Life in OUR America, Volume 2, The Livyjr Files Options

[Livyjr]

And, as always, back to the "news"!

Or is it really "HIGH FARCE"?

"Iran: U.S., Israel Waging Smear Campaign"

By ALI AKBAR DAREINI, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 55 minutes ago

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran accused the U.S. and Israel on Sunday of a smear campaign against its president-elect and warned Europe, which is in tricky nuclear negotiations with Tehran, not to join in the mudslinging.

The ultraconservative Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who won a landslide presidential election victory, has been accused of taking American hostages in 1979 when radical students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran.

Iranian exiles and an Austrian politician are alleging he was involved in the 1989 slaying of a Kurdish leader and two associates in Vienna.

Iranian officials have denied both allegations.

"The charges are so evidently false that they don't deserve an answer."

"It's clear that it's mere lies," Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said Sunday at a news conference in Tehran.

"Europeans should show their political maturity and not intertwine their interests with those of the Americans."

"They are advised to seriously avoid interference in this issue," Asefi warned.

"We advise the Europeans not to fall into the trap of the Zionist media."

The Iranian warning came as France, Germany and Britain lead European Union efforts to persuade Tehran to permanently halt nuclear enrichment activities, which the United States claims are part of Iran's plan to develop a nuclear arsenal.

Iran rejects the U.S. claims and insists it is pursuing nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, such as generating power.

Uranium enriched to low levels can be used for energy while highly enriched uranium can be used in bombs.

President Bush has said the claims swirling around Ahmadinejad are not his primary concern and he instead wants the Europeans to make clear to the new leader that a nuclear-armed Iran will not be tolerated.

Israel's ambassador to Washington, Daniel Ayalon, said Monday that Ahmadinejad was more extreme than his rivals.

He insisted Iran must be stopped from developing nuclear weapons, a task that he said should be assigned to the U.N. Security Council.

The Europeans are offering economic incentives in hopes of persuading Iran to permanently freeze its enrichment program on its own to avoid U.N. intervention and possible sanctions.

Ahmadinejad, the former mayor of Tehran, has said Iran will not curtail its nuclear program and will restart uranium enrichment activities, which it voluntarily suspended in November as part of negotiations with the Europeans.

Asefi said the wave of allegations against Ahmadinejad was an expression of disappointment over the June 24 presidential runoff vote.

Ahmadinejad defeated former President Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, who was perceived as more moderate.

"That the result of the election was not predictable for them should not serve as a reason not to accept it," the spokesman said.

"We can't dissolve the whole nation and create another nation to follow their wish."

In 1979, Ahmadinejad was a member of the Office of Strengthening Unity, the student organization that planned the Tehran Embassy takeover.

Six former hostages who saw the president-elect in a 1979 photo or on television said they believe Ahmadinejad was among the captors who held them for 444 days and one said he was interrogated by the new president.

Ahmadinejad has denied he was one of the hostage takers.

On Saturday, Saeed Hajjarian, a top former secret agent and a senior adviser to outgoing reformist President Mohammad Khatami, also denied the allegation and identified the captor in the pictures as a former militant who committed suicide in prison years ago.

A different set of allegations against Ahmadinejad emerged on Saturday in Austria.

The newspaper Der Standard quoted a top official in Austria's Green Party as saying authorities have "very convincing" evidence linking Ahmadinejad to the 1989 slaying of Abdul-Rahman Ghassemlou, an Iranian opposition Kurdish leader, in Vienna.

Exiled Iranian dissidents made the same accusations.

But Hajjarian denied those allegations as well.

"I'm opposed to Ahmadinejad's policies and thinking but he was not involved in the hostage drama nor in the assassination of an Iranian opposition Kurdish leader in Vienna," Hajjarian told The Associated Press on Saturday.

Though Hajjarian said the president-elect was not involved in either incident, he has been at loggerheads with the hard-line Ahmadinejad and did accuse him of financial wrongdoing while previously serving as governor of Ardabil province in northwestern Iran before he was mayor of Tehran.

No official charges have been brought against Ahmadinejad.

Mohammad Reza Bahonar, a senior hard-liner close to Ahmadinejad, publicly acknowledged this week that Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi had opposed Ahmadinejad's appointment as Tehran mayor because there was a "dossier" against him.

But he did not explain the nature of the case.

[Livyjr]

Elections - AP

"Conservatives Win, Moderates Lose"

Thu Nov 4, 4:58 PM ET

By RON FOURNIER, AP Political Writer

In addition to the 59.3 million happy Bush voters and 55.7 million grim Kerry voters, it's a full roster of winners and losers.
___

Winner: Fear, a powerful motivator and Bush's main weapon.

With more than 1,100 dead in Iraq and millions unemployed at home, many Americans wanted a new direction.

Bush made them afraid of change, warning of terrorist strikes and Kerry's ability to command.

Winner: Exurbs, the farthest suburbs in states such as Minnesota, Wisconsin and Arizona are packed with new Republican voters and converted Democrats.

Rove thinks shifts to the GOP in exurbs and small towns are the secret to a semi-permanent Republican majority, and nobody is arguing with him right now.

Uh, hhhhmmmm, Minnesota, eh?

And Karl Rove, you say?

Hhhhmmmm!

What's this, then?

"Minn. Lawmakers on Holiday Amid Shutdown"

By PATRICK CONDON, Associated Press Writer

Sun Jul 3, 5:26 AM ET

ST. PAUL, Minn. - Minnesota lawmakers left for the holiday weekend with the state government still partly shut down and no deal on a new budget or even a temporary spending plan to restart it.

The shutdown, caused when the previous budget expired July 1 without a replacement, left 9,000 state employees out of work and interrupted some state services.

"Minnesota has always been the state that works," said Democratic Rep. Lyndon Carlson, referring to the state's long tradition of good government.

"We're no longer the state that works in the eyes of the general public."

Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty and Senate Democratic Leader Dean Johnson, the principal antagonists in the dispute, met for over an hour Saturday morning without reaching an agreement.

Democrats then tried to pass a temporary spending bill to give them more time, but House Republicans blocked it, saying it was a political ploy that would remove a sense of urgency from the talks.

The impact has been softened by a court order that services deemed critical to health and safety continue, and part of a new two-year state budget has already taken effect.

The largest number of idled workers, about 4,000, are with the transportation department, affecting such services as driver's license renewals.

The few reports Saturday of the shutdown affecting people during the holiday weekend, when most offices would have been closed anyway, were complaints about the closed highway rest stops.

Still, lawmakers worried people would be riled by the dysfunctionality of their elected leaders.

"The confidence the public has in this Legislature, which was probably low to begin with, is probably nonexistent now," said Republican Sen. Dave Kleis.

Some lawmakers were upset at being sent home until Tuesday, saying they should stay in St. Paul and spend every available minute on solving the budget impasse.

Johnson, who is also a Lutheran minister, disagreed and said a cooling off period could be beneficial.

The governor and legislative leaders planned to continue discussions.

"I think it's good for members to be able to go home and meet family and friends and sleep in their own beds," he said.

[Livyjr]

Top Stories - U.S. News & World Report

"Destroying it to save it?"

By Ilana Ozernoy

FALLUJAH, IRAQ--Once the sky stopped raining fire and the smoke from the tank cannons vanished, it was time to pick up the pieces.

But where to start?

What had been houses were now piles of brick and glass, demolished by 500-pound bombs.

Whole city blocks were leveled, the rubble and mangled carcasses of cars pushed to the sides of the streets by the force of Abrams tanks.

In crushing the Sunni insurgents who had laid claim to the streets, U.S. and Iraqi forces left Fallujah looking like a city ripped asunder by a hurricane.

"It's in bad shape."

"I don't know what they [residents] have to come back to," said Sgt. 1st Class John Ryan of the 1st Infantry's Division Task Force 2-2, which flanked U.S. marines on the eastern side of the city during the fighting.

As muted sounds of gunfire crackled in the city last week, Ryan, along with the soldiers of Alpha Company, took shelter in a damaged house.

Picking through debris, a soldier wondered out loud, "What is this place?"

"Hell."

In an upstairs bedroom, the unit's Iraqi translator took a ballpoint pen and wrote on a closet door in small, neat Arabic:

"We're sorry about the destruction of this house and all the houses of this town."

"We came here to make peace and bring safety."

Bringing safety to restive Iraqi cities is an increasingly costly exercise for U.S. forces stretched thin by their pursuit of insurgents across the Sunni triangle.

Even as Fallujah was declared "secure" (although not "safe"), the military deployed troops to counter insurgents in the cities of Mosul and Baquba.

Rooting out a thousand or so insurgents in Fallujah required American commanders to commit some 10,000 troops, reinforced by punishing air power.

The Army's 1st Infantry Division, lacking the number of soldiers necessary to search every house, employed its tanks, blasting heavy cannon rounds in answer to snipers' gun-and mortar fire to minimize time--and U.S. casualties.

"You never want to destroy someone's city like this."

"These people have worked hard for what they have," said Staff Sgt. David Bellavia, of Task Force 2-2's Alpha Company.

"But this was the only way to eliminate those fanatics."

Hit or miss.

While some houses survived with little damage, whole swaths of the city were made virtually unlivable.

On the eastern side of Fallujah, which suffered some of the heaviest fighting, the front of one house looked as if it had been sliced off with a bread knife.

