Ethanol Continued

Here are some more reasons why the shift to ethanol is a cluster fuck. Politicians have proposed this so that they can look like they have an energy policy and, especially here in the mid-west, look like they are doing something about creating jobs.

1. It cannot solve the problem with “foreign oil.” Bush's stated goal of having 15% of our fuel usage come from ethanol would require the entire US corn crop.¹ In addition ethanol yields less energy per gallon that gasoline: in other words, your 7mpg hummer now only gets 5mpg.

2. It produces less energy than is put into producing it. This is idiotic. So that we can become independent from foreign oil, we should plant and grow a bunch of corn that requires machinery powered by oil, fertilizers and pesticides produced from oil. While the USDA “scientists” claim there is a net energy gain, they do not take into account all inputs If all inputs are taken into account, 29% less energy is produced from burning ethanol than goes into the production of it.²

3. It causes environmental damage. It does produce fewer emissions than gasoline when burnt. But, Corn requires more pesticides, herbicides, and nitrogen fertilizers than any other food crop. Production of the corn requires fossil fuels and the production of the ethanol from the corn produces “Volatile organic compounds” including “formaldehyde and acetic acid, both carcinogens. Methanol, although not known to cause cancer, also is classified as a hazardous pollutant.”³

4. It drives up the price of food. Most of the corn grown in the US goes to animal feed and so, when you drive around that corn, you drive up the prices of milk, eggs, meat, cheese, staples for poor people like us.

5. It doesn't benefit farmers. "Initially we all were excited by the high prices," said Troy Roush, a sixth-generation farmer who grows 2,600 acres of corn in central Indiana. "But the truth is that the farmers won't keep any of it. There's an old saying that expenses will always rise to meet revenue. It all gets built in."

   And that's exactly what has happened: As the price of corn has gone up, so has the cost of growing it. In just two months, the price Roush paid for fertilizer doubled. And speculation has driven land prices through the roof. "It's insane," Roush said. "In the last four months our land values have increased 40 percent. We're all sitting around wondering if it's real."

   While most farmers own some land, the vast majority rent part or all of their acreage.⁴

6. It benefits large agribusiness. “Ethanol leader ADM’s market share has actually declined from a stunningly high 60 percent to a still-worrisome 25 to 30 percent in recent years. But a recent analysis by USDA agricultural economists concluded, “The fuel ethanol industry may very well be in transition toward an inevitable concentration of ownership into the hands of a few large processing firms.” The market is driven by large-scale gasoline refining firms, which “don’t want to deal with all these small plants,” and a “virtual consolidation of ethanol processing” is taking place. (ADM didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment for this story.)”⁵

1See: Colin Carter and Henry I. Miller, Christian Science Monitor:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0521/p09s02-coop.html

2See David Pimentel (Cornell) and Tad W. Patzek (Berkeley), Natural Resources Research, Vol. 14, No. 1, March 2005.

3This is from an AP story. I found it on CBS news. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/05/03/tech/main508006.shtml

4Lisa Hamilton, “Ethanol Booms, Farmers Bust,” http://alternet.org/environment/52073/

5Christopher Cook, “Biofuel: Who Benefits - Smaller Growers or Just Large-Scale Producers and Agribusiness?” from the Friday, April 14, 2006, American Prospect, accessed at http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0414-22.htm.

Some Justice

Think Progress » Breaking: Libby Sentenced To 30 Months In Prison, $250,000 Fine: "Breaking: Libby Sentenced To 30 Months In Prison, $250,000 Fine"

Microsoft Surface Video - Touchscreen, Multi Touch Coffee Table

Microsoft Surface Video - Touchscreen, Multi Touch Coffee Table - Behind the Scenes - Popular Mechanics: "Microsoft Surface: Behind-the-Scenes First Look (with Video)"


More multi-touch display porn. Han and his latest creations are featured about 1/2 through.

Another Leopold shot for Rove's downfall

from an interview w/ one of the fired attorneys:

 

 Iglesias told me that, while we still do not know how he and his colleagues
were placed on the termination list, he does believe a "smoking gun"
exists that will lead directly to Karl Rove and blow the scandal wide open.

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The Summer of Iran

Cheney in the news in the last two days:

Cheney on a recent CBS Sunday Talkshow:

The fact is that the threat to the United States now of a 9/11 occurring with a group of terrorists armed not with airline tickets and box cutters, but with a nuclear weapon in the middle of one of our own cities, is the greatest threat we face. It's a very real threat. It's something that we have to worry about and defeat every single day.

And then today:

Multiple sources have reported that a senior aide on Vice President Cheney's national security team has been meeting with policy hands of the American Enterprise Institute, one other think tank, and more than one national security consulting house and explicitly stating that Vice President Cheney does not support President Bush's tack towards Condoleezza Rice's diplomatic efforts and fears that the President is taking diplomacy with Iran too seriously.

This White House official has stated to several Washington insiders that Cheney is planning to deploy an "end run strategy" around the President if he and his team lose the policy argument.

The thinking on Cheney's team is to collude with Israel, nudging Israel at some key moment in the ongoing standoff between Iran's nuclear activities and international frustration over this to mount a small-scale conventional strike against Natanz using cruise missiles (i.e., not ballistic missiles).

This strategy would sidestep controversies over bomber aircraft and overflight rights over other Middle East nations and could be expected to trigger a sufficient Iranian counter-strike against US forces in the Gulf -- which just became significantly larger -- as to compel Bush to forgo the diplomatic track that the administration realists are advocating and engage in another war.

So, what exactly is the truth value of Bush's prediction that he would be a uniter and not a divider?

There's a good reason we don't often post poll numbers a lot, but I want to make one exception. The new CBS poll on the Iraq war records that:

CBS Poll: 76% Say War's Going Badly, Record Number In Survey Say Getting Involved In Iraq Was Mistake - CBS News: "a CBS News/New York Times poll shows the number of Americans who say the war is going badly has reached a new high, rising 10 percent this month to 76 percent. "

But the really really interesting poll number is buried a bit in the article:

In addition, the poll finds Americans are more pessimistic than ever about the overall direction in which the United States is headed. Seventy-two percent, the highest number since the CBS/NYT poll started asking the question in 1983, say the country is on the wrong track, while 24 percent say it's headed in the right direction.

Ethanol....More later

I have been quiet about ethanol so far, but Jesus...this is most ridiculous idea ever. More later, but one reason which I'm sure you've seen. You're then driving poor people's food. But here it is reposited:

It's just a side comment from the FT:

"Retail food prices are heading for their biggest annual increase in as much as 30 years, raising fears that the world faces an unprecedented period of food price inflation.

Prices have soared as the expanding biofuels industry, climate change and the growing prosperity of nations such as India and China push up the costs of farm commodities including wheat, corn, milk and oils."

Remember Caesar, Thou Art Mortal

Bush Anoints Himself as the Insurer of Constitutional Government in Emergency | The Progressive: "Under that plan, he entrusts himself with leading the entire federal government, not just the Executive Branch. And he gives himself the responsibility “for ensuring constitutional government.”

He laid this all out in a document entitled “National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD 51” and “Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-20.”

The White House released it on May 9.

Other than a discussion on Daily Kos led off by a posting by Leo Fender, and a pro-forma notice in a couple of mainstream newspapers, this document has gone unremarked upon.

The subject of the document is entitled “National Continuity Policy.”

It defines a “catastrophic emergency” as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government function.”"

...

The document emphasizes the need to ensure “the continued function of our form of government under the Constitution, including the functioning of the three separate branches of government,” it states.

But it says flat out: “The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government.”

Our 544th Post: Back to the Future

I'm feeling nostalgic, so I thought I'd take a look at the first Repository post:

http://repositagain.blogspot.com/2005/12/firedoglake-jonathan-alter-newsweek-on.html

Turns out that our first post was also the first of a series we reposited in 2005 and much of 2006 on the NSA wiretapping revelations.

So, in honor of our 1st post I thought I'd reposit the most recent developments...

First, you must view scenes of James Comey's testimony in front of Schumer's senate committee from Tuesday. I mean it...even if you've read some highlights you've got to see it for yourself. Comey -- who is a mainstream loyal Bushie -- tells a story that both implicates Bush directly as a co-conspirator in the illegalities surrounding the program, and also shows Gonzales and Andy Card and Bush to resort to brute thuggishness against their own.

Now, a few choice quotes from the Washington Post editorial the morning after Comey's testimony. Not only is this a loyal Bushie Comey telling this tale, this is the loyal Bushie (or at least not openly disloyal) Washington Post editorial page.

