July 15, 2010
July 14, 2010
Ye Olde Scribe Presents: A Neo Con Take on Curious George
Better days,: back when Curious George actually basked under the “glorious” picture of Junior’s Mommy at the White House during his maladministration.
This is a take off of an actual book about our adventurous simian.
Curious George went to the museum of Natural History. Apparently he hadn’t heard that God created the whole damn planet in a week, more or less, and then relaxed to have a deity strength doobie. You really should try them. When the blessed Saint Dean entered Heaven he introduced God to this all powerful herb. Ever since then they’ve been doing concerts for the angels singing, “Doobie doobie do….”
Curious George wandered amongst the exhibits. He was really interested in a big dinosaur called Tyrannosaurus Rex, right next to Michael the Savage Weiner Rex and Rex Harrison. So he hid in a bathroom and do what monkeys often do… until closing time. If you don’t know what monkeys “often do,” let’s just say that Curious George was very sore, especially when he tried to do number one, after waiting in the bathroom so long.
Once the museum was closed he climbed aboard Rex and started whooping as the bomb dropped down to the ground….
Sorry. That wasn’t George, but it was a famous movie.
He climbed aboard dino Rex and dino Rex broke. Alarms went off. Homeland Security showed up. They dragged off Curious George to Gitmo where they did far worse unspeakable things to George than George did to himself. By the time they got through with him he had admitted to plotting 9/11, murdering Michael Jackson, causing his sister’s wardrobe “malfunction,” sabotaging BPs well and being Satan himself. Proving once again that Neo Cons know how to protect America and anyone who dares to disagree with them needs to join Curious George.
There, now wasn’t that a nice little story, boys and girls?
Next we’ll read from another Neo Con children’s book: Bessie the Sheep and Lush Dimbulb Get Married Then Go to Neo Con College.
Subtitle: Flock Ewe.
Comments Off
No fine for F-Bombs
http://www.televisionbroadcast.com/article/103332
I’m not addicted to cursing, nor am I particularly offended by it. But I am offended by senseless breaches of our freedoms for no reason other than it makes some prude’s mouth look like a cat’s ass. And I am offended when AMC – which stands for American Movie Classics – a cable-only channel – plays some movie like Blazing Saddles, only to butcher the shit out of it. I mean, fuck man! What the hell?
Comments Off
U.S. banks laundering Mexican cartels’ drug money
Author’s note: Get caught with a pot seed in your car ashtray in Texas and you’re lookin’ at jail time, but get caught laundering coke money and no problem. The real criminals, sociopaths and pyschopaths are more likely to found in high places than trying to clean toilets in a motel room, or smoking weed in a trailor. All the feds have to is follow the money in order to find them…
Excerpt:
A report in the August 2010 issue of Bloomberg Markets magazine sheds light on the role that U.S. banks have played in helping to finance the violent drug trade that has plagued the U.S. – Mexico border for years, resulting in over 22,000 dead on both sides of the border since 2006. Among the dead are police, soldiers, journalists and ordinary citizens.
Last December, a statement by Antonio Maria Costa, head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, was largely dismissed by U.S. corporate media. He said he has seen evidence that the proceeds of organized crime were “the only liquid investment capital” available to some banks on the brink of collapse last year. He said that a majority of the $352 billion of illegal drug profits was absorbed into the economic system as a result.
A document obtained by Bloomberg seems to confirm Costa’s statement. It is an agreement between Wachovia, now owned by Wells Fargo & Co., and U.S. Department of Justice prosecutors in which Wachovia officials admit the bank had not done enough to watch for money-laundering schemes among some $378 billion it transferred between its branches and Mexican currency-exchange houses from 2004 to 2007. Wachovia has admitted in court that its unit failed to monitor and report suspected money laundering by narcotics traffickers – including the cash used to buy four planes that shipped a total of 22 tons of cocaine.
According to Bloomberg, US banks, including Wachovia, Wells Fargo & Co., HSBC and Bank of America are playing a crucial role in the running of the Mexican drug trade, allowing their facilities to be used to launder money.
Bloomberg also reports that a former Wachovia executive in charge of anti-money laundering operations “quit the bank in disgust” after managers ignored his reports that drug money was being laundered through its facilities. He said, “if you don’t see the correlation between the money laundering by banks and the 22,000 people killed, you’re missing the point.”
