Boy, am I with you on that sentiment!

And I'm surprised these "rocket scientists" in the Democratic National Committee can't seem to see these things very clearly, especially since it is all right out there in plain sight!

Too much focus goes into the office of the president, is what I think, these days anyway, as compared to a hundred years or so ago, and when one looks at the United States Constitution, and the history of that document, it is quite clear that the House and Senate are the more important bodies in OUR frame of government, at least as it was originally envisioned to be, and so, if the Democratic National Committee wants to start attracting some voters, like me, who am an independent, then the Democratic National Committee is going to have to start, in my own opinion, coming across as knowledgable about OUR frame of government, as opposed to being seen as just a bunch of mouthy, ignorant politicians, which is the image that I got from that Terry MacAuliffe, and now Howard Dean, who I have considered a numbskull ever since that SSSSSCCCCRRREEEEAAAAAMMMMMM!

Being mouthy and ignorant may play well to somebody, but I just don't know who that is, myself, and so ....

And while we're on the subject of mouthy and ignorant not playing well, here in OUR America, what's this, then?

Could it be?

Could it really be?

The American people are finally starting to wake up and realize that in their fear, in their abject terror, which was in their minds, they have just royally screwed a whole vital nation by putting in incompetent back in the White House for FOUR MORE YEARS?

washingtonpost.com Highlights

"Poll finds dimmer view of Iraq war - 52 percent say United States is no safer than before conflict"

By Dana Milbank and Claudia Deane

Updated: 7:29 a.m. ET June 8, 2005

WASHINGTON - For the first time since the war in Iraq began, more than half of the American public believes the fight there has not made the United States safer, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

While the focus in Washington has shifted from the Iraq conflict to Social Security and other domestic matters, the survey found that Americans continue to rank Iraq second only to the economy in importance -- and that many are losing patience with the enterprise.

Nearly three-quarters of Americans say the number of casualties in Iraq is unacceptable, while two-thirds say the U.S. military there is bogged down and nearly six in 10 say the war was not worth fighting -- in all three cases matching or exceeding the highest levels of pessimism yet recorded.

More than four in 10 believe the U.S. presence in Iraq is becoming analogous to the experience in Vietnam.

Perhaps most ominous for President Bush, 52 percent said war in Iraq has not contributed to the long-term security of the United States, while 47 percent said it has.

It was the first time a majority of Americans disagreed with the central notion Bush has offered to build support for war: that the fight there will make Americans safer from terrorists at home.

In late 2003, 62 percent thought the Iraq war aided U.S. security, and three months ago 52 percent thought so.

Overall, more than half -- 52 percent -- disapprove of how Bush is handling his job, the highest of his presidency.

A somewhat larger majority -- 56 percent -- disapproved of Republicans in Congress, and an identical proportion disapproved of Democrats.

There were signs, however, that Bush and Republicans in Congress were receiving more of the blame for the recent standoffs over such issues as Bush's judicial nominees and Social Security.

Six in 10 respondents said Bush and GOP leaders are not making good progress on the nation's problems; of those, 67 percent blamed the president and Republicans while 13 percent blamed congressional Democrats.

For the first time, a majority, 55 percent, also said Bush has done more to divide the country than to unite it.

Rising gloom

The surge in violence in Iraq since the new government took control -- 80 U.S. troops and more than 700 Iraqis died in May alone amid a rash of bombings -- has been accompanied by rising gloom about the overall fight against terrorists.

By 50 percent to 49 percent, Americans approved of the way Bush is handling the campaign against terrorism, down from 56 percent approval in April, equaling the lowest rating he has earned on the issue that has consistently been his core strength with the public.

The dissipating support for the Iraq war is of potential military concern, because, as Marine Lt. Gen. James N. Mattis wrote in a note to his troops as he led them back into Iraq in February 2004, "our friendly strategic center of gravity is the will of the American people."

Some authorities on war and public opinion said the figures indicate that pessimism about the war in Iraq has reached a dangerous level.

"It appears that Americans are coming to the realization that the war in Iraq is not being won and may well prove unwinnable," said retired Army Col. Andrew J. Bacevich, a professor at Boston University.

"That conclusion bleeds over into a conviction that it may not have been necessary in the first place."

That is the view of poll respondent Margaret Boudreaux, 63, a casino worker living in Oakdale, La.

"I don't think it's going well -- there's too much killing," she said, worrying that the Iraq invasion could move more enemies to violence.

"I think that some of the people, if they could, would get revenge for what we've done."

‘A lot of talking’

"You hear a lot about Saddam but nothing about Osama bin Laden."

"I don't think he [Bush] does enough to deal with the problems of terrorism. . . ."

"He's done a lot of talking, but we haven't seen real changes," said another poll respondent, Kathy Goyette, 54, a San Diego nurse.

"People are getting through airport security with things that are unbelievable. . . ."

"I don't think he learned from 9/11."

While Bush has shelved his routine speeches about terrorism, and Congress has turned to domestic issues, fear of terrorism has receded from the public consciousness.

Only 12 percent called it the nation's top priority, behind the economy, Iraq, health care and Social Security.

The drop in Bush's approval ratings on fighting terrorism came disproportionately from political independents.

In March, 63 percent of independents approved of Bush's job combating terrorism.

By April this had fallen to 54 percent.

And in this weekend's survey, 40 percent gave him good marks.

The poll suggests that views on the Iraq war's impact also remain highly partisan.

Three in four Republicans said the Iraq invasion has boosted domestic security, while three in four Democrats said it has not.

Political independents lean negative on the issue: About six in 10 said the war has not made Americans safer.

Overall, Bush's 48 percent job approval rating was essentially unchanged from the 47 percent rating he received in a late-April poll.

And there was growth in the proportion of people who said the economy was doing well: 44 percent, up from 37 percent in April.

But the public took a generally gloomy view of the White House and Congress.

A plurality said Bush is doing worse in his second term than in his first, and 58 percent said he is not concentrating on the things that matter most to them -- the worst showing Bush has had in this measure in Post-ABC polls.

Disapproval of Congress

Congress fared no better.

The proportion of the public disapproving of the legislative body was at its highest since late 1998, during President Bill Clinton's impeachment.

More people said they would look at a candidate other than their sitting representative than at any point in nearly eight years.

For the first time since April 2001, Democrats (46 percent) were trusted more than Republicans (41 percent) to cope with the nation's problems.

But at the same time, favorability ratings for the Democratic Party, at 51 percent, tied their all-time low.

A total of 1,002 randomly selected adults were interviewed by telephone June 2 to 5 for this Post-ABC News poll.

The margin of sampling error for the overall results is plus or minus three percentage points.

The poll also found disapproval or division when it came to Bush's performance on several other recent, high-profile issues.

One-third of those surveyed approved of the way Bush is handling federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, while 55 percent disapproved.

The public was divided on the president's handling of judicial nominations, with 46 percent approving and 44 percent disapproving.

And half said they were opposed to drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a proposal backed by Bush and being debated in Congress.

But the most striking trend identified by the survey was the spreading impatience over Iraq and national security matters.

While six in 10 were confident that the United States was not violating the rights of detainees at the military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Americans were more skeptical that the government is protecting the rights of U.S. citizens at home.

Only half said Americans' rights were being adequately protected, down from 69 percent in September 2003.

James Burk, a sociologist at Texas A&M University, said disillusionment about Iraq may have grown to the point that policymakers will have difficulty reversing it.

"People all across the country know people in Iraq [so] there's a direct connection to the war," he said.

Burk sees a "disjuncture" between upbeat administration rhetoric and realities the public perceives.

"These data suggest we will soon reach the point, if we haven't yet reached the point, where that kind of language will seem too out of touch."

Polling director Richard Morin contributed to this report.

end quotes

Take all the lies out of this administration's mouth, and they would all be mutes, without a solitary thing to say, if they couldn't just tell some more lies, to cover up the lies of yesterday, and the day before that and ........

And speaking of the man whose head blew up on national TV, or so I heard, anyway, when he emitted that now-famous scream .....

MSNBC Poll @ 6:15 PM EST

What is the political impact of Howard Dean's remarks about the GOP? * 31464 responses

He will rally the Democratic Party faithful 31%

He's a boon to the Republican Party 44%

I'm not sure yet 12%

I don't care 13%

Politics

"Dean defends view of GOP as 'Christian party' - Democratic Party chairman tries to turn attention to other issues"

The Associated Press
Updated: 11:01 a.m. ET June 8, 2005

WASHINGTON - Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean on Wednesday defended his recent harsh criticism of Republicans, including his observation that they are “pretty much a white, Christian party.”

Dean noted that he, too, is a white Christian.

But he said the GOP is too narrow in its scope and the Democratic Party is far more diverse.

While even prominent Democrats in recent days have distanced themselves from some of his comments, the outspoken Dean, appearing on NBC's “Today” show, said criticism of him is meant by Republicans to divert attention from the country’s problems and make him the issue instead.

Dean told a forum of journalists and minority leaders Monday that Republicans are “not very friendly to different kinds of people, they are a pretty monolithic party ... it’s pretty much a white, Christian party.”

Challenged on that during the NBC interview, Dean said “unfortunately, by and large it is."

"And they have the agenda of the conservative Christians.”

“This is a diversion from the issues that really matter: Social Security, and adequate job opportunity, strong public schools, a strong defense,” Dean said.

Raising eyebrows

Asked about it on the “Fox & Friends” show, GOP Party Chairman Ken Mehlman joked that “a lot of folks who attended my bar mitzvah would be surprised” he heads a Christian party.

“We gotta get ourselves beyond this point where when we disagree about politics, we call the other guy names,” he said.

The former Vermont governor also recently raised eyebrows when he told a group of progressives that Republicans “never made an honest living in their lives,” a comment he was forced to explain a day later.

The one-time presidential candidate also said that House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, who has not been accused of any crime, ought to go back to Houston where he can serve his jail sentence.

Some Democrats distance selves

On Wednesday, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said that while Dean was "doing a great job" as party chairman, "I don't think the statement that the governor made was a helpful statement."

She later added that it "is not a fair assessment to characterize the Republicans" the way Dean did.

Democratic New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Tuesday that Dean is doing a good job, but is not the party’s spokesman.

Last weekend, Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., and 2004 vice presidential candidate John Edwards criticized Dean for his recent remarks, saying he doesn’t speak for them.

Biden, asked about Dean Wednesday during an interview on the Don Imus radio show, also said the chairman is doing a good job.

“A lot of things he does say, I agree with,” Biden said.

But he also said that Dean “has views that are slightly different than mine ... But look, he’s a lightning rod."

" ... It’s probably good that there’s a guy out there that’s a lightning rod ... .”

Biden, however, added that he thinks “the rhetoric is counterproductive.”

“I think this country has a purple heart, not a red heart or a blue heart,” Biden said.

“If we can’t bring this (country) together, man, boy, we’re really in deep trouble.”

And speaking of intellectual dishonesty .......

"Survey: Scientific Misbehavior Is Common"

By MALCOLM RITTER, AP Science Writer

2 hours, 49 minutes ago

NEW YORK - It's not the stuff of headlines, like fraud.

But more mundane misbehavior by scientists is common enough that it may pose an even greater threat to the integrity of science, a new report asserts.