Mr. Comey's vivid depiction, worthy of a Hollywood script, showed the lengths to which the administration and the man who is now attorney general were willing to go to pursue the surveillance program. First, they tried to coerce a man in intensive care -- a man so sick he had transferred the reins of power to Mr. Comey -- to grant them legal approval. Having failed, they were willing to defy the conclusions of the nation's chief law enforcement officer and pursue the surveillance without Justice's authorization. Only in the face of the prospect of mass resignations -- Mr. Comey, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III and most likely Mr. Ashcroft himself -- did the president back down.

...

The dramatic details should not obscure the bottom line: the administration's alarming willingness, championed by, among others, Vice President Cheney and his counsel, David Addington, to ignore its own lawyers. Remember, this was a Justice Department that had embraced an expansive view of the president's inherent constitutional powers, allowing the administration to dispense with following the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Here are a few legal opinions just to whet your appetite for more detailed reading.

First, from two posts by Glenn Greenwald at Salon:

What more glaring and clear evidence do we need that the President of the United States deliberately committed felonies, knowing that his conduct lacked any legal authority? And what justifies simply walking away from these serial acts of deliberate criminality? At this point, how can anyone justify the lack of criminal investigations or the appointment of a Special Counsel? The President engaged in extremely serious conduct that the law expressly criminalizes and which his own DOJ made clear was illegal.

...

But more revealingly, just consider what it says about this administration. Not only did Comey think that he had to rush to the hospital room to protect Ashcroft from having a conniving Card and Gonzales manipulate his severe illness and confusion by coercing his signature on a document -- behavior that is seen only in the worst cases of deceitful, conniving relatives coercing a sick and confused person to sign a new will -- but the administration's own FBI Director thought it was necessary to instruct his FBI agents not to allow Comey to be removed from the room.

Comey and Mueller were clearly both operating on the premise that Card and Gonzales were basically thugs. Indeed, Comey said that when Card ordred him to the White House, Comey refused to meet with Card without a witness being present, and that Card refused to allow Comey's summoned witness (Solicitor General Ted Olson) even to enter Card's office. These are the most trusted intimates of the White House -- the ones who are politically sympathetic to them and know them best -- and they prepared for, defended themselves against, the most extreme acts of corruption and thuggery from the President's Chief of Staff and his then-legal counsel (and current Attorney General of the United States).

...

As former OLC official Marty Lederman noted last night, John Ashcroft and James Comey are both Republican ideologues who proved that they were willing to endorse and defend even the most radical (and illegal) behavior (including the lawless detention of Jose Padilla and the administration's "refashioned" -- though still illegal -- warrantless eavesdropping program). If they were insisting that the conduct of the Bush administration was not only illegal, but so illegal that they were ready to resign en masse over it, then, as Lederman asks: "can you even imagine how bad it must have been?"

...

James Comey's testimony amounts to a statement that -- even according to the administration's own loyal DOJ officials -- the President ordered still-unknown spying on Americans, and engaged in that spying for a full two-and-a-half-years, that was so blatantly and shockingly illegal that they were all ready to resign over it. And the President's Attorney General then lied to ensure that this episode remain concealed. Mere one-day calls for a Congressional investigation are woefully inadequate here.

And from a former lawyer in the OLC under Clinton, MartyLederman:

These are hardly officials who were unwilling to push the legal envelope, or who were disdainful of the objectives or need for the NSA program. Two or three weeks later, OLC did develop an alternative legal theory that permitted a narrower version of the surveillance program to go forward. By all accounts, that legal theory is some version of the argument that the 2001 Authorization for the Use of Military Force against Al Qaeda authorized this form of electronic surveillance, notwithstanding FISA. That is a theory that I and many others have harshly criticized (see, for example, the letters collected here). It is, to say the least, an extremely creative reading of the relevant statutes -- a reading that not a single member of Congress who voted for the AUMF could possibly have imagined, and one that (to my knowledge) not a single member of Congress has approved once reading of it in DOJ's "White Paper."

These DOJ officials were willing to sign off on that very tenuous legal theory. What does that tell us about the OLC theory that they inisted upon repudiating?

Important Unanswered Questions to Date:

1. Did Bush make the call to Mrs. Ashcroft to pressure her to allow Gonzales and Card in the hospital room?
2. Did Bush know that Ashcroft and then acting Attorney-General Comey said "no" to certifying the legality of the 2001-2003 program? -- Note: even now it is already looking like this is a silly question and is obviously "yes" and will never be denied by the white house.
3. What made Comey and Ashcroft change their minds on this program at this time in 2003? After all, the program was recertified once a year as being legal by the Office of Legal Council in the DOJ (which, by congressional law, has the last and only say in what counts as "legal" and "illegal" in the Executive Branch)?

Actually it is not exactly right to say that Comey "changed" his mind, since he was fairly new to his position coming in in 2003. Actually, the guy who changed his mind is --- Goldsmith, who had also come on board in 2003 as the new head of the OLC. Goldsmith had apparently undertaken a review of his predecessor's legal proclamations, and it seems found many of them wanting.

And you'll never guess who it was that was head of the OLC before Goldsmith....None other than John Woo. Yes, that John Woo.

Now, Goldsmith somehow convinced Comey and Ashcroft that the OLC and therefore the DOJ and the entire executive branch was going to have to completely reverse its stand on the NSA program in question. Now if you watch the Comey video, you get the sense that he probably was easy to convince. My guess is his briefing by Goldsmith was his first encounter with the program and it scarred the hell out of him. (I mean it -- watch his testimony!) What I don't get is Ashcroft. Is it really possible that Woo had convinced him of the program's legal validity only to have a more persuasive Goldsmith come along and so convincingly persuade him to effectively shut down this national security program? Come on...Pull the other one.

Here's my guess, either Ashcroft
1. didn't even read the original Yoo legal evaluations or
2. there weren't any original Yoo evaluations or
3. there were aspects to the program that didn't get mentioned (or were deliberately distorted) in the original Yoo evaluations.

And at this point, the consensus opinion seems to be a mixture of 1 and 3, but there may be other possibilities as well. One possibility seems to be that Yoo and the DoJ folks were not given access to all the details of the program in question, but went on developing legal justifications nonetheless, and that Goldsmith and Comey insisted on knowing the details before they would sign off.

But all this is window dressing: Bush directly intervened and took it upon himself to continue the operation of a program that the OLC -- the one and only voice that is always taken as dispositive in matters of law in the Executive Branch -- and that means that yet again Bush and several others are felons.

A Special Place in Hell?

Falwell dies.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. evangelist Jerry Falwell, a leader of the Christian right, died on Tuesday, his assistant said.

Falwell, 73, was found unconscious in his office and was taken to a nearby hospital in Virginia, CNN said. He had a history of congestive heart problems.

"That is true, it's over," the assistant, Duke Westover, told Reuters by telephone. He said an official statement would be issued soon.

Bush joke kicks off Korea talks

MWC News - A Site Without Borders - - Bush joke kicks off Korea talks: "Rare talks between military leaders from North and South Korea have got off to an unusual start with one of the North Korean generals recalling an internet joke about the US president.

Tuesday's meeting at the border village of Panmunjom was intended to discuss the restoration of rail links after more than half a century.

Both sides had previously agreed to a test-run across the heavily-fortified border on May 17th, but the North's military must first give its consent.

Shortly after the meeting began however, Lieutenant-General Kim Yong-chol opened proceedings by telling a joke at George Bush's expense.

'I recently read a piece of political humour on the internet called 'saving the president',' he was quoted as saying in pool reports from the talks."

The Joke

Bush goes out jogging one morning and, preoccupied with international affairs, fails to notice that a car is heading straight at him.

A group of schoolchildren pull the president away just in time, saving his life, and a grateful Bush offers them anything they want in the world as a reward.

"We want a place reserved for us at Arlington Memorial Cemetery," say the children.

"Why is that?" asks Bush.

"Because our parents will kill us if they find out what we've done."

Two noteworthy Truthout pieces

From Alternet.org

On
Tuesday, without note in the U.S. media, more than half of the members
of Iraq's parliament rejected the continuing occupation of their
country. 144 lawmakers signed onto a legislative petition calling on
the United States to set a timetable for withdrawal, according to
Nassar Al-Rubaie, a spokesman for the Al Sadr movement, the nationalist
Shia group that sponsored the petition.





Pelosi Threatens to Sue Bush Over Iraq Bill

By Jonathan E. Kaplan and Elana Schor
The Hill

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is threatening to take President Bush
to court if he issues a signing statement as a way of sidestepping a carefully
crafted compromise Iraq war spending bill.

Pelosi recently told a group of liberal bloggers, "We can take the president to court" if he issues a signing statement, according to Kid Oakland, ablogger who covered Pelosi's remarks for the liberal website dailykos.com.

