Alienation
Americans Alienate Indonesia
Published on Thursday, April 7, 2005 by the Toronto Star
Americans Alienate Indonesia
by Haroon Siddiqui
In tackling terrorism, Indonesia has something in common with Saudi Arabia.
Post-9/11, the Saudi rulers and the ruled remained in denial that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis. Reality set in only when terrorists bombed targets at home.
In this nation, too, official and populist indifference greeted early American warnings of homegrown terrorism. That didn't change until after the bombings in Bali (2002) and two in Jakarta (at the Marriott Hotel in 2003 and the Australian embassy in 2004).
Shocked mainstream Muslim groups condemned the violence. The government arrested dozens belonging to an Al Qaeda-related terror network. Several were sentenced to long jail terms and three to death.
The verdicts were widely welcomed.
But the most high-profile, terrorism-related case has floundered — twice — in the courts.
Abu Bakar Bashir, a cleric, was recently cleared of seven charges and convicted only on one. He was sentenced to 30 months, of which he has already served 10.
America and Australia were outraged. So were many Indonesians — for the exact opposite belief that he was being scapegoated, having been cleared of similar charges two years ago.
The case shows the political and cultural clash at the heart of George W. Bush's war on terror.
...
America withholds evidence but demands a guilty verdict. It advocates democracy but seems to pine for Indonesia's old authoritarian ways. It needs Muslim moderates but alienates them, including those who, in last year's elections, voted against Islamists and for secularists.
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0407-29.htm
We were pinned down by fire as a gun battle took place in the heart of Kashmir'
When the gunfire suddenly sprayed across the street in front of us, we dived for the ground, scrabbling desperately to get behind a parked car. Up ahead, a woman had been hit and we saw her fall to the ground, the blood soaking her shirt. The Independent's photographer, Olivia, was trapped in a mêlée of fleeing people. A bullet whistled past her head, missing her by inches.
There were five of us huddled behind an old Hindustan Ambassador car, trying impossibly to press ourselves deep into the ground, hoping the car's unarmoured body would stop the bullets - it wouldn't have.
You could feel the others' bodies shaking with fear. There was a sick feeling in your stomach, you could feel your heart pounding fit to burst and massive shocks of adrenaline kept hitting your body. You even found yourself praying. On each side of us, Indian soldiers took up positions, kneeling and cradling their assault rifles.
This was the scene on a busy street in central Srinagar yesterday - the day before the bus journey that is supposed to herald a new era of peace and prosperity for this broken land. We were pinned down by fire, unable to move, as a full-scale gun battle took place in the heart of Indian Kashmir's summer capital.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-06.htm
Colombian senators have been calling for the men, who were based in the country, to be extradited from the US.
But US ambassador William Wood said the soldiers are immune from prosecution.
More than 200 Colombian citizens have been extradited to the US to face trial for drug trafficking, under a bilateral deal between the two countries.
Colombian politicians have asked the government to push for the US to hand over the men, arguing that the extradition agreement works both ways.
"In practical terms, these military personnel committed the alleged crime in Colombia, and according to the extradition treaty, which is bilateral, they should be tried here," legislator Gustavo Petro said.
President Alvaro Uribe, who is visiting China, has said he will review the issue "very carefully".
...
Five US soldiers were arrested at a US military base in Texas after they stepped off a flight from Colombia on 29 March.
They are suspected of attempting to smuggle 16kg (35 lb) of cocaine on a US military aircraft.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-07.htm
Twenty-eight Italian police officers went on trial in Genoa yesterday accused of beating anti-globalisation demonstrators at the G8 summit four years ago. Almost 100 people were hurt during the raid on the Diaz school, the then headquarters of the Genoa Social Forum.
Judge Bernardo Di Mattei adjourned the trial to May 19, raising fears the proceedings will take so long that the defendants will exploit a statute of limitations.
Among the accused are Italy's current anti-terrorism chief, Francesco Gratteri, and Giovanni Luperi, the head of an EU taskforce on Islamist terrorism. The charges include grievous bodily harm, slander and false arrest.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-09.htm
[This is ridiculous. Who cares if the Minutemen trip the sensors? No one stops the illegals from coming voer the border anyway. Evey single illegal immigrant could stop and make a photocopy of his or her ass on the way over the border and pin it to these sensors and it wouldn’t make any difference.]
Meanwhile, Border Patrol apprehensions of illegal immigrants have dropped notably in the Naco area since civilian volunteers began gathering there. Agency spokesmen credit an increased presence by Mexican authorities south of the border and say it's too soon to tell whether the volunteers are having an impact.