The upstairs bedroom remained intact, a small vase of plastic roses sitting undisturbed above a perfectly made bed while the guts of the house spilled into the front yard, burying a man caked with blood and dust.

After the fighting subsided, Fallujah was declared a tactical victory.

Military officials said roughly 1,200 insurgents were killed (about 51 Americans were killed and 425 wounded).

Other insurgents fled, and terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi was denied a base of operations.

"We feel right now that we have . . . broken the back of the insurgency," said Lt. Gen. John Sattler, the Marine Corps commander in Iraq.

"We've taken away this safe haven"

Still, the victory in Fallujah is hardly so clear.

The U.S.-backed interim government sees a city wrested from the hands of terrorists in order to pave the way for elections in January.

But minority Sunnis, fearing they'll be shortchanged in the political process, see an exercise in obliteration, not liberation.

To try to convince them otherwise, U.S. commanders hope to make Fallujah a demonstration of American generosity, as well as military might, with plans for some $90 million in reconstruction spending.

Pentagon officials say this will be a larger version of the rebuilding effort begun in Najaf after Shiite-led fighting stopped there, back in August.

The military says that effort has helped keep the peace by putting people to work.

Marine officers will oversee paying compensation to thousands of Fallujah families.

The U.S. Agency for International Development has started distributing humanitarian aid, and the Pentagon plans to give Iraqis jobs rebuilding the electrical grid as well as restoring water and sewer service.

But with weeks to go before the electricity is turned on and serious reconstruction work begins, Fallujah risks becoming a sequel to the battle for Baghdad--a quick, effective military operation, followed by a slow and problematic reconstruction effort.

What Iraqis have seen so far are the images of scorched neighborhoods and wounded civilians looped on Arab satellite TV newscasts, and those who survived the fighting angrily condemned the military tactics.

"There was no food, no water, no electricity--just the smell of gunpowder," recalled Muhsan Fuad, 30, who fled his house in Fallujah's Jolan neighborhood a few days after the offensive began, transporting the remains of a cousin killed by mortar fire.

"It's a war for freedom and democracy where there is no mercy, no law, no difference between men, women, and children."

"This is the American way of democracy?"

Last week, Iraqis tentatively braved the streets under Marine supervision to pick up decomposing bodies and provide them an Islamic burial.

Military commanders said most of the dead were combatants, explaining that civilians had plenty of advance warning and that most had fled before the fighting.

"Everybody out there," said Staff Sergeant Bellavia, referring to the dead, "you can pry a weapon out of their hands."

Military officials say ensuring that the reconstruction of Fallujah goes as smoothly as its downfall will require a substantial security commitment.

"What is it going to take to clean this place up?"

"A lot of money and a lot of manpower," said Sgt. Major Wayne Bell, from the 1st Marine Division.

Even as the military's civil affairs units wandered through town assessing damage to public utilities and private businesses, sporadic gunfire and the threat of booby traps hindered their work--raising the specter that the insurgents might strike again, hoping to exploit reconstruction delays to undermine the Americans' efforts.

"Shiite-Sunni Tension Rises Anew in Iraq"

By HAMZA HENDAWI, Associated Press Writer

Sun Jul 3, 1:37 PM ET

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The Shiite mourners were crying for blood, threatening to burn down a Sunni town where dozens of Shiite travelers had been slain.

Their rage boiled over after a fresh spate of bombings killed nearly 40 people in Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad.

A senior Shiite politician, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, appealed for calm, telling the 2,000-strong crowd that Sunnis and Shiites must live in peace together.

Yet he had sent a very different message just two days before, suggesting Shiites set up vigilante groups to track down "terrorists" in the Sunni-led insurgency and report them to security authorities, which are dominated by Shiites.

Tensions between Shiite Arabs and the Sunni minority are rapidly worsening, pushing Iraq closer to a civil war that could disrupt its young democracy and lead to its breakup.

Since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime more than two years ago, tensions have flared several times.

But each time, historical ties binding the two groups and appeals for calm from religious leaders have averted conflict.

In the face of spiraling violence, however, anti-Sunni sentiments among Shiite leaders are being articulated publicly, with impunity and tacit approval from powerful political circles.

On Tuesday, a Shiite lawmaker joined al-Hakim's call for vigilante groups, finding so much support in parliament that some fellow Shiites forfeited their turn to speak so he could finish.

"The rage of our young people is putting pressure on us," said Khidir al-Khozai, who warned Sunni Arab political parties not to remain silent over the Baghdad bombings.

The bombings last week in the Shula and Karradah districts, and the killing Tuesday of a Shiite legislator in his 80s, have pushed anti-Sunni sentiments to levels never seen since Saddam's ouster.

Beside making the rounds of parliament, the issue also had been discussed in the home of Shiite spiritual leader Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

"There is a terrifying amount of sectarian tension in Iraq these days," warned Adnan al-Janabi, a senior Sunni Arab legislator and a moderate.

Mohammed Abdul-Hassan al-Shammari, a 37-year-old tennis pro, was among the victims of the Karradah bombings.

Mithaq Salem, his Sunni colleague and friend of 13 years, was with al-Shammari's family for four consecutive days to help with the funeral, sitting with family and friends under an outdoor tent drinking bitter coffee and listening to Quranic verses.

"Everyone was cursing the Sunnis and praying to God that He takes revenge on them," Salem recalled.

"But what can I do?"

"Not all of us are terrorists."

"Mohammed and his brother Fayez taught me everything I know."

"We are like brothers."

"This Shiite-Sunni thing never came up."

In Shula, storekeepers have taken matters into their hands, prohibiting parking in parts of the neighborhood by placing tires, metal containers and palm tree trunks alongside sidewalks.

There's virtually nothing in looks or speech to distinguish between ordinary Sunnis and Shiites, yet Salem Lazem Hussein, who runs an electrical supplies store by the site of one of last week's car bombs, said: "We have become so alert now that we can tell who is an outsider right away."

"I close the store when I hear the call to sunset prayers."

"You cannot see your enemy in the dark, so I stay home," said the 37-year-old father of six.

Shiite-Sunni tensions were most palpable at the June 26 ceremony marking the bombing deaths in Karradah and Shula.

It was held at the offices of Iraq's biggest Shiite party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.

Many in the 2,000-strong crowd cheered the Badr Brigade — a Shiite militia associated with al-Hakim's party and which many Sunnis accuse of targeting their community.

Most of their ire was directed at sheik Harith al-Dhari, leader of the Association of Muslim Scholars, an influential Sunni group known to have ties to the Sunni-dominated insurgency.

"Al-Sistani is the sword of the Shiites, if he gives the order we will burn down Latifiyah," they chanted, alluding to the Sunni town south of Baghdad notorious for killings of Shiites.

The mood of the crowd appeared to reflect the angry tone of al-Hakim's June 24 statement in which he called on Shiites to set up "popular committees" in their neighborhoods to "uncover terrorist cells" and report them to security forces — most of which are Shiite-dominated.

The call for vigilante groups appeared to suggest a system very similar to what was used by Saddam's Baath party and security agencies to ferret out critics of the regime.

In a statement Saturday, al-Hakim warned against sectarian strife and called on the Iraqi government to step up efforts to fight with militants.

"We stress the importance of being alert and cautious not to be carried away toward the sectarian strife that our enemies want for us," he said.

"We ask the Iraqi government, particularly the security apparatuses, to exert more efforts to strike these terrorist groups."

Shiite tribal sheiks, meanwhile, have been begging al-Sistani to issue a fatwa, or edict, permitting them to go after Sunnis who kill their fellow Shiites, according to Iraqis familiar with the meetings held at the cleric's home in the holy city of Najaf.

Al-Sistani, whose word is law for many Shiites, has refused to grant such permission, but has signaled his concern about the rising tensions.

He told Shiite and Sunni politicians who met him Monday at the holy city of Najaf that it was "unacceptable" from a religious viewpoint for Muslims to kill each other.

Over the past century, Iraq's Sunni Arab minority dominated the country — pushing the Shiites and Kurds to the sidelines.

That ascendancy ended with the ouster of Saddam, their last patron.

The domination by Sunnis of the two-year insurgency, and the rise to power of a Shiite-Kurdish alliance after elections in January, have deepened the rift.

Sunni Arabs account for up to 20 percent of Iraq's estimated 26 million people.

Their inclusion in the political process — drafting a constitution, putting it to a vote in October and holding a general election two months later — is essential for its credibility and success.

If Sunni-Shiite tensions burst into conflict, the process will be derailed, throwing the country's political future into doubt and possibly causing the breakup of Iraq.

Already, the process is troubled over problems of a sectarian nature — Shiite opposition to come of the Sunnis on the committee drafting Iraq's constitution, and a growing desire in the oil-rich, mainly Shiite south of Iraq for autonomy modeled on Iraqi Kurdistan.

There, 14 years of self-rule have reduced Baghdad's authority to virtually nothing.

Replicated in the south, it could spell the breakup of Iraq, a country that has existed in its present shape for less than a century.

For some, the marble plaza outside the Shiite Kazimiya shrine in northern Baghdad offered some respite from the mounting pressures.

Here, large families of robed women, children and men picnicked on rice, lamb and vegetables as worshippers prepared for the sunset prayers.

"Peace and tranquility are found here," said Abu Bilal al-Basri, a silver-bearded man who came with a friend to pray.

