I've written a limerick about Bush's debate bulge, which begins:
Some think that George Dubya was wired,
While debates with John Kerry transpired.

The rest of my Wired Prez Limerick is here.

And speaking of debates, I wrote the Education President Song Parody in anticipation of all the bragging about his "education accomplishments" Bush will inevitably do during the domestic issues debate: Here's the first verse (to be sung to Barry Manilow's I Write The Songs):

Bush promised parents that he'd fix our schools.
That he'd make sure their children didn't turn out fools.
But all the teachers got were lots of rules.
Let's right his wrongs, let's right his wrongs.

Education President Song Parody is here.

Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is approaching its fifth decade. It is an occupation that has inflicted unspeakable cruelty on a civilian population of 3.5 million Palestinians, not to speak of the suffering inflicted on Israeli victims of Palestinian terrorism.

With certain notable exceptions, the overwhelming majority of Israelis have anesthetized their reactions to these cruelties by buying into a contrived narrative that absolves them of all responsibility.

The Supreme Court has taken it upon themselves to review their 1980 decision to disallow official display of the Ten Commandments on public and government property. This is, from the start, a waste of tax money. There can be no question that (a) the Ten Commandments is a religious document, and that (b) a display of the Ten Commandments made by the governing body of public or government property is the establishment of religion, forbidden by the Constitutition of the United States.

Some have proposed that if other religious documents were put alongside the Ten Commandments that such 'equal time' would honor the Constitution. But is the government able to fund and maintain the religious documents of all religions at all government buildings? Who will represent the best interests of Mithras and Wotan and Ug-Zum-Pweet, God of Warm and Dry Caves? Does Aum Shinrikyo get to display their beliefs? Which Ten Commandments will the government be allowed (or not allowed) to display? And how are the non-religious needs of atheists met by religious displays?

It is not the function of government to honor any particular religion nor all religions. The function of government is to assume its citizens are secular, and that any religious expression should occur on their own time and at their own expense.

The rest of the world understands that the United States has become a crusading theocracy. It is time and past time to recognize that here and do something about it.

"You know, Josh Burkeen is our rep down here in the southeast area. . . . He was telling me lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they'll only let one girl go to the bathroom. Now think about it. Think about that issue. How is it that that's happened to us?"

-- Tom Coburn, the Republican Senate candidate in Oklahoma, at a town meeting Aug. 31 in Hugo.

Profile of neocon cabal member Michael Ledeen:

Ledeen is especially contemptuous of leaders he regards as weak and corrupt, such as Bill Clinton. In a 1999 article in the scholarly journal Society, he warned of dire consequences if Clinton were not impeached. "New leaders with an iron will are required to root out the corruption and either reestablish a virtuous state, or to institute a new one. . .," he wrote. "If we bask in false security and drop our guard, the rot spreads, corrupting the entire society. Once that happens, only violent and extremely unpleasant methods can bring us back to virtue."

In a March 2003 speech at the American Enterprise Institute, Ledeen dismissed worries that the American public would lose heart if there were too many casualties in the then-imminent Iraq war. "All the great scholars who have studied American character have come to the conclusion that we are a warlike people and that we love war. . .," Ledeen declared. "What we hate is not casualties but losing."

The Ledeen enigma -- extolling democracy while calling for iron political discipline -- can be traced back to what he has called "the usual Machiavellian paradox: Compulsion -- or necessity, as he terms it -- makes men noble, and enables them to remain free, while abundant choice is dangerous, leads to chaos, and leaves men at the mercy of their enemies." Ledeen fears that some elements of society have forgotten the virtue of such compulsion. "The generals, the businessmen, and the athletic coaches know this, but the political leaders and journalists often forget it."

America, this is one of the "visionaries" inspiring your foreign policy. What say you?

Kurt Nimmo on being jobless in Bush's America:

Unemployed in Dreamland

Doth Protest Too Much? Olanzapine To The Rescue!


Color My Future Soylent Green.