One-third of scientists surveyed said that within the previous three years, they'd engaged in at least one practice that would probably get them into trouble, the report said.

Examples included circumventing minor aspects of rules for doing research on people and overlooking a colleague's use of flawed data or questionable interpretation of data.

Such behaviors are "primarily flying below the radar screen right now," said Brian C. Martinson of the HealthPartners Research Foundation in Minneapolis, who presents the survey results with colleagues in a commentary in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

Scientists "can no longer remain complacent about such misbehavior," the commentary says.

But "I don't think we've been complacent," said Mark S. Frankel, director of the Scientific Freedom, Responsibility & Law Program at the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Frankel, who wasn't involved in the survey, said its results didn't surprise him.

But he said that the survey sampled only a slice of the scientific community and shouldn't be taken as applying to all scientists.

The survey included results from 3,247 scientists, roughly 40 percent of those who were sent the questionnaire in 2002.

They were researchers based in the United States who'd received funding from the National Institutes of Health.

Most were studying biology, medicine or the social sciences, with others in chemistry and a smaller group in math, physics or engineering.

Of the 10 practices that Martinson's study described as the most serious, less than 2 percent of respondents admitted to falsifying data, plagiarism or ignoring major aspects of rules for conducting studies with human subjects.

But nearly 8 percent said they'd circumvented what they judged to be minor aspects of such requirements.

Nearly 13 percent of those who responded said they'd overlooked "others' use of flawed data or questionable interpretation of data," and nearly 16 percent said they had changed the design, methods or results of a study "in response to pressure from a funding source."

Martinson said the first question referred to other researchers in their own lab, and the second question referred to pressure from companies funding their work.

But David Clayton, vice president and chief scientific officer at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, which focuses on biomedical research, said he found both questions worded so vaguely that they could be referring to perfectly acceptable activities.

Clayton also says it's not clear whether the behaviors addressed in the survey have been increasing or declining over time.
___

On the Net:

http://www.nature.com

"'Downing Street memo' gets fresh attention"

By Mark Memmott, USA TODAY

Wed Jun 8, 6:58 AM ET

A simmering controversy over whether American media have ignored a secret British memo about how President Bush built his case for war with Iraq bubbled over into the White House on Tuesday.

At a late afternoon news conference, Reuters correspondent Steve Holland asked Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair about a memo that's been widely written about and discussed in Europe but less so in the USA.

It was the most attention paid by the media in the USA so far to the "Downing Street memo," first reported on May 1 by The Sunday Times of London.

The memo is said by some of the president's sharpest critics, such as Democratic Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, to be strong evidence that Bush decided to go to war and then looked for evidence to support his decision.

The Sunday Times said the memo is the minutes of a meeting that British Prime Minister Tony Blair had with some of his top intelligence and foreign policy aides on July 23, 2002, at 10 Downing Street, the prime minister's official residence.

The story said the memo indicates that Blair was told by the head of Britain's MI6 intelligence service that in 2002, the Bush administration was selectively choosing evidence that supported its case for going to war and ignoring anything to the contrary.

The war began in March 2003.

"Intelligence and facts were being fixed" by the Bush administration "around" a policy that saw military action "as inevitable," the newspaper quoted from the memo.

"There's nothing farther from the truth," Bush told reporters as Blair stood at his side.

"Both of us didn't want to use our military," Bush said in response to a question about the memo.

"It was our last option."

Blair added, "The facts were not being 'fixed' in any shape or form at all."

Bush said that at the time the memo was written, no decision had been made about going to war.

He pointed out that it was written two months before he went to the United Nations and asked for a Security Council resolution calling on Saddam Hussein to give up his weapons of mass destruction or face "serious consequences."

The Sunday Times' May 1 memo story, which broke just four days before Britain's national elections, caused a sensation in Europe.

American media reacted more cautiously.

The New York Times wrote about the memo May 2, but didn't mention until its 15th paragraph that the memo stated U.S. officials had "fixed" intelligence and facts.

Knight Ridder Newspapers distributed a story May 6 that said the memo "claims President Bush ... was determined to ensure that U.S. intelligence data supported his policy."

The Los Angeles Times wrote about the memo May 12, The Washington Post followed on May 15 and The New York Times revisited the news on May 20.

None of the stories appeared on the newspapers' front pages.

Several other major media outlets, including the evening news programs on ABC, CBS and NBC, had not said a word about the document before Tuesday.

Today marks USA TODAY's first mention.

Some activists who opposed Bush's decision to attack Iraq have been peppering editors with letters and e-mails to push the media into more aggressive coverage.

Last week, a group known as Democrats.com offered $1,000 to anyone who can get Bush to answer "yes or no" to this question: Did he or his administration "fix the intelligence" about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and alleged ties to terrorism?

"We want what the Michael Jackson, Paris Hilton and Star Wars stories have gotten: endless repetition until people have heard about it," says David Swanson, one of Democrats.com's organizers.

Robin Niblett of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think tank, says it would be easy for Americans to misunderstand the reference to intelligence being "fixed around" Iraq policy.

"'Fixed around' in British English means 'bolted on' rather than altered to fit the policy," he says.

Ombudsmen at both The New York Times and The Washington Post have been critical of their newspapers for not covering the story more aggressively.

USA TODAY chose not to publish anything about the memo before today for several reasons, says Jim Cox, the newspaper's senior assignment editor for foreign news.

"We could not obtain the memo or a copy of it from a reliable source," Cox says.

"There was no explicit confirmation of its authenticity from (Blair's office)."

"And it was disclosed four days before the British elections, raising concerns about the timing."

end quotes

And the way things are today, where seemingly eveything is a lie that is associated with either this Blair, or George W. Bush, and the "media", who can know whether up is down anymore, let along whether right is really left?

And the other point that never seems to get noticed, is that George W. Bush today is STILL TALKING ABOUT SADDAM HAVING WMD's!

Saddam had no WMD's, so George W. Bush's trip to the U.N. to get a resolution making Saddam give up something that he never had, and thus could never give up, was nothing more than a sham to justify attacking Iraq so as to be able to take over its oil, for Dick Cheney's crowd, and so ....

And so, I wonder that anyone at all in the media takes these denials and evasions seriously anymore!

But that's just how it is with toadies and lapdogs, I guess, they are loathe to do anything but lick the hand that feeds and cuddles them, and so .....

And speaking of all in OUR America that is or can be a casualty to all the endless lies that we have been hearing from the present incumbent's adminstration, how about OUR national security?

"Army Headed to Recruiting Shortfall"

By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

36 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - The Army appears likely to fall short of its full-year recruiting goal for the first time since 1999, raising longer-term questions about a military embroiled in its first protracted wars since switching from the draft to a volunteer force 32 years ago.

Many young people and their parents have grown more wary of Army service because of the likelihood of being dispatched on combat tours to Iraq or Afghanistan, opinion polls show.

U.S. troops are dying at a rate of two a day in Iraq, more than two years after President Bush declared that major combat operations had ended.

The Army says today's economy offers attractive alternatives to many high school and college graduates.

The recruiting statistics appear to bear that out.

Officials said Wednesday that although the Army will not release its numbers until Friday, it fell about 25 percent short of its target of signing up 6,700 recruits in May.

The gap would have been even wider but for the fact that the target was lowered by 1,350.

The Army said it lowered the May target to "adjust for changing market conditions," knowing that the difference will have to be made up in the months ahead.

The Army also missed its monthly targets in April, March and February — each month worse than the one before.

In February it fell 27 percent short; in March the gap was 31 percent, and in April it was 42 percent.

"It's like having a persistent drought," said Daniel Goure, a military analyst at the private Lexington Institute.

"At some point when you have drought conditions you have to institute water rationing, and that's what you potentially face in the military if it goes on long enough."

"You would get to a stage where you don't have enough people to staff your organizations."

Prior to February, the last time the Army had missed a monthly recruiting goal was May 2000.

The Army National Guard and Army Reserve are even farther behind in recruiting this year.

The shortfalls have led to speculation that the government might be forced to reinstitute the draft.

There is little support for that in Congress, and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has ruled it out, saying the all-volunteer force has proven the wisdom of discontinuing the draft in 1973.

Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, spokesman for the Army's chief of personnel, said in an interview that despite the recent setbacks the Army remains cautiously optimistic that it will make up the lost ground this summer — traditionally the most fruitful period of the year for recruiters — and reach the full-year goal of 80,000 enlistees.

"One number matters: 80,000," Hilferty said.

"The Army's fiscal 2005 goal was, is and remains 80,000 recruits."

Others, speaking privately, said the official optimism is sagging rapidly.

They note that with only four months left in the budget year, the Army is at barely 50 percent of its goal.

Recruiters would have to land more than 9,760 young men and women a month, on average, to reach the 80,000 target by the end of September.

In other words, they would have to far exceed their official targets, which range from 5,650 to 9,250 a month.

With the summer recruiting season in mind, the Army has added hundreds of extra recruiters, raised the enlistment bonus for four-year commitments to $20,000, and targeted more advertising at parents.

Hilferty says the extra recruiters are being counted on to produce big results between now and September.

"They're better now than they were last month," he said.

"Experience counts."

Goure said the prospect of reaching 80,000 is grim.

"I don't see them making it," he said.

If the slump ended next year the impact might not be great.

But if it continues, as many expect, the consequences could be large.

The problem, if it lasts, would be particularly acute for the Army because it is in the midst of a major expansion of its ranks — from about 482,000 soldiers in the active force to 512,000 — in order to complete a top-to-bottom redesign of its 10 combat divisions.

That redesign is central to the Army's "transformation" plan to become more agile and mobile — and to have more units available for duty in Iraq.

The Marine Corps also has missed monthly recruiting targets lately, but only by small margins.

The Air Force and the Navy, in contrast, are easily meeting their goals, in part because they play much smaller and less publicized roles in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Navy is actually trying to shed thousands from its ranks.

Beyond the statistical comparisons, the military as a whole may be entering a period in which new approaches are needed to fill its ranks.

Charles Moskos, a sociology professor and expert on military personnel issues at Northwestern University, has said the Army's recruiting woes are likely to persist until the children of upper-class America begin to enlist more readily.

He also sees a possibility of the services relying more on non-Americans to sign up.

Moskos said in an interview Wednesday that of the 750 males in his graduating class at Princeton University in 1956, more than 400 went on to serve in the military.

Of the 1,100 males and females in last year's Princeton class, eight joined.

"That's the difference," he said.
___

On the Net:

Army recruiting aid: http://www.goarmy.com/flindex.jsp

Army Recruiting Command: http://www.usarec.army.mil/

And here is one of those local stories from my area that always interest me, for the memories of the history of this particular area that they dredge up, in more ways than one, I guess:

"Burial plot holds secrets to the past - Experts speculate bodies found at site were soldiers from early encampments"

By PAUL GRONDAHL, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Thursday, June 9, 2005

COLONIE -- Workers digging a trench for a municipal sewer line uncovered 13 old graves near the Menands line that could date nearly 250 years.

The site at 592 Broadway, called Hedge Lawn, is across from Schuyler Flatts, a sprawling estate and farm of the Schuyler family that served as an encampment for soldiers who mustered out to the French and Indian and Revolutionary wars.