The volunteers, many of whom were recruited over the Internet, plan to watch the border throughout April and report any illegal activity to federal agents.
Except for Wednesday's incident, Border Patrol officials said the volunteers have remained peaceful. However, they have continued to unwittingly trip sensors that alert the agency to possible intruders, forcing agents to respond to false alarms. Authorities said volunteers' footprints have also made if difficult for agents to track illegal immigrants.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-04.htm
[I like this. This is a true statement:
“After all, to the elites whose spokespaper is the [NY] Times, not even Martin Luther King was Martin Luther King... until he was dead.”]
What President Vicente Fox, together with his former adversaries of the once-monolithic PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party, which ruled Mexico for seven decades prior to Fox’s 2000 electoral victory), are attempting today is nothing less than a pre-emptive coup d’etat: a political assassination, dressed up in legal technicalities no more serious than a parking ticket, to remove Mexico’s leading presidential candidate from the 2006 contest.
...
And that – as a 12-percent crash in recent days of the Mexican stock market presages – will set in motion a political war dance with steps already planned by Mexico City’s activist (and strategist) governor. López Obrador is ready to go to jail and lead the fight from there. And much of Mexico is declaring its will to, if need be, join him behind bars by launching what would be the country’s first-ever campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2005/4/7/93753/46058
Associated Press reports:
“It was the second major scandal to hit the U.S. military in Colombia.
“In 1999, the wife of former commander of U.S. anti-drug operations in Colombia, Laurie Heitt, pleaded guilty of shipping $700,000 in cocaine and heroin to New York in diplomatic parcels. She was sentenced to five years in prison.”
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2005/4/3/01839/38740
Friends of Balmoral Cemetery president Kelvin Johnston branded the vandalism as
the worst seen at the cemetery since the mid-1990s when in one night 200 graves
were destroyed.
This latest evil act occurred just six days after The Courier-Mail reported
claims of satanic activity at the cemetery.
"We've noticed black candles outside the gateways, gravel witches' circles
inside the cemetery, fish with stakes in them, gutted black cats with medical
gloves nearby, and anatomically rearranged bones inside a cat carcass," Mr
Johnston said at the time.
"And it's obvious that orgies are taking place, as the area where they go
is littered with used condoms."
>http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,12770154-1248,00.html
Dr. Ronald Schuchard, a leading researcher in the field, told delegates at the
Vision 2005 conference in London that his team were at a loss to explain some of
their results, particularly: improvements in vision in the non-implanted eye;
improvements in areas of the retina that should not have been affected by the
surgery; and improved colour perception, despite the fact that the implant is
not capable of detecting or distinguishing colours. Vision 2005 is an annual
conference that takes in all aspects of sight loss, including technologies and
medical advances that could help people overcome blindness.
ource=Evening%20Standard">http://www.thisislondon.com/news/londonnews/ar
ticles/17732278?source=Evening%20Standard
In the case of the market for U.S. Treasuries, the Financial Times summed up
exactly how small it really is in two major stories, one just under the masthead
on page one, on 24 January 2005. One story began, ìDuring the past few years the
US has become dependent, not so much on millions of investors around the globe
but on a few individuals in a few of the worldís central banks.î[2] In 2003
these central bankers bought enough treasuries to cover 83% of the U.S. current
account deficit, and 86% of those purchases came from Asian central banks.
The two main sources of money for U.S. Treasuries are the central banks of Japan
and China. Japan held about $715 billion in U.S. Treasuries, as of November
2004, and China held about $191 billion.[3] All the other nationsí central banks
hold altogether, about the same amount again, roughly another trillion.
As the total of all obligations is about $4 trillion, two central banks
obviously hold about one quarter of the total. They are in the position to pump
or dump the Treasury market all by themselves. They can sell what they have or
simply stop buying when the Treasury sells.
Since the money comes from a handful of foreign central banks, the possible
rigging of the Treasury market equals the possible rigging of the foreign
exchange markets. These central banks have to buy dollars before they buy
Treasuries. Even Alan Greenspan has acknowledged that the two go together,
admitting that Asian central banks ìmay be supporting the dollar and U.S.
Treasury prices somewhat.î[4]
The Working Groupís existence is no mystery. See for yourself. Go to Google and
type in Executive Order 12631. You will find the Executive Order, and even a 14
November 2003 statement from Secretary of the Treasury John Snow giving a brief
history of the Working Group, describing its policy advisory activities, and
concluding with these words: ìIt also is a forum used to exchange information
during market turmoil through ad hoc conference calls and meetings.î
...
