Why the Christian Right Distorts History and Why it Matters

And while we sometimes laugh at the caricatures of "Christian" ministers and evangelists that parade across our screens, we MUST keep in mind how VERY, VERY powerful that they and their followers actually are.

We must remember that they create their own divisions between their selves and the rest of society primarily with the belief that THEY know what is best for all of us non-Christian heathens.

And that my friends is the foundation of fascism and oppression.

It is said that history is written by the victors. And we simply can NOT allow these obvious fruitcakes to rewrite history to reflect that ANY of the Founders of this Country EVER intended this country to have ANY position on religion other than to protect the right of the individual conscience to believe as they may.

Any other interpretation is simply an attempt to usurp authority for the purpose of subjugation, persecution, imprisonment, torture and murder.

PublicEye.org - Why the Christian Right Distorts History and Why it Matters

The reasons for the founders' decision - and this is important to be able to explain - is that they were operating on the broad principle of the rights of individual conscience. Mainstream historians note that early opposition to the ratification of the Constitution came from those who, like Jefferson, felt that the Constitution was insufficiently strong and clear on these matters. So in exchange for Jefferson and his allies' support for ratification, the convention penned the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights, which says:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

It took time to extend these rights fully to the states, and to make them real in the lives of all citizens. As a nation we are still working on it. But it was this founding right to believe as you will, to believe differently than the powers that be - and to change your mind - free from the interference of the state or unduly powerful religious institutions, that was the main original contribution of the framers of the Constitution and is a central part of the story of the nation.

And even as many will note that the Constitution perpetuated various forms of oppression - of women, slaves, and people who did not own property - this founding principle contained the powerful possibility for change. The right to believe differently (having disentangled mutually reinforcing institutions of oppression via the unity of church and state) made possible every advance in human and civil rights that has come since.

Here is where a marvelous fact emerges that should illuminate any narrative. The right of individual conscience and the ultimate ratification of the Constitution by the thirteen states was won because of the alliance between orthodox evangelical Christians of the day, notably Baptists and Methodists, and those influenced by the ideas of the Enlightenment, like Jefferson and Madison. For these strange bedfellows, the issue was not whether Christianity or religion was good or bad, although certainly many differed on the point. The issue was that individuals should have the right to believe as they will without interference from powerful religious institutions or the government. (emphasis added)

And a special thanks to Stupid Evil Bastard for the following quote on legislative attempts to rewrite history.

But first:
House Resolution 888,"Affirming the rich spiritual and religious history of our Nation's founding and subsequent history and expressing support for designation of the first week in May as 'American Religious History Week' for the appreciation of and education on America's history of religious faith."

House Resolution 888, sponsored by Rep. Randy Forbes (R-VA-4th District), seeks to rewrite American history to include a number of falsehoods perpetuated by Christian extremists. This should be of grave concern to every American atheist as well as anyone who values historical accuracy.

For many specific examples of the misinformation contained in H. Res. 888, see Chris Rodda’s excellent post at Talk To Action. It is long, but it really is a must read. Rodda has done an impressive job of debunking many of the claims contained in the resolution. Plain and simple, this is revisionist history intended to promote the “Christian nation” myth through deception.

For more information about the implications of H. Res. 888, talking points you can use when discussing what is wrong with it, and even a sample letter you can send to your Representative in Congress, see Bruce Wilson’s helpful post at Talk To Action. Contacting your Representative is especially important if he or she happens to be on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. You can find the letter I sent to my Representative here.

And why exactly should you care about any of this revisionist history stuff? Here are a few reasons:

• Revisionist history in the National Junior ROTC program
• Why the Christian right distorts history and why it matters
• Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the evangelical moment in American public life
• Christian reconstructionists are trying to take dominion in America—and they have powerful friends
• Beware the dominionists
• What is Christian nationalism?

You can also see my first post on H.R. 888, Christ on a Cracker.

On This Anniversary of the Kent State Massacre

By STEVEN ARGUE

Thirty eight years ago today, on May 5, 1970, at Ohio’s Kent State University, the National Guard opened fire on students protesting the US war in Vietnam. The students were shot from a distances of 275 to 400 feet, giving lie to claims that the students posed a threat to the Guardsmen. Four students were murdered and nine were injured. Nobody ever did time for those murders.

Before May 5, 1970, an anti-war movement had been building in the United States. The American people were increasingly impatient with the war, and an active anti-war movement helped build that kind of consciousness. People wanted an end to the war and Nixon kept promising a “light at the end of the tunnel.” On April 30, 1970, Nixon announced the invasion of Cambodia. This was the opposite of what people wanted to hear. Protests erupted on campuses that had not had them in the past, like Kent State. For many, the cold blooded murder of students at Kent State and murders of students soon after at Jackson State, were the final straw.

Immediately after the Kent State shootings 8 million students went out on strike, and some Universities, such as Berkley, were taken over by students and faculty as anti-war universities. After May 1970, the majority of those drafted were already opposed to the war before they got to Vietnam. This brought an end to the war. The US government could not win the war because they were facing fierce battles from the Vietnamese and many US soldiers were actively resisting the war. Commanding officers were winding up dead as they tried to force soldiers to kill people in a foreign land for a war they did not believe in. Nixon could not win a war with drafted soldiers who refused to fight, and this was a factor that forced the U.S. government to withdraw from Vietnam.

Three million Vietnamese were murdered as a result of the US occupation of southern Vietnam and massive U.S. bombing of the north. Over 50,000 US soldiers died. It was resistance, both by the Vietnamese people, and the resistance of the anti-war movement in the United States that brought an end to the US occupation of Vietnam. Had the working class of the United States been ready to join that strike of 8 million students in May 1970, we would have potentially had a revolution in the United States, but at that time the working class was not ready.

Today, after the lessons of Vietnam, and after decades of bi-partisan union busting, outsourcing, privatization, and declining living standards for the US working class, the U.S. working class is now stepping out and taking the lead in the struggle against the criminal occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. On May 1st, 2008 10,000 U.S. port workers of the ILWU went out on strike against the U.S. occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, shutting down all 29 ports on the West Coast for eight hours. Within the union, Vietnam Vets were some of the strongest advocates of the strike.

Joining the strike in solidarity with the demand of immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq were the Iraqi port workers at Umm Qasr and Khor Alzubair. They joined U.S. workers in a deeply symbolic one hour strike to end the occupation.

In going out on strike, the union ranks of the ILWU defied the rulings of an arbitrator, who twice ordered them not to strike. They also defied the employers of the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA) who declared the strike “illegal”. This is the kind of defiance the working class will need to emulate in other industries, both to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to start winning better contracts.

Today, over a million Iraqis have died as a result of the U.S. invasion. In addition, the U.S. has installed a religious death squad government where women's rights have eroded, the economy has deteriorated, the environment has been seriously devastated by the radiation of US DU weapons, millions of refugees have fled the country, people are often arrested without cause and tortured, the US bombs civilians from the sky, and basic infrastructure like water and electricity have been destroyed by the US and not rebuilt by the US occupiers.

It is also a war that has cost the U.S. thousands of lives, tens of thousands of casualties, and trillions of dollars in debt. Yet, for a few extremely wealthy Americans it has meant massive profits for military contractors and other businesses with contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition, multinational companies like Exxon, BP and Shell are drooling as the U.S. government tries to force an oil law down the throats of the Iraqi people that would turn ownership of Iraqi oil over to these corporations.

Meanwhile, the pro-war Democrat Party voted for the war and keeps voting to fund it. Today, the Democrats are once again pushing for $178 billion in funding for the war. Neither Clinton nor Obama would promise to withdraw all troops from Iraq by 2013 ("The Democratic Presidential Debate on MSNBC", New York Times 9/26/07). In addition, the two of them have offered differing versions of expanding these wars into Iran and Pakistan.

Whoever wins the upcoming election, it will take increased action by the working class to end these wars. ILWU member Jack Heyman is correct in saying of the May 1st strike against the war, “There's precedent for this action. In the '50s, French dockworkers refused to load war materiel on ships headed for Indochina, and helped to bring that colonial war to an end.” The longshore workers’ May 1st strike does indeed show the way forward. More strikes, and bigger strikes, along with building a workers’ party independent of the Democrats and Republicans, can indeed end these wars. This is an article of Liberation News, subscribe free:
http://lists.riseup.net/www/info/liberation_news

Join the Cool Earth Party
http://tribes.tribe.net/coolearth

Jesus Made Me Puke : Rolling Stone

Jesus Made Me Puke : Rolling Stone

The program revolved around a theory that Fortenberry quickly introduced us to called "the wound." The wound theory was a piece of schlock biblical Freudianism in which everyone had one traumatic event from their childhood that had left a wound. The wound necessarily had been inflicted by another person, and bitterness toward that person had corrupted our spirits and alienated us from God. Here at the retreat we would identify this wound and learn to confront and forgive our transgressors, a process that would leave us cleansed of bitterness and hatred and free to receive the full benefits of Christ.