Work was halted Wednesday. Colonie town officials, engineers and archaeologists will determine within the next few days how best to study, dig up and rebury skeletons from the burial plot so that the sewer project can proceed.

Given nearby underground utilities and heavy shale deposits, rerouting the sewer line around the graves or a boring technique that would drive the pipe under them did not seem feasible, officials said.

"Everybody wants to do what's right for the individuals resting there and to comply with the various laws," said Colonie town attorney Arnis Zilgme.

He said the abandoned burial plot does not appear on maps and its provenance is uncertain.

Detailed archaeological work has not yet begun, but a human skull found there appeared from a brief inspection to be very old, perhaps from the mid-1700s.

"It's completely speculative at this point, but there was a lot of activity with soldier encampments from the mid- to late 18th century," said Colonie town historian Kevin Franklin.

The skull discovery was made late Sunday morning when backhoe operator John Vellano Jr. dug a trench across an access road at a time when trucks from a nearby Federal Express warehouse were idle.

He had excavated the first 54 feet of an 1,100-foot trench to a depth of 13 feet near the Colonie-Menands border.

"He dumped a load of soil, and a skull rolled off the pile," said the operator's father, John Vellano, owner of Anjo Construction.

The soil was studded with melon-sized rocks, and workers initially thought what they had seen was a stone.

Upon closer inspection, workers discovered the "rock" had a jaw and eye sockets.

"It was kind of strange and eerie," Vellano said of the skull.

They shut down the backhoe, police were called in and they quickly surmised that the skull dated from centuries past and could not be the remains of any recent missing person case.

Archaeologists with Hartgen Archaeological Associates did a preliminary assessment.

They marked off and covered remnants of 13 wooden coffins with tarps.

The bodies are buried uniformly, about five feet deep, side by side, all facing east to west.

It suggests a burial plot from a specific period.

"There's been a lot of conjecture that possibly this was a burial plot for soldiers who died in action or from disease at the military encampments," said Peter Hess, president of nearby Albany Steel, vice president of Albany Rural Cemetery and a local historian.

Hess said the abandoned cemetery plot probably predates the stunning Greek Revival mansion behind a stand of trees, hardly visible from the roadway at 592 Broadway.

His company owns the 1830 house, which has been divided into eight rental units.

The home was built by Gen. William Jenkins Worth, a commandant of the Watervliet Arsenal and military hero from the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War.

His fame was so great that Fort Worth, Texas, is named for him.

He was buried in Manhattan near the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Broadway.

The grave site is marked by a tall obelisk monument to Worth in a busy median just off Times Square.

Several years before his death in 1849, Worth sold the mansion in Colonie to the Jermain family, who named the estate "Hedge Lawn."

A Jermain relative who lived there, Margaret Olivia Slocum, married the wealthy industrialist Russell Sage and she inherited Sage's fortune of more than $100 million, with which she founded Russell Sage College in Troy.

Today, Hedge Lawn is a stone's throw from a Burger King restaurant and a stretch of commercial buildings, aged strip malls and apartment complexes.

Beginning in the Colonial era, the area was a magnet for the wealthy who settled as country squires in the bucolic setting north of the crowded, dirty and noisy urban center of Albany.

Across Broadway, along the Hudson River plain, Schuyler Flatts had been in the prominent Dutch family from 1672, when Gen. Philip Schuyler's great-grandfather purchased the farmland from the Van Rensselaers.

The Erie Canal, opened in 1825, ran along what is Broadway today between Schuyler Flatts and Hedge Lawn.

In Colonial times, the Flatts was a popular American Indian trading center.

Later, in the 18th century, the Schuylers allowed soldiers to camp on the grounds while on their way to fight in the French and Indian Wars and at the Battles of Saratoga and other Revolutionary War battles.

"This whole area is rich with history," Franklin said.

In 1998, a construction crew came upon an old cemetery plot near the 592 Broadway site while digging a water line to the new Federal Express warehouse.

The remains were determined to be a woman, surrounded by a rotted coffin.

No extensive archaeological work was done then.

The FedEx facility was built on the grounds of the former Tri-City Drive-In.

This week's discovery of 13 coffins will delay the $180,000 sewer rehabilitation project.

It is being done to redirect the current flow into Watervliet back to the Colonie trunk sewer, said Gary Male, managing engineer with C.T. Male Associates.

It is one piece of a $1 million series of sewer rehabilitation projects being undertaken around Colonie.

Probably most people in OUR America today would not recognize the Schuyler name, which is certainly alright with me, but in the early days of this nation's history, the 1750's through the Revolutionary War, and beyond, at least through that period when the United States Constitution ratification was being debated, the Schuylers were quite involved in that history, and if it were not in part for the influence of the Schuylers, whose daughter Betsy, I believe it was, was married to young Alexander Hamilton, Hamilton himself would likely not have been made a delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1787 in Philadelphia, and then, who knows, but I always find these connections between people in various places over time to be interesting, and so, when given the opportunity, or maybe even half an opportunity, well, I do prattle on then, don't I.......

Which brings us to this other story, kind of from that same area, but a little later era in time:

"Remaking a 19th century wonder - Canal created the Empire State, but route awaits a vital 21st century role"

By KATE GURNETT, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Sunday, May 29, 2005

The Erie Canal ushered in America's industrial era.

Envisioned by a bankrupt flour merchant, it was scoffed at by Thomas Jefferson and designed by self-made engineers.

Building the $7 million waterway proved deadly to laborers, many Irish, who worked up to their waists in leech-ridden waters near Cayuga Lake.

Others were killed in Lockport, blasting through 2 miles of solid rock.

Residents cut trees to lean atop their houses for protection from the flying boulders.

For Native Americans, particularly New York's Iroquois, the canal accelerated their dispossession through questionable land deals and Indian removal policies.

But DeWitt Clinton's "folly," a 363-mile canal just 4 feet deep and 40 feet wide, featured 18 aqueducts and 83 locks to raise or lower boats.

The engineering marvel prompted a national canal fever.

Travel time from Albany to Buffalo was cut in half.

With shipping costs sliced from $100 to $4 a ton, the canal carried Genesee Valley wheat and cheese, Finger Lakes fruit and Adirondack timber to the port of New York, which quickly surpassed Philadelphia.

Along the way, it created a culture best described by Herman Melville.

Living near the locks when Lansingburgh was a major port, he'd hoped for his own canal job.

Later, in Moby Dick, he wrote of the Erie Canal:

"For three hundred and sixty miles, gentlemen ... through numerous populous cities and most thriving villages; through long, dismal, uninhabited swamps, and affluent, cultivated fields, unrivalled for fertility; by billiard-room and bar-room; through the holy-of-holies of great forests; on Roman arches over Indian rivers; through sun and shade; by happy hearts or broken; through all the wide contrasting scenery of those noble Mohawk counties; especially, by rows of snow-white chapels, whose spires stand almost like milestones, flows one continual stream of Venetianly corrupt and often lawless life."

Cargo and passenger boats grew so thick the canal was widened to 70 feet beginning in 1836.

In 1905, the state launched a $155 million conversion of the Erie into New York's "Barge Canal."

The new route used river sections, was 125 feet wide and 12 feet deep.

By then, canal traffic was being eclipsed by trains.

And later, trucks.

Though barges were common on the Erie Canal well into the 1960s, the waterway fell into disrepair by the 1970s.

Locks crumbled.

Concrete chipped.

Piers disintegrated.

By the late 1980s, state leaders turned to recreation as a way to revitalize the Erie Canal corridor, which includes the Champlain, Oswego and Cayuga-Seneca canals and two Finger Lakes.

In 2000, the area was designated a National Heritage Corridor.

After years of review, the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor Commission plans to soon release a management plan.

It covers recreation, marketing, economic development and historic preservation for the canal and many of the 234 municipalities within the corridor.

HAMILTON, ALEXANDER, lawyer, statesman, was born Jan. 11, 1757, in the West Indies.

He entered the army as an officer of artillery and became an aid-de-camp to Washington, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

He was a delegate to the continental congress in 1782 and 1783, and in 1787 and 1788; in 1786 was elected to the state assembly; was elected to the convention which framed the federal constitution; by his writings, signed Publius, did much to secure its adoption, but was the only member from New York who signed that instrument.

In 1789 he was appointed secretary of the treasury, and continued in that office until 1795, when he resigned.

In 1804 he had a difficulty with Aaron Burr, which resulted in a duel, which took place at Hoboken, when he received a fatal shot, and died on the following day, July 12, 1804.

As a brilliant modern American thinker once said,:

" There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, it's probably in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on ... shame on you. It fool me. We can't get fooled again."

During winter camp at Morristown, Hamilton met and fell in love with Elizabeth Schuyler, whom he would marry at the end of the year.

The Schyuler family was one of the wealthy Dutch dynasties of New York.

Elizabeth's father, Major General Philip Schuyler, was acquainted with Hamilton and was delighted with the match, despite the fact that Hamilton was penniless and propertyless.

Not inconsiderable was the fact that the marriage would be a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Schuyler had a feeling that Hamilton would go far and was willing to give him a push if necessary; although it turned out that Hamilton ended up doing most of the pushing.

In "Betsy" Hamilton found a loving and adoring wife, who proved a steadfast companion even in his darkest moments.

When not busy with correspondence or courting his wife-to-be, Hamilton turned back to the business of building a better nation.

During his tenure as aide-de-camp, Hamilton had formed important ties among New York politicians with whom he regularly corresponded.

On the request of congressman James Duane, Hamilton wrote a lengthy missive on his "ideas of the defects of our present system, and the changes necessary to save us from ruin."

Hamilton then enumerated the weaknesses of the current government, and offered a very forward-thinking solution: ". . .by calling immediately a convention of all the states with full authority to conclude finally upon a general confederation."

The Philadelphia convention was still seven years away.

The rest of the letter reveals a great chunk of what was to become Hamilton's official policies.

Indeed, a study of his unofficial political musings prior to his taking office as Secretary to the Treasury show the unfolding of a consistent political plan for America based upon his experiences with the government of a weak confederation.

Congress's inability to provide even the most basic of the army's needs proved the dire necessity for a more powerful government.

The army, Hamilton observes "is now a mob . . . without cloathing, without pay, without provision, without morals, without discipline."

"We begin to hate the country for its neglect of us; the country begins to hate us for our oppressions of them."

The poor state of the army comprises "three fourths of our civil embarrassments."

Once again, he casts the eyes of the world on the doings of the American government.

Hamilton then goes on to detail a financial plan for the country.

Had his future political rivals read this letter, none of Hamilton's fiscal policies would have taken them by surprise.

He suggests revenue sources--securing a foreign loan, a money tax on business, and a tax in kind on farmers.

He expounds upon turning the public debt to the nation's advantage; creating an economy based on paper money; and dwells at length on the founding of a national bank which would be established by the investments of "monied men of influence" who would "relish the project and make it a business."

Knowing full well how his plan would be received by the bulk of Americans, Hamilton opines:

"There are epochs in human affairs, when novelty even is useful."

http://www.iment.com/maida/familytree/henr...derhamilton.htm

And then what happens, jeffmoskin, is that despite those wise words of this brilliant American PROPHET, WE GET FOOLED AS A NATION, ALL OVER AGAIN, EACH AND EVERY DAY, BY THIS SAME GUY THAT IS SAYING "CAN'T GET FOOLED AGIN", above here!

