Thursday, June 30, 2005

Frist Being Investigated About Schiavo Diagnosis

That's what you get for making assumptions about a person's medical status without ever evaluating them. He is a doctor and a politician. He used that poor woman for politcal gain.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Letter_Frist_Schiavo_diagnosis_being_reviewed_in_Te_0630.html

42% Of Americans In Favor Of Impeachment If Bush Misled

Obama Commencement Speech

It was moving just reading it. Imagine being there, listening to him.

http://www.alternet.org/story/23240/

Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Pentagon Claims They Don't Torture Prisoners

They give them ice cream and candy to get information out of them!!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050629/pl_afp/usattacksguantanamo_050629211707

Mother Locks 5 Year Olds In Trunk Of Car

I cannot believe this woman was not arrested. When these kids turn up dead, it will be the police officers fault.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBRD0XDKAE.html

Woman Cancels Wedding, Uses Money For Party For The Homeless

Former Iran Hostages Believe President Elect Is One Of Their Captors

It wouldn't surprise me. Between bad and worse, Iranians picked worse.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGB7FFV7KAE.html

Republican Calls His Constituants "Idiots"

It doesn't matter who he sent the email to...he still called them idiots.

http://www.wftv.com/news/4665036/detail.html

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Terrorists Hoped For Bush Re-election

Aljazeera Reports US Businessman Making Money From Looted Iraqi Artifacts

Mosque Fires Bin Laden Supporting Leader

I'm glad the good Muslims of the world are taking a stand

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGB2GTU0JAE.html

Reagan Voted Greatest American Of All Time

I can see it. But Oprah? She is so annoying, thinking that she is the guru of everything and gets peeved when others don't cater to her. I don't agree with her being on the list. And OMG, George W. Bush? With his low approval ratings? Apparently, his supporters can't get their heads out of the sand. And as much as I like Clinton, I don't agree with his inclusion either.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4631421.stm

Canada Passes Equal Marriage Bill

I don't really get homosexuality, but I do support people to live how they want. Only God can judge.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/06/28/samesex050628.html

Allies Continue To Leave Iraq

Dead Fetus Found Inside Teenage Boy

Bush Is Dangerous Because He Is Simple

Kerry Pushes To Increase Veterans Health Care Benefits

I'm glad someone is trying to do what is right. Bush isn't interested in protecting veterans, he cut their benefits.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050627/ap_on_go_co/congress_veterans_1

Anti-Gay Group To Picket Soldier's Funerals

Military Audit Challanges 1.4 Billion in Halliburton Charges

NASA Does Not Meet Basic Safety Requirements

Monday, June 27, 2005

BTK Killer Gives Chilling Details Of His Murders

Bush Only Supports Elections When He Likes The Winner

No kidding, it's all about him after all. If Iran voted in someone he doesn't like, tough beans, it is their country and the voters made their decision. Why do we think every country wants to be like us? Maybe they know what is right for them, given their values, beliefs, culture, etc.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20050627/pl_nm/iran_usa_democracy_dc_1

Boot Camp Recruits Assaulted By Drill Instructors

Uh, is this the way boot camp is supposed to be?

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBG8QMDHAE.html

Picasso's Mistress Auctions Off His Sketches

US, Britain, Held Massive Airstrike Campaign Before Declaring War

The unofficial war: U.S., Britain led massive secret bombing campaign before Iraq war was declared

Larisa Alexandrovna and John Byrne

A U.S. general who commanded the U.S. allied air forces in Iraq has confirmed that the U.S. and Britain conducted a massive secret bombing campaign before the U.S. actually declared war on Iraq.

The quote, passed from RAW STORY to the London Sunday Times last week, raises troubling questions of whether President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair engaged in an illegal war before seeking a UN resolution or congressional approval.

While the Downing Street documents collectively raise disturbing questions about how the Bush administration led the United States into Iraq, including allegations that “intelligence was being fixed,” other questions have emerged about when the US and British led allies actually began the Iraq war.

According to the May 1, 2005 Downing Street Memo, official minutes of a 2002 meeting between British Prime Minister Tony Blair, members of British intelligence MI-6 and various senior level members of the Bush administration, air strikes had already begun by July 23, 2002.

U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld “said that the US had already begun "spikes of activity" to put pressure on the regime. No decisions had been taken, but he thought the most likely timing in US minds for military action to begin was January, with the timeline beginning 30 days before the US Congressional elections.”

War Dates Officially

October 10, 2002 - Congress passes the Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq.

November 8, 2002 –The UN Security Council unanimously approves resolution 1441 imposing tough new arms inspections on Iraq and requiring Iraq to declare all weapons of mass destruction and account for known chemical weapons material stockpiles on pain of "serious consequences." Iraq accepts the terms of the resolution and UN inspectors return.

January 28, 2003 – State of the Union Speech on WMD

February 5, 2003 - Colin Powell makes a presentation to the UN, attempting to prove that Iraq is evading the inspectors, continues to produce WMD's, and is linked to al-Qaeda.

March 2003 – Start of Iraq war

The Ides of May-June

Starting in late May to June of 2002 a flurry of activity began both in the United States and in the Middle East. In what appears to be an admission of covert activity, chief allied air force commander Lieutenant-General Michael Moseley divulged in a little-noticed quote in the New York Times that US/British aircraft flew 21,736 sorties between June 2002 and March 2003.
Moseley said that some 600 bombs were dropped before the official start of the war, targeting 391 locations and/or installations.

Moseley explained that the combination of air strikes and covert raids occurred in the southern no-fly zone regions covered by routine patrols.

The targets of these strikes are difficult to pinpoint, but RAW STORY has found a clear divergence between U.S. and Iraqi reports at the time, as well as disagreement over what provoked the strikes.

GlobalSecurity.org, a military defense group, raised concerns about the air strikes when they mushroomed in early 2002, though their worries produced few press reports.

The group saw the strikes as a means by which the U.S. could degrade Iraqi defensive capabilities, and as a precursor to a declared war.

“It was no big secret at the time,” GlobalSecurity.org director John Pike told RAW STORY. “It was apparent to us at the time that they were doing it and why they were doing it, and that was part of the reason why we were convinced that a decision to go to war had already been made, because the war had already started.”