This has an advantage for the Bush administration, which has the ruinously
ridiculous policies of simultaneously cutting taxes and waging wars or building
up for them. In effect, the basic racket is: the Bush administration exports
jobs to these countries, and in turn they finance Bushís fiscal deficit so he
can continue his wars and cut taxes for his friends. The deficit for 2005 will
be at least $400 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.[7] The
Pentagon budget for 2005 was about $400 billion. Add in two supplemental
requests for the costs of his Iraq war and the Pentagon figure is roughly $500
billion. ìIt is interesting to note that the military budget is about the same
order of magnitude as the fiscal deficit,î said veteran Pentagon waste fighter
Ernest Fitzgerald.
The forecast by Andrew Robertson, chief executive of Omnicom's BBDO advertising
agency, the world's third-biggest, underscores the uncertainties facing
advertisers in developed markets as they shift from their traditional dependence
on television.
http://www.rense.com/general63/cellphonestoreplaceTV.htm
Obviously, not everyone against the war feels able to participate in an anti-war
demonstration. About two months ago, I saw this classified ad in a Southern
Californian newspaper (not Hollywood): Support Our Soldier For Deployment!!
Garage Sale! Saturday 7am-?
The mother of this since-deployed soldier told me outright that Bush lied to
start the war. But she felt constrained. ìYou see,î she said emotionally, ìÖIím
torn because I feel that I have to support my sonÖ I donít talk a lot about it
to him or my husband, the way I truly feel, because you know itís just too hard
when they support it and I donít. Itís hard.
&sid=1051”>http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article
&sid=1051
Johnny Gosch, Jeff Gannon, Hunter Thompson and the unraveling of a troubling
tale.
By Tim Schmitt
Noreen Gosch sits in a booth at the West Des Moines Village Inn, nursing a cup
of coffee and managing, despite her larger-than-life personality, to blend into
the surroundings and keep a low profile in the almost empty restaurant. She is
open with her thoughts and willing to share what information she can, yet she
remains guarded - cautious and thoughtful in a manner often mistaken as cold and
standoffish. She thinks carefully as she speaks about her son, Johnny, and the
players in a bizarre conspiracy surrounding his disappearance in 1982 that
continues to evolve, and may finally be on the verge of breaking down.
http://www.pointblank-dm.com/cover.shtml
According to the few journalists who were able to attend the event, once the two men had done their bit for the cameras - and it is the TV audience these events are really aimed at - some of the journalists attempted to ask questions.
At which point a phalanx of party supporters - apparently bussed in for these occasions - were pushed in front of their leaders to shield them from the prying media. No questions were allowed.
They also seemed to burst into coordinated clapping just at the right time to drown out questions from the press.
Too late
It is being suggested that this is to be the norm for this campaign.
After the prime minister announced the date of the election from Downing Street - taking no questions from the media - he was then helicoptered off to a party event in Dorset with just a tiny group of hacks in tow.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4419789.stm
[Now no one in DC wants to talk about the costs of healthcare, but imagine if you will the costs of not doing anything about healthcare in the following situation.
Some dastardly terrorist type infects some low-middle income people with a deadly, but slow acting, disease. Now they have no health insurance, so they don’t go tot he doctor. Most likely they can’t affod to stop working either, even if they feel kind of sick.
So these people go out there day in and day out spreading whatever diease they have been stuck with, until finally they drop on the ground unconscious or some such thing and get taken to the emergency room.
Now they will be in the hospital with all the othe patients, all the visitors, and all the hospital workers until they figure out the person has some evil deadly disease.
Well by the time they figure that out, the diease could have spread all over the coutry, and why? Because these people couldn’t afford to go to a doctor when they felt alittle bit sick, because they couldn’t afford to stay home and infect other people whenthey felt laittle bit sick.
This article already says 18,000 people a year diei n this country because they don’t have health insurance. That number could eaisly go way, way up from there.]
Durieux's is one of many unique strategies that the 45 million uninsured people in the United States employ in an attempt to keep themselves healthy without going broke, as medical and health insurance costs have soared in recent years.
Premiums for family coverage in employer-sponsored plans rose 59 percent between 2001 and 2004, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, compared with a 9.7 percent growth in consumer prices.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050407/ap_on_he_me/health_insurance_tango
Today, the Rapid City (S.D.) Journal examined the Guckert/Gannon links to the 2004 U.S. Senate contest in that state, which sent the Democratic leader, Sen. Tom Daschle, packing. The newspaper’s probe followed reports in E&P and elsewhere about Gannon’s apparent links to political operatives and bloggers in the state who are credited with helping to elect John Thune to the post.