Jan Crouch is a televangelist. She is married to televangelist Paul Crouch. Paul Crouch has done prison time for sex with under-age boys, paid adult men to keep their sexual encounters private, sets up fake minority owned companies to meet federally mandated diversity requirements, stolen book ideas to use as television docu-dramas, and is clean and sober except when he is drunk or high on cocaine. But enough about Paul Crouch - what about Jan Crouch?

Jan Crouch is the head of the charitable organization The Smile of a Child. The city of Pembroke Pines wants to give The Smile of a Child some medical equipment and emergency vehicles, so that The Smile of a Child can in turn give them to Haiti to aid in disaster relief there. But The Smile of a Child is considered an organization of such ill repute that there is serious doubt these donations would reach their destination.

But where in the world would donated goods and services go if not to those in need? Maybe to Paul and Jan's combined USD$754, 700.00 salary. Maybe to fuel their USD$7.2 million jet or many luxury cars. Maybe it would go to the upkeep of their thirty homes. Or maybe to booze, boys and blow. Who knows? It's all tax deducatable with no accountability, so who cares? Set up a secular charity and you've got all sorts of accountability, but say you are "religious" and anything goes. When you've got God on your side, all things are possible.

FAIRFIELD -- A local sign maker is angry that some "Support Our Troops" ribbon signs sold in the area are made overseas, with proceeds not going toward U.S. soldiers.

[snip]

In an age when even the metal recovered from New York's fallen Twin Towers is being sold commercially as Sept. 11 "mementos," Wiles' outrage raises questions of how far business enterprise should be allowed to go in making a buck from emotive national issues.

Via ProRev

While right-wing bloggers and websites have been particularly adept at using the net to push an agenda, liberal groups are catching up fast. In the last few weeks, conservative mob targets have included those involved in the CBS scandal (Dan Rather, producer Mary Mapes, Bill Burkett) and Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry, who was scrutinized for reaching into his pocket at the first debate.

Liberals led by Media Matters for America succeeded in knocking pollster Frank Luntz off MSNBC by highlighting his Republican ties and are currently insisting that Fox News correspondent Carl Cameron be pulled from the campaign beat for making up Kerry quotes that got posted on the news outlet's website. [more]

After almost four years of an unprecedented assault on the wildest places in America, the Bush administration is pulling out the greenwashing brushes so that it can paint a more palatable picture of its environmental policies.

But you cannot simply gloss over the scope and magnitude of the Bush administration's assault on America's wild heritage. It's time for a reality check. [more]

A powerful "old guard" faction in the Central Intelligence Agency has launched an unprecedented campaign to undermine the Bush administration with a battery of damaging leaks and briefings about Iraq.

The White House is incensed by the increasingly public sniping from some senior intelligence officers who, it believes, are conducting a partisan operation to swing the election on November 2 in favour of John Kerry, the Democratic candidate, and against George W Bush. [more]

Take him down, spooks!

"Even if you accept this election as legitimate, it was only for a single branch of government. There are no checks and balances, unless of course you count the fact that the only power he really has grows out of the barrel of an American gun. If he weren¹t a puppet, he¹d be an absolute dictator." -- Posturing

From the LA Times:

The conservative-leaning Sinclair Broadcast Group, whose television outlets reach nearly a quarter of the nation's homes with TV, is ordering its stations to preempt regular programming just days before the Nov. 2 election to air a film that attacks Sen. John F. Kerry's activism against the Vietnam War, network and station executives familiar with the plan said Friday.

...Sinclair has told its stations ‹ many of them in political swing states such as Ohio and Florida ‹ to air "Stolen Honor: Wounds That Never Heal," sources said. The film, funded by Pennsylvania veterans and produced by a veteran and former Washington Times reporter, features former POWs accusing Kerry ‹ a decorated Navy veteran turned war protester ‹ of worsening their ordeal by prolonging the war. Sinclair will preempt regular prime-time programming from the networks to show the film, which may be classified as news programming, according to TV executives familiar with the plan.