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France joins

Yes, Michael, we love exploitation just as much as you.





Michael, 26, fishmonger: "I voted for Sarkozy. I like what he said about working more to earn more."



meanwhile:



"President-elect Sarkozy will take possession of the Elysees Palace on
May 16. He intends to go on a retreat for a week, in an unknown place,
to meditate on the difficult task lying ahead."

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Sarkozy seen winning French election: Belgian media

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Conservative favorite Nicolas Sarkozy is on course to win France's presidential election run-off on Sunday with between 53 and 54 percent of the vote, Belgian media reported.

The RTBF public broadcasting station and the newspapers Le Soir and La Libre Belgique reported on their Web sites that unofficial estimates showed Sarkozy beating Socialist Segolene Royal comfortably.

Bush/Cheney Impeachment

I'm seeing this on a number of sites today (digg, GNN, etc) and have found the lines tied up when I've tried. Can't verify if Pelosi actually is conducting this, but it doesn't matter at this point...



House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is conducting a phone poll -- the number is
1-202-225-0100. Just call in and say something to the effect of "I'd
like to register my support for the impeachment of President George W.
Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney."

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Venezuela quits IMF and World Bank

Fitting May Day piece...



The Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, today severed ties with the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.

In doing so he distanced Caracas further from what he described as Washington-dominated institutions.

The
populist leader, who took office pledging to pursue radical political
reform and an economic "third way," said yesterday that Venezuela no
longer needed institutions "dominated by US imperialism."

Speaking
at a May Day event, Mr Chavez said: "We don't need to be going up to
Washington... We are going to get out. I want to formalise our exit
from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund."

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Ratfucking 101: Find a Good Rat's Nest

Okay, don't usually link to my own posts but here I pointed out a couple stories that detail the relationship between Rove and the small Tenn. company chosen to "host" the RNC servers. I posted it when it first came out that Rove maintained non-WH email accounts and used them regularly for all purposes.

I linked to a photo of Rove that (we know now) was photoshopped to show him walking out of a resturant in Tenn. carrying the promotional materials for Copitx. It turns out that this photo was fucked with by some folks at Coptix for "kicks".

Then we learned that millions of emails are now missing from the WH and private RNC server.

And now, this...

AlterNet: Network Hosting Attorney Scandal E-Mails Also Hosted Ohio's 2004 Election Results:

"There is more than ample documentation to show that on Election Night 2004, Ohio's 'official' Secretary of State website -- which gave the world the presidential election results -- was redirected from an Ohio government server to a group of servers that contain scores of Republican web sites, including the secret White House e-mail accounts that have emerged in the scandal surrounding Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's firing of eight federal prosecutors."

Wolfowitz asked to resign from World Bank

I don't know if you've been following the brew-ha-ha that has sparked up over (among other things) Wolfie's latest attempt to use someone else's treasury as if it were his own, but since this refuses to go away, and now the IEG group has called officially for him to resign, I thought this should be reposited for history's sake.

United Press International - NewsTrack - Top News - Wolfowitz asked to resign from World Bank:

"WASHINGTON April 23 (UPI) -- An agency that oversees the World Bank is asking for the resignation of the bank's president, former deputy U.S. Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz.

In a document obtained by the Financial Times, the Independent Evaluation Group asked for Wolfowitz's immediate resignation, saying a continuation of his leadership will lead to 'irreparable harm to worldwide efforts in poverty reduction and sustainable development.'"

Map: Welcome to the Blogosphere Recognizing Themselves Mutually Recognizing One Another

Map: Welcome to the Blogosphere | Technology | DISCOVER Magazine: "Map: Welcome to the Blogosphere"

RIP Kurt Vonnegut

Reuter's.
The New York Times

A poem of his from "A Man Without a Country,"
Requiem

When the last living thing

has died on account of us,

how poetical it would be

if Earth could say,

in a voice floating up

perhaps

from the floor

of the Grand Canyon,

“It is done.”

People did not like it here.

New York Times Select Free with Academic Email Address.

Go here.

Revolution, flashmobs, and brain chips: A Report on 2035 from Britain's Minister of Defense

Revolution, flashmobs, and brain chips. A grim vision of the future | Science | Guardian Unlimited:

Take a look at the whole thing, but here's one prediction their making:

"'The middle classes could become a revolutionary class, taking the role envisaged for the proletariat by Marx,' says the report. The thesis is based on a growing gap between the middle classes and the super-rich on one hand and an urban under-class threatening social order: 'The world's middle classes might unite, using access to knowledge, resources and skills to shape transnational processes in their own class interest'. Marxism could also be revived, it says, because of global inequality. An increased trend towards moral relativism and pragmatic values will encourage people to seek the 'sanctuary provided by more rigid belief systems, including religious orthodoxy and doctrinaire political ideologies, such as popularism and Marxism'."

Popularism?

Because it is Easter, after all...

Scandal puts spotlight on Christian law school - The Boston Globe:

"Regent Law School has had no better friend than the Bush administration. Graduates of the law school have been among the most influential of the more than 150 Regent University alumni hired to federal government positions since President Bush took office in 2001, according to a university website.

One of those graduates is Monica Goodling , the former top aide to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales who is at the center of the storm over the firing of US attorneys. Goodling, who resigned on Friday, has become the face of Regent overnight -- and drawn a harsh spotlight to the administration's hiring of officials educated at smaller, conservative schools with sometimes marginal academic reputations.

Documents show that Goodling, who has asserted her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination to avoid testifying before Congress, was one of a handful of officials overseeing the firings. She helped install Timothy Griffin , the Karl Rove aide and her former boss at the Republican National Committee, as a replacement US attorney in Arkansas."

I'm sure Gen. Petraeus was speaking as a private citizen and not as head of the Multinational Force Iraq, right?

Think Progress » Petraeus: McCain’s market trip ‘helped the Iraqi economy.’:

"Petraeus: McCain’s market trip ‘helped the Iraqi economy.’

On PBS yesterday, Gen. David Petraeus tried to boost up Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) much-maligned visit to Baghdad’s Shorja market: “He was not protected by a cocoon of security. Yep, there was security there, but he out — actually he helped the Iraqi economy quite a bit, bought a number of carpets, in fact.” McCain did not reveal his goods, but Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) contributed to the economy by purchasing “five rugs for five bucks.”"

Red Rover, Red Rover

Students Lie in Front of Car, Delay Rove After Speech - washingtonpost.com:

"Heckling protesters briefly delayed the car carrying top White House aide Karl Rove last night as he left the American University campus, where he had just given a speech. No arrests or injuries were reported after Rove's invitation-only talk.

About 20 students lay in front of the car as it prepared to leave, a witness said."

Baudrillard dies

Missed this back on March 6.

French philosopher Jean Baudrillard dies - International Herald Tribune:

"PARIS: Jean Baudrillard, a French philosopher and social theorist known for his provocative commentaries on consumerism, excess and what he said was the disappearance of reality, died Tuesday, his publishing house said. He was 77."

Now there's an Idea

The Once and Future Republic of Vermont

My my, Rove gets really involved in the details of who runs the nameservers for his non-WH communications

The sharp folks at Corrente have found a photo of Rove carrying around info from a TN nameserver provider and speculates on the "services" that a close relationship with such a provider might permit.

Think of it - a political hacker's dream...All that candid email residing on a PRIVATELY OWNED server. Calling all hackers -- no federal crime need be committed in the theft of WH private communications.


Rove spotted in Chattanooga with brochure for gwb43.com nameserver host. Can we subpoena the records now? | CorrenteWire:

"So: Karl went out and hired his own, bespoke, politically wired nameserver company. Of course, Karl would never give business to any company that hadn’t sworn fealty to the authoritarian agenda, but I imagine Karl is also getting a level of, erm, personal service that he wouldn’t get from a fiddy-dollar administrator like GoDaddy or Yahoo or whatever."

Waxman Renews Niger Queries by Ordering Rice to Appear at Hearing

Waxman Renews Niger Queries :: Committee on Oversight and Government Reform :: United States House of Representatives:

Dear Madam Secretary:

On March 12, 2007, I sent you a letter renewing, as formal requests of the Committee, prior letter requests that I sent to you between 2003 and 2006. These requests sought information on the claim that Iraq sought uranium from Niger, White House treatment of classified information, the appointment of Ambassador Jones as “special coordinator” for Iraq, and other subjects. My March 12 letter is attached.

The March 12 letter requested a response by March 23 to several of the inquiries, but the Committee received no response from you.

