Apparently after 9-11, the EPA wanted to tell New Yorkers lots of things about their environment. It seems that the 1600 Crew had different ideas...but lying about 9-11 was becoming a team sport with them ("We didn't know!" "Saddam did it, or at least was involved!" "We need the PATRIOT Act!"). The Crew banned the EPA from getting the word out about what residents of Manhattan needed to do to be safe, enviromentally speaking.

At the direction of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, the EPA's inspector general has revealed, the agency that's supposed to protect the public health against environmental hazards added "reassuring statements" to its press releases in the days after the terrorist attack, and deleted "cautionary ones."

The EPA wanted to tell residents to obtain "professional cleaning" - that is, environmentally safe cleaning - to remove from their homes tons of dust containing asbestos, dioxin, lead, pulverized plastics and steel and glass. The White House removed this from a press release.

The EPA wanted to caution about the health risks to "sensitive populations" - the elderly, kids, and those already suffering from respiratory problems. The White House said no.

You'll never get the truth, until it's too late and thems the facts, Jack!

Is the SCLM finally starting to waken at its periphery? Here's a column from the Chicago Trib (login: gorevidal/gorevidal) that actually raises the bullshit flag on the 1600 Crews policy in Iraq, and names names, Douglas Feith you recalcitrant neocon warmonger you, hanging with Manucher Ghorbanifar of Iran-Contra fame...

First, it is generally accepted (except by the war's avid authorities) that the reasons for invading Iraq were false. Second, the war party around the White House and the Pentagon are responding to their incredible failures of judgment not by modifying their policies in the Middle East, but by doing more and still more of the same.
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The joke around town is that the Bush zealots had all along been scheming to attack Iraq to get all the terrorists in the world to pour in there--to get them all in one place.

Meanwhile, the administration is unwilling to take actions that could ameliorate the situation--such as putting forth a UN resolution that would share the military and reconstruction burdens in Iraq. Part of the reason is their zealotry, carefully clothed in the fancy dress of "democratization"--and part of it is that neither they nor their friends or children are actually fighting or suffering in this war.
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Officials from the civilian Pentagon offices of Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, the man most responsible for the failures of reconstruction in Iraq, recently met surreptitiously with Manucher Ghorbanifar, the Iranian middleman in U.S. arms-for-hostage trades to Iran in the mid-1980s, in Europe. The reappearance of the discredited Iranian arms dealer clearly indicates how conspiratorial the Iraqi war is becoming.
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Perhaps the only hope lies in the story going around town that President Bush has told the Pentagon he wants "no more American dead" after next March. By then, the electoral campaign will be well under way, and perhaps zealotry will give way to reality--or at least to a change in administration.

From the local fish-wrapper, otherwise known as the Columbus Dispatch, this guy has some pretty fine sentiments...hope there are a few more like him in our "battleground" state, it might give Unka Karl the fits and shits he so richly deserves...

Ohio’s elected representatives have lost touch with their suffering constituents

Saturday, August 30, 2003

I received a letter from U.S. Rep. Bob Ney, R-St. Clairsville, on the day my wife of 49 years passed away. The letter pointed out his deserved recognition as a better-than-average representative of the people of his district and requested a donation for his re-election campaign.

There’s little I would like more than to be able to send a contribution to him, as I once did, and to consistently support charities and less-fortunate individuals.

Unfortunately, I cannot, thanks in part to the fact that those who are supposed to represent Ohioans in federal government have lost touch with reality.

Example 1: The $250 Ohio survivingspouse legal benefit was discontinued Jan. 1. Also, Social Security says there will be no death benefit for my wife’s survivors, as she supposedly didn’t earn enough, and her $167 monthly checks will end. Her family is being penalized because she chose to work with handicapped children, a low-paying job.

Example 2: The much-hyped federal "tax cut" is in reality a tax transfer from the wealthy and the corporations to the states and those less likely to donate to politicians — the old, the sick and the too-busy-trying-to-live-on-minimumwage-jobs.

One of the benefiting corporations closed me out four years short of retirement, at 31 percent of my earned retirement. Then it cut another $700 a year, or 18 percent, in 2002.

These kinds of legal theft and quiet cuts are more common than most people suspect. Think Enron.

I must have missed the news when our "gravely concerned" politicians insisted upon their pay being cut. Don’t hold your breath.

I am among the fortunate who are able to work, but there are seniors unable to work, and other working poor who now must pay the additional 1 percent Ohio sales tax out of their already-limited incomes. I’m sure they won’t mind adding more water to get five or six quarts out of a gallon of milk so the country can send billions more to try to buy foreign "friends."

My wife and I taught our children by word and deed to have a strong work ethic, obey the law and always vote. What a disservice we did them. I’m almost afraid to vote, not knowing which insurance or pharmaceutical company I’m voting for.

We should have taught them to be good liars; at least then they may have done as well as the average politician.

The only gold to be found in the golden years is the gold extracted from us.

WILLIAM BARNES

West Lafayette

It just can't get any more unbelievable. If the 1600 Crew spends any more pandering to the Religious Right wingnut-morons, they're going to move Fortress 1600 into the caves next to the Dead Sea and start wearing robes and sandals...

President Bush ordered the State Department on Friday to withhold U.S. family planning help from overseas groups that promote or perform abortions with their own money.

The decision expands an order issued two years ago that applied only to family planning money administered by the U.S. Agency for International Development, a division of the State Department.
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"At this time, the face of HIV/AIDS in Africa is a young woman, and family planning services are integral," said Terri Bartlett, vice president of Population Action International, a research-based advocacy group in Washington. "They are all reproductive health care services."

Said Gloria Feldt, president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund: "The world's poorest women and their children again are bearing the brunt of Bush's obsession with appeasing his domestic political base. This is the real face of Bush's compassionate conservatism."

