Tonight’s ‘Funkalicious Friday’ is presented with my sincerest apologies to ‘K9K’ and ‘BD’…I’m not fit to hold your usb cables….
So in the spirit of filling in on someone else’s funkalicious time slot….and with full awareness of my own lack of funkaliciousness….tonight’s installment will be dedicated to cover songs.
Dylan wrote it, Jimi rocked it….
Garth Brooks covers Kiss’ ‘Hard Luck Woman’…in this version, Kiss backs him up…
And, hey, if country stars can cover rock tunes, then Live can cover Johnny Cash, right? “Walk the Line”…
You just KNEW there would be some Live in here, right?
Johnny Cash can give as good as he gets…here he covers the Nine Inch Nails song “Hurt”
I like this one a little more than i probably should….it’s the band Me First and the Gimme Gimmes covering “Rainbow Connection”. They also do an ass-kicking cover of “I Believe I Can Fly”, which I’ll save for another day…
You can’t not love the Shat, “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds”
(If a person could be reincarnated as a cover song….as a cover song that was performed in the same space-time as the incaration he/she is being reincarnated from…then i would want to be this next song.)
Toad the Wet Sprocket covers “Ziggy Stardust”
Here, The Red Hot Chili Peppers (of whom I’m not fond) cover the Bee Gees (whom I love absolutely). “How Deep Is Your Love”
And, finally,
M.C. the Max covers Sublime’s “Santeria”
Well, I got the ‘Friday’ half of Funkalicious Friday….the ‘funk’ part i’m not the best source for. I hope i didnt spoil your weekend or anything š
Obligatory youtube song, some New Orleans funk from Bonnie and Sheila, danced to by a goofy fellow up north:
My mother used to use a Yiddish word as her highest praise, she’d say “That one is a mensch.”
Lots of definitions of that term, but my mother took it to mean a “human being.”
Crazy times to be a human being. I dunno, it’s not so much that we’re suffering more than we have in human history as we are able to view what is happening globally in a way never before experienced here on planet earth.
And that has its drawbacks as well … for there is always a difference between viewing an event whether on television or in photographs or on the tubez, and actually being there.
Case in point — 9/11. Here in the City we were all glued to our TV screens because we only had such a small view of what had happened. Yet our view was unique and charged by the experience. We did not have more information, but we had close-up experience that information alone, in all of its manifestations, could not convey.
So we know and we don’t know. Crazy times.
I find this to be the challenge of our times — how to remain a human being when all the forces in our anti-culture, both in the US and worldwide, are trying to bend us into a different form, a different view, sometimes with malevolent intent and other times from a mindless perpetual motion that no one controls and everyone controls.
I won’t try to define “human being” here. It’s something we all recognize and respond to, whether it be in our own finer moments, or in those inspirational moments when another person can say or do something that connects to our hearts and minds and gives us a feeling that life has meaning and each life is sacred and somehow a part of us.
Here at Docudharma, many of us have spoken of the “shiny distractions” that can whirl a person’s mind into a conditioned form of existence that is extremely painful. For I believe in all of us there is a part of ourselves that knows when we are not living authentically, and suffers for that.
We make jokes about Americans who pay more attention to “American Idol” than what is really happening in our world.
We also fume over the blogosphere’s “candidate wars,” seeing folks we have always respected in the past turn into strange new creatures we don’t understand at all, as the real issues of our times are ignored.
Crazy times, crazy times.
The unreal world reveals itself by its very disconnectedness, I think. A Presidential campaign held against a backdrop of insane criminality. News stories which bear no relationship to anything but the thinnest cherry-picked surface of events. CEO’s of big corporations making obscene amounts of money and not even knowing how to do their job. Public opinion makers who know nothing at all. It is a manufactured world and day by day we see how little connection each part has to the other when it comes to any kind of real culture, community or society.
Crazy times, crazy times.
How to be a mensch, then? How to stay human?
Well, I don’t think we can use this manufactured world as our point of reference any more. And I’ve seen this happen here, whether folks are aware of that or not. Our reference point has changed and we’ve changed along with it. Sure, we get sucked back in now and then, but the cognitive dissonance soon makes us pull right back out, and each time it gets easier.
