28 July 2007

Gorbachev attacks American Imperialism

Former President Mikhail Gorbachev said Friday that the fall of the Soviet Union, which he helped bring about, ushered in an era of U.S. imperialism responsible for many of the world's gravest problems.

I truly don't understand how something this important could get absolutely zero coverage in the western world. This issue is at the forefront of what has gone wrong with the world in the last 20 years.

In the insane days of the Cold War, there was a counterbalance between the Communists centered in the Soviet Union and the capitalists centered in the United States. With both sides mounting multiple warhead ICBMs (InterContintinental Ballistic Missiles) capable of horrific destructive capacity, there was an atmosphere of Mututally Assured Destruction (MAD), which didn't allow either side to get too agressive.

Michael Gorbachev ascended to the rule the Politburo of the Communist party, and this man of vision clearly saw that the adversarial and antagonistic attitudes of both nations was hurting both parties. In a bold move, he unilaterally began opening up the USSR to change in a show of good faith thru such measures as perestroika and glasnost (google or wikipedia them if you are unfamiliar).

Gorbachev was a man of peace and made the first overtures of reconcilliation, expecting that the US would follow suite and initiate their own domestic measures of trust and disarmament. Unfortunately, under the conservative cultural change embodied by the great deceiver Ronald Reagan, the powers that be in our county interpreted every concession by the USSR as further cause what we were right in the first place.

This is like some schoolyard squabble where one kid realizes thats its ridiculous to fight, so they begin to seek compromise (regardless of who was right in the first place or who threw the first punch). Let bygones be bygones and lets just walk away so to speak. But this other kid doesn't have peace on his mind, and see's every gesture of the first kid as being a pussy, so gets even more aggressive. Without a playground monitor, you can guess where this leads.

The US had and continues to have a moral obligation to stand down. We must dismantle our gargantuan sized military industrial complex, and use the peace dividend to rebuild our nation. No more world police, no more CIA overthrows of foreign governments, no more invasions of sovereign countries. The end result of us showing our truly peaceful character is a better world. The result of us bullying the world in a show of superiority is for other nations to rise up and confront us in the future. Its our choice.

Another MidEast Gamble

US 'plans huge Saudi arms deal'

In a huge strategic gamble, the Bush Administration plans to sell the conservative republic of Saudi Arabia 20 billion dollars worth of sophisticated weaponry to counter the growing strength of Iran in the region. Iran is far from a friend of liberal freedoms in the world. In fact, they are so brutally repressive towards basic human liberties, that they make King George and his neocon collaborators look nice in comparison. Iran is an ultra conservative power in the region that must be dealt with at some point and time. The main question is how and when.

Let us review some of the strategic gambles the US has taken in the Middle East in the past. To counter Soviet alliances among Arab republics, the Pentagon gave a vast arsenal to our current ally in the region, the Shah in Iran. Being shortsighted as the military industrial complex often proves to be, they failed to predict a mass popular uprising in that country in 1979.
Following the horrific events of that tragedy, they fueled one Saddam Hussein with massive amounts of weaponry to counter the Islamic republic in Iran. Again, failing to see things as they really are, Hussein turned out to be a brutal dictator, more bent on his own ambitions than anything else. Iraq soon turned its new arms on a territorial gambit with Kuwait. The first and second wars ensued (and let me say, the second was completely unnecessary).

Which brings us to this latest gamble. The Pentagon argues that Saudi Arabia is steady ally in the region that supports a march towards not only Western, but humanistic values (basic freedoms of human beings) and is prepared to support them with the brute force of advanced weaponry. What if, now this a hypothetical, but the question must be asked, WHAT IF this sale turns out to once again go to support some force of evil in the region? It would be testimony to the failure of the central forces in the US once again to be a force for good in the region.

We must tread very carefully in this hornets nest of regions. Giving deadly weapons to a country based on poor evidence could backfire yet again on us.

26 July 2007

Decades of False Detention in the US

The BBC reports that "[four men] spent decades in prison after the FBI withheld evidence of their innocence. Two died in jail. After being falsely convicted and jailed in 1965, they were finally released in 2001 when the buried evidence of their innocence finally leaked its way out of the FBIs secrative locked files. For those of us in dictatorial-like states with excessive government control, this comes as no real surprise, the fact that it ever was proven to have taken place is most surprising. People disappear or are falsely imprisoned everyday in the United States and other harsh countries in the world.

A jury awared the families a total of $100 million US (worth much less with our wimpy dollar and being split by 4 families), which is hardly compensation for spending 36 years, half of their lives in a federal pen. The men who were behind this cowardly act should be imprisoned for the rest of their lives to give them a taste of what they did to innocent men, which would hardly even be enough, since these men have spent the better parts of their lives in freedom and are now nearly dead themselves.