My question is, if the UN heads into Iraq, will President Deserter-boy use it as an excuse to cut and run? After all, the UN needs funding and the CheneyBurton Corporation, with a little well-placed graft can, I am sure, keep their fat no-bid contracts, especially if they sub parts out French, German and Russian companies. I hope I'm not being too cynical here...

"Regarding the possible participation of international forces in Iraq under U.S. command, we don't see anything wrong with this," Putin told a news conference on the Italian island of Maddalena, near Sardinia.

"It is possible, but it would require a decision from the U.N. Security Council," he said.

Russia, along with two other heavyweight Security Council members Germany and France, opposed the U.S.-led war that toppled Saddam on April 9. The three countries now favour a larger role for the United Nations in Iraq.

Since Bush declared major combat over on May 1, U.S. troops have faced persistent and often deadly attacks and the U.S.-led administration in Baghdad has been plagued by sabotage to the country's protentially lucrative oil industry.

"This is the greatest crime ever against the Muslims in this holiest place," said Sheikh Ali Jabbar, a cleric at the Imam Ali mosque, as women dressed in black slapped their heads in grief.

The mosque contains the tomb of Ali, son-in-law and cousin of Prophet Mohammed, the founder of Islam.

Thousands of shoes lay around the mosque, left behind by worshippers and scattered in all directions by the bomb.

Ten years from now, what's this going to look like? Will there be another Wall in the Capitol Mall? Is Iraqi Oil or the lust for it going to be the seminal event that changes the way America is perceived in this century and perhaps beyond, especially as the arguments for invasion grow weaker by the day? Damn, it was a bad year for my crystal ball to break.

There are bad ideas, then there are really bad ideas, and here's one: allowing Microsoft to automatically update your computer if you are a Windows 2000 and beyond user (I guess). Little rich-guy Billy wants to be able to do that to stay on top of security "issues" like the recent worms unleashed on the us all.

Q. Have you considered enabling the Windows XP Firewall by default?

A. The fact is there has been a fire wall inside of Windows that would have blocked MSblast [the worm]. We're doing a better job of getting information out to people of how to turn that on and when they should turn that on. The idea that it would be on by default is something that we have to push the technology to make that work for people. It looks like we've got a solution to do that.

Q. Some people are concerned about the automatic distribution of patches because of the possibility of doing widespread damage.

A. These patches will be signed by us, and things that are put into the critical security path that we have to pass through we have to be very careful that there is no regression in those things. It's a channel that has to be used not for features, but just for very critical things. We have some other ideas such as something called behavior blocking that will obviate the need in many cases to use patches.

As to the "firewall" component of XP being turned on by default, thanks, but no thanks. Nothing like slowing the whole machine down by having their bloatware do stateful packet inspection, redraw your screen at the same time, and perform all of its other functions.

I am sure that like all other MS products that are "bundled", it will eventually cost $$$ to use it as soon as they get enough users "addicted" to it by giving it away, the tactic they used with NT workstation and NT server, both inferior products, but with great market penetration, because there were so many "pirated" versions installed from "evals" that folks could not afford to get rid of them once the evaluation expired.

FYI: we did a test of installing Win2003 server and Netware 6 on two identical Dell servers, with LSI raid cards, external RAID arrays using raid 1 + 0 (don't ask) and Broadcom Gigabit over Copper cards time to install (not including finding drivers if available/required):

Win2003 server: about 3 hours 45 minutes, including multiple reboots and F6's (hey, Microsoft when's that going away?) and it still does not support the tape drives for backup...no drivers are out there yet that have been "logo tested". So bad luck if your server crashes.

Netware 6: about 25 minutes to up and running from CD insertion/boot to being on the network. No reboots required and all the drivers were there/usable, we did one reboot after all the setup was done, to watch the NLM loads.

But CIO's the world over swear by Microsoft. I think that the Command Line Interface scares the shit out of them and always has. I also think that they all wanted to believe in Larry Ellison's "thin client/network computer" fantasy...which has never come to pass, and now they can't leave the Microsoft Server world without looking like fools...when a friends company transitioned from Netware to MS servers, they went from 20 to over 100 servers to do the same things...how is that reducing TCO?

Bill wins, security stinks and we are all poorer for it. Don't even get me started on how badly "Active Directory" sucks.

Hard to call them casualties of the 1600 Crew economy, but victims fits I think. The two folks profiled in this Washington Post story seem like a Joe and Jane Six-Pack kind of couple. The went west to Vegas looking for something more, and found less; much less. It seems that some of what happened to them was self-induced, but it's also hard to believe that a healthy economy would not have afforded them a better shot at self-sufficiency and a future.

"On the Internet, it's very deceiving. It makes it look like you can start working the day you arrive," Arreguin says, explaining the decision to come to Las Vegas. He says he has worked in construction for 24 years, that he did metal framing on just about every skyscraper in downtown Houston, and that contractors in Las Vegas couldn't have cared less. Every one of them said the same thing, he says, that without a driver's license, which he didn't have, and access to a reliable car, which he didn't have, they had no use for him.
...
...There were the three months in the Salvation Army shelter, and the walks along the Strip where they were told they could not be hired as waiters or busboys or janitors without an identity card from the Sheriff's Department ($35) and a health card showing they had been tested for communicable diseases ($35), money they didn't have.
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There is another view, of course. In Las Vegas, where the unemployment rate was down to 4.9 percent last fall, the current rate is 5.6. In Phoenix, where they stop the first night to change buses, the pre-recession unemployment rate was 2.7 percent; now it's up to 5.8. In Luna County, N.M., where they stop for a snack break, the rate is 24.1 percent. In El Paso, it has gone from 8.8 percent when they passed through on their way to Las Vegas to 10.1, and in Houston, now less than eight hours away, the rate has gone from 7.9 percent when they left to 9.3.