SO!

Go figure that, will you?

Except .....

I wonder, maybe down there in Tennessee, they don't get fooled like they do in Texas ...........

No, that's not right, 'cause they got Frist, and Texas has DeLay, and Bush, and so .....

Maybe they get fooled worse?

Just so we here in Ohio don't feel left out -- we got Taft. So there.

A.B.

And howdy, Mr. A.B., good to know you're around as always, with your own observations on Life in OUR America, over the span of your own lifetime, which it is good to hear about from time to time, these thoughts of yours from days gone by, like on Mr. Taft, here.

It's interesting, Mr. A.B., how our regional differences shape our perspectives on things, and especially politicians, who often times are from someplace, like George W. Bush, or Howard Dean, but are known differently than that in other places, because of this "media" thing that can portray a person in an entirely false light, all too often, for either good or ill!

People in the place a politician is from often have a view of that person that can be insightful, but generally is never heard outside of that small region, as in the case of George Pataki, who is out there raising money in a lot of other states than New York, where people do not really "know" him, while here, he is held in low regard, partly because he is not here doing his job, but instead, is out there traipsing around, raising money for himself and George W. Bush and the Republican Party, as if that is what we, the people here, elected him to do, which to me, is being damn frivolous with OUR trust, and ON OUR DIME, to boot.

And Taft is probably outside the consciousness of a lot of people today, and so, hearing the name, and having to think of who he really was, is a good mental exercise for us younger folks in here, and so, thanks for providing the impetus to have to do that thinking, and if you like, feel free to flesh out your thoughts with a thumbnail sketch of Mr. Taft, from your perspective.

To me, the ultimate beauty of this thread is that it has no real form, no real substance that has to be defended in any way, shape or manner; no ground to control, so to speak, and so, at a literal moment's notice, I can go streaking off in just about any direction possible, and based on what Mr. A.B. has added above here, which is his thoughts on Mr. Taft, and the people of Ohio, I want to jump back in time even farther than that, to the days of OUR nation's beginnings, which in this case would be 1787, in the wake of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, which I must say, are times in OUR America, the significance of which I am only now coming to really grasp, in terms of their significance to US in OUR America today!

I have been reading lately from a book entitled Miracle at Philadelphia, by Catherine Drinker Bowen, and it is about the 1787 Constitutional Convention, largely through the eyes of James Madison, though his notes of the convention, which were extensive, and exhaustive, and thus, are a continuing source of information about OUR America, right on down to OUR present times, as anyone following along in my Judicial Thread would note from the language of Justice O'Connor, just the other day in a well-publicized United States Supreme Court decision which I have posted over there, for its language on how OUR Constitution is interpreted today, by the courts of this nation.

The specific phrase that came to me from that book, in response to this comment above by Mr. A.B., about Mr. Taft, is from words by General John Lamb, who in the days before ratification, expressed fears concerning what the true range of presidential power was to be in OUR America, AFTER George Washington was gone, and his humility with him, from that high office.

It is said that General Lamb grew tired of hearing about George Washington and his virtues alone as a reason to ratify the Constitution, who Lamb called "our illustrious chief, this Cincinnatus who laid down his laurels and returned to the plow", like a common citizen, here in OUR America, despite the fact that he could have been a king, if he so chose!

The words of General Lamb which caught my attention are these, where General Lamb admitted that it was all well and good with General Washington, "BUT WHAT ABOUT GENERAL SLUSHINGTON, WHO MIGHT SUCCEED HIM"?

And what about General Slushington, indeed?

How many of him have we had sitting on the throne since General Washington departed that high office?

At least one, isn't it, and in OUR own times, to boot?

Lamb, John

Lamb, John, 1735–1800, American Revolutionary leader, b. New York City.

Prior to the Revolution he was a leader of the Sons of Liberty in New York and helped form the New York committee of correspondence to coordinate anti-British activity.

With Isaac Sears he led (1775) a mob that seized the New York customhouse and another that captured the British arms at Turtle Bay in Manhattan.

Lamb served in the Quebec campaign and in later battles.

In 1784, he became collector of customs in New York City.

Later he was one of the leaders of the opposition to the U.S. Constitution in New York.

See I. Q. Leake, Memoir of the Life and Times of General John Lamb (1850, repr. 1971).

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed.

About this Governor of ours here in the Buckeye State of Ohio ----

It's important to know that, basically, both rural and downstate

Ohio is pretty much Republican. Most of the larger northern cities, i.e. Cleveland, Toledo, Youngstown, Akron, etc, are largely democrat cities.

That is why so many Ohio Governors & Senators are GOP'rs. Also why inept people like Taft and that person in the White House get so many Ohio votes.

Dems are simply outnumbered.

Taft is a " downstater ", from Cincinnati I believe.

Back to Taft ------Mediocrity is his greatest asset. Most Ohio people think he is fairly honest. This includes most dems. Just not very smart.

There is a big scandal happening right now in the state concerning several million dollars of so called lost or missing funds. I agree with the word missing but not with the word ' lost'. When something is lost, it generally means no one knows where it is. I have always held the belief that there is no such thing thing as ' lost' government money. Someone always knows where it is but producing it is liable to send the finder to jail.

These missing funds are from the assets of the Workman's Compensation Bureau.
It is quite a long story. In the interests of brevity, let us just say that Mr. Taft has once again come up with egg all over his face. His honesty is not being questioned.
Just his ability.

I have put in a few quotes from the Cleveland daily paper, in order to provide a better understanding of this ' happening'.

Ohio Democrats cry foul; Taft surprised by investment losses
Friday, June 10, 2005
T.C. Brown
Plain Dealer Bureau
Columbus- Gov. Bob Taft is weary of "getting surprised" with the drumbeat of revelations of financial missteps by the Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation, but he warned Thursday there could be more to come.

Democrats, meanwhile, toured the state decrying a "cover-up" by state Republican leaders and calling for a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation. They also want the BWC Oversight Commission to cede authority for approving investments to the state treasurer for a year.

This week, the bureau publicly acknowledged that politically connected MDL Capital Management, of Pittsburgh, lost $215 million in bureau investments last year. Taft says he learned of the missing funds only this week.

The latest news added fuel to an ever-growing financial scandal involving the bureau's $55.4 million investments in rare coins controlled by Toledo coin dealer and Republican money machine Tom Noe. That investment has lost up to $13 million and Noe has become the subject of civil and criminal investigations.

Taft, who initially defended the coin investments, did not know of the coin fund or MDL's losses, "a huge amount of money to lose," Taft said Thursday.

Taft held a 20-minute news conference after he and interim BWC Administrator Tina Kielmeyer gave bureau employees a pep talk.

"Clearly there was something very wrong with the investment management at the Bureau of Workers' Compensation," Taft said. "I don't think we know yet everything that went wrong with that part of the bureau."


The MDL fund ran into problems when it greatly exceeded the leveraging of its principal account, at one point putting the bureau at risk for between $3.5 billion and $7 billion, according to Jim McLean, the bureau's chief financial officer who was put on leave this week.

Taft said, "I simply don't know" why his bureau liaison, Jim Samuel, failed to alert him about the MDL investment loss after Samuel received an e-mail in October from former Administrator Jim Conrad. Conrad resigned last week.

"A process was in place and the bureau was taking care of this issue. Things were happening," Samuel said. "I didn't recall the e-mail. When I saw it this week, I remembered it."

Taft said Samuel will no longer serve as the bureau's liaison.

At an earlier Statehouse news conference, Senate Minority Leader C.J. Prentiss accused Republican leadership of conducting a "cover-up all the way up and all the way down."

Prentiss - and other Democrats at a morning news conference in Cleveland - renewed calls for equal representation on a House-Senate committee that will examine the bureau's investments.


Harris, a Republican, said that if Democrats don't appoint members, he will appoint them, and if they fail to show, they will be marked absent.

"We are in the majority and we are responsible for whatever we do," Harris said. "Trying to make this an issue sounds good politically."

As state GOP Chairman Bob Bennett accused Democrats of conducting a "politically motivated road show," Attorney General Jim Petro proposed legislative changes in the way state agencies award contracts.

Plain Dealer reporter Brian Albrecht contributed to this report.

A.B.

Well, Mr. A.B. you just got me to see how far my own ignorance runs, because the Taft that I thought you were talking about was that other Taft, the "White House" Taft of some years ago.

Over in my JUDICIAL thread, I just finished a post about how little we really do know of this country, in the aggregate, and here is a case in point, where being from the east of you, and in another state, I really am pretty ignorant of what Ohio politics are really all about, and that is what I like about this forum, and this thread, is that we get a chance to hear from people like yourself, who is just another person out there, with experience of life, as opposed to all these "spinners' and "pundits" and "pitchmen" and "shills", whose job it is to package up some other incompetent that someone wants in office, for their ends, and designs.

Since I have seen the power this forum in particular gives to us as common citizens, here in OUR America, I have begun to envision all of us as a continuing "committee of correspondence", as was the case here in OUR America during the pre-revolutionary war days, when British corruption was rampant over here.

The information that I get to consider in here, like your viewpoints, Mr. A.B., coupled with this "news" from your area, serves to "inform" me in a way that has never been available to me, before, and I find that kind of mind-boggling at times, that you and I could even be having this conversation in here at all, because just a short time ago, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN IMPOSSIBLE.

It's like finding two pins in a giant haypile, instead of just one, the odds that you and I, and jeffmoskin, and all these others, would ever meet, let alone converse, when you think of all the obstacles that there are to that happening, distance alone being the very first of those.

SO!

If you're simple-minded like me, miracles occur every day, and you know, Mr. A.B., that's not a bad thing, at all!

And by the way, I think Pataki is over in Spain right now!

Who he is getting money from over there, we don't know yet, but since Pataki is like a New York city taxi, which doesn't move from the curb unless there is money in the meter ........

And what a mouthfull you have just said here, Mr. A.B.!

Missing money!

Up here, it is missing because all these "special people" that are better than the rest of us, and who therefore are "privileged" to have "public office" absent the need for "public trust", since they are better, and we are not, well, because they are "special", ISN'T THAT MONEY IN OUR TREASURY REALLY THEIRS, to do with what they will because we are just too stupid to know the difference?

"Audit questions SUNY Foundation payments - Comptroller cites housing allowances for presidents, $1.3 million for lobbyist"

By KENNETH AARON, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Friday, June 10, 2005

ALBANY -- An audit of the State University of New York's Research Foundation uncovered questionable housing allowances to a pair of presidents and a payment to send the child of SUNY's top enrollment officer to an out-of-state college, state Comptroller Alan Hevesi said Thursday.

The audit, which included July 2001 through the end of 2003, pointed to other transactions that Hevesi found suspect -- such as a $1.3 million contract with a Republican lobbyist that didn't specify particular duties.

The $97,500 in housing allowances -- including $46,500 that went to SUNY acting Chancellor John Ryan when he was president of SUNY Maritime College -- helped skirt the university's regulations limiting presidents' housing perks to $37,500.