Read the full story here. If you don't have an account with the LA Times, you can read it over at Truthout (scroll down to the second story).

. . . at least that's what Fark sez; I didn't find any other sources for it.

Starring Jason Alexander.

Carrying signs that read: "Columbus: America's first terrorist" and "We were here first," about 300 opponents of the parade stood in its path. Police stopped the parade a block before it reached the protesters and told them to move. About 200 refused and were arrested.

In 1907, Colorado became the first U.S. state to make Oct. 12 a holiday, the reason American Indians have campaigned in Denver for 15 years to change the name of the holiday. The holiday has been changed to the second Monday in October.

"We're here to protest a few racists who continue to honor Columbus," said Russell Means, a longtime American Indian activist. [more]

Nearly 70 voters in Alma who applied for absentee ballots got misprinted ballots that some feared could cause their votes for Democrats John Kerry and John Edwards to go to Republicans George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

On the absentee ballots, voters mark their choice by filling in a space between the head and tail of the arrow. The misprinted ballots had arrows shifted down one position so the arrow pointing to a vote for the Republicans, who were first on the ballot ahead of the Democrats, was missing.

Some people said that could cause votes for Kerry-Edwards to be miscounted, because the arrows were in the wrong position. [more]

Biggest Bush lie that comes first to my mind tonight: "The air¹s cleaner since I¹ve been the president . . . "

But didn't the President of Sierra Club go on Bill Moyers within the last year and tell us all that for the first time in thirty years, under this administration, our air and water have gotten dirtier? Bush is lying; Bush is walking around like he's doing an infomercial: pumped up and yelling. He's repeating the same old phrases over and over again.

Let's listen in on the journalists, eh? "The President really did better than last time! . . . The President didn't make any major gaffes! He was strong and forceful!"

Blinking like you just got sprayed in the eye with pepper water is strong and forceful? Yelling over your moderator when you just have to say something in fury is not a major gaffe? Talking about "rumors on the internets"? Bald-faced lying about the cleanliness of air in America makes you a fucking winner?

When the federal government issues a terrorist warning, presidential approval ratings jump, a Cornell sociologist has found. Interestingly, terrorist warnings also boost support for the president on issues that are largely irrelevant to terrorism, such as his handling of the economy

Robb Willer, assistant director of the Sociology and Small Groups Laboratory at Cornell and a doctoral candidate in sociology who expects his Ph.D. in May 2005, tracked the 26 times that a federal government agency reported an increased threat of terrorist activity in the United States between February 2001 and May 2004. He also tracked the 131 Gallup Polls that were conducted during the same period. He then conducted several time-series and regression analyses on the relationship between government-issued terror warnings and Gallup Poll data on approval ratings of President George W. Bush.

"Results showed that terror warnings increased presidential approval ratings consistently," said Willer. "They also increased support for Bush's handling of the economy. The findings, however, were inconclusive as to how long this halo effect lasts."

Willer's study is published in the Sept. 30 issue of Current Research in Social Psychology, a peer-reviewed online journal, at http://www.uiowa.edu/%7Egrpproc/crisp/crisp10_1.pdf

Didn't some bloggers figure this out a while back?

Much of the $18.4 billion dollars appropriated for the reconstruction effort in Iraq last year will never reach Iraqi hands, according to an analysis by the CSIS Post Conflict Reconstruction Project. The analysis, a follow up to Progress Or Peril: Measuring Iraq's Reconstruction Progress, estimates that "as much as 73 percent of the funds is spent on security and insurance costs for foreign contractors, U.S. government overhead, profits for foreign companies, salaries for foreign workers, and corruption, fraud, and mismanagement." An estimated 27 percent is left to provide "direct benefit to Iraqis and Iraq¹s economy."

I thought I'd commemorate the Cheney v. Edwards debate with a pair of limericks:

There once was a Veep named Dick,
Whose actions made liberals sick.
He took us to war...
The rest is here.

