Politics, Everyday, All day... morning, noon and night....

[cowboyangel]

Nature: A Real Moral Value
By Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
AlterNet

Tuesday 11 January 2005.

Despite the rejection of some of Bush's worst environmental initiatives, the White House still hasn't learned that it's sailing against the public tide.

As President Bush prepares his plans for a second term, he should remember that the name on the Oval Office door isn't the only thing that will stay the same. Another is America's broad, bipartisan consensus about conservation, health and environmental stewardship. The vast majority still believe in strong laws to keep our air and water clean, our families healthy and our beautiful landscapes preserved.

To protect nature is to follow a moral path, but ultimately we do it not for the sake of trees and animals, but because our environment is the infrastructure of our communities. If we want to provide our children the same opportunities for dignity and enrichment as those our parents gave us, we've got to start by protecting the air, water, wildlife, and natural treasures that connect us to our national character. Therein lie the values that define our community and make us proud to be Americans.

It's worth noting that President Bush largely avoided mentioning his environmental record during the campaign because it made him more vulnerable in the eyes of most voters. All the more reason then to be wary of his administration claiming a false mandate to continue pursuing its hostile environmental agenda.

Consider the words of EPA Administrator Mike Leavitt, who told reporters a few days after Bush's re-election that the administration's agenda has been "validated and empowered" by the voters.

A mandate on the environment? Nothing could be further from the truth.

When people were given the opportunity to vote on a purely environmental issue, as they did this year in ballot initiatives around the country, they almost always voted overwhelmingly in favor of protecting the environment.

By a more than two-to-one ratio, voters in Washington state approved a ballot initiative to prevent more waste from being dumped at the federal Hanford nuclear site, the nation's most contaminated federal facility. The decision will require cleanup of the 586-square-mile site before any additional waste is stored there. That is, if this common-sense measure survives a legal challenge by the Bush Justice Department.

In Montana, a conservative state that went for Bush, voters upheld a ban on using cyanide, a toxic chemical, in open pit mining. In Colorado, another "red" state, voters approved a requirement that utilities must generate 10 percent of their electricity from renewable sources of energy, like solar and wind. And let's not forget the revolt of ranchers, anglers and hunters - particularly out West - who expressed outrage and bitter disappointment over the Bush administration's destructive public lands policies.

While the presidential contest was not a referendum on the environment, this election clearly demonstrated that protecting our health, environment and natural heritage was, is and always will be strongly supported by the American people.

Unfortunately, this message may be muddled back inside the Beltway. Despite the rejection in Congress of some of the Bush administration's worst initiatives, including Arctic Refuge drilling and industry-friendly air pollution and energy plans, the White House still hasn't learned that it's sailing against the public tide.

All indications are that Bush's second term will proceed as the first with respect to energy, the environment and efforts to auction off our natural landscapes at fire-sale prices. And they won't wait for Inauguration Day to continue rewarding corporate polluters with special exemptions, rule changes and loosened laws.

In the face of recent rhetoric about an alleged mandate, it's clear the challenge is greater than ever. But the important thing is that the fundamental politics of the environment did not change with this election. To the contrary, the forces that have worked to protect our communities remain firmly in place.

There is strong bipartisan support for a safer, cleaner approach - particularly in the U.S. Senate and among the nation's governors. And the fight won't just be about holding the line; in fact, we will see increasing efforts to move forward on pressing problems like mercury contamination, water pollution, ocean restoration and perhaps most importantly, global warming.

As the nation moves forward in tackling our environmental challenges - and we must - it's important to remember that all faiths teach us to protect our environment. In that sense, we can consider safeguarding the water we drink, the air we breathe, the wildlife and wild places we cherish, and the natural heritage owed to our children as the most important of the moral values that reportedly weighed heavily in this year's presidential race.

-------

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, and author of "Crimes Against Nature."

