June 6, 2008 archive

As many of you already know, the unemployment rate jumped to 5.5%. That’s an increase of 861,000 Americans who are now unemployed. Before I took the job with the Merkley Campaign as their netroots director, I was working full time at a job with no benefits. I understand that for small business owners like my former employer, it’s quite expensive to provide health care coverage. I lived below the poverty line and even though I could pay my bills, saving money was not an option. The plight of the working poor has always been near and dear to my heart and it’s no wonder I have been advocating for Jeff Merkley long before I joined the campaign.

1. U.S. Economy Continues Plunge Into the Abyss

   The bottomless pit?

   First up, the Los Angeles Times reports Monthly growth in unemployment rate is biggest in over 20 years. “The nation’s unemployment rate took a sharp turn for the worse in May, jumping to 5.5% from 5% a month earlier — the largest one-month increase in more than two decades and a further sign that the ailing economy is not yet on the mend.”

   “Altogether, the economy lost 49,000 jobs in May and 324,000 jobs since the beginning of the year — five straight months of contraction, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The economy must create about 100,000 jobs a month just to keep pace with population growth.”

   The Washington Post adds that Despite interest rate cuts, foreclosures hit a record high. More than 1 million homeowners face foreclosure. Nearly 9 percent of mortgages nationally are in trouble with the bulk of the foreclosures in California and Florida.

   What began as a mortgage crisis focused largely on subprime borrowers has spread and is being fed by the slowing economy it helped create. Borrowers once considered the most creditworthy have been hamstrung by declining home prices, making it difficult to refinance their home to dodge a financial crunch.

   Americans have been living on home-equity and credit and now, with rising food and gas prices combined with declining property values, many people are heading towards financial ruin.

   [UPDATED 4:30 EDT] Things won’t be getting any better for small retirement investors trapped in their IRAs and 401ks on Wall Street. The New York Times reports the Dow plunges more than 400 points, while oil rockets nearly $11. “Wall Street suffered its worst losses in more than two months… At the close, the Dow was off 3.13 percent, at 394.64…”

   “Shares opened lower after the government reported that the unemployment rate in May had its highest monthly increase in 22 years. But the decline accelerated as investors confronted a $10.75 jump in the price of crude oil, the biggest one-day climb ever… A report by Morgan Stanley on Friday said that oil prices could reach $150 a barrel by July 4… The dollar declined against other currencies, a move that makes each barrel of oil more expensive. Gold prices rose.”

2. John McCain continues to embrace George W. Bush’s, um, policies. From The New York Times, Adviser says McCain backs Bush wiretaps. Those would be the illegal, warrantless wiretaps that Bush is demanding telco immunity for.

   A top adviser to Senator John McCain says Mr. McCain believes that… Bush’s program of wiretapping without warrants was lawful, a position that appears to bring him into closer alignment with the sweeping theories of executive authority pushed by the Bush administration legal team.

   Despite a 1978 federal statute that requires court oversight of surveillance, McCain promises to continue with Bush’s lawlessness. Of course, McCain has altered his “straight talk” on what his position. Once upon a time (last year), McCain said “I don’t think the president has the right to disobey any law”. The more McCain agrees to take on Bush’s positions, the more apparent it becomes that McCain is running for Bush’s third term.

Four at Four continues with Israel threating Iran and the U.S. blackmailing Iraq.

The official report is out. Bush and Cheney officially lied to the world, the UN and the American People to invade a sovereign country with no reason or provocation. The ultimate War Crime…

“the supreme international crime, differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”

…made even more despicable (if that is even possible) by the willful deception.

Why?

To establish an outpost of American Empire in the Middle East. To control and dominate the region by dint of armed might. To kill and subjugate masses of innocent people, thus terrorizing ‘the terrorists’ into submission. And of course being Republicans, to profit personally and politically.

Two oilmen, plucking the low hanging fruit of energy hegemony by brute force and in violation of every International Law and Treaty.

They of course knew they were lying. They of course knew that there were those that saw through the lie and opposed them. They then, of course, had to insure against detection of their lies by controlling the press, and by spying on their own citizens. As part of their campaign to terrorize “the terrorists” they established a network of secret torture prisons. To eliminate opposition and suspicion, they sought to destroy a former ambassador who was pointing the finger of fraud at them…and in the process destroyed an entire CIA counter-terrorism network.

War Crimes, War Profiteering, Torture, Treason.

And yet they walk free. And yet they still have power….and yet their dreams of Empire continue.  As they try to blackmail their own puppet government into completely submitting to their schemes of Empire and subjugation. To continue the lie, to continue the occupation, to continue the profits, to continue to commit America to the exact course of tyrannical empiricism it was founded in protest of and was founded to prevent.

War Crimes, War Profiteering, Torture, Treason.

And yet they walk free. And yet they still have power….the power to attack yet another sovereign country…according to so many sources (heh) that the warnings would be foolish to ignore.

It was NOT “an error” that has led to over 4000 America deaths, up to a million Iraqi deaths, to 4 million refugees, to trillions of dollars spent as our economy falls apart.

It was a deliberate lie.

And yet they walk free. And yet they still have power. And yet still not one of our ‘leaders’ will stand in the Halls of Congress and point the finger of truth at our naked Emperor.

Something is seriously wrong in my brain….i went to bed without auto-publishing a friday a.m. pony…and woke up at 3 a.m. and remembered….

