Clinton's reply to Ann Coulter

YouTube - Late Show

Praying for some Dea ex machina in the Middle East...

I may have mentioned before that the conflict surrounding Israel scares the shit out of me. Even if we had a reasonable government, I'd be worried about the building war between Israel and Hezbollah. Unfortunately, we're living in Bizzarro Amerikkka, where the worst possible person for any position in the administration is the very person who has the job in question. If we survive the Bush years, we will truly know that Goddess is on our side, because I don't see any possible way we're getting out of this mess with our country intact. Our Democracy is on the roof waiting for the boats to come rescue it, and Mike Brown is still working for FEMA. Let's pray Lady Liberty can swim.

I'm doing this little dance where I try to hear enough news to know what's happening, but not so much that my head explodes. The fact that Condi Rice, the most spectacular fuck-up in the history of our nation, is over there trying to work things out is just the most recent tragedy in the 5,000 year obscenity of Eastern Patriarchy. They were actually not going to call for a cease-fire until they could ensure a lasting peace. WTF?!?!?!?

Apparently every official in this deal is working on the incorrect premise that a) bombs solve anything and b) someone can be entitled to drop bombs on someone else. I defy anyone on either side to give me one substantive reason for dropping a bomb on a baby, because that's what they're doing. I'll take any cease fire I can get, whether it lasts a day or an hour, because that's one day, or one hour, or one minute that innocent people aren't dying for.... what the hell are they fighting about, again? A shithole in the desert that is basically uninhabitable, but for some ungodly reason - oh, wait- for some "godly" reason the Jews, Christians and Muslims all want to occupy the same barren patch of desert because their moldy old scrolls tell each group that they're entitled to it. Show me a scroll that says Aruba is the promised land, and you might convince me. Israel? No way. The heat has obviously curdled all their brains, or maybe it's the religion, but do they ever just stop and look around and say "why are we making this miserable place more miserable than it already is?"

I say instead of evacuating Americans who are stupid enough to find themselves over there, we offer to evacuate anyone who is willing to live somewhere else peacefully. Once we've got them safely settled elsewhere, we take the planes we used to evacuate them, and we go to every official in DC and tell any one of them that sees a reason for anybody, American or not, to be fighting in the Middle East to get on the plane. Then we pick up Falwell and Dobson and everyone who works for FOX news. We fly all of them over to the patch of desert, so that now, only people who think this is worth fighting for are there.

Now, the trick is, we take away all of the bombs. They get guns and bullets, only. They fight it out hand to hand or not at all. All transportation in or out ceases, so that they have to stay there and deal with the mess they've created. No electricity, no communications of any kind, just them, the desert, guns and their unshakable faith that Jesus will be back at any minute or whatever they think is going to happen. The rest of the world will go on with its life, knowing that they have no bombs and can only hurt each other. We'll have guards around the perimeter so no one gets out. When they've all died out from whatever, we'll reward the border guards with trips to Aruba, and we start working on Africa. We keep going until there's peace on the planet, and anyone who wants to fight about anything gets shipped off to Antarctica.

That's certainly no crazier than the trash Bush and Condi have been talking this week, and frankly, my idea has a better chance of working because I don't actively pray for the world to end. What I pray for is for the Goddess to make Herself prominent in the world again, and inspire humans to work together in peace and harmony.

We CAN do better. Peace is possible - it's our natural state of being.

A Painting a Day....

flashmovies

This is entirely too cool. I don't know why I love it so much, but I do.

"The Goddess is a Verb, the Isness of the Goddess Goddessing,"

MatriFocus Web Magazine:

" The Goddess must be bigger than my imagination. Divinity must be bigger than I dare touch, beyond the first naming, beyond the first speaking that created matter from nothingness, beyond me. You see, the comfort of Mother and Father has very little to do with the Goddess Goddessing. Like the Tao, it cannot be spoken; as soon as I give the Goddess a gender I am in the trap of two, shackled to the mountain of either/or. The Goddess breaks through the law of physics that says, 'Two things cannot exist in the same place at the same time,' because the Goddess is in everything, beyond everything, between everything."

