President Obama Destroys the US Dollar and economy for Political Windfall

The Gay Secretary

Barack Obama ran for president as a man of the people, standing up to Wall Street as the global economy melted down in that fateful fall of 2008. He pushed a tax plan to soak the rich, ripped NAFTA for hurting the middle class and tore into John McCain for supporting a bankruptcy bill that sided with wealthy bankers "at the expense of hardworking Americans." Obama may not have run to the left of Samuel Gompers or Cesar Chavez, but it's not like you saw him on the campaign trail flanked by bankers from Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. What inspired supporters who pushed him to his historic win was the sense that a genuine outsider was finally breaking into an exclusive club, that walls were being torn down, that things were, for lack of a better or more specific term, changing.

Then he got elected.

What's taken place in the year since Obama won the presidency has turned out to be one of the most dramatic political about-faces in our history. Elected in the midst of a crushing economic crisis brought on by a decade of orgiastic deregulation and unchecked greed, Obama had a clear mandate to rein in Wall Street and remake the entire structure of the American economy. What he did instead was ship even his most marginally progressive campaign advisers off to various bureaucratic Siberias, while packing the key economic positions in his White House with the very people who caused the crisis in the first place. This new team of bubble-fattened ex-bankers and laissez-faire intellectuals then proceeded to sell us all out, instituting a massive, trickle-up bailout and systematically gutting regulatory reform from the inside.

How could Obama let this happen? Is he just a rookie in the political big leagues, hoodwinked by Beltway old-timers? Or is the vacillating, ineffectual servant of banking interests we've been seeing on TV this fall who Obama really is?

Whatever the president's real motives are, the extensive series of loophole-rich financial "reforms" that the Democrats are currently pushing may ultimately do more harm than good. In fact, some parts of the new reforms border on insanity, threatening to vastly amplify Wall Street's political power by institutionalizing the taxpayer's role as a welfare provider for the financial-services industry. At one point in the debate, Obama's top economic advisers demanded the power to award future bailouts without even going to Congress for approval — and without providing taxpayers a single dime in equity on the deals.

How did we get here? It started just moments after the election — and almost nobody noticed.

You Get My Point, Surely, President Scofflaw

American Scofflaw

I do not want to have one more of my tax dollars spent on a war for corporate profit. I do not want to see one more of our fine US soldiers get killed or maimed for life in the name of corporate profit.

The outcomesof the invasion and Afghanistan were to have been;

1. To install the pipelines to control Eurasian oil (a goal the US/NATO occupation is not anywhere near accomplishing).

2. To control the drug trade, from which so many profit so handsomely. And if you are screaming "no, this couldn't possibly be", and just about to throw your computer at the wall for such a suggestion, please, sit down, take a deep breath, and look at the facts.

Under the rule of the Taliban, the cultivation of opium poppies had nearly disappeared. After the invasion and occupation by US/NATO forces, opium production has soared.

As reported on 3 September, 2006, in

http://thetorontotimes.com/content/view/560/68/

"Helmand province has seen a 162 % increase in opium production over last year. This province has also seen significant attacks on British troops and NATO forces this past year. The narco-economy is threatening to turn the state into a Narco state with the complete collapse of the democratic reforms initiated by the western allies."

Any questions?

The people of Afghanistan pose absolutely no threat to US national security; they just happen to be cursed to live at a geographic spot that would be great for pipelines, and the ideal weather conditions for growing opium.

They simply want us out of their country, period, end of discussion.

Any new "surge" in Afghanistan will be met by an equal - or better "surge" of Taliban fighters, which will then cause the US military to ask for more troops which will....

You get my point.

Remember Us???

American Scofflaw
As the war drums beat louder for the invasion of Iran, a look back at just how the war fever was ignited in the first place.




"אני רוצה להגיד לך משהו מאוד ברור, אל דאגה לגבי הלחץ האמריקאי על ישראל, אנו, העם היהודי שליטה אמריקה ואת האמריקאים יודעים את זה." - אריאל שרון----Ariel Sharon

Meatballs Without Choppers

American Scofflaw
Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski wasn't pleased, but then who the hell would be in this situation?

