Just how relevant is Reverend Wright.

Just how relevant is Reverend Wright.

I am so sick the media attention to the newest star Huckster Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Just how relevant to fixing this country problems is Reverend Wright. The great so called God fearing Black crusader who now is going to exploit this rift with Obama to peddle his upcoming book no one would have read until now.

Pay attention people, this is just another smoke screen to blind people from seeing the real issues that matter.

Just look at who McCain is kissing ass for, John Hagee. John McCain, naturally, is "very proud to have Pastor John Hagee’s support." Meanwhile, Hagee seems to hate Catholics about as much as Jews and Muslims quite a bit more so. McCain has a lot to be proud of. I wonder what McCain really stands for because McCain has changed so many of the positions he has held in the past just to get the vote of the far right.

If you wonder whose butt Hillary is kissing, just stick it out there she’ll kiss it for a delegate.

Obama is the only candidate so far that has not gone negative first. He has defended his positions when attacked and admitted that he did not agree with all that reverend Wright has said in the past, and admits that it is something that he needed to clarify his position on.

When they start talking about the real issues, issues that matter for the future of this Nation, that’s when you will get my attention again candidates.

Now listen Mr. McCain, Ms. Clinton, and Mr. Obama. I don’t care about your preacher, spiritual advisor, whether or not you’re white, black, gray, or gay, male or female, whether or not you where born to a foreign daddy or born in a canal zone. Let’s get real let’s start talking real issues that are going decide the future course of America. Who has the best ideas, who will end the strangle hold of corporate America over the congress and president of this great nation.

Let’s start talking about how we are going to end this mess in Iraq without starting WWIII.

Let’s start talking about how we are going to sustain social security. The government uses the surplus that has come into the treasury from the FICA in your pay check tax since the 1980’s to fund all the earmarked pork barreling, misguided military adventures and the missile shield star wars that have enriched the military industrial complex and bankrupted the nation.

Let’s start talking about how we are going to create real sustainable renewable energy projects not lowering gas prices.

Let’s start talking about what Americas roll in foreign affairs should be. Can we really be the world’s policeman any longer?

Let’s start talking about ways to fix our economy and set up sustainable import export policies that will protect our jobs and national security instead of throwing six hundred dollars at me like a rich man gives a crack whore as he tells her to get out of his Lexus and have a nice life.

Let’s start talking about how America should conduct itself to the rule of law and human rights. Ending the torture of prisoners and closing down the detention center at Guantanamo Bay would be a good place to start.

Let’s start talking about what we are going to do about our porous boarders and what should be done about illegal immigration.

Let’s start talking about restoring the power to the congress and repairing the damage done to our liberty by Bush and Co. so we don’t end up with another demagogue in the White House, who will use fear mongering to strip your constitutional rights away in the name of security.

Let’s start talking about what we are going to do about the corporate control of the media.

LET’S START TALKING REAL ISSUES!!!

Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

Who will we choose as a leader

Who will we choose as a leader

I was reading an article today about the importance of who we choose as a leader to end this moral & economic ruination of our nation. What she had to say is worth reading. What we base our decision on will reflect how the path that the Nation will follow for the next four years.

What will you base your decision on? Will you vote for McCain because he is a so called war hero? McCain’s heroism comes from his activity in Vietnam. He no doubt was courageous in captivity, but the war itself was immoral.

What the Republican Party will try to do, is use war heroism to confuse the American people into continuing unjust wars and supporting their architects with the honor of brave soldiers.
Nixon used this same tactic in 1968 and by calling Democrats as too weak to STAY THE COURSE.

McCain is playing the war hero card for sure in this the most important election in recent history. If the Democrats are to win the presidency and seats in congress they better dispel the war hero myth and engage the republicans about war and war heroes.

Soldiers in both unjust and just wars may be heroes if you just look at the personal courage and self sacrifice in a battle. The trick is and the Republican leadership will put a smoke screen over this, so we must know that those who oppose a preemptive unnecessary war are also heroes.

It took great courage to stand in the halls of congress and speak against the call to war as Senator Robert Byrd (S.WV.) did in March of 2003 before King George and his cable of cretins rushed to war to steal Iraqi oil.

It is easy to make war, strike out and destroy, but it is hard to be a peacemaker that will negotiate and settle differences and build a lasting peace. In my life the ultimate moral force in the world is the peace hero one who will not stand for evil or injustice.