In the context of the wound theory, Fortenberry's tale suddenly made more sense. Being taken on that eighteen-hole golf trip with the barmaid, and watching his family ditched by Dad, had been his wound. It was a wound, Fortenberry explained, because his father's abandonment had crushed his "normal."

"And I was wounded," he whispered dramatically. "My dad had ruined my normal!"

The crowd murmured affirmatively, apparently knowing what it was to have a crushed normal.

After introducing us to the concept of wounds and normals, Fortenberry told us one last cautionary tale before sending us to our first group session. It was about a paratrooper who had done a tandem jump with a training dummy for some Army exercise or other, only to have the dummy's chute fail to open. The dummy had plunged to the ground, crashing through the trees and landing with a thud in a bush. Fortenberry's Army buddy had taken advantage of the situation to have a little joke at the expense of some other exercising soldiers on the ground who weren't privy to the fact that the troopers were jumping with dummies. The Army buddy had cried and wailed in asking where the "body" had fallen, leaving the soldiers on the ground to think that someone had just been killed.

The soldiers had felt guilty, Fortenberry explained, because they'd failed to help what they thought was a fallen comrade. Why? Because they'd been afraid to look behind the bush.

"So I'm telling you now, as you go into your groups," the pastor explained, "don't be afraid to look behind the bush."

I wrote in my binder: "LOOK BEHIND THE BUSH." Then I waited as my name was called out for group study.

"LOOK BEHIND THE BUSH", indeed! This article is a MUST READ by Matt Taibbi of RollingStone.com, who went undercover into the church (cult) of televangelist and McBush supporter, John Hagee to write this report on Christian Zionism, America's very own religious fundamentalists.

It really hits home to me because I live among the caricatures of humanity that he describes in vivid detail every day. At the risk of sounding elitist, were I live you have poor white trash, alcoholics and drug addicts, Blacks, Mexicans, inbreds, and then the church (which consists of many of the afore mentioned and all of the rest). Here in their midst, if you do not sing the praises of "My Personal Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ" publicly and forever, you are as nothing.

They insist upon your complete and total dependence on the group (the Church) and insist that this is what makes you Independent and Free. "Think and do only as we tell you. And this shall make you FREE!"

Businesses actually market themselves as "Christian Believers" on TV commercials and in the press! If you have any trouble at all understanding the reason for the title of this blog, "Surviving Christianity", YOU MUST READ THIS ARTICLE. Matt's tale is one long nightmare to me.

"Well, uh, OK, then," he said. "Matthew, do you want to tell your story?"

My heart was pounding. I obviously couldn't use my real past — not only would it threaten my cover, but I was somewhat reluctant to expose anything like my real inner self to this ideologically unsettling process — but neither did I want to be trapped in a story too far from my own experience. What I settled on eventually was something that I thought was metaphorically similar to the truth about myself.

"Hello," I said, taking a deep breath. "My name is Matt. My father was an alcoholic circus clown who used to beat me with his oversize shoes."

The group twittered noticeably. Morgan's eyes opened to tea-saucer size.

I closed my own eyes and kept going, immediately realizing what a mistake I'd made. There was no way this story was going to fly. But
there was no turning back.

"He'd be sitting there in his costume, sucking down a beer and watching television," I heard myself saying. "And then sometimes, even if I just walked in front of the TV, he'd pull off one of those big shoes and just, you know — whap!"

I looked around the table and saw three flatlined, plainly indifferent psyches plus one mildly unnerved Morgan staring back at me. I could tell that my coach and former soldier had been briefly possessed by the fear that a terrible joke was being played on his group. But then I actually saw him dismissing the thought — after all, who would do such a thing? I managed to tie up my confession with a tale about turning into a drug addict in my midtwenties — at least that much was true — and being startled into sobriety and religion after learning of my estranged clown father's passing from cirrhosis.

It was a testament to how dysfunctional the group was that my story flew more or less without comment.

I kinda' wish I'd been there for that! And THAT is saying something, as I spend the bulk of MY time trying to think of ways to live here without coming into direct contact with the indigenous peoples. Because I have lived all that Matt describes on a daily basis. It really does make me want to puke sometimes!

I know, it's a lousy way to live. It's what causes me to question my own belief in Buddhist Socialism. If I can't see them in any other way than that, how can I expect them to see me in any other way than they do. The social partition of class distinction, being taught by wrote in (at the very least) all public and private southern parochial schools.

I have to regularly remind myself that intolerance of intolerance is still intolerance.

True, I could see some other angles to what was going on as well. Virtually all of the participants of the Encounter identified either one or both of their parents as their "offender," and much of what Fortenberry was talking about in his instructional sessions was how to replace the godless atmosphere of abuse or neglect that the offenders had provided us with God and the church. He was taking broken people and giving them a road map to a new set of parents, a new family — your basic cultist bait-and-switch formula for cutting old emotional ties and redirecting that psychic energy toward the desired new destination. That connection would become more overt later in the weekend, but early on, this ur-father propaganda was the only thing I could see that separated Encounter Weekend from the typical self-help dreck of the secular world.

This article is Truth and Hilarity in one of the most grotesque dances of reality that one could imagine. There is plenty more that I'd like to site, for truth if not for the humor. But in the interest of brevity, I will conclude with this final passage.

By the end of the weekend I realized how quaint was the mere suggestion that Christians of this type should learn to "be rational" or "set aside your religion" about such things as the Iraq War or other policy matters. Once you've made a journey like this — once you've gone this far — you are beyond suggestible. It's not merely the informational indoctrination, the constant belittling of homosexuals and atheists and Muslims and pacifists, etc., that's the issue. It's that once you've gotten to this place, you've left behind the mental process that a person would need to form an independent opinion about such things. You make this journey precisely to experience the ecstasy of beating to the same big gristly heart with a roomful of like-minded folks. Once you reach that place with them, you're thinking with muscles, not neurons.

Read the article here.

US religious freedom watchdog mulls blacklisting Iraq

Let me see... Aren't the United States Military Forces there to provide safety and security, and to promote DEMOCRACY?

US religious freedom watchdog mulls blacklisting Iraq

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A US watchdog on religious freedom on Friday expressed serious concern over violations in strife-torn Iraq and was considering whether to place the ally of Washington on a blacklist with countries such as North Korea and Iran.

The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom said in a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that it was "seriously concerned" about religious freedom conditions in Iraq, where widespread persecution of Christians has been reported.

Yeah! And that's not counting all those Muslims that have died AS A DIRECT RESULT OF FOREIGN OCCUPATION! Let me see, that would be U.S.

A Little "Good News"

This is an excellent article by Noam Chomsky. But I chuckled aloud as I read the following.

Z Magazine - "Good News," Iraq & Beyond, Part II

Recent polls in Pakistan also provide "good news" for Washington. Fully 5 percent favor allowing U.S. or other foreign troops to enter Pakistan "to pursue or capture al Qaeda fighters." Nine percent favor allowing U.S. forces "to pursue and capture Taliban insurgents who have crossed over from Afghanistan." Almost half favor allowing Pakistani troops to do so. And only a little over 80 percent regard the U.S. military presence in Asia and Afghanistan as a threat to Pakistan, while an overwhelming majority believe that the U.S. is trying to harm the Islamic world.

The good news is that these results are a considerable improvement over October 2001, when a Newsweek poll found that "Eighty- three percent of Pakistanis surveyed say they side with the Taliban, with a mere 3 percent expressing support for the United States," while over 80 percent described Osama bin Laden as a guerrilla and 6 percent a terrorist.

Events elsewhere in early 2008 might also turn out to be "good news" for Washington. In January, in a remarkable act of courageous civil disobedience, tens of thousands of the tortured people of Gaza broke out of the prison to which they had been confined by the U.S.-Israel alliance (with the usual timid European support) as punishment for the crime of voting the wrong way in a free election in January 2006. It was instructive to see the front pages with stories reporting the brutal U.S. response to a genuinely free election alongside others lauding the Bush administration for its noble dedication to "democracy promotion" or sometimes gently chiding it because it was going too far in its idealism, failing to recognize that the unpeople of the Middle East are too backward to appreciate democracy—another principle that traces back to "Wilsonian idealism."