25 July 2007

The good fight

"Democrats gather in Tennessee this weekend to discuss how to appeal to moderate, independent-minded voters in 2008" AP. There is a bit of an identity crisis in the democratic party the last couple decades. On one hand, the left side of the party advocates a strong stance on issues of social justice and the other, often termed the "moderate" side advocates a soft spoken approach.

In the last election, John Kerry listened to the moderate side of the party and tried to appeal early to the more "centrist" issues and "independent" voters. His opponent, King George was starkly devisive, had strongly worded speeches, and appealed solely to the hard core ultra conservative base (didn't even attempt to appeal to independent voters). What was the result? As bad of a president as he proved to be, driving our nation into deep debt, selling out to China, making up bullshit excuses to invade Iraq, and waging a deadly assault on the Constituion, this horror of presidents won by 3 million votes!

When will the Democratic party wake up? Evil must be opposed. Wrongs must be confronted. The conservative Republican deceit must be fought. The only thing that keeping your mouths shut will do is to let them get their way and win yet another presidency (7/10 terms of this uber powerful post have been under conservative control). The late fallen Senator from Minnesota Paul Wellstone claimed that he was from the "Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party". This is the type of leader reasonable thinking men and women need to stand up for whats right. Not some watered down type of compromiser who will sell out real values for a non-confrontational manner.

23 July 2007

US may now strike Pakistan

Sometimes the Republicans are so ridiculously and obnoxiously stupid that I have to wonder how they got so shortchanged on brains at birth. In their latest signs of lunacy, the govt of King George states that "American forces might be sent into Pakistan to strike at Osama Bin Laden." Don't misunderstand me, any chance to hit that islamo-conservative fanatic would be music to my ears, but if he is in Pakistan, you *have* to let them do the job.

"President Pervez Musharraf has a shaky hold over their country the way it is, and has already "vowed to root out extremists from every corner of the country". The conservative elements of this country are ready to rebel, and all it would take is a spark, like King George ordering an airstrike within their sovereign borders. Then what would we have? A conservative islamic uprising and possible revolution in Pakistan.

The short sighted nature of Republicans in the US simply astounds me. Sometimes I think they *want* the conservative islamists to take control over there (maybe to justify destroying the economy to support a mammoth military-industrial complex or using the Constitution as toilet paper).

18 July 2007

Political Vendettas

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us
US Govt attacking Cats. In a region of the USA that actively aspires to achieve independence, the Keys of Florida, the US Government under the direction of King George and his consevative minions have sunk to a new low. They are attacking the right of the Ernest Hemingway Home & Museum to keep control of its own pets. More specifically, the famous 6 toed cats introduced by the famous writer Ernest Hemmingway.

This shallow and petty political vendetta has nothing to do with animal control in the slightest. It has EVERYTHING to do with a vindictive conservative republican administration bent on the task of attacking anything that disagrees with it. Under their polically appointed partisan puppet, the U.S. Animal and Plant Inspection Service officials argue that the house, listed as a National Historic Landmark since 1968, requires a federal Animal Welfare License, like a circus or zoo. Like a fucking CIRCUS! Like cats with 6 toes are as dangerous as Lions or Elephants! Get a fucking life you bastards. Wake up and smell the corruption already! Attacking cats to fight free thought via a long dead author and the spirit of freedom he inspired, give me a break. We have better ways to spend our tax dollars than a republican political vendetta like this.

12 July 2007

US National Debt

By the time you finish reading this article, the national debt in this country will be well over a million dollars greater. The US debt is fast approaching 9 trillion. check out theU.S. NATIONAL DEBT CLOCK to see what it is currently at, thanks to King George. Our debt is increasing by $14,815 every second thanks to gross fiscal mismanagement by the neocons. I have reported on this previously, to refute the misconception that liberal democrats are 'tax and spend' oriented, but nobody seems to be listening.

How would your personal finances hold up if you got a bunch of credit cards, and just continued to borrow thousands of dollars a year to give you a false sense of financial well being? Bankruptcy, thats where. You would soon realize that the mounting debt you are accumulating will ruin your material well being. All those electronic toys, nice furniture, and ample floor space will soon be repossessed, leaving you on the street, begging for soup. It is the same with our nation. Tax cuts for the rich, a war to rectify daddy, exporting jobs, etc. are the motto of the conservatives, and this is ruining our country financially. Thanks again King George and you shortsighted neocon fucksticks. We are now over a million dollars poorer as a nation!

NY firefighters attack Giuliani



NY firefighters attack Giuliani. The NYC firefighters state that, "Giuliani pushed for a faster clean-up at Ground Zero before all the remains had been recovered, and placed an emergency centre in a building that later collapsed" which [led to the deaths of 121 men]. It went on to state, "[Giuliani] failed to provide working radios for crews and halted the recovery effort too soon" and that "Giuliani is exploiting the disaster as a theme for his presidential candidacy."

Lets see how he tries to spin his lies in the face of this!