[Salt]

Yes, this is the truth. Yet, saving the earth. Who cares, right? I've done conservation funded by the government, good good stuff. Yet if it was not for the individual acting from within, it might have well been in the corp of engineers' budget. Is there not a massive hurdle from saving the source of the power and beauty, the spring.
I'm saying, two valid choices. Thats pretty pafuckingthetic.
Go downtown. If your that person. If your not go into the forest. How many pizza places (different trees) do you see.

[cowboyangel]

"*"

[DVD Burner]

IRAQ IN TRANSITION: WAR COMMENTS



Bush: 2nd thoughts on `Bring 'em on'

Associated Press
Published January 14, 2005


WASHINGTON -- President Bush expressed misgivings Thursday for two of his most famous expressions: "Bring 'em on," in reference to Iraqis attacking U.S. troops, and his vow to get Osama bin Laden "dead or alive."

During an interview with reporters from 14 newspapers, Bush acknowledged that his tough language "had an unintended consequence."

On July 2, 2003, two months after he had declared an end to major combat in Iraq, Bush promised that U.S. forces would stay until the creation of a free government there. To those who would attack U.S. forces in an attempt to deter that mission, Bush said, "My answer is: Bring 'em on."

"Sometimes, words have consequences you don't intend them to mean," Bush said Thursday. "`Bring 'em on' is the classic example, when I was really trying to rally the troops and make it clear to them that I fully understood, you know, what a great job they were doing. And those words had an unintended consequence. It kind of, some interpreted it to be defiance in the face of danger. That certainly wasn't the case."

In the week after the Sept. 11 attacks, Bush was asked whether he wanted bin Laden, the terrorist leader blamed for the attacks, dead.

"I want justice," Bush said. "And there's an old poster out West, that I recall, that said, `Wanted, Dead or Alive.'"

Recalling that remark, Bush said Thursday: "I can remember getting back to the White House, and Laura said, `Why did you do that for?' I said, `Well, it was just an expression that came out. I didn't rehearse it."'

As the president was expressing his misgivings, a former adviser to Bush's father, James Baker, said the current administration should consider a phased withdrawal of some of the 150,000 American troops in Iraq. Otherwise, the former secretary of state said, the U.S. risks being suspected of having an "imperial design" in the region.

Nonetheless, a protracted U.S. military presence in Iraq is probably unavoidable because attacks on U.S.-led coalition forces and on Iraqi security forces are likely to continue, Baker said Tuesday in a speech at Rice University in Houston.

"Even under the best of circumstances, the new Iraqi government will remain extremely vulnerable to internal divisions and external meddling," he said.

Baker, who was secretary of state during the Persian Gulf war under President George H.W. Bush, also said progress on Israeli-Palestinian peace would help in Iraq.

[cowboyangel]

http://www.brightpathvideo.com/video/PrePrin.mov

we can change government step by step by working in our local communities.
see this video on the Precautionary Principle to see how some folks are doing it.

[cowboyangel]

Joel PLEASE COME BACK
I miss you even if you're a conservative
Love, Cowboyangel

[cowboyangel]

http://www.brightpathvideo.com
if I can find the time I'll put up a streaming quicktime video tonight or at least by tomorrow of the protest of Donald Beardslee's execution at San Quentin Prison.....right in my backyard almost. Sister Helen Prejean might be there as she's in town to promote her new book that criticises the death penalty. So good to be surrounded by so many really sane, spiritually alive people with so much horror going on just a few feet away.

[DVD Burner]

I think I'd rather have Joel come back.

[samtzu]

gotta' say this, Cowboy:

Donald Beardslee did what he did. The ladies he did it to are very dead, and no amount of legal wrestling will bring them back. The death penalty may or may not be unjust, but this is a fight that needs to be taken up for someone who may or may not be guilty, not this slime ball. You just weaken the anti-death penalty case by fighting for his survival.