This glaring illustration of elite hatred and contempt for democracy is routinely reported, apparently with no awareness of what it signifies. To pick an illustration at random, Cam Simpson reports in the Wall Street Journal (February 8) that despite the harsh U.S.-Israeli punishment of Gaza and "flooding the West Bank's Western- backed Fatah-led government with diplomatic and economic support [to] persuade Palestinians in both territories to embrace Fatah and isolate Hamas," the opposite is happening: Hamas's popularity is increasing in the West Bank. As Simpson casually explains, "Hamas won Palestinian elections in January 2006, prompting the Israeli government and the Bush administration to lead a world-wide boycott of the Palestinian Authority," along with much more severe measures. The goal, unconcealed, is to punish the miscreants who fail to grasp the essential principle of democracy: "Do what we say, or else."

(Italics and bold added by the Heartland Heretic for emphasis.)

The wonderful world of the Neo-con! And such a legacy, too! We should all be very proud of those in whom we have placed our collective trust. But, what can we do? They stifle and oppress us here just as they do third-worlders. They just have an advantage here... years of media and mind manipulation for the masses, along with fluoridation of the water, mandatory psychological treatment (forced medication), and a pretty decent police militia armed to the teeth for any of those other malcontents.

Oh, and apparently they have engineered a 'stupid' gene and spliced it into the genetics of the "Average American". Because it is way past obvious that the American public cannot think for themselves any more.

The Looming Attack Against Asia

The knowledge of this fundamental truth does not restrain the intent to make war in the minds of the masters. The assertion that an attack against Israel "would be considered an attack on the U.S." by the current president and every presidential contender, as silly as it sounds, virtually assures that we will attack Iran, even if WE do the attack on Israel or arrange for it to be done. And this will disregard the safety and security concerns of any and all allies and interests in the region. You'd think some of this would matter. But apparently it doesn't. We have troops and equipment "...just sitting on the boarder collecting dust waiting for the Green Light".

It should be just about any time now, folks. Congratulations to Iran for making it personal for all Asians. It highlights the literal fallout of the operations that Bush & Co. are going to goad the world into.

Asia Times Online :: Middle East News, Iraq, Iran current affairs

This year, Iran finally becomes a natural gas-exporting country. The framework for the $7.6 billion Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline, also known as the "peace" pipeline, is a go. Both these key South Asian US allies are ignoring Bush administration desires and rapidly bolstering their economic, political, cultural, and - crucially - geostrategic connections with Iran. An attack on Iran would now inevitably be viewed as an attack against Asia.

Food Crisis Skyrocketing-avaaz.org

I just signed a petition urging world leaders to tackle the food crisis now gripping the world. This is important and I thought you might like to sign it too:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/world_food_crisis/tf.php
--
Have you noticed food costing more when you shop? Here’s why -- we're plunging headlong into a world food crisis. Rocketing prices are squeezing billions and triggering food riots around the world. In Sierra Leone alone the price of a bag of rice has doubled, now unaffordable for 90% of citizens. Fears of inflation stalk the whole world, and the worst could be yet to come.

We need to act now -- before it's too late. So we're launching an urgent campaign with African foreign minister and human rights campaigner Zainab Bangura. Click below to see Zainab's video message and add your name to the food crisis petition -- we need to raise 200,000 signatures by the end of this week to deliver a massive global outcry to leaders at the UN, G8 and EU:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/world_food_crisis/tf.php

Thanks!

Working people don’t need stimulus checks

Socialists: Working people don’t need stimulus checks
“Working people need good paying jobs”

Stewart A. Alexander
Nominee for Vice President Socialist Party USA
Candidate for Vice President Peace and Freedom Party

May 3, 2008

Today, millions of Americans are considering how they will spend their government rebate checks that will be received within the next few days and weeks. Recently, the Bush administration announced that the checks would be released earlier in hopes of giving the U.S. economy a needed jump start.

I have personally listened to many ideas of how these checks could be spent; the ideas range from taking a trip to Las Vegas, to hitting the local casinos; taking a vacation is another popular idea. The majority of people that I have encountered are hoping to receive their $300 to $600 check to help pay their mounting household bills. It also appears that most individuals have decided to put the shopping spree on hold and to use whatever extra cash to purchase gasoline.

This action by the president and the Feds, to reduce the time that 130 million Americans will need to wait before receiving their government checks, is another indication of the critical state the U.S. economy is now experiencing. Realistically, the government checks will do very little to relieve the financial dilemma for most working people. Most working people are struggling to survive, earning smaller paychecks, while paying more for food, fuel and daily expenses; and a one time check for $300 to $600 will be spent before most recipients are able to make the deposit into their bank accounts.

The government rebate checks are an example of the failures of capitalism and how a capitalist system will never meet the needs of working people. The checks are being sent to provide quick spending cash for millions of working people; however, these checks will provide few benefits for the poor and working class; while adding to the wealth and welfare of billionaires.

My wife, Vicki Alexander and I recently did an update on our monthly household budget to determine our finances as we approach the summer months. Since September 2007, our monthly expenses jumped a whopping $294. Our monthly gasoline cost, for the V6 Ford Mustang and the Ford Ranger, has increased an additional $78 monthly; and our groceries and food cost has increased an additional $60 monthly. All other household expenses were up an additional $156 monthly; a combined increase of $294 monthly and $3,528 annually. Millions of working people, across the nation are in the same situation as my wife and I, and a $600 government check will do little in the face of rising inflation and a shrinking U.S. economy.

This week, President Bush fired off some harsh criticism at the Democrats in Congress, “accusing lawmakers of dragging their feet on bills that would address pocketbook issues,” according to the New York Times; however, the blame rest with the president, the Democrats and Republicans. Washington leadership has gone on the offensive against working people and has allowed the capitalists to run wild, ravishing the pocketbooks of all working people.

While he was addressing the press at the White House, President Bush also stated that there is no easy fix for the U.S. economy; however, that is far from being the truth. Fixing the economy must begin by ending the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan; the war is destroying the U.S. economy and has completely destroyed the economies of these two war torn nations. These wars, whose tremendous cost is not offset by taxes, are the immediate cause of the weakness of the dollar, skyrocketing inflation and oil prices, and the widening trade deficit.

The president and U.S. Congress has the power and authority to end the present housing crisis; however, the president and Congress have only taken action to protect the interest of big banks and financial institutions, and global capitalists. The federal government needs to take immediate action to protect the millions of Americans that could lose their homes in 2008 and 2009, and shift the cost of the mortgage lending disaster from working people to the financial manipulators who created the problem.

An immediate change in tax policy must reverse the trend of the last thirty years of shifting the tax burden to those least able to pay. Income taxes should end on individuals earning less than $30,000 annually and couples earning less than $60,000 annually, and increased federal taxes on those with incomes in the millions, who pay less proportionately against the income they receive. Taxing the rich would replace the revenues that are now being paid by workers that are receiving the least income.

A real national rebuilding program is needed. The federal government must invest $3 trillion within the next five years and a total of $5 trillion over the next decade to rebuild the nation’s utilities, communications, and rail infrastructure, refurbish public buildings, strengthen bridges, and repair low income housing across America. The federal government must invest in constructing low income housing, providing jobs for low income families and providing good paying jobs for women and men.

To break the stranglehold of the big energy corporations and associated financial institutions on our government and economy, natural resources, including oil, must be brought under public ownership and democratically managed by the people, not controlled and owned by private corporations.

Socialists believe it is necessary to create good paying jobs for working people rather than mailing millions of people a one time welfare check. Socialists have called for higher minimum wages and developing socially useful jobs for all working people.

The federal government must develop programs to relieve working people from the tremendous debt burden that modern capitalism constantly creates; it is necessary to establish a Universal Basic Income (UBI) for all working people, and full comprehensive assistance for the aging. Even though many socialists have called for a Universally Guaranteed Personal Income (UGI), in the 21st Century it has become extremely necessary due to the multitude of failures inherent in a capitalist system.