I now request your appearance before the Committee at a hearing on Wednesday, April 18, 2007, at 10:00 a.m. in Room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building. At this hearing, you will be asked to provide testimony and respond to questions on the subjects outlined in the March 12 letter and the original request letters. …

Sincerely,
Henry A. Waxman
Chairman

Under oath??

John Bolton on Iraq [BBC]

Two different BBC videos on Bolton's current assessment of the War in Iraq worth perusing. His basic understanding of recent history is astounding, from 'there still may be "intellectual evidence" of WMDs in Iraq' to 'Good thing we won the revolution against British'...

Bolton on BBC w/ critical crowd
YouTube - John Bolton on Iraq [BBC]: "John Bolton on Iraq"

15 British sailors held by Iran | Iran | Guardian Unlimited

Gulf of Tonkin II anyone?

15 British sailors held by Iran | Iran | Guardian Unlimited: "The Iranian navy has detained up to 15 British sailors, the Ministry of Defence confirmed today.

The Royal Navy and Royal Marines personnel were taken after they had boarded a dhow during a routine patrol in the Shatt al-Arab waterway at 10.30am local time.

While they were searching the fishing boat for possible smuggling activity, Iranian boats approached the vessel and captured the men at gunpoint and taken to an Iranian naval base.

The waterway has also been an important smuggling route for oil illegally exported from Iraq as well as a crossing point for groups opposed to the US-British occupation and seeking to infiltrate Iraq. The 120-mile tidal river is Iraq's only water access to the Gulf."

Collapsing Colonies: Death of Bees = Death of us?

While Der Spiegel leads with the sexy question about whether GM crops are to blame, the problem is worrisome, whatever the cause. Whole bee colonies are dying. In some places 60-70% of them. To paraphrase the quote from Einstein in the article: No bees=no pollination=no plants=no animals=no us.

Communist Party USA Gives Its History to N.Y.U. - New York Times

Communist Party USA Gives Its History to N.Y.U. - New York Times: "Communist Party USA Gives Its History to N.Y.U.
Michael Falco for The New York Times

The vast collection from the Communist Party USA includes personal letters, smuggled directives and photographs.



By PATRICIA COHEN
Published: March 20, 2007

The songwriter, labor organizer and folk hero Joe Hill has been the subject of poems, songs, an opera, books and movies. His will, written in verse the night before a Utah firing squad executed him in 1915 and later put to music, became part of the labor movement’s soundtrack. Now the original copy of that penciled will is among the unexpected historical gems unearthed from a vast collection of papers and photographs never before seen publicly that the Communist Party USA has donated to New York University."

US embassy officials bombed in Kabul

US embassy officials bombed in Kabul -News-World-Asia-TimesOnline:

"A number of US embassy officials were wounded and a 15-year-old Afghan civilian killed when a Taleban suicide car bomber blew himself up next to a convoy in Kabul this morning.

The explosion took place as the convoy made its way through a road located two miles from the embassy, scattering debris around the motorcade as well as passing pedestrians."

Look how freely they speak in their emails?

TPMmuckraker March 15, 2007:


"In the email, which has the subject line 'Re: Question from Karl Rove,' Kyle Sampson, who was then at the Justice Department, discusses with then-deputy White House Counsel David Leitch the idea of replacing '15-20 percent of the current U.S. Attorneys,' because '80-85 percent, I would guess, are doing a great job, are loyal Bushies, etc.'"

"[I]f Karl thinks there would be poliitical will to do it, then so do I," Sampson concludes.


UPDATE: It is looking more and more like the loyal Bushies have good reason to write so openly and freely in their emails even when the Presidential Records Act (PRA) is supposed to require the indexing and preservation of all Administration written communication -- They're using RNC email addresses from inside the White House and the Department of Justice.

America: The State of the Nation - OhmyNews International

Find any news of these points?

America: The State of the Nation - OhmyNews International:

1. "it has been announced that Pelosi and her Senate counterpart, Harry Reid, will make a bipartisan display of unity in support of Israel, by appearing alongside Dick Cheney at the March meeting of the ultra-reactionary American Israel Public Affairs Committee. AIPAC has dominated American foreign policy for decades, strengthened since 2000 by the Project for a New American Century, the Bush shadow cabinet, which drew up the blueprints for American empire and the conquest of Iraq and Iran."

2. The European Union increased its abhorrence of the CIA kidnapping of innocent people on the streets of European cities, and their rendition to nations prepared to torture them in exchange for U.S. largesse. Both Italy and Germany have begun prosecutions on these illegal practices.

Reposited for Posterity's Sake

The Raw Story | Ex-White House adviser guilty of 4 of 5 counts, will appeal:

"Former White House adviser I. Lewis 'Scooter' Libby has been found guilty of four of five charges, including perjury and obstruction of justice, in the federal court proceedings that resulting from the investigation of the outing of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson."

Diebold Machines Become Liability to Bottom Line?

Wired: AP Technology and Business News from the Outside World on Wired.com:

"CLEVELAND (AP) -- Diebold Inc. saw great potential in the modernization of elections equipment. Now, analysts say, executives may be angling for ways to dump its e-voting subsidiary that's widely seen as tarnishing the company's reputation."

BSG S3E16 [spoilers below]

Not sure if you all have managed to see this yet, but Chief at one point actually says, "It's called a General Strike." (just before Adama threatens to kill Callie).

So, apparently the problems of a class society can be solved in a 3 minute drunk conversation between the Chief and The Pres. Only abstractly of course. My only hope is that the fact that he refuses another drink implies that he is already drunk and that what comes next is "cloud talk" so to speak.

Curiouser and Curiouser

(From RAWSTORY)

AP WIRE: "Vice President Dick Cheney made a visit to the hospital today after experiencing what his office called some 'discomfort' following his recent trip overseas," the Associated Press reports. "A statement from cheney's office said an ultrasound revealed a deep venous thrombosis (DVT) or 'blood clot' in his left lower leg and added his doctors will treat him with blood thinning medication for several months."

Submitted without comment

FT.com / World / US & Canada - Yellow ribbons dwindle with war support: "Magnet America, the largest manufacturer of the product, has seen sales fall from a peak of 1.2m in August 2004 to about 4,000 a month and now has an unsold stockpile of about 1m magnets."

On Libby Jury

Okay - my only speculative post on the Libby jury deliberations:

After a short day of deliberating today, the jury left two questions for the judge to answer for them at the start of the day Monday. You can see the actual handwritten notes here.

Ignoring the first question, I want to wager two guesses about what we can tell about jury from its contents. We'll see if I'm right.

Here is the content of the second jury question:

We would like clarification of the term "reasonble doubt." Specifically, is it necessary for the government to present evidence that it is not humanely possible for someone not to recall an event in order to find guilt beyond a reasonble doubt?

Oh, come on. The tortured phrasing? The ridiculous, almost rhetorical nature of the question ("it is not humanely possible...to find guilt beyond a reasonable doubt")? One or more potential holdout jurors have been pinned to a very specific (and indefensible) interpretation of reasonable doubt and the burdens of proof, and the unifed block of jurors are sending it up for the smackdown. Don't forget, they sent out a note requesting a dictionary earlier this week and were told they could not have one by the judge.

Even more, I think you can read today's note as strongly suggesting that that a strong majority or supermajority have been able to force the potential holdout juror that it is was their responsibility to propose a definition of "reasonable doubt" that the judge will either confirm or reject. Since the dictionary couldn't be used to point out that "reasonable" and "not humanely possible" only have in common the fact that you can find the words in the same book, the supermajority of jurors are forcing the holdout into a dilemma of their own making.

Why is it likely that there is only one (or at most two) potential holdout jurors?

1. the language of the definition is so tortured with its double (or is it triple?) negation, that it doesn't seem likely that the contents of the defintion are a product of human collaborative effort. (If you look at the note, it has a couple of inserted words, suggesting that the group didn't discuss how exactly to formulate a very precise question. Hell, even the word "specifically" is added via insert. You can almost hear the foreperson now: "Alright, we're holding you to this: What is your specific threshold of doubt, beyond which you would agree that it is not reasonable for Libby to 'forget' what nine others remember pretty clearly? Come on, what is it? And be specific!"

2. Along these same lines -- only a strong majority could exert enough power in small group deliberations to force an individual member of the jury to commit themselves to one specific defintion in the first place. Even two or three people (or even one if they heldout strong enough) could generate enough solidarity and good will among the others to get them accept some other position as at least "reasonable". All that has to be said is that "Sorry gang, but I have doubts that the prosecution proved the charge. I can't just stop having them. And to me, a reasonable person, that means that the charge hasn't been proven beyond a reasonable doubt. " Ding dong, hung jury. No no. In our case the potential hold out has been forced to spell out their ridiculous supposition and subject it to open scrutiny of the embodiment of the law, the judge. That means the majority is strong enough to force the minority into an agreement to accept the judge's view of "reasonable doubt" as dispositive. Doubt is such a nebulous thing that I find it hard to believe that anything but a strong and vocal and clear majority could force deliberation to such a head.

