer the question. Where did I say anything about denying others the ability to have and express their opinions?
Sigrid Knutson: Kyle, both Bush Sr & Reagan gave the same kind of speech to children when they were president. Bush Jr did not choose to do this. So, the question becomes, “what makes Bush Sr & Reagan okay to listen to, but not Obama?”
Sigrid Knutson: I would assume that many of these Texas parents listened to Bush Srs speech to children when he was president.
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: Where did I say that we need to listen to Bush HW or Reagan over Obama?
Sigrid Knutson: @Kyle. You didn’t. I just turned your question around, after thinking that I answered your primary question.
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: So what was the point of you mentioning that GHWB and Reagan gave a similar speech?
Sigrid Knutson: Kyle, you asked, “What makes Obama a better human being to listen to than Bush?” I asked, “What makes Bush Sr & Reagan okay to listen to, but not Obama?” I’m sorry that you don’t seem to be able to comprehend this.
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: In normal conversation, when someone asks a question, you do not answer it with another question. Sorry that you do not understand that a question begs an answer, not a question. Answer mine and I will answer yours!
Sigrid Knutson: kyle kyle kyle. here all this time i thought you were a gal… turns out you are just another dude ♥
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: Are you avoiding the question or are you just taking the opportunity for a personal attack?
Sigrid Knutson: neither, kiddo
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: Then why did you NOT answer my question, still?
Sigrid Knutson: you make me weary, kiddo. you don’t want an answer. you still want a fight.
Kyle Huwer: I do want an answer. If you don’t want to answer my question, then fine. But don’t tell me that I want to fight when all I am doing is asking you to explain yourself so that I do not get anything wrong or put words in your mouth. And again, belittling with the “kiddo” talk. THANKS!

