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And, yes, I DO take it personally: 09/04/2011 - 09/11/2011
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"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it."
- Noam Chomsky
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And, yes, I DO take it personally

Wednesday, September 07, 2011

Another Obama promise to be broken... *yawns, goes back to sleep*

so, what's new...?

Plan Would Keep Small Force in Iraq Past Deadline

By ERIC SCHMITT and STEVEN LEE MYERS

A recommendation from Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta to keep troops in Iraq beyond 2011 would break a longstanding pledge by President Obama.


it's all part of the strategy of "endless war," right...? oh, and keeping control of the world's oil supply, mustn't forget THAT...

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Tuesday, September 06, 2011

Sigh... Matt, I agree with you... I don't believe him any more either...

matt taibbi...
Listening to Obama talk about jobs and shared prosperity yesterday reminded me that we are back in campaign mode and Barack Obama has started doing again what he does best – play the part of a progressive. He's good at it. It sounds like he has a natural affinity for union workers and ordinary people when he makes these speeches. But his policies are crafted by representatives of corporate/financial America, who happen to entirely make up his inner circle.

I just don't believe this guy anymore, and it's become almost painful to listen to him.

i've heard enough, seen enough and now just don't want to listen any more...

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There is nothing more dangerous than allowing power to be exercised without accountability: no oversight, no transparency, no consequences

glenn...

Those who wield true political authority as part of an empire are vested with immense power over other people, but those who exercise that authority as part of wars are more powerful still. That kind of power not only attracts warped authoritarians and sociopaths like moths to light, but it also converts -- degrades -- otherwise normal people who come to possess it. That's not a new development, but rather as old as political power itself. Those bolded quotes are a pure expression of a demented, amoral God complex. That's the mentality that produces Endless War, and Endless War, in turn, breeds that mentality.

This is why there is nothing more dangerous -- nothing -- than allowing this type of power to be exercised without accountability: no oversight, no transparency, no consequences for serious wrongdoing: exactly the state of affairs that prevails in the United States. It's also why there are few things more deeply irresponsible, vapid and destructive than demanding that citizens, activists, and journalists retreat into Permanent Election Mode: transform themselves into partisan cheerleaders who refrain from aggressively criticizing the party that is slightly less awful out of fear that the other party might win an election 14 months away, even when their own party is the one in power. Renouncing the duty of holding accountable political leaders who exercise vast power makes one directly responsible for the abuses they commit.

let's be clear... to repeat glenn's statement, this is "exactly the state of affairs that prevails in the United States"...

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Monday, September 05, 2011

The U.S. to Libya: We have everything and if you try and take it away from us we will kill you

chris hedges...
Once the Libyans realize what the Iraqis and Afghans have bitterly discovered—that we have no interest in democracy, that our primary goal is appropriating their natural resources as cheaply as possible and that we will sacrifice large numbers of people to maintain our divine right to the world’s diminishing supply of fossil fuel—they will hate us the way we deserve to be hated. Libya has the ninth largest oil reserves in the world, which is why we react with moral outrage and military resolve when Gadhafi attacks his citizens, but ignore the nightmare in the Congo, where things for the average Congolese are far, far worse. It is why the puppets in the National Transitional Council have promised to oust China and Brazil from the Libyan oil fields and turn them over to Western companies. The unequivocal message we deliver daily through huge explosions and death across the occupied Middle East is: We have everything and if you try and take it away from us we will kill you.

pretty much...

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Sunday, September 04, 2011

What a goddam, freakin' mess we're in...

just sayin'...

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Saturday, September 03, 2011

Obama "needs to start doing business in a different way in a hurry"...? Puhl-e-e-eze...

there's a fundamental flaw to the reasoning here... think you can spot it...?
I keep thinking back lately to that candidate and team I watched in 2008. The candidate really had his finger on something. The team almost never made a serious mistake. When a mistake did happen, they did a respectable job of digging their way out of it. They had some fight in them. Well, I’ve learned something new from these folks: Up until now, I’ve thought that running a strong presidential campaign is a sign that one can probably govern fairly well too. But there appears to be little correlation between the two.

One wonders if there is concern now in the party’s higher echelons about the White House’s methods. Of course there must be. But what, for example, do seasoned Democratic senators say to one another when they chat in private? What about the party’s big money people? All of them must be dismayed. But which of them can reach Obama? Who can pierce the armor of his inner circle and tell him he needs to start doing business in a different way in a hurry?

there's an implied assumption that obama the candidate really had any intention of doing anything different than he has done since he took the oath of office...

speaking for myself, i was so unbelievably discouraged after the eight disastrous years of george w. bush that i completely neglected my due diligence on candidate obama, leaving myself to become enraptured instead with obama's eloquence and populist rhetoric, rather than looking seriously at his record... at least i can console myself with the fact that i was hardly the only one...

but, at this point, with the 32 months of obama's record as president staring us in the face, i don't see how anyone can think for a minute that 1) anybody can "pierce the armor" or that 2), even if the armor is "pierced," that the man has the slightest intention of "doing business in a different way"... he is what he is and god help us all...