Pike says the allied forces used their position in the ‘No-Fly- Zone’ to engage in pre-emptive action long before war was formally declared.

“They I think had decided to take advantage of Southern Watch and Northern Watch to go ahead and take the air defense system apart and attack any other targets that they felt needed to be preemptively destroyed,” Pike asserted.

“They explicitly altered the rules of engagement,” he added, “because initially the rules of engagement had been that they would shoot back if [someone] shot at them. Then they said that if they were shot at, they would shoot at whatever they wanted to.”

One U.S. Air Force vet told a hearing in Istanbul this weekend, “I saw bombing intensify. All the documents coming out now, the Downing Street memo and others, confirm what I had witnessed in Iraq. The war had already begun while our leaders were telling us that they were going to try all diplomatic options first.”

Iraq complained about the air raids to the UN Secretary-General May 27, 2002. Iraq’s Minister for Foreign Affairs Naji Sabri wrote:

On instructions from my Government, I have the honour to transmit to you herewith a letter dated 27 May 2002 from Mr. Naji Sabri, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Iraq. The Minister calls attention to the ongoing wanton aggression against Iraq by United States and British aircraft in the unlawful no-flight zones and to the fact that in the period from 16 April to 16 May 2002 they carried out 844 armed sorties, 52 of them from Saudi Arabia, 656 from Kuwait and 136 from Turkey, as shown in the statement enclosed with the letter. On 19 April and 1 May 2002, United States and British aircraft bombed civilian and military sites in Ninawa Governorate, killing one citizen and wounding five others and damaging a number of civilian and military installations.

The Minister reaffirms the Government of Iraq’s position that the United States of America and the United Kingdom must bear full international responsibility for these acts of aggression and terrorism, and he further states that Iraq reserves its right, as established by the Charter of the United Nations and international law, to defend itself against this ongoing hostile, terrorist activity. He expresses the hope that you will perform the duties assigned to you under the Charter, that you will urge the governments of the countries in question to halt forthwith their constant aggression against Iraq and that you will call upon the regional parties to desist from providing the necessary facilities.”

In another letter to the UN, Naji Sabri stated that on May 28, 2002,
“American and British aircraft dropped heat flares on crops of barley in the governorate of Ninawa, burning large areas of these crops: 1,630 dunums in the district of al-Hamdaniya and 400 dunums in the district of Hamam al Alil.

This new incident of burning crops illustrates the inhumanity and the immorality of the policy of these two States towards Iraq, which seeks to inflict maximum damage on the Iraqi people and target its source of domestically produced food after imposing comprehensive sanctions on Iraq. This policy constitutes an act of terrorism and a crime against humanity which the international community must not ignore.

The U.S. account differed. The U.S. European Command issued this statement about an attack the following day:

Iraqi forces threatened Operation Northern Watch (ONW) coalition aircraft today. Iraqi forces fired anti-aircraft artillery (AAA) from a site in the vicinity of Saddam Dam while ONW aircraft conducted routine enforcement of the Northern No-Fly Zone.
Coalition aircraft responded to the Iraqi attack by delivering precision ordnance on elements of the Iraqi integrated air defense system.

Coup De Main?

Michael Smith, the British reporter who broke the Downing Street leaks, revealed in the Daily Telegraph that on June 8, 2002 roughly 100 US/British crafts engaged Iraq's major western air defence installation. Smith adds that although “only 12 aircraft dropped precision-guided bombs on to the H3 airfield, 240 miles west of Baghdad and close to Jordan, many support aircraft took part.”

According to the report, Iraq made 130 attempts to shoot down coalition aircraft in 2002.
The public reasons given for at least some of these air strikes generally involved purported violations of the no-fly zone region in Southern Iraq or the disabling of air defense installations.
But the timing and intensity of the strikes suggest otherwise. As the U.S. quietly moved heavy armor to the region in early 2002, along with supplies of ammunition from Qatar in August of that year, the strikes mushroomed.

The number of days per month that allied planes attacked installations in Iraq leapt from six to nine between July and August of 2002, then skipped to thirteen from December to February of 2003.

Congress had approved the use of force pending the exhaustion of diplomatic options in October 2002, and UN inspectors returned in November, while an aggressive air campaign was in full swing.

When President Bush formally declared war on Iraq in March 2003, allied airstrikes in Iraq actually declined.

Midwest Overwhelmed With Methamphetamine Crisis

Court Rules No Constitutional Right To Protection From Police When You Have A Restraining Order

Then what is the point of having a restraining order?

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBFFUGZGAE.html

No Privacy With New FBI

Thousands Of Wal Mart Employees On Public Assistance

Sunday, June 26, 2005

Iran President Elect Vows To Restart Nuclear Program

US Officials Met With Insurgents

Bush Considers Restarting Plutonium 238 Production

Is he brilliant or what? He demands that other countries cease their development of Plutonium and wants the US to start producing it. He has got to have Alzheimer's disease or something. Like he can't remember what he said a week ago. Or is he really this inane?

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/06/26/news/nuke.php

Billy Graham May Have Just Ended His Last Revival

Bush Plays T Ball

I hope he does this better than he rides a bike.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBJDNEUFAE.html

Rumsfeld Says Insugency Will Last For Years

Yeah, no kidding. And just a few weeks ago Cheney said the insurgency is on it's last legs. It will be here for much longer than a few years. This will turn into the type of battle that has been going on in Ireland for decades. And thanks to our illustrious leader, we are in it for the long haul. Why isn't he impeached yet?

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGB39S6VFAE.html

Saturday, June 25, 2005

Lawmakers Want To Repeal 22nd Ammendment

If there is the remotest possibility that Bush will be president for another term, I quit.

http://www.dailynews.com/Stories/0,1413,200%7E20954%7E2937530,00.html#

Chairman Of House Ethics Committee Has Own Problems

Delay Speaks At Young Republicans Conference

He says that liberals say that the world's worst problems are America's fault. He must be referring to the war. That is not America's fault, that is Bush's fault. Liberals don't blame terrorism on America either. They blame Bush and his administration however, for not tackling terrorism, rather, taking on Iraq instead and breeding new terrorist threats from the war there. What a dufus.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/nation/3240320

Ed Klein Grilled on Al Franken Show-Transcript

About his unsubstanciated allegations about Hillary Clinton

http://mediamatters.org/items/200506240007

World Tribunal On Iraq

Representatives from all over the world are getting together to discuss issues including, the legality of the war

http://www.worldtribunal.org/main/?b=1

Allergy Free Cats?