Bigger picture, it's a buyers market for employer with numbers like those cited in the story...again, it's with almost three years at the helm, the 1600 Crew can't lay the blame for this on the Clenis™ anymore. It's not going to work, people like Alex and Dixie are proof that all is not right with the world and all the wishing and hoping of Rangers and Pioneers will not make it so...I hope that Alex and Dixie and those like them register to vote and vote against the 1600 Crew next year...it would be a move in the right direction for them. At least in my humble opinion.

The reaction of the "top brass"? To be expected. It's never a problem in the military until it (a) hits the media or (b) a congressman shows up. Every branch of the service actually trains people for event (a) and prays to never have event (b) occur at a unit level...they prefer to handle "congressionals" at their liason offices in DC (John McCain did that just before entering politics).

So the rapes were reported, I blogged a bit about this last February when it started coming out, before there were wholesale command "changes", and commitees appointed to look into the "allegations". Yeah, OK.

My opinion, FWIW, the problem with a lot of this is purely cultural. I am not a Service Academy graduate, but I can share a truism we used to use: four years into the fleet, and you couldn't tell an Annapolis guy from an AOC (Aviation Office Candidate, remember "Officer and a Gentleman"?)...anyhow, the "performance" issues aside, what's the big difference? Attitude. Almost to a man, the Naval Academy grads I knew were "taught" how to "game the system". Their "honor code" was a convenient tool for punishment of the "unworthy" or "dissenting" square peg, and after graduation, many openly bragged about "going over the wall" into town for a little extra liberty.'

Thus it came as no huge surprise to me when they had the scandals at the Naval Academy in the early to mid-90s, and a Very Most Senior Officer, an officer I had known from the fleet, was ummmm "involved" for sort of looking the other way while various acts of inappropriate behaviour were on-going. He was a guy who was definately in the Ring-Knockers Protective Association. He also once gave a litle spiel at an all-pilots meeting about how what happened on the other side of the International Dateline stayed there...oh, and he was married and had kids. I can pretty much swear to the Hairy Thunderer that he was about the first one out the gate and over Shit River when the Liberty Call sounded in the Philippines and other ports, and it wasn't the Christian Science Reading Room he was headed for. The thing was he saw nothing wrong with this behaviour, and was only worried about it affecting his marriage, not the obvious moral questions it raised.

So the youngsters at the various Academies who lead pretty sheltered, disciplined lives see these folks, and make bad decisions...really bad decisions. Then, they are afforded protection first from their peers in the form of 'honor councils' (of which I understand the Air Force Academy has the worst i.e. the most likely to be partial and biased against a "defendant"), more protection of the institution comes from the officers directly supervising the cadets; they don't want any trouble, they just want to do their tour and get back to the "fleet" as it were, and then the more senior officers don't want the "honor" of their Academy "stained". Well I got news for them, clorox ain't getting this stain out. Ever.

If this scandal were to shut down the Air Force Academy, I don't honestly think it would hurt that particular branch of the service. I think that their ROTC and OCS system could easily pick up the slack. They clearly can't deal with this, and have been and still are in denial about it.

We always used to joke about the Air Force, now I'm not so sure that some of that humor was so off track...there are lots and lots of great folks in the Air Force, but I wonder how well they are being served by their bosses. Obviously there must be an informal course on CYA being taught at the USAFA, and all these folks are honor graduates.

For the record, I am an NROTC grad. No service academy time at all...except I got a flight physical at the Naval Academy once, since they had a real flight surgeon.

There is not a doubt in my military mind that this adminstration makes the lying-bastard Nixon boys look like rank amateurs...no doubt at all. Hell, half the administration seems to be carry-over party hacks from the days of Tricky Dicky; just elevated to newer better postion. Via Atrios we learn (and I'm sure that everyone has been there already) that an analysis of the Walking Battery's actions and responses to Congress have led to responses that are to be tactful, less than truthful....written by John Dean, one of the principal Nixon Water Carriers who saw the light after a little felony conviction action...post-Watergate.

So what did the Duracell with Legs lie about? Well, everything seemingly, at least related to his Energy Tasl Force documents.

hen this August's Report was issued. It was not the thorough, comprehensive Report GAO wanted it to be. (Indeed, GAO's Comptroller General has stressed that "the Vice President's persistent denial of access to" records "precluded GAO from fully achieving our objectives and substantially limited our analysis.") But it is enough to shock, and disturb, the reader.

The Report shows that Cheney's claim to Congress, in the August 2, 2001 letter, that responsive documents were provided to GAO, was plainly false.

According to the Report, Cheney provided GAO with 77 pages of "documents retrieved from the files of the Office of the Vice President responsive to" GAO's inquiry regarding the Energy Task Force's "receipt, disbursement, and use of public funds."

To any lawyer, a mere 77-page document production seems suspiciously slim - especially when it is meant to represent information from a group of people on a fairly broad topic. Surely there were more documents that were not turned over.

Moreover, it turned out, as the Report reveals, that the documents that were turned over were useless: "The materials were virtually impossible to analyze, as they consisted, for example, of pages with dollar amounts but no indication of the nature or purpose of the expenditure." They were further described as "predominantly reimbursement requests, assorted telephone bills and random items, such as the executive director's credit card receipt for pizza."

In sum, the incomplete document production was not only nonresponsive - it was insulting. So the GAO pressed for responsive documents numerous times in different ways: letters, telephone exchanges and meetings.