There once was a Veep named Dick Cheney,
Who conducted himself inhumanely.
He debated John Edwards...

The rest is here.

(or: Why so many critics miss the message of Fahrenheit 9/11)

Help Yourself - Support the Gay Economic Boycott

Iraq had no WMD, says US inspector (Reuters)

"Iraq had no stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons before last year's US-led invasion and its nuclear programme had decayed, the chief US weapons inspector said yesterday, contrary to pre-war assertions of the Bush administration.

"'I still do not expect that militarily significant WMD stocks are cached in Iraq,' Charles Duelfer, the CIA special adviser who led the (Iraq Survey Group) hunt for such weapons said in testimony to the US Senate Armed Services Committee."

Remember, a manufactured threat like this one is the kind of deception upon which moves like these are built. "Hordes of poison-drenched terrorists are trying to destroy our way of life. So send us your children and throw your support behind 21st century nationalism for the sake of freedom and security."

Was I not looking closely enough, or was I really the first one to post this? Or are the findings mixed? I wondered about this as I read the ISG report on Cryptome.

Theists are between a rock and a hard place. They have a problem with good and a problem with evil. The problem with good is that if good comes from God, then anything God causes or allows to happen is good. If God says put your children in the oven, because God said it then it becomes good. Morality is irrelevant, only obedience matters. But if good does not come from God, if God is using the same standards of good as we humans, then we don't need God to know (and act on) what is good. Every bit of religious morals becomes irrelevant, because we can be good without God.

The problem with evil is a better known problem for theists. If God is all powerful and worthy of worship, why is there natural evil (disease) and unjust human-made evil (putting one's children in the oven)? Misfortune falling on the wicked is just barely a religious defense of evil - when a mugger accidentally shoots himself, theists and atheists alike can share a sense (if not a reality) of the universe being just. But unjust human-made evil... what is a theist to do? The evidence points towards either God's non-existence or God's maliciousness.

There is a third option. Present God as malicious, but call it love. That's what the Pope has done in his recent book Memory and Identity. The atrocities committed in the name of communism were caused by God: "There was a sense that this evil was in some way necessary for the world and for mankind. It can happen, in fact, that in certain particular human situations, evil is revealed as somehow useful inasmuch as it creates opportunities for good." Communism was caused by God, but National Socialism was just allowed to happen: "The Lord God allowed Nazism 12 years of existence [...] evidently this was the limit imposed by Divine Providence upon that sort of folly."

By definition, it is not possible that a person who is killed can look back and see what happened as an 'opportunity for good.' The only possible meaning for the Pope's words is that there are two classes of humans. One class is able to experience evil as an opportunity for good. And the other class is made up of sub-humans, sacrificial animals; their suffering and death is an opportunity for good for we who live. The only possible meaning for the Pope's words is that a person's suffering and death is an opportunity for good - among others, for those who cause the suffering and death. Every act of torture, every rape, every murder is ordained by God. Those who die were born for that function, so that the rest of us might chose good (or not chose good). If one is able to cause others to suffer, then one is justified in doing so. The greater the suffering, the greater the opportunity for good for those who cause it. And so the atrocities done in the name of communism and fascism are the greatest gift God could have given us. If a few sub-human children get put in the oven along the way, so what - with God on your side, all things are possible.

These are not the morals of a person or group worthy of admiration or support. It is time and beyond time to increase the heat against religion to bring about the day of its withering away.

Which part of the following quote is wrong?

