November 29, 2009 archive

Tragedy Strikes in the Pacific Northwest

Lakewood Washington Police Ambush and Killed Pictures, Images and Photos

The South Puget Sound area is reeling from shock, in the aftermath of an apparent ambush at a Lakewood/Parkland area coffee shop.  At approximately 8:15 A.M. this morning, a lone gunman (although there is some suspicion that a second person may have been involved) entered the premises, and opened fire on four Lakewood police officers as they were completing paperwork on their laptop computers, killing them all.  Neither of the two baristas nor any of the customers in the shop were physically harmed (except for the physiological impact of witnessing such a horrific event).  Updated details, as the story unfolds, can be found here.  If you wish to check out other nearby news sources, you can access the websites from area newspapers such as The Olympian (Olympia, WA), The Morning News Tribune (Tacoma), The Seattle Post-Intelligencer (Seattle), The Seattle Times (Seattle), and Seattle area television stations, such as KOMO, KING and KIRO.  

Weekend News Digest

Weekend News Digest is an Open Thread

Now with World and U.S. News.  57 Story Final.

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Rumsfeld decision let Bin Laden escape: Senate report

AFP

Sun Nov 29, 11:27 am ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Osama bin Laden was “within the grasp” of US forces in late 2001 but escaped because then-defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld rejected calls for reinforcements, a hard-hitting US Senate report says.

The report, set for release Monday, is intended to help learn the lessons of the past as President Barack Obama prepares to announce a major escalation of the conflict, now in its ninth year, with up to 35,000 more US troops.

It points the finger directly at Rumsfeld for turning down requests for reinforcements as Bin Laden was trapped in December 2001 in caves and tunnels in a mountainous area of eastern Afghanistan known as Tora Bora.

It’s about as Watered Down as it can get, Howard Dean warns

also posted on dkos

Since I record Dylan Ratigan, for viewing on the week ends, I managed to catch this shocker of an Interview with Howard Dean, a few days ago.

I’m surprised not to have seen it covered much, so here goes …

Full MSNBC Interview

Howard Dean:

“The problem is with this legislation, if one person holds up this Bill, and it passes as a ‘hodge podge of nonsense’, which is what the 4 more conservative Democrats want — basically ‘A Insurance Company Bill’ is what they want — this is a huge problem for the Obama Administration, it is a huge problem for the Democrats in 2010.”

BTW Howard Dean knows a thing or two about winning Elections, nationwide, so Dems would be wise to listen to and think about his blunt warnings.

Flight 77 Data Recorder: The Cockpit Door Wasn’t Opened; Hijack Impossible

Well this is rather interesting.   Hat-tip to Cryptogon.

From Pilots for 9/11 truth dot org:

9/11: PENTAGON AIRCRAFT HIJACK IMPOSSIBLE —

FLIGHT DECK DOOR CLOSED FOR ENTIRE FLIGHT]


(PilotsFor911Truth.org) – Newly decoded data provided by an independent researcher and computer programmer from Australia exposes alarming evidence that the reported hijacking aboard American Airlines Flight 77 was impossible to have existed. A data parameter labeled “FLT DECK DOOR”, cross checks with previously decoded data obtained by Pilots For 9/11 Truth from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) through the Freedom Of Information Act.

On the morning of September 11, 2001, American Airlines Flight 77 departed Dulles International Airport bound for Los Angeles at 8:20 am Eastern Time. According to reports and data, a hijacking took place between 08:50:54 and 08:54:11[1] in which the hijackers allegedly crashed the aircraft into the Pentagon at 09:37:45. Reported by CNN, according to Ted Olson, wife Barbara Olson had called him from the reported flight stating, “…all passengers and flight personnel, including the pilots, were herded to the back of the plane by armed hijackers…”[2]. However, according to Flight Data provided by the NTSB, the Flight Deck Door was never opened in flight. How were the hijackers able to gain access to the cockpit, remove the pilots, and navigate the aircraft to the Pentagon if the Flight Deck Door remained closed?[3]

Founded in August 2006, Pilots For 9/11 Truth is a growing organization of aviation professionals from around the globe. The organization has analyzed Data provided by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) for the Pentagon Attack, the events in Shanksville, PA and the World Trade Center attack. The data does not support the government story. The NTSB/FBI refuse to comment. Pilots For 9/11 Truth do not offer theory or point blame at this point in time. However, there is a growing mountain of conflicting information and data in which government agencies and officials along with Mainstream Media refuse to acknowledge. Pilots For 9/11 Truth Core member list continues to grow.

http://pilotsfor911truth.org/c… for full member list.