Perhaps the most pointed of these was a July 18, 2001 letter from the Comptroller to the Vice President. It noted that GAO had "been given 77 pages of miscellaneous records purporting to relate to these direct and indirect costs. Because the relevance of these records is unclear, we continue to request all records responsive to our request, including any records that clarify the nature and purpose of the costs." (Emphasis added.)
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Despite receiving this letter, Cheney still claimed to Congress, a few weeks later, on August 2, that responsive documents had been produced.
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Nor can there be any question that Cheney knows what it means to produce responsive documents - and not to do so. In the same paragraph of the August 2 letter in which he claims he was responsive to the Energy Task Force request, he makes a lesser claim with respect to another GAO request - stating that there, he had merely "provided substantial responses." (Emphasis added.)

Plainly, Cheney knows the difference between being responsive; offering a substantial response; and sending insulting non-responsive materials, featuring unexplained phone bills, columns of unidentified figures, and a pizza receipt.

Thus, Cheney's claim to have produced responsive documents was a false statement and, all evidence suggests, an intentional one. That means it is also a criminal offense - a false statement to Congress. (In a previous column, I discussed the false statements statute and its application.)

If there were ever a reason for two-party control of government, this is it. No one will ever investigate this, certainly not any republican congresscritters, and the press as usual, is asleep at the switch. I guess they must be having a blow-dryer sale, or mousse is on special down to the MegaMart or something. Wouldn't want to risk those nicknames or an invitiation to the B-B-Q dinner.

The 1600 Crew mantra for the new century:

via commentor Lurch, here's a little "memory hole" excerpt of an interview with Seymour Hersh...you know, real journalist, Pulitzer Prize winner, guy who broke the My Lai Massacre story (sorry about that Colin).

SY HERSH: They're whacking everybody they can whack that looks like a bad guy.

JANE WALLACE: And suddenly they're told to back off--

SY HERSH: From a certain area--

JANE WALLACE: -- and let planes fly out to Pakistan.

SY HERSH: There was about a three or four nights in which I can tell you maybe six, eight, 10, maybe 12 more-- or more heavily weighted-- Pakistani military planes flew out with an estimated-- no less than 2,500 maybe 3,000, maybe mmore. I've heard as many as four or 5,000. They were not only-- Al Qaeda but they were also-- you see the Pakistani ISI was-- the military advised us to the Taliban and Al Qaeda. There were dozens of senior Pakistani military officers including two generals who flew out.

And I also learned after I wrote this story that maybe even some of Bin Laden's immediate family were flown out on the those evacuations. We allowed them to evacuate. We had an evacuation.

JANE WALLACE: How high up was that evacuation authorized?

SY HERSH: I am here to tell you it was authorized — Donald Rumsfeld who — we'll talk about what he said later — it had to be authorized at the White House. But certainly at the Secretary of Defense level.

JANE WALLACE: The Department of Defense said to us that they were not involved and that they don't have any knowledge of that operation.

SY HERSH: That's what Rumsfeld said when they asked him but it. And he said, "Gee, really?" He said, "News to me.

Yeah, "no evacuations" my butt...those flights were reported even on the "friendly" media, because aircraft going out of Kabul was not a normal event. Strange how the reports got "shut off" after about 24 hours.

More 1600 Crew loyalty...but not to Americans, unless they can pony up the big bucks, or have the correct pedigree...

Well, not really. But this little gem that passed GEN Sanchez's lips has to be for the purpose of ensuring that post-retirement large dollar defense contractor "job" consulting or some such. Sanchez is the biggest flag-rank 1600 Crew apologist/cheerleader in the theatre.

The commander of U.S. forces in Iraq said Thursday there was no need for more U.S. troops in the country and blamed continuing violence on insufficient intelligence and lack of cooperation from the Iraqi people.
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"Putting more soldiers on the ground is not going to solve the problem if I don't have the intelligence to act on," Sanchez said at a news conference.

Sanchez said casualty figures since the end of major fighting in Iraq -- declared by President Bush on May 1 -- were "about what we would expect to get in this kind of conflict." Since May 1, 143 U.S. soldiers have died -- five more than during the war itself.

Way down south in Dixie, some one needs to shove some tall cotton up some rednecks backside...seems that all the good christo-fascist folks are not in Montgomery worshiping the Judge Roy Moore Graven Image™ which has seemingly been carted away in the same ignominy as the ashes of executed Nazi war criminals...no their brethren are out there shooting at and burning Mosques. Brave folk that they are, they even leave anonymous notes...

The pungent smell of charred wood permeated the small white tent where a group of Muslims gathered for evening prayers this week.

As members prayed, they faced the burned-out remains of a two-bedroom gray brick house that had served for almost a year as a temporary Islamic Center for about 100 coastal families. The house was torched before dawn Sunday, investigators say.
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Al-Farooq Masjid, one of the largest Islamic centers in metro Atlanta, posted a notice of the arson on its Web site and has begun a campaign to raise money to help restore the Savannah center. Christian and Jewish groups in Savannah also have offered to help build a new mosque.
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"With the [U.S. military] casualties in Iraq mounting, [Islamic groups in the United States] fear that Muslims all over the U.S. will face similar challenges," a note on the Web site says. (emphasis added)
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Among treasures destroyed in the fire were a rare 200-year-old, handwritten copy of the Quran that was donated to the center along with other old and valuable copies of the Islamic holy book.

Ahmed said the fire followed two disturbing incidents. At a monthly board meeting Aug. 3, Ahmed said, board members found five bullet holes in the garage door.

"We first noticed the bullet holes in the walls at the back of the garage and discovered the bullets had been fired through the garage door," he said. "This is where the women and children always held their services."

On Aug. 18, someone broke into the apartment of Mohammed Hafez, a graduate student at Georgia Tech's Savannah campus, while he was at pre-dawn prayers at the center. Hafez, 26, moved to Savannah in January from Egypt to pursue a doctoral degree in engineering. His laptop computer, his cellphone and a small amount of money were taken; the intruders left behind a swastika-emblazoned threatening note, he said. "It said, 'We want you Muslims' life. Get out of Savannah. We are watching you 24-7,' " Hafez said. Police and the FBI were notified of both incidents.