"For us, it's the only safe place in Baghdad."
___

Associated Press reporter Qassim Abdul-Zahra contributed to this story from Baghdad.

[Livyjr]

"Players in land venture connect to Bruno - Senator's son got friends to buy some homes in controversial project" 
 
By MICHELE MORGAN BOLTON and BOB PORT, Staff Writer and Senior editor
Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Thursday, June 23, 2005

Ask state Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno about First Grafton Corp., his controversial real estate venture in eastern Rensselaer County, and his spokesman has a quick answer:

"The senator doesn't have a real estate company -- it's in a blind trust."

But just how blind is Bruno's 25 percent share?

It's true, the second most powerful state Republican did remove himself in 1992 from the board of directors of the company run by influential Albany lobbyist James Featherstonhaugh.

But "Feathers," a longtime close Bruno friend, then sold parcels of land to the senator's son, the senator's son's new girlfriend, the senator's son's snowmobiling friends, the wife of the senator's thoroughbred horse-racing friend and the son of the Republican supervisor in the town of Grafton.

Now the remaining acreage just off Route 2 has been sold to Massachusetts developer David Lipinski, of Stonybrook Land LLC, who plans to build out the rest of the 22-home luxury subdivision and carve a second access road around the leafy perimeter of Dyken Pond.

It caps an era that began in 1991 when Bruno, R-Brunswick, introduced his 625-acre project to the mountainous and sparsely populated community by bulldozing a 1.7-mile road through the old-growth forest and wetlands without the necessary state permits.

Nearby residents were furious.

Then, in 1996, the state fined and suspended from practice one of First Grafton's engineers for manufacturing the state-mandated Environmental Quality Review Assessment that the Health Department said was at odds with actual conditions.

As the project continued to raise the ire of its country neighbors, it was stalled by a number of state and federal lawsuits.

But it finally kicked into gear in 2001 when the senator's son, who was then the Rensselaer County district attorney, laid the foundation for his own home on 10.8 acres.

Next in was Scott Newell, an avid outdoorsman and longtime friend of Ken Bruno, who with his wife, Tracie, purchased 8 acres in 2002.

However, he said his relationship with First Grafton has been as rocky as the soil.

"They told anyone what they wanted to hear to get the land sold," Newell said.

"They did a lot of bad things."

Among them, he said, was attempting to take a 15-foot-wide public accessway from his property; breaking a landowner covenant to keep the access road, Pond View Way, private by secretly deeding it to the town to make the development more marketable; and working to dissolve a stipulation to forever preserve several hundred acres as wild, Newell said.

"I've spent $15,000 in legal fees fighting them," he said.

"Bruno blocks wetland shield - Senate leader's opposition to widely supported bill that would extend protection to smaller areas raises questions of conflict of interest"

By MICHELE MORGAN BOLTON, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Sunday, July 3, 2005

ALBANY -- For more than a year, Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno has blocked widely supported wetlands legislation that would limit development on luxury homesites his family's business recently sold for more than $1.1 million.

A wide margin of senators -- three-fourths of them by some lobbyist counts -- were prepared to for the proposed law, called the Clean Water Protection/Flood Prevention Act, but Bruno refused to allow any full Senate vote.

The state Assembly passed the bill 115-28 on Feb. 2.

The act would have created basic state protection for small areas of wetlands -- ranging in size from one to 12.4 acres -- that the U.S. Supreme Court in 2001 declared exempt from regulation by the federal Army Corps of Engineers.

Records obtained by the Times Union show a Bruno family investment, First Grafton Corp., has a history of resisting wetlands restrictions on a 625-acre development site in Grafton in eastern Rensselaer County.

In 1991, Bruno created a stir when his business mowed down forest and wetlands to create a road without any permits.

In 1995, state officials warned that extending that road and building homes on at least six planned lots "will impact federally protected wetlands."

In 2000, the Army Corps issued a stop work order when First Grafton began bulldozing and filling protected hemlock swampland to extend its road to accommodate the future home of Kenneth R. Bruno, the senator's son.

Last July, with Ken Bruno acting as a real estate broker, First Grafton began quickly selling off its 14 remaining lots to five buyers, including one $800,000 sale in February of 10 lots and raw land to a Massachusetts developer, who promised to extend the site's road another mile within a year.

The developer's lots and road right of way are dotted with wetland areas of six acres or less that would be covered by the proposed legislation.

Bruno spokesman John McArdle scoffed at claims the senator purposefully killed the wetlands bill or that the senator's interest in First Grafton Corp., which was placed in a blind trust, represented any conflict of interest.

"It's outlandish to use First Grafton as an excuse," McArdle said.

"That argument doesn't hold any water."

Bruno has repeatedly said he opposes the wetlands plan because it is unfair to landowners who want to make their own decisions about what happens on their property.

Nevertheless, environmentalists who work in the capital are outraged and outspoken.

"We did a survey of senators on how they would vote and we know we had more than sufficient votes," said Bill Cooke of Citizens Campaign for the Environment.

"What happened?"

"Joe Bruno is what happened."

"Joe stopped the legislation."

"Is his conduct criminal?"

"I don't know," Cooke said.

"Is it outrageous, unreasonable and bordering on the immoral?"

"You bet."

"It's a disservice to the voters in this state."

The bill was sponsored by Senate Environmental Conservation Committee Chairman Carl L. Marcellino, R-Syosset, and co-sponsored by 10 other senators, including two Republicans on Marcellino's committee.

Marcellino first introduced the bill in last year's session.

Lobbyists say 20 Democratic senators also asked to be co-sponsors.

The Senate Environmental Conservation Committee approved the bill 11-1.

Marcellino did not respond to requests for comment, nor did most of the bill's sponsors or any other legislators contacted by the Times Union.

Sen. Frank Padavan, R-Queens, and the Senate vice president, is still committed to the legislation.

"He'll do whatever he has to do to keep it in focus," Peter Potter, his spokesman, said.

Potter declined to say whether Padavan planned to press Bruno for the bill to be put to a vote next session.

Marcellino's bill would give the Department of Environmental Conservation regulatory jurisdiction over 270,000 wetland areas around the state of between one and 12.4 acres.

The Supreme Court's 2001 decision left those areas without any oversight.

The legislative session closed again this year without a vote on Marcellino's bill just as the Times Union published a June 23 report on First Grafton and Bruno's perceived conflicts of interest.

The Senate majority leader was a 25-percent stockholder in the business, which was run by Bruno friend and lobbyist James Featherstonhaugh.

Bruno transferred his stock to a so-called blind trust in 1992 to remove any direct financial interest that could have raised ethical conflict of interest issues under state law.

Peter Bruno of Glens Falls, the senator's brother, continued to own a one-eighth interest in First Grafton.

The company dissolved in May.

In a 1995 letter to Army Corps brass, First Grafton engineer Peter A. Chiefari urged federal officials to be swift in allowing the project to move forward after First Grafton was cited for building a 1.7-mile road over wetlands without a permit.

"The price range for the lots has been set at from $250,000 to $400,000 each," wrote Chiefari, who did not return a call or e-mail for comment.

"Failure to obtain a timely approval may result in serious financial harm to First Grafton with consequent liability."

In April 2001, the Army Corps of Engineers lifted a stop work order prompted by further road construction after receiving a remediation plan.

Two months later, Ken Bruno, then Rensselaer County's district attorney, purchased a 10.8-acre lot near the end of the extended wetlands road for $44,000.

That summer, Ken Bruno received permission from the Rensselaer County Health Department to build his septic system without a county inspection, according to documents obtained by the Times Union.

The remainder of the development includes a total of 49 small wetlands areas covered under Marcellino's bill.

"The fact Sen. Bruno was involved with an enterprise that violated federal wetlands laws helps explain why he's working hard to stop a bill that would regulate destructive development on New York's treasured wetlands," said John Stouffer, who is the legislative director for the Sierra Club's Atlantic chapter.

Wetlands serve as natural water filters, absorbing contaminants, as they protect water quality in streams, lakes and rivers, advocates explained.

That's critical for municipalities that rely on surface supplies of water, like New York City and Albany.

Bruno's stance against the wetlands bill contrasts with his usual support for environmental legislation and issues.


In April, he joined Gov. George Pataki and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver in signing a memorandum of understanding that makes $30 million available for local communities to develop strategies to clean up and reuse brownfields.

A supporter of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's new $20 million center for future energy systems, Bruno also took the lead in passing a tough anti-smoking law in 2003.

In August 2000, he delivered a $400,000 state grant to Troy to renovate Riverfront Park and improve the view.

In 1998 he rolled out $6.6 million in pork barrel grants for historic preservation and environmental conservation around the Capital Region.

Bruno spokesman McArdle said detractors may as well blame First Grafton for all of what ails the Legislature, including its failure to restore the death penalty.

The Senate majority leader became more defensive this year after a May report by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law, a downstate think tank, slapped him for "standing in the way of progress" as he continues to control what legislation sees the light of day.

Cooke, of Citizens Campaign for the Environment, a Schoharie County farmer, said he and his colleagues persuaded tens of thousands of New Yorkers to ask their state senators to support the wetlands bill.

Cooke owns 14 acres and rents another 80 or so.

He acknowledged the bill would prevent him from developing the majority of his property.

"I'm a conservative Republican, and I still recognize the need to protect it," he said.

"This issue is not about Joe Bruno and Bill Cooke," Cooke said.

"It's about our children and their children."

"I understand about peoples' property rights, but that's life."