Enjoy.  Please pass along to others.   If you doubt the credibility of this site, please check out that bottom link for the member list.  It’s pretty impressive.

Pilots know the “official story” of 9/11 is a lie.  

Aww shucks, you guys are terrific.

PhotobucketThank You!

Kevin tells me that he has responded to all of your comments, and he is delighted with all of the great links and advice you gave to him.  I know it will peak his curiousity, and he will follow up.  To help him along, I left behind a link to Docudharma’s html cheats.  Whenever I don’t know how to do something, it is where I head.   They are the best written and easiest to understand cheats in all of Tubeland.  

Again, thank you all very much for bringing his blog to life.  It now reminds of home.  ๐Ÿ˜€

Holiday Blah’s Open Sub

Last day of the long Holiday weekend…. I am feeling really blah, but I’m lurking and wandering around reading. I’m sure someone is cooking up some brilliant essay full of insights and observations and more, but I got nothin’.  Is it just me?  Yo.

So… Open Thread must be on holiday too. This can fill in as a sub? Meh. ๐Ÿ™‚

I can’t give you anything but love, baby.

That’s the only thing I’ve plenty of, baby.

Dream a while. Scheme a while.

We’re sure to find

Happiness, and I guess

I can’t give you anything but love.

Honduras: Same As It Ever Was

Today there are presidential elections in Honduras.  The US says that it doesn’t matter that the golpista government of Roberto Micheletti is still in control despite international condemnation, that Manual Zelaya, the democratically elected president, is still stuck in asylum in the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa, and that Brazil and Venezuela have announced that they will not recognize today’s election results.  Nor does it matter that the US originally denounced the coup, cut off non-military aid, and demanded the immediate reinstatement of Zelaya.  All of that, amigos, is stuff you’re supposed to forget about.  Just forget it.  Yeah, after today, democracy will be magically restored in Honduras via an election.  And we’re back to the same old same old.  The power of El Norte continues, the maquiladoras make Fruit of the Loom for export, the bananas are back on the shelves, and the military puts its boot on the throat of anyone in Honduras who complains about the lack of democracy.  It’s 1910 all over again.

The AP reports:

A new Honduran president chosen Sunday faces the challenge of defending his legitimacy to the world and to his own people, who are bitterly divided by Central America’s first coup in more than 20 years.

Porfirio Lobo and Elvin Santos, two prosperous businessmen from the political old guard [both of whom support the golpistas], are the front-runners. But their campaigns have been overshadowed by the debate over whether Hondurans should cast ballots at all in a vote largely shunned by international monitors.

Manuel Zelaya, the left-leaning president ousted in a June 28 coup, is urging a boycott, hoping overwhelming abstention will discredit the election. As polls opened Sunday, he vowed the United States would regret its decision to support the vote.

“Abstention will defeat the dictatorship,” Zelaya told Radio Globo from the Brazilian Embassy, where he took refuge after sneaking back into the country from his forced exile Sept. 21. “The elections will be a failure. the United States will have to rectify its ambiguous position about the coup.”

The US’s “ambiguous position about the coup” isn’t all that ambiguous. Especially in historical context.  The US has said explicitly it will support the government elected in this election. Period. It just doesn’t matter to the US government that is imposing democracy in Iraq, Afghanistan, and who knows where else, that there be actual democracy in its own hemisphere.  That would require the restoration of Manual Zelaya and an election supervised internationally.  Instead, we have an election supervised by the golpistas and their military.  One can only wonder why US warships have not arrived off shore to preserve order and democracy.

The word from the streets isn’t ambiguous at all:

“The best thing for this country is not to vote, to show the world, the United States, which stabbed us in the back and betrayed us,” said Edwin Espinal, whose 24-year-old wife, Wendy, died of from asthma complications a day after soldiers hurled tear gas to disperse protesters demanding Zelaya’s return.

