From the NYT:

A german commercial ship, following a Russian Icebreaker is about to complete the Northeast Passage. I never thought I’d see this. And the really scary thing is that now there are myriad commercial interests that want this to continue.

But the Russians hope that the transit of the German ships will inaugurate the passage as a reliable shipping route, and that the combination of the melting ice and the economic benefits of the shortcut – it is thousands of miles shorter than various southerly routes – will eventually make the Arctic passage a summer competitor with the Suez Canal.

“It is global warming that enables us to think about using that route,” Verena Beckhusen, a spokeswoman for the shipping company, the Beluga Group of Bremen, Germany, said in a telephone interview.

I want my mandate, and I want it forced down my throat/ up my ___ (fill in the blank) , or maybe in my EAR/NOSE/THROAT (I dunno I’m not a medical professional)

—

RIGHT NOW.

If you don’t force me to pay for junk insurance at the threat of jail if I can’t fuckin’ afford it than I may really want to maybe just primary someone somewhere –well maybe– if you think that might be OK that is.

And not against THE RULES OF THE SITE (??!!)

(please don’t HR me to death. I’m new around here…please???? But, I really really —really–I love you guys. And anyone even remotely LIKE you guys. I kiss a shrine to you guys twice a day. And ten times a day to our glorious leader–Rahm Emmanuell )

Anyway,

I WANT MY MANDATED NON OPTIONAL NON PUBLIC PUBLIC OPTION AND I F>U>C>K>I>N>G WANT IT NOW

(or I won’t turn off the caps lock, well I don’t know how to anyway)

I Don’t care how many innocents you bomb in some foreign land that I can’t even spell, or burn, or torture, or crucify (well, I can’t do any of that–but you can, EVEN SPELL!) ,  I don’t care how many fake elections you support in one of those places, I don’t care how many more planes and bombs my tax $$ buy, how many more bankers get a bonus,  I want my damn mandate, and if I don’t get it I will give the whole .50c in my pocket (bank account done been closed) to primary someone in Wyoming or Nevada or something, which should really really scare you because we all know that Wyoming or Nevada is just dying for someone who is a real progressive.  More and better, right?

(of course I would never support a real 3rd party progressive in a really progressive state–that’s just unrealistic, you f’ing Naderite you, well except for SANDERS because he CAUCUSES WITH DEMOCRATS–so he must be one right ?  Of course not Kucinich because someone once said ‘Ugh’)

(please don’t HR me to death. I’m new around here…please???? But, I really really —really–I love you guys, already. And anyone even remotely LIKE you guys. I kiss a shrine to you guys twice a day. And ten times a day to our glorious leader–Rahm Emmanuell  )

I love you guys.

 (oh, and can anyone get me a job? I need to pay for my mandated health care, more taxes for more bombs for more killing to free more people–like woman in Bruhas, bruk=haas or Burkars or whchamakallit, and I  really, really need to have .50c left over for some guy in Utah who’s running against a Mormon nine term incumbent billionaire, with 80  million in the bank-I’m sure my .50c will do the trick. PLEASE HELP. IF WE ALL SEND .50c, we could send like ten bucks !!!!!!

!!!!

!!!!!!

!

Or, does anyone think I can maybe keep my .50c for meself?

I’m kinda hungry this month)  

I’m going to try to post updates here about how Jimena effects us down here in Baja California Sur until the power gives out, which it likely will real early .

So far, there’s already a good bit of flooding in the streets, no wind.

Links:

http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/graphi…

http://eebmike.com/

From School of Americas Watch:

A controversial facility at Ft. Benning, Ga. — formerly known as the U.S. Army’s School of the Americas — is still training Honduran officers despite claims by the Obama administration that it cut military ties to Honduras after its president was overthrown June 28, NCR has learned.

A day after an SOA-trained army general ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya at gunpoint, President Barack Obama stated that “the coup was not legal” and that Zelaya remained “the democratically elected president.”

The Foreign Operations Appropriations Act requires that U.S. military aid and training be suspended when a country undergoes a military coup, and the Obama administration has indicated those steps have been taken.

However, Lee Rials, public affairs officer for the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, the successor of SOA, confirmed Monday that Honduran officers are still being trained at the school.

“Yes, they’re in class now,” Rials said.

Asked about the Obama administration’s suspension of aid and training to Honduras, Rials said, “Well, all I know is they’re here, and they’re in class.”

And, inside Honduras, nothing has changed either:

The ongoing training of Hondurans at Ft. Benning is not the only evidence of unbroken U.S.-Honduran military ties since the coup.

Another piece was discovered by Maryknoll Father Roy Bourgeois, the founder of SOA Watch, while on fact-finding mission to Honduras last week.