“Wachovia’s blatant disregard for our banking laws gave international cocaine cartels a virtual carte blanche to finance their operations,” said federal prosecutor Jeffrey Sloman according to Bloomberg. Wachovia agreed to pay $160 million to settle the court case in exchange for charges being dropped, a move Sloman described as “historic.” Historic, perhaps, but that is chump change for a bank that posted $7.79 billion in profits in 2006 – while engaging in these blatant violations of federal law.
If any American is caught with even a small amount of drugs in their possession in these border states, they are looking at a stiff prison sentence. Yet the people who finance the drug trade get off with a slap on the wrist while making huge profits from it. Perhaps instead of incarcerating Americans, tracking the “illegals” and talking about building worthless fences on the border, federal investigators should follow the money. It may lead to the real criminals.
Read more, get links here: Madison Independent Examiner – U.S. banks laundering Mexican cartels’ drug money
Comments Off
July 12, 2010
News from Berkeley: The Alameda County Fair, Pick-N-Pull & Chez Panisse
If you are having trouble trying to keep from being driven completely nutso by all the grim, horrible and terrible national and international news headlines that just keep pouring down on our heads, then perhaps it’s time to take a break and focus in on some of the good things in life instead. And there actually are a lot of good things happening here, locally, in my own home town — which happens to be Berkeley.
One good thing about living in Berkeley is that you can never get bored.
For instance, a friend of mine just started working at a new Japanese grilled-chicken restaurant called Ippuku, and on July 15 at 7 pm, I’m going there for dinner — so that I can compare their grilled chicken kebabs with all those chicken kebabs that I ate daily while in Iran for a month back in 2008. Iran is the Queen of too-dry chicken. Will Ippuku do better? They have to! Here’s a review of Ippuku (which is the Japanese word for “Take a break”): http://www.umamimart.com/2010/07/sneak-peak-ippuku-berkeley/
I also have plans to spend the night at Arnieville on Russell Street and Adeline, camping out with the disabled people there who are protesting Governor Schwarzenegger’s rather foolish budget cuts to salaries for their home-care workers. Will let you know how that goes.
And here’s a trilogy of articles I just wrote about Berkeley — or at least the East Bay area. Hopefully these places will cheer you up too.
****
The Alameda County Fair: “We had fun!”
(To see photos of the fair, click here: http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2010/07/alameda-county-fair-we-had-fun-lets-go.html)
“Let’s go to the Alameda County Fair on Wednesday,” said my daughter Ashley — and I, of course, replied, “Yawn.” But I was wrong. We went and had a really good time.
Not only was there a carnival with all the rides and monster foot-long corn dogs and all that kind of stuff but this really was a true county fair and there was pie judging and flower judging and demonstrations of gadgets that you never knew that you needed and quilt exhibits as well.
And there were also chickens. We bought chickens. We now have four chickens — they were four for $20 (and also came with food.) We named them Smokey Robinson, Sun Rocker, Mariqa Mustache and Scary Spice.
“Did you like the fair?” I asked my two-year-old granddaughter Mena.
“We had fun!” she replied. And we did.
****
Pick-N-Pull: America 50 years from now?
(To see photos of Pick-N-Pull, click here: http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2010/07/pick-n-pull-america-50-years-from-now.html)
My daughter’s friend recently needed some spare parts for his car. “Wanna go to Pick-N-Pull with me?” he asked. Pick-N-Pull? What’s that? “It’s an Elephant’s Graveyard for old cars.” Let’s go!
Pick-N-Pull is located way out in Richmond, in the Iron Triangle area. Guys (yes, it’s a guy thing) go there to pull spare parts out of old cars so they can get used parts on the cheap. The place has HUNDREDS of old cars — row after row, just sitting there. And looking like what American streets will look like in 50 years after we have run out of oil.
Ashley’s friend brought his tool box. A bunch of other guys did too. And, yes, there were a few women there, but not many besides me. And the pickers and the pullers were all leaning over engines with wrenches and stuff. I loved it. Rows and rows and rows of cars — most were from the 1990s. There were only a few really old cars and trucks. We looked at them all — but Ashley’s friend never did find the right part for his car.
PS: Approximately 40 rows at Pick-N-Pull were devoted to the ruins of American-made cars, mostly Cadillacs, Saturns, Buicks and Fords. And only approximately five rows there were devoted to broken-down foreign-made cars. What does that tell us?