There is justice in the universe, whether we see it or not, and the price someone should pay for the willful death of another, with his own hands, is death. I cannot support you or the others in the fight for this man's life. If he dies, so be it. If he lives, so be it. This is not justice, this is a circus, and I am not entertained.

[DVD Burner]

I've really been enjoying Aljazeera's new site.
http://www.aljazeera.com/cgi-bin/news_s ... ce_id=6564

I enjoy most the abillity to make coments and read the responses. Much better than any American or Brittish tabloid.

[cowboyangel]

gotta' say this, Cowboy:

Donald Beardslee did what he did. The ladies he did it to are very dead, and no amount of legal wrestling will bring them back. The death penalty may or may not be unjust, but this is a fight that needs to be taken up for someone who may or may not be guilty, not this slime ball. You just weaken the anti-death penalty case by fighting for his survival.

There is justice in the universe, whether we see it or not, and the price someone should pay for the willful death of another, with his own hands, is death. I cannot support you or the others in the fight for this man's life. If he dies, so be it. If he lives, so be it. This is not justice, this is a circus, and I am not entertained.

this is about compassion and justice. Tests revealed that Beardslee's right brain hemisphere was non-functional. It is a crime to execute anyone no matter what the crime (Killing to stop killing?? the stats prove this is a fallacious argument) and worse to execute someone who is mentally damaged. Read the info on the links I posted and stay tuned for the video. Got a great interview with Mike Farrel from M.A.S.H.

[DVD Burner]

Actually what I'm looking forward to is this new administration changing social security so that the suckers will want to invest into companies similar to Enron and get ripped off again. Speaking of which.....what happened to Enron and Kenny boy?

Uh huh! Figured so.


People will belive anything.

[DVD Burner]

Oh and hey,

What happened to the Anthrax investigation?

[DVD Burner]

Last one for politics today......


How long will it take before Bush goes into Syria? True, Bush & Co. never had plans to go into Iran first. They stated that in the "statement of principles." in '97.


toodle do.



Ah, people will belive anything.

[DVD Burner]

damn,

almost a half hour to midnight.......and......I wanted to know what Condi ment by the "WANGS".

[cowboyangel]

here it is folks...do some of you remember M.A.S.H.? Anti-Death Penalty video

http://www.indybay.org/news/2005/01/1715847.php

[DVD Burner]

Here's one to get Joel out.

Joel = Johnson.

[DVD Burner]

night.


spelled right?

[cowboyangel]

[DVD Burner]

Friday 21st January, 2005

Christian leader rips Sponge Bob video --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Big News Network.com Friday 21st January, 2005 (UPI)

U.S. Christian leader James Dobson says cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants appears in a pro-homosexual video.

The founder of Focus on the Family, one of the leading voices in the campaign to ban gay marriage, said at a black-tie dinner in Washington, the popular figure appears in the video with children's TV characters Barney and Jimmy Neutron, The New York Times reported.

Dobson said the makers of the video planned to mail it to thousands of elementary schools to promote a tolerance pledge that includes tolerance for differences of sexual identity.

Video creator Nile Rodgers, who wrote the disco song We Are Family, believes Dobson is confused by the We Are Family Foundation -- founded by Rodgers after the 2001 terror attacks -- and an unrelated Web site belonging to another group called We Are Family, which supports gay youth.

The video makes no mention of sexual preferences and is available only on the group's Web site.

[Silver 2]

Goes a bit over the top now and again but contains some really valid points:

http://www.urbanarchipelago.com/

[DVD Burner]

Something to think about:

OSLO, Norway (AP)

- President Bushs Hook em, horns salute got lost in translation in Norway, where shocked people interpreted his hand gesture during his inauguration as a salute to Satan. Thats what it means in the Nordics when you throw up the right hand with the index and pinky fingers raised, a gesture popular among heavy metal groups and their fans in the region. Shock greeting from Bush daughter, a headline in the Norwegian Internet newspaper Nettavisen said above a photograph of Bushs daughter Jenna, smiling and showing the sign. For Texans, the gesture is a sign of love for the University of Texas Longhorns, whose fans are known to shout out Hook em, horns! at sporting events. Bush, a former Texas governor, and his family made the sign to greet the Longhorn marching band as it passed during the inaugural parade through Washington during Thursdays festivities, explained Verdens Gang, Norways largest newspaper.