3. Also, the ridiculous phrasing strongly suggests that there wasn't a lot of time given to the potential holdout for revision. "Why specifically do you think that the prosecution hasn't proven beyond reasonable doubt? What is your "reasonable doubt"? Oh? Because humans aren't perfect and do forget things? And, what's that you say? The prosecution never ever proved that humans can't forget things, so its still possible that Libby did forget things? Fine - we're sending this up to the judge right now, and asking him if it is okay to apply the standard of guilt you want to use. If the judge comes back saying that the standard we apply must be less that requiring the prosecution to prove that, as you said, "it is not humanely possible for a person not to recall an event" then you must admit you have no reasonble doubt about the defendant's guilt." Without any time to revise you end up with an off-the-cuff and under pressure 'shot in the dark' like an appeal to "I doubt because I've seen insufficient evidence that humans can't forget things." The point the potential holdout would have loved to have made -- if not under such pressure of time -- appears to be something like "Libby is a human, and that under certain circumstances humans can forget even the most amazing things. And I see several reasons for thinking that these were extraordinary times in the VP office., etc., etc.." Alas, a strong, clear majority who see the ridiculousness of this claim just the same, have agreed to exercise their collective power and not give endless time for perfecting the bullshit. Whether that is good or bad, meh.

ps. The other question the jury sent out today concerned a clarification of Charge I - the obstruction of justice charge. I've read several commentators this afternoon who interpreted this as an indication that either the jury is skipping around the charges (and therefore missing the forest for the trees) or that they're stuck even after so many days. Since I'm speculating, I'll wager that they've convicted (or will convict once "reasonable doubt" is settled) on all counts except Obstruction, and now have returned to it as the most serious and the charge that depends on the others. If they were going to aquit on all other counts II-V, would you really have a need to clarify the language in the overraching obstruction charge? And unless our single holdout digs in their heals, a guilty verdict on all counts comes back Tuesday early AM at the latest.

Fitzgerald’s Rebuttal

Today I happily make my return to blogging with just a couple of quoted sentences. Today saw closing arguments in the Libby trial. And after years of reading between the lines of Fitzgerald's memos and press releases and questions, we finally find him tipping his hand.

He's been after Dick all along, and the Libby thing was an attempted triangulation on the old bastard just like Fitz did in the Illinois governor case and other RICO cases. What I would have given to have been in the court room to hear Fitz articulate each vowel and consonant. (To think, I was in DC all weekend and should have just stayed a day longer).

Anyway, here is the moment I've thought was coming for some time...


Libby Live: Fitzgerald’s Rebuttal (from emptywheel's indispensible live-blogging of the trial)

"There is a cloud over the VP. He wrote those columns, he had those meetings, He sent Libby off to the meeting with Judy. Where Plame was discussed. That cloud remains because the denfendant obstructed justice. That cloud was there. That cloud is something that we just can't pretend isn't there."

BSG Season 4

the TV addict » Blog Archive » The LA TIMES is reporting that the Sci Fi Channel is expected to announce tomorrow that it has renewed the critically acclaimed (yet little watched) series for a fourth season. Thirteen new episodes of BATTLESTAR GALACTICA will be produced this summer to premiere in January 2008.

Guardian: US ready for Iran Strike in spring

While I am still skeptical that something like this is really in the works, some things of note appear in this article:
1. Not much new in terms of the build-up (the second carrier group, etc.) Except the planning: "US preparations for an air strike against Iran are at an advanced stage, in spite of repeated public denials by the Bush administration, according to informed sources in Washington.

The present military build-up in the Gulf would allow the US to mount an attack by the spring. But the sources said that if there was an attack, it was more likely next year, just before Mr Bush leaves office."
[snip]
Colonel Sam Gardiner, a former air force officer who has carried out war games with Iran as the target, supported the view that planning for an air strike was under way: "Gates said there is no planning for war. We know this is not true. He possibly meant there is no plan for an immediate strike. It was sloppy wording.

"All the moves being made over the last few weeks are consistent with what you would do if you were going to do an air strike. We have to throw away the notion the US could not do it because it is too tied up in Iraq. It is an air operation."

2. The risk of accidental escalation by having the ships there, conducting war games, and the Iranians own saber-rattling and test launches.
"The danger is that the build-up could spark an accidental war. Iranian officials said on Thursday that they had tested missiles capable of hitting warships in the Gulf."

3. That the US has sold nuclear tipped bunker-busters to Israel.
"Raymond Tanter, founder of the Iran Policy Committee, which includes former officials from the White House, state department and intelligence services, is a leading advocate of support for the MEK. If it comes to an air strike, he favours bunker-busting bombs. "I believe the only way to get at the deeply buried sites at Natanz and Arak is probably to use bunker-buster bombs, some of which are nuclear tipped. I do not believe the US would do that but it has sold them to Israel.""

4. The American Enterprise Institute, along with Cheney and allies seem to still have sway. They think so long as it is not an invasion ala Iraq, there isn't anything to worry about (or that there is less to worry about by attacking Iran than by letting them assert regional dominance).

"Josh Muravchik, a Middle East specialist at the AEI, is among its most vocal supporters of such a strike.

"I do not think anyone in the US is talking about invasion. We have been chastened by the experience of Iraq, even a hawk like myself." But an air strike was another matter. The danger of Iran having a nuclear weapon "is not just that it might use it out of the blue but as a shield to do all sorts of mischief. I do not believe there will be any way to stop this happening other than physical force."

Mr Bush is part of the American generation that refuses to forgive Iran for the 1979-81 hostage crisis. He leaves office in January 2009 and has said repeatedly that he does not want a legacy in which Iran has achieved superpower status in the region and come close to acquiring a nuclear weapon capability. The logic of this is that if diplomatic efforts fail to persuade Iran to stop uranium enrichment then the only alternative left is to turn to the military.

Mr Muravchik is intent on holding Mr Bush to his word: "The Bush administration have said they would not allow Iran nuclear weapons. That is either bullshit or they mean it as a clear code: we will do it if we have to. I would rather believe it is not hot air.""

Unhappy Meals - Michael Pollan - New York Times

One of the better food related articles I've read in a while, but what is more interesting for our purposes is this useful and concise, though general, conception of ideology...

Unhappy Meals - Michael Pollan - New York Times: "The first thing to understand about nutritionism ? I first encountered the term in the work of an Australian sociologist of science named Gyorgy Scrinis ? is that it is not quite the same as nutrition. As the ?ism? suggests, it is not a scientific subject but an ideology. Ideologies are ways of organizing large swaths of life and experience under a set of shared but unexamined assumptions. This quality makes an ideology particularly hard to see, at least while it?s exerting its hold on your culture. A reigning ideology is a little like the weather, all pervasive and virtually inescapable. Still, we can try."

Orange snow causes concern in Siberia | Russia | Guardian Unlimited

Orange snow causes concern in Siberia | Russia | Guardian Unlimited: "There is nothing unusual about snow in the towns and endless forests of Siberia. But when locals in the small village of Pudinskoye woke up on Wednesday they immediately noticed something rather strange: the snow falling from the sky was orange.

In fact, three regions of southern Siberia - a vast area of industrial towns, pine trees and the odd bear - yesterday reported the same mysterious phenomenon. Not only was the snow not white, it also smelt bad. Most of the snow was orange. But some of it was red and yellow as well, officials confirmed, after scrambling to the affected areas to dig up samples. And it was also oily, they discovered."

Chávez Wide-Ranging Powers

So here's what the first lines of the major outlets are saying.

BBC: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has been granted new special powers after an extraordinary assembly vote in the main square of the capital, Caracas.

Mr Chavez will now be able to rule by decree for the next 18 months.

His planned reforms will affect the energy sector, telecommunications, the economy and defence, among others.

Mr Chavez has said the legislation will transform the country into a socialist society. Opponents describe the new law as an abuse of power.

washingtonpost.com: "The line forms every day after dawn at the Spanish Consulate, hundreds of people seeking papers permitting them to abandon Venezuela for new lives in Spain. They say they are filled with despair at President Hugo Chávez's growing power, and they appear not to be alone. At other consulates in this capital, long lines form daily."

and at npr.org, the same reporter from the post, w/ his emphasis on the opposition and the totalitarian turn of Chavez and Chavezistas...

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has started his third presidential term ? one that has him serving until 2013 ? with a flurry of policy moves that have shaken his opponents and mesmerized his supporters.