Our own intimate personal experience is a rich source of humanity for us, and when we combine it with awareness of the manufactured world, we become our own reference point, subjective and imperfect and human. We see what is true and what is not. Our own existence is our reference point now, not the platitudes of the pundits or the threats of the crooks who have cannibalized themselves in their greed for never ending power.
Crazy times, and they are about to become even more crazy, we all know this. As we get nearer to November, we will all be affected by the forces that seek to confuse us, to make us turn away from what our very eyes see and ears hear and hearts know. The criminals in power in the USA as well as the tyrants around the world who are boldly coming forth knowing our country can no longer control everything, will plunder as much as they can. We all know this.
We have a point of reference, though, with which to stay human. We have shifted our point of reference. And even in this crazy time, there will be mensches, human beings. I do not underestimate that very real power.
Yeah, it’s Friday and the work week is done for me and my fellow wage slaves. Spring has sprung. Happy weekend to all!
Today I wrap up my series on Progressives and Liberals, Movements and Political Parties. In the first entry of the series, I explained what I think distinguishes progressives from modern American liberals, and the distinction to be made between a movement and the political party (or parties) through which it acts. In the second, I went into some detail on short and long term strategies, how we can use strategic campaigning to influence more Democratic candidates to run leftward, progressive campaigns.
Before I begin in earnest, I must point out that when I write about bringing the Progressive Party to all fifty states I mean we establish presences at the local level. The reason for this is one of practicality: you cannot hope to achieve tangible, lasting results by trying to build from the top down; the only way to build any structure is from the bottom up. An example of why this is important is the Green Party-members have tried to go national before they had solid state-level presences and infrastructures throughout the country, and a very damaging consequences has been that it has incurred the wrath of Democrats for the 2000 electoral disaster (unfairly, to be sure, but nevertheless Greens are held responsible). Trying to win a national-level campaign without first building the local and state infrastructures required is political suicide, not to mention foolish.
So the first step is to begin at the local level. Seek out and establish contact with like-minded progressives, and start holding meetings. First figure out if this is something you really want to devote your time and energy to, because if no chapter exists in your state you’ll be starting from scratch, and there is a certain level of commitment necessary to build a political party from the ground up. Once you’ve decided that you all are set on doing this, it’s time to establish a platform on which to run (for an example, see the aforementioned first entry in this series).
After that phase has been completed, you’ll need to both create a working set of party bylaws for your state or municipality and expand your network to other, like-minded progressives. As you grow in number, those bylaws are going to come in handy since no political party can function without the organizational structure. You’ll also want to make clear what your short and long term objectives are. As I wrote in the second entry of this series, you’ll want to focus on finding and running candidates in areas where Democrats don’t run, or where the Democrat is a corporate-conservative. Your best bet, of course, is to pick the former over the latter unless circumstances dictate otherwise. Why? Because the overall goal for the time being is to decrease the numbers of the GOP in political office, and influence the Democrats to shift leftward. Use your own judgment, however, as to how best to achieve this goal.
Finally, you need to find candidates. Running for political office is not for everyone. I don’t write this to knock anyone, but again, there is a certain level of commitment required and many people simply do not have the time, energy, or passion for politics. So finding someone who lives and breathes politics is vital. Once you find someone willing to take on this monumental task of running a political campaign, you need to raise money. Election laws are set up to eliminate people who can’t raise a set amount of funds. Speaking for myself, I think that blows, but there is a certain pragmatism to it; if you can’t convince a hundred people to donate fifty dollars, how do you expect to convince a thousand, or ten thousand?
That’s about all I can tell you here. The rest is up to you. If you would like more information, you could do a lot worse than to get in touch with the Vermont and Washington Progressives.
Sometimes we start with an intention to address one idea and someone insists that another idea be spoken, even if that person doesn’t know it or intend to do so. Wandering can sometimes be productive. But sometimes not.
Be forewarned.
Central to much of my teaching philosophy is the following concept:
Learning is not a race. It’s not a contest between individuals. Students who are competing against each other…or against their teacher…for grades are missing the point of education.