I wonder what kind of weird science is going into this. I hope cats will not be harmed by this technique.

http://www.sinusnews.com/Articles/allergy-free-cats.html

Italian Judge Orders Arrest Of 13 CIA Agents

How To Be Idle

Friday, June 24, 2005

Iraqi Men Say They Were Arrested And Beaten For Wearing Jeans And Having Long Hair

Tom Cruise Video

He acts like he knows all about psychiatry...duh...Ritalin is not an anti-psychotic, neither are anti-depressants.

http://video.msn.com/video/p.htm?i=1a0a3ed6-306d-4726-94e6-51e2d9b49c7b&m=Home%20and%20Living&mi=NBC%20Today&p=source_Today%20Show>1=6586&rf=http://www.msn.com/

Massive Crack In Earth, In Texas

Anti-Scientology Website

Tom Cruise Interview With Matt Lauer

Tom Cruise, please stop spouting off about Scientology. I have loved you since the beginning, but you are starting to turn me off. You are going to loose alot of fans and send your career down the toilet if you keep it up. You were condesending and insulting to Matt Laur. You act as if you are an expert in psychiatry and psychology. I think it's great that you would never use drugs of any type, but leave those who do alone. You are free to do what you want and so are others. Scientology is NOT a religion, it is a philosophy-they are different. You live your life the way you want, don't talk down to others.

Please Tom, come back to us.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/TV/06/24/people.cruise.ap/index.html?section=cnn_topstories

1st US Born Animal With Mad Cow Disease

Spurned 78 Year Old Woman Guns Down 85 Year Old Ex-Boyfriend In Senior Home

Medicaid/Medicare Will No Longer Fund Viagra

Fianlly, some equity. If these programs won't pay for birth control, they ought not pay for Viagra.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBIG8YRCAE.html

Why Some People Support Bush-No Matter What

Why do families with the shakiest grip on the American dream support the Bush equivalent of taking bread from the poor and giving it to the rich?

Let's consider our political moment through a story.

Suppose a chauffeur drives a sleek limousine through the streets of New York, a millionaire in the backseat. Through the window, the millionaire spots a homeless woman and her two children huddling in the cold, sharing a loaf of bread. He orders the chauffeur to stop the car. The chauffeur opens the passenger door for the millionaire, who walks over to the mother and snatches the loaf. He slips back into the car and they drive on, leaving behind an even poorer family and a baffled crowd of sidewalk witnesses. For his part, the chauffeur feels real qualms about what his master has done, because unlike his employer, he has recently known hard times himself. But he drives on nonetheless. Let's call this the Chauffeur's Dilemma.

Absurd as it seems, we are actually witnessing this scene right now. At first blush, we might imagine that this story exaggerates our situation, but let us take a moment to count the loaves of bread that have recently changed hands and those that soon will. Then, let's ask why so many people are letting this happen.

On average, the 2003 tax cut has already given $93,500 to every millionaire. It is estimated that 52% of the benefits of George W. Bush's 2001-03 tax cuts have enriched the wealthiest 1% of Americans (those with an average annual income of $1,491,000).

On average, the 2003 tax cut gave $217 to every middle-income person. By 2010, it is estimated that just 1% of the benefits of the tax cut will go to the bottom 20% of Americans (those with an average annual income of $12,200).

During at least one year since 2000, 82 of the largest American corporations -- including General Motors, El Paso Energy, and, before the scandal broke, Enron -- paid no income tax.
In the meantime, the poor are being bled. Long-term unemployment has risen while the Bush administration has cut long-term unemployment benefits. Most American cities are looking at 15% cuts in already bare-boned budgets, which will close more libraries, cancel more after-school and esl programs, and limit access to health clinics.

Proposed budget cuts beginning in 2006 are threatening the funding given to low-income programs. According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, with these cuts in place, low-income programs will be significantly reduced over the next five years.

By 2010, elementary and secondary education funding will be cut by $4.6 billion, or 12%; 670,000 fewer women and children will receive assistance through the Women, Infants, and Children Supplemental Nutrition Program; Head Start, which currently serves about 906,000 children, will serve 100,000 fewer children; and 370,000 fewer low-income families, elderly people, and people with disabilities will receive rental assistance with rental vouchers. Bush proposes to cut housing and community-development aid by more than 30% in 2006 alone.
It's not hard to understand why the millionaire, with the power to satisfy so many desires, might want to claim another's bread. But why does the chauffeur open the door? Why do about half of lower- and middle-income Americans approve of tax cuts that favor the rich and budget cuts that deprive the poor?

The Slipping of the American Dream

We often hear two explanations for this. First, George W. Bush has deflected public attention from the bread transfer at home to political enemies abroad. Second, Americans have been repeatedly told over the last three decades that the government -- military spending aside -- is grossly wasteful and hopelessly inefficient. So why not pocket a little money yourself, no matter who gets the lion's share, if it's being wasted anyway?

But, by itself, can anti-government propaganda -- added to war fever -- explain why so many Americans are rolling over in the face of such an extraordinary transfer from poor to rich? Most Americans used to believe, after all, that the government could help people achieve the American dream.

In 1970, when America had far fewer homeless children and millionaires, it helped people more, and taxpayers begrudged it less. Most people were proud that the United States was a middle-class society, without much in the way of an overclass or an underclass. They credited their government for fostering this ideal. Many Christians among them thought taxes on the rich and programs for the poor expressed a vital Christian ideal: sharing.

But three things have changed since 1970: attitudes toward governmental redistribution, economic times, and the shape of empathy. Attitudes toward redistribution are different -- even among those who would stand to benefit the most.

When asked in a 2003 Hart and Teeter poll, "Do you think this (Bush) tax plan benefits mainly the rich or benefits everyone?" 56% of blue-collar men (those without a college degree) who answered "yes"(the plan favors the rich) still favored the plan. For blue-collar men living on annual family incomes of $30,000 or less, half supported it.

Apart from the super-rich, who overwhelmingly vote Republican, an interesting pattern emerges: Even many of those with a fragile grip on the American dream go along with taking bread from the poor and giving it to the rich.