Don't look for speedy work from the Asscrack crew, they're still looking for porno-distributing bong sellers. Tough work, but somebody on the federal payroll has to do it for Johnny; otherwise real criminals might get caught. Besides, they are still trying to determine if this might be a "hate crime".

Quack. Hark! I hear a gekko.....

Knowing that any conflict with the North K's would be a high-order disaster, the 1600 Crew has studiously avoided any conflict. Sure, Chickenhawk DoD court jester John "stop the recount" Bolton has talked tough, but everyone just patted him on the head and sent him away. Just like you do to that annoying kid at a big family dinner...

So, tough cowboy rhetoric, a political-appointee 1600 Crew moron in charge of policy and what's the yield?

That may be the operative question...seems the North K's want to find out too. They are formally announcing their "nuclear" status, and planning operational tests of their weapons. Hmmmm, hey Auntie Donnie, guess they have more than "one or two", eh?

North Korea startled a six-nation conference on East Asian security by announcing its intentions to formally declare its possession of nuclear weapons and to carry out a nuclear test, a Bush administration official said Thursday.
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James Kelly, the chief U.S. delegate, demanded that North Korea engage in the verifiable and permanent dismantling of its nuclear weapons programs, in return for which the United States would provide security guarantees and economic benefits.
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Tensions and hostilities have been escalating since October, when Pyongyang acknowledged — to Kelly himself — that it had restarted a nuclear program it supposedly shut down. The United States has demanded that North Korea stop the program immediately, while the impoverished North has refused to budge without guarantees of security and economic aid.

If the North K's are now resorting to nuclear blackmail to get economic aid, what's the next step an invasion of the South?

Wait, I have it...let's see if Pyongyang will pledge peacekeepers for Iraq in return for oil and food...gee, I'll bet they bite before say, the French.

My kingdom and/or a hundred bucks or some free flying lessons in trade for anyone around central OH! IO! who can teach me the fundamentals of Mac Gimp. I am starting to feel pretty computer-illiterate...geez, I can fly a plane, keep all our routers and switches humming along, fix any version of Netware from 2.15 on, and this stupid program is giving me fits.

Yes, I have the "Gimp for Linux Bible" and "Grokking the Gimp". I'm still annoyed.

Grrrrrr. I feel like such an .... end-user.

Jessica Lynch, y'all remember her right? Well the Army has seen fit to seperate her from Active Duty, effective today or whenever she finishes her terminal leave, if any. Guess that she must have been a 2x6 (two years active, 6 years reserve), or they let her out to pursue "other" things. Last I heard, she wanted to hang with her sweetie, and go to college, which any book deal might help...no student loan debt for her.

Goodwin said Lynch had not signed a book deal with anyone as of today, although Pulitzer Prize-winning author and former New York Times reporter Rick Bragg has been a guest at the Lynch home to do research. The Times has reported Bragg will be paid $1 million to tell Lynch's story.

Now, will someone tell me what's up with the other "survivors" of the same incident, like Shoshana Johnson? Is she out too? Is she getting lots of attention too. No? Guess the SCLM just doesn't find a young African-American Female soldier to be quite the story...

Had to rent the TT today and see it again, so the blogging is a bit sparse. Sorry about that. Still annoyed that Peter Jackson messed with the storyline by adding romantic interludes and the whole Faramir-tries-to-take-the-Ring thing...always thought that Faramir's character in the book was pretty good, because he didn't behave like his brother. Oh well.

Looking forward to the RoTK. Not buying the TT until the "extended" DVD comes out, don't need two copies. Fool me once, etc....

So the question, "why have Kenny-boy and Co. not been prosecuted?" is right up there in American Political Discourse...and we have all been wondering, wondering, wondering. Now, heeeeeere's the answer....

"Retroactive legislation moving rapidly through Congress would make it easier for corporate wrongdoers to escape responsibility for defrauding investors, harming the environment and otherwise maximizing profits at the expense of the health and financial well-being of ordinary citizens," says Nan Aron, president of Alliance For Justice, a nonprofit corporation based in Washington, DC. "In the wake of the worst corporate scandals in fifty years, rather than acting to deter wrongdoing, Congress is poised to encourage more white collar misconduct with passage of a so-called class action reform bill which actually retroactively helps several of our most notorious corporate miscreants escape accountability."

President Bush Wants Senate to Debate the Retroactive House Bill Which Lets Ken Lay Off Hook and Usurps Federal Judicial Discretion
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How would the House provisions let Ken Lay and other white collar wrongdoers off the hook? HR 1115 retroactively applies all of its provisions to all current class actions pending in federal court in which the plaintiff class has not yet been certified, granting current defendants strong new powers to postpone financial liability for years and, perhaps, escape it entirely. (The Senate bill also strongly favors defendants, but would only apply to future cases.)

If this passes, there needs to be a lot said about this in congressional elections next year. There seems to be an expectation of some sort of "justice" for the Energy Thieves so well-beloved by the 1600 Crew, and this pretty much seems to put a nail in the coffin of any real, meaningful justice goiing forward...keep the article handy and use it against your congresscritter if they supported it, especially the way energy prices and all seem to be increasing.

So the Deserter went off to go fund-raising and happened to stop by the American Legion convention in St. Louis, where he whored for donations with this sentiment:

President Bush defended his policy on Iraq today, declaring that the United States had struck a blow against terrorism in overthrowing the government of Saddam Hussein. And Mr. Bush said the United States might carry out other pre-emptive strikes.