Chavez wants the constitution reformed so he can run indefinitely. On Wednesday, the National Assemby is expected to give Chavez the power to push through new laws to accelerate what he calls "21st-century socialism."

CARACAS ? A Venezuelan Congress wholly loyal to President Hugo Chavez met at a downtown plaza Wednesday and gave him the authority to enact sweeping measures by presidential decree.

globeandmail.com - Hundreds of Chavez supporters wearing red ? the colour of Venezuela's ruling party ? gathered in the plaza, waving signs reading ?Socialism is democracy!? as lawmakers read out the bill who passage gave the President special powers for 18 months to transform 11 broadly defined areas, including the economy, energy and defence.

guardian.co.uk - Hugo Chávez was today poised to gain extended powers allowing him to make sweeping changes as he seeks to transform Venezuelan society.

Obama Smeared by FOX news

Well, you know. Here's the link.

Obama Announces

From Reuters.

There doesn't seem to be much coverage of this.

THE phone company went to Atlanta and all I got was this crappy two year commitment

The big concessions that ATT had to make to recreate Ma bell:
a two year commitment to net neutrality and the promise to offer 19.95 crap-ass DSL to people in the south.

From Business Week.

Ethopia bombs Somalia

From the Times
ZANZIBAR, Tanzania, Dec. 24 ? Ethiopia officially plunged into war with Somalia?s Islamist forces on Sunday, bombing targets inside Somalia and pushing ground troops deep into Somali territory in a major escalation that could turn Somalia?s internal crisis into a violent religious conflict that engulfs the entire Horn of Africa.

The coordinated assault was the first open admission by Ethiopia?s Christian-led government of its military operations inside Somalia, where ? with tacit American support ? it has been helping a weak interim government threatened by forces loyal to the Islamic clerics who control the longtime capital, Mogadishu, and much of the country.
[snip]
Some of the most frightening snipets:
The bombs also destroyed a recruitment center and a fuel depot, killing at least 10 people, witnesses reported. Hours later, the transitional troops marched into the area, and a new mayor was installed.

Many of Beledweyne?s people seemed relieved, not so much about the change in government, but because the fighting appeared to have ended so fast.

?We?re so sick of war,? said Ahmed Issa, a shopkeeper in Beledweyne. ?We?ll obey anybody.?
[snip]

In a hint of a possible direction to come, Ethiopia?s prime minister recently told American officials that he could wipe out the Islamists ? in one to two weeks.?

US Army might break Goodyear strike

From the The Financial Times ("The only paper that tells the truth"). It seems to be the only paper reporting this, but it also charges money for full access.

The US Army is considering measures to force striking workers back to their jobs at a Goodyear Tire & Rubber plant in Kansas in the face of a looming shortage of tyres for Humvee trucks and other military equipment used in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A strike involving 17,000 members of the United Steelworkers union has crippled 16 Goodyear plants in the US and Canada since October 5.

The Next Afghanistan?

I don't know if you all have been following this, but a coalition of Muslim groups have overthrown the warlords running the transitional government in Somalia, and pushed them out of most of the country. Now, Ethiopia, a mainly Christian country has thousands of "trainers" (give or take a few thousand) in the country and the Somalis want them out. Of course, its hard to know who the good guys are when one is an invader and the other is a group of religious zealots.
From the NYT today:

The inevitability of war hangs over Mogadishu, Somalia?s bullet-pocked seaside capital. But unlike the internal anarchy that has consumed the country for 15 years, the looming battle is now with Ethiopia, threatening to further destabilize the troubled Horn of Africa.

In the past week the increasingly militant Islamists in control of Mogadishu and much of the rest of the country have begun a food drive, a money drive and an AK-47 assault rifle drive, and have sent doctors and nurses, along with countless young soldiers, to the front lines.

For its part, Ethiopia, with tacit approval from the United States, has been steadily slipping soldiers across the border, trying to hold off the Islamists and shore up Somalia?s weak, unpopular and divided transitional government.

Judge's Decision on Libby's Graymail Gambit

Judge settles classified info fight in Libby case - Politics - MSNBC.com:

"WASHINGTON - A federal judge has accepted a series of redactions and substitutions proposed by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald - to be provided to I Lewis 'Scooter' Libby's defense team - which will limit what Libby can share with jurors at his upcoming trial on some of the specifics of his top-secret White House briefings."

Iran students heckle Ahmadinejad

From Al Jazeera.

AlterNet: War on Iraq: Oil for Sale: Iraq Study Group Recommends Privatization

The Report also states that its suggestions should be implemented as a whole, not piecemeal (i.e. no consideration of troop w/drawl before oil is clearly available to multinationals):

AlterNet: War on Iraq: Oil for Sale: Iraq Study Group Recommends Privatization: "In its heavily anticipated report released on Wednesday, the Iraq Study Group made at least four truly radical proposals.

The report calls for the United States to assist in privatizing Iraq's national oil industry, opening Iraq to private foreign oil and energy companies, providing direct technical assistance for the 'drafting' of a new national oil law for Iraq, and assuring that all of Iraq's oil revenues accrue to the central government."

Venezuela's Chávez Wins Decisive Victory - washingtonpost.com

Venezuela's Chávez Wins Decisive Victory - washingtonpost.com: "CARACAS, Venezuela, Dec. 3 -- By an overwhelming margin, Venezuelans reelected President Hugo Chávez on Sunday, further extending a presidency that began when the former paratrooper was swept into power eight years ago, intent on overturning Venezuela's old social order. Chávez will receive another six years in office to broaden his leftist revolution and contest American initiatives across Latin America."

War Protestor's Public Suicide in Chicago Went Unnoticed by Media

He's The Worst Ever

This is the title of Eric Foner's opinion piece in today's Post.

washingtonpost.com

Bush Fails Women With Global AIDS Plan

Figures I was not aware of and won't attest to their authenticity, but seeing this coming from Ms. Magazine is shocking. Since today is World AIDS day I thought it appropriate to recognize this form of structural violence...(had to throw that in there)

Bush Fails Women With Global AIDS Plan: "Today, 17.3 million women in the world live with HIV/AIDS, and of the 16,000 new HIV infections daily, as many as 55 percent occur among women. The proportion of women among the total infected population has risen at a steady and frightening rate: from 35 percent in 1990 to 41 percent in 1997, to 48 percent in 2004."

Bolivia passes major land reform | The Guardian | Guardian Unlimited

Let's hope it spreads...

Bolivia passes major land reform | The Guardian | Guardian Unlimited: "The Bolivian president, Evo Morales, has secured a sweeping land reform bill with the help of thousands of indigenous peasants who marched on the capital, La Paz.

To the jubilation of his supporters, Mr Morales signed the bill into law at a midnight ceremony last night after overcoming fierce resistance from senators representing large landowners.

The law is intended to reverse centuries of discrimination against the indigenous majority by seizing 77,000 square miles of land - an area around three-quarters the size of Britain - deemed unproductive or illegally owned and redistributing it to the poor."

A Quantum (Computer) Step

University of Utah News Release : November 19th, 2006:

"Nov. 19, 2006 -- A University of Utah physicist took a step toward developing a superfast computer based on the weird reality of quantum physics by showing it is feasible to read data stored in the form of the magnetic 'spins' of phosphorus atoms."

Michigan Teen Fuses Atomic Nuclei for Fun

He creates fusion in his Oakland Township home: "In the basement of his parents' Oakland Township home, tucked away in an area most aren't privy to see, Thiago is exhausting his love of physics on a project that has taken him more than two years and 1,000 hours to research and build -- a large, intricate machine that , on a small scale, creates nuclear fusion."

Leftist leads banana baron

Leftist leads banana baron in Ecuador election:

"A leftist nationalist who is friendly with Venezuela's anti-U.S. president held a commanding lead over a Bible-toting banana tycoon in Sunday's runoff presidential election in Ecuador, exit polls showed.

The tall and charismatic Rafael Correa received nearly 57 per cent of the vote, compared to 43 per cent for Alvaro Noboa, according to an exit poll conducted by CEDATOS-Gallup."

Crowd stones Iraqi PM

Calls for calm as crowd stones Iraqi PM | Top News | Reuters.co.uk: "BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The motorcade of Iraq's prime minister was pelted with stones on Sunday by fellow Shi'ites in a Baghdad slum when he paid respects to some of the 200 who died there last week in the deadliest attack since the U.S. invasion."

'More popular' President Bush defends son from 'hostile audience'

Yeah, you go original King George, you tell those pesky kids, what the hell do they know

'More popular' President Bush defends son from 'hostile audience': "The former president lost his cool with one audience member, calling him 'crazy' and recommending that he 'go back to school.'