What is being forged, then, is a strange, covert moral deal between the millionaire and the hard-pressed chauffeur, sealed by the right-wing church. It is a deal that says, in essence, "Let's ignore the needy at home, exacerbate the class divide, wage war after war abroad, and sustain the idea that all this is morally good."

The Empathy Squeeze

What is happening in the heart of the chauffeur? He has himself known hard times, and is as capable as anyone else of compassion. What about his circumstances, his religious beliefs, and Bush's manipulation of these might lead him to harden his heart?

For some time now, many families have felt squeezed between high hopes and declining prospects. Most Americans strongly believe in working hard and moving up the ladder of success. They "identify up" with people more rich, famous, and lucky than they, rather than "identifying down" with people more poor, obscure, and unlucky. However underpaid, our chauffeur dreams of becoming a millionaire more than he dreads lying homeless in the street. If others can rise to the top, he figures, why can't he?

And in decades past, he had good reason to aim high. For every decade in the 150 years before 1970 -- including the decade of the Great Depression -- real earnings rose. As University of Massachusetts economist Rick Wolff points out, however tough a man's job or long his hours, he could usually look forward to a bigger paycheck.

But after 1970, the real earning power of male wages -- and I focus here on men, for they are the closer fit to the profile of the chauffeur -- stopped rising. Their dream was linked, it turned out, to jobs in an industrial sector that been automated out or outsourced abroad. Their old union-protected, high-wage, blue-collar jobs began to disappear as new non-union, low-wage, service-sector jobs appeared. Indeed, the man with a high-school diploma or a few years of college found few new high-opportunity jobs in the much-touted new economy while the vast majority ended up in low-opportunity jobs near the bottom. As jobs in the middle have become harder to find, his earning power has fallen, his benefits have shrunk, and his job security has been reduced.

As a result, Wolff argues, two things happened. First, life at home became tougher. Wives took paid jobs -- and this in a society that had given little thought to paid parental leave or family-friendly policies. For men as well as women, hours of work have increased. From 1973 to 1996, average hours per worker went up 19%. Since the 1970s, increases have occurred in involuntary job loss, in work absences due to illness or disability, and in debt and bankruptcy. The proportion of single mother families rose from 12% in 1970 to 26% in 2003.

Tougher times have led, in turn, to an "empathy squeeze." That is, many people responded to this crisis by withdrawing into their own communities, their own families, themselves. If a man gets fired or demoted, if he can't make his house payments, if his wife is leaving him, or if his son is failing in school, he feels like he's got enough on his hands. He can't afford to feel sorry for so many other people. He's trying to be a good father, a helpful neighbor, and friend to people he knows who themselves need more help. He localizes empathy. He narrows his circle of empathy in a way that coincides with George W. Bush's hourglass America. Pay a tax to help a homeless mother in another city? Forget it. Charity begins at home.

Despite this, many people who voted for Bush may feel real qualms about the homeless mother and her hungry children. They experience the chauffeur's dilemma. In his heart of hearts, the chauffeur feels bad that he has put such space between himself and the homeless woman's plight. If he goes to a Christian church, he wants to be a good, giving, sharing Christian.

And here is where Bush and his social-issues team make a stealthy empathy grab. How? They "privatize" the chauffeur's morality, and in two ways. They do it first by redefining "good" as a matter not of giving or of sharing but of judging. The chauffeur is offered the chance to feel good by disapproving of homosexuals and of economic failures while quietly setting aside the idea of helping the poor, the disabled, the mentally ill, and the unemployed.

Second and more importantly, Bush proposes the idea of giving through private, religious channels, and thus offers moral cover for the idea of giving less. We will stop giving to the less fortunate as citizens through our government and start giving as parishioners through our churches. But, quite apart from this as a bid to expand the fold, it is a way of offering a moral free pass to the act of replacing a lake with a drop of water.

Rather than fixing the problems that make people anxious, Bush takes advantage of the very feelings of anxiety, frustration, and fear that insecurity creates -- and that his policies exacerbate -- while deflecting hopes away from government help. He makes life quietly harder at home while pointing a finger of blame at one enemy after another abroad. He is, I think, deregulating American capitalism with one hand while regulating the resulting anxiety with the other. And to do this, he has enlisted powerful allies on the corporate and religious right.

The Chauffeur and the Rapture

This leads me to a second effect of economic distress that Wolff notes: rising membership in nontraditional Protestant churches. Among these are some churches that promote the belief that the world is coming to an end, and that, following this, Christians will ascend to heaven in a Rapture while all others will suffer in hell. Those who hold to these beliefs are not a minor group. According to a recent Gallup Poll, 36% of Americans believe that the world is coming to an end. The 12-volume Left Behind series of Christian novels has sold more than 62 million copies.
We can understand the appeal of the idea of a Rapture, though not, or not only, in the believer's terms. There is a world literally coming to an end -- the industrial world of the well-paid blue-collar worker. It is a world to which the working man and woman have already sacrificed much time and from which the promised rewards are disappearing.

Belief in the Rapture provides, I would speculate, an escape from real anxiety over this very great earthly loss. Internet images of the Rapture often portray thin, well-dressed white people rising up into heaven to join awaiting others. The excluded are welcomed. The rejected are accepted. The downwardly mobile become upwardly mobile. The Rapture creates a celestial split between haves and have-nots, with no one in the middle. And in this vision, those caught in a social class squeeze are at last securely on top. The Rapture absorbs the sting of being hardworking losers in the harsh and rigged winner's culture of the radical right.

In a just society, of course, there need be no permanent economic losers. It is well within the capacity of a wisely led American government to restore a living wage to every worker. The power of the people once pointed in that direction. Popular uprisings in the 1930s led to massive demonstrations, strikes, and eventually Works Progress Administration projects, unemployment insurance, and our Social Security system.

But today's impulse to protest goes into blockading abortion clinics and writing Darwin out of school textbooks. The inner-city homeless, children in overcrowded public schools, unemployed in need of job retraining, and the 18% of American children who don't get enough to eat each day become part of the glimpsed world the chauffeur passes by, and his church can only do so much for them.

Like many others, I felt moved by the Christians who knelt in prayer for the family of the late Terri Schiavo, the comatose patient on life support in Florida. But it made me wonder why we don't see similar vigils drawing attention to near-comatose victims of winter living on city sidewalks. They've been taken off life support, too.