"This is highly inappropriate and it is unfair to the students and faculty on all SUNY campuses -- and indeed to all New Yorkers," Hevesi said.

Foundation officials said that some of Hevesi's complaints are unfounded because it is not a state agency subject to SUNY rules, but a private, nonprofit group that supports SUNY and pays for research.

The housing allowances and tuition reimbursement helped attract top-flight talent to SUNY, officials maintained.

And the lobbyist -- former U.S. Rep. Bill Paxon -- helped attract millions of dollars to the system.

"Over the past five years, we've spent $5 million and brought in $87 million," foundation spokeswoman Cathy Kaszluga said.

The audit comes at a time when SUNY has been criticized for excessive compensation.

In January, for example, former Chancellor Robert King asked for a six-month paid leave at the same time that a tuition hike was on the table.

He canceled his request and the tuition hike was ultimately shelved, but he still was given a $206,000-a-year professorship after he stepped down as chancellor last week.

The foundation has several SUNY officials on its board but is not subject to the same rules of disclosure as the university and has long resisted attempts to shine light on many of its financial doings.

The organization was reluctant to give Hevesi's office information, but ultimately acquiesced.

Assembly Higher Education Chairman Ronald Canestrari said the foundation is a "mystery agency" that needs to be opened up to increased public scrutiny.

"We fought for every dollar for SUNY, fighting back a tuition increase, fighting to restore the tuition assistance program," the Cohoes Democrat said.

"And here, dollars are being spent in this manner."

"It's outrageous."

Kaszluga said the foundation fought against releasing records because officials didn't think Hevesi had jurisdiction to see them.

"Our records are appropriately public through our annual report, our IRS filings and the audits performed by the sponsoring agencies that provide the funding," she said.

The vast majority of the foundation's $710 million budget last year came from federal sources.

State tax dollars are not used to support it.

While much of the money goes for scientific research at SUNY institutions, the foundation can also pay for things that improve the system.

The foundation stopped paying a housing allowance to Ryan, who also served a year as interim president at the University at Albany until February.

The other president to get a housing payment was John Craine, who ultimately succeeded Ryan at the Maritime College but was president of the Levin Institute in Manhattan when the foundation gave him $51,000.

The foundation is not currently giving housing payments to any other presidents.

But Kaszluga argued that these payments are common practice.

David Bass, director of the National Center for Institutionally Related Foundations, agreed.

"That's just one of the many ways that college and university foundations can bring private resources to support the missions of the institutions that they're affiliated with," he said.

The $7,000 tuition payment to Wayne Locust, SUNY's vice chancellor for enrollment and university life, matched a perk he got at his last school, the University of Connecticut.

His daughter was already enrolled at a non-SUNY school.

The foundation "was happy to help SUNY recruit a person of this caliber rather than lose him over such a small amount of money," Kaszluga said.

Foundation officials agreed with some of the audit's findings.

They plan to institute tighter controls on no-bid contracts, for instance, and require better documentation of goods and services supplied to the foundation before payment is made.

That's what bothers me about this country. It seems to me that, because of TELEVISION, the not-so-very-smart candidate who looks like "one of us" (I'm talking about a certain dim-witted Texan now) can convince 50 percent of the electorate (and I'm talking give or take 3.5 million) to vote for him.

Doesn't speak well for OUR country.

It was James Madison who said, “It is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently a free people.”

How did we get to where we are today?

And how do we escape?

Trying to make this an issue?

Excuse me, but I would say it already was one, at least from a citizen's point of view, here.

And boy, Mr. A.B., this country has REPUBLICANS, like a dog has fleas!

And you got a nitwit for a governor out there, from the sounds of it, Mr. A.B., while here, we have a thug instead, or at least a thug-like man!

Up here, Pataki knows where the money is going, and he makes no pretenses whatsoever about it being anything other than intended, since the REPUBLICANS, in his scheme, have the "power", and so, they have the graft, as well, because in New York State, politics and graft are indistinguishable, and so .....

At least the nitwit sounds honest, and maybe that is something, if you can only overlook what sounds like gross incompetence .....

And from Mr. A.B.'s beloved Ohio, we wing our way back east to where I am, and here, it is hot and unsettled, and unseasonably so.

Right now, we are under the influence of what is known up here as a "Bermuda High", and so, our air is coming in from the south, and when I look down that way .....

"Tropical Storm Arlene moves into gulf - Forecasters say system could become weak hurricane Saturday"

NBC News and news services
Updated: 1:35 p.m. ET June 10, 2005

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla - Florida's west coast was already feeling the wind and rain as Tropical Storm Arlene strengthened Friday and moved north through the Gulf of Mexico, bearing down on Gulf Coast communities still recovering from last year’s hurricanes.

Forecasters said Arlene, the Atlantic hurricane season’s first named tropical storm, could become a weak hurricane before hitting the Deep South late Saturday, with the worst weather arriving earlier, east of the storm’s center.

It was then expected to travel north along the Mississippi-Alabama line, reaching Tennessee by Sunday evening.

Mississippi officials urged residents in flood-prone areas to move to higher ground, and two large deepwater oil platforms off the Louisiana coast were evacuated.

In Pensacola Beach, where many residents are still living in government trailers because of damage from last year’s Hurricane Ivan, residents eyed the forecast warily.

Margie Wassner, 57, said she planned to ride out Arlene with friends inland in Pensacola.

“It’s pretty scary to me."

"I just kept hoping that we wouldn’t have anything, but I don’t know."

"It’s awfully early in the year to be having this,” she said.

Tropical storm warnings and hurricane watches were posted from Florida to Louisiana for Arlene, which had top sustained winds of 60 mph, up from 45 mph earlier in the day.

A tropical storm becomes a hurricane when its speed reaches 74 mph.

Arlene's speed was likely to increase, but forecasters said the biggest impact would be heavy rain that arrives ahead of the storm’s center.

'Major rainfall'

“This is going to be a major rainfall event before and ahead of the storm,” said Trisha Wallace, a meteorologist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.

At 11 a.m. ET, Arlene’s poorly defined center was about 440 miles southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River.

The storm was moving north at about 13 mph, picking up speed from its 10 mph pace earlier in the day, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

Wind and rain extended 150 miles north and east of the storm’s center.

Southern and central Florida could see tornadoes Friday and more than 7 inches of rain by midday Saturday.

Beach erosion was also possible, with coastal storm surge flooding of 2 to 4 feet above normal tide levels.

A tropical storm warning stretched along the northern Gulf Coast from Grand Isle, La., to St. Marks, Fla., including Lake Pontchartrain.

A hurricane watch went from the mouth of the Pearl River to Panama City, Fla.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush told reporters that the state and its residents were prepared, saying he was encouraged by “phenomenal” sales of generators and hurricane-related materials.

“This is a good sign that people are taking this very seriously,” Bush said.

Resident feels odds in his favor

Panhandle residents were told to prepare for possible heavy rain and flooding this weekend.

Sitting outside his temporary mobile home, 69-year-old retiree Jim Milliken monitored the forecasts and hoped the bad luck that cost him his house had finally run its course.

“I have to assume the probabilities are in my favor and it’s not going to be a really big, bad thing this time,” he said.

The Atlantic hurricane season began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

Forecasters have predicted a very active summer.

Fifteen named storms spawned nine hurricanes last year.

Florida was struck by hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne; between them, the four storms damaged one out of every five homes in the state.

The storms caused about 130 deaths in the United States and are blamed for $22 billion in insured damage.

Florida State meteorologist Ben Nelson warned coastal residents that flooding patterns could be different now “because the dunes, the offshore structures, have been changed around by Ivan.”

Oil, crop concerns

Crude oil held above $54 a barrel Friday, amid concerns about U.S. supply disruptions as the Atlantic hurricane season gets under way.

Many offshore wells and some refineries are located around the gulf.

One of the gulf’s largest producers, Chevron Corp. said it was evacuating 900 company and contract workers from the area, including some essential ones, but production was not affected.

Murphy Oil said it was shutting three oil and natural gas platforms and removing all workers on them ahead of the storm.

Total and BP had also evacuated nonessential staff from offshore facilities, and Total shut production at three of its rigs.

Hurricane Ivan wrecked seven oil platforms and numerous pipelines in the gulf, which provides 25 percent of domestic production.

Arlene could also blow soybean rust spores into Alabama and neighboring states by early next week, the U.S. Agriculture Department said.

Soybean rust is a contagious windborne disease that can slash soybean crop yield by as much as 80 percent.

Cuba welcomes rain

Arlene was a godsend for central and eastern Cuba, where light rainfall brought relief from the longest drought in a century.

The storm also dumped 4.5 inches of rain on the tobacco-growing province of Pinar del Rio, which grows the leaves for Cuba’s famed cigars.

Some 14,000 people were evacuated Thursday night from Cuba's southern coast, including several hundred foreign tourists at a diving center.

Havana saw some evacuations and coastal flooding but no reports of deaths or injuries.

The Associated Press, Reuters and NBC's Mary Murray in Havana, Cuba, contributed to this report.

end quotes

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush told reporters that the state and its residents were prepared, saying he was encouraged by “phenomenal” sales of generators?

What, he has stock in some generator company, then?

Encouraged by the "phenomenal" sale of generators?

Hhhhhmmmm.

I guess you just had to be there, to understand!

And while the one brother is exulting down there in Florida about the phenomenal sales of generators, which after all, puts some bucks in the pockets of the Republican "base", what's the other brother doing up there in Washington, D.C., about this strange weather?

Oh!

More of that ......

"White House defends editing of climate reports"

By Dan Vergano, USA TODAY

Thu Jun 9, 7:51 AM ET

The White House on Wednesday defended the actions of one of its key staffers who's publicly accused of editing government reports to downplay the link between "greenhouse" gases and global warming.

But some scientists reacted angrily.

It's "par for the course from the administration, in terms of interfering with science for political ends," said Luke Warren of the Union of Concerned Scientists, which has criticized the Bush administration's science policies.

The New York Times reported Wednesday that Philip Cooney, chief of staff for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, changed descriptions of climate research approved by government scientists.

The Times said that Cooney, a lawyer and former lobbyist with the American Petroleum Institute, made notes on drafts of reports issued in 2002 and 2003, removing or adjusting language on climate research.

Some of the changes were as subtle as adding the words "significant and fundamental" before the word "uncertainties," the Times reported.

In one section, he crossed out a paragraph describing the projected reduction of glaciers and snowpack, the newspaper said.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said in a press briefing that Cooney's editing was part of a broad review by 15 federal agencies, including policy people like Cooney as well as scientists.

"Everybody who is involved in these issues should have input in these reports, and that's all this is," he says.

Climate change has been controversial for the Bush administration since 2001, when it withdrew support for the Kyoto Protocol, a global pact to curb greenhouse-gas emissions.

The administration questioned the cost and scientific merit of planned constraints.

"Scientists are best equipped to inform the public about climate science, not White House lawyers," says Naomi Oreskes of the University of California, San Diego.

"People have a right to know the truth about climate science and the scientific consensus on the seriousness of this problem," she says.

McClellan says that some of the reports edited by Cooney were praised by scientists:

"One of the very reports highlighted in the article today was the administration's 10-year plan for climate science, and that plan was widely praised by the scientific community, including the National Academies of Science."