For more information search the Web for: Stewart A. Alexander; Socialist: Federal tax relief package is welfare for billionaires; U.S. Federal tax relief vanishing at the pumps.
http://www.banderasnews.com/0803/edop-stewartalexander04.htm
http://labs.daylife.com/journalist/stewart_a._alexander

http://StewartAlexanderCares.com
http://www.vote-socialist.org/
http://peaceandfreedom-sjv.org/home/
http://www.sp-usa.org/
http://www.dcpoliticalreport.com/pres08.htm
http://www.politics1.com/p2008.htm

Take The Bush-McCain Challenge

I just took The Bush-McCain Challenge -- an online quiz to see if you can tell the difference between George W. Bush and John McCain. Check it out, and see how you can do! It's a little harder than it sounds.

Bush-McCainChallenge.com

If nothing else, it is an amusing way to kill 3-5 minutes.

A Bush in St. Louis is worth 1000 Liars

If i knew who it was that taught the chimp the word 'robust', I would slap the shit out of them! When that little Hitler gets a new word, he wears it out. Speaking of Hitler, I think it was he who said, "...if you repeat anything often enough, the masses will believe it", or something like that.

Now, everything is "robust" or "not quite as robust as we would like it to be". I suppose the death toll in Iraq is "robust".

Anyhow, can anyone tell me where they find these morons to sit and listen to that asshole lie, hanging on his every word? It seems to me that the son of a bitch should be able to find nothing but hostile audiences. Yet, they continue to appear at his little lie fests with hearts, minds and arms wide open. Kinda' makes the case for family planning and contraception, if you ask me... which you didn't.

Bush responds to jobs data - May. 2, 2008

President Bush, responding to recent economic reports, said on Friday that "the economy is not as robust as any of us would like it."

The U.S. Labor Department reported earlier in the day that the April unemployment rate dipped to 5% from 5.1% and that employers trimmed jobs for the fourth straight month. The 20,000 net reduction in jobs was less than economists had forecast.

Bush, speaking in St. Louis, also said that Wednesday's report on gross domestic product - showing that the U.S. economy expanded at sluggish 0.6% growth rate in the first quarter - was "not good enough for America."

Would YOU, Mr. Bush, just sit down, shut up, and go back to Crawford and stay. I'm sure Texas Death Row misses you.

Turkish government claims workers May day celebration was a threat to Turkish government claims workers May day celebration was a threat to national security

ORGANIZED RAGE

Yesterday Turkish workers were attacked by riot police as they attempted to defy their government decision to ban them from celebrating May day in Istanbul's Taksim Square. Below are a number of reports of the events that unfolded yesterday, which I have collated from the mainstream Turkish press, when reading these remember that they were taken from the bourgeois media.

ORGANIZED RAGE

A special thanks to organizedrage.blogspot.com . Keep up the good work!

West Coast Dockworkers Strike Against Iraq War

FINALLY, solidarity asserts itself! We need very badly to keep up the pressure.

Become an "Independent"

I hear a lot of people trying to express their dis- and malcontent with the current regime by declaring that the are "not Republican or Democrat, I'm an Independent!"

Well, bully for you! But what do they mean by "Independent"? In most cases you can be sure that it means that they will vote for either a Democrat or a Republican, they just don't want to publicly commit to either one.

But if you are reading this at all, then I probably don't need to mention that supporting either of those fine institutions is support for the status quo, business as usual, same old shik.

My point? Declaring yourself an "Independent", if not your first step toward abandoning capitalism altogether, is pointless. Why not just think for yourself. Read the lies put out by the press every day and recognize them for what they are: manipulation of the masses.

"Independent" indeed! Be independent long enough to realize how much we all need each other. Then you might make the socialist leap.

Defining Permanent Bases

The Washington double speak is baffling! Since when did "the state of mind contemplated by the use of the term," have anything to do with law... unless one of the signing party's are mentally or educationally impaired?

Base-less Strategy - FCNL Issues

Defining Permanent Bases


The administration has drawn comparisons between the structure of bases in post-World War II Germany and in South Korea after 1953 and its expectations for the longevity of bases in Iraq. Taking that as his cue, two days after Petraeus and Crocker testified before the Senate, Senator James Webb (D-VA) asked Assistant Defense Secretary Mary Beth Long to define what, in the administration's jargon, is a "permanent" base. When Long conceded that there was no such definition in her department, let alone in the administration, Webb observed that the word described not what the bases will be but what they won't be.

"Permanent," it now seems, "refers more to the state of mind contemplated by the use of the term," according to Long, rather than a physical reality. Thus administration officials can testify, as they did repeatedly during the hearing just referenced, that the United States will have no permanent bases in Iraq because their "state of mind" is that the bases are non-permanent. By extension, for every negotiation involving security commitments and the forward basing of military units (and what authorities these units might be permitted), defining the meaning of such terms as "permanent" and "commitment" becomes a recurring task. All participants in a potential agreement have to be clear as to the connotations as well as the denotations of the language used. Equally, like the dog that didn't bark in the middle of the night in Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes' mystery "Silver Blaze," negotiators need to agree on what is not meant by such words.

May Day, Law Day

Some are making the argument that May 1st is "Law Day" and in the same breath complaining about immigrant rallies taking place on this day (insinuating that said immigrants are by default "breaking the law" and hence, in violation of a sacred holiday somehow). So, here are the facts:

Law Day was created in the late 1950s, by the American Bar Association to draw attention to both the principles and practice of law and justice. President Dwight D. Eisenhower established Law Day by proclamation in 1958. It is defined in 36 U.S.C. § 113[1]. May 1, which is also International Workers' Day, was chosen as Law Day.

Like Earth Day, Law Day is not an actual government holiday. In fact, few outside the legal community in the United States are even aware of the existence of Law Day. To celebrate Law Day, some local bar associations hold a luncheon, featuring speakers who discuss topics such as justice or the liberties provided for by the United States Constitution. Also, attorneys might visit schools and talk to students about the American legal system.

It is suspected that the date of May 1 was, in the context of the then-growing Cold War climate, chosen to deflect attention from the May Day holiday celebrated by labor movements around the world.

While,

May Day occurs on May 1 and refers to any of several public holidays.[1] In many countries, May Day is synonymous with International Workers' Day, or Labour Day, which celebrates the social and economic achievements of the labor movement. As a day of celebration the holiday has ancient origins, and it can relate to many customs that have survived into modern times. Many of these customs are due to May Day being a cross-quarter day, meaning that it falls approximately halfway between an equinox and a solstice.

So, if truth be told, Law Day is an illegal usurpation of the legitimate holiday that is traditionally held on that day. Furthermore, it was usurped specifically to thwart the rightful recognition of the advancement of labor movements. And it is mostly known of only in legal circles. So obviously, it is the "legal" establishment within the U.S. which wants to interfere with the celebration of labor.

And guess who all of those "immigrants" out there rallying on May Day actually ARE. They are your labor force, of course.

So, if someone happens to wish you a "Happy Law Day", tell them what to do with law day and remind them that Labor is the source of all of their materialistic priorities and without Labor they would likely be lighting fires with two rocks.

Messages of hope

While I feel little 'hope' for America under the steely grip of corporate control that plagues our nation, I am stuck with the anticipation of which of the feral dogs will continue to bleed our nation dry. I will not vote for a Democrat nor a Republican this time around. I will vote Socialist. But I will do this with the knowledge that my candidate has no chance of winning. And looking at the pack of likely winners, I have to place my 'hope' in the only one who has not had a chance to prove that he (or she) is not a prick at heart. Senator Obama has many positions with which I do not concur. But I feel that he will do the least damage and at least try to improve the standing of our nation and the circumstances of our people. I have to hope...

That being said, here are a couple of Obama ads that I really liked and want to share. You can visit http://www.obamain30seconds.org and vote on your favorite ad.

Forgive me for hoping against hope that someone will try to make things better. I have known Hillary since '75. She is not the one. Let me put it this way: She is a lawyer and a politician. And if that doesn't clarify anything for you, she is a corporate crook who never got caught because the man who could have implicated her "committed suicide". Uh huh, right.

I have known of McCain since around the same time. As far as I am concerned, he should have been court martialed even before he was taken prisoner by the VC and collaborated with the enemy on multiple occasions. Hell, he crashed four military planes in non-combat flights, not counting the one he got shot down in! But he, being the son of an admiral received multiple medals and citations.

He worked with and for the Viet Cong, yet he will not even speak with American Socialists. Indeed, he will have them arrested for appearing at his office to request an audience.

He claims to be an agent of change... He is an agent, alright. Just not the kind that we need running our coutry.

US truckers call for nation-wide shutdown

And the last "one day strike" that they called for on April 1st was such a resounding success. The roads were FULL of truckers who either couldn't afford a day off or drove for companies that just don't care. Let's see how far their solidarity carries them this time.