The chauffeur knows this and wants to do the moral thing. But he's worse off himself. He feels he has less to give. Bush offers him a way to feel good about giving less -- make a general ethic of giving less. He can downsize his conscience and still feel good. This deal, first struck between right-wing anti-tax interests and evangelicals back in the 1970s, offers a way to satisfy the chauffeur's better angel while getting his OK to take the bread. If right-wing ministers have talked our chauffeur into believing in the Rapture, this belief, too, can become just another reason to drive on.

In a sense, Bush is exploiting the common man twice over -- once by ignoring his own plight and that of the poor and twice by covering it over with military drums and tin-man morality. We really need to turn both things around. But to do that, we need to remind the chauffeur, wherever he is, that it's within his power to stop the car -- tax the millionaire, help the homeless, and offer new hope to those in between. Otherwise, the deal Bush is brokering between millionaire and chauffeur will impoverish the chauffeur -- in his pocketbook and in his soul.

This article appears in the July issue of The American Prospect magazine (Vol. 16, No. 7).
Arlie Hochschild is a professor of sociology at University of California, Berkeley and the author of "The Commercialization of Intimate Life" as well as "The Time Bind" and "The Second Shift."

Bush Says No Timetable For Troop Withdrawal

OK, I know you can't predict what is going to happen, but why can't everyone put their heads together and come up with some goals/markers? Like, so many Iraqi troops will be trained by January, so many by June, etc? Why can't they say outline some things so that we can be more optimistic that things are going to eventually come to a conclusion?


http://customwire.ap.org/dynamic/stories/B/BUSH_IRAQ?SITE=TXELP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-06-24-12-26-04

Creative Way To Encourage Voter Turnout In Bulgaria

After 5 Years, Clinton Gets New Columbian Bracelet

Poor Being Bled By Bush Tax Cuts

Doctors Aided Interrogations At Guantanamo Bay

Bush Approval Rating 17% Among Independents

More People Think Bush Provoked War Than Hussein

Thursday, June 23, 2005

Yahoo Sweeps Site Of Child Porn

It's about time. It is incredible, the amount of sleeze there is out there, men going after kids, etc. No need to give them a forum to do that.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBOEFNRBAE.html

Equivalent of 100 People Per Hour Die In Russia Daily

New Heart Medication Targeted For Blacks

Kerry Blasts Rove

Communist Ruled China More Favorable Overseas Than US

Chemical In Soy And Tofu Could Affect Male Fertility

Top US General Says Cheney Is Wrong

North Carolina Republican Nominee For Supreme Court Quits

Oprah Doesn't Get Special Treatment And Blames It On Racism

She is so amazingly annoying. She thinks she can just go whereever she wants and people will cater to her. I am so sick of everything being about racism. Maybe the French are just not that impressed with her.

http://entertainment.msn.com/movies/hotgossipb?GT1=6657

Supreme Court Ruling-Government Can Seize Homes For Private Development

C-Span: Update on Iraq Live Video Feed

Looted Iraqi Art/Artifacts Used To Fund Terrorism

Southern Baptists End Disney Boycott

They say for it to be effective, it needs a beginning and an end. I think they see that their Nazi like views are not in line with the majority of americans and have given up.

http://www.wkrc.com/news/national/story.aspx?content_id=1F99D5D7-F462-411E-9D9F-BBD85FD09CC1

The Live 8 Debate

Rewriting Reality-Flash Cartoon

Pentagon Gives Halliburton Another Contract-Worth 1 Billion

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Pentagon Building Database Of Teens For Military Recruitment

Rove Says Liberals Don't Understand 9/11

Another dufus in the Bush regime. Crush, kill, destroy is his motto. He thinks that we will go into Iraq or wherever and crush the "enemy", as if the ideology of terrorism will go away with the deaths of those the Bush administration views as the enemy.

Stupid man does not understand that you have to understand terrorists to stop terrorism, otherwise, 50 terrorists will spring up to replace the one he killed. It's a shame.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050623/ap_on_re_us/rove_sept_11

Handicapping The Supreme Court Nominees

Delay Compares Iraq To Houston, Texas

This man if off his rocker!! Talk about denial. Bush surrounds himself with idiots. Why isn't he impeached yet?

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/3235606

Canada Campaigns To Give Army Deserters Refuge

I don't think that I am in agreement with this, I mean, even though I am against this war, if you sign up for the military, you know you might have to fight a war, wether you agree with it or not.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1119448188359_114857388/?hub=Canada

Bush Ignored Kim's Overture To Resolve Nuclear Dispute In 2002

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Delay Aides Had Tribal Donations Diverted

Is there one single, honest person in this administration? Why isn't Bush impeached yet?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050621/ap_on_go_co/delay_tribal_donations

Are Political Parties Obsolete?

You wouldn't think so by the lines in the sand drawn by "them" and "us"...it seems if anything, people are clutching to their political ideological platforms rather than thinking for themselves and using common sense to determine where they fall in the spectrum. But this guy makes some good points.

http://www.alternet.org/story/22256/

Common Virus Might Kill Cancer Cells

FYI-Bush Impeachment Rallies

September 24: Impeachment March on WashingtonJoin the Impeachment Contingent atthe Next Huge Anti-War Demonstration

White House - 12 noon

The next big step for the Impeachment Movement will be on September 24 when more than 100,000 people will descend on Washington DC to the doors of the White House, and in actions in San Francisco and Los Angeles, to demand that George W. Bush and his administration be held accountable for the ongoing lies, deceptions, death, and torture.

It is only "politics" that has been a shield for the Bush administration as it attempts to avoid responsibility for its criminal conduct. But the politics of the country are changing rapidly. Bush's approval rating is at an all time low, the number of people opposing the handling of the war has soared to 70%, and a clear majority believe that the Bush administration should never have invaded Iraq to begin with.

During the past week, practically every newspaper has carried an article admitting that the issue of impeachment is clearly on the political radar. That constitutes a sea change. It has been the ImpeachBush.org / VoteToImpeach grassroots movement that has been in the vanguard of this effort. In the last two-and-half years the campaign has placed full page newspaper ads in the New York Times, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle and in newspapers in large and small cities. More than a half a million people have voted in the ImpeachBush.org referendum.