****
My birthday dinner at Chez Panisse
“The American life-style is non-negotiable,” said George H.W. Bush — and then he and his sons almost immediately proceeded to negotiate away as much of it as they possibly could to bankers, tycoons, weapons manufacturers, lobbyists and Congressmen on the take.
And not only was the Bush family’s and corporatists’ enthusiastic deregulation of our public safety guarantees and the wholesale looting of our treasury a huge threat to the American life-style, that but when our oil runs out in a few years, we can forget that life-style completely! According to James Howard Kunstler’s book “The Long Emergency,” in less years than we would like, we’ll all be back to living like the Amish.
But there is one part of the American life-style that I absolutely refuse to negotiate until I absolutely positively have to — my yearly birthday dinner at Chez Panisse. Even if I have to scrimp and save all year long, even if I have to beg my grown children to treat me, I’m going! Nothing makes getting older more bearable than having a birthday dinner at Chez Panisse.
I can’t find the fancy little souvenir menu they gave me which says exactly what me and my son Joe ate, but I can still (vividly!) remember most of it anyway. Salmon carpaccio, rack of lamb and cherry pie. Plus I took plenty of photos. See them here: http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2010/07/my-birthday-at-chez-panisse-american.html
Comments Off
July 11, 2010
A new word: Oilcane
Author’s note: This is kinda funny. According to the New York Times there is a new word in the English Language. I can now die of benzene, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, 2-Butoxyethanol, Propylene Glycol and other volatile organic compounds knowing that I made a difference!
Oilcane
The combined effect of spilled oil and a hurricane.
Tropical storm Alex has prompted fears about the possible effects of a hurricane on the oil clean-up operation in the Gulf of Mexico, Gregory Patin wrote on Examiner:
According to Bloomberg, the mere possibility of a named storm entering the Gulf had Wall Street betting on a worst-case senario. On Friday, crude oil prices rose the most in four weeks on concern the first tropical storm of the hurricane season may head into the Gulf, disrupting both clean up efforts and oil production. …
Researchers at the Colorado State University hurricane forecast team, perhaps the most accurate in the nation, predict 18 storms. The team anticipates 10 hurricanes forming in the Atlantic basin between June 1 and Nov. 30. Five are expected to develop into major hurricanes (Saffir/Simpson category 3-4-5) with sustained winds of 111 mph or greater.
So, what does that mean for Gulf residents, besides the usual destroyed property and higher gas prices? How about a new word? Oilcane! And a new experience that makes the tar sheets washing up on beaches benign by comparison.
Patin directed readers to a post by senior meteorologist Alex Sosnowski on AccuWeather.com, who argued:
Depending on the approach of a tropical storm or hurricane, increasing winds and building, massive seas would first halt containment operations.
Rough seas would dislodge or destroy protective booms, rendering them useless as the storm draws closer.
Next, as the storm rolls through, high winds on the right flank of a hurricane making landfall would cause some oil to become airborne in blowing spray.
A storm surge could carry contaminants inland beyond bays, marshes and beaches to locations well inland.
Even a glancing blow from a hurricane passing to the west of the oil slick could be enough for winds and wave action to drive the goo nearby onshore, or to more distant fishing and recreation areas, perhaps in foreign waters.
Read the original article here: Madison Independent Examiner
Comments Off
July 10, 2010
Gulf residents, marine life: Specimens for a toxic science experiment
Author’s note: The oil and the dispersants alone are toxic, but the combination may be worse. No wonder BP won’t allow clean up workers to speak to the press, or allow the press anywhere near the clean up operations.
Excerpt:
According to scientists and researchers, the wide use of dispersant chemicals on the oil in the Gulf may amount to a toxic science experiment because because so little is known about the health effects of oil mixed with dispersants.
What is known about the chemicals is frightening.
The Oil
The oil itself is highly toxic. Dr. Gina Soloman’s blog for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), describes the acute health effects of exposure to oil as including headaches, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, irritation of the eyes and throat and difficulty breathing. In addition, the off-shore burning of oil, one of the strategies being used to reduce the massive spill, could harm human health. Anywhere that oil can be smelled is a place where oil particles are being inhaled and that poses health hazards.
There are long-term health concerns as well. Even after the spill has been staunched, fish and shellfish may carry the contaminants in their bodies for decades. “Contaminants in oil can persist for years and accumulate in the food chain,” Dr. Solomon writes, “causing elevated cancer risks or neurological risks from exposure to heavy metals such as mercury.” In addition to long-term cancer risks, some of these chemicals have been linked to miscarriages and birth defects.