Notice the reference to patriarchal "Tao" and the false statement about physics. Quantum physics shows us that two things can co-exist in the same place at the same time, and a thing may exist in more than one state at one time, or exists in every state at any given time. This is a Goddess worshipper stuck in the artificial patriarchal binary.

Goddess, I am sick of this point of view, especially from Pagans. You do not have to have male to have female. Female comes first. Female can reproduce alone. Male is derived from the Female, and therefore included in it.

The "50-50" proportion doesn't occur in Nature. There is always more female than male, and maleness is newer because it is derived from femaleness. That's simple biology.

Duality is dangerous. It's where we get the conflict in our cultures - "Opposite" sexes, Good vs. Evil, them and us. That conflict benefits the power structure.

The totality of the Universe, or Perfection, the Dragon, Goddess, is expressed in the number 0. Existence is that which deviates from 0. When the Goddess became aware of Herself, she became 1. She ripened as 1, and then She birthed the Universe, She became 2, Mother and Child. Mother and child eventually become 3 (Mother/Consort/child), then air, earth water fire and spirit (5) differentiate from the Source, and so on:

0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377, 610, 987 .....

Perfection is Goddess
Source is Goddess, and becomes
Mother Goddess
Mother Goddess and divine child
Mother/Consort/Child= family
5 elements
8 Sabbats
13 Moon cycles
21 = 3x7, 37 x 21 = 777 or three 7s

Our culture is focused on the 2. We need to focus on the 1, and the 0. Eventually, we'll all be 0 again. Right now, we are intimately connected as 1.

"from me all things proceed and to me they must return"

The passage I quoted above sees the female gender as a limitation. What do we have to do to get Goddess Wimmin, of all people, to stop thinking in terms of duality? The author is trying to express 0, but she can't see it as female. Why not?

I take this subject seriously because it's essential to understand that the Universe is a conscious, living female entity. If you grok that, everything else falls into place.

Vanuatu is world's happiest country:

Yahoo! News

Wed Jul 12, 11:08 AM ET

LONDON (AFP) - The tiny South Pacific Ocean archipelago of Vanuatu is the happiest country on Earth, according to a study published measuring people's wellbeing and their impact on the environment.

Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominica and Panama complete the top five in the Happy Planet Index, compiled by the British think-tank New Economics Foundation (NEF).

The index combines life satisfaction, life expectancy and environmental footprint -- the amount of land required to sustain the population and absorb its energy consumption.

Zimbabwe came bottom of the 178 countries ranked, below second-worst performer Swaziland, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ukraine.

The Group of Eight industrial powers meet in Saint Petersburg this weekend but have not much to smile about, according to the index.

Italy came out best in 66th place, ahead of Germany (81), Japan (95), Britain (108), Canada (111), France (129), the United States (150) and Russia, in lowly 172nd place.

Andrew Simms, NEF's policy director, said the index "addresses the relative success or failure of countries in giving their citizens a good life while respecting the environmental resource limits on which all our lives depend."

Nic Marks, the head of NEF's centre for wellbeing, added: "It is clear that no single nation listed in the Happy Planet Index has got everything right.

"But the index does reveal patterns that show how we might better achieve long and happy lives for all, whilst living within our environmental means," he said, according to British daily The Guardian.

"The challenge is: can we learn the lessons and apply them?"

Island nations performed particularly well in the rankings. But Vanuatu, with a population of around 200,000, topped them all.

"Don't tell too many people, please," said Marke Lowen of Vanuatu Online, the republic's online newspaper.

"People are generally happy here because they are very satisfied with very little," he told The Guardian.

"This is not a consumer-driven society. Life here is about community and family and goodwill to other people. It's a place where you don't worry too much."