The September 24 mass mobilization will see the largest contingent advocating Impeachment since Ramsey Clark initiated the campaign at the January 18, 2003 anti-war demonstration of 500,000 in Washington DC. People from all over the country are working to make this mobilization a huge success. In addition to volunteers working round-the-clock, many people are making contributions to sustain this momentum. Everyone who had made a contribution should be proud of their sacrifice and this expression of commitment. If you have not made a donation, we ask you to do so now. If you have already made a contribution, we ask you to consider doing so again. Click here for access to the online donation form and the secure server, where you can also get information to write a check.

September 24 will be a wonderful sight. A sea of protestors will surround the White House. The yellow and black impeachment banners and signs will be everywhere. We will be sending out updated logistical announcements about the demonstration in the coming days and weeks.

ImpeachBush.org volunteers will be assisting in transportation and housing arrangements. The website will contain this information. A new Impeach Bush flyer for September 24 will be available soon. Be sure that you are signed up to receive the ImpeachBush.org emails and ask your friends and family to join the low-volume list too so that they receive the most updated news about the campaign and the demonstration.

Lions Rescue Kidnapped Girl In Africa

Al Qaida Forms Iraqi Suicide Squad

Monday, June 20, 2005

95 Year Old Sets 100 Meter Speed Record

For men between 95-99. Can't you just picture him running, full of pride, with the wind blowing in his face? He's crawling at a snails pace compared to everyone under 90, but he doesn't know it. I love stories like this.

http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/3704092

Bush Wants To Bypass Congress On Bolton

Just like he bypassed the UN on Iraq. All the Democrats want is the information he has on Bolton. If there is nothing to hide, there is nothing to hide. He has quite the flair. Why isn't he impeached yet?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/20/AR2005062000402.html?sub=AR

Transportation Security Administration Spying On Flyers

Doctor's Think Teen Age Boy May Be Menstruating

Sunday, June 19, 2005

Priest Crucified Nun?

This is one of the most bizarre things I have heard of in a while.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,15657303%255E1702,00.html

Biden To Run For President

Father Has To Buy Son Body Armour For Iraq War

This is outrageous!! Who is running the show over there? He should be court martialed, along with everyone else who expects soldiers to put their lives on the line without even a chance of saving themselves. This is not an isolated incident. Over and over, this type of thing has been reported. And the military wonders why they can't recruit enough soldiers...for what...a certain death sentence? Bush should be impeached on the fact alone, that he insists on keeping Rumsfeld in charge of this war.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Dad_picks_up_600_tab_for_sons_Iraq_body_ar_0619.html

Flash Cartoon-Packin Heat (Gun Lobby)

Leon Trotsky Murder Weapon May Have Been Found

Saturday, June 18, 2005

Republican Senator Hagel Says Bush Is Out Of Touch With Reality

Couple Expecting Their 16th Child

Iran To Have First Run Off Presidential Elections In It's History

Catholic Church Votes To Keep One Strike Your Out Child Abuse Policy

Brits Say US Used Napalm in Iraq

Senior White House Official Says Next Year In Iraq Will Be Worse Than This One

Friday, June 17, 2005

School Considers Banning Clothing With Any Flag On It But US Flag

This is just plain stupidity. Don't educators have anything else to do, like say, educate? If a kid comes to school wearing a shirt with the Canadian flag on it, I suppose all hell will break loose. This country is so debilitated by terrorism and nationalism that we are not thinking straight.

http://www.sptimes.com/2005/06/17/Hernando/School_board_examines.shtml

Another Security Breech Could Put 40 Million Credit Card Holders At Risk

Military Investigates "Make A Pig Out Of The Quran" Web Site

This kid justifies his actions by saying he can do this stupidity because Muslims in Iraq burn the American flag. First of all, the flag is not the Bible. Second, no matter what people do in Iraq or anywhere else, we should not stoop to their level.

http://www.syracuse.com/news/poststandard/index.ssf?/base/news-0/111899795221760.xml&coll=1

Beautification of French Priest Suspended Until Vatican Investigates Allegations of Anti-Semitism

I'm glad to see the Vatican taking this stance. Pope John Paul's apolgy for the church's history of anti-semitism is mute otherwise.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGB0D7UQ2AE.html

Insurgents Take Over Ramadi

Important Recall

Jeb Bush Opens Up New Investigation On Terri Schiavo

There was an autopsy. There was no evidence of any battering or trauma, if there were, it would have come out. What do they think they will find that can prove Michael Schiavo is responsible for her death? They will never leave him alone. And I'm sure that if this were anyone else, the governor would not go to these lengths. It's Terri Schiavo, and she is a political figure now. How sad.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBOPCIL2AE.html

Oprah Winfrey is #1 Most Influential Celebrity

She is so annoying. I used to like her. Now, everything is about her. She used to do programs about interesting and socially relevant topics. Now she just flaunts her celebrity friends and shows off her wealth by giving stuff away. She thinks that she is the guru of everything. I admire the smarts it must take to get where she is, but I cannot tolerate her personally anymore.

http://tv.msn.com/tv/tvnews?GT1=6657

USDA Planted Fake, Tax Funded News

Artist Bungee Jumps From Skyscraper To Depict Victims Of 9/11

This is nauseating. I doubt that this so called "artist" is so traumatized by 9/11 that he felt compelled to pull this stunt and call it art. He is simply looking to cash in on a tragedy.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/falling_artist

Halliburton To Build New Detention Facility At Guantanamo Bay

Rate of Marijuana Use

Iran Presidential Campaign Nears End

This vote is far more important than the Iraq vote was.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBX5IRX1AE.html

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Michael Musto-Why Jackson Beat It

New Morgan Spurlock Show

It looks good. Informative and it appears that it will raise awareness to social issues.

http://www.villagevoice.com/screens/0524,tv1,64886,28.html

Oil Refineries To Spend 1 Billion On Pollution Control

45 Billion More For Iraq War Next Year

Another Bush Cabinet Member Resigns

Scientists Make Blood From Stem Cells

Live Downing Street Memo Hearing Feed

Do Lobbyist's Have Their Hands In Public Television?