According to the AP, a student implied that 'U.S. wars were aimed at opening markets for American companies,' and that 'globalization was contrived for America's benefit at the expense of the rest of the world,' but 'Bush was having none of it.'

'I think that's weird and it's nuts,' Bush said. 'To suggest that everything we do is because we're hungry for money, I think that's crazy.'

'I think you need to go back to school,' Bush added."

What an awkard moment...

"For all the focus on the Democrats, a former Bush official who predicts a coming bloodbath between the White House and disgruntled conservative Republicans brushed off the Pelosi-Hoyer tussle as much ado about process."

"'The Democrats are the sideshow,' he said. 'Bush self-destructing is the big story in town.'"

New York Daily News - Politics - Pelosi's bruising:

Oh Fuck

Wanted: man to land on killer asteroid and gently nudge it from path to Earth | Science | Guardian Unlimited:

"A huge asteroid is on a catastrophic collision course with Earth and mankind is poised to go the way of the dinosaurs."

"The proposals are at an early stage, and a spacecraft needed just to send an astronaut that far into space exists only on the drawing board, but they are deadly serious. A smallish asteroid called Apophis has already been identified as a possible threat to Earth in 2036."

"A 1bn tonne asteroid just 1km across striking the Earth at a 45 degree angle could generate the equivalent of a 50,000 megatonne thermonuclear explosion."

Workers without bosses at a turning point

Workers without bosses at a turning point: "Workers face off with the Argentine government on the status of their worker-controlled factories and other businesses. Since 2001, many have had to face bleak futures of unemployment. The workers, reclaiming their destinies, have opened closed plants and started operating outside the system to make a living. Many of these worker-controlled plants have operated for years in legal limbo."

Al-Jazeera, which already had an English language website, relaunches

Along with a new english language cable channel. Of course, good luck finding a cable system that carries it. For news junkies, the old site did not have RSS feeds (though there were folks that unofficially put them out), but the new one does.

See, for example, the Middle East section's RSS feed.

Document shows Bush guided CIA on detention

International Herald Tribune:

"WASHINGTON: The Central Intelligence Agency has acknowledged for the first time the existence of two classified documents, including one signed by President George W. Bush, that have guided the agency's interrogation and detention of terror suspects."

Charges Sought Against Rumsfeld

TIME.com: Exclusive: Charges Sought Against Rumsfeld Over Prison Abuse -- Page 1:

"New legal documents, to be filed next week with Germany's top prosecutor, will seek a criminal investigation and prosecution of Rumsfeld, along with Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former CIA director George Tenet and other senior U.S. civilian and military officers, for their alleged roles in abuses committed at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison and at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba."

Collective puts Marx's Das Kapital on stage | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

As long as we don't have to eat ashen bread, I'm in...

Collective puts Marx's Das Kapital on stage | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited: "There is no wedding, no romantic interest and no plot to speak of. Instead the reader of Karl Marx's epic work, Das Kapital, is treated to a lengthy treatise on the division of labour and capitalist modes of production, offered up in long, convoluted sentences."

Editor and Publisher: U.S. Soldier Killed Herself After Objecting to Interrogation Techniques

U.S. Soldier Killed Herself After Objecting to Interrogation Techniques:

"Now we learn [via FOIA] that one of the first female soldiers killed in Iraq died by her own hand after objecting to interrogation methods used on prisoners.

She was Army specialist Alyssa Peterson, 27, a Flagstaff, Ariz., native serving with C Company, 311th Military Intelligence BN, 101st Airborne. Peterson was an Arabic-speaking interrogator assigned to the prison at our air base in troubled Tal-Afar in northwestern Iraq. According to official records, she died on Sept. 15, 2003, from a ?non-hostile weapons discharge.? "

[snip]

?Peterson objected to the interrogation techniques used on prisoners. She refused to participate after only two nights working in the unit known as the cage. Army spokespersons for her unit have refused to describe the interrogation techniques Alyssa objected to. They say all records of those techniques have now been destroyed. ...".

She was was then assigned to the base gate, where she monitored Iraqi guards, and sent to suicide prevention training. ?But on the night of September 15th, 2003, Army investigators concluded she shot and killed herself with her service rifle,? the documents disclose.

Rare Joint Editorial between Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines Calls for Rumsfeld to Resign

The Ross Report:

"An editorial scheduled to appear on Monday in Army Times, Air Force Times, Navy Times and Marine Corps Times, calls for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld"

Judge Rejects Libby's Use of Memory Expert

Olbermann's Comment on Habeas Corpus Loss

See here to get a video of post festum's post on Olbermann...Here is another strong one, showing what Adams did for the sedition act, Wilson did to the pacifists (remember Debs for President, got a million votes), and Roosevelt did to the Japanese-Americans, Bush does...

YouTube - Olbermann's Comment on Habeas Corpus Loss

Threats to Hugo Chavez As Venezuela's December Presidential Election Approaches

Interesting piece detailing Chavez' support, program and opposition. In addition, the author hints at possible US responses. Quite an interesting projection, but alas it remains to be seen...One interesting sidenote, a US military base in Mariscal Estigarribia, Paraguay was opened (far from Venezuela) but this was stated/speculated:

It's also been reported that George Bush recently bought a 98,842 acre farm in Paraguay to go along with the 173,000 acres his father already owns there. Both properties border Bolivia and Brazil and comprise 2.7% of the whole country that comprises an area the size of the state of California. It's not known what the Bush family has in mind there or whether it may have any connection to a planned US military intervention in the region. It is known Paraguay has no laws criminalizing money-laundering, anti-terrorism or terrorist financing even though if does have an extradition treaty with the US. It's also important to be mindful of the fact that a dominant US family of two US presidents now owns a sizable piece of real estate in a country able to domicile a large number of US forces. It may only be for whatever personal use they have in mind, but it may not be and we can only speculate on what that may be.

Threats to Hugo Chavez As Venezuela's December Presidential Election Approaches: "It still remains to be seen what strategy the opposition will decide on or even which, if any, of them will show up on election day. Already Accion Democratica, Venezuela's largest opposition party in size of membership, at first refused to back any candidate. The AD's General Secretary, Henry Ramos Allup, said the only option is to abstain from the election and that Rosales, Borges (before he dropped out of the race) and other candidates are 'like drunks fighting over an empty bottle.' Others in his party disagree though calling for an exercise of 'democratic resistance.' Still it's clear to all in the opposition, Chavez is so far ahead in the polls there's no chance anyone can defeat him in a free, fair and open election so it's likely Rosales was chosen to run with something else in mind, and his strategy will show it as the campaign unfolds and especially as election day approaches.



Clearly the US had the final say in picking him for whatever strategy is planned that may have a lot to do with the fact that he's the governor of the state of Zulia that has 40% of Venezuela's oil and where in the past energy elites there supported the state's independence to free it from the government in Caracas. Rosales also favors this idea (likely with a little coaxing from his US allies) and has called for a referendum to let the people of Zulia decide. He's also very close to the Bush administration and was the only governor to sign the infamous '(Pedro) Carmona Estanga Decree' after the 2002 coup that dissolved the elected National Assembly and Supreme Court and effectively ended the Bolivarian Revolution and all the benefits it gave the Venezuelan people (for two days).



Rosales' electoral plan, with considerable US National Endowment for Democracy (NED)-funded through Sumate support, should become clear close to or right after the December 3 e"

11/1/06 Olbermann?s Special Comment

An incredible piece of oratory.

Crooks and Liars » Olbermann?s Special Comment : There is no line this President has not crossed ? nor will not cross ? to keep one political party, in power.:

"And finally tonight, a Special Comment.

On the 22nd of May, 1856, as the deteriorating American political system veered towards the edge of the cliff, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, shuffled into the Senate of this nation, his leg stiff from an old dueling injury, supported by a cane. And he looked for the familiar figure of the prominent Senator from Massachusetts, Charles Sumner.

Brooks found Sumner at his desk, mailing out copies of a speech he had delivered three days earlier ? a speech against slavery.

The Congressman matter-of-factly raised his walking stick in mid-air, and smashed its metal point, across the Senator's head.

Congressman Brooks hit his victim repeatedly. Senator Sumner somehow got to his feet and tried to flee. Brooks chased him, and delivered untold blows to Sumner's head. Even though Sumner lay unconscious and bleeding, on the Senate floor, Brooks finally stopped beating him, only because his cane finally broke.

Others will cite John Brown's attack on the arsenal at Harper's Ferry as the exact point after which the Civil War became inevitable.

In point of fact, it might have been the moment ? not when Brooks broke his cane over the prostrate body of Senator Sumner - but when voters in Brooks's district started sending him new canes.