US truckers call for nation-wide shutdown

Truckers' protest urges Congress to stop subsidizing oil industry and build new refineries

Wednesday April 30th, 2008

A convoy of trucks rolled through Washington, DC, on Monday, as part of a protest to pressure Congress into acting on high gas prices. As gas around the US hit an average of $3.66 per gallon--a full 66 cents above the price this time last year--truckers called on the US government to take action

Venezuelan Military Destroys Colombian Paramilitary Camp in Venezuela

Keep in mind that these are forces loyal to Alvarez Uribe of Columbia, George Bush's good buddy. And also note the nearly 175 pounds of cocaine located at their position. So much for the 'war on drugs'. Americans fund a fictitious war on drugs when our own president is neck deep in the trade.

Venezuelan Military Destroys Colombian Paramilitary Camp in Venezuela | venezuelanalysis.com

Caracas, April 29, 2008 (venezuelanalysis.com) - The National Armed Forces of Venezuela has detected and destroyed a camp presumably used by Colombian paramilitaries only 500 meters from Venezuela's border with Colombia in the municipality of Catatumbo, in the state of Zulia.

The camp was discovered on April 24 by military personnel during a routine patrol and reconnaissance as part of Operation Sierra 2008. The operation was initiated on April 17 and is aimed at combating the cultivation of illicit drugs and the cocaine trade from Colombia.

At the premises military fatigues, fire arms, ammunition, explosives, communications technology, camping equipment and armbands from the Auto-defence Units of Colombia (AUC), were found.

The discovery includes dorm-like installations and obstacles used to train paramilitary troops in over 236 sq. miles around the camp consisting of tunnels and obstacle courses and 79 kg of cocaine.

Iran executes hundreds in 2007 - Amnesty

Iran Focus - Iran executes hundreds in 2007 - Amnesty

Iran executes hundreds in 2007 - Amnesty PDF Print E-mail
Tuesday, 15 April 2008

Iran Focus

ImageLondon, Apr. 15 - Iran executed at least 317 people in 2007, a prominent international human rights organisation said on Tuesday.

Iran had the second-highest number of executions per capital, Amnesty International said in its yearly statistics, Death Sentences and Executions in 2007.

Only China, with a much larger population, executed more people than Iran, the report said.

The group highlighted the case of three individuals executed in Iran for crimes allegedly committed when they were minors. "Mohammad Mousawi (16 years old at the time of the offence), Sa'id Quanbar Zahi (17 years old at the time of the execution), Makwan Moloudzadeh (13 at the time of the offence) were executed in Iran on 22 April, 27 May and 4 December respectively", the report said.

The figure of 317 was considerably higher than the 177 number of executions that the group had said had been carried out in Iran in 2006.

The group said that the true number of people executed in Iran was believed to be higher than that reported.

And if we will recall, that's about the number of death warrants that George W. Bush signed in his term as Governor of Texas.

Iran and China killed that many as a Nation. G.W. killed that many as one man from one State, in the name of that State.

Keep it in perspective, people. If you are gonna start picking out international killers, be sure to include them all.

"For Eli"

Must Watch 3 Minute Video

Andrea Gibson at the 2006 poetry slam, performing "For Eli"

Fu** Your Yellow Ribbon.

A Special Thanks to Information Clearinghouse
for bringing such quality media to our attention.

Take it from a Veteran of the USMC, all the flag waving and lip service in the world will never return the men and women that left in the service of their country to the families they left behind.

In a local bread shop, the attendant seeing my Marine Corps ball cap asked me, "What do they teach you guy's in the Marine Corps? After one tour in Iraq, I don't even know my little brother any more. He can't even go into Walmart without flipping out. All he talks about is killing and death." I was stunned. I said, "They teach us to kill whoever is shooting at us."

And then after teaching us this "skill", they drop us into the middle of some god forsaken place where they have pissed everyone off to attract their fire, thus it becomes self-preservation.

And I can tell you this, as well. Once you kill a man, it is difficult to ever see mankind as anything other than drossy chattel again.

And then they label us anti-social. The very architects of the "kill or be killed" mentality label us, their dupes, their pawns, their mercenaries, as anti-social.

And "Support the Troops" car magnets, lapel pins, signs, and such make me sick. Because it fosters the atmosphere in which these atrocities are born.

If you really want to support our troops, bring them home NOW. And don't ever send them off to the battlefield again. If our nation is physically attacked, we would all likely take up arms in our defense. And this is as it should be! But to go picking fights...

the frustration leaves me speechless. Killing is serious business with serious ramifications to all who are left behind. And permanent ramifications for the dead and those who did the killing.

TOP 10 REASONS TO SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT IN ANWR

Reason number one should give us pause.
Alaska Oil Anwar

TOP 10 REASONS TO SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT IN ANWR
1. Only 8% of ANWR Would Be Considered for Exploration Only the 1.5 million acre or 8% on the northern coast of ANWR is being considered for development. The remaining 17.5 million acres or 92% of ANWR will remain permanently closed to any kind of development. If oil is discovered, less than 2000 acres of the over 1.5 million acres of the Coastal Plain would be affected. That¹s less than half of one percent of ANWR that would be affected by production activity.

The only permanency that we can be sure of is the permanent tendency of the imperialists to lie, cheat, steal, and kill to get whatever they want in spite of any permanent pledges they have ever made. They have been breaking promises and treatise since the inception of "the States". Just find a Native American (if you can) and ask them.

I mean, think about it. When the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) was created in 1960 the area was designated as a "protected" site where oil drilling would be prohibited for ecological reasons.

Now, they (the imperialists) want to carve out 1.5 million acres or 8% on the northern coast of ANWR for exploration and drilling. The typical "What we said then doesn't count now" reasoning is the rule of the day.

And this is George W. Bush, John "Songbird" McCain and the Republican Party's answer to oil addiction. And I still can't understand EVERYONE'S fixation on the necessity to burn something to produce power. It's like, no one even wants to think about REAL ALTERNATIVES to "combustion". (Might I point the reader to a previous post here.)

If you would like to look at a long list of lies, deceptions, and aggressions committed by this band of thugs and their ilk, you should read Amoral America.

Just sit back and let them go, as you have in the past. Eventually, whatever they want will belong to you... and they will take it, and possibly kill you for the trouble of taking it from you.

Oh yeah, I'm the fruitcake.

Cops: Deputies shoot, kill man with knives at Calif. court

Cops: Deputies shoot, kill man with knives at Calif. court

MERCED, Calif. (AP) - Three sheriff's deputies fatally shot a man who stormed through security at a county courthouse Monday brandishing two large butcher knives, authorities said.

Guards tried to stop the man after he ran through metal detectors at the Merced County courthouse, but couldn't catch up to him as he moved down a crowded hallway, Chief Deputy District Attorney Harold Nutt said.

The man busted through the doors of Courtroom 2, and into an area where lawyers were standing as court was proceeding, Nutt said.

"As soon as he hit the inside doors I was behind him and I started yelling that he had a knife," Nutt said. "The officers started yelling at him, and yelling at everybody else to get down and at that point it was rather chaotic. People started screaming, people started heading for the door, and I just ran back outside."

As the judge tried to hurry his court clerks out of the courtroom through his chambers, the man held the knives in a stabbing position, Nutt said.

When the man refused to drop the weapons, three officers fired directly at him, and the man died on the courtroom floor, in front of several dozen attorneys, law enforcement officers and others doing business in the court, sheriff's spokesman Tom MacKenzie said.

No other injuries were immediately reported. The courthouse remained on lockdown as investigators interviewed witnesses and the three sheriff's deputies, MacKenzie said.

Nutt said a public defender told him he recognized the man who was killed as a previous client with a history of mental illness.

Now, let me see if I got this right...

Three Cops who couldn't stop an obviously deranged man chased him into a chamber full of lawyers, judges and clerks and shot the man in that room full of people. All three of them! And they shot not just to "wing" him, but to kill him! In a room full of people! You can almost bet that if they weren't all "Johnny Law" themselves, someone would be claiming "excessive force". Because no matter how deranged the man was, he needed help - not bullets. (He was probably a vet!)

I stated in an earlier post that cops are only here to kill us, or take our property or families. And today presents a prime example of their bungling, inept implementation of the law: "Just fucking kill them. Kill them all!"

Yeah, well, karma is a bitch. Good luck with that.