This isn't the first deployment of the Oregon National Guard's helos and staff to the Mideast, but it is the first time the entire fleet has been called into duty - leaving only four pilots and one borrowed helicopter to cover the state's emergency Guard calls.

"I do not know who will fill the void," said mountain rescuer Michael Leming. "Even in perfect conditions it can take hours and hours to get people off the mountain. The reality is people are going to get seriously hurt, and some are not going to make it."

The Black Hawks were originally acquired by the Oregon National Guard's 1042nd Air Ambulance Company in 1996 through a determined bit of legislative maneuvering by Oregon's Republican Senator Mark Hatfield, who managed to earmark 15 brand new UH-60Ls coming off the Sikorsky assembly line for the Oregon National Guard.

The 1042nd was renamed in 2006 as Team Charlie - C Company, 7th Battalion, 158th Aviation. Team Charlie is among over 3,000 Oregon National Guard soldiers slated for deployment this year.

Dear God, Why Did They Ever Join?

American Scofflaw

At least 128 American soldiers committed suicide last year, bringing the rate up to the highest level in nearly three decades. About a third killed themselves during deployment, a third after, and a third not having been deployed. The rate of military suicides is higher than civilian for the first time since Vietnam.

The endless wars abroad in Afghanistan and Iraq and the advent of 15-month deployments would seem to be the best explanation. Many servicemen and women face major life problems after coming back.

Some proponents of staying the course suggest that dissenting civilians here at home will lose the war, just as they allegedly lost Vietnam. Yet we are at peace now with Vietnam. Yes, horrors were unleashed when the U.S. withdrew, but much of that was exacerbated in its ferocity by U.S. intervention in the first place (such as with U.S. bombing in Cambodia warming the people up to the Khmer Rouge).

These interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq have lasted longer than World War II, at a tremendous cost with no end in sight. Some close to Obama suggest the new administration might see the Afghanistan engagement lasting as long as Vietnam. The objective is very unclear.

Some conservatives seem to see the futility in trying to nation build in Afghanistan, now that Obama wants to do it. Some liberals saw the futility in the Iraq war. But nothing can be gained by continuing the occupations of either one.

Many in the military want to come home. For three years, troops in Iraq have overwhelmingly supported withdrawing within a year. By a wide margin, Ron Paul, the one candidate clearly advocating as rapid a withdrawal as manageable, was the favorite Republican of the men and women of the Armed Forces, in terms of campaign donations. Obama, percieved as favoring a drawdown, also fared well in this regard.

Difficulty meeting recruitment goals have led to dubious practices, the use of stop-loss orders, the signing up of convicts and illegal aliens and worse. Morale is down and has been for years. Some politicos are even agitating for conscription, but the bipartisan consensus in any event is we need a bigger military.

The military does not need more troops. It has enough and too many are fighting and dying where they shouldn't be.

Americans and foreigners continue to die in these wars. The foreign dead and American wounded are hardly counted. Young Americans suffer unspeakable physical and psychological injuries. And it continues every day, so far with little indication from Obama that he will effect a real break from the pattern.

We must not let this issue fall off our radar. Some will quiet down now that there is a Democratic president, but America needs peace as it needs liberty more than ever

Fascism Is Fun, Doncha Know

Charlie Says...

Rangel Wants Military Draft

One More Time

American Scofflaw

There is no Iran nuclear crisis.

There is a paranoid nation that is itself covertly building nuclear weapons underneath a supposedly peaceful reactor and in order to assuage its own guilt projects that every other nation must be doing the same thing. This paranoid nation attacked and bombed Iraq's power station claiming it contained a clandestine weapons factory. Examinatyion of the rubble proved that it was nothing but a power station. The paranoid nation led the hue and cry that Saddam had banned weapons of mass destruction. after Iraq was bombed back to the stone age and occupied, that claim too turned out to have been a national hallucination by that sick little paranoid country; one that has cost the United States trillions of dollars and thousands of young lives.