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Friday, September 02, 2011

Air quality: Obama gives away the store - yet AGAIN...!

why doesn't obama just make it official and switch to the republican party... at least i wouldn't have to constantly deal with such massive cognitive dissonance...

note the highlighted item in the first paragraph...

Obama Pulls Back Proposal to Tighten Clean Air Rules

The Obama administration is abandoning its plan to immediately tighten air quality rules nationwide to cut reduce emissions of smog-causing chemicals after an intense lobbying campaign by industry, which said the new rule would cost billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs, officials said Friday.

The Environmental Protection Agency, following the recommendation of its scientific advisers, had proposed lowering the so-called ozone standard from that set by the Bush administration to a new stricter standard that would have thrown hundreds of American counties out of compliance with the Clean Air Act. It would have required a major effort by state and local officials, as well as new emissions controls by industries and agriculture across the country.

The more lenient Bush administration standard from 2006 will remain in place until a scheduled reconsideration of acceptable pollution limits in 2013, officials indicated Friday.

ya gotta give the man credit... the balls-less wonder knows which side his bread is buttered on...

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Suing the banks - about freakin' time...!

more like this...
U.S. Is Set to Sue a Dozen Big Banks Over Mortgages

The federal agency that oversees the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is set to file suits against more than a dozen big banks, accusing them of misrepresenting the quality of mortgage securities they assembled and sold at the height of the housing bubble, and seeking billions of dollars in compensation.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency suits, which are expected to be filed in the coming days in federal court, are aimed at Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Deutsche Bank, among others, according to three individuals briefed on the matter.

The suits stem from subpoenas the finance agency issued to banks a year ago. If the case is not filed Friday, they said, it will come Tuesday, shortly before a deadline expires for the housing agency to file claims.

it's 1:45 a.m... i fell asleep around 6 p.m. with my clothes on and am just now getting up to go back to bed... still recovering from jet-lag, i guess...

anywayz...

doing a late-night email check, i ran across the above, guaranteed to put a smile on my face... how sad that even the slightest evidence of any accountability whatsoever can make my heart flutter...

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Thursday, September 01, 2011

The U.S. doesn't give a crap for democracy, only for its "national interests"

via information clearing house...

Noam Chomsky : Hegemonic Powers Show Extreme Contempt For Democracy



and what would those "national interests" be...? hmmmmmmmmm...?

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Forced relocations for terrorism "suspects" in the UK

UN-frickingly-believable... and, mind you, no due process, rules of evidence, indictment or conviction anywhere in sight...

note the highlighted last paragraph...

from the guardian...

The government is planning emergency powers to forcibly relocate terror suspects, months after pledging to scrap the existing measure.

Launching the terrorism prevention and investigation measures (Tpim) bill in May, the Home Office said "relocation to another part of the country without consent will be scrapped". But it has now brought back the powers, reserving them for "exceptional circumstances".

The emergency legislation would enable the home secretary to specify more stringent restrictions on suspected terrorists in exceptional circumstances, the Home Office said.

These would include the power to relocate the individual without their consent to a different part of the country and tighter restrictions on association and communications, it said.

The enhanced Tpim bill will be put before parliament should exceptional circumstances arise. Under the measures, the home secretary "may impose restrictions on the individual leaving a specified area or travelling outside that area", the draft bill said. A suspect under such an order may also be forced to hand in their passport.

The home secretary could also impose restrictions on the individual's possession or use of electronic communication devices, including both computers and telephones. Further restrictions could also be imposed to limit who the suspect communicates or associates with, where the suspect works or what he or she studies. The restrictions imposed under the Tpim were an "imperfect but necessary step", the Home Office said.

It also rejected a recommendation from the joint committee on human rights that an alternative system of restrictions linked to an ongoing criminal investigation, such as that proposed by the former director of public prosecutions Lord Macdonald, was appropriate.

"Tpim notices, like the control orders they will replace, are intended to be used in such cases – where there is no realistic prospect of a prosecution, and there is no imminent prospect that further investigation will yield evidence that could be used to prosecute," the Home Office said.


as convinced as i am that the united states is out of its collective mind with the ever-growing and completely fear-based national security and surveillance state, this latest development in the uk is so over the top as to leave me speechless...

so, what's next...? repeat after me... d.e.t.e.n.t.i.o.n. c.e.n.t.e.r.s., known in an earlier era as "war relocation camps" (japanese internment camps) in the u.s. and by another, much more emotionally loaded term in germany (which i don't need to mention here)...

p.s. don't think for one minute that this diabolical plan isn't on the drawing board right here in the u.s...

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