"The only things we fear are cyclones or earthquakes."

Selected others: 17. Philippines; 23. Indonesia; 31. China; 32. Thailand; 44. Malaysia; 62. India; 64. Iceland; 70. Netherlands; 87. Spain; 88. Hong Kong; 89. Saudi Arabia; 99. Denmark; 112. Pakistan; 115. Norway; 119. Sweden; 123. Finland; 139. Australia; 154. UAE; 156. South Africa; 159. Kuwait; 166. Qatar.

150 out of 178. That's not good, y'all. I mean, I'm sure our polluting ways have a lot to do with that rating, but think about it - how many people do you know who would describe themselves as "happy." I'm not sure I know any. I know a lot of people who are chronically depressed, or stressed out, or sick.

I always wanted to live on an island. If I had any brains, I'd head out for one and never look back. But here I sit, on a mountain in the middle of nowhere. Actually, that's not true. I have to drive 3 hours to get to the middle of nowhere.

On the plus side, Ann Coulter got dropped from one of her columns, and Valerie Plame is suing Cheney, Libby and Rove. Hee.

Sane, Liberal Christians! Yay!

Religion Taking A Left Turn?

Conservative Christians Watch Out: There's A Big Churchgoing Group Seeking Political Power

July 10, 2006

Reverend Tony Campolo said: "We are furious that the religious right has made Jesus into a Republican. That's idolatry." (CBS)

"Jesus never said one word about homosexuality, never said one word about civil marriage or abortion."
Dr. Bob Edgar, General Secretary of the National Council of Churches

(CBS) At a church in Washington, hundreds of committed Christians met recently and tried to map out a strategy to get their values into the political debate.

But these are not the conservative Christian values which have been so influential lately. This is the religious left.

"Jesus called us to love our neighbor, love our enemy, care for the poor, care for the outcast, and that's really the moral core of where we think the nation ought to go," Dr. Bob Edgar, General Secretary of the National Council of Churches told CBS News correspondent Russ Mitchell.

The National Council of Churches represents about 50 million Christians in America — the majority of them mainline Protestants.

"Jesus never said one word about homosexuality, never said one word about civil marriage or abortion," Edgar said.

He calls this movement the "center-left" — and it's seeking the same political muscle as the conservative Christians, a group with a strong power base in the huge Evangelical churches of the South.

But the left has its own Evangelical leaders, such as the Rev. Tony Campolo.

"We are furious that the religious right has made Jesus into a Republican. That's idolatry," Campolo said. "To recreate Jesus in your own image rather than allowing yourself to be created in Jesus' image is what's wrong with politics."

The Christian left is focusing on:

Fighting poverty
Protecting the environment
Ending the war in Iraq

"Right now the war in Iraq costs us $1 billion per week," said Rev. Jim Wallis, a Christian activist. "And we can't get $5 billion over ten years for child care in this country?"

To try to attract young voters and the attention of politicians who want their votes, leaders of the religious left are promoting issues like raising the minimum wage.

"Nine million families are working full time," Wallis said. "Working hard full time, responsibly, and not making it."

Three decades ago liberal religious leaders had a powerful influence on politics.

In the 1960s and 70s they led demonstrations against civil rights abuses and the war in Vietnam. But when those battles were over, the movement seemed to lose energy, while the Christian right had become well organized and committed to having its voice and concerns heard.

After years of sitting on the sidelines, it will take more than meetings and talking points to make the liberals into a political power again.

"The Christian right has a ground game," said Mark Silk of Trinity College's religious studies department. "Thus far the Christian left mainly has an air game: they want to throw positions, they want to talk to the media, but do they have the networks in place on the ground to get people out to vote?"

So, it remains to be seen whether there's any action behind the words. But there's no doubt they're on a mission.

"I've watched a generation die. And I watched them shift from idealism to a 'me' generation that was only orientated to consumerism and it hurt, and I wondered whether we ever would come back." Campolo said. "But the pendulum is swinging."