According to the paper, Thune said last week that he barely knew Gannon. He said he appeared on Gannon's radio show once early in the campaign and later may have done another interview for a print piece. But Thune said “his campaign didn't pay Gannon for his reporting services and didn't coordinate its campaign strategy with him, as some critics have implied.”
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000827954
[Why anyone would take advice from al awyer on any subject is beyond me.
i remember a good story about the McCarthy hearings. Some guy was being interrogated for being a possible Commie Pinko dupe or whatever. So he was sitting there with his lawyer next to him, and senator whoever asked him a question. So the guy puts his hand over the microphone and his lawyer sits there whispering in his ear.
And the layer is whispering and whispering.
Finally he stops, and the guy takes his hand off the microphone.
He leans for ward and says “Senator, I decline to answer hat question based on the fact I can’t understand one damn word of what my lawyer is telling me.”]
The legal counsel to Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) admitted yesterday that he was the author of a memo citing the political advantage to Republicans of intervening in the case of Terri Schiavo, the senator said in an interview last night.
Brian H. Darling, 39, a former lobbyist for the Alexander Strategy Group on gun rights and other issues, offered his resignation and it was immediately accepted, Martinez said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32554-2005Apr6.html
In a fortnight when two Arab footballers have kept Israel in World Cup contention, an Arab schoolboy has beaten hundreds of Jewish children to win a quiz focused on the history of Zionism.
Rami Wated, 12, an Arab Israeli from Jaffa, was a winning finalist in a competition to answer questions mainly based on Tel Aviv street names and their relevance to the history of Jewish nationalism.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=627093
Carrying bamboo sticks in their fists, a crowd of men formed in the village of Ganeshpur. "Kill the Maoists and their supporters," a young man shouted as the mob moved down the street. Soldiers at a barracks 90 feet away stood by and did nothing.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2358&ncid=2358&e=6&u=/csm/20050405/wl_csm/onepalx_1
The Transportation Security Administration, once the flagship agency in the nation's $20 billion effort to protect air travelers, is now slated for dismantling.
The latest sign came yesterday when the Bush administration asked David M. Stone, the TSA's director, to step down in June, according to aviation and government sources. Stone is the third top administrator to leave the three-year-old agency, which was swiftly created in the chaos and patriotism following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The TSA absorbed divisions of other agencies such as Federal Aviation Administration only to find itself now the victim of a massive reorganization of the Department of Homeland Security
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35333-2005Apr7.html
Israeli police have arrested two Jews suspected of planting fake bombs in Jerusalem to try to disrupt plans to pull settlers out of the Gaza Strip.
The pair were caught after leaving a backpack rigged with wires, police said.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4420875.stm
The New Zealand intelligence community, based in Asia, believes with certainty that NGOs operated by Kiwis are coming under Israeli intelligence pressure.
One well positioned Scoop contact says: ìThis is a matter of record as well as personal experience and the experience of those close to me.î This contact says this pressure is linked directly to Israel being angered that the New Zealand Government insisted the illegal passport case against two Israelis in Auckland be aired publicly.
http://scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0405/S00133.htm
[Wait. It can’t happen to me. I’m an honest upstanding American citizen. I am paying with real American money. No one would ever arrest me and chain me to a pole for paying a bill. This is America.
You’re damn right it’s America.]
"When I bought the stereo player," Bolesta explains, "the technician said it'd fit perfectly into my son's dashboard. But it didn't. So they called back and said they had another model that would fit perfectly, and it was cheaper. We got a $67 refund, which was fine. As long as it fit, that's all.
"So we go back and pay for it, and they tell us to go around front with our receipt and pick up the difference in the cost. I ask about installation charges. They said, 'No installation charge, because of the mix-up. Our mistake, no charge.' Swell.
"But then, the next day, I get a call at home. They're telling me, 'If you don't come in and pay the installation fee, we're calling the police.' Jeez, where did we go from them admitting a mistake to suddenly calling the police? So I say, 'Fine, I'll be in tomorrow.' But, overnight, I'm starting to steam a little. It's not the money -- it's the threat. So I thought, I'll count out a few $2 bills.
...
Meanwhile, everybody's looking at me. I've lived here 18 years. I'm hoping my kids don't walk in and see this. And I'm saying, 'I can't believe you're doing this. I'm paying with legal American money.'"
Bolesta was then taken to the county police lockup in Cockeysville, where he sat handcuffed to a pole and in leg irons while the Secret Service was called in.
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:UMChJpuMiwsJ:www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/bal-md.olesker08mar08,1,76004.column%3Fcoll%3Dbal-local-columnists+my+bill+twice.+You+don%E2%80%99t+want+these+bills&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
Published on Thursday, April 7, 2005 by the Toronto Star
Americans Alienate Indonesia
by Haroon Siddiqui
In tackling terrorism, Indonesia has something in common with Saudi Arabia.