Catherine Crier wrote in her article CHOOSING A LEADER

“During this contentious political season, we are called upon to judge the character of the candidates. Who should lead the nation, the fighter or the war hero? Who best wears their patriotism on their sleeve (or lapel)? Who can throw or take the biggest punch, swig the strongest shot, or bowl the highest game?

When the American Film Institute took a vote on the greatest American film hero of the last century, the winner was not Rambo, Rocky or a John Wayne cowboy. Instead it was Atticus Finch; gentle, bookish, moral, yet tough to his core. He never proclaimed his authority or postured for effect. He simply acted on his principles, with bravery and integrity, leaving no doubt who the real leader was. This might not be a bad model for the next occupant of the White House.”

http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20080418/cm_huffpost/097352;_ylt=ApeL23AAzZdbl4cNWQ7b5bP9wxIF

Who fits this mold the best, McCain, Clinton, or Obama.

Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

The Senate FISA Bill is coming up soon contact you Senators and tell them you want accountability.

The Senate FISA Bill is coming up soon contact you Senators and tell them you want accountability.


Last month the fear monger who still illegally occupies the White House, tried to bluff his way into getting the House to grant immunity to the Telecom industry for illegally spying on American citizens.


Enough of you patriots out there said enough is enough and told your congressmen to stand up and protect the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. You told them that we want protection from the government spying and data mining of innocent Americans.


Now in the words of a great American Elmer Fudd “that wascally wabbit is up to no good again” and he will pressure the Senate to fix the bill so that his pals at Verizon won’t be liable for their irresponsible and illegal act of just handing over our privacy to the administration of this imperial president just because he wants it.


All you free Americans need to put the pressure on the Senate not to cave in the King George W and join with Senators Patrick Leahy, and Congressman John Conyers. Demand that your Senators support the strong and balanced FISA legislation that the House Passed in March 2008.


My Democratic Senator Bill Nelson’s staff told me when the Senate last voted on the FISA bill, that he did not support immunity for the telecoms, but then voted for it anyway. These guys must be watched closely and held accountable when they try to dismantle the Constitution.


I urge everyone that values freedom to contact your Senators and Demand they support the House’s FISA bill.


With all the smoke and mirrors flashing across your TV, the mud slinging democrats and the free ride McCain gets from the press. This lame duck administration will try to get all of their agenda passed into law before they slither out of the White House and crawl back under the rocks they came from.


Here is a letter that I will be sending to my Senators. Please feel free to use it or alter it to your liking but send it by email, fax, and call your Senators and tell them how you feel.


You can find your Senator here.

http://www.senate.gov/



Dear Senator,

I urge you to support the fair FISA bill passed by the House of Representatives in March.


Any new FISA legislation must be strong and balanced, protecting America's national security while defending civil liberties -- without granting retroactive immunity to phone companies. Retroactive immunity would abet the Bush-Cheney Administration's efforts to avoid accountability for its actions.


The House's FISA bill strikes the appropriate balance. That's why I strongly support the FISA bill passed by the House in March, and why I'm urging you as my Senator to support the House's legislation as well.

Sincerely,
Your name
Your address


Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

Robert Byrd was one of the Senate's most outspoken critics of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

I saw the speech Senator Robert Byrd made to the Senate before the Iraq invasion. Too bad Senator Clinton wasn’t listening that day. Maybe her vote to go to war would have been different.


Senator Byrd is the longest serving U S Senator in our history. He was a member of the KKK and was one of the most prominent Dixiecrats of the 60’s.


He has changed his views of civil rights over the years. He was one of the few brave lawmakers who had the nerve to stand up to the cable of cretins led this country into the debacle in Iraq.



In a speech on March 13TH 2008 he stated:


"If the United States leads the charge to war in the Persian Gulf, we may get lucky and achieve a rapid victory. But then we will face a second war: a war to win the peace in Iraq. This war will last many years and will surely cost hundreds of billions of dollars. In light of this enormous task, it would be a great mistake to expect that this will be a replay of the 1991 war. The stakes are much higher in this conflict."


On March 19, 2003, when Bush ordered the invasion after receiving U.S. Congress approval, Byrd stated:


"Today I weep for my country. I have watched the events of recent months with a heavy, heavy heart. No more is the image of America one of strong, yet benevolent peacekeeper. The image of America has changed. Around the globe, our friends mistrust us, our word is disputed, our intentions are questioned. Instead of reasoning with those with whom we disagree, we demand obedience or threaten recrimination."

Byrd also criticized Bush for his speech declaring the "end of major combat operations" in Iraq, which Bush made on the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln. Byrd stated on the Senate floor:


"I do question the motives of a deskbound president who assumes the garb of a warrior for the purposes of a speech."