05 July 2007

Poll: Majorities say income gap too wide

An AP article on Yahoo! reports that, "seven in 10 said discrepancies between income levels are too large". This has been a problem in societies since the dominant social patterns changed from roaming bands to larger semi-sedentary tribes, although the more complex and large a culture is the more pronounced the gap between rich and poor is.

In the United States, free market capitalism and entrepeneurialship have devolved into little more than short term greed. The conservative Republicans who have been in charge of this nation virtually since 1970, continue to be true to their corporate masters and find ways to further unbalance the economic system to favor greed. Reagan began a series of tax cuts for the rich and corporate loopholes (remeber Vodoo economics and the 'trickle down effect'?), which were added to by the first Bush, and compounded exponentially by King George.

They will try to sell you their propaganda that tax cuts are good for the economy, but the real results have been the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. Previous to these pieces of draconian legislation, a family could easily get by with one income earner, while today, both parents need to work to attain almost half of what was to be had a generation earlier. On the other side of the spectrum, the richest 80,000 people in this country own half the wealth. HALF!

What could anyone possibly need that much money for anyways? One private jet isn't enough? Need to have a 72' yacht on both coasts? One mansion isn't enough? Come fucking on, over a third of this country is struggling to simply put food on the table, and conservative politicians talk about giving tax breaks to oil companies? Well, the poor got fucked for a long time, but it hasn't been until recently that the middle class in America has started to seriously suffer from wealth consolidation.

If the rich and powerful can return someone like King George to his throne (such as the election of 2004), despite his tragic deficiencies, what hope is there for any of us to turn this situation around? They will always outspend groups seeking to balance the situation by a magnitude of 10, and some talented sap will always be willing to pull the wool over their own eyes and do their dirty work for a big paycheck, so this situation might be inescapable. Who knows, perhaps one day poor people will start selling their children and bodily organs, oh wait, THATS ALREADY GOING ON!

Kosovo again tense

"UN chief warns Kosovo may regress if status unresolved" Yahoo! News. Though I adhere to a Wilsonian 'self-determinationist' ideology as long it is applied equally across the board. If the Serbian spiritual heartland of Kosovo is allowed to attain self determination, then so should other regions in the world. Europe is full of diversity, and if a cultural group is allowed to have their own independent political nation, then we should allow this for the Basques, Catalans, Galicians, Brittany, Scotland, Wales, Trans-Dnieper, etc. Equal rights to all for self governance. In the US, Native American regions and Hawaii continue to seek their own independent nations, but all pleas fall on deaf ears in the tyrranical US Government.

However, this policy is applied discriminantly, and Serbia is clearly being singled out, likely because of their staunch support of their traditionally close ally for generations, Russia. So get ready everyone, because of a short sighted punitive geopolitical strategy that had more to do with hegemony than ideology, Kosovo will yet again soon erupt in yet another round of violence. That is, unless, full independence is granted and the remaining Serbs, Gypsys, Romani, and possibly the Turks are ethnically cleansed. That is sarcastic if you couldn't tell, I abhore the very notion of ethnic cleansing.

04 July 2007

Pakistani cleric captured under burqa

This is hillarious. The ultra right wing radical cleric, Maulana Abdul Aziz was caught trying to escape capture at a mosque in Pakistan by fleeing dressed as a woman (in the full Burka dress). I think this just goes to show that conservatives around the world will stoop to any means to try to evade responsibility for their actions. Can't trust them, no matter where in the world you are. Read the full article at Yahoo! News.

02 July 2007

Corruption at the highest level !

The bar has been set so laughably low for this president (King George), that this news may barely phase some in the American audience, just like previous atrocities have (blatant lying to invade Iraq, actually invading Iraq, stocking the Supreme Court with fascist judges with an agenda, suspending the Bill of Rights for warantless wiretaps on civilians, unilaterally crushing international arms treaties, destroying the dollar, massing a 9 trillion dollar national debt, etc. etc. etc.). But for those who continue to dream of and fight for a better nation and world, this news should be a 9 on the political richter scale.

George W Bush has pardoned Lewis "Scooter" Libby!

This demon was the only one who inept prosecutors could actually finger for the treasonous affair in which the name of an active CIA undercover operative was publically named (Wikipedia) in revenge for her husband not following orders to manufacture evidence implicating Iraqs Baath regime trying to acquire nuclear material in the days before the morally bankrupt start of the Iraq War.

There is little doubt that King Georges director of propaganda, Karl Rove and his headmaster Dick "the Dick" Cheney were ultimately responsible for the deepest blame for this, but they tossed Scooter up as a prize high enough to get the American public off their backs, knowing that the Executive Branch of government has enough dictatorial powers these days that nobody could expect any greater accountability. That was far short of even a hint of justice in this act of treason, and now, to make matters worse, Scooter is off the hook all together.

What kind of nation do we have where our president can condone such treason, betrayal, and corruption? Do we not expect our leaders to exhibit a higher moral fiber than this? Are we living in a communist dictatorship or a constitutional democracy?