Post-9/11, the Saudi rulers and the ruled remained in denial that 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudis. Reality set in only when terrorists bombed targets at home.
In this nation, too, official and populist indifference greeted early American warnings of homegrown terrorism. That didn't change until after the bombings in Bali (2002) and two in Jakarta (at the Marriott Hotel in 2003 and the Australian embassy in 2004).
Shocked mainstream Muslim groups condemned the violence. The government arrested dozens belonging to an Al Qaeda-related terror network. Several were sentenced to long jail terms and three to death.
The verdicts were widely welcomed.
But the most high-profile, terrorism-related case has floundered — twice — in the courts.
Abu Bakar Bashir, a cleric, was recently cleared of seven charges and convicted only on one. He was sentenced to 30 months, of which he has already served 10.
America and Australia were outraged. So were many Indonesians — for the exact opposite belief that he was being scapegoated, having been cleared of similar charges two years ago.
The case shows the political and cultural clash at the heart of George W. Bush's war on terror.
...
America withholds evidence but demands a guilty verdict. It advocates democracy but seems to pine for Indonesia's old authoritarian ways. It needs Muslim moderates but alienates them, including those who, in last year's elections, voted against Islamists and for secularists.
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0407-29.htm
We were pinned down by fire as a gun battle took place in the heart of Kashmir'
When the gunfire suddenly sprayed across the street in front of us, we dived for the ground, scrabbling desperately to get behind a parked car. Up ahead, a woman had been hit and we saw her fall to the ground, the blood soaking her shirt. The Independent's photographer, Olivia, was trapped in a mêlée of fleeing people. A bullet whistled past her head, missing her by inches.
There were five of us huddled behind an old Hindustan Ambassador car, trying impossibly to press ourselves deep into the ground, hoping the car's unarmoured body would stop the bullets - it wouldn't have.
You could feel the others' bodies shaking with fear. There was a sick feeling in your stomach, you could feel your heart pounding fit to burst and massive shocks of adrenaline kept hitting your body. You even found yourself praying. On each side of us, Indian soldiers took up positions, kneeling and cradling their assault rifles.
This was the scene on a busy street in central Srinagar yesterday - the day before the bus journey that is supposed to herald a new era of peace and prosperity for this broken land. We were pinned down by fire, unable to move, as a full-scale gun battle took place in the heart of Indian Kashmir's summer capital.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-06.htm
Colombian senators have been calling for the men, who were based in the country, to be extradited from the US.
But US ambassador William Wood said the soldiers are immune from prosecution.
More than 200 Colombian citizens have been extradited to the US to face trial for drug trafficking, under a bilateral deal between the two countries.
Colombian politicians have asked the government to push for the US to hand over the men, arguing that the extradition agreement works both ways.
"In practical terms, these military personnel committed the alleged crime in Colombia, and according to the extradition treaty, which is bilateral, they should be tried here," legislator Gustavo Petro said.
President Alvaro Uribe, who is visiting China, has said he will review the issue "very carefully".
...
Five US soldiers were arrested at a US military base in Texas after they stepped off a flight from Colombia on 29 March.
They are suspected of attempting to smuggle 16kg (35 lb) of cocaine on a US military aircraft.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-07.htm
Twenty-eight Italian police officers went on trial in Genoa yesterday accused of beating anti-globalisation demonstrators at the G8 summit four years ago. Almost 100 people were hurt during the raid on the Diaz school, the then headquarters of the Genoa Social Forum.
Judge Bernardo Di Mattei adjourned the trial to May 19, raising fears the proceedings will take so long that the defendants will exploit a statute of limitations.
Among the accused are Italy's current anti-terrorism chief, Francesco Gratteri, and Giovanni Luperi, the head of an EU taskforce on Islamist terrorism. The charges include grievous bodily harm, slander and false arrest.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-09.htm
[This is ridiculous. Who cares if the Minutemen trip the sensors? No one stops the illegals from coming voer the border anyway. Evey single illegal immigrant could stop and make a photocopy of his or her ass on the way over the border and pin it to these sensors and it wouldn’t make any difference.]
Meanwhile, Border Patrol apprehensions of illegal immigrants have dropped notably in the Naco area since civilian volunteers began gathering there. Agency spokesmen credit an increased presence by Mexican authorities south of the border and say it's too soon to tell whether the volunteers are having an impact.
The volunteers, many of whom were recruited over the Internet, plan to watch the border throughout April and report any illegal activity to federal agents.