Original Post: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bb8qG76L9jE

Kyle Huwer: This is stupid. This is absolutely PLAGUED with strawmen logical fallacies. GARBAGE!
Redjade InHungary: i think this is satire – but, ya never know these days!
Kyle Huwer: While it may be satire, does it not portray an idea that the “Conservatives” do not want anything socialized?
Redjade InHungary: huh Kyle?
Kyle Huwer: Satire means – to portray an idea in an “over the top” way as to make fun of it, correct?
Redjade InHungary: Not quite, satire usually means very close to the truth, but also absurd.
Kyle Huwer: I did not know that over the-top-meant “false.” Nevertheless…. So what is this video satirizing that is “close to the truth”?
Redjade InHungary: that Free Market fundamentalists are nuts. and there are many that do believe in privatizing the Fire Dept, it is not an exaggeration – just their portrayal. Maybe you dont like the joke, but since when do you expect humour to be accurate in anything? It’s humour, maybe not good humour, but it is humour.
Kyle Huwer: You know the funny thing… Here in Arizona right up the road from me in Scottsdale they have a privatized fire department and they – the people and the city – have called it a success. Whatdya know?!?! But hey, I’d be willing to hear some of this evidence/proof that free-market people are nuts…
Redjade InHungary: Kyle, I apologize for stepping on the big toe of your economic religion – but for most people in the world, the ‘Free Market’ is not ‘free’ and nor is it really a ‘market’ – it is usually associated with corruption and seen as something that is imposed on you. A democratic State running essential services like a Fire Dept or healthcare is the better option – and it works most of the time quite well.
Kyle Huwer: I just don’t appreciate being satirized and then called a nutjob for believing something. I agree, the free market is not free – it is socialized. America while it may claim to have a “free market” is not free at all. Zero. What we have is a pseudo free-market and you are right, it has a lot of corruption. However, that does not mean at all that we need to regulate it even more. Likewise, America is not a democracy. It is a Republic. However, it too is so molested that it is pretty much a democracy. While some services can be run sufficiently by the government – I will bet my life on it that a purely capitalist system can do it better, cheaper, and more efficiently. Guaranteed. Scottsdale alluded to above is proof…. Read More. If you want to give up % of your money to participate in government program XYZ, then do it, but don’t FORCE me into YOUR system. Is that too unfair to ask?
Redjade InHungary: Kyle – who is forcing you to do ANYTHING?
Kyle Huwer: If we have socialized medicine, can I opt out? Can I opt out of any of these public services (yes, even the fire department) if I want to?
Redjade InHungary: Kyle, if you have a child in your home and it is burning – YES, the big bad evil STATE should break into your home and save your child from dying. And because your home is on fire, other homes will also catch on fire, YES. and the examples go on… Why is that ‘libertarians’ only think the world is about me, me and me?
Kyle Huwer: How about I opt out of the fire department – and I take full responsibility for the loss of my child AND my neighbor’s home burning? My situation, my responsibility! What proof do you have that libertarians think it is about me, me, and me?
Redjade InHungary: sorry had to wash the dishes… ‘What proof’?
well, i used to be a Libertarian a long time ago – then I grew up and realized there is such a thing as society and civilization…. ‘me, me, and me’? Your replies are such an example.
Meike Capps-Schubert: Kyle – who is paying for your fire department ?
Kyle Huwer: @Redjade: So you = me? No, it does not work like that. My replies are nothing of your “proof.” So because I want to opt out of socialized programs, this is now all about “me”? And once again, “and then I grew up” yet another emotionally loaded statement. Are you implying that I am immature?
@Meike: Are you asking for the current payee or who is paying for MY fire department?
Meike Capps-Schubert: the fire department you are talking about in Scottsdale
Kyle Huwer: @Meike: The people that are covered by the fire department, are covered by the fire department. Who else would pay for it?
Meike Capps-Schubert: so the fire fighters work for free or pay for them selfs and their equitment ?
Kyle Huwer: @Meike: They are a business. So, they buy the equipment beforehand and then provide a service to their area. Are you confusing a paid public service with a free, free-market service?
Meike Capps-Schubert: WHO is paying their work they have to get payed from somewhere so who is paying it the companie? do people pay the companie after they put out a fire or how does that work – where does the money come from – what so hard to understand?
Sigrid Knutson: this is a joke… aimed at those against single payer health insurance.
Sigrid Knutson: and Kyle, please don’t comment.
Redjade InHungary: @kyle. I did a short amount of googling about your Capitalist Scottsdale Fire Dept. Here they are: http://www.ruralmetro.com Their web site says they provide Fire protect and other services to communities and the private sector (companies etc) – but NO MENTION of providing to individuals, like you.
This means that Tax Funded local governments make a decision For You and Hire Them and use Your Money that the government Took From You and you have No Choice!… This is certainly not a ‘pure’ socialized’ Fire Dept, but the principle that society needs to make social decisions to protect society is still upheld in the case you point to. Understand, comrade?
Kyle Huwer: @Meike: The people who are covered! There is nothing else to this idea Meike! The only difference between your system is that the private company can lose it’s contract if they act poorly. With the public option, they can do whatever they want and maintain their position.
@Sigrid: You bet I am going to reply…. I want an answer why this is “close to the truth” that Redjade alluded to! Are you trying to suppress my opinion?
@Redjade: Provide services to the COMMUNITY. Right, and who lives in the community? Individual citizens! So if you think that they do not care for individual citizens, then WHO are they caring for in the community – as you mentioned?… Also, Their mission statement includes, “Works within the communities we serve to build trust and promote the well-being of the CITIZENS.” Also, “Rural/Metro Corporation is a leading provider of emergency and non-emergency medical transportation services, fire protection and other safety-related services to municipal, RESIDENTIAL…”
Sigrid Knutson: An outraged citizens group in Scottsdale is looking to replace the private Rural/Metro Fire Department with a municipal fire department. The Committee to Protect Scottsdale and Our Firefighters claims Rural/Metro’s staffing and response are unacceptable and unsafe. http://www.allbusiness.com/finance-insurance/209222-1.html
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: No I do not need his name. So what is your point?
First off – I do not know where “here” is nor am I going to go snooping to try to find out where “here” is.
So you think that a public option that bills you is exactly what I am talking about? Where did I say that?
Sigrid Knutson:
Satire: Main Entry: sat·ire
Pronunciation: \ˈsa-ˌtī(-ə)r\
Function: noun
Etymology: Middle French or Latin; Middle French, from Latin satura, satira, perhaps from (lanx) satura dish of mixed ingredients, from feminine of satur well-fed; akin to Latin satis enough — more at sad
Date: 1501… Read More
1 : a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn
2 : trenchant wit, irony, or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly
about an hour ago
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: GREAT! If they are doing a horrible job, then get them out!
However, if we look at the date of that article, that was written in 2002! It is 7 years later and they are STILL providing service. Must have not been THAT bad. Right?
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: Are you just going to cut and copy or do you have a point?
Sigrid Knutson: When your opponent sets up a straw man, set it on fire and kick the cinders around the stage. Don’t worry about losing the Strawperson-American community vote.
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: Yes, strawman…. Are you doing homework or do you have a point? Quit cutting and copying and say what you want to say!
Sigrid Knutson: i’m 56. been around a few blocks. so have you. stop thinking everyone is out to get you. they are not.
Sigrid Knutson: ps… i don’t give a shit about fire depts OR strawmen. i care more about you as a person.
Sigrid Knutson: Kyle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTQfERb9HVk
Kyle Huwer: @Sigrid: If you do not want to debate, then why did you step into the ring? I am asking you to answer a few questions and you refuse to do so here, and on other posts. Why? You continually C&C stuff and never say your position. I am not going to guess your position, so say it and say it with conviction! I still have no idea what you are getting at with the straw man or the 2002 report. I am asking you, or anyone, to explain!… Also, if you know that I’ve “been around the block a few times” then why did you call me a “kiddo” in the other thread? That is offensive and for some reason my opponents always use that as a “nice” way to belittle me. Am I just a kiddo or am I an intelligent adult here, Sigrid?
Sigrid Knutson: you are younger than my sons. you had a hell of a time with your CO & your wife. i am guessing that you — like me — are angry at the world. so, your questions here are mundane to me. what you really need/want is a good fight & a good cry. go to the gym, climb a mountain. i should. i have not answered you — in the way you would like — cos to be honest, it bores me. however, you — as a person — do not.
Meike Capps-Schubert: so this if fun , but still does that mean they only put out the fires of the people who payed for their service- and what makes it better – do they use evian water linke in the video?
Kyle Huwer: @Singrid: What does me and my CO or me and my wife have to do with this debate here? I will answer for you – nothing at all. You do not know me apart from what little tidbits you have read here and there. I am not angry at the world. Are you kidding me? I am the most peaceful person you will ever know. Obviously I will stand up for my beliefs but I am far from wanting a FIGHT. I have asked you many times to answer questions to better give me an understanding and you continually tap-dance around them. If you are going to debate, then DEBATE. Don’t pussy-foot with me. Just to let you know, I am quite active both on a personal sense and on a community/political sense. I have quite a nice life…. If the conversation and/or issue bores you, then quit responding… Simple. And thank you for not belittling me by calling me a kiddo this time around! Means a lot.
Kyle Huwer: @Meike: I didn’t quite get what you are saying but I will try to respond.
I think you are misunderstanding the issue with the FD.
In a public service the FD will use the city resources AND be paid by the city by tax dollars. With the public service there is no contract….
With the private service the FD will also use the city resources AND be paid by tax dollars. With the private service, there is a contract and if they do not do their job or do it well enough, they could lose their contract/job.
So, with the public option it does not matter how good or bad they do. Since there are no standards for termination or contract end date, they can do whatever. With a private service they are being watched. If they do a bad job then they can lose their contract job to someone else. So as a result, it is in their best interest to do it cheaply and provide good service.
This is a summary. But maybe you can understand this. If not, ask.