©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.

I knew there were still some good, New Testament Christians out there. It's nice to see them starting to organize. The Radical Right has been making them look bad.

'Google' -- the verb -- makes Merriam-Webster dictionary

globeandmail.com

Wouldn't you think that would be a good thing? But NO, because our trademark laws are so freaking archaic that it puts Google's trademark in jeopardy. When is Congress going to get off its ass and make some trademark/copyright laws that make sense in the computer age? As rapidly as technology is advancing, don'tcha think it's time for a Department of Technology to keep up with this stuff?

"The House of Representatives is full of insane Jackasses." - Jon Stewart.

UPDATE: Veteran's Memorial Pentacle Quest

FROM THE CIRCLE NETWORK:

Veteran Pentacle Quest in DC & Media Update

Roberta Stewart and Rev. Selena Fox of Circle Sanctuary spoke at a religious freedom rally in Washington, DC on the 4th of July. More than 300 people, including Pagans from 17 states, attended the rally, held in Farragut Square Park, located near the White House and the headquarters of the US Department of Veterans Affairs.The rally included a variety of speakers and musicians. Some photos of this rally are now on-line at the newly created rally page and more photos will be posted this week:
http://www.circlesanctuary.org/liberty/veteranpentacle/dcrally/index.htm

On Wednesday, July 5, Roberta and Selena went to Capitol Hill and met with a legislative aide in Senator Harry Reid's office. The aide then accompanied them to VA headquarters where they met with Under Secretary for Memorial Affairs William Tuerk and two other VA officials. The Under Secretary, who is head of the National Cemetery Administration (NCA) which maintains the VA's list of authorized emblems of belief for memorial markers for veterans, told them that the VA is not approving any emblem of belief addition requests at this time because the VA procedures adopted in October 2005 for adding emblems of belief to the NCA list were not adopted correctly. The Under Secretary still would give no timeline for the completion of this latest "revising the rules" process. Both Selena and Roberta urged him to add the Pentacle to the NCA list under previous protocols while the VA sorts out its procedural mistakes.

The Pentacle Quest continues to make news.

An article appeared on the top of the second page of the Washington Post on July 4 and is now being published by other media. Associated Press and United Press International articles have been and are being picked up by media sources across the USA and several other countries.

On July 5, Roberta and Selena appeared on the evening news on the ABC television affiliate in Washington, DC.

The July 7 radio broadcast of Roberta and Selena on Barry Lynn's Culture Shocks program is now archived on-line (show # 722) -- listen to it at: http://www.cultureshocks.com

CNN television interviewed Roberta and Selena while they were in Washington, DC -- the story is presently scheduled to air tomorrow (Monday, July 10) on the American Morning Show (6 - 10 am EDT)

More media coverage is in the works for this week.

Your continued support for this Veteran Pentacle Quest is needed and appreciated.

HOW YOU CAN HELP:

(1) SPEAK OUT: Monitor media coverage of the Pentacle Quest. Write letters to the editor and to blog sites --express your support for the Pentacle being added to the NCA list, call the VA to uphold religious freedom, and express appreciation for
good media coverage. Write words of support in comments sections, which accompany news reports on-line, such as following the article in the Sacramento Bee:
http://www.sacbee.com/content/lifestyle/v-print/story/14275816p-15085367c.html

(2) ALLIES: The Quest needs more Allies ... religious leaders of other religions, veterans organizations, Senators & Congresspeople, religious freedom activists, and others. Please contact possible allies you know -- give them information about this Quest, ask them to write letters of support to the VA & media, and let us know about your efforts -- email:liberty@circlesanctuary.org or fax copies of letters sent to us: (608) 924-5961.