[DVD Burner]

Yesterday during the Bush prayer ceremony when everyone (Bush's Cheney's and Co.) was in church singing the "Star Spangle Banner" , everyone needed to pick up their song chart to read what the second verse was.

Did anyone notice?

[DVD Burner]

Chinese Hostages Freed in Iraq

By VOA News
22-January-2005



The Chinese Embassy in Baghdad says eight Chinese workers held hostage in Iraq have been freed by insurgents who kidnapped them earlier this month.

The kidnappers said in a video message broadcast Saturday that they decided to release the men after China promised to discourage its citizens from traveling to Iraq.
There is no word on the whereabouts of the Chinese hostages, who were working in Iraq as construction laborers before they were seized. However, China's official Xinhua news agency says the Chinese Embassy in Baghdad confirmed the men had been released.

Arabic television station Al-Arabiya broadcast the statement from the insurgents, who call themselves the Movement of the Islamic Resistance - Nuamaan Brigades. It said the hostages had not been harmed, and that no ransom had been paid.

The kidnappers, who said four days ago that they were planning to kill the hostages within 48 hours, announced Saturday that the eight men were released as a good-will gesture, following assurances that China would counsel its citizens not to travel to Iraq in the future.

[cowboyangel]

(Washington Post) - White House officials said yesterday that President Bush's soaring inaugural address, in which he declared the goal of ending tyranny around the world, represents no significant shift in U.S. foreign policy but instead was meant as a crystallization and clarification of policies he is pursuing in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Middle East and elsewhere. Nor, they say, will it lead to any quick shift in strategy for dealing with countries such as Russia, China, Egypt and Pakistan, allies in the fight against terrorism whose records on human rights and democracy fall well short of the values Bush said would become the basis of relations with all countries




bull....shit

[cowboyangel]

[cowboyangel]

Alternate Reality
By Molly Ivins
Creators Syndicate

Friday 21 January 2005

Austin - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice helpfully explained it all for us. The problem is that we are living in an alternative reality. What we think we know is not true. We have always had enough troops in Iraq. There are 120,000 trained Iraqi soldiers ready to take over. The president has condemned torture, so what else is there to say? Why torture happened, whose fault it is and why it is still happening at Guantanamo is not a problem because the president has condemned it. Secretary Rice also condemns it, so why raise questions about the fact that she wrote a letter to get an anti-torture clause in the intelligence appropriation bill taken out?

What, do you want to insult her integrity?

Secretary Rice did say that mistakes were made, but she does not know who made them or who should be held accountable. And, of course, as we all learned during the last election, no matter what happens, it is never, ever President Bush's fault.

Oh, goody, another Texan with a big job in Washington. We're so proud. Jonathan L. Snare has been named to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). Just the guy we would have chosen ourselves, because his background is so relevant. No, he's not an expert in health or safety, but he used to be the lobbyist for Metabolife, the ephedra diet pill that attracted so much unpleasant attention. Ephedrine was finally barred in 2003 after the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) decided it had caused 155 deaths. I guess we're lucky Bush didn't put Snare at the FDA. According to the Washington Post, Metabolife spent more than $4 million lobbying the Texas Legislature between 1998 and 2000. Snare was also general counsel to the Republican Party of Texas from 1999 to '01 and has extensive experience in election law.

Exactly how this qualifies him to head OSHA is unclear - maybe he's a quick learner. He did join the solicitor's office of the Department of Labor in June 2003, where the Labor Department's announcement says, "Snare focused on issues at OSHA, as well as the Wage and Hour Division and the Mine Safety and Health Administration." Wage and Hour, you may recall, has made what business considers a great leap forward by making overtime pay optional, whereas the Mine Safety people have just had their budget cut.