"We regulate everything, including the fence height in between peoples' houses -- and we can't protect our wetlands?"

"Come on."

"Is it public need?"

"Or personal greed?"

Rob Moore, a lobbyist with Environmental Advocates, was another of many who urged state lawmakers to pass the wetlands legislation, which would require any development that encompasses a smaller wetland to obtain a DEC permit.

Moore agreed with his colleagues that Bruno's refusal to allow votes on certain bills seems to follow a pattern directly related "to his reported personal and business interests."

"The thumb was already put on this early," he said.

"It didn't get a debate on the floor."

"That doesn't happen in any other state."

[Livyjr]

"Bush may sign G8 climate change agreement: reports"

1 hour, 37 minutes ago

LONDON (AFP) - Top officials are confident US President George W. Bush could pen an agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions at the G8 summit, newspapers said.

The US has refused to ink the United Nations' Kyoto Protocol on emissions limits but Bush may be prepared to move on the issue, reports said.

Leaders from the Group of Eight industrial powers are to start their three-day annual gathering on Wednesday at Gleneagles, Scotland.

Host British Prime Minister Tony Blair has put climate change and Africa at the top of the agenda.

In a draft text being thrashed out by negotiators on behalf of Britain, Germany, Canada, the United States, France, Italy, Japan and Russia, the G8 states are expected to pledge themselves to cut back on fossil fuel use, The Observer reported.

The burning of carbon-rich fuels releases the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into the atmosphere which traps in the Sun's heat, thus warming the Earth's surface.

"With George Bush we are hoping he will sign up to a statement like 'climate change is a reality and we must look to find ways out of the problem by employing new technologies', a senior government source told The Sunday Times.

"We think Bush will basically swallow it out of his friendship with Tony Blair."

There were fears French President Jacques Chirac might scupper any agreement by insisting the Kyoto Protocol be the basis for any deal.

"It all depends on what mood Chirac is in on the day," the source told the newspaper.

An action plan will focus on providing green technology to developing countries and cleaning up air and land transport, The Observer reported.

"We were never going to get the Americans to accept everything on the science front or sign up to Kyoto; that was clear," a source told the newspaper.

"But what they do accept is that there is climate change and that for reasons of energy security and just reducing pollution, they favour measures that reduce our dependence on carbon-based fuels."

"The motivation might be different but the net results and the impact are the same."

[lazyboy]

Hello, I was just taking a look over the border at how you in America were feeling about things at the G8. Livyjr, I am glad to read the above because on news.bbc I read that Bush has no feelings of gratitude towards Blair over Iraq, and that boded badly for him being swayed on the Kyoto protocol.

My husband would tell you how dear to my heart is the Kyoto Protocol, and how actively I promoted it until I got to thinking that all I am doing is making enemies of everyone, trying to persuade them not to idle their engines in our road etc. so I have stopped for now. The news channels and documentaries do not seem to take climate change seriously in Japan.

If you go to a motorway parking area you will find ALL the juggernauts and trucks idling their engines NO MATTER WHAT THE WEATHER. The Prime Minister does not seem to care. The only really caring person is the Mayor of Tokyo who has a lot of sway because his brother was a famous and popular actor and he himself is a popular writer. He has passed lots of legislation to cut down emmissions in Tokyo and this has helped a lot.

[Livyjr]

My definition of "development" is "BRING to a higher state of being", and that sure is not what is being done up here, and that is a fact!

A good friend of mine ended up buying a brand-new house in a "town-approved" subdivision up here for a hundred-plus thousand dollars or so that was right smack-dab in the bed of an intermittent stream coming off the side of the ridge above it, and when the water-table would rise, which is every time it would rain, or the snow melt, the place would be inundated.

He bought it in the spring, and by August of that same year, he had sewage all over the place, because it obviously couldn't go down into the saturated ground, and what a stink when it was hot and humid, and there was no breeze!

He had all the neighbors quite upset, at him, and there was nothing he could do to solve the problem!

And his lawyer, the one who helped him close on the house turned out to be the developer's lawyer, too, as well as being the Town judge!

What a racket!

He was finally able to unload the place and get out, and now, it turns out that a friend of another friend of mine has bought the place, and the cycle repeats!

And this is what is touted in the town as "high-end" development!

What a rip-off, and you still owe the property taxes on the assessed value, when the place ain't worth a dime, in reality!

Which is why every swamp up here is now targeted for development!

The "stupids" with all the money have no idea of what they are spending it on, so long as it costs more than what all their friends have paid for the same crap, and so ...

In the meantime, as a result of all of this desecration of the uplands above me, and the town as well, which is lower down the ridge than I am, there is now so much water coming down the gorge through my land that back in March, a couple of tons of silt came down with the high water and blocked the channel on one side of what was my private little island, which then caused the creek to jump sideways about six feet or so, washing away half the island in the process, and undercutting a bank about thirty feet high, so that will now cave down and wash further down the creek, plugging the channels further down, and one of these times when that happens, the creek is going to jump its banks, and the town is going to get flooded again, and you know what?

We old timers think that that is the only thing now that will drive any sense at all into these fool's heads, which is to destroy the town, like the "Great Johnstown Flood" did all those years ago in Pennsylvania, but who knows about that, of course, since it is more than fifteen or twenty seconds ago, and so, is out of memeory, and just plain gone!

"Nature is benign, kiddies, so put your thumbs back in your mouths, and go back to sleep, it is alright", this to people in their twenties and thirties and forties, and more, who have to have everything "just so, don't you know!"

Before I built where I am, which is on land that I have lived on all my life, I still went out there two winters in a row, and walked around, and watched where the snow melted early, versus where it lingered, and when I had made sure that I was not moving onto wet ground, then and only then did I actually try to start living there.

Today, when I make mention of that, all I hear in return is "OH, I don't have that kind of time to wait; I WANT IT NOW!"

Well, okay, it's on its way!

And by the way, how long can you tread water?

Entropy, jeffmoskin!

Entropy!

That old bug-a-boo, entropy!

Disroder increases as a function of the intensity of the effort being made to achieve something, like a nuclear source of power to fuel an already entropic life style, and we engineers, who are now little more than a pack of whores, well, what we are supposed to do is to bow down to consumerism, and to do that, we are to pretend that there is no entropy!

Since everything is possible in theory, and because people want everything, regardless, then give it to them, and don't start making excuses like entropy!

"Oh, no, Livyjr, as engineers, it is our sacred duty to give things to people that they want, and it is not up to us to aseess such things as environmental harm caused by our own negligence!"

"That, Livyjr, is why we have politicians, here in OUR America, to make those decisions for us!"

"We are here to do what we are told!"

And so it is ....

And now, we have succeeded in two things, which are leading to a third, which is a concomitant of the first two:

a) We have built the world's biggest pyramid;

b) We have built the world's biggest pyramid upside down, so that ours stands on its point; and

c) Pyramids built to stand on their points are inherently unstable, and so come crashing down!

And what is the solution when you are beset by entropy?

Yes, folks, that's right - go faster still, because, there is no entropy!

It's all a lie!

How do I know?

I got it straight from a REPUBLICAN lawyer myself, and since they are the real "scientific" experts .....

"Flood of questions after dam's failure - Power, houses and highways are casualties as Pataki declares state of emergency"

By JORDAN CARLEO-EVANGELIST, Staff writer
First published: Monday, July 4, 2005

FORT ANN -- As day broke over the aftermath of the catastrophic dam breach that sent millions of gallons of water gushing through residential neighborhoods here, officials began to cobble together what caused the massive collapse of the 2-month-old dam that, incredibly, killed no one.

By day's end Sunday, dozens of officials, including Gov. George Pataki's chief of staff, had come to survey the devastation in this Washington County community about 60 miles northeast of Albany.

But there was no word on what caused the earthen, cement and steel bulwark to wash away, taking homes and roads with it.

Much of the south end of Hadlock Pond -- once a 220-acre lake with an average depth of 12 to 15 feet -- is now a mud flat sliced by a wide shallow stream.

Boats lie on the lake bottom next to wooden docks that are now hundreds of feet from the nearest water.

The dam's most prominent feature now is a 65-foot canyon west of its cement spillway.

Despite the evacuation of hundreds from the neighborhoods ringing the 1-mile man-made lake, no one was believed to have been killed or seriously injured, officials said.

Late Sunday, Pataki declared a state of emergency.

"We're lucky we didn't have a loss of life," said Bill Howard, Pataki's acting chief of staff, after a helicopter tour of the devastated area with state Sen. Betty Little, a Queensbury Republican whose district includes Fort Ann.

Both described scenes of overturned cars in the water's path.

"There's concrete pinning at one point, but there's no road there anymore."

"We're going to have tremendous detours here," Little said.

At least four homes were destroyed -- one by fire and three snatched from their foundations by the rushing water, said Town Attorney John Aspland Jr.

A 3-mile stretch of state Route 149, a major tourist connection to Vermont, remained impassable, washed out in three places where it crosses the normally tranquil creeks that drain the lake, he said.

Hadlock Pond Road, Copeland Pond Road and parts of 149 also remained closed.

Authorities estimated about 50 people were directly affected but many more were evacuated.

Many had not been allowed to return late Sunday, and officials declined to speculate on when power and roads would be restored.

The flood also damaged a nearby water main, and a boil-water advisory was in effect for the village of Fort Ann.