Formatting was no preserved. I don’t have time to format it all… Meike lives in Germany. Redjade I would assume lives in Hungary. And I have no idea where Singrid lives but I think they live in Germany as well.

by TJ Tunnington and Kevin Cozine

The President of the United States spoke to school children yesterday on the importance of staying in school and how hard work will pay off. Both great messages that need to be conveyed to all students, but should it be the president that needs to convey or refortify these things.

Now please get this straight: I am not one of those “Right-Wing Crazies” that believes that the President doesn’t have the right to speak to students. Although people seem to forget that Democrats went even more off the deep end when George HW Bush spoke to students, going so far as to having congressional hearings about it. Indeed former Democratic House Minority leader Richard Gephardt even accused the President of politicizing education. What a loon.

In fact if my daughter was of school age I would have encouraged her to listen to the President and sat down with her at night to discuss what he had to say, as I think all parents should have done. Parenting is a skill that seems to have left some of those that choose its path. President Obama should be applauded for his “tough language” encouraging parents to get involved and calling on students to drop the Xbox and crack the books.

Nor am I one who believes that the president deviated much from his original message when conservatives were going crazy last week about the indoctrination of our youth. Although, that is a legitimate question.

But here are my thoughts, and to be honest this is my blog so I hope that is what you are reading it for. I am of the opinion that the President chose to give this speech for one of two reasons. The first reason could possibly be that the President used this speech as sort of a good will act of his presidency. He would have had to been living under a rock or on a secluded island in Massachusetts for the past few weeks to not see his poll numbers plummeting. In fact President Obama’s approval ratings have dropped faster than any president that has won the popular vote. In seeing this, his administration, (cause lets face it he does nothing without consulting the yes men he has surrounded himself with), decided that something needed to be done to help rebuild the President’s trust. What is one of the things that this country holds dear? The education of our youth of course, as it should. So in giving this speech the President hoped not to just give the strong message that was outlined in his speech but to also achieve a certain boost in the approval and the trust of the American voter.

This is the administration’s equivalent of kissing babies on the campaign trail. This isn’t so much the indoctrination of the youth with the liberal ideals of the President and his administration (although the original “lesson plan” accompanying the speech certainly was) but a simple use of our children to help bolster his once strong approval with those that voted him in. Is one any worse or better? Well that is for you to decide, but no matter what he calls it; this practice was still a politicization of the classroom. It may come as a great shock to idealists, but every time a president speaks it’s political.

The second reason is a far more frightening one that I hope corrects itself in the near future. Indeed this reason is why I am looking into private institutions for my daughter. Could it be possible that the NEA and a majority of its members have lost the authority that they need to have in the classroom to instill these ideals within its student body? I know it will come as a great shock to many, but Republicans are not the only party beholden to special interests. I was relayed a story a while ago by a Republican State Representative in NJ who attended a NJEA meeting. He said that the speaker at the meeting got up and stated that the NJEA is built on a three legged stool and the pillars of that stool are; Salary, Benefits, and Tenure. Being a silly Republican, as I am, I would think that the Educators’ union would want to be built on Education, Parents, and Students but maybe that is just me. Teachers have begun to care so much about the things afforded to them some have lost the real purpose of their jobs, educating the youth. These unions which once stood for a noble purpose have become no better than the “evil corporations” our President and his supporters denounce in wild fits of populist anger. Indeed the same people who cried foul at bonus packages for AIG don’t blink twice at guaranteed pay raises and tenure for incompetent teachers. What happened to “not using taxpayer money to reward failure”? Now please don’t take this as me damning all teachers, there are a lot of good ones out there, I happen to be friends with one who I think is very good and an enthusiastic educator. Despite the fact that there are many excellent and dedicated teachers out there who are not “taking a free ride”, the President could have rallied many conservatives and independents to his side if he had delivered a straight talk speech to teachers instead of students.

So if this schoolroom speech by the President wasn’t for his own political gain, why would he feel it was needed if educators are already giving this message?  Maybe it was a mixture of the two, but in either case neither is as altruistic or original as the Media made it out to be. So the next time Chris Matthews fawns like a high school prom queen over President Obama’s revolutionary speech, someone should ask him what he thought in 1991.

     Despite all of the rhetoric about the uproar over Barack Obama’s speech to the nation’s students today, albeit changed so much that it didn’t match the syllabus that the Dept. of Education had initially published, it seems that the Democrats have been quite hypocritical in their attacks on the parents who did not want their children involved with this Presidential speech.