"Our nation is now poised to go to all-out war against Iraq. Iraq has not committed any act of aggression against the United States. Iraq was not responsible for 911. No credible evidence exists linking Iraq to Al Queda's role in 911. Iraq was not responsible for the anthrax attack on our nation. The United Nations has yet to establish that Iraq has usable weapons of mass destruction. There is no intelligence that Iraq has the ability to strike at the United States. According to the CIA, Iraq has no intention to attack America, but will defend itself if attacked. Why then, is our nation prepared to send three hundred thousand of our young men and women into house to house combat in the streets of Baghdad and Basra? Why is our nation prepared to spend $200 billion or more of our hard-earned tax dollars for the destruction of Iraq? Why is our nation preparing to use the most powerful military machine in history to wage an assault against the people of Iraq, to destroy their houses and buildings, to wipe out their water and electric systems and to block their access to food and medical supplies? There is no answer which can separate itself from oil economics, profit requirements of arms trade, or distorted notions of empire-building." - Dennis Kucinich, January 5, 2003

ISRAEL¹S plan for a unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip is intended to freeze the peace process and block the emergence of a Palestinian state, the top adviser to the prime minister, Ariel Sharon, said yesterday.

The United States and Israel have always claimed that the Israeli evacuation of all 21 settlements in the Gaza Strip would help the peace process.

But in an interview published in the newspaper Haaretz, Mr Sharon¹s adviser, Dov Weisglass, a key architect of the disengagement plan, was blunt: "The significance of the disengagement plan is the freezing of the peace process," he said. "When you freeze that process, you prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state and you prevent a discussion on the refugees, the borders and Jerusalem."

Mr Weisglass continued: "Effectively this whole package called the Palestinian state, with all that it entails, has been removed indefinitely from the agenda, all of this with a presidential blessing and the ratification of both houses of Congress.

"The disengagement supplies the amount of formaldehyde so that there will not be a political process with the Palestinians."

With the Australia, the US and the UK all having elections in the next quarter, I decided to post my study on election results of all the "Coalition of the Sh^H^HWilling" members.

I also did a mark-up of the first Kerry/Bush debate.

Undercutting the Bush's administration's rationale for invading Iraq, the final report of the chief U.S. arms inspector concludes that Saddam Hussein did not vigorously pursue a program to develop weapons of mass destruction after international inspectors left Baghdad in 1998, according to lawmakers and others briefed on the report.

From Kevin Drum:

During the [VP] debate, Dick Cheney mentioned that you could go to factcheck.com to get the real scoop on Halliburton. What he meant was factcheck.org, a nonpartisan site run by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.

But if you click on factcheck.com, as many people probably will, you get redirected to.....

Oh, just go ahead and do it. This is really too rich to give away.

Karma, I say.

Update: Drum has a follow up on this story, quoting a WSJ piece:

In fact, FactCheck.com is owned by Name Administration Inc., a Cayman Islands company that engages in so-called "domain parking" -- it acquires discarded Web sites and monetizes the traffic with text advertising.

...The site had been showing education-related ads, mostly for online-degree programs, when Mr. Cheney mentioned the site during the debate. Suddenly, Name Administration saw a surge in traffic -- about 50,000 unique visitors in the first hour -- which costs the company money for Internet bandwidth, according to John Berryhill, Name Administration's attorney.

...So employees redirected traffic to the Soros site, not because of any request nor payment from Mr. Soros's organization or supporters, but based on their own political viewpoints, Mr. Berryhill said. "Individuals within the company are favorably disposed to George Soros's political point of view," said Mr. Berryhill.

Iraqi President condemns US air assaults

A hitchhiker's guide to the Bush universe

Orwell's `1984' predictions may come true yet if Bush is re-elected

A statement of belief in Bush By MARY KUNZ, Buffalo News, NY, October 5, 2004; ... for months now, I've had to weather his attacks on President Bush. One column bore the headline "Bush popularity hard to understand." And guess what? Now, I can speak up. If Bush's popularity is hard to understand - well, I'll explain it. The best way to do this might be by explaining what makes many Republicans like myself tick. . . .

faith (n.)

1. Confident belief in the truth, value, or trustworthiness of a person, idea, or thing.
2. Belief that does not rest on logical proof or material evidence. See Synonyms at belief. See Synonyms at trust.
3. Loyalty to a person or thing; allegiance: keeping faith with one's supporters.
4. often Faith Christianity. The theological virtue defined as secure belief in God and a trusting acceptance of God's will.
5. The body of dogma of a religion: the Muslim faith.
6. A set of principles or beliefs.