By Sunday evening, the water had begun receding, draining slowly southwest into the Champlain Canal.

Lisa Oriol woke Sunday morning in a nearby shelter to the radio sounds of Jon Politis, Colonie's EMS chief, and other airborne rescuers plucking a stranded diabetic man in need of insulin to safety in a helicopter.

"You get that helpless feeling," said Oriol, who returned from the supermarket about 6 p.m. Saturday to see water bubbling up through her back yard on Hadlock Pond Road and emergency crews yelling at her to leave immediately.

"You know how the stream sounds after a heavy rain?" she said.

"It sounded like that."

Oriol spent the night in the Red Cross shelter in the Bay Ridge Volunteer Fire Department with her family and two house guests who had driven up from New York City for the weekend.

Fifteen people stayed in the shelter Saturday night, said Edna Quesnel, a Red Cross volunteer from Ticonderoga.

"Some slept in their cars last night."

"Some slept at their mothers' or friends'," she said.

Only about half the residents around the lake live there year-round.

And because of the way the water poured south out of the dam, many of those worst affected lived away from the lakefront.

"We're just wondering how high the water went," Oriol said.

"Nobody knows, nobody can tell us."

The swarm of displaced and detoured residents who swamped a nearby Stewart's Shop for most of the day spoke more of the destruction than of why it might have happened.

Jeremy Barnes spent most of Saturday night trying to reach his four horses stabled on Goodman Road, one of several washed-out town roads.

It was an evening filled with the cries of terrified animals, he said.

"You ever heard 'If you don't know what to do, watch nature?'"

"The animals know what to do," he said.

Packing what little she had, Oriol echoed what many couldn't get past Sunday as the extent of the damage became painfully obvious:

"I didn't think the new dam would burst so soon."

The dam was completed in May, after a roughly $1.5 million safety rehabilitation done over the winter at the direction of the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

But Bob Pettersen, president of the Lake Hadlock Association, said many residents believed the old dam was sturdy and resisted building a new one.

"Had they left it alone, it wouldn't have occurred."

"People knew the dam needed work."

"The ironic part, and it's very sad, is that the dam was replaced so that this exact event would not occur," Pettersen said.

The dam, which many said had been around in some form since the 1800s, was redesigned to meet DEC guidelines for a so-called 500-year flood.

The land and the dam are owned by the town of Fort Ann, said Aspland, but the construction was funded through a state grant and a smaller tax district made up of homeowners who live on and near the lake.

"My understanding was that DEC was heavily involved," Pettersen said.

"It's my understanding they inspected the dam."

"There's enough blame on this one to go around."

"Nobody wanted this to happen."

DEC spokeswoman Maureen Wren said she couldn't comment on specifics of the investigation into Saturday's breach.

But she confirmed that the entire rehab project had been done under DEC oversight.

Aspland said that part of the dam's upgrade included the installation of two 50-foot fuse plugs, which are sections of the dam made of roller compacted concrete and engineered earthwork designed to fail first and control the flood to prevent a catastrophic collapse.

The fuse plugs appeared to be the section of the dam that gave way, Aspland said.

Pettersen said he knew of at least one resident who claims to have noticed the water level down as much as three inches Friday night, but Aspland said the town never received any report of it.

Kubricky Construction Corp. of Glens Falls won the bid to build the dam, Aspland said.

New Hampshire-based HTE Engineering was the project engineer.

Pettersen, a civil engineer by trade, said he believed the failure was caused by a construction or design flaw, not subsequent damage from recent storms.

Whether homeowners' insurance will cover their losses remains one of the most daunting questions. So is who is responsible for the calamity.

"That's something that needs to be addressed in the long term," said James Tuffey, director of the state Emergency Management Office.

Carleo-Evangelist can be reached at 454-5445 or by e-mail at jcarleo- evangelist@timesunion.com

[Livyjr]

Hello, I was just taking a look over the border at how you in America were feeling about things at the G8. 

Livyjr, I am glad to read the above because on news.bbc I read that Bush has no feelings of gratitude towards Blair over Iraq, and that boded badly for him being swayed on the Kyoto protocol. 

My husband would tell you how dear to my heart is the Kyoto Protocol, and how actively I promoted it until I got to thinking that all I am doing is making enemies of everyone, trying to persuade them not to idle their engines in our road etc.  so I have stopped for now. 

The news channels and documentaries do not seem to take climate change seriously in Japan. 

No one takes climate change seriously, lazyboy!

At least over here, in America, so far as I can tell anyway, and the "forces" of the "government" here, which is no longer "of us, by us, and for us", well, their efforts go into keeping the lid on, and telling people that it's alright, put your thumbs back in your mouths, kiddies (this to people in their twenties, thirties, forties, fifties, sixties on up), and go back home, there can be no climate change caused by man, because the earth is too big, and everybody knows .......

The problem is that the whole world economy is built up on a basis of destroying the earth, and all on it, and so ....

We are supposed to believe, as "good Americans" that we can consume, without end, and that is OUR due, over here, because God and Jesus are enamoured of the sinners who comprise the ruling class in America, and if we love God and Jesus, well, we will just keep consuming, so that the sinners will have more money to sin with, and thus, will make God and Jesus love them, and us, even more than yesterday!

A great big pack of lies, but since that is where the money is .....

And it is about the money, after all, isn't it?

I mean, isn't everything else just "cold comfort" if you don't have a huge wad of money to lay your pumpkin head down on every night .....

Isn't that why Donald Trump is in the TOP TEN of American heros of the MILLENIUM?

Climate change?

It's a lie cooked up by some "enviros" and "tree huggers" to politically embarass, George W. Bush, George Pataki, and the REPUBLICAN Party of America, and yes, folks, THE WORLD, too!

We're all REPUBLICANS now, and may God have mercy on OUR souls, for that!

[Livyjr]

Hello, I was just taking a look over the border at how you in America were feeling about things at the G8. 

And speaking about extreme paranoia and the G-8 (GANG of 8), and the "world's most powerful men", all in one breath .....

"G-8 Summit Site Under Security Lock Down"

By ED JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer

26 minutes ago

GLENEAGLES, Scotland - With a five-mile ring of steel, 10,000 police on standby, watchtowers and a no-fly zone, Gleneagles Hotel is locked down under a sophisticated G-8 security operation to protect the world's most powerful men.

Chief Constable John Vine of Tayside Police has spent 18 months planning for the arrival Wednesday of leaders of the Group of Eight industrialized nations in this picturesque corner of rural Scotland.

His team is braced for hundreds of anarchists and anti-globalization protesters who intend to disrupt the three-day summit — and the possibility of a terrorist strike.

"It is a potential terrorist target," Vine told The Associated Press.

"All our planning has been based on it both being a terrorist target and of course a target for public protest, so there is a necessity for us to have an exclusion zone."

Operation Sorbus — named after the berry of the rowan tree, which according to folklore wards off evil spirits — includes a 6-foot-high steel mesh fence around the perimeter of the exclusive Gleneagles hotel and country club, running through rolling farmland in the Perthshire countryside.

It is guarded by a series of watchtowers and a network of surveillance cameras.

As well as a formidable obstacle, the fence is also a clear demarcation line; protesters who attempt to cross it face immediate arrest, Tayside police say.

Inside the perimeter, where the leaders of Britain, the United States, France, Germany, Russia, Canada, Japan and Italy will meet Wednesday through Friday, are further extensive security measures, which police officials declined to describe.

About 10,000 officers drafted from across the United Kingdom are available to deal with G-8 protesters — from peaceful environmental and anti-poverty campaigners to hardcore anarchists.

Some 3,000 police are assigned to Gleneagles itself, including a specialist firearms team, officers mounted on horseback and a guard-dog unit.

An airship will act as a spy in the sky to spot troublemakers and beam back video footage to officers on the ground.

Two helicopters also will patrol the skies.

Police have set up four checkpoints on rural roads that pass close to the hotel's grounds and championship golf courses.

Only delegates, media and local residents issued with accreditation will be allowed to pass.

In a further security measure, gasoline stations across central Scotland have been banned from selling fuel in portable containers until the summit ends.

Vine, who has 22 years of policing experience, said an extensive intelligence operation had been under way for months, involving Britain's domestic intelligence service MI5, Special Branch and London's Metropolitan Police, gathering details on anarchist groups.

"Our strategy will be to try to deal with those people very quickly, very effectively, to try to separate them out from the peaceful protesters," said Vine.

"We know that this event will attract those elements to it."

"It always has done and it will on this occasion."

"There has been lots of speculation about what has happened at other summits, particularly Genoa," he said, referring to the 2001 G-8 summit in Italy, where an officer shot and killed a protester.

"I don't have a crystal ball," he added.

"We have spent 10 weeks training our officers across the forces of Scotland in dealing with public disorders."

"Police officers will be deployed in ordinary uniforms with a friendly face."

"We want to police this in a very low-key way."

"We do not want to overreact to anything that might happen."

The final guests at the five-star, 269-room hotel checked out Sunday to make way for the G-8 leaders.

In nearby Auchterarder, many locals were nervous about the planned march Wednesday by the campaign group G-8 Alternatives, which will pass through the town.

"It's the talk of the local bowling club, people are panicking, panicking," said Colin White, who works at a butcher shop.

"I don't believe a small community like this should have to put up with it."