(3) DONATE: Send donations to Circle Sanctuary to help defray travel costs and other expenses incurred in the Quest. You can donate on-line: http://www.circlesanctuary.org/donate/ or
send to:

Veteran Pentacle Quest Fund, Lady
Liberty League, Circle Sanctuary, PO Box 9,
Barneveld, WI 53507 USA.

Donations are tax deductible in the USA. Make checks payable to Circle Sanctuary - Lady Liberty League.

(4) RITUALS: Please send blessings of strength and support to Roberta and Selena and others working with them on this Quest. Envision success for the Veteran Pentacle Quest. Join with others in invoking the Goddess Liberty (Libertas)and other Divine forces for success and support at this Full Moon time and in the time ahead. More info about Libertas and how to work with Her is on-line:http://www.circlesanctuary.org/circle/articles/pantheon/GoddessFreedom.html

(5) NETWORK: Tell others about this Quest and encourage them to help. Post the URL for our Veteran Pentacle website to lists and websites (http://www.circlesanctuary.org/liberty/veteranpentacle). Forward this email on to others.

Thank you!

Circle Times: Sunday, July 9, 2006

They're relying on procedural bullshit to deny this fallen soldier the recognition given every other member of the military. What a bunch of chicken shit Chicken Hawks. What exactly are our soldiers fighting for? The pResident keeps saying it has something to do with freedom, but I don't see much support for freedom in this case. America is designed to foster diversity, and religious freedom is fundamental to who we are as a nation. If Sgt. Stewart isn't given a proper stone immediately, we need to consider just who and what this government stands for these days.

These rights are "unalienable" - they are with us at birth, and no one, including the government, has the right to ignore them. This is about freedom to worship as we choose without State approval; it's about Equal Protection Under the Law. They've done it for others. They have no Constitutionally supported option but to give this man fair acknowledgement of his beliefs.

It has been too long already. Are we FREE or Are We NOT?

Scholars Question Cheney's Role in 9/11

Scholars Question Cheney's Role in 9/11

Experts conclude Vice President possessed foreknowledge and suggest Moussaoui trial a "distraction".

Duluth, MN (PRWEB) March 13, 2006 -- A society of experts and scholars contends that the prosecution of Zacarias Moussaoui -- for willfully concealing advance knowledge of the events of 9/11 -- has the status of a Soviet-style "show trial" and functions as a diversion from the real culprits. The nonpartisan group, Scholars for 9/11 Truth, asserts that the evidence implicating Vice President Dick Cheney of that very offense is more obvious and compelling. If they are even remotely correct, then the alleged terrorists appear to have been cast in the role of "patsies."

The only reasonable interpretation of the orders
The experts base their conclusion on testimony presented to the 9/11 Commission by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta on May 23, 2003, which was omitted from its final report, and on related events at the Pentagon. Members of the society will present their findings during a press conference to be held at 1 PM on Tuesday at the United States Courthouse in Alexandria, VA, the location of a trial to determine whether Moussaoui, who is called "the 20th hijacker", should serve a life term or receive the death sentence.

"Mineta's testimony is devastating," observed James H. Fetzer, Ph.D., McKnight Professor at the University of Minnesota. Fetzer is the founder and co-chair of the scholars' society, which recently joined with Judicial Watch in calling for release of documents, films and videos, and physical evidence withheld from the public by the administration. "It pulls the plug on the Commission's contention there was no advance warning that the Pentagon was going to be hit."

According to Secretary Mineta's testimony, which is in the public domain, when he (Mineta) arrived at an underground bunker at the White House (known as the Presidential Emergency Operations Center), the Vice President was in charge. "During the time that the airplane was coming in to the Pentagon", he stated, "there was a young man who would come in and say to the Vice President, 'The plane is 50 miles out.' 'The plane is 30 miles out.'

"And when it got down to, 'The plane is 10 miles out,'" Mineta continued, "the young man also said to the Vice President, 'Do the orders still stand?' And the Vice President turned and whipped his neck around and said, 'Of course the orders still stand. Have you heard anything to the contrary?'" One way to construe these remarks could be that the orders were to shoot down the plane.