As a student my task, as I understand it now…and maybe I understood it then as well…was to compete with myself to learn more. And better. To push back the boundaries of my own ignorance. And to try to remember that we each possess so much ignorance that even when everyone is striving to push back those boundaries, we will rarely all be pushing in the same direction.
I will never stop being a student.
As a teacher it has been my job to encourage students to push back those boundaries, to try to grab a small amount of attention in a small amount of time to all try to push in as close to the same direction as we possibly can. As a teacher, I have striven never to be the foe of my students, but rather their teammate in the cooperative venture we have joined in. As a teacher my foe has been willful ignorance, the choice to not know what could be learned.
About the only thing that causes me more pain than willful ignorance is people who use their knowledge for immoral/self-serving purposes. Thus I spend a major portion of my life in pain.
Maybe that’s one of the Lessons, we are supposed to learn. Or maybe it’s just a lesson I am supposed to learn. How would I know what anyone else is supposed to learn about life? We’re born, we eat, we excrete, maybe reproduce, and then we die. And along the way we/re allowed to learn things. Maybe we’re even required to do so. How would I know? But learning can’t be a bad thing, as I see it.
Maybe that’s another lesson: I shouldn’t judge anyone by my standards except myself. They have their own standards to live up to. And I shouldn’t try to live up to anyone else’s standards at the expense of sacrificing my own. Been there, done that. For too many years.
Of course, there have to be some common standards in order to have a somewhat orderly society. There are, after all, those people who intentionally use knowledge to harm others. One of the lessons I learned was that I have to speak up when that happens…even when it would be much easier to walk away. I fail as a human being if I don’t, at the very least, speak up.
Willful ignorance is tougher. In the face of ignorance, every instinct tells me to first learn and then teach. That’s what being a teacher is. But isn’t trying to teach someone who refuses to learn doing damage to that person? And first do no harm? It’s tough trying to measure the damage done to the individual who intentionally chooses to remain ignorant versus the damage that might be done to the rest of us by not challenging that choice.
I mean, who am I to make such a decision? I’m just a teacher…
That’s the message being sent by the ILWU, the West Coast-based International Longshore and Warehouse Union.
I only found out about this from a diary over at Planet Orange by Sarge in Seattle, and if this event has already been featured and discussed here, I apologize. I also apologize in advance if I am violating site standards by reposting the Kossack’s diary here; but this is so important I felt I should, as I would not plagiarize his and rewrite it as if it were my own. So here goes…
—-
War Protest: Westcoast Longshoremen to Close Ports
by Sarge in Seattle [Subscribe]
Fri Apr 25, 2008 at 04:40:12 PM EDT
I received this letter by email. The letter is a couple of weeks old, so, if this is old news to anyone, my apologies. I hadn’t heard anything about this, so I thought others might want to know.
Jack Heyman
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
SF Chronicle Submissions
Letters to the Editor
Open Forum
Sunday Insight
While millions of people worldwide have marched against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and last week’s New York Times/CBS News poll indicated that 81 percent believe the country is headed in the wrong direction – key concerns being the war and the economy – the war machine inexorably grinds on. Amid this political atmosphere, dockworkers of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union have decided to stop work for eight hours in all U.S. West Coast ports on May 1, International Workers’ Day, to call for an end to the war.
Sarge in Seattle’s diary :: ::
This decision came after an impassioned debate where the union’s Vietnam veterans turned the tide of opinion in favor of the anti-war resolution. The motion called it an imperial action for oil in which the lives of working-class youth and Iraqi civilians were being wasted and declared May Day a “no peace, no work” holiday. Angered after supporting Democrats who received a mandate to end the war but who now continue to fund it, longshoremen decided to exercise their political power on the docks. Last month, in response to the union’s declaration, the Pacific Maritime Association, the West Coast employer association of shipowners, stevedore companies and terminal operators, declared its opposition to the union’s protest. Thus, the stage is set for a conflict in the run up to the longshore contract negotiations.