Except for Wednesday's incident, Border Patrol officials said the volunteers have remained peaceful. However, they have continued to unwittingly trip sensors that alert the agency to possible intruders, forcing agents to respond to false alarms. Authorities said volunteers' footprints have also made if difficult for agents to track illegal immigrants.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0407-04.htm
[I like this. This is a true statement:
“After all, to the elites whose spokespaper is the [NY] Times, not even Martin Luther King was Martin Luther King... until he was dead.”]
What President Vicente Fox, together with his former adversaries of the once-monolithic PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party, which ruled Mexico for seven decades prior to Fox’s 2000 electoral victory), are attempting today is nothing less than a pre-emptive coup d’etat: a political assassination, dressed up in legal technicalities no more serious than a parking ticket, to remove Mexico’s leading presidential candidate from the 2006 contest.
...
And that – as a 12-percent crash in recent days of the Mexican stock market presages – will set in motion a political war dance with steps already planned by Mexico City’s activist (and strategist) governor. López Obrador is ready to go to jail and lead the fight from there. And much of Mexico is declaring its will to, if need be, join him behind bars by launching what would be the country’s first-ever campaign of nonviolent civil disobedience
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2005/4/7/93753/46058
Associated Press reports:
“It was the second major scandal to hit the U.S. military in Colombia.
“In 1999, the wife of former commander of U.S. anti-drug operations in Colombia, Laurie Heitt, pleaded guilty of shipping $700,000 in cocaine and heroin to New York in diplomatic parcels. She was sentenced to five years in prison.”
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2005/4/3/01839/38740
Friends of Balmoral Cemetery president Kelvin Johnston branded the vandalism as
the worst seen at the cemetery since the mid-1990s when in one night 200 graves
were destroyed.
This latest evil act occurred just six days after The Courier-Mail reported
claims of satanic activity at the cemetery.
"We've noticed black candles outside the gateways, gravel witches' circles
inside the cemetery, fish with stakes in them, gutted black cats with medical
gloves nearby, and anatomically rearranged bones inside a cat carcass," Mr
Johnston said at the time.
"And it's obvious that orgies are taking place, as the area where they go
is littered with used condoms."
>http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,12770154-1248,00.html
Dr. Ronald Schuchard, a leading researcher in the field, told delegates at the
Vision 2005 conference in London that his team were at a loss to explain some of
their results, particularly: improvements in vision in the non-implanted eye;
improvements in areas of the retina that should not have been affected by the
surgery; and improved colour perception, despite the fact that the implant is
not capable of detecting or distinguishing colours. Vision 2005 is an annual
conference that takes in all aspects of sight loss, including technologies and
medical advances that could help people overcome blindness.
ource=Evening%20Standard">http://www.thisislondon.com/news/londonnews/ar
ticles/17732278?source=Evening%20Standard
In the case of the market for U.S. Treasuries, the Financial Times summed up
exactly how small it really is in two major stories, one just under the masthead
on page one, on 24 January 2005. One story began, ìDuring the past few years the
US has become dependent, not so much on millions of investors around the globe
but on a few individuals in a few of the worldís central banks.î[2] In 2003
these central bankers bought enough treasuries to cover 83% of the U.S. current
account deficit, and 86% of those purchases came from Asian central banks.
The two main sources of money for U.S. Treasuries are the central banks of Japan
and China. Japan held about $715 billion in U.S. Treasuries, as of November
2004, and China held about $191 billion.[3] All the other nationsí central banks
hold altogether, about the same amount again, roughly another trillion.
As the total of all obligations is about $4 trillion, two central banks
obviously hold about one quarter of the total. They are in the position to pump
or dump the Treasury market all by themselves. They can sell what they have or
simply stop buying when the Treasury sells.
Since the money comes from a handful of foreign central banks, the possible
rigging of the Treasury market equals the possible rigging of the foreign
exchange markets. These central banks have to buy dollars before they buy
Treasuries. Even Alan Greenspan has acknowledged that the two go together,
admitting that Asian central banks ìmay be supporting the dollar and U.S.
Treasury prices somewhat.î[4]
The Working Groupís existence is no mystery. See for yourself. Go to Google and
type in Executive Order 12631. You will find the Executive Order, and even a 14
November 2003 statement from Secretary of the Treasury John Snow giving a brief
history of the Working Group, describing its policy advisory activities, and
concluding with these words: ìIt also is a forum used to exchange information
during market turmoil through ad hoc conference calls and meetings.î
...