On October 17, 2003, Byrd delivered a speech expressing his concerns about the future of the nation and his unequivocal antipathy to Bush's policies. Referencing the Hans Christian Andersen children's tale The Emperor's New Clothes, Byrd said of the president: "the emperor has no clothes." Byrd further lamented the "sheep-like" behavior of the "cowed Members of this Senate" and called on them to oppose the continuation of a "war based on falsehoods."


Byrd criticized what he saw as the stifling of dissent: "The right to ask questions, debate, and dissent is under attack. The drums of war are beaten ever louder in an attempt to drown out those who speak of our predicament in stark terms. Even in the Senate, our history and tradition of being the world's greatest deliberative body is being snubbed. This huge spending bill - $87 billion - has been rushed through this chamber in just one month. There were just three open hearings by the Senate Appropriations Committee on $87 billion - $87 for every minute since Jesus Christ was born - $87 billion without a single outside witness called to challenge the administration's line." Finally, Byrd quoted Nazi leader Hermann Göring who stated that rushing to war is easy if the proponent of war portrays opponents as unpatriotic.


In July 2004, Byrd released the book Losing America: Confronting a Reckless and Arrogant Presidency about the Bush presidency and the war in Iraq. Of the more than 17,000 votes he has cast as a Senator, Byrd says he is proudest of his vote against the Iraq war resolution.


Maybe 2008 will be the year we vote in candidates that will serve our country instead of serving up our country to the war-profiteers.


Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

Does America have long to remain a democracy?

Does America have long to remain a democracy?

As I watch the upcoming campaigns unfold I am thinking to myself will America remain a democracy? It almost seems like a diabolical conspiracy, that our education system has failed to educate our population how to be a good citizens through a good and intense civics education program.

Most people have very little knowledge on how our system of government works, and I see that most people don’t really care. That is obvious because when you look at the numbers, since 1960 – 2006 less than 55% of eligible voters vote in a presidential election and less than 41% vote in non-presidential federal elections.

Source http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0781453.html More people have voted for Amerika Idol.

We see scandal after scandal and until this very year, when they put in an independent ethics board to investigate corruption, no real ethics reform has ever passed into law.

We have let the politicians dismantle the Constitution. They have broken the antitrust laws that Teddy Roosevelt put in place to protect us, and now we have the oil companies making the energy policies and the 6 giant media corporations controlling the information we receive on the main stream sources.

We have allowed a Neo-convict to bamboozle the nation into an endless “war on terror” and let his pals at the war-profiteer store to empty out our treasury and put us into debt so far that it will take at least as many years as the Commander in Thief has been in office to get out if we do the right things.

We pass laws that dismantle our industrial manufacturing base like NAFTA, CAFTA and what ever. I wonder who will be building our ships, tanks, and aircraft soon.

I saw 2 quotes on another blog from a Scotsman named Alexander Tyler, a history professor from about the time that our constitution was written in 1787.

A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.



The average age of the world's greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:

· From bondage to spiritual faith;

· From spiritual faith to great courage;

· From courage to liberty;

· From liberty to abundance;

· From abundance to complacency;

· From complacency to apathy;

· From apathy to dependence;

· From dependence back into bondage.

I do see more people starting to wake up to what has been going on at the highest levels of government. Is it too late and too little though? This country will have to endure some hard times and it will be painful. The problem seems to be now that no one wants to be the ones who do the suffering.

Paying for this war should start when you begin the war not passed off to future generations. We need to become energy independent and that will be painful. We need to fix Social Security, health care, our crumbling infrastructure, education, the illegal immigration problem and many other issues that need real long term solutions not campaign mantras.

It seems as if Amerika has become the nation of the quick and easy fix. Everyone wants the payoff but not the work. We want knowledge and wisdom like Neo got it in the movie the Matrix. Plug in the USB to the brain and load the information up in 30 seconds. I don’t have the time to learn I have to watch the latest on Brittney, then I have to catch up on who fell down in dancing with the stars.

To fix the issues that matter, will be painful and anyone addressing these issues and doing real long term cures will probably only have one term to do it.

American democracy, is our time about up?

Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

McCain gets a free ride from the press.

While the democrats tear each other apart in the news each night, the press seems to give our Republican candidate for president the free pass. You can’t even read a story about McCain without hearing him called a “maverick.”


Maverick

NOUN: One that refuses to abide by the dictates of or resists adherence to a group; a dissenter.