The last set of contentious negotiations (in 2002) took place during the period between the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the invasion of Iraq. Representatives of the Bush administration threatened that if there were any of the usual job actions during contract bargaining, then troops would occupy the docks because such actions would jeopardize “national security.” Yet, when the PMA employers locked out the longshoremen and shut down West Coast ports for 11 days, the “security” issue vanished. President Bush then invoked the Taft-Hartley Act, forcing longshoremen back to work under conditions favorable to the employers.
The San Francisco longshore union has a proud history of opposition to the war in Iraq, being the first union to call for an end to the war and immediate withdrawal of troops. Representatives of the union spoke at anti-war rallies in February 2003, including one in London attended by nearly 2 million people, the largest ever held in Britain. Executive Board member Clarence Thomas went to Iraq with a delegation to observe workers’ rights during the occupation. At the start of the war in Iraq, hundreds of protesters demonstrated on the Oakland docks, and longshoremen honored their picket lines. Without warning, police in riot gear opened fire with so-called less-than-lethal weapons, shooting protesters and longshoremen alike with wooden dowels, rubber bullets, pellet bags, concussion grenades and tear gas. A U.N. Human Rights Commission investigator characterized the Oakland police attack as “the most violent” against anti-war protesters in the United States.
And finally, last year, two black longshoremen going to work in the port of Sacramento were beaten, Maced and arrested by police under the rubric of Homeland Security regulations ordained by the “war on terror.”
There’s precedent for this action. In the ’50s, French dockworkers refused to load war materiel on ships headed for Indochina, and helped to bring that colonial war to an end. At the ILWU’s convention in San Francisco in 2003, A. Q. McElrath, an octogenarian University of Hawaii regent and former ILWU organizer from the pineapple canneries, challenged the delegates to act for social justice, invoking the union’s slogan, “An injury to one is an injury to all.” She concluded, “The cudgel is on the ground. Will you pick it up?” It appears that longshore workers may be doing just that on May Day and calling on immigrant workers and others to join them.
May Day protest WHEN: 10:30 a.m., May 1, followed by a rally at noon.
WHERE: Longshore Union Hall, corner of Mason and Beach (near Fisherman’s Wharf).
WHAT: March to a rally at Justin Herman Plaza along the Embarcadero.
The war in Iraq is, as much as anything, an economic one. Recall how adamant the neocon cheerleaders were with their prognostications on how cheap this war would be, that it would cost in the tens of millions of dollars, and Iraqi oil would pay for the reconstruction. Remember how necessary it was for them to insure us that we wouldn’t be taxed.
The war was made possible by a marketing effort that convinced the American people it could be done on the cheap. Still, five years later, our Government refuses to ask the citizens of this country to pay for the war, preferring to borrow the money, saddling my children and yours with crushing debt on top of the massive long term liabilities for returning veterans.
There’s no such thing as a free war, and our economy is starting to pay the price.
The reason this war is going to end is because an end is now in the best financial interests of the American people. God damn us! We choose war – CHOOSE WAR – so long as we can get it on the cheap and it creates jobs and protects our oil interests in the mideast.
I applaud the longshoremen, and any other group that can hit the financial interests of Americans if it will help speed up the end to this occupation in Iraq.
Dick Cheney was wrong. Americans do have the stomach for war. We just don’t have the stomach to pay for it.
Poll
Do you think the longshoremen strike is legitimate?
“The tourist may complain of other tourists, but he would be lost without them.”
Agnes Repplier
“We are all tourists in history, and irony is what we win in wars.”
Anatole Broyard
“The worst thing about being a tourist is having other tourists recognize you as a tourist.”
Russell Baker
I had great designs on tackling the pictorial delights of Boston. I was hampered by a colleague hobbling on crutches, other colleagues who wanted to shop, and the fact that my employers expected us to actually attend the conference.
The hotel we stayed in was so modern, I did not know how to turn on the taps or find the light switch when we first arrived. Turns out I was not the only one who struggled with this, reference was made to it in the opening speech.