This has an advantage for the Bush administration, which has the ruinously
ridiculous policies of simultaneously cutting taxes and waging wars or building
up for them. In effect, the basic racket is: the Bush administration exports
jobs to these countries, and in turn they finance Bushís fiscal deficit so he
can continue his wars and cut taxes for his friends. The deficit for 2005 will
be at least $400 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.[7] The
Pentagon budget for 2005 was about $400 billion. Add in two supplemental
requests for the costs of his Iraq war and the Pentagon figure is roughly $500
billion. ìIt is interesting to note that the military budget is about the same
order of magnitude as the fiscal deficit,î said veteran Pentagon waste fighter
Ernest Fitzgerald.
The forecast by Andrew Robertson, chief executive of Omnicom's BBDO advertising
agency, the world's third-biggest, underscores the uncertainties facing
advertisers in developed markets as they shift from their traditional dependence
on television.
http://www.rense.com/general63/cellphonestoreplaceTV.htm
Obviously, not everyone against the war feels able to participate in an anti-war
demonstration. About two months ago, I saw this classified ad in a Southern
Californian newspaper (not Hollywood): Support Our Soldier For Deployment!!
Garage Sale! Saturday 7am-?
The mother of this since-deployed soldier told me outright that Bush lied to
start the war. But she felt constrained. ìYou see,î she said emotionally, ìÖIím
torn because I feel that I have to support my sonÖ I donít talk a lot about it
to him or my husband, the way I truly feel, because you know itís just too hard
when they support it and I donít. Itís hard.
&sid=1051”>http://www.interventionmag.com/cms/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article
&sid=1051
Johnny Gosch, Jeff Gannon, Hunter Thompson and the unraveling of a troubling
tale.
By Tim Schmitt
Noreen Gosch sits in a booth at the West Des Moines Village Inn, nursing a cup
of coffee and managing, despite her larger-than-life personality, to blend into
the surroundings and keep a low profile in the almost empty restaurant. She is
open with her thoughts and willing to share what information she can, yet she
remains guarded - cautious and thoughtful in a manner often mistaken as cold and
standoffish. She thinks carefully as she speaks about her son, Johnny, and the
players in a bizarre conspiracy surrounding his disappearance in 1982 that
continues to evolve, and may finally be on the verge of breaking down.
http://www.pointblank-dm.com/cover.shtml
According to the few journalists who were able to attend the event, once the two men had done their bit for the cameras - and it is the TV audience these events are really aimed at - some of the journalists attempted to ask questions.
At which point a phalanx of party supporters - apparently bussed in for these occasions - were pushed in front of their leaders to shield them from the prying media. No questions were allowed.
They also seemed to burst into coordinated clapping just at the right time to drown out questions from the press.
Too late
It is being suggested that this is to be the norm for this campaign.
After the prime minister announced the date of the election from Downing Street - taking no questions from the media - he was then helicoptered off to a party event in Dorset with just a tiny group of hacks in tow.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/vote_2005/frontpage/4419789.stm
[Now no one in DC wants to talk about the costs of healthcare, but imagine if you will the costs of not doing anything about healthcare in the following situation.
Some dastardly terrorist type infects some low-middle income people with a deadly, but slow acting, disease. Now they have no health insurance, so they don’t go tot he doctor. Most likely they can’t affod to stop working either, even if they feel kind of sick.
So these people go out there day in and day out spreading whatever diease they have been stuck with, until finally they drop on the ground unconscious or some such thing and get taken to the emergency room.
Now they will be in the hospital with all the othe patients, all the visitors, and all the hospital workers until they figure out the person has some evil deadly disease.
Well by the time they figure that out, the diease could have spread all over the coutry, and why? Because these people couldn’t afford to go to a doctor when they felt alittle bit sick, because they couldn’t afford to stay home and infect other people whenthey felt laittle bit sick.
This article already says 18,000 people a year diei n this country because they don’t have health insurance. That number could eaisly go way, way up from there.]
Durieux's is one of many unique strategies that the 45 million uninsured people in the United States employ in an attempt to keep themselves healthy without going broke, as medical and health insurance costs have soared in recent years.
Premiums for family coverage in employer-sponsored plans rose 59 percent between 2001 and 2004, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, compared with a 9.7 percent growth in consumer prices.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050407/ap_on_he_me/health_insurance_tango
Today, the Rapid City (S.D.) Journal examined the Guckert/Gannon links to the 2004 U.S. Senate contest in that state, which sent the Democratic leader, Sen. Tom Daschle, packing. The newspaper’s probe followed reports in E&P and elsewhere about Gannon’s apparent links to political operatives and bloggers in the state who are credited with helping to elect John Thune to the post.