The scholars suggest that that is an implausible interpretation. The Pentagon, they observe, may be the most heavily defended building in the world. If the orders had been to "shoot it down," then no doubt it would have been shot down. Moreover, there would have been no apparent reason for the young man to have expressed concern over whether or not "the orders still stand." Shooting it down, under the circumstances, would have been the thing to do.

"The only reasonable interpretation of the orders," Fetzer observed, "is that the incoming aircraft should not be shot down, which would have been an obvious source of anxiety for an aide. Since it contradicts the official story about the Pentagon," he added, "it had to be suppressed and was not even included in The 9/11 Commission Report." And other scholars, including Professor David Ray Griffin of Claremont Graduate University, have drawn the same conclusion.

Philip J. Berg, Esq., Former Deputy Attorney General of Pennsylvania and a past candidate for Governor, Lt. Governor, and U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania, who is a member of Scholars for 9/11 Truth, added, "Those who made it happen were obviously in the position to know that it was going to happen and therefore could have sounded a warning alarm. The case against Cheney is more powerful than the case against Moussaoui. No one is more culpable than the perpetrators. If Moussaoui deserves the death penalty, what does our Vice President deserve?"

Berg also represents William Rodriguez, a WTC witness, in a RICO lawsuit against officials in the administration for complicity in the events of 9/11, being U.S. District Court (Philadelphia) Case Number 04CV4952. Other members of the society include Robert Bowman, head of the "Star Wars" program in both Democratic and Republican administrations; Morgan Reynolds, former Chief Economist for the Department of Labor in the Bush administration; Andreas von Buelow, former assistant defense minister of Germany; and Griffin, a noted theologian and author of The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions.

Members of the society point to other indications of advance knowledge, which include volumes of put-options placed by betting that the stock value of United and American Airlines would drop. The SEC has detailed information about those who placed the options, which it has not released to the public. "Time and time again," Fetzer remarked, "evidence that would expose the official account to be a deception and a hoax intended to manipulate the nation has been concealed."

According to Fetzer, experts in the society of scholars, including pilots and aeronautical engineers, physicists and mechanical engineers, have established that flying these planes would have been beyond the "hijackers" capabilities, that it would have been virtually impossible for cell phone calls to have been placed during those flights, and that even the Saudi Arabian Embassy has long confirmed that several of the accused "hijackers" did not die on 9/11.

"It does not take rocket science to infer that, if these guys were killed in the crash of these aircraft, then they cannot be alive and well and living in Saudi Arabia," he remarked, "yet the FBI has not bothered to revise its list of suspects." Other studies available on the society's web site at www.st911.org indicate that the passenger manifests for the four flights did not include the names of the hijackers nor were autopsies conducted on them.

"A growing body of evidence supports the inference that these 19 men were patsies for forces within the United States government," Fetzer concluded. "This trial appears to be yet one more illustration of Karl Rove's policy of 'creating our own reality' to serve the political goals of the administration, even when it comes at the cost of the lives and the security of the American people. The idea that Bush is 'the security president' is just a cruel joke!"

Documentary support for the conclusions reported here may be found at the Scholars for 9/11 Truth web site at www.st911.org.

For Further Information:

James H. Fetzer, Ph.D.
Founder and Co-Chair
Scholars for 9/11 Truth
(218) 726-7269 (office)
(218) 724-2706 (home)
(218) 726-7119 (fax)
http://www.st911.org

Philip J. Berg, Esq.
706 Ridge Pike
Lafayette Hill, PA 19444
(800) 993-7445 (office)
(610) 834-7659 (fax)
(610) 662-3005 [cell
http://www.911forthetruth.com

## # #

Trackback URI: http://www.prweb.com/dingpr.php/Q291cC1Db3VwLUluc2UtTWFnbi1IYWxmLVplcm8=

A later press release on the Scholars for 9/11 Truth site says that at least one member's children have been threatened, after which he resigned. These aren't just professors - one guy was the head of the Star Wars program under both Clinton and Bush, and there are several ex-military types on the list, too. I strongly encourage everyone to check out that link.