The academies warned the White House in a 2004 report that political involvement in climate change reports could discredit the administration.

Asked if the White House is politicizing science, McClellan said, "These reports should always be based on our scientific knowledge ...."

The documents were provided by the Government Accountability Project.

end quotes

Scottie McClellan is full of ****!

Chock full!

And as to discrediting this administration?

Fat chance, because it already has no credibility, with regard to anything, and thus, it has nothing to lose, while we, of course, have everything ....... to lose!

For an interesting perspective on that thought .....

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/061005Y.shtml

"Rumsfeld plays down idea of closing Guantanamo"

Thu Jun 9,12:18 PM ET

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Thursday played down the idea of closing the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, saying such a move would raise questions about what would happen to the prisoners.

"A whole lot of questions come to mind."

"If you closed it, where would you go," he told a news conference at NATO headquarters.

Amid mounting complaints and calls for the facility to be shut down, including a broadside from former president and human rights champion Jimmy Carter, President Bush on Wednesday left open the door to its eventual closing.

"We're exploring all alternatives as to how best to do the main objective, which is to protect America."

"What we don't want to do is let somebody out that comes back and harms us," Bush said in an interview with Fox News Channel when asked whether it should be shut down.

Rumsfeld, asked about Bush's remarks, did not contradict his boss, but said he understood that what "the president said is that we're always looking at ways to improve our operations."

The Pentagon earlier this week ruled out any prospect of shutting down the Cuba-based detention center and Rumsfeld on a stop in Norway on Wednesday reinforced that line.

"I know of no one in the U.S. government, in the executive branch, that is considering closing Guantanamo," he told reporters, within hours of Bush's comments being broadcast in the Fox News interview.

During the NATO news conference, Rumsfeld said Washington's goal has been to ensure that people involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people or who were captured on battlefields in Afghanistan, Iraq or elsewhere be kept off the street "so they don't kill more people."

Aiming to prevent future attacks, the suspects have been interviewed, in some cases providing intelligence that saved lives, he said.

In all, 70,000 to 80,000 people have been detained and the majority have been released, Rumsfeld said.

The Pentagon has turned over suspects to their countries of origin "when we have been able to negotiate with the country an agreement that they would handle them in a way that was humane and appropriate," he said.

It would like to release many more to Iraqi and Afghan governments but both lack appropriate prison and criminal justice systems.

The aim is to have these suspects "off the street, but in the hands of the countries of origin for the most part," he added.

Calls for closure of the Guantanamo prison camp for foreign terrorism suspects have risen since Amnesty International set off a furor last month by calling it a "gulag" and comparing it to the brutal Soviet system of forced labor camps in which millions died.

Adding to the drumbeat, the United Nations said on Wednesday that 6,000 of Iraq's 10,000 prisoners were in the hands of the U.S. military and that thousands are detained without due process in apparent violation of international law.

end quotes

The thumb up, or the thumb down of the God Emporer Bush is due process, isn't it?

At least as far as he is concerned, anyway!

"China Flood Hits School, Killing 29"

Fri Jun 10, 9:56 AM ET

BEIJING - A torrent of water rushed down a mountain in northeast China on Friday and hit a primary school, killing 29 people, most of them students, and leaving another four people missing, the government said.

Twenty-seven of the victims in Shalan, a town in Heilongjiang province, were students, while the other two were villagers, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Rescuers were searching for another four people, including two students, it said.

Some 352 pupils between the ages of 6 and 14 were at the Chang'an Primary School with 31 teachers when the flood of water poured into the town, which lies in a basin, Xinhua said.

Shalan is in a remote area 280 miles from the capital of Harbin, it said.

And speaking of George W. Bush and de-mockery in the same breath .....

"Thousands Demand Ouster of Arroyo"

By OLIVER TEVES, Associated Press Writer

34 minutes ago

MANILA, Philippines - Thousands of protesters on Saturday demanded President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo step down during the biggest anti-government rally since allegations surfaced that she fixed last year's election and her family received gambling kickbacks.

The government has denied the allegations, saying they were part of a plot to unseat Arroyo.

Police nationwide and soldiers in the capital Manila were on full alert against a power grab in a country with a history of coup attempts.

Claims of payoffs to Arroyo's son and a brother-in-law from illegal gambling operators and an alleged wiretapped conversation between Arroyo and an election official to fix the 2004 vote, come as she battles poverty, rising prices, a fiscal deficit, corruption and the lowest popularity rating since late dictator Ferdinand Marcos.

At a reception on the eve of Philippine independence, Arroyo said "purveyors of instability and intrigue" were undermining her efforts to reform the economy.

Arroyo said she was focused "like a laser beam" on reforms "to turn this economy around, and no one will deter me from that mission."

"We cannot resolve our differences by tossing out the democratic process just because we are not getting our way," she said.

In a rare show of solidarity, a wide spectrum of anti-Arroyo groups, including opposition politicians and rival leftist groups, joined forces in Saturday's rally dubbed a "National Day of Mourning."

Police estimated that 5,000 people took part in the protest.

"The rally for me can be seen as a measure of how far or how widespread the disgust is for Arroyo and her isolation," said Rep. Teddy Casino of the left wing Bayan Muna party.

Casino said his party wants Arroyo's ouster, but opposes a coup d'etat, a military junta or a "palace coup."

"This is the early stage of the struggle for the eventual regime change that is expected," he said.

However, he said talk of "an imminent downfall is not accurate."

Earlier in the week, a key witness testifying in an ongoing Senate hearing on the illegal numbers game called jueteng claimed she personally handed payoffs to Arroyo's son and brother-in-law, who are both members of the House of Representatives.

The two men have denied the charges.

Arroyo's son has filed a libel suit against the witness.

To show she was not protecting her family, Arroyo immediately ordered government investigators to look into the allegations and file charges if warranted, saying her kin are not above the law.

On Friday, the dismissed deputy head of the justice department's investigation agency claimed he was the source of an audio recording that purportedly has Arroyo talking to an election official about fixing last year's election to gain a 1 million margin against her closest rival, Fernando Poe Jr.

Poe died in December following a stroke.

Samuel Ong, former deputy director of the National Bureau of Investigation, said disgruntled military intelligence agents gave him the "mother of all tapes" containing the alleged wiretaps.

Officials said the recording was doctored to show alleged wrongdoing by the president.

"In the first place," Ong said, "our constitution says that the (Commission on Elections) is an independent constitutional body to ensure peaceful, orderly and honest election."

"Now here comes somebody outside this constitutional body ... not only asking but directing him to do something."

Presidential spokesman Ignacio Bunye said Ong's allegation is "part of a well-orchestrated plot to destabilize the government and eventually replace the president."

"We will not allow democracy to be undermined," he said.

end quotes

If democracy is government by the people, how exactly can it be undermined, except by corrupt politicians, of course, shutting the people out of the process, so that the only ones who can really undermine democracy are those in power!

Hhhhmmmm.

Well, I just did something that I have been heading for for quite a while now, but never exactly knew how to do before, and that was to go over to the HEALTH part of this forum, to start a thread on the healing benefits of 'tai chi.

If it were not for the power of the mind that t'ai chi can unlock, well, I probably would not be much more than a mound of dirt out in a field somewhere, with a stone marker above it saying something like, "Oh Well ....", because when you are a disabled combat veteran, as I am, there really is not much room for error in life as one gets older, and so .....

SO!

We'll see how that all goes, I guess!

The name is the "T'ai Chi Corner", kind of like a holistic healing version of Mr. A.B.'s corner, perhaps, where I will feel comfortable talking about just that one subject, which ultimately must include all things under the sun, if it is to truly be t'ai chi, and so .....

I just heard on the radio news that this White House lawyer Cooney, who has no scientific training, himself, has resigned from this position in OUR government that allowed him to lie to us by editing scientific reports which he was not qualified to edit!

Good riddance, say I, for if there is one thing that we don't need in OUR government, it is these lobbyists like Cooney, who will use their postions, on behalf of their clients, to protect their client's "interests" by lying to US, the American people!

Good riddance to Mr. Cooney!

Now, stay gone!

And thank you on behalf of a grateful nation, for resigning!

And while we are on the subject of "climate" .....

"Heavy rain drenches Florida panhandle - Arlene approaches Gulf Coast; expected to stay a tropical storm"

The Associated Press

Updated: 1:08 p.m. ET June 11, 2005

PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla. - Heavy rain drenched the Florida Panhandle early Saturday and heavy surf pounded beaches as Tropical Storm Arlene plodded toward the Gulf Coast, chasing a few weather-weary residents into shelters.

The storm had wind blowing at a sustained 70 mph, and the National Hurricane Center posted a hurricane warning along 125 miles of coast from Pascagoula, Miss., to Destin in the western Florida Panhandle.

Meteorologists said there was a slight chance Arlene could build into a Category 1 hurricane by landfall, with its heaviest wind and rain north of the storm's center.

The center of the storm was expected to hit the northern Gulf Coast during the mid to late afternoon, the hurricane center said.

"We anticipate that Arlene will probably stay at a very strong tropical storm this afternoon," Ben Nelson, Florida's state meteorologist, said Saturday afternoon.

"Those warnings are up just in case."

Bob Garcia checked into a Red Cross shelter at Gulf Shores, Ala., with his son, Tommy.

Garcia said they live in a mobile home in Sommerdale, Ala., and there was "no sense in taking chances" with the possibility of tornados developing as the storm plowed ashore.

He was one of only 13 people in the shelter Saturday morning.

One death had been blamed on the storm -- a Russian exchange student died after she was pulled from the rolling waves off Miami Beach Friday.

'Here we go again'

The worst fears were in the Florida Panhandle, still reeling from Hurricane Ivan nine months ago.

Piles of debris, gutted homes and storm-damaged roofs covered by plastic blue tarps are vivid reminders of Ivan's wrath.

"I was pretty shocked to see how bad it still was," said tourist Roddy Rogers, 46, of Springfield, Mo.

"I've been in third-world countries and it looks kind of like that in some places."

Officials urged thousands of people in low-lying areas of three Panhandle counties to evacuate, and people flocked to hardware stores to buy generators, flashlights and other hurricane supplies.

At the Islander Package and Lounge in Pensacola Beach, a sign read "Here we go again."

However, Florida officials said only about 200 people had sought refuge in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties, two areas hit hard last year by Ivan, and no one showed up at a shelter in Walton County.

"I really believe there are a lot of folks that were looking at this and saying 'OK, it's not a hurricane, it's not a Hurricane Ivan and we're probably going to be OK to stay where we are,"' said Escambia County spokeswoman Sonya Smith.

State of emergency

By midmorning, about 4,000 Gulf Power customers in Escambia County were blacked out, though most service was quickly restored.

"It's mostly been because of tree limbs that were weakened or cracked by Hurricane Ivan," said John Hutchinson, Gulf Power's general manager of public affairs.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush declared a state of emergency Friday.

At 11 a.m. EDT, the storm was centered 85 miles south-southeast of Mobile, Ala., and was meandering toward the north-northwest at 14 mph.

Meteorologists said Arlene could bring up to 8 inches of rain to some areas, plus a storm surge of up to 5 feet.

"Rainfall is definitely a concern, as well as severe weather, and not just around the storm center," Nelson said.

