Waiting for the outside world

In the "old days" of the U.S. peace movement, when many people focused on the threat of a global nuclear "exchange" an organization called Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) postulated what would happen if a major American city was actually blasted by an atomic bomb.

The doctors described utterly horrific scenarios extending far beyond the numbers of dead and severely wounded. In plain words they described what the few survivors would experience: a landscape that not only had sustained unimaginable casualties, but which had also suffered the destruction of its transportation and health care infrastructure. No ambulances would arrive with lights and sirens to whisk away the suffering. Doctors, nurses, blood plasma, pain killers, antibiotics, bandages - all would be destroyed along with the hospitals and highways.

As difficult as it was to picture such a reality, the hardest thing to imagine was that in a nuclear war there would be no "outside" from where help will come. When every major city suffers the same fate as yours, no one "out there" can help you. "Out there" is all gone. Instantly, in

Missing the forest for the uprooted floating trees

The trillion dollar question has long been: How do we get the major media outlets in this country to notice that the White House is run by oil barons who launch illegal wars based on lies, defund everything else, and destroy the environment at every opportunity – and that this is a single, connected story?

In June we garnered a bit of interest in the Downing Street Memos story, which then dried up and went away.  Then there was the Karl Rove scandal, which dried up and went away.  It's not that the actual events went away.  More evidence continued to come out, protests continued to grow, congressional action by progressive Dems and brave Republicans accelerated.  But the media lost interest.

Next came the Cindy Sheehan story.  This one was such a big splash that the media announced the birth of an anti-war movement (which was born simply because the media had, after all these years, decided to acknowledge its existence – at least briefly).  And now we have the Katrina story.

The Miseducation of Mr. George Bush.

It is not chutzpah to fire your advisors- it is stupidity. I don't know where you learned it but you learned it wrong. You had some pretty good advisers there George telling you not to go into Iraq -some seriously starred Generals I believe. Even your Dad had better sense. I see a pattern. Instead of respecting better wisdom and higher authority, you just fire it-assuming there could be no higher wisdom or authority than yours. Isn't that the very definition of arrogant A-holedom? Then classically after the catastrophic mistake you engage in the head scratching wondering what went wrong. Maybe we didn't do the Iraq thing exactly right when Saddam had no WMDs and no Niger yellow cake and we kind of fudged the numbers and photos at the UN and lied to the country in the State of the Union whipping everyone up on an orange alert which even Tom Ridge knows is a load of horse dung (which you want to spin into trivial insignificant oblivion after lying through your teeth.) Is Homer Simpson wearing a T-Shirt with your face on it- because you are the Duh-Ya THINK?? President. No worse- you are the "I am the Poster boy of malicious

Ohio recount lawsuit set for trial; election workers indicted

On Tuesday August 30, a federal district judge set a trial date for the Green Party’s Ohio Recount lawsuit and indictments were handed down against two Cuyahoga County elections officials for their roles in the bungled election audit.  The timing was coincidental; the two actions are not related though they both stem from charges that the recount was conducted in violation of state and federal law.

Judge James Carr set the trial date for August 22, 2006.  The lawsuit was initiated by Green Party presidential candidate David Cobb and his Libertarian counterpart, Michael Badnarik.

Bush administration and New Orleans

Why is the Bush administration so slow to respond to the human suffering on the Gulf Coast? Why do they not practice the corporal works of mercy? Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, harbor the stranger, visit the sick, visit those in prison, bury the dead. And Bush calls himself a Christian? Ye shall know the tree by its fruit.

Richard Hayes Phillips
Canton, NY 13617

Katrina: A tragedy made worse

Reverend Jesse Jackson is working in the Louisiana region with the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Last week, Rev. Jackson and a Rainbow/PUSH delegation visited Venezuela, and are grateful for the relief aid offered by President Hugo Chavez. Below is Rev. Jackson's statement on the tragedy.