I had to go buy a Bosox cap ( so I did shop ) because the first morning I popped out of bed needing coffee and there was a Starbucks in the lobby,pulled on my wrinkled clothes from the night before and realized my hair was sticking up and I was scaring the other hotel guests. They shrank away from me in the elevator. Even the Starbucks people seemed uneasy.
Oddly enough, although I have worked nights for years, early morning has never been a problem for me. I hate afternoons. Afternoons should just be eliminated as far as I am concerned.
I got up early to take these…
We went to the market area, and while my colleagues went shopping, I took note of the street performers…
Drum Man…..
Statue Lady…..
The Dancing Guys….
Straight Jacket Man…..
A few more….
Conning my colleagues into being subject matter….
The Italian District….
Boat shot…
I hope to go back another time to Boston, and capture some of the historical stuff that I missed, and maybe to drink and chow a bit more with Mass and VC. P will have moved to a new land.
Thanks for looking and please feel free to post any recent or favorite pictures you have taken.
The video was produced by a Father of a returning Afgan Soldier, and he isn’t Happy. Don’t blame him At All, how about You!
The video was made by Edward Frawley, the father of a sergeant in the 82nd Airborne Division who returned from Afghanistan on April 13 and is among the soldiers now living in the barracks.
Barracks for Charlie CO 2/508 82n Airborne
Added: April 22, 2008
This video shows the condemned terrible conditions that soldier must live in after a 15 month tour in Afghanistan
The nation’s top military officer said today that the Pentagon is planning for “potential military courses of action” against Iran, criticizing what he called the Tehran government’s “increasingly lethal and malign influence” in Iraq.
Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said a conflict with Iran would be “extremely stressing” but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force.
“It would be a mistake to think that we are out of combat capability,” he said at a Pentagon news conference.
Still, Mullen made clear that he prefers a diplomatic solution to the tensions with Iran and does not foresee any imminent military action. “I have no expectations that we’re going to get into a conflict with Iran in the immediate future,” he said.
The Los Angeles Times adds Mullen believes Iran is increasing, not curbing, arms flow to Iraq. “Adm. Michael G. Mullen, the Joint Chiefs chairman, said there was not a massive infusion of weapons but said over time there had been ‘a consistent increase’ in arms shipments. Speaking at a morning news conference, Mullen said weapons had been intercepted in Iraq that showed evidence of relatively recent manufacture in Iran, adding that Gen. David H. Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, would lay out a fuller account of the evidence in the weeks to come.”
Yes, I know the U.S. has a war plan for every nation on the planet, but that’s not the point. The point is the Bush administration has been, once again, beating the drum for war with Iran more loudly. The biggest infuser of weapons to Iraq is the United States. The biggest source of foreign fighters in Iraq, next to the U.S., is Saudi Arabia. The Bush administration’s rhetoric is increasing and they are determined to have a war and almost any encounter in the Gulf could be used as a catalyst. Such as…
The Guardian reports US military ship shoots at ‘Iranian’ boats. “A ship contracted by the US military fired warning shots towards two ‘Iranian’ boats, American defence officials said today. The Westward Venture, a cargo vessel chartered by the US department of defence, was travelling north in international waters in the central Gulf at around 8am local time yesterday when the incident took place, the US navy said… Tehran played down the incident, saying there was no confrontation. A US defence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the boats were believed to be Iranian.”
Yesterday it was Syria, today it is Iran. Bush is determined to have total war.
Four at Four continues below the fold…
The Los Angeles Times reports Data on Iraqi forces unreliable, study finds. “The U.S. military does not have an accurate tally of the number of Iraqi security forces who have been trained or who are present for duty, according to an oversight agency’s analysis of Pentagon reports that was released Thursday.” Dead soldiers and police are still on the payroll, for example.
The study, which reviews Pentagon progress reports on Iraq, also notes that there is no way of knowing how many of the men who were trained remain in the force. As a result, the U.S. military lacks an assessment of training rates.
The readiness of the Iraqi army and police is a crucial issue for the U.S. military. Congress has spent $20.4 billion building up the Iraqi forces since 2004. Strategy calls for American troops to gradually step back into “overwatch” roles as the Iraqis take more responsibility. Until the Iraqis are more capable, military officials have said, significant cuts in U.S. troops will be risky.