Bourgeois — accompanied by two lawyers, Kent Spriggs and Dan Kovalik — visited the Soto Cano/Palmerola Air Base northwest of Tegucigalpa, where the U.S. Southern Command’s Joint Task Force-Bravo is stationed.

“Helicopters were flying all around, and we spoke with the U.S. official on duty, a Sgt. Reyes” about the U.S.-Honduran relationship, Bourgeois said. “We asked him if anything had changed since the coup and he said no, nothing.”

Read the whole thing here:

http://www.soaw.org/presente/i…

And the US is still continuing aid to Honduras, according to Narconews:

http://www.narconews.com/

The sport has come a long way from it’s Scots roots baby, to where it’s mostly just an eco disaster, stealing water, dumping chem lawn, and totally for fat drunk rich guys who can’t even walk around or carry their own clubs.

In Venezuela they’re doing something :

In Maracay, officials are considering building low-income homes on the golf course or turning it into a campus of Mr. Chávez’s Bolivarian University. In Caraballeda, plans are advancing to turn the course into a park for children.

Mr. Chávez, for his part, said he had no plans to outlaw golf. “I respect all sports,” he said. “But there are sports and there are sports. Do you mean to tell me this is a people’s sport?”

He then answered the question: “It is not.”

NYT

This is what golf has become in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina (which was once a very unique and beautiful place, believe it or not) :

64 years ago, the United States blew up Hiroshima, killing over 110,000 people.

Many of our favorite ‘left’ wen sites have nothing about this at all, in their effort to not piss off any potential web traffic.

But still there’s a few interesting items:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…

http://www.politics.co.uk/news…

http://www.truthdig.com/report…

I won’t get fooled again.

I voted for Kerry, and I voted for Barrack Obama.

But I won’t ever do it again.

And I of all people should’ve known better.

See, back in 76, I was a 12 year old kid during the Gerald Ford / Jimmy Carter election.  I’d seen the Watergate movie, and I had a pretty good grasp of what was going on.

Probably most here have forgotten or never even knew that in ’76 there was also an independent run by Eugene McCarthy–the actually semi-leftist guy the Dems screwed way back in 1968.

Despite strong showings in several primaries – indeed, he won more votes than any other Democratic candidate – McCarthy garnered only 23 percent of the delegates at the 1968 Democratic National Convention, largely due to the control of state party organizations over the delegate selection process.

Emphasis: mine.  From http://www.answers.com/topic/e…

Anyway, in 76, since I was 12, I couldn’t drive yet, but I had a cool bike with a blue banana seat, and I cruised all over town handing out literature for Gene.  

When election day came I too young too vote, but old enough to canvass, and I witnessed an amazing phenomena:

The Democrats were bringing in carload after carload of scared old people from old folks homes.  In return for a nice dinner, they would vote a straight Democratic ticket.  That was the deal–the other poll watchers informed me– I was incredulous at  first, but they brought them in by Lincoln, they brought them in by vans, they came and they came and they came.

And they didn’t look left.  They didn’t look right.  Not one took any literature from me or anyone else. And there was fear in their eyes when they saw me–real fear. I assume from hunger, but I don’t know.

They voted, they ate. Or, they ate they voted, I’m not sure which–but I’ve always wondered–since if they were fed first what were they worried about?  

I bet they hadn’t eaten yet.  And now 33 years later they’re all dead anyway.  

Well, 33 years from now I’ll likely be dead too, or at least I’ll be getting pretty damn fragile.

And, I’ll still look left, when asked, even if I have to forgo supper.

This one caught my eye in the NYT front page :

How does this not make the health insurance industry more powerful and entrenched than it already is ??

Single Payer addresses the real issue.

Public Option: window dressing.

The New Your Times reports:

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan – “You know what this is for,” Emilbek Kaptagaev recalled being told by the police officers who snatched him off the street. No other words, just blows to the head, then all went black. Mr. Kaptagaev, an opponent of Kyrgyzstan’s president, who is a vital American ally in the war in nearby Afghanistan, was found later in a field with a concussion, broken ribs and a face swollen into a mosaic of bruises.

The United States has remained largely silent in response to this wave of violence, apparently wary of jeopardizing the status of its sprawling air base, on the outskirts of this capital, which supports the mission in Afghanistan. Indeed, the Obama administration has sought to woo the Kyrgyz president since he said in February that he would close the Manas base.

In June, President Obama sent a letter to Mr. Bakiyev praising his role in Afghanistan and the campaign against terrorism. Mr. Bakiyev allowed the base to stay, after the United States agreed to pay higher rent and other minor changes.

And:

Syrgak Abdyldaev says he barely escaped that fate. In March, Mr. Abdyldaev, 47, a well-known journalist who has scrutinized the president’s political activities, was lured to a meeting by an anonymous caller who promised confidential information, and was attacked.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07…

Okay, Okay, you say.