Take your pick.

. . . yet Bush's numbers among women have gone up recently? What's to account for this? Two words: corporate media, which actively hides Bush's War On Women.

"Watch Al Frankenbeans and Ann Cunter get it on!"

PFP profiled in the Adult News here.

While most nationalisms are founded upon beliefs of ethnic or cultural superiority; American Nationalism is based upon the belief that our political ideal is superior. This would make sense, for Americans feel pride in seeing themselves as an ethnically and culturally diverse nation. America is the great "melting pot", as they say. Thus, George W. Bush's claim that Bin Laden attacked us because he "hated freedom" is a prototypical example of American Nationalism in action. Ironically, though America is among the most nationalistic of all countries, it does not see itself as such. Indeed, this belief is seen as far back as our declaration of independence, "we hold these truths to be self-evident..." So it is with the "truths" of the American Nationalist.

Among western democracies, Americans show the greatest degree of pride in their nationality. A world values survey showed that 70% percent of Americans declared themselves "Very proud" of their nationality. In contrast, less than half of the English, French, Germans, Danish, or Dutch felt "very proud" of their nationality.

A 2001 Pew Global Attitudes Survey show that 79 percent of Americans felt that it was a good that American ideas and customs are spreading across the planet. Yet, less than 40 percent of respondents from other Western Democracies agreed. Furthermore, less than half even liked American ideas about Democracy. Yet an American Nationalist does not see such opinions as being legitimate. On the contrary, he'd probably either accuse them of being "French", or "anti-American"; and to him, to be anti-American, is to be against "universal" values.

The majority of Americans would be offended that I'd make the above statement. One cannot blame them. Unlike other countries, the majority of nationalistic behavior among Americans is voluntary. There are no laws that demand that private business fly American flags. Our pledge of allegiance is not mandated, and was in fact standardized because of the efforts of private associations lobbying congress. Frankly, the biggest champions of American Nationalism are generally little old ladies, in hideous red, white, and blue moo-moos who join leagues such as the Daughters of the American Revolution. Ironic.

From my description thus far, it might seem that American Nationalism is mostly a benevolent creature -- "a dumb puppy with sharp teeth", as Johnny Depp said. Nothing could be farther from the case. American Nationalism should be rightfully ranked as being among the most dangerous forces in the world.

For one, although the United States inherited a great deal of its knowledge and opportunity from its European roots, its people did not share in the catastrophes of the two world wars. Though, many Americans fought bravely, and died in the fields of Europe; the majority of Amercians were removed from the true horrors of the war. The fire bombings, the gas attacks, the rounding up of the Jews, the holocaust, the trenches... Nothing comparable has ever happened on American soil. Europe is largely post-nationalist in this age, and the Great Wars take full credit.

Americans often wonder why the rest of the world hates them. Allow me to settle this question with a snipit from Washington Post's right-wing op/ed columnist Charles Krauthammer. Indeed, this arrogant trash reads like a satire of American nationalist arrogance:

The world apparently likes the US when it is on its knees. From that the Democrats deduce a foreign policy - remain on our knees, humble and supplicant, and enjoy the applause and 'support' of the world... The search for logic in anti-Americanism is fruitless. It is in the air the world breathes. Its roots are envy and self-loathing - by peoples who, yearning for modernity but having failed at it, find their one satisfaction in despising modernity's great exemplar. On 11th September, they gave it a rest for one day. Big deal.

This drivel's intent is fairly clear: To relinquish any responsibility America might have for its current position. And there, my friends is the real danger. Its as though the popular psyche has forgotten that Mark Twain epigram is satirical:

The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane.