"It should have been right in the middle of the Atlantic on an aircraft carrier."
___

Associated Press Television News producer Catherine Gaschka contributed to this report from Gleneagles.

end quotes

The "world's most powerful men"?

What a crock!

If they were that "powerful", they wouldn't need all these police to protect them, now would they?

I can just see Jesus coming back today, surrounded by a fifty-thousand man security force, and a fifty-mile security cordon, where no one, or nothing could get through, while Jesus handed out loaves and fishes .......

[jeffmoskin]

Hello, I was just taking a look over the border at how you in America were feeling about things at the G8.  Livyjr, I am glad to read the above because on news.bbc I read that Bush has no feelings of gratitude towards Blair over Iraq, and that boded badly for him being swayed on the Kyoto protocol. 

My husband would tell you how dear to my heart is the Kyoto Protocol, and how actively I promoted it until I got to thinking that all I am doing is making enemies of everyone, trying to persuade them not to idle their engines in our road etc.  so I have stopped for now.  The news channels and documentaries do not seem to take climate change seriously in Japan. 

If you go to a motorway parking area you will find ALL the juggernauts and trucks idling their engines NO MATTER WHAT THE WEATHER.  The Prime Minister does not seem to care.  The only really caring person is the Mayor of Tokyo who has a lot of sway because his brother was a famous and popular actor and he himself is a popular writer.  He has passed lots of legislation to cut down emmissions in Tokyo and this has helped a lot.

BushCo's answer to climate change is to take 11 percent of the world's known oil reserves off the market, thus driving the price up to $60 a barrel. Soon we will see $100 a barrel. This is what Adam Smith called the "invisible hand" and what BushCo has advanced to what I call the "invisible finger."

Surely, $3.00 gasoline will cause a decrease in consumption. Do I hear $4? $5?

We are supposed to believe, as "good Americans" that we can consume, without end, and that is OUR due, over here, because God and Jesus are enamoured of the sinners who comprise the ruling class in America, and if we love God and Jesus, well, we will just keep consuming, so that the sinners will have more money to sin with, and thus, will make God and Jesus love them, and us, even more than yesterday!

A great big pack of lies, but since that is where the money is .....

And it is about the money, after all, isn't it?

Sad, but true. But look at the bright side, Livyjr. Cheney and his buddies at H'burton have every single oil rig in America out on lease, what with the old "stripper wells" coming back on line. And Bush and his Texas buddies are pumping all they can at $60. Except for the smarter ones who are waiting to see $100 before they start pumping.

[Livyjr]

And speaking about extreme paranoia and the G-8 (GANG of 8), and the "world's most powerful men", all in one breath .....

"G-8 Summit Site Under Security Lock Down"

By ED JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer

GLENEAGLES, Scotland - With a five-mile ring of steel, 10,000 police on standby, watchtowers and a no-fly zone, Gleneagles Hotel is locked down under a sophisticated G-8 security operation to protect the world's most powerful men.
 
Operation Sorbus — named after the berry of the rowan tree, which according to folklore wards off evil spirits — includes a 6-foot-high steel mesh fence around the perimeter of the exclusive Gleneagles hotel and country club, running through rolling farmland in the Perthshire countryside.

It is guarded by a series of watchtowers and a network of surveillance cameras.

As well as a formidable obstacle, the fence is also a clear demarcation line; protesters who attempt to cross it face immediate arrest, Tayside police say.

Inside the perimeter, where the leaders of Britain, the United States, France, Germany, Russia, Canada, Japan and Italy will meet Wednesday through Friday, are further extensive security measures, which police officials declined to describe.

At midnight on July 1, 1997, Hongkong, the British Crown Colony, was restored to China.

The British seizure of Hongkong was an aspect of one of the most ugly crimes of the British Empire: the takeover and destruction of India, and the use of India to flood China with opium.

The British twice sent the Royal Navy to enforce opium addiction on China, in order to open up China for looting.

It was common knowledge before 1921, that the British Empire was the world's leading drug trafficker in the 19th century.

Even Ted Koppel, in a recent "Nightline'' special report on Hongkong, was forced to admit this.

The destructive nature of opium was well known at the time of the Opium Wars.

Opium is highly addictive, and induces passivity into the smoker.

Addicts seldom lived past age fifty; heavy smokers had a life expectancy of only five years.

The drug was widely used in Britain itself, even by the Royal Family, as shown by revelations that Queen Victoria's court frequently ordered opium from the royal apothecary at Balmoral.

In England, where opium was legal, the cause of the exceptionally high infant mortality rate in one Lancashire town was discovered to be a concoction, called "Godfrey's Cordial,'' a cough syrup containing opium which was given to babies, often in lethal doses.

While a prosperous Chinese official could afford opium addiction, a Chinese worker would spend two-thirds of his wages, neglecting his family.

Many Chinese saw opium as a poison introduced by foreign enemies.

In 1729, the Emperor banned the import of opium, except for a small amount, licensed as medicine.

In 1799 a stronger Imperial decree was issued prohibiting both the smoking of opium and its importation.

This decree stated:

"Foreigners obviously derive the most solid profits and advantages ... but that our countrymen should pursue this destructive and ensnaring vice ... is indeed odious and deplorable.''

Confucianism strongly condemned the use of drugs like opium.

Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716), the great German mathematician, physicist and philosopher, who wrote extensively on China, recognized that Confucianism contained many of the most positive features of Christianity.

Leibniz worked for an ecumenical alliance between Confucianism and Christianity.

In Confucianism, a man had a duty and debt to his ancestors.

His body was given to him by his ancestors as their link to his descendants.

Therefore, for a man to destroy his own body was a great offense against filial piety.

The British were well aware of the destructive nature of opium, but argued that opium sales were necessary because it was the only item which they could sell to the Chinese.

Payment for tea, which the British imported, had created a drain of silver from England to China.

The Governor-General of the East India Company stated in 1817,

"Were it possible to prevent the use of the drug altogether, except for medicine, we would gladly do it, in compassion for mankind.''

This explanation sounds like the famous bandit, Willie Sutton, who, when asked, "Why do you rob banks?'' responded, "Because that's where the money is.''

To understand British actions in the Opium Wars, it is necessary to step back, and to place them in the context of modern history.

The establishment of the nation-state, with the creation of France under Louis XI, as a project of the Golden Renaissance, allowed mankind to rise above a condition where 95% of the population lived little better than cattle.

However, a financial oligarchy, centered in Venice, was bitterly committed to preserving feudalism.

This Venetian oligarchy survived, and succeeded in capturing the Netherlands and England as the base for their operations.

The British East India Company (the "Company'') was one of the institutions created as a product of the Venetian takeover of England.

The Levant Company, set up to trade with the East, had been formed in 1592 as a fusion of the Turkey Company and the Venice Company.

In 1600, the East India Company was formed as a spin-off of the Levant Company.

It received a perpetual charter from the British Monarchy for a monopoly on trade with the East Indies.

In 1740, the Company's role in India was limited to trade through its centers at Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.

By 1815, it had an army of 150,000 men, and governed most of India, either directly or indirectly.

The Company utilized the vast superiority of European weapons to take over India in stages, through a series of wars.

Its takeover was assisted by the collapse of power of the Indian Moghul Emperors, which left India broken up into sections, controlled by local rulers.

By 1800, the main source of revenue, from Company operations in India, was land taxes, imposed on conquered lands.

Bengal was the first major area conquered by the Company.

Its army defeated the native ruler in 1757, and proclaimed itself the official ruler of Bengal in 1765.

It imposed incredibly harsh taxes.

The province deteriorated rapidly.

In 1770, the failure of monsoon rains, led to a famine in which an estimated one-third of the population perished.

Bengal then became the center of the East India Company's opium monopoly.

The East India Company's domination of the Indian economy was based on its private army.

However, giving the lie to the radical "privatizers,'' the ultimate muscle behind the company was the British military, as Lord Palmerston demonstrated by deploying it in the Opium Wars, to back up the British demand for "free trade.''

In the aftermath of the disastrous Bengal famine, the British Crown took control over the East India Company's operations, and, under the India Act of William Pitt the Younger, in 1785, the Governor-General of India was made a Crown appointment.

A six-member "Board of Control'' was established in London to "superintend, direct and control'' the Company's possessions.

On the Board were the British Chancellor of the Exchequer, and a Secretary of State, both ministers of the British Crown.

From this period, the "free-trade'' East India Company was, effectively, a semi-official branch of the British government, until it was finally formally dissolved in 1858.

The Company lost control of India with the Indian Revolt of 1857-58, when British troops poured in to crush the uprising.

The British government, under Lord Palmerston, took direct control of India.

Queen Victoria, who noted that most Englishmen felt "that India should belong to me,'' was made Empress of India in 1877.

http://east_west_dialogue.tripod.com/dialogue/id9.html

[Livyjr]

Sad, but true.

But look at the bright side, Livyjr.

Cheney and his buddies at H'burton have every single oil rig in America out on lease, what with the old "stripper wells" coming back on line.

And Bush and his Texas buddies are pumping all they can at $60.

Except for the smarter ones who are waiting to see $100 before they start pumping.

Out in Wyoming, around Lander, a little north of there, there was a little old man who did all his work with a team of horses, even in the winter.

He put up his hay with those horses, and in the winter, you would see him out there, feeding his cattle from off a wagon, while those horses pulled it along, like clockwork!

And this is somewhere around 1980, now!