Snare was formerly with the Texas law firm Loeffler, Jonas & Tuggey. That would be W's close friend and big-time money-raiser Tom Loeffler, who ran for governor of Texas on the grounds that he was "tough as 'bob war.'" To prove it, he proudly claimed to have played football with two broken wrists. (Loeffler also wore shower caps on his feet while showering during a visit to San Francisco back in the '80s lest he get AIDS through his feet. (I tell this story not to make Snare ridiculous by association but just because it's a good story.)

Snare is actually the second fox assigned by Bush to guard this particular henhouse. The assistant secretary is John Henshaw, a former health and safety chief for the chemical company Monsanto. In 40 months on the job, Henshaw axed three dozen proposed regulations from the agency's agenda, according to NPR - toxic chemical exposure regs, metalworking fluids regs, flammable and combustible liquids reactive chemicals that kill people and so forth.

Snare was generally well-liked and well thought of here in Texas, but that still doesn't make him an expert on health and safety issues. OSHA is now so toothless, with so few inspectors that they can only look at a tiny percentage of plants in this country.

Henshaw also encouraged partnership with industry. According to NPR reporter Peter Overby, "What OSHA has done is turn away from regulating; less stick more carrot. Now its goal is to work with industry instead of mandating health and safety standards." He also reports the new alliances business encouraged by Henshaw do not include worker representatives. "That's not the only way in which previous policies at OSHA have been stood on their head. OSHA used to recruit its top appointees from state agencies and job safety organizations. In the Bush administration, it draws appointees from business and anti-regulatory groups."

Well, Snare will certainly fit right in, then. This administration disdains the whole idea of ergonomic injuries, also called repetitive stress syndrome, despite the fact that millions of people have them. It's one thing to ignore ergonomic injuries since people seldom die of them, but chemical exposure and many other problems are life-threatening. Workplace deaths were up last year, but the agency claims illness and injuries were down. I hate to sound like a cynic, but I'd like to know how they changed the reporting requirements on the last two.

[DVD Burner]

hey man,

ahnold for prez and ban gays period. also lets not forget, reverse roe vs. wade.


yepper......this is gonna be real good. now excuse me while i take some more much needed drugs to deal with all this.

wait a minute, I said this again when?
Posted: Tue Nov 16, 2004 12:28 am

Looks like they wont waste any time huh?



Posted on Mon, Jan. 24, 2005

Abortion foes stage protest of Roe v. Wade

By LAURIE KELLMAN

Associated Press


WASHINGTON - President Bush told abortion foes on Monday he shared their support for "a culture of life" and claimed progress in passing legislation to protect the vulnerable.

"We need most of all to change hearts and that is what we're doing," Bush said as anti-abortion activists marked the 32nd anniversary of the Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion with a day of rallies, protests and other activities.

The issue took on new urgency with the likelihood of a high court vacancy.

Bush addressed marchers by phone from the presidential retreat at Camp David, Md., where he had spent the weekend.

Every anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision, prompts demonstrations by opponents and proponents of abortion rights. Activists on both sides of the abortion issue marched in demonstrations across the country Saturday, the actual anniversary of the Jan. 23 decision.

This year there is increasing speculation about Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist's health. Three other justices have had cancer.

One or more court vacancies would give President Bush the chance to install another justice or justices who oppose the Roe decision, increasing the likelihood that at some point, the ruling could be overturned.

Bush conceded that a society "where every child is welcome...may still be some way away."

Still, he said, he was working with Congress to pass "good, solid legislation to protect the vulnerable." He cited his signing of legislation last year to outlaw certain late-term abortions.