The Dispersants
Corexit 9500 and 9257 have been injected in the underwater gusher by BP and dropped from the air to disperse the oil. They have been used by BP in unprecedented quantities. As of June 7, already over 1.08 million gallons have been used in the Gulf.
According to Molly Rauch, MPH, writing for Physicians for Social Responsibility:
The dispersants do not make the oil go away, but they break it up into tiny blobs so that it is not as harmful to wildlife and so that it is more accessible to being broken down by bacteria. At least that’s the thinking behind what is turning out to be a massive, uncontrolled experiment in the use of these chemicals….These chemicals are poisons, used only in a grim calculation that their effects on the ecosystem can’t be worse than the effects of the unchecked oil spill. (Emphasis added).
Although two of the known hazardous chemical ingrediants of a dispersant are 2-Butoxyethanol and Propylene Glycol, others are unknown and listed as “proprietary” on the Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) published by Nalco, the manufacturer. Charlie Pajor, a senior manager at the Illinois-based company told the New York Times: “It’s like any other product. We developed them and we’re protecting our trade secret.”
The MSDS’s list both acute and chronic potential health effects on humans including, central nervous system effects, nausea, vomiting, anesthetic or narcotic effects, injury to red blood cells (hemolysis), kidney and liver damage, and may defat and dry the skin, leading to discomfort and dermatitis.
Toxicologists, however, are now saying that Corexit is much more harmful to human health and marine life than we’ve been told.
The Toxic Soup
While both the oil and dispersants alone are toxic, the two substances combined may be even more toxic. The chemical compounds in each do not negate each other or disappear, rather they combine into what can be called a toxic soup.
On July 9, Dr. Shaw stated on CNN:
Shrimpers [were] throwing their nets into water… [then] water from the nets splashed on [one's] skin. …[He experienced a] headache that lasted 3 weeks…heart palpitations…muscle spasms…bleeding from the rectum…And that’s what that Corexit does, it ruptures red blood cells, causes internal bleeding, and liver and kidney damage. …This stuff is so toxic combined… not the oil or dispersants alone. …Very, very toxic and goes right through skin. (See video here).
Similarly, marine biologist and toxicologist Dr. Chris Pincetich, who has an extensive background in testing the affects of chemicals on fish, says that Corexit disrupts cell membranes in all living organisms, including humans. He also explains that EPA testing of chemicals is woefully inadequate. (See video here).
Considering that all of the ingredients of Corexit are not known, that EPA toxicity testing is inadequate, and that no one knows what the health effects on humans are when exposed to oil combined with dispersants, what this amounts to is a huge toxic science experiment with all of the marine life in the Gulf and Gulf residents as the test subjects.
Read more, get links and videos here: Madison Independent Examiner – Gulf residents, marine life: Specimens for a toxic science experiment.
Comments Off
Wealthy Republicans: Die Now!
What’s the one thing that just burns up Rethugs more than anything else? No, I mean besides a black President. That’s right – the Death Tax!
Or, more accurately, the Estate Tax, which is what is taken by the federal (and state) government when you pass on your property via a will to anyone but your spouse or a charity. Prior to 2002, the maximum estate tax rate was 55%, with the first $675,000 being exempt from the tax.
However, all through Bush’s two terms, Congress was busy at work slowly whittling the death tax to…well, to death. By the time Bush left office in 2009, the estate tax carried an exemption of $3.5 million, and the maximum tax rate was down to 45%.
But they weren’t done with it yet. Here’s a sneaky little secret: This year – 2010 – is the year of No Death Tax.
Yes you read that right. Zero percent. No taxation no matter who you leave your money to, no matter how much.
Libertarians rejoice! Your dreams have come true! Ding, dong, the witch is…
…uh, wait.
That rate is only good for 2010. NEXT year, the Death Tax is reinstated to PRE-BUSH LEVELS. Up to 55% tax rates on anything over a mill.
Why would Bush’s Congress do such a thing?
Seems obvious to me – they were setting up the next President to get blamed for raising taxes.
The good news for the American Landed Gentry is that this is probably not going to actually happen. If things progress as Wikipedia expects, then the new estate tax will carry an exemption of 5 million dollars, and will max out at 35%.
The bad news is that they will still cry about how Obama raised taxes.
The best win/win that I can see is this: All you rich Republicans need to die THIS YEAR. Then you don’t pay any estate tax, and the rest of us will be rid of you.
Are you listening, Pigboy?