Chavez confirms he is willing to help negotiate release of US hostages

I suppose that Bill Richardson is not exactly on the "friends" list of the Bush Administration right now, not to mention the chagrin of Alvarez Uribe. Gov. Richardson will probably be placed on the "watch list" of Homeland Security for his co-operative attitude towards the Venezuelan President. At least, a western diplomat is realizing the potential of a symbiotic relationship with the Bolivarian leader. Will anyone else come to their senses?

Venezuela's Chavez confirms he is willing to help negotiate release of US hostages - International Herald Tribune

CARACAS, Venezuela: President Hugo Chavez said Sunday he will try to facilitate the release of three Americans held captive by Colombia's largest rebel group even though he has lost contact with the guerrillas.

Chavez confirmed his willingness to help a day after New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said the socialist leader had agreed to mediate a possible exchange of the U.S. defense contractors for imprisoned guerrillas.

"I told him that we're at their service, to try to help even though the issue is very complicated," said Chavez, speaking during his weekly television and radio program.

Ethnic Cleansing in North America

So, you thought that the genocide of the Native North American People was over? Think again!

Support TMT - Free Shawn Brant

These particular charges stemmed from an earlier demonstration around the Culbertson Tract, land which the federal government has long acknowledged rightfully belongs to the Mohawks but which is languishing at the negotiation table. On November 15th, 2006, Mohawks from Tyendinaga erected posters at the site of a proposed 140-home development project which was later scuttled due to Mohawk resistance to building on their land. During the protest, five Canadian Military vehicles were spotted traveling in a convoy through the reserve. In the context of the history of military involvement in policing Native protest across Canada, the convoy was seen as a veiled threat. The Mohawks blocked the vehicles' path with cars and trucks, eventually allowing the O.P.P. to escort the military away. No one was charged until two months later - just days after Shawn Brant announced that Tyendinaga Mohawks planned to take blockade actions as part of the upcoming June 29th Aboriginal Day of Action, the three Mohawks were charged.

As is always the case with Capitalists, if they want something that even they admit is rightly yours, they will simply take it by force! "If you are not with us, you are a terrorist and we will kill you". Proud to be uhmericun!

Army, Marines up enlistment of ex-convicts

It should give one pause to consider the relationship of this issue to the facts that matter. Most convicts are low educated, poor, minorities. In other words, we are beginning to use the same people that we forced to die for nothing in Vietnam. And most of them don't even understand that they are being duped.

Army, Marines up enlistment of ex-convicts

"Concerns have been raised that the significant increase in the recruitment of persons with criminal records is a result of the strain put on the military by the Iraq war and may be undermining military readiness," said House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.).

In 2006, the regular Army granted 249 waivers to felons so they could join up. But the number jumped to 511 last year, Waxman said, citing statistics provided by the Pentagon's top personnel official, David Chu.

The Marines went from 208 waivers to 350 during the same period, Waxman said.

Those numbers are even higher if active-duty and Army Reserve waivers for those charged with felonies who were never convicted are factored in.

Would you rather stop bullets for fascist pigs, or adopt the philosophy of Henry David Thoreau and sit in a cell (where it is safe and warm, and people cook your meals) and live for what you believe?

The problem here is that soooooo many of these "good christian" assholes don't believe in anything to begin with... with the exception of, "I believe I'll drink some more beer and go beat my wife and kids".

Frame-up Charges Against Larry Hales HAVE BEEN DROPPED!

More Police brutality? Now, why does that not surprise me?

Troops Out Now Coalition

On Nov. 30, 2007 African-American police brutality and anti-war activist Larry Hales was arrested after 10 cops illegally busted into his home without a warrant and without permission, physically attacked him and handcuffed his partner to a chair. He is facing frame-up charges of "interfering with the police" and faces extended jail time for being the victim of a police attack.

At the time of the police attack, Hales and his partner Melissa Kleinman were housing a survivor of police brutality who was on parole. The man had been shot in the back by police and had filed a civil case against the Aurora police department. Hales had previously agreed to house visits by the man's parole officer, but only when the man was home.

However, when Hales told the police officers at his door on Nov. 30 that the parolee wasn't home, and asked to see the business cards that because of a city ordinance Denver police must carry and surrender upon request, he had badges stuck in his face and told that they didn't have to give him their cards. Hales told them that they didn't have permission to come in, that the parolee was not home and that he wanted their cards. One of them scoffed and pushed the door open and him out of the way.

The cops charged into his apartment and ransacked his house. When Hales expressed concern that his cats would escape, he was shoved. When he asserted his rights, the police told him to shut up and violently attacked him, twisting his arm, grabbing him by the back of the neck, ripping out several of his dreadlocks, throwing him against the wall, and tearing off his shirt. He was pushed down the stairs of his apartment building, against the wall and railings and out into the cold night with a half-ripped shirt, socks and thin sweat pants. One officer squeezed his cuffs and the two had an exchange, where the officer remarked that more could be done and that Hales could end up face down on the ground, then he was hit in the stomach and thrown into the car.

The officers rolled the front windows down, left Hales in the car, told him he looked like he might hurt himself and that he would be booked as a "John Doe" and have to spend 72 hours in jail before anyone could find him. He spent the night in a freezing jail cell.

Police brutality is rampant in Denver, and this attack is part of the ongoing attacks on Black youth, from the Jena 6 to Sean Bell and countless cases of police brutality and repression throughout the country.

Had enough yet? Obviously not. Don't worry, they will be knocking down your door soon!

3 NYPD detectives acquitted in 50-shot killing

Could anyone have honestly expected any other outcome?
3 NYPD detectives acquitted in 50-shot killing

Three detectives were acquitted of all charges Friday in the 50-shot killing of an unarmed groom-to-be on his wedding day, a case that put the NYPD at the center of another dispute involving allegations of excessive firepower.

Reverend Al Sharpton suggested in a public statement regarding the acquittals that this was not a miscarriage of justice but was an abortion of justice. I would go even farther to suggest that what passes for 'government' in North America is no less than an abortion of social science.

The hard line drawn between law enforcement and "the criminals" that make up our society (that's YOU) by the judicial is quite apparent. Know this: YOU are expendable and if you are not the target of police aggression, you are acceptable collateral damage. Cops Kill. They are not there for any other reason than to kill you and/or take your property and family. And YOU are apparently OK with that. Fine. FY. You will get yours along with the Nazi rulers.

Prison Nation

So, we find that "democracy", as viewed through the narrow minds of our keepers, is the reason for high incarceration rates. Why does that make my stomach turn?

U.S. prison population dwarfs that of other nations

Several specialists here and abroad pointed to a surprising explanation for the high incarceration rate in the United States: democracy. Most state court judges and prosecutors in the United States are elected and are therefore sensitive to a public that is, according to opinion polls, generally in favor of tough crime policies. In the rest of the world, criminal justice professionals tend to be civil servants who are insulated from popular demands for tough sentencing.

Meanwhile, FBI agents have been busy teaching "terrorists" how to build bombs (to hit the WTC), organizing youths into swearing allegiance to Al-CIA-duh (Liberty City Seven), and incarcerating hundreds of children for allegedly having CHRISTIAN religious fanatics for parents.

And I can speak to Missouri policy on convicts: if you have HIV, you will do the maximum amount of time (no good time). Yeah, the show me State.

U.S. to Expand Collection Of Crime Suspects' DNA

U.S. to Expand Collection Of Crime Suspects' DNA

U.S. to Expand Collection Of Crime Suspects' DNA
Policy Adds People Arrested but Not Convicted
By Ellen Nakashima and Spencer Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, April 17, 2008; A01

The U.S. government will soon begin collecting DNA samples from all citizens arrested in connection with any federal crime and from many immigrants detained by federal authorities, adding genetic identifiers from more than 1 million individuals a year to the swiftly growing federal law enforcement DNA database.

The policy will substantially expand the current practice of routinely collecting DNA samples from only those convicted of federal crimes, and it will build on a growing policy among states to collect DNA from many people who are arrested. Thirteen states do so now and turn their data over to the federal government.

The initiative, to be published as a proposed rule in the Federal Register in coming days, reflects a congressional directive that DNA from arrestees be collected to help catch a range of domestic criminals. But it also requires, for the first time, the collection of DNA samples from people other than U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents who are detained by U.S. authorities.

And why should this be of concern to "law abiding" citizenry? For starters, now YOU don't have to break the law for them to TAKE your DNA. And once they have your sequence, they can grow your DNA in the lab and place you wherever they want you to have been.

Oh, yeah.