Hurricane conditions exist when a storm has sustained winds of at least 74 mph or dangerously high water or both.

Arlene had sustained winds of 70 mph, with higher gusts.

Hurricane watches and tropical storm warnings extended west to Grand Isle, La., and east to Indian Pass, Fla.

A tornado watch was issued for a huge swath of the Gulf region.

In Gulf Shores, Ala., residents worried about the storm undoing repairs and adding to beach erosion from Hurricane Ivan.

Sue Alford had her beachside townhouse repaired but still has a big steel container of Ivan trash in front of the building.

"My biggest concern is there's so much debris around," she said.

Arlene had moved northward Friday across the Gulf of Mexico, drenching western Cuba and causing heavy rain, gusty wind and rough seas in South Florida.

The hurricane season began June 1 and ends Nov. 30.

Last year's first storm of the season, Alex, didn't form until Aug. 1.

Two weeks later, Florida was hit by the first of four hurricanes in the space of a few weeks.

They caused about 130 deaths in the U.S. and $22 billion in insured wind damage.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

Yes, how did we get to where we are today? It was only five years ago when the most important questions being asked in OUR America were:

1. What should we do with the budget surplus?

2. Where is Chandra Levy? Did Gary Condit kill her?

3. What happened to the money I invested in dot com stocks?

4. How does an idiot like George W. Bush expect to get elected?

To quote Bob Herbert from the NY Times,

"Sixty years after his death we should be raising a toast to F.D.R. and his progressive ideas. And we should take that opportunity to ask: How in the world did we allow ourselves to get from there to here?"

As I continue to study that period of time that was this nation's founding period, which, arguably, was some thirty years in length, give or take, depending on one's view of the history of those times, I came across last night in that wonderful book Miracle at Philadelphia by Catherine Drinker Bowen, these questions which were raised by "federalists" in 1787, or early 1788, when what was to be the United States Constitution, ultimately, was still being debated in the various state's ratifying conventions:

"Always it seemed easy for some hardheaded Federalist to cut down his opponent with a few commonsense suggestions."

"Why - for instance - should we fear our congressmen?"

"Are they not our own creatures, elected by ourselves?"

"Why must it be assumed that Congress will be more corrupt than the voters who are responsible for sending them to govern?"

"And will not the president as well as the much-dreaded senators be returned to the people, to live among their neighbors and bear their reproaches, SHOULD THEY MISCONDUCT THEMSELVES IN OFFICE?"

end quotes

Republican government only can work, if the people themselves work at "government", and how a common person works at "government", in my estimation, is by not being corrupt, him or herself, and by then refusing representation by corruption, which is all that we seem to have today, in OUR America.

The whole place, it seems, from coast to coast, and I don't think these Federalists, like Madison, and George Washington, could ever have conceived such a thing could ever be possible!

And so, here we are!

And the Republic?

Who even knows anymore, and that is a fact!

And that starts with George W. Bush!

But the mess, in the end, belongs to us, THE PEOPLE!

A weak, inept, craven, cowardly representative government has to be representative of a weak, inept, craven, cowardly people, and that is what the fears of the "anti-federalists" of that time really were all about, and in the end, I think they had the better view of things, such as Mr. Patrick Henry, in the Virginia Ratifying Convention:

"Whither is the spirit of America gone?"

"Whither is the genius of America fled?"

"We drew the spirit of liberty from our British ancestors!"

"But now, Sir, the American spirit, assisted by the ropes and chains of consolidation, is about to convert this country into a powerful and mighty empire."

"There will be no checks, no real balances, in this government!"

"What can avail your specious, imaginary balances, your rope-dancing, chain-rattling, ridiculous ideal checks and balances!"

end quotes

Methinks even way back then, Mr. Patrick Henry foresaw the rise of what is now the REPUBLICAN party, here in OUR America, with its Frists, and DeLays, and especially, its George W. Bush, and Dick Cheney, and he shuddered at that vision, and rightly so, methinks, anyway, for now, we are here, and Patrick Henry?

Well, more right than wrong to me, at least, and Jemmy Madison?

Well, his heart was in the right place, in his thoughts about the integrity of the American people, but unfortunately, his brand of American people have been replaced by the new breed that Patrick Henry saw coming, all those years ago!

And here we are!

And while we are on the subject of "evolution", and the American people, and Karl Rove, of course, who Patrick Henry saw coming as a threat to OUR America, all those years ago, we have this, just in "off the wire":

"US National Academies fights evolution controversy"

Sat Jun 11, 5:48 PM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The National Academies, the flagship of U.S. science, said on Friday it had set up a Web site to battle attempts to portray evolution as mere speculation about how life developed on Earth.

The Web site, http://nationalacademies.org/evolution/ , carries links to various reports on evolution, which some U.S. religious groups want to be taught in schools only if their own views of a divine creator get equal credence.

"The theory of evolution is one of science's most robust theories, and the National Academies have long supported the position that evolution be taught as a central element in any science education program," the Academies said in a statement.

"Over the past several years, however, there has been a growing movement around the country to include non-scientifically based 'alternatives' in science courses," it added.

"Currently there are challenges to the teaching of evolution in some 40 states or local school districts."

Some of these are detailed by the National Center for Science Education, a non-profit organization dedicated to keeping evolution in public school education, at its Web site, http://ncseweb.org.

The National Academies is an independent organization that routinely provides guidance on scientific, medical and engineering questions to the federal government and other groups that may ask them.

And on another note, since we are talking about "evolution" in here, and Karl Rove's "theory" that the earth is only five thousand years old .....

"Europe's oldest civilisation unearthed: report"

Sat Jun 11, 6:35 PM ET

LONDON (AFP) - Europe's oldest civilisation has reportedly been discovered by archaelogists across the continent.

More than 150 large temples, constructed between 4800 BC and 4600 BC, have been unearthed in fields and cities in Germany, Austria and Slovakia, predating the pyramids in Egypt by some 2,000 years, The Independent newspaper revealed.

The network of temples, made of earth and wood, were constructed by a religious people whose economy appears to have been based on livestock farming, The Independent reported.

Excavations have taken place over the past three years but the discovery is so new that the civilisation has not yet been named.

The most complex centre discovered so far, beneath the city of Dresden in Saxony, eastern Germany, comprises a temple surrounded by four ditches, three earthen banks and two palisades.

"Our excavations have revealed the degree of monumental vision and sophistication used by these early farming communities to create Europe's first truly large scale earthwork complexes," said Harald Staeuble, from the Saxony state government's heritage department.

The temples, up to 150 metres (164 yards) in diameter, were made by a people who lived in long houses and villages, the newspaper said.

Stone, bone, and wooden tools have been unearthed, along with ceramic figures of people and animals.

A village at Aythra, near Leipzig in eastern Germany, was home to some 300 people living in up to 20 large buildings around the temple.

end quotes

Hhhhmmmm!

Dum-de-dum, let's see here, now, these scientific fellows, who, of course, don't know the earth is only 5,000 years old, well, they have this view, an "ANTI-ROVITE" view, it can be said, that there were people living in what is now OLD EUROPE, according to Cheney and Rumsfeld, who are ROVITES, themselves; these scientific boys have people living in OLD EUROPE some 6,800 hundred years ago, WHICH, OF COURSE, is simply impossible!

The earth had not been created yet, if it is only 5,000 years old, and it is, trust me, Karl Rove says so, and he is the man in charge of everything, and so, he would have to know everything, to be in charge of everything; and so these scientific fellows have to be dead wrong, unless, of course, they are employing that "new math" here, and then, who can tell anything at all, but as a loyal American, myself, well, I have to believe Karl Rove, don't I?

Don't I?

SO?

Why are these scientists lying to us, then?

Oh, I'm so scared!

I hope George W. Bush has one of his White House lawyers edit this report, and quickly, to make it consistent with the reality that there is NO GLOBAL WARMING, and that the earth is only 5,000 years old, and that these temples that were found, well, these ancient peoples knew of the coming of George W. Bush, even back then, and they just wanted him to know that he was revered by them, just in case he was having a bad hair day, and was looking for someone to NUKE!

"Not us" those temples said!

"WE LOVE YOU, GEORGE!"

Yeah, right!

And Karl Rove told me so, and so, it must be right, since it is Karl Rove that we are talking about here, and not just some crack-pot who thinks that the world is only 5,000 years old!

And since we are already off on "flights of fancy" in here this morning, well, we might as well go to Iraq, which, less than 5,000 years ago, was a place known as Mesopotamia, if you believe any of that scientific crap, anyway .......

"Iraq Struggles to Draft New Constitution"

By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 9 minutes ago

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraqi efforts to draft a new constitution are weakened by the lack of political experience within the minority Sunni Arab community, the prime minister's spokesman said Sunday.

Laith Kuba said the process to draw up Iraq's first post-Saddam Hussein constitution will be hindered if any group is "marginalized."

Sunni Arabs, who enjoyed great influence when their patron Saddam ruled Iraq, have fallen from power and are calling for a greater say within a parliamentary committee that is drawing up a constitution.

Their leaders claim they have lost out to Iraq's majority Shiite community and the U.S.-allied Kurds, who swept to power in historic Jan. 30 national elections.

Iraq's Kurdish community has enjoyed relative autonomy in the northern Kurdistan region since the early 1990s, under the protection of a U.S.-controlled no-fly zone barring Saddam's warplanes from flying over the area.

The region has also established its own parliament-like assembly to control affairs.

Kuba said this has given Iraqi Kurds greater political experience than Sunni Arabs, which could be a disadvantage for the latter in trying to have a bigger say in the country's future.

"The most powerful (force in drafting the constitution) might be the Kurdish parties because they have had experience in this field, but the weakest side might be the Sunnis because it is the first time they entered true negotiations," Kuba said during a press conference.

He did not explain why he thought the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari had the necessary experience.

Although Shiites make up an estimated 60 percent of the population, they were suppressed under Saddam's secular Sunni-dominated regime.

"I believe this might be the weak point in the constitutional process, which is Sunni parties might lack experience," he said.

President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, said during the week that Sunnis may receive an additional 20 to 25 seats on the 55-member constitutional committee, which currently includes just two Sunni Arabs.

But there is widespread reluctance by many Shiite Muslim politicians to grant Sunnis more than 14 seats — the same number as Kurds.

Sunni alienation from the political process is seen as a driving force behind Iraq's raging insurgency, which has killed more than 930 people since the country's new Shiite-dominated government was announced April 28.

"It doesn't serve the interest of any side if any other party is marginalized," Kuba said.

end quotes

He did not explain why he thought the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari had the necessary experience?

That's easy - THEY HAVE THE GUNS, AND THE WILL TO KILL ANYTHING AND EVERYONE IN HIS PATH, OF GEORGE W. BUSH, WHO HIMSELF HAS NO EXPERIENCE OF TRUE DEMOCRACY, ON THEIR SIDE, AND WHAT MORE DO YOU NEED THAN THAT?

After all, isn't what democracy is going to be really dictated to everyone else by the man with the biggest gun?

That's what I get out of all of this anyway .........

Shoot first, and to hell with asking any questions at all, either before, or after ....

Kill them all, and let Allah sort them out, right, Don, as long as though precious oil wells are preserved in the process?