    From the Washington Post, October 4, 1991:

House Democrats criticized President Bush yesterday for using Education Department funds to produce and broadcast a speech that he made Tuesday at a Northwest Washington junior high school.

The Democratic critics accused Bush of turning government money for education to his own political use, namely, an ongoing effort to inoculate himself against their charges of inattention to domestic issues. The speech at Alice Deal Junior High School, broadcast live on radio and television, urged students to study hard, avoid drugs and turn in troublemakers.

“The Department of Education should not be producing paid political advertising for the president, it should be helping us to produce smarter students,” House Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) said. “And the president should be doing more about education than saying, ‘Lights, camera, action.’ ”

Two House committees demanded that the department explain the use of its funds for the speech, an explanation that Deputy Secretary David T. Kearns provided late in the day in a letter to Rep. William D. Ford (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee. Education Secretary Lamar Alexander was out of town.  [...]

Rep. Patricia Schroeder (D-Colo.), chairwoman of the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families, said it was outrageous for the White House to “start using precious dollars for campaigns” when “we are struggling for every silly dime we can get” for education programs.

Rep. Martin Frost (D-Tex.) said that if Bush feels obliged to use government funds to hire outside consultants “to make him look good,” then he should fire some of the public relations experts on the White House payroll. “Then the president might be more sympathetic to unemployment benefits,” Frost said, referring to Bush’s threat to veto legislation to extend benefits.

     The Dems went so far as to have the GAO investigate Bush for any impropriety that may have occurred as a result f the speech.

     The NEA condemned Bush for spending $26,000 for the speech while cutting school lunch programs. The NEA today, of course, had high praise for the initiatives of the new President, despite no word on the cost of today’s speech. (Obama has been in office 232 days, and has addressed the American public, in one way or another 263 times).

http://www.tonysrants.com/national/perspective-dems-slammed-george-h-w-bush-for-address-to-schools/

Perspective redux: Dems ordered GAO to investigate George H.W. Bush school speech

Not a Good Demostration

On This Date in History: 

Orville and Wilbur Wright made their first public demonstration of their airplane on this date in 1908.   Actually, it wasn’t the same Wright Flyer that made the historic flight in December 1903. They had made a number of improvements over nearly 5 years, but no one really noticed. The day that they made their initial flight, they had invited the press but no one came. Instead, they had been focused on the ill-fated attempt at heavier than air flight by the more celebrated Samuel Pierpont Langley. Following the Wright’s flight at Kitty Hawk, NC the New York Daily Tribune printed a small story with the headline “Dayton Boys Fly Airship.” The newspaper obviously had no clue as to what they had accomplished. After that, the Wrights worked on improving their “airship” but even the farmers weren’t interested. A farmer once watched the Wrights fly a plane near Dayton, Ohio 24 miles in 38 minutes, but he didn’t even stop plowing his field.

Docs Couldn't Revive Selfridge

Well, the brothers on this date in 1908 began a series of demonstrations for the Army at Fort Myer, Virginia and the public was invited. The demonstrations went on for several days and it took but two short weeks for the Wrights to achieve a somewhat infamous aviation record when on September 17, Orville took Lt. Thomas E Selfridge on a ride to demonstrate the potential military value of the airplane. A guy wire broke and got tangled in a propeller and the plane “came down like a bird shot dead in full flight.” Orville shattered his hip and left leg but Selfridge was killed, going in the record book as the first aviation crash and first aviation fatality. So Orville got to make the first flight, was the first to crash, the first to be in a fatal air crash. Meanwhile, poor old Wilbur was the first Wright born on my birthday, the first to get typhoid fever around the time that the Titanic sunk in April 1912 and was the first Wright to die when he succumbed a month later. Talk about bad breaks…

On this date in 1944, a young Lieutenant pilot was recovering on a US submarine after his plane crash. He went to to at least earn the same fame as Orville Wright. Lt. George Bush was but 20 years old when his plane was shot down over the Pacific Ocean by enemy anti-aircraft fire. His two crewmen were killed. One of them was killed in the aircraft while the other bailed out with Bush. But, only Bush’s parachute opened. After paddling around in a life raft for 4 hours, Lt. Bush was picked up by the USS Finback. But the sub had other things to do and Bush spent the next month on board while the Finback continued its mission. Bush spent his time assisting in picking up other downed pilots.

Either Bush May Not Have Been President If not For Finback

For his heroism and actions during numerous sorties (58 missions in 1944 alone) Bush received the Navy’s Distinguished Flying Cross, three Air Medals and a Unit Citation shared with the rest of the crew of the USS Jacinto. He went on to be a Congressman, Ambassador to the UN, CIA Director, Vice-President, President of the United States and only the second former President to have a son also hold the nation’s highest elective office. Imagine all that the nation would have missed had the Finback not been in the area. You never know what one good turn can lead to.

tall sunflowers, fat stomach

Weather Bottom Line: 

High pressure that brought us such cool weather is drifting eastward.  Consequently, our humidity levels will be on the rise, though temperatures will be rising only modestly.  An upper disturbance to our southwest may be close enough to increase our rain chances some this afternoon and that type of scattered stuff will be around through the labor day weekend, though Saturday we’ll probably be in between the shortwaves so probabilities will be lowest then.  As it is, none of the shortwaves at this time seem to be too strong nor do they track right over us so its a fair bet that you won’t see any rain at all through Monday…that’s either a good thing or bad thing, depending on how you look at it.  My Sunflowers like rain.