Comments Off
Ye Olde Scribe Presents: Web Cam al Qaeda!
Welcome, infidels. Achmed has taken over the mind of Ye Olde Scribe, just like he has the weak, pathetic brain of the infidel who considers himself my master. You WILL go to the new al Qeada website. (http: www.ifIonlyhadabrainanarmalega.org… not NOT real URL. That’s an Islamic porno site. But Scribe is NOT kidding: they do have a new website he will NOT give the URL for. Screw you Achmed!) At the new website we have a live web cam. It’s a body cam.
Get to visit the al Qaeda barbershop where “a little off the top” is NOT just a slogan, and never, ever, “a little.” Or how about the parlor of 71, 51, or however many virgins it is. So hard to remember since my “accident.” Still under construction. You can’t get in unless you’re dead like me and then you still can’t get in because… you’re dead like me.
A “Catch 22?”
SILENCE INFIDEL!!!
Watch as other infidels like Glenus the Schmeckus Beckus, Lush Dimbulbs and other fellow fanatics curse us while demanding your country offers up a never ending supply of Americans to maim, kill and poke their eyes out while going nuke, nuke…
What do you mean I can’t use that phrase, it’s already the property of those who own the rights to the Stooges. I’m gonna KEEEEL YOU!
Then the grand finale as the body cam offers an “inside view” as another dead terrorist is created. Give him a hand! A leg! A foot, a brain ….if I only had a brain… (Tries to whistle the tune but he has no lungs so he can’t whistle.)
Web Cam al Qaeda has been brought to you by Islamic Sponge Bob, who REALLY made the Bikini Bottom drop.
Comments Off
July 9, 2010
We are ALL pelicans: The harsh consequences of environmental pollution
Last night I dreamed that I was interviewing Oscar the Grouch. But when I woke up, I discovered that it was only a leg cramp that had caused the dream. Do you know how to cure leg cramps? Here’s how. Use an exercise that physical therapists call “The clam shell”.
Assuming that this evil cramp is in your right leg, then lie down on your left side, thrust your right hip as far to the left as you can go, bend your right leg half-way, and then move your right knee up to the ceiling and down to the bed or floor a few times — like a clam shell opening and closing. Voila. End of cramp.
It’s the sideways motion of your leg that does it. The muscles get confused. They think that they are only spozed to move back and forth, not sideways.
And clams got me to thinking about pelicans and all that oil-spill mess in the Gulf. If someone doesn’t contain that spill soon, our oceans could become hopelessly polluted — and if the oceans lose their ability to breath oxygen into the atmosphere and our oceans die, then you and me will probably die too.
When our oceans’ inability to process oxygen is combined with our disappearing forests’ inability to process oxygen plus our reduced oxygen levels caused by car exhaust, air travel and war machines, then any fool can tell that we humans will soon be in big trouble — not to mention that nobody seems to notice the huge amounts of totally dangerous nuclear waste we are accumulating, along with enough piles, mounds and masses of plastic Coke bottles generated daily to be seen from the moon if they were all in one place.
Am I the only one alive today that notices this stuff?
Anyway, after I woke up from the Oscar the Grouch dream, I got to thinking about pelicans. You know, the ones all covered with oil; the ones with the look in their eyes that says, “What happened? What hit me? Help!” And that “greasy-pelican” look could pretty much become ours soon too, in a shorter amount of time than we would like — covered with pollution, wondering what the freak had happened to us and slowly dying.
Not only that but there are approximately six billion people on the planet right now and each one of us has added at least one plastic bottle per (week, day, month, check one) to the landfill — or what used to be our farmland. Dig into the ground almost anywhere 20 years from now and you won’t hit oil. You’ll hit plastic. And rusted-out old cars. And toxic chemical sludge. And nuclear waste. Unless something changes drastically in the very near future, in less time than we can imagine, we are all gonna be pelicans too.
PS: Actually, the human race does have one saving grace on the horizon — the end of oil. When we are out of oil in a few decades, at least there won’t be so much carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere any more. Who would have thought that being forced to go back to candlelight, horse-drawn buggies, caissons, cavalry and manual typewriters would be just the ticket to save the human race from extinction?
PPS: I was listening to progressive radio talk-show host Mike Malloy the other day and some right-winger commented that, “If only Ronald Reagan was alive today, he would have searched for an answer to the oil spill problem — and to all of our other problems too.” Dream on, wingnut. The only answers that Ronald Reagan ever searched for involved looking for newer and better and more corrupt ways to make him and his rich buddies even richer.