"You know, we come from many, different backgrounds, but what unites us is our understanding that the essence of civilization is this: The strong have a duty to protect the weak," Bush said. He has said he supports a constitutional amendment to outlaw abortion, but has not actively pushed for it.

Bush also said that he would continue "seeking common ground where possible and persuading increasing numbers of our fellow citizens of the rightness of our cause. This is the path of the culture of life that we seek for our country."

On Monday, abortion opponents staged a rally before a march from the Ellipse to the Supreme Court. Other groups opposed to abortion rights were holding events on Capitol Hill.

NARAL Pro-Choice America has projected that 19 states would quickly outlaw abortion, and 19 more might follow suit, if Roe v. Wade were overturned.

Last week, Norma McCorvey, the woman known as "Jane Roe" in Roe v. Wade, asked the Supreme Court to overturn its 1973 decision

[DVD Burner]

This is not a lie.........?


http://www.whitehouse.gov/response/disarm.html

Disarm Saddam Hussein

The gravest danger we face in the war on terror is outlaw regimes that seek and possess nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.


Twelve years ago, Saddam Hussein agreed to disarm all weapons of mass destruction. For 12 years, he systematically violated that agreement.
Three months ago, the United Nations Security Council gave Saddam his final chance to disarm. He has shown his utter contempt for the U.N.
The U.N. and U.S. intelligence sources have known for some time that Saddam Hussein has materials to produce chemical and biological weapons, but he has not accounted for them:
26,000 liters of anthrax—enough to kill several million people
38,000 liters of botulinum toxin
500 tons of sarin, mustard and VX nerve agents
Almost 30,000 munitions capable of delivering chemical agents From three Iraqi defectors, we know that Iraq in the late 1990s had several mobile biological weapons labs. But he has not disclosed them.
The International Atomic Energy Agency confirmed in the 1990s that Saddam Hussein had an advanced nuclear weapons development program, a design for a nuclear weapon, and was working on methods of enriching uranium for a nuclear bomb. He recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa, according to the British Government. He has attempted to purchase high strength aluminum tubes suitable for nuclear weapons, according to our intelligence sources. Yet he has not credibly explained these activities.
Thousands of Iraqi security personnel are at work hiding documents and materials from the UN inspectors.
Iraqi officials accompany all inspectors in order to intimidate witnesses.
Iraq is blocking U-2 surveillance flights requested by the U.N.
Saddam Hussein has ordered that scientists who cooperate with the UN be killed, along with their families.
Saddam Hussein aids and protects terrorists, including al-Qaida members. He could provide hidden weapons to terrorists, or help them develop their own. It would take just one vial, one canister, one crate slipped into this country to bring a day of horror like none we have ever known.
The United States will ask the UN Security Council to convene next week to consider the facts of Iraq’s ongoing defiance of the world. We will consult. But if Saddam Hussein does not disarm, we will act for the safety of our people, and for the peace of the world.

I see no treason nor any lie here.

[DVD Burner]

"Games Without Frontiers"

Hans plays with Lotte, Lotte plays with Jane
Jane plays with Willi, Willi is happy again
Suki plays with Leo, Sacha plays with Britt
Adolf builts a bonfire, Enrico plays with it
-Whistling tunes we hid in the dunes by the seaside
-Whistling tunes we're kissing baboons in the jungle
It's a knockout
If looks could kill, they probably will
In games without frontiers-war without tears
Games without frontiers-war without tears

Jeux sans frontieres

Andre has a red flag, Chiang Ching's is blue
They all have hills to fly them on except for Lin Tai Yu
Dressing up in costumes, playing silly games
Hiding out in tree-tops shouting out rude names
-Whistling tunes we hide in the dunes by the seaside
-Whistling tunes we piss on the goons in the jungle
It's a knockout
If looks could kill they probably will
In games without frontiers-wars without tears
If looks could kill they probably will
In games without frontiers-war without tears
Games without frontiers-war without tears

Jeux sans frontieres

PETER GABRIEL