Now they can commit whatever "operation" they wish, plant someone else's (anyone they choose) DNA at the scene, and then "capture and prosecute" the "terrorist" for the crime they themselves perpetrated.

You say, "Paranoid?" I say, do you want to find out? You're about to.

The Price of doing Business

US military deaths in Iraq at 4,037

Apr 18, 7:08 PM (ET) By The Associated Press

As of Friday, April 18, 2008, at least 4,037 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes eight military civilians. At least 3,295 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers.

So, this would suggest that approximately one American per week dies in non-combat related incidents, as a price of doing business. Not to suggest that the loss of well over a million Iraqis is not more egregious! But if this venture were a business with an employee a week mortality rate for over 5 years, they would have been shut down years ago. And someone would likely be in jail!

“Housing bill- homeowners lose round one in U.S. Senate”

Senate housing bill- more grief for homeowners
“Housing bill- homeowners lose round one in U.S. Senate”

Stewart A. Alexander
Socialist Party USA Nominee for Vice President
Candidate for Vice President Peace and Freedom Party

April 14, 2008

Socialists across the nation are rejecting a U.S. Senate housing bill that offers little help to struggling homeowners facing foreclosure, while providing tens of billions for banks, financial institutions and big corporations. The bill (Foreclosure Prevention Act) passed in the Senate this past week by a vote of 84-12 and has been sent to the House. The vote was clearly a major setback for millions of homeowners and a big win for banks and big businesses.

There is a major provision in the housing bill that will likely exacerbate the housing crisis and will cause hundreds of thousands of working families to lose their homes; the measure provides a $7,000 tax credit for people who will buy foreclosed properties and will provide huge tax breaks for big businesses; an estimated $25 billion.

While the housing bill was still in the Senate, there was an amendment to the bill that was quickly voted down by the Democrats and Republicans. That amendment would have offered protection to struggling homeowners, giving federal judges the ability to adjust mortgage terms. More of an insult to homeowners, the bill provides financial assistance to homeowners for foreclosure counseling.

The U.S. housing crisis is a national tragedy and it is impacting neighborhoods across the country. The City of Murrieta, California is a small city with a population just under 100,000. In 2007, one of every nine Murrieta homes entered foreclosure, more than anywhere else in the country, according to data from Realty Trac, a foreclosure tracking service, and the Southern California Association of Governments.

Socialists nationwide stand in total opposition to the Foreclosure Prevention Act because it will not benefit struggling homeowners in jeopardy of losing their homes; this legislation will only provide more welfare funding for wealthy billionaires. It is important for Congress to develop comprehensive legislation that will protect homeowners and working families.

Congress must take immediate measures to protect the financial security of working class families. Congress must implement broad based legislation to deal with the mortgage crisis, sagging wages, inflation and the recession.

First, Congress must freeze all balloon payments for a period of 18 months. Congress must also eliminate all adjustable loans. During the next 24 months, Congress must act, giving federal courts the authority to prevent foreclosures and to alter mortgage terms.

Homeowners that have been in their homes for less than 36 months should be allowed to vacate their home with a small reimbursement fee, from the mortgage lender, to provide funds for relocation if it can be determined, in U.S. Federal Court, that the loan was negotiated under fraudulent conditions.

Congress should also act to restore the credit of millions of individuals that have been the victims of credit fraud. If it can be determined that a home loan was made fraudulently, the buyer’s credit should be restored, not to indicate a bank foreclosure.

Congress should also direct the U.S. Justice Department to seize certain banks, mortgage companies and financial institutions that have violated professional standards that may have put homeowners and hard working families at risk.

The Foreclosure Prevention Act is not for working families; it will only benefit Wall Street while creating more potholes on Main Street. An estimated 8,000 families are losing their homes everyday; if the Foreclosure Prevention Act becomes law, it will only increase the rate of foreclosures.

For more information search the web for: Stewart A. Alexander; Mortgage Crisis Jeopardizing Working Class Families http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2007/11/369231.shtml
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/apr2008/home-a05.shtml

http://StewartAlexanderCares.com
http://www.vote-socialist.org/
http://peaceandfreedom-sjv.org/home/
http://www.dcpoliticalreport.com/pres08.htm
http://www.politics1.com/p2008.htm

SEIU International Attacks Labor Gathering

And this is the way labor behaves with each other? I think not. Someone here has no interest at all in the plight of the worker and should be outed for their subversive motives. If Labor is going to blaze the path of a brave new world, we need to clean ourselves up. And management organizations must not be allowed to masquerade as workers' unions. The line of division must be clear.

And when we are physically attacked in lieu of civil discourse, I see no alternative save self-defense with equal or greater force than that of the attackers. We must not be "brought down to their level". But we must not be trampled under, either.

Dearborn, MI-The Service Employees International Union turned their dispute with the California Nurses Association violent by attacking a labor conference April 12, injuring several and sending an American Axle striker to the hospital.

A recently retired member of United Auto Workers Local 235, Dianne Feeley, suffered a head wound after being knocked to the ground by SEIU International staff and local members. Other conference-goers- members of the Teamsters, UAW, UNITE HERE, International Longshoremen' s Association, and SEIU itself-were punched, kicked, shoved, and pushed to the floor. Dearborn police responded and evicted the three bus loads of SEIU International staff and members of local and regional health care unions. No arrests were made.

The assault took place at the Labor Notes conference, a biennial gathering of 1,100 union members and leaders who met to discuss strategies to rebuild the labor movement.

David Cohen, an international representative of the United Electrical Workers, asked protesters why they came. He said one responded, "they told us just to get on the bus."

The protesters included several members with young children, who had to be ushered away when SEIU tried to force their way into the conference banquet hall. Protesters were targeting Rose Ann DeMoro, executive director of the AFL-CIO-affiliated CNA. DeMoro was scheduled to speak but declined to appear after threats were made against her union's leadership.

Despite being welcomed to the conference earlier in the day-and given space to debate supporters of the CNA and the National Nurses Organizing Committee about neutrality organizing agreements-SEIU international and regional staff shouted down speakers at workshops and panels throughout the event.

"Labor Notes has always been a space for open debate, but when a union decides to engage in violence against their brothers and sisters, we draw a line," said Mark Brenner, director of Labor Notes. "Violence within the labor movement is unacceptable and we call on the national leadership of SEIU, including President Andy Stern, to repudiate it."

The SEIU International has a policy of 'Partnership with Capital" at
the expense of its own members and other unions. The SEIU thugs attack
a meeting workers and assault people and 'no arrests were made'. These
thugs have the protection of the boss' government through the open
collaboration of the SEIU International Union. When was the last time
that the SEIU International Union defended a picket line? Hell most of
them have never been on a picket line.

More Real McCain

10 things you should know about John McCain (but probably don't):

1. John McCain voted against establishing a national holiday in honor
of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Now he says his position has "evolved,"
yet he's continued to oppose key civil rights laws.¹

2.
According to Bloomberg News, McCain is more hawkish than Bush on Iraq,
Russia and China. Conservative columnist Pat Buchanan says
McCain "will make Cheney look like Gandhi."²

3. His reputation is built on his opposition to torture, but McCain
voted against a bill to ban waterboarding, and then applauded President
Bush for vetoing that ban.³

4. McCain opposes a woman's right to choose. He said, "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned."⁴

5. The Children's Defense Fund rated McCain as the worst senator in
Congress for children. He voted against the children's health care bill last
year, then defended Bush's veto of the bill.⁵

6. He's one of the richest people in a Senate filled with millionaires.
The Associated Press reports he and his wife own at least eight homes!
Yet McCain says the solution to the housing crisis is for people facing foreclosure to get a "second job" and skip
their vacations.⁶





7. Many of McCain's fellow Republican senators say he's too reckless to
be commander in chief. One Republican senator said: "The thought of his being president sends a cold chill down my spine.
He's erratic. He's hotheaded. He loses his temper and he worries me."⁷

8. McCain talks a lot about taking on special interests, but his
campaign manager and top advisers are actually lobbyists. The
government watchdog group Public Citizen says McCain has 59 lobbyists
raising money for his campaign, more than any of the other presidential
candidates.⁸

9. McCain has sought closer ties to the extreme religious right in recent
years. The pastor McCain calls his "spiritual guide," Rod Parsley,
believes America's founding mission is to destroy Islam, which he calls
a "false religion." McCain sought the political support of right-wing preacher
John Hagee, who believes Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment for gay
rights and called the Catholic Church "the Antichrist" and a "false
cult."⁹

10. He positions himself as pro-environment, but he scored a 0—yes, zero—from the League of Conservation Voters
last year.¹⁰

John McCain is not who the Washington press corps make him out to be.