CHICAGO- The Reverend Jesse Jackson, Sr., the founder and president of the Rainbow PUSH Coalition released the following statement regarding the tragedy caused by Hurricane Katrina:

All of us share the pain of those hit so hard by Hurricane Katrina. All of us will do what we can to help ease the burden of the families who have lost their loved ones, their homes, and even their towns and cities.

Even our amigos y amigas in Venezuela have generously offered their assistance. President Hugo Chavez himself told me in Caracas earlier this week, as we watched the flooding on television, that Venezuela would provide millions in aid, as a gesture of compassion from the people of Venezuela, to ease the pain and suffering of the victims of Katrina. We thank President Chavez and the Venezuelan people for their generosity.

Paul Allen's other yacht

In the wake of the New Orleans disaster, I thought of an article I read about Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s other yacht. The 300-foot Tatoosh carries a 30-person crew, two helicopters, a swimming pool, a spa, a private movie theater, six other surface boats (including a separate 54-foot racing yacht and two Hobie catamarans) and a submarine. Reading about the Tatoosh and a third yacht just slightly smaller made me wonder about Allen’s yacht of choice.  Did it have two swimming pools? Four helicopters? Twelve other on-board boats? And what was Allen doing with two yachts, when he could only ride on one at a time?

Bush’s implicit answer to Cindy Sheehan’s question

President Bush has evaded Cindy Sheehan’s question, “What was the noble cause that my son died for?” But he provided a partial answer on the day that the New Orleans levees gave way.

The media coverage was scant and fleeting -- but we should not allow the nation’s Orwellian memory hole to swallow up a revealing statement in Bush’s speech at a naval air station near San Diego.

In the Aug. 30 speech, moments after condemning “a brutal campaign of terror in Iraq,” the president said: “If Zarqawi and bin Laden gain control of Iraq, they would create a new training ground for future terrorist attacks. They’d seize oil fields to fund their ambitions.” In other words, the U.S. war effort in Iraq must continue because control of Iraqi oil is at stake.

Would U.S. troops be in Iraq if that country didn’t have a drop of oil under its sand? Most politicians dodge that kind of question. And for years, the U.S. news media -- with few exceptions -- have elided the oily obvious. Such denials go back a long way.

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Happy Labor Day, comrades

AUSTIN, Texas -- Happy Labor Day, comrades. Hail to all who have yet to be outsourced, downsized, zero-budgeted, streamlined, cut back, laid off, globalized or otherwise pre-shrunk. Those of us who are lucky winners in the employment lottery can still enjoy our stagnant wages, disappearing benefits and collapsing pension plans. What, us worry?

Not that I want to start off one of my favorite national holidays on a bummer note, but it's enough to make Joe Hill rise from the dead yet again. One of the handicaps Americans have when it comes to discussing labor is that about 90 percent of us think we're middle class. Upper-class people are quite as likely to self-identify as middle class as are working-class folks. And middle-class folks do not think of themselves as "labor."

How could you be part of labor when you don't wear a hardhat or carry a lunch bucket? When you live in a suburb and own a bass boat, as well as an SUV? When you wear a suit and tie or high heels to work? When you're management, for pity's sake? Because that's what American labor looks like now -- just like you.

All Supreme Court appointments must be postponed

The death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist and the deaths of some 10,000 or more American citizens in New Orleans and Mississippi have come virtually at the same time.

We thus face one of the most important moments of decision in all US History---the appointment of two new Justices to the Supreme Court, including a new Chief Justice.

Such decisions are too momentous to make amidst the chaos and crisis that is today's United States. There is only one thing that can be done under the circumstances: postpone the appointments.

The nation is reeling from what may be its deadliest weather-related disaster ever. In effect, the country has lost an entire city, and it has done so in ways that could have been avoided.

New Orleans will almost certainly be rebuilt. But what emerges will be a very different place from the one America has known and loved for so long.

The implications of what has happened there are enormous and unique. The last time the nation and world lost entire cities in one fell swoop was at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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