His only motorized vehicle was an old Ford truck, circa 1930, or so, that he had bought new, and then never bothered to discard, as I guess he was not "sophisticated", and therefore didn't need the new Porsche 4-wheeel drive fancy version to haul his hay in, or whatever!

I used to watch that old man out there, doing his work, and I used to think that all the world could cease to function, right then and there, because it ran out of oil, and that old man would likely not even know about it!

And in a lot of ways, I guess I am like him, jeffmoskin!

Oil was nice, for awhile, but that is that!

Mankind lived for thousands of years without it, and when I was young, we really did not need it for much, and that is where I have gone back to, because it is where I came from!

George W. Bush and his crowd can ask $2,000 for a barrel of oil, as far as I am concerned, or maybe $10,000,000!

Who cares?

I don't anymore!

It is not worth the stress and worry of how I am going to keep up, because I can't!

Anymore, I am like a turtle trying to cross the L.A. Freeway at rush hour!

It's not my element, so why be there?

And you know, I feel so guilty that I don't have more to give up, so that these fat-bottomed rich folks can have the "more" that God decreed to them, I really do!

I feel that maybe if I dig a hole in the ground, and crawl down into there, and give them all my property and such, that it will make them a little better off, but my possessions are already pretty miserable, and so, it would likely only be a token gesture on my part, and that makes me feel so bad, that I can't do more to inflate these people's already over-inflated egos .....

[Livyjr]

Entropy, jeffmoskin!

Entropy!

That old bug-a-boo, entropy!

And what is the solution when you are beset by entropy?

Yes, folks, that's right - go faster still, because, there is no entropy!

It's all a lie!

How do I know?

I got it straight from a REPUBLICAN lawyer myself, and since they are the real "scientific" experts .....

"Homeowners Deal With Rising Property Taxes"

By JOHN PAIN, AP Business Writer

Sun Jul 3, 5:24 AM ET

MIAMI - As home prices skyrocket, property taxes are also going up, especially in hot markets like Florida, California and the Northeast.

"Young families simply can't afford to live here."

"It's very difficult for police officers, firefighters, teachers and nurses," said Lori Parrish, the property appraiser in nearby Broward County, who has pushed for more property tax breaks.

Teri Vasarhelyi and her husband thought they would be able to afford a bigger house with more land two years ago when they left San Francisco, the most expensive home market in the country.

They figured they found a good deal in a two-bedroom house in the peaceful, leafy Coconut Grove area for $440,000 in March 2004.

But the shock came when their first property tax bill came a few months later — more than $9,200 a year, nearly double what they paid in their old home.

"That's an awful lot of money, on top of your mortgage, to find that cash," said Vasarhelyi, 35, who's taking time off from her advertising career to raise their baby.

Many people are running into similar problems, a side effect of the real estate boom.

First-time home buyers are especially running into trouble as wages adjusted for inflation haven't kept pace with real estate prices, and elderly residents on fixed incomes who have lived in their homes for decades are also struggling to pay ever-increasing taxes.

The national average annual property tax collection was $971 per person in 2002-2003, up 18 percent from $822 five years earlier, according to the latest figures available from the Tax Foundation, a research organization in Washington.

The median home price nationwide rose to $170,000 in 2003 from $128,400 in 1998, according to the National Association of Realtors.

The most expensive states for property taxes were in the Northeast, with New Jersey topping out at $1,872 per person in 2002-2003.

The cheapest state was Alabama at $329 per person.

While rising property taxes in theory should slow down the real estate market, that hasn't happened for two key reasons:

"The popular belief that real estate is the best investment and the American willingness to spend a remarkably high fraction of their disposable income on housing," said foundation spokesman Bill Ahern.

Governments are still sensitive to complaints from homeowners.

At least 48 states have tried to give homeowners relief from rising property taxes, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

The methods include tax freezes, restricting property taxes to a percentage of the home's market value and caps on how much a home's assessed value can increase.

Many states are considering expanding property tax relief.

But local governments are also wary of cutting back on what they collect — they get more than 95 percent of all property taxes.

Altogether, American businesses and home-owners paid $296.7 billion in property taxes in 2002-2003, up from $279.1 billion in 2001-2002, according to the latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau.

Those numbers likely climbed even faster recently along with record-high home prices.

Property taxes pay for everything from schools and roads to police and fire departments.

While they usually are collected by local governments, states generally write the laws that govern them.

"States are interested in keeping property taxes manageable at the same time they're balancing the delivery of public services demanded by citizens," said Bert Waisanen, fiscal analyst with the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Property tax relief varies widely from state to state, and even within them.

A 2002 report by the legislative conference said that states are walking a tightrope to ensure that tax burdens are fair.

"(T)he relief provided to some may come at the expense of others," the report said.

California was a pioneer in easing the burden of property taxes.

In 1978, voters there passed Proposition 13, which capped the increase in a home's taxable value at 2 percent a year until it is sold.

It also limits a homeowners property tax to 1 percent of market value.

Many other states followed with similar breaks, even though California's recurring budget crisis has been partly blamed on the initiative.

Forty-eight states also give home-owners a homestead exemption or credit, which allows them to deduct a certain amount from their home's taxable value.

But those rules aren't enough to keep taxes level.

It is also becoming more difficult for people to move because they usually lose out on property tax breaks when they do.

For example, the previous owner of Vasarhelyi's house paid less because the increases in assessed values are capped in Florida at a maximum of 3 percent a year.

But once the house is sold, that limit is lifted.

So what options do people have when the taxman comes calling?

"The biggest thing that any individual home-owner can do is to make sure that they aren't overassessed."

"The errors that take place in assessing properties are rampant," American Homeowners Association president Richard J. Roll said.

Some common errors are improper calculation of square footage and incorrect number of bathrooms or bedrooms, he said.

Only 2 percent of homeowners have challenged their assessment, but many more should because about 70 percent of those who do receive a reduction, Roll said.

"There are often tremendous disparities for no apparent reason," he said.
___

On the Net:

American Homeowners Association's property tax kit: http://www.homeownertaxcut.com

Tax Foundation: http://www.taxfoundation.org/

U.S. Census Bureau: http://www.census.gov

[Livyjr]

And speaking about extreme paranoia and the G-8 (GANG of 8), and the "world's most powerful men", all in one breath .....

"G-8 Summit Site Under Security Lock Down"

By ED JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer

GLENEAGLES, Scotland - With a five-mile ring of steel, 10,000 police on standby, watchtowers and a no-fly zone, Gleneagles Hotel is locked down under a sophisticated G-8 security operation to protect the world's most powerful men.
 
Chief Constable John Vine of Tayside Police has spent 18 months planning for the arrival Wednesday of leaders of the Group of Eight industrialized nations in this picturesque corner of rural Scotland.

His team is braced for hundreds of anarchists and anti-globalization protesters who intend to disrupt the three-day summit — and the possibility of a terrorist strike.

"Police Scuffle With Protesters Before G-8"

By ED JOHNSON, Associated Press Writer

35 minutes ago

EDINBURGH, Scotland - Police scuffled with black-clad anarchists and antiglobalization protesters Monday in the streets of Edinburgh, and 450 demonstrators sat down in the road blocking an entrance to a naval base for nuclear submarines.

The demonstrators at the Clyde Naval Base, who protest every year, vowed to shut down the base for Britain's nuclear armed Trident submarine fleet during the G-8 summit meeting, starting Wednesday in Scotland.

"It is vitally important that people make the link between the industrial war machine and the poverty that so many people are suffering from around the world," said protester Jenny Gaiawyn, 26.

As two helicopters circled overhead, helmeted police, including a contingent on horseback, stopped a march by some 300 anarchists and opponents of globalization in the city's financial district, then slowly let them go one by one.

Most of the marchers wore black, and some had masks.

There was also a standoff in Edinburgh near the Sir Walter Scott monument where riot police stood three-deep to stop a mix of about 150 clowns, anarchists and local people.

Protesters jumped up and down and blew whistles, stood atop bus shelters and dragged several park benches onto the road.

Some directed obscene gestures and shouts at police.

One man stripped off his clothes and walked naked down the street, pursued by reporters.

But there was also a lighter element.

Some protesters kissed police riot shields, leaving lipstick marks.

A bagpiper wearing a skateboarding helmet provided a musical accompaniment.

Office workers leaned out of windows to watch as one clown waved a carrot at police horse, another tried to tickle their noses with a feather duster.

One protester held up a banner outside Starbucks saying, "abolish capitalism before it kills the planet."

In Gleneagles where the leaders will meet, mounted police and a mobile surveillance camera unit were seen on the streets.

Minor roads were closed, and police roadblocks were set up around the hotel, site of the summit.

The hotel was also protected by a 6-foot tall steel mesh fence, a series of watchtowers and a network of surveillance cameras.

About 10,000 officers from all over the country are policing the event.

At Clyde Naval Base, more than 100 police officers were stationed at its entrance and at intervals around its perimeter.

They appeared to be adopting a low-key approach aimed at avoiding confrontations with the protesters; no arrests had been reported.

The protesters later broke up into smaller groups and marched around the base's perimeter fence.

At several entrance points, groups of between six and 10 sat on the ground and joined hands with plastic piping covering their arms in an often-used tactic that makes it more difficult for police to separate them and remove them from the scene.

end quotes

I don't know about anyone else, but those clowns sure do scare me!

Pretty heavy duty TAY-RIZM when they bring in the clowns ......