ADJECTIVE: Being independent in thought and action or exhibiting such independence: maverick politicians; a maverick decision.


According to Media Matters McCain was called a maverick more than 1,300 times in print and on television. I don’t know about you but someone who sticks with his party line 80% of the time is hardly a maverick. The times that he has bucked his party line was with issues that were very popular with the majority of the public so he was not taking any political risks.


McCain has been referred to be a moderate despite the fact that both his McCain himself and his voting record proves that he is a neo-con. McCain voted for cutting federal funding of family planning clinics that counseled women on abortion. He has opposed federal hate crimes legislation, the establishment of the International Criminal Court, the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, pro-labor legislation, ergonomics rules, lawsuits against gun manufacturers, and benefits for gay partners. He has supported privatizing Social Security, conservative judicial appointments, the teaching of intelligent design in public schools, tax cuts for the wealthy, and the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools.


His claim to be a straight talker but McCain has been all things to all people. McCain used to describe Jerry Falwell as an agent of intolerance but after he decided to make another run for president he publicly embraced Falwell back in 2006. It seems like someone needs a favor from the religious conservatives.


He has flipped on many issues such as tax cuts for the wealthy he opposed in 2001 he is now in favor of when he needs to appeal to the conservative base. McCain also once said on abortion, I would not support repeal of Roe vs. Wade." And yet he had also told an anti-choice group in a letter, "I share our common goal of reducing the staggering number of abortions currently performed in this country and overturning the Roe vs. Wade decision". Today, his website reads, "John McCain believes Roe v. Wade is a flawed decision that must be overturned."


When he ran for president in 2000, he skipped the Iowa caucus, and made clear his contempt for ethanol made from Iowa corn. "Ethanol does nothing to reduce fuel consumption, nothing to increase our energy independence, nothing to improve our air quality," he said in 2003. Yet in 2008, he decided to compete in the Iowa caucus, and had a change of heart on ethanol. "I do not support subsidies, but I support ethanol and I think it is a vital alternative energy source, not only because of our dependence on foreign oil but because of its greenhouse reduction effects," he said in August 2006.


The squeaky clean McCain has his own whitewater with his involvement in the Keating Five. Back in early 1987, at the beginning of his first Senate term, McCain attended two meetings with federal banking regulators to discuss an investigation into Lincoln Savings and Loan, an Irvine, Calif., thrift owned by Arizona developer Charles Keating. Federal auditors were investigating Keating's banking practices, and Keating, fearful that the government would seize his S&L, sought intervention from a number of U.S. senators. At Keating's behest, four senators--McCain and Democrats Dennis DeConcini of Arizona, Alan Cranston of California, and John Glenn of Ohio--met with Ed Gray, chairman of the Federal Home Loan Bank Board, on April 2. Those four senators and Sen. Don Riegle, D-Mich., attended a second meeting at Keating's behest on April 9 with bank regulators in San Francisco.

Regulators did not seize Lincoln Savings and Loan until two years later. The Lincoln bailout cost taxpayers $2.6 billion, making it the biggest of the S&L scandals. In addition, 17,000 Lincoln investors lost $190 million.


The news media would also have you believe that McCain doesn’t tell people what they want to hear but makes decisions based not on what’s good politics but on what’s right. The press presents John McCain as unwavering in principle, and propped up by endless political courage and would never pander for a vote.


Consider his decision in 2000 to denounce the Confederate flag flying over the south Carolina statehouse but when the primary approached, he said that the flag was a symbol of heritage.


In recent months, McCain has backtracked on his positions on immigration and taxes, with an eye toward pleasing the conservative base, any other politician who tried a similar gambit would be criticized for such blatant pandering. But for John McCain, the rules are different.


Maybe after they pick the winner of the Democratic primary we will get to see the real John McCain.


Peace and Liberty through intelligence, strength, and integrity.

Iraq is in a helluva mess

There is no military solution to a problem like that in Iraq.”General David Petraeus
Commanding General, Multi-National Force Iraq
March 2007
***

“The fact is, this president never listened to the soldiers
on the ground. The problem is not just a military problem.
It is a political problem and a diplomatic problem.”General Wesley Clark (ret.)
Former Supreme Allied Commander, Europe
May 2007
***

“[America is] not making the progress
we need to be making [in Iraq].”
General John Abizaid (ret.)
Former Commander, United States Central Command
October 2007
***

“Iraq is in a helluva mess.”James A. Baker III
Former U.S. Secretary of State
October 2006
A RESPONSIBLE PLAN TO END THE WAR IN IRAQ