Of course this is all according to plan. There is no way for U.S. troops to “stand down” because there is no way in knowing if Iraqi troops are to “stand up”. What a complete and utter debacle Iraq is.
The only thing standing between Pakistan’s Taliban and the lifeline for U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan may be an Islamist warlord who controls the area near Pakistan’s famed Khyber Pass…
Mangal Bagh, who leads a group called Lashkar-i-Islam, voiced his disdain for America but said he’s rebuffed an offer from the Taliban to join them…
Locals said that Bagh wouldn’t allow Taliban fighters to cross into the Khyber agency, which is part of Pakistan’s tribal belt and is now largely under his control…
“I’m not the ruler of Khyber, I’m the servant,” said Bagh, 35, who had an unexpectedly gentle manner as he relaxed with his Kalashnikov-toting men, drinking tea. “My aim is to finish all social evils.”
A proposed solution to reverse the effects of global warming by spraying sulfate particles into Earth’s stratosphere could make matters much worse, climate researchers said on Thursday.
They said trying to cool off the planet by creating a kind of artificial sun block would delay the recovery of the Antarctic ozone hole by 30 to 70 years and create a new loss of Earth’s protective ozone layer over the Arctic.
“What our study shows is if you actually put a lot of sulfur into the atmosphere we get a larger ozone depletion than we had before,” said Simone Tilmes of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, whose research appears in the journal Science.
It was a very close call. If a devastating drought that gripped Africa had lasted just a little longer, or been a little worse, we would not be here today.
There would be no humans, no cities, no art and no science. There would be no wars and no human-induced climate change. The world would belong to the animals.
An international genetics project has found that modern humans almost became extinct 70,000 years ago.
The Genographic Project, led by American and Israeli researchers, made the discovery after undertaking the most extensive mitochondrial DNA survey ever undertaken in Africa.
Hi, my name is Jeffrey Lieber and before I got started on the UPROUNDERSā¢ program my “certain part of the male anatomy” was mere inches long, but with the help of UPROUNDERSā¢ my “junk” now measures a full 22 inches, or almost TWO FULL FEET!
How did I do it… and how can YOU do it too?
Well let me show YOU how UPROUNDERSā¢ five step program works for EVERYONE…
1) Do a “junk measurement” and as long as you come up with a number greater then 5 inches… YOU’RE IN BUSINESS!
2) ROUND UP, so that your trouser mouse is now… 10 inches long!!!
3) Take 10 inches and round UP to 15, after all 10 is closer to 15 than to 1, right?!!
4) Take 15 inches and round UP to 20, because 15 is closer to 20 than to 10, right?!?
5) Use the UPROUNDERSā¢ bonus pack to add 2 more inches! Just cause!
Don’t believe me? Check out this testimonial from a national Presidential campaign…
We really needed a double digit victory in a hotly contested primary in order to justify continuing our campaign. The problem was… we only won by 9.2%. With normal rounding techniques that’d be a 9% win and we’d have to go through the trouble of using our brainwashing ray to wipe the minds of all good thinking American’s in order to get any of them to take us seriously. But UPROUNDERSā¢ fixed everything and TA-DA… everyone is talking about our 10% victory today.
In fact, we were so happy with UPROUNDERSā¢ that we used them again to turn what we will soon have to admit was a 6 or 7 million dollar funding spree into 10 MILLION DOLLARS!
We love you UPROUNDERSā¢!
See!
Interested in other UPROUNDERSā¢ PROGRAMS?!?!
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UPROUNDERSā¢ CAN DO IT ALL!
I’m Jeffrey Lieber and not only am I a member… but I’m the President!*
*Side effects may include: Nausea, vomiting, headaches, heartburn, hair loss, diarrhea, dry mouth, water retention, painful rectal itch, hallucination, dementia, psychosis, coma, death, halitosis, lung cancer, mental retardation, brain tumors, sleep loss, internal bleeding, internal combustion, a sudden craving to sniff your carpet, an addiction to cocaine, heroin, PCP, speed and Windex, bone weakening, claustrophobia, acne, making Jesus cry, the inability to use proper english in an online environment, homosexuality, AIDS, an urge to kill bunny rabbits, inability to breathe oxygen, migraines, diabetes, deafness, and of course, the inability to speak properly.
