Saturday, January 24, 2009

Rethinking the closing down of Gitmo ....

Remaining insulted and embarrassed by the cowards who desecrated what most of us feel America represents, I wonder if perhaps we should reserve Gitmo as the holding place for Bushco criminals awaiting justice.

Particularly those accused of war crimes. After all did we not keep human beings accused as well as those absent war-crime accusations at Gitmo pending legal actions some of which were never intended to take place?

I for one do hereby put the Obama Administration on notice:

Should someone snatch Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld or any related criminals and take them out of country for trial/tribunal fun and games, I will be opposed to any attempt to return them home prior to their having to account for themselves before the governments of those harmed by their madness.

Or perhaps if this country receives an extradite request for members of the Bush crime organization, could we not detain them at Gitmo pending a decision as to whether or not to extradite?

Mr. Cheney - for example - IMO deserves nothing less than force fed quail soup through a tube.

Saturday, January 17, 2009

It's late. I'm tired. There's the door.

In my house I think I'd get up in the middle of his waxing semi-eloquent and clean the kitty litter box. I'd spill the contents on him, insist it was an accident, claim that this particular cat's poo is toxic and tell him to go straight to the ER.

I know it would work.

Read This:

Hasn't He Gone Yet?

[Excerpt]

Have you ever had a boring guest long-overstay his welcome, perhaps after breaking several family heirlooms and spilling red wine on the rug? It's late, you have a really big day ahead, and you just want him gone. But he stands unmoving at the door, saying his goodbyes, and that leads to him telling another tall tale and then another. Oblivious to the late hour, oblivious to reality right in front of him as you weave dizzily, about to collapse. And he just goes on and on, talking about himself, how great he is. And all the while, the pounding in your head screams, "Just Leave Already!!!"

I think that's a little how most of America is feeling with the George Bush Interminable Farewell Tour.

Is he still there? Hasn't he moved back to Texas yet? Doesn't he have the decency to just go off already and pack? Or is George Bush still standing in the doorway, boorishly telling his hosts how great he is, after having broken their treasured possessions?

Sunday, January 11, 2009

Wise Personal Governance?

Not sure about this but I'm glad I was not raised by a Nazi Food Mom. But then maybe I wouldn't have grown up overweight and fighting gout today. Nevertheless, don't know where my mother would have found Amish-raise, free range chicken but am pretty sure the Utah-Idaho Mormons would have preached the free-range stuff if Joseph had said no smoking and only Amish-raised free-range chicken and turkeys.
Via Alternet

Excerpt from Alternet


My War Against Food Nazi Moms
By Laura Bennett, The Daily Beast. Posted January 5, 2009.


I was at a parents' meeting at my boys’ school one recent morning, talking to one of the new moms, an attractive, petite, divorced woman in her 40s. She was discussing her relationship with her ex-husband and how challenging it has been. There was a distinct sound of bitterness in her voice, not surprising when she mentioned that he left her for a 24-year-old.

She told me that he had crossed a line with her kids on a recent visitation, and she was going to have her lawyer work on getting his joint custody rights revoked. She felt her case was ironclad, he had "obviously acted wrongly" and "anyone would agree with her."

"What did he do?" I had to ask, bracing myself for some juicy gossip. Surely this would involve sex and drugs, his babe girlfriend naked, or strippers at the very least.

And then she told me her ex's transgressions. He had packed a non-organic lunch for her sons. Seriously. She went on to describe the brown bags loaded with Cheetos, Go-gurt, and a sandwich that was made with white bread.

Because I stood there speechless, looking completely shocked with my mouth hanging open, she continued. She went on and on about the dangers of food additives and how they had exacerbated one of her boys' ADHD. She talked about how each morning when her boys are in her care she takes the time to poach Amish-raised, free-range chicken and then stuffs it into a whole-grain pita with hydroponic tomatoes and micro-greens and that her ex was obviously not fit to spend time with the kids because he was willing to put their health in such grave danger.

Saturday, January 10, 2009

We are not a nation of selective compassion ... are we?

Susan Cornwall writes about how Few Speak Out for Palestinians in US Congress - via commondreams.org

Does a moral perspective include cheering on the destruction of other human beings regardless of what side of the fence you step from?

Can we call evil good just because we agree with one side over the other?

Cornwall:

WASHINGTON - Many voices around the world speak up for the Palestinians, but few in the U.S. Congress.

Lawmakers in Washington routinely pass nonbinding resolutions supporting Israel during Middle East crises. The Senate on Thursday backed Israel's battle against Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip and the House of Representatives followed on Friday.
Even U.S. lawmakers who express sympathy for the Palestinians hesitate to call themselves pro-Palestinian and they voice strong support for the security of Israel as well, hewing to decades of close U.S.-Israeli ties.

Why not?