Former President George H.W. Bush notified Ted Kennedy's family that he will not attend Saturday's funeral service.

(CNN) – Former President George H.W. Bush will not attend Ted Kennedy’s private funeral mass in Boston on Saturday, his spokesman Jim McGrath told CNN.

McGrath said the 41st president spoke to Kennedy’s wife Vicki and his niece Caroline to let them know. Earlier reports had said that all four living presidents would attend the service.

Former presidents Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are still scheduled to attend.

Earlier: All four ex-presidents to attend Kennedy funeral

there are so many reasons why i don’t live in the u.s. any more. why i can barely stand coming back here at all. but i do it to see my grandma because she is the one reason that it remains difficult for me to live abroad. i’ve spent the last couple of weeks cleaning up her house, cooking, grocery shopping, taking her to doctor appointments, and taking her to auditions. a few years ago my grandma was encouraged to start an acting career at age 85 and she’s had a few bit parts in short films and commercials since then. she’s had two since i’ve been here. one was some italian movie called “christmas in beverly hills” and the other was for an episode of some fox tv show called “house md,” which i’ve never seen. that audition was on the 20th century fox studio lot.

we drove onto the lot and into the parking garage where my grandma’s agent told us to park. but he also gave us a map showing that we had to walk from there all the way across the studio lot in order to get to the building where the audition would be. i told the guard that it would be impossible for us to do that and asked him for to arrange for us to drive onto the lot so we could park next to the building. silly me: i thought that there would actually be handicapped parking spaces out front. but there were none. all the spaces outside building #52 were reserved for people who work on something called “bones” and “futurama.” so i parked in some other reserved space a bit closer to the building. the only handicapped spot i gleaned was in front of building #1, which was too far of a trek for my grandma and her walker. and i did not think that it would be a good idea to push her into an audition in her wheelchair.

where are the handicapped parking spots?

when we got into the office building i saw a line of women my grandma’s age and then i saw photos on the wall about this “house md” show that stars someone called hugh laurie (also someone i’ve never heard of, but apparently he’s a big name in hollywood). we went through all this effort for my grandma to utter one line: “ooooooohhhh!” it was funny standing outside the door and listening to all the women go inside and utter this exclamation. i think the scene is a patient in bed and this is obviously a response to something the doctor does. well, it turns out that it was worth the effort because my grandma got the part. she’s going to be in an episode of “house md” this season in a scene with hugh laurie. and it is even a bigger deal because now she has enough credits to join the screen actors guild (sag), a union for actors. this means my grandma will have an easier time getting acting gigs. so tomorrow we are going to get her a sag card.

the acting thing is great for my grandma as it gets her out of the house and interacting with people. otherwise she stays at home too much, which is not good for her physical or mental health. but the whole hollywood thing is one reason i left los angeles way back in 1987. the individualistic and narcissistic attitudes that plague people in hollywood infect everything in the city. for the most part, everything and everyone strikes me as fake. and i’ve never liked this aspect of my home town.

but sometimes good things come out of hollywood. my grandma and i went to see the movie “food, inc.” last night. it featured two writers i really like a lot when it comes to food issues: eric schlosser and michael pollan. the film is important in the way it draws connections among labor, class, environment, health, nutrition, government control and censorship, and what we eat. here is a trailer for the film, which gives you an idea of the subjects it covers:

the film’s one main failing is its lack of attention to how u.s. food policy affects the rest of the world. rami’s blog addresses this issue on a daily basis. michael pollan’s open letter to then president-elect barack obama addressed these issues and showed how they are intertwined in crucial ways:

After cars, the food system uses more fossil fuel than any other sector of the economy — 19 percent. And while the experts disagree about the exact amount, the way we feed ourselves contributes more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere than anything else we do — as much as 37 percent, according to one study. Whenever farmers clear land for crops and till the soil, large quantities of carbon are released into the air. But the 20th-century industrialization of agriculture has increased the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by the food system by an order of magnitude; chemical fertilizers (made from natural gas), pesticides (made from petroleum), farm machinery, modern food processing and packaging and transportation have together transformed a system that in 1940 produced 2.3 calories of food energy for every calorie of fossil-fuel energy it used into one that now takes 10 calories of fossil-fuel energy to produce a single calorie of modern supermarket food. Put another way, when we eat from the industrial-food system, we are eating oil and spewing greenhouse gases. This state of affairs appears all the more absurd when you recall that every calorie we eat is ultimately the product of photosynthesis — a process based on making food energy from sunshine. There is hope and possibility in that simple fact.

In addition to the problems of climate change and America’s oil addiction, you have spoken at length on the campaign trail of the health care crisis. Spending on health care has risen from 5 percent of national income in 1960 to 16 percent today, putting a significant drag on the economy. The goal of ensuring the health of all Americans depends on getting those costs under control. There are several reasons health care has gotten so expensive, but one of the biggest, and perhaps most tractable, is the cost to the system of preventable chronic diseases. Four of the top 10 killers in America today are chronic diseases linked to diet: heart disease, stroke, Type 2 diabetes and cancer. It is no coincidence that in the years national spending on health care went from 5 percent to 16 percent of national income, spending on food has fallen by a comparable amount — from 18 percent of household income to less than 10 percent. While the surfeit of cheap calories that the U.S. food system has produced since the late 1970s may have taken food prices off the political agenda, this has come at a steep cost to public health. You cannot expect to reform the health care system, much less expand coverage, without confronting the public-health catastrophe that is the modern American diet.

