“Doomed if you do, doomed if you don’t.”

That’s how a Bushwhacked-sounding Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz described the box President Bush has put Iraq in to American journalist Norman Solomon.

Solomon is one of the few American journalists who has tried to get Iraq’s side of the crisis over whether the Mideastern country’s purported “weapons of mass destruction” are such a threat to world peace that the United States has a right to take preemptive military action against it.

Of the many tragedies of last year’s terrorist attacks on America, one of the worst was that it turned a war wimp like President Bush into an international bully. Bush is intent on telling the world what to do, and if the rest of it won’t go along with him he will go it alone.

The Senate is poised to pass legislation that would give federal prosecutors broad new powers to shut down RAVEs, hemp festivals, marijuana rallies, concerts and other events and punish business owners and activists for hosting or promoting events. Because of its broad language, the proposed law would also potentially subject people to enormous federal sentences if some of their guests smoked marijuana at their parties or barbecues. This includes promoters of national acts that perform at the Nationwide and Schottenstein arenas, as well as the Promowest Pavilion.

The bill, known as the Reducing American’s Vulnerability to Ecstasy Act (RAVE Act), was just introduced in the Senate on June 18th and has already passed the Senate Judiciary Committee. It is moving very rapidly and could be passed by the Senate as early as this week. While it purports to be aimed at ecstasy and other club drugs, it gives the federal government enormous power to fine and imprison event promoters, even if they’ve never smoked marijuana.

he National Organization for Women (NOW), its Board of Directors, and its members have received numerous complaints regarding workplace environment and employment practices at Wal-Mart stores, distribution centers and regional and corporate offices. Extensive public record on cases filed against Wal-Mart were considered and the allegations were found disturbing. They are sex discrimination in pay, promotion, and compensation; wage abuse; exclusion of contraceptive coverage in insurance plans; violations of child labor laws and the Americans with Disabilities Act; and discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Cases have also been filed regarding firing pro-union workers, eliminating jobs once workers joined unions, and discouraging workers from unionizing. In addition, Wal-Mart continues to refuse to dispense Preven, the “morning-after pill.”

AUSTIN -- Under the radar. Wheee, it is coming down fast and hard out here.

The Wall Street Journal devoted some coverage to the interesting case of Janet Rehnquist, inspector general at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Rehnquist, daughter of the chief justice, is in hot water for politicizing her nonpartisan office and forcing out longtime career civil servants: This is the kind of thing that draws attention in Washington, D.C., but buried in the story, we find some interesting nuggets concerning Inspector Rehnquist's efforts to create a kinder, gentler IG department.

"The HHS office is responsible for safeguarding $450 billion-plus in annual spending, including Medicare and Medicaid, giving it a big role in policing health-care fraud. It annually makes cost-saving recommendations totaling billions of dollars, participates in hundreds of criminal prosecutions and bars thousands of entities from government work," reports the Journal.

Walking back to my car after a rally calling for peace at the Ohio State House on Saturday, I walked past a spot where only a few days earlier a distraught man sat in his van with a gun to his head surrounded by police. From what I understood of that situation, it sounded like the guy was at the end of his rope, in need of help and aiming a gun at his head on election day was the only way he felt anyone might listen to him. The only way he felt he had left to amplify his voice and be heard. It was his own private anarchy against a system he felt had wronged him.

Many people spoke on Saturday from a variety of backgrounds, experiences and emotions, all trying to make the same point- the Bush Administration must be stopped. With such diversity taking the stage, everyone there could find a speaker who touched their conscience, their soul, their heart, their mind. Another voice that echoed their individual thoughts and feelings on our country's disastrous situation and reenforced "I am not alone," "I am not crazy," "I am not unpatriotic or un-American to be here."

I believe it's safe to say that as individuals, each person has his or her