``Having fought under the American flag and seen it folded and given to families of your friends, you are committed, as am I, to protecting the dignity of the flag and the Constitution of the United States,'' he said, to loud cheers.

Of course, as in the Iraq debacle, no member of the Chimp Clan is in uniform, and in any future "pre-emptive" strike, I doubt we'd find too many drawing weapons and paychecks from the DoD, except as consultants...and then it would be limited to the paychecks part. Bush 1 and his daddy were aberrations I guess, all the rest have yellow streaks as wide as Constitution Avenue running down their backs...

Indeed.

In a Beobachter WaPo OP-ED today Senator Robert Byrd of WV has lots of observations for the 1600 Crew, and a quote that is well, ironic.

Candidate George W. Bush spoke about the need for humility from a great and powerful nation. He said, "Let us reject the blinders of isolationism, just as we refuse the crown of empire. Let us not dominate others with our power -- or betray them with our indifference. And let us have an American foreign policy that reflects American character. The modesty of true strength. The humility of real greatness."

How PNAC. They live, others die.

The resurgent Taliban and Islamist movement in Afghanistan should come as no surprise to anyone who has been semi-conscious, not on vacation, and keeping half and eye on on Afghanistan and Pakistan. The situation there has never been under control, the 1600 Crew has shamefully neglected the puppet government it installed, the US Forces it left there, and has forgone any semblance of caring about bringing the country forward from the 12th Century conditions it found after the insta-conquest in 2001.

The Taliban has not forgotten its country, and it wants it back. Knowing that the attention of the 1600 Crew is focused on finding a producing oil patch for President Dry-Hole, it has been quietly reconstituting itself, and seems to be in no hurry...kinda like the North Vietnamese, and there's a scary parallel.

Progress in science and technology has a direct impact on battlefields, where missile technology, supreme aircraft, nuclear bombs, chemical weapons and the like have changed the dynamics of fighting over the years.

However, despite such advancements in technology, the human element, notably inspiration, remains a decisive force in any struggle. The Taliban, perhaps, realized this a long time ago, and in their period in power in Afghanistan from 1996-2001 they placed much emphasis on generating the human resources that would be committed to their cause.
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But the left curve from the heart of Chaman takes one to a different world, the world of dozens of tiny villages along the border, which, according to one Akram of the Edhi Welfare Trust Center in Chaman, are too numerous to be counted. Edhi is one of Pakistan's largest non-government organizations.
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Says Akram, "My experiences with the Edhi Center in Chaman have been very bad. It is a completely mullah-dominated society. If you live in Karachi [from where Akram hails] you know that people trust our [Edhi] services all over Pakistan, we give most of the donations we receive to our trust. Here, our experience is different. You will know that fitrana for example, [a fee that all Muslims pay to a needy person before saying their Eid, a major Muslim festival, prayers] comes to 300 rupees [US$5]. Similarly, the number of sacrificial animal skins - cows or goats - comes to seven. Here in Chaman, even these seven skins and the 300 rupees are donated by army officers posted in Chaman, not by the local people. And then these entire donations go to the Islamic seminaries. Here the people say that their lives and deaths are with the mullahs, not with you people."
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The Taliban and their supporting parties in Pakistan have invested everything in this region. At the time that the Taliban faced the crunch in Afghanistan (driven out of power in late 2001 and on the run thereafter) their madrassas around Chaman remained well guarded against ideological impurity and outside influences. This investment has paid off, as now the seminaries that dot both sides of the border provide the best fodder for the resistance movement.
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One can only believe that the Taliban foresaw this development. Maybe not. In any case, the seminaries that now flourish around Chaman have more than adequately filled the void of their city counterparts.

And, crucially, they have in their advantage, because of their history and their remote location, that they are well beyond the writ of either the Pakistani or the Afghan governments. They will thus continue to serve as feeders for the Taliban in Afghanistan for a long time to come.

Allegations are running rampant across the internet and blogtopia in particular that Chimpy's butt-boy Karl Rove was very directly involved in the Joseph Wilson/Valerie Plame affair.

Like everyone else, I am following the story with great interest, since it's sort of like Watergate's Ehrlichman/Haldemann connection to Nixon, same level and access and all...I do have a piece of advice for Unka Karl, if you have to go to the bad place that Colson/Magruder and the rest went, remember to ask for clothing with vertical stripes because, well those horizontal stripes will make you look a little chubby.

Just a fashion thought...FWIW.

The governor of Alabama is trying to raise some revenue for his state by raising taxes, which you know, makes a little sense to pay for stuff like traffic lights and education and police and firefighters. Minor requirements of life in the universe as we know it.

I have a suggestion, why not put Judge "Pet Rock" Moore on un-paid leave? I'm sure that the savings might buy some school supplies for some school district somewhere in Alabama, and it would be well, fair. After all, I'm pretty sure that the Hairy Thunderer will be happy to pony up for the good Justice's utilities, mortgage, car loans, grocery billl and such right after he's done settling the conflicts in Israel, Northern Ireland, Bosnia, and other places where there is religiously inspired violence. Until then, Judge Pet Rock can talk about himself, a favorite topic:

In a speech in front of the monument last week he mentioned God 12 times and himself 21 times. And now he's been suspended from the Supreme Court, the real question is: anyone want to bet against Roy Moore running for governor of Alabama in the not-too-distant future?

Oh, and how does a two-and-a-half ton stone tablet with the 10 Commandments not count as a Graven Image?

Didja know that President "Didja See that Drive?" has really bad re-elect numbers. That's wonderful. Here's another number, but it's kind of sad and frightening at the same time.

This is Bush's 26th trip to Crawford as president. In 949 days in office, he has spent 166 days at the ranch or on the way there.

Apologies to Firesign Theatre, big time...but yet another one from the TV Newspaper...could not find the link, but it's on page 6A of the Print Edition.