I fear dearly for America. At this point in time (4:00 AM central-US), I've suddenly realized that this topic is too large to cover in one post. However, I do have a few last points:

The health of the US economy is no longer a domestic issue. The rest of the world would be wise to remember the historical effects of a falling economy, and fear of the rest of the world. When I say "do not make us any angerier", I mean it -- for your own sake. The majority of the public is feeling lost in these strange times. Foreign hatred does nothing besides reinforce the public's need to cling to their rockets, bombs, and f-15s.

Americans need to remember their unique place in history: Never before has a single nation weilded so much power, wealth, and influence than the United States. I say this not to entertain neo-con fantasies of "empire building", or "an american century". Rather, I'd like to remind a few people of the responsibility they have to America, and the rest of the world. The world is prone to following our example. Do we set an example of pre-emptive war; "do whatever we please cause' we can"? Or, do we show the rest of the world that there actually might -- in fact -- be substance behind our rhetoric of freedom, justice, and opportunity? I think the American electorate would be wise to think very carefully about that question.

Cross Posted At Net Politik

Why you should vote for me, by George W. Bush

George W. Bush on Foreign Policy

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Monday he knew of no "strong, hard evidence" linking Saddam Hussein's Iraq and al Qaeda, despite describing extensive contacts between the two before the Iraq invasion.

Rumsfeld, during a question-and-answer session before the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, was asked to explain the connection between Saddam and Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda network, blamed for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on America.

Let's see...
If it walks like a duck...
and it talks like a duck...

Ten-Hut! Thinking of joining the military? Before you sign on the dotted line, here are some options to consider.

Do you like breathing? Then you may want to postpone your military service, as one in ten recruits is infected with the adenovirus. The andeovirus is a respiratory virus that has a vaccine, but the military stopped issuing the two pills needed to keep our soldiers healthy and alive years ago because it was 'too expensive.' That can only mean it's cheaper to get a new soldier than keep the old one breathing. You place your bets and you takes your chances.

Do you like medical care when you get sick? Then you might prefer to flip burgers at the local mall, as the Veterans Administration has been overburdened for decades and there is a current backlog of more than 300,000 claims. You may have a wait of several months to get seen for your medical needs. President Bush has the answer to this problem: cut the Department of Veterans Affairs, which handles benefits claims.

Do you prefer contracts to be honored? Then consider staying in school, as the U. S. Military is telling soldiers that the contracts they signed are not valid - their tour of duty is being extended, and fuck you if you think you signed a document that said otherwise.

Do you like it when the bullets stay outside of your body? Then think about moving to Canada, as over fifty thousand US soldiers have been deployed without effective body armor.

Are you a military family? Then get ready for the long goodbye, as the military is not making efforts to keep some of your family alive while putting other family members in harm's way. Parents are seeing not one but all of their children going to the front lines. And children are seeing not one but both parents being deployed.

Do you want the right person to work at the right job? Then get your passport in order, as the military has not much to do with being a meritocracy. Women want to rise to the limit of their ability, but are disallowed. Minorities want to take on their share of the responsibility, but are disproportionately taking on the majority of the responsibility. And homosexuals? Well, you know...

Alright, soldier, now you know. The next time a military recruiter comes around, make sure they are confronted with these facts and make sure those around you hear about them as well. The United States is currently not supporting its military - stay out until they do.

Today [2004-10-02] several hundred (perhaps a couple thousand in attendence by the end) people marched from Arlington National Cemetery to The Ellipse, south of the White House. They carried many of the hundreds of cardboard coffins (the rest laid out on The Ellipse by volunteers ahead of the march) from the cemetery, across the Memorial Bridge, past the Lincoln memorial and down Constitution Avenue. [more]

How many Americans even know that the Bush administration engineered the recent coup in Haiti?

Thanks to Dr. Menlo for ftp.ing this, so I could add the link here.

Oh, if anyone has info, like the original link location, please comment, and I will update this post.

Thanks to Norm of onegoodmove: I thought these things might be clues for pointing me to the correct site for this excellent video: SLAM BUSH | Hip Hop Battle/Poetry Slam to Defeat George W. Bush