The impact of the American food system on the rest of the world will have implications for your foreign and trade policies as well. In the past several months more than 30 nations have experienced food riots, and so far one government has fallen. Should high grain prices persist and shortages develop, you can expect to see the pendulum shift decisively away from free trade, at least in food. Nations that opened their markets to the global flood of cheap grain (under pressure from previous administrations as well as the World Bank and the I.M.F.) lost so many farmers that they now find their ability to feed their own populations hinges on decisions made in Washington (like your predecessor’s precipitous embrace of biofuels) and on Wall Street. They will now rush to rebuild their own agricultural sectors and then seek to protect them by erecting trade barriers. Expect to hear the phrases “food sovereignty” and “food security” on the lips of every foreign leader you meet. Not only the Doha round, but the whole cause of free trade in agriculture is probably dead, the casualty of a cheap food policy that a scant two years ago seemed like a boon for everyone. It is one of the larger paradoxes of our time that the very same food policies that have contributed to overnutrition in the first world are now contributing to undernutrition in the third. But it turns out that too much food can be nearly as big a problem as too little — a lesson we should keep in mind as we set about designing a new approach to food policy.

Rich or poor, countries struggling with soaring food prices are being forcibly reminded that food is a national-security issue. When a nation loses the ability to substantially feed itself, it is not only at the mercy of global commodity markets but of other governments as well. At issue is not only the availability of food, which may be held hostage by a hostile state, but its safety: as recent scandals in China demonstrate, we have little control over the safety of imported foods. The deliberate contamination of our food presents another national-security threat. At his valedictory press conference in 2004, Tommy Thompson, the secretary of health and human services, offered a chilling warning, saying, “I, for the life of me, cannot understand why the terrorists have not attacked our food supply, because it is so easy to do.”

if you click on the link at the beginning of the above-quoted text you’ll find that pollan goes a lot further–both historicizing these problems and offering solutions to them. the film, too, asks people to take action after viewing it as all the participant film productions do. the film people have a website where the update various items that encourage action on the part of their viewers. this is, of course, rare in hollywood. and not all of this film company’s productions on the various social issues are on the mark politically from where i stand. but i think this food film is important and raises issues. the question is if americans can get off their asses and do something about it. that remains to be seen.

there was another really great food documentary i saw last year called “king corn” which was an independent film about how the food industry is destroying agriculture, health, and the environment. it traced and tracked how and where corn travels across the united states and beyond (to a certain extent) in all of its various forms (“food, inc.” covers the subject, too). and they also have a link on their site where you can find out what to do to take action. you can get a good idea about the film from this extended clip (and the film is available for download on itunes):

but as much as i appreciate the various threads these filmmakers pull together to show us how damaging our eating practices are on a national scale, i think some further attention to the ways american agriculture is affecting the planet is necessary. one of the key evil mutli-national corporations featured in the film “food, inc.” is, of course, monsanto. and the film does a great job showing how monsanto bullies farmers into submission, compliance, and bankruptcy. but at the same time this is what is going on globally for the same reasons. just look at what nancy scola explains the u.s. and monsanto are doing in places like india and iraq:

In short, Order 81 was Bremer’s way of telling Monsanto that the same conditions had been created in Iraq that had led to the company’s stunning successes in India.

In issuing Order 81, Bremer didn’t order Iraqi farmers to march over to the closest Monsanto-supplied shop and stock up. But if Monsanto’s experience in India is any guide, he didn’t need to.

Here’s the way it works in India. In the central region of Vidarbha, for example, Monsanto salesmen travel from village to village touting the tremendous, game-changing benefits of Bt cotton, Monsanto’s genetically modified seed sold in India under the Bollgard® label. The salesmen tell farmers of the amazing yields other Vidarbha growers have enjoyed while using their products, plastering villages with posters detailing “True Stories of Farmers Who Have Sown Bt Cotton.” Old-fashioned cotton seeds pale in comparison to Monsanto’s patented wonder seeds, say the salesmen, as much as an average old steer is humbled by a fine Jersey cow.

Part of the trick to Bt cotton’s remarkable promise, say the salesmen, is that Bollgard® was genetically engineered in the lab to contain bacillus thuringiensis, a bacterium that the company claims drastically reduces the need for pesticides. When pesticides are needed, Bt cotton plants are Roundup® Ready — a Monsanto designation meaning that the plants can be drowned in the company’s signature herbicide, none the worse for wear. (Roundup® mercilessly kills nonengineered plants.)

Sounds great, right? The catch is that Bollgard® and Roundup® cost real money. And so Vidarbha’s farmers, somewhat desperate to grow the anemic profit margin that comes with raising cotton in that dry and dusty region, have rushed to both banks and local moneylenders to secure the cash needed to get on board with Monsanto. Of a $3,000 bank loan a Vidarbha farmer might take out, as much as half might go to purchasing a growing season’s worth of Bt seeds.

And the same goes the next season, and the next season after that. In traditional agricultural, farmers can recycle seeds from one harvest to plant the next, or swap seeds with their neighbors at little or no cost. But when it comes to engineered seeds like Bt cotton, Monsanto owns the tiny speck of intellectual property inside each hull, and thus controls the patent. And a farmer wishing to reuse seeds from a Monsanto plant must pay to relicense them from the company each and every growing season.