The Real Mccain

Get to know the man. You may be seeing a lot of him in the future!
CPUSA Online

04/07/2008 16:55 IT department sat down with Carolyn Trowbridge National Committee member of the CPUSA from Arizona to talk about her favorite Senator John McCain.

April 6th General Strike in Egypt

Arabisto.com

The text of the document from when all this activity apparently springs is as follows: “All national forces in Egypt have agreed upon the 6th of April to be a public strike. On the 6th of April, stay home, do not go out; Don’t go to work, don’t go to the university, don’t go to school, don’t open your shop, don’t open your pharmacy, don’t go to the police station, don’t go to the camp; We need salaries allowing us to live, we need to work, we want our children to get education, we need human transportation means, we want hospitals to get treatment, we want medicines for our children, we need just judiciary, we want security, we want freedom and dignity, we want apartments for youth; We don’t want prices increase, we don’t want favoritism, we don’t want police in plain clothes, we don’t want torture in police stations, we don’t want corruption, we don’t want bribes, we don’t want detentions. Tell your friends not to go to work and ask them to join the strike.” It was signed by and supported by the Al-Karama Party, the Al-Wasat Party, the Labor Party, Kifaya, the Bar Association, Educational Workers Movement, University Professors, Grain Mill Workers and of course the Ghazl Al-Mahala workers. The U.S. Embassy in Cairo, however, does NOT support it and has threatened to fire anyone who misses work on Sunday.

It is obvious from this text that workers the world over are fed up with Capitalisms failed strategy of Free Market self regulation. While the world enjoys the greatest food surpluses in history, food prices are rising and wages and employment are falling. While imperialist regimes subsidize multi-billion dollar banking interests, they tell the masses to go eat rocks. They also drive home the fact that if workers complain about the impoverishment they are suffering that they will "fire" them and hire someone who is willing to work for peanuts in any event. It is hard (though not impossible) for me to find guilt in anyone who is trying to earn a buck to survive in spite of a workers' strike, but institutionalized hunger and poverty is exactly what allows big business to operate in spite of a workers' strike.

I was SHOCKED on April 1,2008 when the Teamsters had announced that there would be a general strike of the trucking industry in the U.S. but the roads were still crowded with big rigs. The fact is that if some independent truckers stop their trucks, even for a day, they will lose their livelihood altogether. I understand this position. But the economic leverage that big business has over "the little guy" is clearly demonstrated here. Work and go slowly under or strike and free fall into absolute poverty and homelessness.

So, the question becomes not when we will strike to flex our collective economic muscle but when we will Socialize all industry and remove those corrupt "middle men" who contribute little or nothing to the value of a product or service from the economic food chain. Striking does indeed serve a purpose. But it will not be the vehicle for social change. Only sweeping global economic and political reforms hold any chance of removing the element of greed from the global approach toward a free and prosperous global society.

Strike if you will and strike if you must. But solidification of all left and socialist groups, parties, and peoples in their common goal will be necessary to correct the damages wrought on society in general by "free market" and Capitalist Privatization. Only a unified voice aimed at removing the influence of special and private interests from the decision and policy making processes of governments can ever promote the progress that our world so desperately needs. And for this we need leadership from within our ranks. And there is not one headliner candidate in the U.S. Presidential Campaign that fills that bill.

Vermont Supreme Court Rules Search Warrant Required for Overflight Surveillance

Montpelier,
VT: The Vermont Supreme Court ruled last week that police must first obtain a search warrant before making low level surveillance flights over private property.

The case began after a Forest Service official, believing defendant Stephan Bryant to be "paranoid" about his privacy, suggested to Vermont State Police that they conduct a fly-over to look for marijuana. On Aug. 7, 2003, a state trooper and an Army National Guard pilot flew over the property hovering about 100 feet above it for 15 to 30 minutes, according to Friday’s court opinion. Two plots of marijuana were spotted from the air. Law enforcement then applied for and received a search warrant, and seized about 45 plants.

Ruling that Vermonters’ right to privacy extends to the airspace above their homes, the state’s highest court threw out a felony marijuana cultivation conviction against Bryant. A 57-year-old contractor, Bryant testified at his 2005 trial that he uses marijuana as an analgesic, to
cope with pain he suffers as the result of a construction accident in the 1970s. His property, on a wooded hillside in a remote area of Goshen, is accessible only by a locked gate on a US Forest Service road.

In a 4-1 decision, the justices said the helicopter wasn’t high enough when it made its flyover.

"The occupants were law-enforcement officers, trained in the identification of marijuana, who conducted an overflight at illegal altitudes solely for the purpose of discovering evidence of crime within a private enclave into which they were constitutionally forbidden to intrude at ground level without a warrant," the Court wrote in it’s ruling. "The actions of law enforcement — flying only 100 feet above the ground for up to 30 minutes over a hillside home — were an unreasonable intrusion of privacy that triggers constitutional protection."

"It doesn’t matter if the invasion comes on wheels or on helicopter rotors," said Bryant’s lawyer, William Nelson. "Vermonters have a
right to expect the government will not be intruding on their privacy, whether it’s in their house, in their backyard or on their property."

For more information, contact NORML Legal Director Keith
Stroup at 202-483-5500.

A major blow to the fascist regime and to those who would follow in their steps. While I don't hold out much hope for the preservation of our Bill of Rights in the long run, it warms my heart each and every time my brothers keeper takes a shot to the nuts. It doesn't happen nearly enough!

HIV-Positive Man Wins Acquittal In Texas’ First Cannabis Medical Necessity Defense

HIV-Positive Man Wins Acquittal In Texas’ First Cannabis Medical Necessity Defense --
NORML Legal Committee Member Leads Defense

Amarillo,
TX: NORML Legal
Committee member Jeff Blackburn won an acquittal for a man charged
with possession of marijuana, by successfully raising a medical necessity
defense, believed to be the first to be accepted in Texas courts.

Defendant Tim Stevens, 53, had never been in legal trouble
until Amarillo police arrested
him for possessing less than 4 grams of marijuana. Mr. Stevens†is HIV-positive
and uses medical marijuana in conjunction with his anti-viral medications.

Defense expert Dr. Steve Jenison, Medical Director of the
Infectious Diseases Bureau for the Department of Health in New Mexico, carried the day with his
testimony. Dr. Jenison detailed his success with the New Mexico medical
marijuana program in treating severe symptoms, particularly nausea and cyclical
vomiting, that plague many HIV / AIDS and cancer patients—for many of whom no
effective medicinal alternative exists. "[Jenison]…was a dynamite witness,"
Blackburn said. "All of this evidence came together and made for a solid defense
case -- one strong enough for us to get an instruction to the jury that they
should acquit if they had a reasonable doubt about medical
necessity."

"We prepared a very extensive presentation about the
medical benefits of marijuana," Blackburn continued. "We relied on clearly
established scientific studies and approaches, all of which show that there are
distinct benefits derived from the use of inhaled marijuana." The jury was out
only eleven minutes before reaching a unanimous verdict of "not guilty." County
attorney Scott Brumley called the verdict "unfortunate." "I respect the jury's
verdict. ... That doesn't mean I agree with it," he said.

Blackburn, who also serves as chief counsel for the Innocence
Project of Texas,
which seeks to identify and exonerate innocent people who have been mistakenly
convicted and imprisoned, believes that this victory can be replicated in other
states as well. "Nearly all states have some variant of the old common law
necessity defense."

For more information, please contact NORML Legal Director
Keith Stroup at 202-483-5500.

Chelsea Clinton Again Asked About Lewinsky

Slick Willy's lies were our business when he was President and since he and his megalomaniacal mate have thrust themselves back into the national lime light, it is still our business. If you don't like the questions being put to you, go back to your cushy 6 figure job and quit touting your parents as the messiah incarnate. If you don't like circumstances in which you find yourself, why don't you take a look in the direction of those who have placed you there: Hill and Bill.

Chelsea Clinton Again Asked About Lewinsky

An audience member at North Carolina State University in Raleigh pressed Clinton on Monday to discuss the Lewinsky scandal, which led to the impeachment of her father, former President Bill Clinton. Clinton declined again Monday to discuss her father's relationship with the White House intern, drawing applause when she told the young man that it was none of his business.

Dear Chelsea,
If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.
Really.
Two Clinton's are more than enough.