No one here gets out alive....

I want that on my headstone.
Either that, or "Is everybody in? The Ceremony is about to begin..."


Five to one, baby
One in five
No one here gets out alive, now
You get yours, baby
I'll get mine
Gonna make it, baby
If we try


Is Ken Lay really dead? I'm not buying it unless I take a DNA sample and run it myself.

I'm not feeling very inspired these days. True, I'm getting over food poisoning from a bad burger - serves me right for eating meat - but there's a general ennui that I can't shake. I haven't read the political blogs I normally haunt in months, not that anyone would miss me. Athana is working on a book, so she hasn't been around to bounce ideas around with. The news is all just so patently bad that I don't know where to begin. How many laws do ya have to break for it to add up to "high crimes and misdemeanors" anyway? I pretty sure that when Thomas Jefferson wrote that law, he was thinking more about illegally spying on the American people and other Civil Rights violations than blow jobs. (Franklin would have been thinking about blow jobs...and beer.)

I watched some of the talks from the YearlyKos conference on CSpan today, and that has me wondering why the hell we are wasting our time. The people with the connections don't get it; the people that get it don't have the connections. Our inherent diversity is working against us, and that's shameful. Progressives ought to know better...

The old get old
And the young get stronger
May take a week
And it may take longer
They got the guns
But we got the numbers
Gonna win, yeah
We're takin' over
Come on!

Progressives are still WAY too comfortable with sexists and sexism to make any real societal change. You may not win with us, guys, but you definitely can't win without us. Wake Up! If the Revolution's not inclusive, then it's not a revolution, it's just the same shit all over again. god is dead - Viva La Mama!

Your ballroom days are over, baby
Night is drawing near
Shadows of the evening crawl across the years
Ya walk across the floor with a flower in your hand
Trying to tell me no one understands
Trade in your hours for a handful dimes
Gonna' make it, baby, in our prime
What I wouldn't give to vote in a real election...

And to the MRA assholes who keep writing that I hate men, get a freakin' clue. I love men - it's patriarchy I hate. I know your two-dimensional brains can't process that, but seriously, if you're over 16 you should be able to hold more than two thoughts in your head at one time. Stretch a little. I'm not posting the hate you spew, so move on, you fascist twit.

Remember that episode of Seinfeld where Kramer got a student intern? That's what I need. I need an intern. I don't do anything, but I'd do it much better if I had some help. I know this because I used to have room mates that were really cool and they did what an intern would do. Unfortunately, my "staff" is in Ireland, having the time of her life and I'll be surprised if she comes back. At least somebody is having a good time. ;-P

I have a new project to tell y'all about, but I need to be in a positive frame of mind for that. It's hard to be positive with food poisoning. So, I'm throwing it out to you readers. What would you like me to write about? I'm taking requests.

(Hey, if I could make things up, I'd finish my book - Spalding Gray)

Lyrics by JIM - "get together, one more time..."

On the Fourth, Read the Declaration of Impeachment

By David Swanson AfterDowningStreet.org

Sunday 02 July 2006

Veterans for Peace has drafted a Declaration of Impeachment using nothing but excerpts from the Declaration of Independence (plus a few words in parentheses). It reads as follows, and should be read at picnics and protests on the Fourth of July:

"... whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

... all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations ... design(s) to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

... The history of the present King (George)... is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny ... To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has ... deprive(ed) us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury ... transport(ed) us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us ...

He is at this time transporting large Armies ... to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens ... to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
A (President) whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

We, therefore ... do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People ... solemnly publish and declare, That these ... Free and Independent (People) ... are Absolved from all Allegiance to the (Bush Administration), and that all political connection between them and (this Administration), is and ought to be totally dissolved ... And for the support of this Declaration ... we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor."