…seriously wrong in my brain, yup…

John McCain To Star In:

The Spies I Love Please Spy On Me

Coming Soon To Your Multi-Plex

Friday’s Headlines:   Investors’ Growing Appetite for Oil Evades Market Limits   Mugabe suspends foreign aid agencies’ work in Zimbabwe  New face of power in Zimbabwe  Germans aghast at ‘Holy Disneyland’ plan   EU treaty in peril as Irish ‘No’ camp takes the lead  Palestinian girl, 6, killed as Israel retaliates for fatal kibbutz attack   Food crisis: A daily quest for bread in Cairo    Quake aid: Neither landslides nor Chinese troops stop this volunteer     Pakistani cops seize 2,200 pounds of explosives  Leftist thinking left off the syllabus

The final battle: remembering D-Day’s veterans

Help us make one last journey to the D-Day beaches in honour of the fallen, plead veterans

By John Lichfield in Colleville-Montgomery, Normandy

Friday, 6 June 2008

A small group of old men will gather on the beaches of Normandy today – a handful of the 3,000 survivors of Britain’s own “Band of Brothers”. Many hundreds of other veterans, such as Bert Bowden in Bristol, will spend the 64th anniversary of D-Day at home, unable to join the men, living and dead, who they still regard as their “own family.”

As the Government faced new questions yesterday about how it pays soldiers who are serving in today’s war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan, in this corner of France on the D-Day anniversary, questions were being asked about how much Britain as a nation values its veterans of six decades ago.

Bert Bowden, 89, came ashore on Gold Beach on 6 June, 1944 and fought until he reached the German Baltic coast 11 months later. He is still physically and mentally strong. Like many of his surviving comrades, he is no longer able to afford a trip to Normandy. Like many others, he is unwilling to leave an ailing wife without a constant carer.

USA

Adviser Says McCain Backs Bush Wiretaps

By CHARLIE SAVAGE

Published: June 6, 2008

WASHINGTON – A top adviser to Senator John McCain says Mr. McCain believes that President Bush’s program of wiretapping without warrants was lawful, a position that appears to bring him into closer alignment with the sweeping theories of executive authority pushed by the Bush administration legal team.

In a letter posted online by National Review this week, the adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, said Mr. McCain believed that the Constitution gave Mr. Bush the power to authorize the National Security Agency to monitor Americans’ international phone calls and e-mail without warrants, despite a 1978 federal statute that required court oversight of surveillance.

Robert Freeman: (to Huey) How many times have I told you, you better not even dream about tellin’ white folk the truth!  You understand me? (walks away)  Shoot!  Makin’ White people riot!  You better learn how to lie like me!  I’m gonna find me a white man and lie to him right now!  The Garden Party

The truth is everything this administration tells you is a lie.

Remember The Pentagon Shill Scandal?  A month ago.  The Scotty Show?  Two weeks.  Phase II?  Today.

Another important story that is getting ignored in favor of arguing about teeth are the lies regarding our status of forces arrangement with the Iraq.  Are we blackmailing Maliki? This is clearly a fundamentally bad deal for Iraq, we demand over 50 bases, control of the airspace under 29,000 feet, ability to arrest anyone and take any military action without consulting any Iraqi and with no consequences under Iraqi law.

It’s hardly a secret to the Iraqis, a majority of parliament has already sent "a letter to members of Congress that rejected the idea of a US-Iraq agreement unless the United States agrees to a specific timetable to get out of Iraq".  Former Iraqi President Rafsanjani says- US trying to "enslave" Iraq with security agreement.

What about Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most influential man in Iraq?  From Juan Cole–

Al-Hayat writing in Arabic reports that Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (the leading bloc in parliament and keystone of the government of Nuri al-Maliki) is saying he spoke to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani about the security agreement with Washington. He says that Sistani laid out four points to which any such agreement must adhere:

• National sovereignty
• Transparency
• National consensus
• Parliamentary approval of it

Al-Hakim met with Sistani Wednesday evening, along with some journalists. The journalists reported that the grand ayatollah stressed national Iraqi unity in the face of challenges, expressed his concern about the lack of services for citizens, including electicity and water, and said the water shortage was especially harming farmers. He also urged haste in the rebuilding of the Askariya Shrine in Samarra.

Al-Hakim said that his own party felt the current American draft detracts too much from Iraq’s sovereignty and fails to protect Iraqi wealth. He said that Sistani did not go into details but stressed general principles. He maintained that in general Sistani shared the concerns of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq.

Frankly, if it’s unratified by the Senate it’s not an agreement the United States is obligated to honor.  I can only imagine what a patriotic Iraqi thinks of it.

Almost cut my hair

It happened just the other day

It’s gettin kinda long

I coulda said it wasn’t in my way

But I didn’t and I wonder why

I feel like letting my freak flag fly

Cause I feel like I owe it to someone

Yeah (sing the song brother…)

Now if uh, six uh, huh, turned out to be nine

Oh I dont mind, I dont mind uh ( well all right… )

If all the hippies cut off all their hair

Oh I dont care, oh I dont care.

Dig.

cause Ive got my own world to live through and uh, huh

And I aint gonna copy you.

White collar conservative flashin down the street

Pointin their plastic finger at me, ha !

Theyre hopin soon my kind will drop and die but uh

Im gonna wave my freak flag high, high !