Are we such a poorly moralistic society that our elected representatives can easily assume that our pretend Christian partisan attitude about Israel lets us look the other way when Israel acts precisely like its Old Testament Divine Tyrant?

Harry Reid, who leads the Democratic majority in the Senate, gave voice to the depth of the relationship when he said on Thursday, "Our resolution reflects the will of the State of Israel and the will of the American people."
The Senate measure offered "unwavering commitment" to Israel. It recognized "its right to act in self-defense to protect its citizens against acts of terrorism" and urged a ceasefire that would keep Hamas from firing rockets at Israel.

I don't remember any request from my senators from Washington or any public request from our Congress for a fair and honest feedback before Senator Reid opted to define my countrymen and myself as partisan to the neglect of our own humanity or conscience.

Nor have I been impressed by any such request regarding Gaza coming to my inbox from "change.gov"

Mr. Reid is speaking horrifically on behalf of a political ally and supporting indiscriminate murder at the same time. Why should I be surprised? This democratic senate has done nothing about indiscriminate murder from the day it became the majority party and moved into the driver's seat.

There isn't ever a time when national honor and core values dictate that we authorize this kind of thinking.

The House on Friday passed a resolution "recognizing Israel's right to defend itself against attacks from Gaza" by 390-5. The measure noted that the humanitarian situation in Gaza "is becoming more acute" but did not rebuke Israel.

And did those cowards in the House indicate that Israel's right to defend itself was limited to it's military or terrorist enemies? I guess not. Being alive and in Gaza is sufficient to be on Israel's indiscriminate enemies list.

The few opponents of the measures often include lawmakers of Arab-American descent or from Arab-American communities, and mavericks such as Democrat Dennis Kucinich of Ohio and Republican Ron Paul of Texas.

Kucinich, who sought the Democratic presidential nomination last year, charged that the United States was ignoring the current humanitarian crisis in Gaza while facilitating Israel's actions with arms deals worth billions.

Washington "sniffs at the slaughter of innocents in Gaza," he said. "U.S. tax dollars, U.S. jets and U.S. helicopters provided to Israel are enabling the slaughter in Gaza."


He's right. And these national politicians represent the highest American moral and spiritual values?

Some Americans "don't have a clue" about the Palestinians' history, James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, said.

That understated truth defines why there is no honor, integrity or even ethical sense in a nation that supposedly prides itself on public religiousness.

There is not any amount of political or patriotic sophistry that can be offered as a justification for turning away from indiscriminate killing. If there were, the pious national members of the Holy American Hypocritical Nationalist Churchianity would have long ago driven us straight toward ending our own indiscriminate killing elsewhere around the globe.

If in fact American politics ties the hands of those in our government who would do the right thing morally and ethically, then the shame is more our own than that of our elected purely political and lobby-vulnerable elected vultures.

I think that Mark Twain might agree today that empathy for Israel deteriorates into self-serving moral cowardice in America.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Frank Rich (NYT) Opinion on the lamest duck in American history. Impeachable - pity is not an option

" ... trying to hawk his
goods in these final days, like a salesman who hasn’t been told by the home office that his product has beendiscontinued."


I endorse this opinion and agree with the assessment.

Op-Ed Columnist - A President Forgotten but Not Gone - NYTimes.com

Excerpt:


The one indisputable talent of his White House was its ability to create and sell propaganda both to the public and the press.

Now that bag of tricks is empty as well. Bush’s first and last photo-ops in Iraq could serve as bookends to his entire tenure. On Thanksgiving weekend 2003, even as the Iraqi insurgency was spiraling, his secret trip to the war zone was a P.R. slam-dunk. The photo of the beaming commander in chief bearing a supersized decorative turkey for the troops was designed to make every front page and newscast in the country, and it did.

Five years later, in what was intended as a farewell victory lap to show off Iraq’s improved post-surge security, Bush was reduced to ducking shoes.

And this excerpt from a second source:

McClatchy - David Lightman





Even to his defenders, Bush's legacy is 'debatable'

WASHINGTON — George W. Bush was supposed to be a president schooled in consensus building and tough, effective management.

However, the first chief executive with a master's in business administration — from Harvard, no less, and the son of a president known for his foreign-policy expertise — is leaving President-electBarack Obama a nation that's arguably in the worst shape since Herbert Hoover left Franklin Roosevelt the Great Depression and a world inwhich fascism was on the march 76 years ago.

"Obama gets Pearl Harbor and the Depression all rolled into one," said Gleaves Whitney, the director of the Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Whilescholars estimate that it takes at least a generation before apresident's legacy can be analyzed objectively, many already are unflinching in their assessment of Bush.

The 43rd president presided over a "free-for-all in which powerful insiders . . . have played roles as policy entrepreneurs," said Karen Hult, a presidential expert at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Va.

"We can certainly talk about his remarkably sloppy decision-making process.That did have consequences," added George Edwards, a presidentialscholar at Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas.

Desperate for Diversions

 

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