There is, of course, the expected golpistas’ repression.  Narconews reports:

The free speech necessary to guarantee free elections is not the message being transmitted to the resistance front. Intimidation, torture, illegal detentions and in extreme cases assassinations are being carried out to prevent mass mobilizations on Election Day. The National Front Against the Coup D’รฉtat has encouraged all week a ‘popular curfew’ on Election Day to prevent clashes with the opposition. The Center for the Investigation and Promotion of Human Rights in Honduras (CIPRODEH), has documented aggression directly from the police and the military towards nearly all human rights groups working in Honduras.

And now, hypnotically, the promise that the US under Obama would have a new relationship with Latin America, one in which democracy would be fostered and coups would be discouraged, one in which the oligarchies would not be permitted to exploit and repress poor people, one in which popular leaders could be elected even if they disagreed with El Norte and not be the immediate objects of golpes de estado,  those promises will be forgotten.  They will be erased from your memories.  And life as we knew it in 1910 will resume.

——————————

simulposted at The Dream Antilles

Iraq War Inquiry: Analysis and Push Back Grows Against any Coverup

But first we have the release of a scathing report from the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, {46 page PDF}  How we failed to get bin Laden and why it matters today

As I’ve said in a few posts, the past week of the hearings,  the picture coming out was our administration then especially, and others, weren’t focused on bin Laden, al Qaeda nor the Taliban who were harboring them in Afghanistan, their almost complete focus prior to 9/11, as to that region, was a growing want to have regime change in Iraq, that became the total focus on the same day as 9/11, as has been noted by Condoleezza Rice mentioning Saddam as a possible suspect behind the 9/11 attacks or supporter of al Qaeda, which he never was.

Here is an analysis of the released report:

Docudharma Times Sunday November 29




Sunday’s Headlines:

U.S. Will Push Mortgage Firms to Reduce More Loan Payments

Glenn Beck: the renegade running the opposition to Obama

Monsanto’s dominance draws antitrust inquiry

Supreme Court to take up anti-corruption law

Palestine calls for release of intifada leader in prisoner swap with Israel

Iraq: The war was illegal

Bhopal: The victims are still being born

Asif Ali Zardari surrenders control of Pakistan’s nuclear arms

Swiss to vote on controversial minaret ban

French oyster farmers suffer from wave of thefts

Drug seizures in west Africa prompt fears of terrorist links

Zimbabwe cabal seizes diamond riches to buy power

Yoani Sanchez, Cuba’s popular blogger, has been beaten up for describing life

Glenn Beck is a TV host, bestselling author and the most influential voice on the rightwing Fox channel. Now, even some Republicans worry that the extreme and maverick views of Beck and his supporters will make their party unelectable. Is the TV tail wagging the political dog?

Late Night Karaoke

Open Thread

Nike!

Well here’s the last of my Thanksgiving Marathon posts and frankly I’m not sorry to see them go because the research is taking forever.

And you miss stuff, like I almost missed AMC’s Batman triple feature.

In fairness, it does start at 2:30 am which is why I’m posting early and will post promote this so I don’t drive down any more of the Front Page than I need to.

Updated twice!  Now with Listiness!

U.S. Senate Report: Bin Laden was ‘within our grasp’

Like everything else the Bush administration touched the capture or attempted capture of Osama Bin Laden was a complete failure. As the world watched the U.S. military had pursued Bin Laden and his deputies to the Tora Bora region of Afghanistan. Trapped in the caves there  Donald Rumsfeld then U.S. Defense Secretary decides that Bin Landen’s capture should be handled by the Afghan army while the U.S. army watched. Osama Bin Laden and his deputies escaped into Pakistan where they are still believed to be.  Think about the consequences of that decision. Al Qaida though weakened at that moment would not only continue to exist but draw recruits as extremists saw Osama Bin Laden’s escape as a victory over America and its allies in the so called War on Terror.

Even if they had captured Bin Laden would that have destroyed Al Qaida of course not but they wouldn’t be the potent symbol they are today thanks to the complete incompetence of George Bush and his advisors.  

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