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Pay For Parking By Cell Phone

GOP Worried About Bush

Insurgents Blow Up Oil Pipeline

Oh boy, now they really pissed Bush off.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBOGXLEZ9E.html

Principal Asks Teachers To Reconsider Grades to Comply with No Child Left Behind

While I agree with NCLB in theory, it has been shown to have significant bugs, especially as related to special education stuedents. It is wrong for the principla to ask his teachers to do this, but this is the position you place educators in when you tie funding to academic performance. I don't know what the answer is as I am not an educator, but there must be some compromise that would not put students in danger of this type of process, and get a true indicator of their progress.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBJ03GFZ9E.html

Frist Refuses Roll Call On Anti-Lynching Issue

To me, only a racist would hold this up in the Senate.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Critics_Frist_vetoed_full_vote_on__0615.html

Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Conservatives/Liberals Align Against Patriot Act

Ignoring Sudan-Cartoon Strip

Brain Cells Duplicated In Lab

Cheney Believes Gitmo Policy Is Correct

Monday, June 13, 2005

Conservative Leader Implies Gays Should Wear Labels

The guy says he did not intend to imply that gays should wear labels. But what else could he have meant? Those religious zealots ought to be careful about what comes out of their mouths...wether they intend their cruel remarks or not. They are starting to look like a pack of little Hitlers.

http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/06/061305pride.htm

Michael Jackson Verdict

I don't know what to think. One thing for sure though, there was no evidence and the boy and his family were not credible. It was just his word against his.

I think Michael Jackson is disturbed enough to really think that it is OK to behave the way he does with kids. People who are not disturbed assume that he did it.On the other hand, who knows.

One thing though, he better stop having those sleepovers, if he has any sense at all. The sad thing is, he is clearly mentally ill. Everyone around him just cow tows to his whims, rather then absolutely insisting that he stop this weird behavior and get help. Very sad. I think that he has led a very sad and lonely life.

I predict though, that he will see this as the green light to go ahead and continue behaving in his unconventional ways. I hope that someone stops him.

Scientists Find New Planet

Beautiful Article By Ron Kovich

He is the VietNam veteran that the movie "Born On The Fourth Of July" is based on. Very poignant insights.

http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/22181/

Department of Interior Evicting Elderly Lady

Don't these guys have anything better to do? What do they do anyway? You would think that a reasonable perosn would go to someone in the department and say, hey, this little old lady lives there, lets renew the lease and leave her alone, but no, it takes an act of Congress...geez, there must be a simpler way. Congress has more important things to worry about.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGB76YEWW9E.html

GOP Presures Bush To Change Iraq Policy

Hopefully, they will be able to knock some sense into him. But with his ego, it wouldn't surprise me if he remained "steadfast".

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8197439/

Sunday, June 12, 2005

Brainwashing Camp For Gay Kids

These religious zealots are getting increasingly funny. They think they can convince kids not to be gay. As if it is a choice. They are living in the stone age. Didn't they hear about recent studies that are more frequently pointing to sexual orientation as being genetic? Like the most recent one, where gay men who smelled male pheronomes, had a very similar brain reaction as women who smelled the men's pheronomes. One could argue that gay men wire their own brains to react that way because of the sexual choices that they make, but I doubt it. In any event, this is lunacy, to put kids through this. Send em to camp, return them home depressed and feeling inferior and like they are going to hell. Now that's Christian!!

http://www.mikeditto.com/archives/kudos_to_queer_action_coalition

Texas Creating Sex Offender Free Neighborhood

I don't like this at all. If I want to live in a nice neighborhood I have to give out personal information, which, anyone can do whatever they want with? It's a bandaid on the problem of sexual predators. We need tougher sentences, that is what will keep offenders away from kids. And, if this should take off, it will just send the offenders to poor neighborhoods to prey on those kids.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBATZYNV9E.html

Flash Cartoon-Pain Man (Medical Marijuana)

Isn't it rediculous that the government won't allow these sick and dying people some relief from their misery?

http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/fiore/2005/06/pain.html

Pink Floyd To Regroup For London Concert

Banned Contractor Gets More Iraq Deals

Microsoft Bans "Democracy" and "Freedom" In Website

If China blocks these words, then I say, Microsoft should not do business there. But nevermind, forget about the principal of the issue for the sake of the money.

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/provider/providerarticle.asp?feed=FT&Date=20050610&ID=4884671

Few Terror Convictions

Although Bush boasts misleading statistics. Why aren't impeachment proceedings underway yet? This man can't tell the truth, no matter what.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/11/AR2005061100381.html

Saturday, June 11, 2005

UK Evidence Of Planned Iraq War Prior To 9/11

From Watergate to Downing Street

Friday, June 10, 2005

Mics Turned Off In Patriot Act Hearing

Chain Saw Wielding Killer Allowed Into US

Mom Steals Iraqi Soldier's Identity

Republicans Target Public Television

They complain about Janet Jackson's boob, Howard Stern...but they want to cut funding to public television...why don't they take the fines that the FCC imposes on inappropriate television and radio content and divert it to public television? Pretty soon all that will be on TV will be Everyone Loves Raymond and American Idol.

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Senator_GOP_targets_Elmo_and_Sesame_Street_for_destr_0610.html

Porn Star To Attend GOP Fundraiser

I thought Bush was all about family values? I guess not when it is about money. If he were really about family values, this person would not be allowed in. Either he or his people would see to it, assuming Bush was for real.

http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/index.php?page=national&story_id=061005b8_pornstar

Bush Names New Director Of Counter Terrorism

Possible Supreme Court Nominees

Thursday, June 09, 2005

Senate Says No Documents, No Bolton

Good, Honest Iraqi's Fighting US Forces

Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Bush Impeachment Links

Tuesday, June 07, 2005

90 Year Old Woman Fights Off Mugger

Monday, June 06, 2005

9/11 Commision Not Happy With Bush

June 6, 2005
Members of Sept. 11 Panel Press for Information on Terror Risk
By PHILIP SHENON

WASHINGTON, June 5 - Members of the Sept. 11 commission, fearing that the Bush administration and Congress will never act on some of their recommendations, are joining together almost a year after completing their final report to press the White House for information showing whether the government has done enough to prevent another catastrophic terrorist attack, commission officials said.