According to the paper, Thune said last week that he barely knew Gannon. He said he appeared on Gannon's radio show once early in the campaign and later may have done another interview for a print piece. But Thune said “his campaign didn't pay Gannon for his reporting services and didn't coordinate its campaign strategy with him, as some critics have implied.”
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000827954
[Why anyone would take advice from al awyer on any subject is beyond me.
i remember a good story about the McCarthy hearings. Some guy was being interrogated for being a possible Commie Pinko dupe or whatever. So he was sitting there with his lawyer next to him, and senator whoever asked him a question. So the guy puts his hand over the microphone and his lawyer sits there whispering in his ear.
And the layer is whispering and whispering.
Finally he stops, and the guy takes his hand off the microphone.
He leans for ward and says “Senator, I decline to answer hat question based on the fact I can’t understand one damn word of what my lawyer is telling me.”]
The legal counsel to Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) admitted yesterday that he was the author of a memo citing the political advantage to Republicans of intervening in the case of Terri Schiavo, the senator said in an interview last night.
Brian H. Darling, 39, a former lobbyist for the Alexander Strategy Group on gun rights and other issues, offered his resignation and it was immediately accepted, Martinez said.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32554-2005Apr6.html
In a fortnight when two Arab footballers have kept Israel in World Cup contention, an Arab schoolboy has beaten hundreds of Jewish children to win a quiz focused on the history of Zionism.
Rami Wated, 12, an Arab Israeli from Jaffa, was a winning finalist in a competition to answer questions mainly based on Tel Aviv street names and their relevance to the history of Jewish nationalism.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/story.jsp?story=627093
Carrying bamboo sticks in their fists, a crowd of men formed in the village of Ganeshpur. "Kill the Maoists and their supporters," a young man shouted as the mob moved down the street. Soldiers at a barracks 90 feet away stood by and did nothing.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=2358&ncid=2358&e=6&u=/csm/20050405/wl_csm/onepalx_1
The Transportation Security Administration, once the flagship agency in the nation's $20 billion effort to protect air travelers, is now slated for dismantling.
The latest sign came yesterday when the Bush administration asked David M. Stone, the TSA's director, to step down in June, according to aviation and government sources. Stone is the third top administrator to leave the three-year-old agency, which was swiftly created in the chaos and patriotism following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The TSA absorbed divisions of other agencies such as Federal Aviation Administration only to find itself now the victim of a massive reorganization of the Department of Homeland Security
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35333-2005Apr7.html
Israeli police have arrested two Jews suspected of planting fake bombs in Jerusalem to try to disrupt plans to pull settlers out of the Gaza Strip.
The pair were caught after leaving a backpack rigged with wires, police said.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4420875.stm
The New Zealand intelligence community, based in Asia, believes with certainty that NGOs operated by Kiwis are coming under Israeli intelligence pressure.
One well positioned Scoop contact says: ìThis is a matter of record as well as personal experience and the experience of those close to me.î This contact says this pressure is linked directly to Israel being angered that the New Zealand Government insisted the illegal passport case against two Israelis in Auckland be aired publicly.
http://scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0405/S00133.htm
[Wait. It can’t happen to me. I’m an honest upstanding American citizen. I am paying with real American money. No one would ever arrest me and chain me to a pole for paying a bill. This is America.
You’re damn right it’s America.]
"When I bought the stereo player," Bolesta explains, "the technician said it'd fit perfectly into my son's dashboard. But it didn't. So they called back and said they had another model that would fit perfectly, and it was cheaper. We got a $67 refund, which was fine. As long as it fit, that's all.
"So we go back and pay for it, and they tell us to go around front with our receipt and pick up the difference in the cost. I ask about installation charges. They said, 'No installation charge, because of the mix-up. Our mistake, no charge.' Swell.
"But then, the next day, I get a call at home. They're telling me, 'If you don't come in and pay the installation fee, we're calling the police.' Jeez, where did we go from them admitting a mistake to suddenly calling the police? So I say, 'Fine, I'll be in tomorrow.' But, overnight, I'm starting to steam a little. It's not the money -- it's the threat. So I thought, I'll count out a few $2 bills.
...
Meanwhile, everybody's looking at me. I've lived here 18 years. I'm hoping my kids don't walk in and see this. And I'm saying, 'I can't believe you're doing this. I'm paying with legal American money.'"
Bolesta was then taken to the county police lockup in Cockeysville, where he sat handcuffed to a pole and in leg irons while the Secret Service was called in.
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:UMChJpuMiwsJ:www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/bal-md.olesker08mar08,1,76004.column%3Fcoll%3Dbal-local-columnists+my+bill+twice.+You+don%E2%80%99t+want+these+bills&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
posted by abu nakba at 4/08/2005 07:13:00 PM
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