But farmers who chose to bet the farm, literally, on Bt cotton or other GM seeds aren’t necessarily crazy or deluded. Genetically modified agricultural does hold the tremendous promise of leading to increased yields — incredibly important for farmers feeding their families and communities from limited land and labor.

But when it comes to GM seeds, all’s well when all is well. Farming is a gamble, and the flip side of the great potential reward that genetically modified seeds offer is, of course, great risk. When all goes badly, farmers who have sunk money into Monsanto-driven farming find themselves at the bottom of a far deeper hole than farmers who stuck with traditional growing. Farmers who suffer a failed harvest may find it nearly impossible to secure a new loan from either a bank or local moneylender. With no money to dig him or herself out, that hole only gets deeper.

And that hole is exactly where farmers have found themselves in India’s Vidarbha region, where crop failure — especially the failure of Bt cotton crops — has reached the level of pandemic.

In may be that Bt cotton isn’t well-suited to central India’s rain-driven farming methods; Bollgard® and parched Vidarbha may be as ill-suited as Bremer’s combat boots and Brooks Brothers suits. It may be the unpredictable and unusually dry monsoon seasons that have plagued India of late. But in any case, the result is that more and more of India’s farmers are finding themselves in debt, and with little hope for finding their way out.

And the final way out that so many of them — thousands upon thousands — have chosen is death, and by their own hands. Firm statistics are difficult to come by, but even numbers on the low end of the scale are downright horrifying. The Indian government and NGOs have estimated that, so far this year, at last count more than a thousand farmers have killed themselves in the state of Maharashtra alone. The New York Times pinned it as 17,000 Indian farmers in 2003 alone. A PBS special that aired last month, called “The Dying Fields,” claimed that one farmer commits suicide in Vidarbha every eight hours.

But let’s not be so pessimistic for a moment, and say that Iraqi farmers see the risks of investing in unproven GM seeds. Let’s say they reject the idea that the intellectual property buried inside the seeds they plant is “owned” not by nature, but by Monsanto. Let’s say they decide to keep on keeping on with nonengineered, nonpatented agriculture.

The fact is, they may not have a choice.

Here is where Order 81 starts to look a lot like the forced and mandatory GM-driven agricultural system that cynics tagged it as when it was first announced. Read the letter of the law, and the impact of Order 81 seems limited to using public policy to construct an architecture that’s simply favorable to a company like Monsanto. The directive promotes a corporate agribusiness model a lot like the one we have in the United States today, but it doesn’t really and truly put Monsanto in the driver’s seat of that system.

Actually handing the keys to Monsanto is instead biology’s job.

Biology — how so? That’s a good question for Percy Schmeiser, the Saskatchewan farmer featured in the film The Future of Food, who found himself tangled with Monsanto in a heated lawsuit over the presence of Roundup® Ready canola plants on the margins of his fields.

The Canadian farmer argued that he had purchased no Monsanto canola seeds, had never planted Monsanto seeds, and was frankly horrified to find that the genetically modified crops had taken hold in his acreage. Perhaps, suggested Schmeiser, the plants in question were the product of a few rogue GM seeds blown from a truck passing by his land?

Monsanto was uninterested in Schmeiser’s theory on how the Roundup® Ready plants got there. As far as the company was concerned, Schmeiser was in possession of an agricultural product whose intellectual property belonged to Monsanto. And it didn’t matter much how that came to pass.

Monsanto’s interpretation of the impact of seed contamination is, of course, a good one if its goal is to eventually own the rights to the world’s seed supply. And that goal may well be in sight. In fact, a 2004 study by the Union of Concerned Scientists found that much of the U.S. seed pool is already contaminated by GM seeds. If that contamination continues unabated, eventually much of the world’s seeds could labor under patents controlled by one agribusiness or another.

In one agricultural realm like Iraq’s, GM contamination could in short order give a company like Monsanto a stranglehold over the market. Post-Order 81 Iraqi farmers who want to resist genetically modified seeds and stick to traditional farming methods may not have that choice. Future generations of Iraqi growers may find that one seed shop in Karbala is selling the same patented seeds as every other shop in town.

And when that happens, what had been a traditional farming community — where financial risk is divided and genetic diversity multiplied through the simple interactions between neighboring farmers — finds itself nothing more than the home to lone farmers caught up in the high-stakes world of international agribusiness.

It’s a world not unfamiliar to former CPA honcho Bremer, if the company he keeps is any indication. Robert Cohen, author of the book Milk A-Z, talks about the Bush administration as the “Monsanto Cabinet.”

Among the many connections between that company and the current White House: Former Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman served on the board of directors of Calgene, a Monsanto subsidiary; one-time Secretary of Defense Don Rumsfeld had an eight-year stint as president of Searle, another Monsanto subsidiary; Clarence Thomas worked as an attorney in Monsanto’s pesticide and agriculture division before coming to the Supreme Court as a George H.W. Bush appointee.