But it’s worth being nice to despotic regimes such as Kyrgyzstan, because we can save the women of Afghanistan from the Taliban, right?

Lesbian and bisexual women and transgender men face violent abuse, including rape, in Kyrgyzstan, both in family settings and from strangers on the street, Human Rights Watch said in a report issued today. The report calls on the Kyrgyz government to acknowledge the problem and protect the victims, and on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and other European institutions to step up their response to violence based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

http://www.hrw.org/europecentr…

That’s OK, right? Obama sure has this one covered:

So why is Afghanistan worth fighting over when Kyrgyzstanis are being tossed away like last months milk ?

Um, well…

Here’s a picture from the north of Afghanistan:

Yea, that’s change alright.

Deja Vue, All Over Again

Obama Wins!

Lockheed Martin Loses!

We won another one, right???

Man, we’re just killing it since January 18.

What a change.

Let’s win some more.

Win Win ! WIN  WIN !

WIN

Fine print do not read this part:

Instead of the 180 odd F-22s they’re building 2400 Lockheed Martin F-35’s to fight ‘counterinsurgency wars all over the globe’.

YEAH !!

2400 more fighter/bombers and more lethality too !!!!!

Change only total idiots can believe in.

The current ‘public option’ being bandied about may be the biggest con job since well… the last con job: TARP I guess, hell, there’s so many to choose from since:

BARACK O’BUSH took office in January

The Public Option is neither

optional

                        Nor

Public:

It’s intended to be FORCED, that is TO FORCE YOU TO PAY TO FOR PROFIT PRIVATE COMPANIES THAT CAN DENY YOUR CLAIM AS USUAL. And it’s not paid by your taxes.

2.5% of your ‘adjusted gross income’ in addition to the money your pay for fat congressmen and bloated military assholes.

Because it’s YOUR FAULT that you weren’t covered by AIG in the first place, it’s all about YOUR TOTAL LACK of Personal Responsibility, you SCUM SUCKING ALLIGATOR.

You didn’t pay enough to the MIC.

Or actually, you didn’t get enough back.

More money to the military than ALL THE OTHER NATIONS IN THE WORLD:

COMBINED

But, there’s none left.

We have been sold out by –as far as I can tell — every member of congress except Kucinich (who has been able to attach a ‘states rights’ clause to the bill that would allow states to do single payer, if they had the $$–which they don’t) and Sanders.

Many of the very Senators who ran on single payer (RON WYDEN YOU FUCKING PRICK–THIS MEANS YOU) have done everything they can to kill it.

And Barack O’Bush?

Open to mandates, which he campaigned against in the primaries.

Open to well–open to what was in fact John McCain’s “health plan” PLUS MANDATES.

The worst of all worlds.

Fuck you Mr Barack O’Bush.

I’ve read a couple of places now about the Israel paid blogging thing (see Inky’s diary here on this) , but this is not just relating to Israel,  but to all sorts of paid bloggers, consumer issues,  and much more — it’s related to money and it’s influence on what we read.   Various industry groups, and corporations have been caught out paying bloggers or web site to shill for them, but many more have not been caught.

A few years ago, my car rolled and fell off a cliff-my family and I were all very lucky to survive, it rolled again on the way down.

Later,  I found a web site where a few other owners complained because their cars had also rolled. Then the posts disappeared.  Then the website itself went away.

Here’s another example of how money influences what we read on the web: after a Winter Rabbit diary here I checked the history of the Dismal Swamp Canal, as it was tangentially related, and I wanted to through up a quick history. Turned out, I could find one– on web site after web site (most sponsored by VA and NC tourist interests, but including  wikipedia) , the canal is described as a fairly wonderful place that slaves used to escape through.

A fairly typical web site (Camden County, NC which Google ranks #2 on a web search) :

Most of the labor was done by slaves hired from nearby land owners. It took approximately 12 years of back-breaking construction under highly unfavorable conditions to complete the 22-mile long waterway. By 1805 flat-bottomed vessels could be admitted into the canal, where tolls were charged to allay the continual expense of improvements and maintenance.

In fact, it was a wee bit worse than “back breaking” — the canal (which was partly owned by George Washington) was built mostly by slave labor, under horrific inhuman conditions, and untold numbers of them died during it’s construction–which took 40 years.  

So, paid bloggers, that claim to be real people? Check. Web sites that whitewash history? Check. Disinformation on Wiki? Check.  Web sites that delete posts that a major automaker objects to? Can’t prove it, but I’m sure that’s what happened.  Web sited that are disappeared? Yep.

Update: A company pleads guilty to placing false reviews on the web:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07…