Note that the colonists didn't just write these words. They also fought and died for them.

Supporting our troops and working to ensure that they not have died in vain are notions that no longer apply to the soldiers who died in the fields around my house in Virginia. The statute of limitations has expired, and the 4,435 who died to rid America of a King George are now in fact required - as a matter of patriotic duty - to have died in vain.

• In vain their deaths to free us of a unitary executive.


• In vain their deaths to establish freedom of assembly.


• In vain their deaths to separate church and state.


• In vain their deaths to create freedom of speech.


• In vain their deaths in the cause of freedom from unreasonable search and seizure.


• In vain their blood spilled in rivers to establish the right to freedom from cruel and unusual punishment.


• In vain their ultimate sacrifices to create a representative democracy based on checks and balances.


• In vain the heartache of their families suffered in the name of an end to empire.

All in vain, all unsupported. Welcome to the world of free speech zones, detention without charge, no access to a court of law, no prohibition on torture. Welcome to the end of the veto and the birth of the signing statement. Welcome to an executive branch that neither obeys Congress nor so much as informs Congress of its actions. Welcome to wars of aggression for a theocratic plutocracy. Welcome back, King George.

King George is opposed by almost all Americans who identify themselves as democrats or Democrats. Only 9 percent of Democrats approve of his "handling the situation with Iraq," according to a CBS poll. The so-called Republican Party, on the other hand, is split. 71 percent of Republicans approve of the king's war, a number that is steadily declining. So, I have to say it annoys me a teeny little bit when the military industrial media complex calls the Democratic Party split and makes that alleged split the focus of reporting.

What they mean is that a little band of plutocratic leeches living in the swamps of the District of Columbia displays different tendencies from the citizenry. Within this inbred sect, Republicans are almost united and Democrats quite split on the question of whether to slaughter more Iraqis indefinitely. All the Republicans are for it, and half the Democrats are for it too. But half the Democrats have come over to the side of the American public to receive the scorn of the pundits and preachers of Objectivity.

What nobody is making note of, though, is that the anti-war Democrats in Congress can balance the scorn that the media bestows on them with the implicit gratitude of the soldiers of the War for Independence, the war in which we were opposing, not creating, a foreign occupation.

I fully expect, one day soon, to wake up to this headline: "Dems split on torturing grandmothers," followed by words to this effect: "Republicans forced a deeply divided and uncertain Democratic Party onto the defensive this week, bringing to a vote their long-planned GT bill. The Grandmother Torture Act of 2006 provides the President with the freedom he needs in handling the rising threat from seniors engaged in terrorist activities, said several Republican leaders. The defeat is expected to hurt the Democrats in November, Diebold executives reported.

Of course, on the question of building permanent military bases in Iraq, it is the Dems in Congress who are united and the Republicans in Congress who are very much split. But that story is not a story, so it doesn't really matter who's split or not split or anything else. Nor is historic justice being served the way it should. Every member of Congress working to create permanent bases in Iraq for unwanted and illegal foreign troops should have two dozen reenactors of the American Revolution occupy their office and live off their campaign funds while endlessly reciting the Declaration of Impeachment.

Happy Fourth!


David Swanson is creator of MeetWithCindy.org, co-founder of the AfterDowningStreet.org coalition, a writer and activist, and the Washington Director of Democrats.com. He is a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, and serves on the Executive Council of the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild, TNG-CWA. He has worked as a newspaper reporter and as a communications director, with jobs including Press Secretary for Dennis Kucinich's 2004 presidential campaign, Media Coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and three years as Communications Coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. Swanson obtained a Master's degree in philosophy from the University of Virginia in 1997. His website is www.davidswanson.org.

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I can't say it any better than that.

Have a happy 4th of July, and please share this with your family and friends.

Enough is enough.