Sad but true, the soldiers in Iraq are getting the short end of the stick again, seems that they can't get enough US-made weapons. Can they all come home now, Auntie Donnie? Not so fast...

US troops in a armor battalion around Baquoba are using captured Kalashinkov AK-47 assault rifles because the soldiers there are short of American-made rifles. The shortage arises from the nature of the fighting. A four-person tank crew is issued two M-4 assault rifles and four 9mm pistols.
...
They are hunting insurgents on foot and in small vehicles, so everyone must have a rifle.
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AK-47s, developed by the Russians, are the preferred weapon of many troops around the world, because they are light, durable and powerful, and they jam infrequently.

Lt. Col. Mark Young, commander of the 3rd Battalion, 67th Armor Regiment of the 4th Infantry Division, says soldiers must demonstrate proficiency with the AK-47 before being allowed to carry one.

Still amazed at the putzes in the Pentagram. Daily.

Yet another gem from the free USA Today, seems that the Army is considering extending overseas tours for soldiers in fun places like Iraq and Afghanistan (and South Korea, which is certainly not as dangerous as the other two...yet) because of well, a manpower shortage. Interesting.

For the first time since the all-volunteer Army began in 1973, significant numbers of U.S. combat soldiers may have to start serving back-to-back overseas tours of up to a year each in places such as Iraq, Afghanistan and South Korea, top Army officers say.

Grappling with large, simultaneous deployments around the world, Army planners are trying to determine how many troops will have to serve extra tours.
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Army officials are worried that the added tours will lower morale and cause a wave of exits throughout the Army. A key concern is that the deployments will cause an exodus of experienced, mid-career veterans such as sergeants, staff sergeants and captains, who are harder to replace than younger soldiers.

If we start seeing these kinds of things happen, how long before someone starts talking about conscription to fill out the ranks, especially if the retention rates start to go through the floor in the next 18 to 24 months. The problem of replacing officers that split is somewhat trickier...you can't draft officers, and I doubt that after all these years of having a college-educated officer-corps, the Pentagram Biggies will be thrilled to go back to promoting mid-level NCOs into their midst. Just a thought.

One of my favorite quotes (and this is from memory, so forgive me) from President Never-did-his-Multiplication-Tables was when he said that "tens and tens of Iraqi citizens" were coming up to our soldiers to thank them for being there...yeah, the other like 24,683,213 (from the CIA Factbook minus Chimpy's 100) are probably wishing we'd get the F*** out of Dodge.

Tens and Tens...what a moron.

One of the little gems of travel is that USA Today that shows up outside your door at "finer" hotels (and after this weekend I use that term loosely). It provides minutes of entertainment flipping through the pages to find graphics for kindergarteners and stories for those whose attention is about that of my mutt.

Well you know that republican congresscritter who had the little traffic accident in South Dakota? Bill Janklow, or William to his friends, did have a little fender-bender that cost the life of a motorcyclist:

An accident report estimated that Rep. Bill Janklow was driving 70 mph to 75 mph on a 55-mph county road when he blew a stop sign and struck a motorcycle, killing the biker.

The report increases the possibility of criminal charges against the congressman and former four-term governor, who has exerted enormous political power over South Dakota politics for nearly 30 years.

The price of inmate-built homes sold to low-income families will rise in October, the South Dakota Housing Development Authority said. The authority's board voted to increase the price of the 960-square-foot Governor's House to $28,000, up from $25,500. A larger version of the house designed for use as a day-care center will rise from $28,750 to $31,500. Prison inmate crews have built the homes since former governor Bill Janklow started the program in 1996.

Back from worm-hunting...found one blaster worm that was broadcasting to the universe, killed it deader than dead, imagine a user with no virus protection running on their workstation (took it off, made it too "slow" grrrrrr)...thanks for being patient...

More bloggy goodness coming, stay tuned and welcome to all my visitors from BartCop Nation!

See ya in a few!

Light Blogifying today, on the road hunting for worms at a remote office. No luck catching any yet (thank goodness). Hope to get on-line tonight and blog a bit, Chimpy's "Press Availability" yesterday ought to be good for some fun. (Can people and fish really get along?)

Later.....

If the 1600 Crew tried any more overreaching, they might as well just start becoming like that character in the Fantastic Four comic, you know the one who could stretch and bend any which way...the new and improved Patriot Act II, AKA the "Victory Act", which I suspect has as much to do with Victory as "Clean Skies" does with clean air, and "Healthy Forests" does with actual, growing green things is on its way to the Senate Judiciary Committee if Orrin Hatch can help it.

The alleged "Victory Act" seems to be all about melding the oh-so-successful "War on Drugs" with the War on Terra™, and we know how successful the War on Drugs has been. If that merger takes place, let's just save us all some time and tax money and hand the keys to the country over to Osama and his ilk now.

Here are some of the proposals being backed by Orrin Hatch (R-Loves Leather):

• Allow the FBI to get a wiretap order on a wireless device, such as a cell phone, from any district court in the country
  
• Force defendants who are trying to exclude illegal wiretap evidence to prove police intentionally broke the rules
  
• Further restrict judges' sentencing discretion in drug cases
  
• Ease restrictions on government access to sensitive financial records
  
• Increase penalties for selling drugs to people under the age of 21
  
• Make it easier for the government to seize or freeze assets of people accused of money laundering
  
• Remove gradations of sentencing for those convicted of selling amphetamines so that anyone convicted of possessing more than 250 meth pills would automatically go to jail for 200 years
  
• Increase the ability of the FBI to self-issue subpoenas for terrorism investigations without having to consult a judge

And what makes them think that someone knowing they are goiing to face 200 mandatory years (where the fuck did that come from?) is going to go peacefully? Not to mention, all the draconian laws on the books have not stopped the use of other illegal substances...let's choose Crack and Pot, if the laws worked, then both would be but a really bad memory...but I don't see that.