And now, because nobody dares have an intervention with this sick little paranoid country, even as this sick little paranoid country openly defies the United Nations to go on dropping banned chemical weapons on to UN schools filled with schoolchildren, the paranoia now aims itself at Iran, who has always allowed IAEA inspectors full access to their power station.

No evidence of a weapons program has been found by the IAEA or produced by the sick little paranoid nation that wants the United States to kill all of its imagined enemies.

And you know, that is the problem with acceding to paranoia. No matter how m,any enemies you kill, there are always new ones being imaged every single day.

Media Dictionary: Arab-Israeli Conflict

American Scofflaw

Definitions:

Caught in the Crossfire: When Palestinian civilians are killed.
Retaliation: When Israeli army or settlers kill Palestinians.
Escalation: (synonym/can be used interchangeably with Provocation): Any act of violence or resistance by the Palestinians.
Murdered: When Israeli Civilians are killed.
Brutal/cowardly/ghastly: adjectives describing attacks on Israelis.
Self defense: Any act of violence by Israelis .
Terrorism: Any act of violence by the Palestinians.
Civilians: Armed settlers are civilians when killed. Try to avoid using this term for Palestinians.
Neighborhoods: Areas inhabited by Israeli settlers especially if targeted by shooting (light guns)
Positions: Any Palestinian towns and villages especially when bombed by helicopter gunships or raked with large caliber machine guns .
Tragedy: Any Israeli death .
Deserved: Any Palestinian death.
Squatters: Palestinian natives .
Democratic ally: Synonym for Israel.
Disputed Areas: Any Palestinian or Arab land occupied by Israel in defiance of International law.
Anti-Semite: Person condemns Israeli violations of Palestinian civil and human rights.
Victims: Any Jewish Israeli .
Attacker: Any Palestinian engaging in any form of resistance (violent or not). Also see terrorist.
Targets: Palestinian buildings, homes, offices - What the Israeli military designates as military targets.
Attack/bombing/murder: Acts the Palestinians commit when directed at Israelis .
Clashes: This is a difficult term to understand but is generally used when Palestinians die .
Measures (e.g. Economic measures, security measures) : Any acts the Israelis commit (blockades, collective punishment, shelling neighborhoods, starving a population etc) .
Security: Anything the Israeli government chooses to do. This can include land confiscation, extra-judicial killings, home demolitions, destruction of groves, uprooting trees, blockades etc. The term security is reserved for use only with the word Israel or Israeli and must never
be applied to Palestinians. Lashing out: A term reserved for Palestinians and acts they commit against Israelis
Under siege: Again a term for use by the Israelis as in Palestinians have put Israelis under siege. Exact meaning depends on the circumstances. Never use for Palestinian towns or villages.

Rules:

When to use Passive voice: If the violent action is committed by Israelis (e.g. 2 Palestinians were killed, one of them a 9 year old).
When to use active voice: If the action is committed by Palestinians (e.g. Palestinians killed a Jewish child, Palestinians kills teenager).
While reporting about Israelis: "2 Israelis were injured", while reporting about Palestinian use the verbs claimed, say etc.
"Palestinians say woman dies of teargas inhalation in West Bank" (e.g. Ha'aretz)
Names: Must be included for any Jewish victims, always avoid names for Muslim or Christian victims but use numbers in stead (remember in the passive voice, e.g. 2 Palestinians died in clashes).
When an Israeli is killed: It is important to note his or her profession, where he/she is from and was going, whether or not he/she is religious, and whether or not he/she is an immigrant from the U.S. or Russia. If the dead person is survived by a spouse and children, this should be noted. If the victim is a youngster, the school they attended should be mentioned, and their friends' feelings should be noted. in general, people who knew the dead person should testify to their humanity.
When a Palestinian is killed, they should not be personalized in any way.
When an Israeli is killed, it is useful to include graphic descriptions of the death scene - the covered body, the fragments of flesh, the path of flowing blood, etc.

Please ensure that your local media editor/journalist receives this list.