[Livyjr]

"Storm Expert: Hurricane Danger on the Rise"

By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, Associated Press Writer
Wed Jun 29, 6:24 PM ET

WASHINGTON - Hurricane activity has increased and is likely to remain high for a decade or more, the head of the National Hurricane Center said Wednesday.

"Tropical Storm Watch Issued for La. Coast"

1 hour, 38 minutes ago

MIAMI - A tropical storm watch was issued Monday along the entire Louisiana coast as a tropical depression gained strength in the Gulf of Mexico.

The watch was issued for about 280 miles along the Louisiana coast from the mouth of the Mississippi River to Sabine Pass, Texas.

A watch means tropical storm conditions are possible within 36 hours.

At 5 p.m EDT, the system was about 435 miles south of the mouth of the Mississippi River and moving north-northwest at 12 mph, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

The depression had top sustained winds of 35 mph, and could strengthen into a tropical storm Tuesday with top sustained winds of at least 39 mph, forecasters said.

Early Monday, the system made landfall over the Yucatan Peninsula and it could bring another 2 to 4 inches of rain over the peninsula's northern tip over the next day, forecasters said.

The depression could bring a total of 10 inches of rain in some areas.

This is the third tropical depression of the Atlantic hurricane season, which began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

The next tropical storm would be named Cindy.
___

On the Net:

National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

[Livyjr]

"Shiite-Sunni Tension Rises Anew in Iraq"

By HAMZA HENDAWI, Associated Press Writer

Sun Jul 3, 1:37 PM ET

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The Shiite mourners were crying for blood, threatening to burn down a Sunni town where dozens of Shiite travelers had been slain.

Their rage boiled over after a fresh spate of bombings killed nearly 40 people in Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad.

A senior Shiite politician, Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, appealed for calm, telling the 2,000-strong crowd that Sunnis and Shiites must live in peace together.

Yet he had sent a very different message just two days before, suggesting Shiites set up vigilante groups to track down "terrorists" in the Sunni-led insurgency and report them to security authorities, which are dominated by Shiites.

Tensions between Shiite Arabs and the Sunni minority are rapidly worsening, pushing Iraq closer to a civil war that could disrupt its young democracy and lead to its breakup.

The mood of the crowd appeared to reflect the angry tone of al-Hakim's June 24 statement in which he called on Shiites to set up "popular committees" in their neighborhoods to "uncover terrorist cells" and report them to security forces — most of which are Shiite-dominated.

The call for vigilante groups appeared to suggest a system very similar to what was used by Saddam's Baath party and security agencies to ferret out critics of the regime.

Replicated in the south, it could spell the breakup of Iraq, a country that has existed in its present shape for less than a century.

"Bush: Insurgents won't win in Iraq - During Fourth of July speech, president asks Americans to support troops"

July 4: Speaking in West Virginia, Bush called for Americans to continue supporting troops and their families.

Updated: 1:02 p.m. ET July 4, 2005

MORGANTOWN, W. Va - President Bush, speaking on America's birthday, said the insurgents in Iraq will fail to stop democracy in that country and U.S. forces will stay "until the fight is won."

The president also asked Americans to support U.S. troops by flying the flag, writing a letter to troops in the field and supporting a military family down the street.

Bush was applauded often as he spoke at a campus setting at the West Virginia University in front of American flags and red, white and blue bunting hanging from windows.

He said the insurgents won't win in Iraq.

"They continue to kill in hope they will break the resolve of the American people but they will fail," Bush said.

'Until the fight is won'

Bush said Iraqis are fighting alongside Americans, telling the cheering crowd, "As Iraqis stand up, we will stand down, and then our troops can come home to a proud and grateful nation."

On a hot, steamy day, the president removed his tie and rolled up his sleeves as he vowed, "We will stay until the fight is won."

He added, "In this war there's only one option and that is victory."

Bush characterized the insurgents in Iraq as "men who celebrate murder" as they seek to spread their ideology and "turn the Middle East into a haven of terror."

Even though the television images of death "are "difficult for our compassionate nation to watch," Bush said, the insurgents are no closer to stopping the move toward democracy.

"Terrorists can kill the innocent but they cannot stop the advance of freedom," he said.

The president called Iraq only the latest battlefield in the war on terror, and warned that "America will not tolerate regimes that harbor or support terrorists."

Third Fourth visit

Bush has made an Independence Day visit to West Virginia a tradition of sorts.

This was his third time.

And it was a quick one -- 90 minutes from touchdown to takeoff from Morgantown, according to his schedule.

Morgantown, in north-central West Virginia, is the state's fastest growing community.

It climbed by about 1,350 people to 28,160 between April 2000 and July 2004, according to new census figures.

Several thousand students, veterans, civic leaders and members of the military listened to Bush at West Virginia University's downtown campus for the ticket-only event.

Demonstrators were kept some distance away and could barely be heard.

Public works and parks crews worked over the weekend to spruce up the areas where Bush's motorcade was to pass.

Last year, Bush spoke before about 6,500 residents at the state Capitol Complex in Charleston on Independence Day.

In 2002, a crowd of more than 8,000 gathered to hear him speak in Ripley.

Bush crisscrossed the state during his re-election campaign last year, making nine visits between April and September.

He won West Virginia's five electoral votes by more than 13 percentage points.

Bush also campaigned at Morgantown High School during the 2000 race.

His visit to West Virginia University is the first by a sitting president since 1911, when William Howard Taft attended the inauguration of Thomas E. Hodges as the school's eighth president.

[jeffmoskin]

Oil was nice, for awhile, but that is that!

Mankind lived for thousands of years without it, and when I was young, we really did not need it for much, and that is where I have gone back to, because it is where I came from!

If you divide the 3,000,000 square miles, 1,920,000,000 acres, by 300,000,000 people, you get 6.4 acres per person. I am of course counting the mountains and the deserts, but... my point is that if we reverted to the 19th century, with 19th century methods, we could not survive as a nation as large as we have become.

We are wedded to the modern City model. And that means we are hooked on energy.

I'm not saying we couldn't get by with half as much - - - maybe one quarter as much. But we cannot ALL do what you are doing. There are too many of us.
BTW, can you imagine the consequences of 300 millions people using 19th century sanitation?

[b][color=red]California was a pioneer in easing the burden of property taxes.

In 1978, voters there passed Proposition 13, which capped the increase in a home's taxable value at 2 percent a year until it is sold.

It also limits a homeowners property tax to 1 percent of market value.

One of the WORST pieces of legislation ever passed. And it was done because of the total failure of OUR Legislature to act. And we are stuck with it.

Before prop 13, we had sufficient funding for the school system, the police, fire departments, and the like. Now, everybody is scrambling for funds, and our once great schools are now ranked with Mississippi.

[lazyboy]

Livyjr, I read with interest about the opium. I believe Afgahnistan and Colombia are rich in poppies and cocaine respectively. I wonder where the money trail leads....

Do you think that it would be better if people lived in cities or the country. I heard on the BBC that the average co2 consumption of an Indian in India was 1 ton a year, for the UK citizen about 8 or 9 tons a year, but, incredibly for the American at least twice that at almost 20 tons a year.

Having visited Canada and the USA - Vermont I noticed that because these countries are so large, if you live in a small town and have a friend in another small town near you, you may have to drive three quarters of an hour to have a cup of coffee together.

This is, I think, how the co2 consumption is so high compared to Britain. Perhaps living in cities with public transport is a better solution.. I have not really thought it through though. People then decide they have to fly three quarters of an hour to go to a meeting at the other side of the country.

I notice Mr Blair was in Singapore just to tell them London wants to have the Olympic games. Why could they not sent some British diplomat who lives in Singapore to do that???

You are so right about inflated egos.

[jeffmoskin]

Livyjr,  I read with interest about the opium.  I believe Afgahnistan and Colombia are rich in poppies and cocaine respectively.  I wonder where the money trail leads....

You can bet that the CIA and the Bush crime family are getting a cut.

Having visited Canada and the USA - Vermont I noticed that because these countries are so large, if you live in a small town and have a friend in another small town near you, you may have to drive three quarters of an hour to have a cup of coffee together.

This is, I think, how the co2 consumption is so high compared to Britain.  Perhaps living in cities with public transport is a better solution.. I have not really thought it through though.  People then decide they have to fly three quarters of an hour to go to a meeting at the other side of the country. 

You should see Texas. People drive for HOURS to go to a mall. And they drive a truck.

I notice Mr Blair was in Singapore just to tell them London wants to have the Olympic games.  Why could they not sent some British diplomat who lives in Singapore to do that??? 

You are so right about inflated egos.

Blair is small time. When Bush travels, he and his coterie take one 747; the press and flunkies take a second one.

[Livyjr]

I notice Mr Blair was in Singapore just to tell them London wants to have the Olympic games. 

Why could they not sent some British diplomat who lives in Singapore to do that??? 

You are so right about inflated egos.

Oh, everybody that is anybody is in Singapore, right now, pitching their city as the one to choose!

Ms. Hillary (Clinton) is over there on behalf of New York, as is Michael Boomberg, the Mayor of New York!

A real "happening" town, over there, is what I hear, that Singapore place, if you like the fast life, as these people like Blair evidently do, the Savile Row set, what!

A great big party, at our expense, so why not?

Don't you know that is why these people get into that racket, in the first place, because everything is free, and you have absolutely no responsibility, to boot?