Tonight, we almost wonder to whom President Bush will send the next new cane.

There is tonight no political division in this country that he and his party will not exploit, nor have not exploited; no anxiety that he and his party will not inflame.

There is no line this President has not crossed ? nor will not cross ? to keep one political party, in power.

He has spread any and every fear among, in a desperate effort to avoid that which he most fears ? some check, some balance against what has become not an imperial, but a unilateral presidency.

And now it is evident that it no longer matters to him, whether that effort to avoid the judgment of the people, is subtle and nuanced ? or laughably transparent.

Senator John Kerry called him out Monday.

He did it two years too late.

He had been too cordial ? just as Vice President Gore had been too cordial in 2000 ? just as millions of us, have been too cordial ever since.

Senator Kerry, as you well know, spoke at a college in Southern California. With bitter humor, he told the students that he had been in Texas the day before, that President Bush used to live in that state, but that now he lives in the state of denial.

He said the trip had reminded him about the value of education ? that quote "if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you can get stuck in Iraq."

The Senator, in essence, called Mr. Bush stupid.

The context was unmistakable: Texas;the state of denial;stuck in Iraq. No interpretation required.

And Mr. Bush and his minions responded, by appearing to be too stupid to realize that they had been called stupid.

They demanded Kerry apologize ? to the troops in Iraq.

And so he now has.

That phrase "appearing to be too stupid" is used deliberately, Mr. Bush.

Because there are only three possibilities here:

One, sir, is that you are far more stupid than the worst of your critics have suggested; that you could not follow the construction of a simple sentence; that you could not recognize your own life story when it was deftly summarized; that you could not perceive it was the sad ledger of your presidency that was being recounted.

This, of course, compliments you, Mr. Bush, because even those who do not "make the most of it," who do not "study hard," who do not "do their homework," and who do not "make an effort to be smart" might still just be stupid ? but honest.

No; the first option, sir, is, at best, improbable. You are not honest.

The second option is that you and those who work for you deliberately twisted what Senator Kerry said to fit your political template. That you decided to take advantage of it, to once again pretend that the attacks, solely about your own incompetence, were in fact attacks on the troops ? or even on the nation itself.

The third possibility is, obviously, the nightmare scenario; that the first two options are in some way conflated.

That it is both politically convenient for you, and personally satisfying to you, to confuse yourself with the country for which, sir, you work.

A brief reminder, Mr. Bush: You are not the United States of America.

You are merely a politician whose entire legacy will have been a willingness to make anything political ? to have, in this case, refused to acknowledge that the insult wasn't about the troops, and that the insult was not even truly about you either ? that the insult, in fact, is you.

So now John Kerry has apologized to the troops; apologized for the Republicans' deliberate distortions.

Thus the President will now begin the apologies he owes our troops, right?

This President must apologize to the troops ? for having suggested, six weeks ago, that the chaos in Iraq, the death and the carnage, the slaughtered Iraqi civilians and the dead American service personnel, will, to history, quote "look like just a comma."

This President must apologize to the troops ? because the intelligence he claims led us into Iraq proved to be undeniably and irredeemably wrong.

This President must apologize to the troops ? for having laughed about the failure of that intelligence, at a banquet, while our troops were in harm's way.

This President must apologize to the troops ? because the streets of Iraq were not strewn with flowers and its residents did not greet them as liberators.

This President must apologize to the troops ? because his administration ran out of "plan" after barely two months.

This President must apologize to the troops ? for getting 2,815 of them killed.

This President must apologize to the troops ? for getting this country into a war without a clue.

And Mr. Bush owes us an apology? for this destructive and omnivorous presidency.

?

We will not receive them, of course.

This President never apologizes.

Not to the troops.

Not to the people.

Nor will those henchmen who have echoed him.

In calling him a "stuffed suit," Senator Kerry was wrong about the Press Secretary.

Mr. Snow's words and conduct ? falsely earnest and earnestly false ? suggest he is not "stuffed" - he is inflated.

And in leaving him out of the equation, Senator Kerry gave an unwarranted pass to his old friend Senator McCain, who should be ashamed of himself tonight.

He rolled over and pretended Kerry had said what he obviously had not.

Only, the symbolic stick he broke over Kerry's head came in a context, even more disturbing: Mr. McCain demanded the apology, while electioneering for a Republican congressional candidate in Illinois.

He was speaking of how often he had been to Walter Reed Hospital to see the wounded Iraq veterans, of how, quote "many of the have lost limbs." He said all this while demanding that the voters of Illinois reject a candidate who is not only a wounded Iraq veteran, but who lost two limbs there: Tammy Duckworth.

Support some of the wounded veterans. But bad-mouth the Democratic one.

And exploit all the veterans, and all the still-serving personnel, in a cheap and tawdry political trick, to try to bury the truth: that John Kerry said the President had been stupid.

And to continue this slander as late as this morning ? as biased, or gullible, or lazy newscasters, nodded in sleep-walking assent.

Senator McCain became a front man in a collective lie to break sticks over the heads of Democrats ? one of them his friend; another his fellow veteran, leg-less, for whom he should weep and applaud, or at minimum about whom, he should stay quiet.

That was beneath the Senator from Arizona.

And it was all because of an imaginary insult to the troops that his party cynically manufactured ? out of a desperation, and a futility, as deep as that of Congressman Brooks, when he went hunting for Senator Sumner.

This, is our beloved country now, as you have re-defined it, Mr. Bush.

Get a tortured Vietnam veteran to attack a decorated Vietnam veteran, in defense of military personnel, whom that decorated veteran did not insult.

Or, get your henchmen to take advantage of the evil lingering dregs of the fear of miscegenation in Tennessee, in your party's advertisements against Harold Ford.

Or, get the satellites who orbit around you, like Rush Limbaugh, to exploit the illness ? and the bi-partisanship ? of Michael J. Fox ? yes, get someone to make fun of the cripple.

Oh, and sir, don't forget to drag your own wife into it.

"It's always easy," she said of Mr. Fox's commercials ? and she used this phrase twice ? "to manipulate people's feelings."

Where on earth might the First Lady have gotten that idea, Mr. President?

From your endless manipulation of people's feelings about terrorism?

"How ever they put it," you said Monday of the Democrats, on the subject of Iraq , "their approach comes down to this: the terrorists win and America loses."

No manipulation of feelings there.

No manipulation of the charlatans of your administration into the only truth-tellers.

No shocked outrage at the Kerry insult that wasn't; no subtle smile as the First Lady silently sticks the knife in Michael J. Fox's back; no attempt on the campaign trail to bury the reality that you have already assured that the terrorists are winning.

Winning in Iraq, sir.

Winning in America, sir.

There, we have chaos: joint U.S./Iraqi checkpoints at Sadr City, the base of the radical Shiite militias ? and the Americans have been ordered out by the Prime Minister of Iraq? and our Secretary of Defense doesn't even know about it!

And here ? we have deliberate, systematic, institutionalized lying and smearing and terrorizing ? a code of deceit, that somehow permits a President to say, quote, "If you listen carefully for a Democrat plan for success, they don't have one."

Permits him to say this while his plan in Iraq has amounted to a twisted version of the advice once offered to Lyndon Johnson about his Iraq, called Vietnam.

Instead of "declare victory ? and get out"? we now have "declare victory ? and stay, indefinitely."

And also here, we have institutionalized the terrorizing of the opposition. True domestic terror:

? Critics of your administration in the media receive letters filled with fake anthrax.

? Braying newspapers applaud, or laugh, or reveal details the FBI wished kept quiet, and thus impede or ruin the investigation.

? A series of reactionary columnists encourages treason charges against a newspaper that published "national security information" ? that was openly available on the internet.

? One radio critic receives a letter, threatening the revelation of as much personal information about her as can be obtained ? and expressing the hope that someone will then shoot her with an AK-47 machine gun.

? And finally, a critic of an incumbent Republican Senator, a critic armed with nothing but words, is attacked by the Senator's supporters, and thrown to the floor, in full view of television cameras, as if someone really did want to re-enact the intent and the rage of the day Preston Brooks found Senator Charles Sumner.

Of course, Mr. President, you did none of these things.

You instructed no one to mail the fake anthrax. Nor undermine the FBI's case. Nor call for the execution of the editors of the New York Times. Nor threaten to assassinate Stephanie Miller. Nor beat up a man yelling at Senator Allen. Nor have the first lady knife Michael J. Fox. Nor tell John McCain to lie about John Kerry.

No, you did not.

And the genius of the thing, is the same, as in King Henry's rhetorical question about Archbishop Thomas Becket: "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?"

All you have to do, sir? is hand out enough new canes."