It’s the sort of wee hours in Old Bombay (now known as Mumbai) as I write this. I’m at the Taj Majal Hotel business center (google it) and can look out the window to my left and see the Gateway of India (google it). I’m about 30 minutes this side of 3 hours at Leopold’s in Mumbai (google it).
I was in Japan three days ago. Returning from India Monday late night (mumbai to Newark, Newark to Birmingham).
So, here’s the deal:
* Bush is a fool, or worse, but Americans are good eggs, all in all (but damn shame they put/allowed an idiot in charge of their country.
* China will soon rule the world, but the Americans, Japanese, Koreans, Indians, Russians and South Americans will . . . eventually, be able to effectively push back.
More. . .
* Green energy is the way to go (wind, biomass) with long term Indian investment.
* Japan remains a force to be reckoned with — i.e. partnered with — when it comes
to technical/green/nano anything.
* India and Japan are WELL aware of China’s bid to be THE dominant economic and polical force on The Planet Earth and, in the end, will throw-in with the U.S. to staunch the that.
* Don’t discount Russia as the NEXT world power and be ready to ALLY with China
and the rest of the world against Russia.
* Japan has an pretty-much-corrupt system when it comes to the importation of medical devices.
* Maharashtra state (google it — Mumbai’s the capital) currently has a 5,550 MW power shortage and if you’re into ANY kind of power generation sector, you’ll as much
as likely be welcomed with open arms into Maharashtra.
* Jerome returns emails where the word “Wind” is in the subject line (God love ‘im).
* Japanese ocean cormorants are larger than Chinese river cormorants.
* Hokkaido was knocking on 80 degrees F a few days ago, which is like Maine
being in the 80s in April. . . draw your own conclusions.
Edokyo remains the coolest place for sashimi in Kyoto, and Leopold’s 2nd floor
Our nation and the world is now officially pregnant!
It is just about nine months until Jan. 20, 2009 when we give birth to a new, post Bush, America!!! Ceegars all around, by gum and by golly!
Though the next nine months will be in some ways an insufferable waiting period, it is also an opportunity. As I wrote yesterday, the Dems are stymied by Bushco control of the DOJ. Even if they wanted to impeach him, (which they don’t, for risk averse political reasons) their subpoenas would not be enforced by the DOJ. They would get NO witnesses to testify from the administration. When they chose not to impeach AG Gonzales for blatantly lying to Congress, they ceded their opportunity to purge and take back the politicized and corrupted DOJ…..and thus to impeach or even remotely hold accountable any member of the administration. That, in hindsight, is where we lost the battle for any sort of justice for Bushco’s crimes by the hand of American law.
At this point, all we can effectively do (besides reminding Congress of how they have failed in their duty to the U.S. and their oaths to the Constitution and to the concept of justice) is prepare for when Bush leaves office and is no longer protected from civil and international law. We have nine months. Here are some options, some initial ideas to consider, none of them, of course easy or quick. Note, I am not a lawyer, it would be great to have one weigh in, though!
Civil suits, to punish Buschco co-conspirators financially, but more importantly, to have evidence formally discovered and presented in an actual court of law! There would have to be a plaintiff that has been damaged, say Omar Khadr, the child who was seized six years ago and has grown up in Guantanamo…or one of the may other torture victims…or the family of one of the torture victims who was murdered while being tortured. Unfortunately there are many to choose from. And a top team of lawyers, probably working pro bono, since this will be a long, long process. Some sort of foundation to pay for the expenses of the case would need to be established to raise the millions of dollars needed to fight through Bushco’s undoubtedly slimy defense tactics …over the years and years it would take.
Pressuring the candidates. Two goals, to get them to commit to investigating once they are in office, as Obama has at least half-heartedly done, in politico-speak…
“I can’t prejudge that because we don’t have access to all the material right now,” Obama continued. “I think that you are right, if crimes have been committed, they should be investigated.”