I’m not sure if I got Mike Malloy’s quote exactly right here or not — because I was too busy cleaning my apartment to take notes. Yes, after all these years I’ve finally found a house-cleaning system that works for me! Every weekday between 6 pm and 8 pm, I listen to Malloy’s radio talk-show on Green 960 AM and clean house. Then I get so angry at all the major Republican neo-con screw-ups he tells us about that I take my anger out on my apartment and actually manage to get stuff cleaned up and/or thrown out.
Next I’m going to take on gardening, another task that I hate, and garden from noon to 3 pm every day while listening to Randy Rhodes — taking my anger out on the weeds.
Currently every kind of right-winger you can imagine is busy telling me that if only America puts Republicans back in office, then they will clean up America’s mess. Not! Republicans and their various rich-dude allies are the very ones who made most of this freaking mess in the first place — as well as getting all us poor sweet victims of their nefarious plans to be all scrambling at each others’ throats while they, like the Beagle Boys, clean out the mint.
It’s like the old “Hair of the dog that bit you” theory I guess — that if we only drink more of the Republican neo-con Kool-Aid that got us drunk in the first place, our hangover from the last batch won’t hurt quite so badly? How naive do they think that we are?
If we really want to clean house in Washington, perhaps we should do it while listening to Mike Malloy!
Comments Off
July 8, 2010
BP turning Gulf Coast into corporate police states
Author’s note: I recently spoke with a friend who used to work with the New York Times and I was told, “don’t go there and get the hell out of FL…ASAP.” Not sure what she meant by that…
Excerpt:
Reporters and photographers are reporting numerous incidents where they have been prohibited from approaching areas where oil has fouled Gulf beaches and have been prevented from taking photos or gathering enough information to publish reports.
BP clean up workers have been forbidden from talking to the press. The incidents of BP officials and the U.S. Coast Guard barring reporters from recording the effects of the disaster have been recorded in mainstream media, and date as far back as the third week of May.
Who owns the Gulf coast, the American people or BP? One may be tempted to answer that the federal government owns it. Keep in mind, however, that all federal officials – elected, appointed or hired – supposedly work for the taxpayers that pay their salaries.
Apparently that is no longer the case in the corporatocracy known as the United States of America, because federal officials, police agencies and the U.S. Coast Guard seem to have pledged their allegiance to BP rather than the U.S. constitution and the American people.
At least the Obama administration has managed to plug one thing: the flow of information related to the oil disaster from the beaches of Gulf states. The ability to document a disaster, particularly through images, is key to focusing the nation’s attention on it, and the resulting clean-up efforts. Yet Americans are being denied this information.
Take, for example, this recent report that has been all-but buried in the sand: (get the links here).
While that may have been a long account of a relatively short-lived incident, it is indicative of the intimidation that journalists, especially free-lancers that are not part of the corporate media establishment, have been subjected to in the Gulf states since the BP oil disaster. I recently spoke with a friend who writes for a major publication and was told, “don’t even go there.” So,instead, I’ll just post a link to the top 20 photos that BP and the federal government do not want you to see here.
Normally, with a story like this, I would be lamenting the lack of corporate media coverage, but many mainstream news sources have reported that journalists and photographers are being denied access to the Gulf coast by BP, local law enforcement and federal officials.
Obviously, the U.S. Government and BP share the same interest – preventing the public from knowing the magnitude of the spill and the inadequacy of the clean-up efforts. What could possibly be happening in the Gulf of Mexico right now that is so drastic that BP and the federal government is willing to destroy our rights in order to protect their secrets?
The police state behavior of this, however, may be even more significant. In effect, BP, a British corporation, is now controlling American law enforcement officials and a branch of the U.S. military. It is impossible to know where government actions end and corporate actions begin because the line between them no longer exists.
Your rights as a free citizen have been obliterated in the past 10 years, and what is happening in the Gulf is a good example of that. America is on the verge of becoming a fascist corporatocracy that answers to the financial interests of huge corporations – at the expense of the freedoms and tax dollars of the people.
Read more, get links and video here: Madison Independent Examiner – BP turning Gulf Coast into corporate police states
Comments Off
The ultimate cage match
What would a columnist say if he were assigned to produce a column about a hypothetical cage match between Hitler and George W. Bush? Could he add a new point that hasn’t been made previously?