Those connections, as much as anything else, might help to explain the impetus behind and timing of Order 81. Let’s suppose for a minute that GM-driven globalized agriculture is, indeed, in the long-term best interests of the new Iraq. Even in the best of circumstances, such a significant policy shift in so core an economic sector can be expected to cause short-term pain. When Bremer issued the directive, Iraq was hardly in a good place: It had recently been invaded, its government dismantled. Considering the desperate need for immediate stability in Iraq in April 2004, Order 81 begins to look like the triumph of connections and ideology over clear-headed policymaking.

vandana shiva, one of my favorite thinkers and activists, speaks about the danger of allowing multi-national corporations hold intellectual property rights for seeds:

so what is the point of all this? the point is to buy locally. to eat what’s in season. to buy from family farmers. to buy as little as possible from any corporation as much as possible. of course, living in palestine that is much easier to do, especially with food. though not with coffee. and this is one last thing i want to say on the subject. coffee is obviously not grown in the levant. so it is imported. and i have not seen much research on the facts about where it gets imported from and how or who works the coffee bean farms and what are the conditions of those workers? all of these things are really important to me when i buy food. when i buy anything for that matter. and one of the main things “food, inc.” was encouraging towards the end was better labeling. but there is no one who labels like groundwork coffee in los angeles. here is a photo of what the coffee and its label on the shelf of their shops looks like:

where my coffee comes from

and here is their mission statement–if only all businesses could think and act in this manner:

groundwork coffee company dates back to 1990, when Richard Karno decided to expand his rare book & café business by roasting his own coffee. The demand from local restaurants became so great, he began roasting around the clock. groundwork then went on to become one of the very first certified organic coffee roasters in Southern California (as well as the largest organic coffee roaster in Los Angeles), while pioneering sustainable, relationship-based, and organic coffee sourcing.

Coffee is one of the earth’s great resources. In dollars it’s the world’s second most traded commodity. When it comes to pesticides it’s the world’s third most sprayed crop– that’s why we went organic.

Organic certification insures the coffee and the community that grew it are not exposed to harmful pesticides, herbicides or fungicides.

groundwork is committed to advancing both the economic and environmental sustainability of the Arabica coffee bean (it’s actually a “seed,” but bean sounds nicer!). Our goal is to purchase and roast the best organic coffees from around the world, while helping to improve the lives of farmers, processors, roaster operators, and café baristas.

By Alexander Lawrie

A SCOTTISH singing star has discovered she is related to US President Barack Obama – while recording an album inspired by her relative’s rise to fame.

Daisy Chute, 20, from Musselburgh, East Lothian, is a member of the modern classical girl group All Angels and has been delighted to find out she is related to one of the most powerful men in the world.

The pretty vocalist was recording her group’s third album, Fly Away, which features a rich musical history of America, when her mum informed her of the amazing coincidence.

Ms Chute’s family is also related to former-presidents George Washington, James Madison and Zachary Taylor, although they’ve known about those connections for many years.

Daisy said: “We’ve always known we were related to the early Virginian settlers through my grandmother’s side, but the news that there was a connection to the most monumental figure of the 21st century, President Obama, was incredible.

“My first reaction was ‘am I a little black?’, then I realized that was not the case – the relation is through Obama’s mother’s side.

Related to three past presidents

Daisy, a former pupil at the exclusive, private Loretto School, and her three bandmates were in the process of recording their new album when she received a call from her mother Alice, 57, informing her about a website she had found which stated the new president was related to seven other past presidents.

Daisy, a former chorister at Edinburgh’s St Mary’s Cathedral, said: “Because my mum knew that we were related to three other presidents in her line, we looked into it more and found that we could add Obama to the list of people we were related to.

“It just seemed like a bit of a coincidence that the group was recording an American album when we discovered that I was related to the president.”

The ancestral link between the families comes from Daisy’s grandparents 11 generations ago, and Obama’s grandparents ten generations ago, making them distant cousins.

Edinburgh-born Daisy is currently living in London and is studying a degree in music at the city’s Kings College.

All Angels signed to the Decca label in 2006 and have sold over 500,000 albums worldwide.

The Brit-nominated band have supported classical star Katherine Jenkins on her UK tour earlier this year and has performed in front of the Queen, Sir Paul McCartney and Cherie Blair.

The talented group’s new album Fly Away will be released on September 28.

“Read my lips.  No. New. Taxes.”

This was just what the GOP wanted to hear from then-VP George HW Bush in 1988 and was exactly the promise he was forced to break as President when faced with a democrat controlled congress and a host of initiatives that he urgently wanted to pass.

President Obama is in a similar pickle. As candidate he made many promises and one was this – no tax hike on “middle class” Americans.  Middle class to Obama is anyone earning under $250,000 per year in income.  He faces a democrat congress and has a host of initiatives, including deficit reduction.

Taxes will go up.  The question is – will the magic $250K mark be the Maginot line for the IRS blitzkrieg that is about to hit the economy?

He will use Bush’s line “new” meant no new types of taxes.  Obama can say that he was talking about income and associated taxes.  He never said anything about a carbon or health care tax.

Time will tell whether the voters will notice and react.  Until then, read Obama’s lips:

Reuters report:

Report on tax hike on energy:

     President George HW Bush campaigned on “No New Taxes”, capping it off with “Read my Lips”. Upon raisng taxes, he was thus held to one term in office.

     Barack Obama kept a similar tone during the campaign, assuring that 95% of us would not see an increase in our taxes.

     Now, on the Sunday circuit, a concerted and ominous effort by the Obama administration to let the American public know that we will face increased taxes to cover the deficit, and as a country, we must be ready to pay up. Both Larry Summers and Timothy Geithner have said that tax increases are inevitable!