However, the Illinois senator left himself an out, suggesting he would weigh evidence of Bush’s guilt against the potential political fallout from prosecuting a former President.
“I would not want my first term consumed by what was perceived on the part of Republicans as a partisan witch hunt because I think we’ve got too many problems we’ve got to solve,” Obama said. “So this is an area where I would want to exercise judgment – I would want to find out directly from my Attorney General – having pursued, having looked at what’s out there right now – are there possibilities of genuine crimes as opposed to really bad policies.”
I was unable to find any Clinton statements on the same subject, does anyone know of one?
Pinning them down and getting them FIRMLY on the record is imperative. As is getting them to promise to rejoin the International Criminal Court.
Unless the US is a signatory to the treaty, Bush is NOT accountable to the ICC.
And finally, the most intriguing from my viewpoint, since we here in the blogosphere would be essential….
Building an international coalition. From the grass roots up, in every country of the world, to demand Bushco be tried for War Crimes. Start a organization and work hard to spread it around the blogosphere and around the world. Align with other orgs. Create a presence, create a consensus, create noise. In essence…do PR and pressure the worlds governments to pass resolutions etc, in support of trying Bushco when they leave office. But most importantly….to not let what they have done be forgotten
Ad that is the main thing we need to think about, both making sure that we keep the illegal invasion, torture, War Profiteering, the Plame Treason…Politicizing the DOJ to provide them immunity…and all of the other too numerous to mention Bushco crimes in the publice eye.
So that when they leave office, this incredible, heinous list of War Crimes, Crimes Against Humanity, and plain old theft and corruption are NOT forgotten, are prosecuted….and most importantly…..that they NEVER AGAIN are allowed to happen.
These are just preliminary thoughts, please share yours. And let’s keep talking about what can be done to create justice, and how we can help do it.
Well, as the pundits talk almost exclusively about the endless Primary Campaign, the Cheney Bush Administration seems determined to start it’s third war:
“…The nation’s top military officer said today that the Pentagon is planning for “potential military courses of action” against Iran, criticizing what he called the Tehran government’s “increasingly lethal and malign influence” in Iraq…”
“…Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said a conflict with Iran would be “extremely stressing” but not impossible for U.S. forces, pointing specifically to reserve capabilities in the Navy and Air Force…”
There’s more…
The “reserve capabilities in the Navy & Air Force”?? Is he out of his mind? “Reserve capabilities”? Adm. Mullen & the Pentagon “pawnmeisters” have already been shuffling the military around to try to fill the ever-increasing gaps:
“…(Feb 7, 2006): WASHINGTON (CNN) — The U.S. Navy will try to lift some of the burden off U.S. Army troops in Iraq this year by increasing the number of sailors inside that country and taking on duties soldiers have been doing, according to the Navy’s top sailor…”
“…The move is designed to ease the pressure on the stressed and stretched Army in Iraq, which has soldiers doing everything from combat, medical and security duties to countless support operations…”
Though Mullen did try to soften the rhetoric a bit by adding:
“…he prefers a diplomatic solution to the tensions with Iran and does not foresee any imminent military action…”
While Mullen & Bush & Co probably believe that they have things well under control, that they can do their saber rattling and get Iran to start toeing the line-does anyone really believe that these clowns have the necessary diplomatic finesse to prevent an escalation, especially an accidental one?
“…WASHINGTON – A cargo ship contracted by the U.S Military Sealift Command fired “a few bursts” of warning shots in the Gulf at small boats believed to be Iranian, U.S. defense officials said on Friday…”
“…Iran quickly denied the alleged confrontation…”
“…The Westward Venture, a cargo ship chartered by the U.S. Department of Defense, was traveling north in international waters in the central Gulf at around 8 a.m. local time on Thursday when the incident took place, said Commander Lydia Robertson, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Navy’s Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet…”
“…The United States said in January Iranian boats threatened its warships on Jan. 6 along a vital route for crude oil shipments…”
Next January can’t come soon enough for me-unless the next President happens to be a 72 year old warmonger.