The officials said the 10 commissioners, acting through a private group they founded last summer, will present a letter within days to Andrew H. Card Jr., President Bush's chief of staff, asking the White House to allow the group to gather detailed information from the Central Intelligence Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Pentagon, the State Department and other agencies about the government's recent performance in dealing with terrorist threats.
Commissioners say they want the information to prepare for a series of public hearings scheduled to begin here on Monday and to draft a privately financed report that will evaluate the government's counterterrorism policies in the wake of the commission's final report last July.

The moves, which may not be welcome at the White House or among Congressional leaders, represent an unusual effort by members of a high-profile federal commission to retain their political viability and to lobby for their recommendations long after their official investigation came to an end.

"We're going to ask a lot of questions," said Thomas H. Kean, who was chairman of the Sept. 11 commission and is now a board member of the 9/11 Public Discourse Project, a private educational and lobbying group. "There are a lot of our recommendations that have not been implemented."

Mr. Kean said that with terrorist groups threatening new attacks on American soil, "we don't have a lot of time left to act."

The 9/11 Public Discourse Project has scheduled eight public hearings on the government's counterterrorism efforts; the hearing on Monday will focus on the C.I.A. and the F.B.I., the targets of the sharpest criticism in the commission's final report last year.

Mr. Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey, said that although witness lists for the other hearings have not been completed, he would not rule out a request for public testimony from senior administration officials, including Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Porter J. Goss, the C.I.A. director.

Told of the private group's plans to approach the White House, a White House spokeswoman, Christie Parell, said Sunday: "We appreciate the work the commission did. We have acted on the vast majority of their recommendations and welcome their continued involvement. We look forward to receiving the letter."

Over its lifespan, the Sept. 11 commission repeatedly clashed with the Bush administration, which had originally opposed its creation, especially over the panel's access to important White House documents and to witnesses. The battles were especially pitched because of their timing, in the middle of Mr. Bush's campaign for a second term.

With their public hearings and their plans for a new report, the Sept. 11 commission is, to a degree, back in business.

The five Democrats and five Republicans who made up the panel are returning together to the public stage - this time, solely as private citizens and without subpoena power - to investigate the government's response to terrorist threats. The 9/11 Public Discourse Project, which has a small staff based in Washington, is underwritten by several prominent private foundations, including the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

John F. Lehman, a Republican member of the panel and a former secretary of the Navy, said he hoped the White House would cooperate with the former commissioners in their renewed investigation "because we have the same objectives - they should see us as a valuable resource outside of the system."

The former commissioners have the enthusiastic support of groups representing the families of victims of the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington.

"I applaud this," said Mary Fetchet of New Canaan, Conn., whose son was killed in the attacks and who is founding director of a family group called Voices of September 11th. "Typically a federal commission writes a report, makes its recommendations and there's no follow-through."
Members of the commission readily acknowledged that they no longer had any authority to force the Bush administration to hand over information or to make witnesses available, and they have no expectation that they will re-create the fireworks of their public hearings last year, when senior administration officials were subjected to hours of often hostile questioning under oath and on live network television. (The hearing on Monday is scheduled to be broadcast live on C-Span 2, the cable network.)

"We don't have that subpoena power anymore," said Jamie S. Gorelick, a Democratic commissioner who was deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration and who will moderate Monday's hearing, which will be held at the Woodrow Wilson International Center, a scholarly organization partly financed by the federal government. "We are looking in from outside."

But Mr. Kean said he was hopeful that the White House would cooperate and that some senior administration officials might be willing to answer questions in public if only to demonstrate their commitment to preventing new terrorist attacks.

"Some of them may be eager to do that," he said.

The hearings are expected to culminate later this year in a report that the 9/11 Public Discourse Project has described as a "report card" on its "unfinished agenda."

The Sept. 11 commission, known formally as the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, went out of business last August after releasing a unanimous final report the month before demonstrating that incompetence and turf battles among the nation's intelligence agencies, notably the C.I.A. and the F.B.I., prevented the government from acting before Sept. 11, 2001, on intelligence suggesting an imminent Qaeda attack.

The report, which became a national bestseller, came after a year of public hearings at which Mr. Rumsfeld, Ms. Rice and others were harshly questioned about intelligence failures before Sept. 11. Its conclusions resulted in legislation that enacted the panel's key recommendation: creation of the job of director of national intelligence, an official who would have the authority to force cooperation among long-feuding spy agencies.

But many of the report's other recommendations have not been acted on, including its call for an overhaul of Congressional intelligence oversight, for the establishment of unified radio frequencies allowing emergency workers around the country to communicate; and for the appointment of a federal civil liberties board to prevent constitutional abuses by intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

In an interview on Friday in his offices at Drew University in Madison, N.J., where he will step down as president this month, Mr. Kean said that he had been gratified by many of the actions of Mr. Bush and Congress in responding to the commission's recommendations, especially the creation of the intelligence director's job and the appointment of John D. Negroponte, the former American ambassador to the United Nations and to Iraq, to the post.

"He's met with us, and we were very pleased with the questions he asked and with his approach to the job," Mr. Kean said.

Mr. Kean, who was once seen as a candidate for the intelligence job that went to Mr. Negroponte, has rebuffed suggestions that he return to politics. In January, he accepted a new job as chairman of the board of trustees of the multibillion-dollar Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, N.J.

While insisting that he saw "the glass as half full" in the government's response to the Sept. 11 report, Mr. Kean said he was disturbed that so many other recommendations had not been acted on, especially the commission's call for an expanded American effort to secure international stores of nuclear materials, especially in the nations of the former Soviet Union.

"There's no greater danger to this nation than a terrorist group acquiring these materials," Mr. Kean said. He said he was also alarmed that there had been little movement by the government in creating the unified radio frequencies for police and fire departments around the country - "that's almost a scandal."

The civil liberties board was created under the law adopted by Congress last year that also established the job of director of national intelligence, but the White House has offered no hint that it is close to naming members of the board.

"I'm very disappointed that the president has not yet seen fit to appoint the board, which is included in the very legislation he signed into law," said Richard Ben-Veniste, the former Watergate prosecutor and a Democratic member of the Sept. 11 commission.

Mr. Ben-Veniste, who is scheduled to lead one of the public hearings next month, specifically on civil liberties issues, said prisoner abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and at the American military base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, demonstrated the need for the board.

Thursday, June 02, 2005

Bush Wants 9/11 Money Back

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