As for all the changes to sentencing guidelines, let's just skip all the expensive and boring judicial stuff and go straight to the stocks and pillory...hell, there's even an football stadium in Kabul that might be available for some events.

Why not just take down that statue with the ridiculous drape and put up what Asscrack really wants; statues of Lavrenti Beria and Heinrich Himmler, with a portrait of Reinhardt Heydrich between both statues.

Seig Heil, Baby - Lorenzo St. Dubois

Nothing gets by our friends at Faux News, here's a lead headline (I'm sure the author will get a tongue-lashing, it's off-message for Faux)

U.S. Military: Terrorism No. 1 Threat in Iraq

Terrorism is the biggest threat to Iraqis and coalition forces working to rebuild the country, particularly in regions where support for deposed leader Saddam Hussein was the strongest, U.S. military officials said Thursday.
...
"It's clearly a problem for us because of the sophistication of the attacks and because of their tactics to go after Iraqis," Gen. John Abizaid, who is in charge of U.S. Central Command, said during a Pentagon briefing.
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"They are clearly a problem for us because of the sophistication of their attacks and because of what I would call their tactics to go after Iraqis," he said.

"Clearly, they're going after Iraqis that are cooperating with us. They're going after soft targets of the international community. They're still seeking to inflict casualties upon the United States."

This must be the guerilla war that Auntie Donnie said didn't exist and would not happen. How long before the radical Islamists move the fight from Iraq, all because of the PNAC pipedreams...and we are all sorrier than sorry for their "leadership"?

Well someone had to be making a buck from the little conflict over in the desert, right? Well someone is, and here's the list. Now I would never be one to be cynical or anything, but does is seem strange to see this:

Citing security concerns and time constraints, they hand picked the companies that would be allowed to bid for the contracts (American firms only, thank you), and in some cases they awarded colossal sums with no bidding at all.

USAID, whose mission is to further "America’s foreign policy interests in expanding democracy and free markets while improving the lives of the citizens of the developing world," invited 21 firms to bid on eight contracts worth $1.7 billion. Many of the contract details have not been revealed to American taxpayers or the Iraqi people

KELLOGG BROWN AND ROOT (KBR) (A HALLIBURTON SUBSIDIARY)

KBR is the engineering and construction wing of the Houston, Texas-based petroleum and gas service firm; Halliburton is publicly traded on NYSE (HAL).

Amount: Unlimited

For: Repair of Petroleum Infrastructure (putting out oil fires, contingency planning)

The contract to extinguish and repair the oil infrastructure of Iraq is the true gem of the reconstruction spoils. For starters it is a "cost plus" contract in which the government pays the total cost of work done, plus a profit. The Army Corps of Engineers predicts the total value will amount to $7 billion over two years with KBR taking 7% (about $490 million) as profit. The contract also gives KBR the right to produce and sell oil inside the country of Iraq. Remarkably, this was a closed-door handout granted to KBR without bidding.

And then, of course, there is Dick Cheney's Halliburton, profiting in the millions from the oil in Iraq. Halliburton subsidiary, Brown & Root, is also in Iraq. Their stock in trade is the building of permanent military bases. Here is your permanent military presence in Iraq, and all for an incredible fee. Cheney still draws a one million dollar annual check from Halliburton, what they call a 'deferred retirement benefit.' In Boston, we call that a paycheck.

They always used to say...don't drink the water. I remember going to the Subcontinent, and being told exactly that. So, absent being able to get bottled water that looked like it had not been bottled in the backyard of the seller, I drank one of those popular cola beverages...some reason to trust the quality, right? Maybe yes, Maybe no.

The government today said Coca-Cola and Pepsi brands contained pesticides well within limits set for packaged drinking water in India, in the absence of separate norms for aerated beverages.

The government has, however, decided to constitute a joint parliamentary committee to probe contamination in colas.

Earlier this month, the Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) had reported pesticide levels in 12 soft drink brands at 11-70 times higher than the limits set by the European Union (EU).

After Auntie Donnie took his Traveling Roadshow and Big Mouth throughout the continent scorning the Europeans, after President Geographically Impaired said "allies? we don't need no stinkin' allies", called the UN "irrelevant" and headed off to kill other people's children in Iraq (ours and theirs) for no good reason, they want help in Iraq. I want some of what they're smoking delivered to me, I'll be in a light silver '68 El Camino in the local Mega-Burger parking lot just after midnight tonight when I get off work...I could use some cheering up.

About 140,000 U.S. troops are in Iraq, with more than 20,000 forces from other countries, mostly Britain.
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Annan said the United Nations didn't intend to send U.N. "blue helmets," or peacekeepers.

The United States has brushed aside earlier discussions to assemble a U.N.-led coalition force in Iraq.
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Annan offered the idea of "a multinational force that oversees the security arrangements with the U.N., focusing on the economic, political and social areas where we do our best work, including the humanitarian aid."

Make no mistake, it's Petrodollars not Patriotism driving these little "foreign entanglements". Count on it.

via Hesiod, who links...well not to me. [sniff] This is truly funny and I can't wait until Sunday.

Seems that Fat Tony and Sleepy could not find sufficient reason to let that "judge" in Alabama keep his pet rock with the 10 Commandments inscribed on them outside his office. Again, I have to wonder, what's the deal? Could the good judge not find a place in his front yard for the stone bearing the 10 Commandments? Why is he interupting public life and discourse to broadcast his view of the universe to everyone? I'm happy he loves religion, but why do I want to care?

Supporters of Chief Justice Roy Moore have been handcuffed and led away from the