Obviously the public is weary of being reminded of the most apparent salient points such as:
Hitler won his country’s top military honor in battle; George W wasn’t it combat.
Hitler wrote a book that sold widely; George W’s book may have been ghost written.
Hitler was a mesmerizing public speaker; George W inspired yawns.
George W. Bush would have to be declared more cunning and conniving than the German who precipitated the Second World War and if you are living in a country going to war, that’s the kind of guy best suited for the driver’s seat.
Hitler took extensive measures to make sure that his people were unaware that he and his men were committing war crimes. Folks were fearful that bad things would happen to the people who were interrogated by the Geheime Staatspolitzi (AKA Ge-sta-po) but they never knew for sure what the specifics were. Thus when the details were revealed during the Nuremburg War Crimes Trials, citizens of Germany were genuinely shocked and ashamed to learn what their leader had done in their name.
Hitler didn’t involve the citizens of his country as co-conspirators in his war crimes.
George W. Bush’s diabolical game plan included the 2003 revelation of complete details for his method of questioning terrorism suspects and after those questioning methods were made public there were very few voices raised in opposition. Thus if (trolls please note the use of the subjunctive mood here) Bush committed any war crimes by using waterboarding and other harsh measures, the citizens of the United States would have to be considered as possible accessories during and after the fact.
Hitler wasn’t included in the list of defendants at Nuremburg. He was not even listed as a defendant being tried in absentia. His team did stand in the prisoners docket and it became obvious during the Nuremburg trials that most of the German citizens were just as shocked and surprised by the offences as was the rest of the world.
Bush’s use of waterboarding may have helped enliven some barroom debates, but it never spurred any serious denunciations from the country’s mass media, the country’s clergy, nor even much of the citizenry.
By enlisting the country as accessories to his methodology, George W. Bush insured himself against any serious threat that he would ever face any legal consequences in his own country’s judicial system. His defense would have to be: “Sorry, we goofed!” Any guilty verdict would have to be tantamount to saying: “We sure did!” and that’s not a bloody well likely scenario in a country that portrays itself as “the Goodguys” (and we don’t mean hippies who scored the famous WMCA T-shirt in the Sixties).
Statistically Germany is a Catholic country and maybe der Fuhrur knew that he couldn’t intimidate the Pope (Pius XII) into giving his imprimatur to the torture, so he kept it hidden, but future dictators (and Presidents) have learned from Bush; if a country is going to sin it is best they do so openly without any hint of an admission of guilt or shame.
Imagine, if you will, that legendary aviatrix Hanna Reitsch had managed to take Germany’s chancellor with her when she made her legendary escape from Berlin in an Arado 96 airplane as the war came to an end. Can you envision that it’s two or three years later and you spot a billboard in Berlin during the airlift portraying the former leader (Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz was named as the successor) with the caption: “Do you miss me yet?” Obviously it would be in German and use the Schwaben style font.
To put things in their proper perspective just imagine that sometime in 1955 Huntley or Brinkley traveled to Germany and got an exclusive interview with the retired dictator on his ranch in Bavaria and that he smirked and tossed off a line about “I consulted the best legal minds available before sanctioning the waterboarding.” That hypothetical scoop will give readers a fair idea of which of the two was a better con man. It should be a gimme to see that Bush is much more devious and treacherous than the vegetarian (who distained smoking) could ever hope to have been. Only one of them connived to include all citizens as accessories to their torture program.
Neither Hitler nor Bush have ever been charged with (let alone convicted of) war crimes in court, so it seems that unless such a hypothetical grudge match could actually be held, their respective fans will (like the continuing sixties debate: Beatles or Stones) have something to debate every time they meet.
Hitler had a gimpy arm and Bush has been called a bully so our money would be on GWB if (in a Twilight Zone world) the cage match actually were to take place.
We were going to use what Robert Frost wrote (“Most of the change we think we see in life/Is due to truths being in and out of favor.”) as the column’s closing (apropos) quote but on the way to the Berkeley Public Library to use the wifi connection to post this column, we ran the premise of a Bush-Hitler cage match past Allison of Home 101 on Shattuck and she had a better one. She said: “They’d just give up and become friends!”
Now the disk jockey will play play Wayne Newton’s “Danker Schoen,” and two by the Andrews sisters: “The Beer Barrel Polka” and “Bei Mir Bist Du Schon.” We have to go to Oakland and post bail for a friend. Have a “hunker in the bunker” type week.