ABSOLUTELY!! It must be right. Just to make sure though, I'm going to ask Mr. Rumsfeld.

And if I want a third opinion, I'm going all the way to the top. I'll ask Mr. Cheney!

And BTW, Mr. Livyjr, in case you haven't seen this column in the N.Y. Times I am sending it along.

What I am doing nowadays, is sending articles that tell the truth along to my Bush loving acquaintances. They can decide to love them or leave them. I do not believe there is any point in only sending these truths to those of us who already know them to be true.

Keep cool these days, Livy jr.

A.B.

And speaking of "flights of fancy" and de-mockery, and guns, and the will to use them, on everything, like some berserk, out-of-control drunken cowboy just in off the Chisolm Trail after a long cattle drive, all liquored-up, and with a gun-belt full of un-spent bullets, just begging to be spent ......

"U.K. Memo Said to Question Postwar Plan"

1 hour, 45 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - A staff paper prepared for British Prime Minister Tony Blair eight months before the invasion of Iraq concluded that U.S. military officials were not planning adequately for a postwar occupation, The Washington Post reported.

"A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise," authorities of the briefing memo wrote, according to the Post.

"As already made clear, the U.S. military plans are virtually silent on this point."

"Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden."

The eight-page memo was written in advance of a July 23, 2002, meeting at Blair's Downing Street offices, the Post said in Sunday editions.

It said the memo and other internal British government documents were originally obtained by Michael Smith of the London Sunday Times and that excerpts made available to Post were confirmed as authentic by British sources who sought anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter.

The Post said the introduction to the memo — "Iraq: Conditions for Military Action" — said U.S. "military planning for action against Iraq is proceeding apace," but that "little thought" has been given to, among other things, "the aftermath and how to shape it."

The July 21 memo was produced by Blair's staff in preparation for a meeting with his national security team two days later that has become controversial since last month's disclosure of official notes summarizing the session.

According to those minutes — known as the Downing Street Memo — British officials who had just returned from Washington said the Bush administration believed war was inevitable and was determined to use intelligence about weapons of mass destruction to justify the ouster of Saddam Hussein.

Blair denied at a news conference with President Bush last week that intelligence was manipulated to justify the war.

end quotes

"Intelligence" was not manipulated!

It couldn't have been, because that crowd possessed no intelligence, then or now, and what you don't have, folks, well, how can you manipulate nothing?

PEOPLE were the only thing that was manipulated, and folks, that, of course, was US, the American people

They wanted the oil, they got the oil, simple as that!

Call theft "democracy on the move", and who on earth will ever know the difference?

Anybody, here in OUR America?

And so, they lied to everyone in a vain attempt to have us all be as stupid as they believe we are, and well ......

It worked!

Well, Mr. A.B., all I can say is that you sure are an inspiration to me to get a lttle older here, because I can see by your words of wisdom above here, that wisdom does come with age!

Yes, the man at the top is Dick Cheney, while in my relative youth and inexperience, of course, I am misled into thinking that it is really Karl Rove, but if I do get a little older, well, as you have pointed out, many times, eventually, it will become clear, to even me ......

And since we are now talking about "flights of fancy" in their more mundane guise as nothing but a pack of outrageous lies .......

"U.S. produces fewer terror convictions than officials claim - Justice Department overstating dragnet’s reach, analysis shows"

Sept. 11 plotter Zacarias Moussaoui is one of just 14 people on the Justice Department’s list of terror convictions to have clear links to al Qaeda, a Washington Post analysis shows.

By Dan Eggen and Julie Tate

Updated: 1:04 a.m. ET June 12, 2005

On Thursday, President Bush stepped to a lectern at the Ohio State Highway Patrol Academy in Columbus to urge renewal of the USA Patriot Act and to boast of the government's success in prosecuting terrorists.

Flanked by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales, Bush said that "federal terrorism investigations have resulted in charges against more than 400 suspects, and more than half of those charged have been convicted."

Those statistics have been used repeatedly by Bush and other administration officials, including Gonzales and his predecessor, John D. Ashcroft, to characterize the government's efforts against terrorism.

But the numbers are misleading at best.

Fewer convictions than advertised

An analysis of the Justice Department's own list of terrorism prosecutions by The Washington Post shows that 39 people — not 200, as officials have implied — were convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security.

Most of the others were convicted of relatively minor crimes such as making false statements and violating immigration law — and had nothing to do with terrorism, the analysis shows.

For the entire list, the median sentence was just 11 months.

Taken as a whole, the data indicate that the government's effort to identify terrorists in the United States has been less successful than authorities have often suggested.

The statistics provide little support for the contention that authorities have discovered and prosecuted hundreds of terrorists here.

Except for a small number of well-known cases — such as truck driver Iyman Faris, who sought to take down the Brooklyn Bridge — few of those arrested appear to have been involved in active plots inside the United States.

Among all the people charged as a result of terrorism probes in the three years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, The Post found no demonstrated connection to terrorism or terrorist groups for 180 of them.

Just one in nine individuals on the list had an alleged connection to the al Qaeda terrorist network and only 14 people convicted of terrorism-related crimes — including Faris and convicted Sept. 11 plotter Zacarias Moussaoui — have clear links to the group.

Many more cases involve Colombian drug cartels, supporters of the Palestinian cause, Rwandan war criminals or others with no apparent ties to al Qaeda or its leader, Osama bin Laden.

Chance arrests

But a large number of people appear to have been swept into U.S. counterterrorism investigations by chance — through anonymous tips, suspicious circumstances or bad luck — and have remained classified as terrorism defendants years after being cleared of connections to extremist groups.

For example, the prosecution of 20 men, most of them Iraqis, in a Pennsylvania truck-licensing scam accounts for about 10 percent of individuals convicted — even though the entire group was publicly absolved of ties to terrorism in 2001.

"For so many of these cases, there seems to be much less substance to them than we first assume or have first been told," said Bruce Hoffman, a terrorism expert who heads the Washington office of Rand Corp., a think tank that conducts national security research.

"There's an inherent deterrent effect in cracking down on any illicit activity."

"But the challenge is not exaggerating what they were up to — not portraying them as super-terrorists when they're really the low end of the food chain."

Only a partial picture of campaign?

Justice Department officials say they have not sought to exaggerate the importance or suspected associations of those prosecuted in connection with terrorism probes, and they argue that the list provides only a partial view of their efforts.

Officials said all the individuals were first put on the list because of a suspected connection or allegation related to terrorism.

Last week, they also said that the department had tightened the requirements for including a case on the terrorism list.

Barry M. Sabin, chief of the department's counterterrorism section, said prosecutors frequently turn to lesser charges when they are not confident they can prove crimes such as committing or supporting terrorism.

Many defendants also have been prosecuted for relatively minor crimes in exchange for information that is not public but has proven valuable in other terrorism probes, he said.

"A person could not have been put on this list if there was not a concern about national security, at least initially," he said.

"Are all these people an ongoing threat presently?"

"Arguably not. . . ."

"We are not trying to overstate or understate what we're doing."

"You don't want to put language or a label on people that is inconsistent with what they have done."

The numbers

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Justice Department database has served as the key source of statistics on the status of terrorism investigations in the United States and has been cited frequently in official speeches and testimony to Congress.

The list obtained by The Post includes 361 cases defined as terrorism investigations by the department's criminal division from Sept. 11, 2001, through late September 2004.

Thirty-one entries could not be evaluated because they were sealed and blacked out.

(The list does not include about 40 cases filed since then that account for Bush's total of about 400).

The Post sought to update and correct data whenever possible, including noting convictions or sentences handed down within the past nine months.

The list of domestic prosecutions does not include terrorism suspects held at the Guantanamo Bay military prison or at secret locations around the globe.

Nor does it include many of the approximately 50 people the Justice Department has acknowledged detaining as "material witnesses," or three men held in a military prison in South Carolina, one of whom has been released.

The Post identified 180 cases in which no connection to al Qaeda or another terrorist group could be found in court records, official statements, the 9/11 commission report or news accounts.

Even some of the terrorism-related cases featured early allegations of terrorist connections that were later dropped.

Of the 142 individuals on the list linked to terrorist groups, 39 were convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security.

More than a dozen defendants were acquitted or had their charges dismissed, including three Moroccan men in Detroit whose convictions were tossed out in September after the Justice Department admitted prosecutorial misconduct.

Minor crimes, short sentences

Not surprisingly, these minor crimes produced modest punishments.

The median sentence for all cases adjudicated, whether or not they were terrorism-related, was 11 months.

About three dozen other defendants were given probation or were deported.

The most common convictions were on charges of fraud, making false statements, passport violations and conspiracy.

Two life sentences have been handed down so far: to Richard Reid, the British drifter who was foiled by passengers in his attempt to blow up an aircraft over the Atlantic Ocean; and Masoud Khan, a Maryland man convicted of traveling to Pakistan and seeking to fight with the Taliban against U.S. forces.

Two others convicted of terrorism-related crimes face life sentences: Ahmed Abdel Sattar, an Egyptian-born postal worker convicted of conspiring to kill and kidnap in a foreign country; and Ali Timimi, a Northern Virginia spiritual leader convicted of encouraging others to attend terrorist camps.

(Timimi was indicted in late September and was not on the list obtained by The Post.)

Only 14 of those convicted of crimes related to terrorism or national security have clear links to bin Laden's network, most notably Moussaoui and Reid.

Others include Faris, an admitted member of al Qaeda who sought to sabotage the Brooklyn Bridge, and six Yemeni men from Lackawanna, N.Y., convicted of providing material support to terrorists by attending an al Qaeda training camp before Sept. 11.

In addition, Taliban fighter John Walker Lindh, who is most closely associated with Afghanistan's deposed government, trained at an al Qaeda camp.

‘Mission creep’

The patterns discovered by The Post are similar to findings in studies of Justice Department terrorism cases by New York University and Syracuse University, each of which examined more limited sets of data.

More than a third of the cases on the list arose from a post-Sept. 11 FBI dragnet, which resulted in the arrests of hundreds of Muslim immigrants for minor violations unrelated to the hijackings or terrorism.

"What we're seeing over time is the equivalent of mission creep: cases that would not be terrorism cases before Sept. 11 are swept onto the terrorism docket," said Juliette Kayyem, a former Clinton administration Justice official who heads the national security program at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

"The problem is that it's not good to cook the numbers. . . ."

"We have no accurate assessment of whether the war on terrorism is actually working."

Tracking al Qaeda

Before the Sept. 11 attacks, many veteran U.S. counterterrorism officials assumed that al Qaeda sleeper cells were hiding in the country, awaiting orders to launch attacks.

The strikes — carried out by 19 hijackers who arrived in the United States and trained here undetected — prompted an aggressive campaign by the Justice Department, the FBI and other agencies to identify al Qaeda operatives on U.S. soil.

The results from the Justice Department database, however, raise the possibility that the presence of al Qaeda operatives and sympathizers within the United States is either limited or largely undetected, many terrorism experts say.

"These kind of statistics show that we really don't know if they exist here in any significant way," said Martha Crenshaw of Wesleyan University in Connecticut, who has studied terrorism since the late 1960s.

"It's possible that they could have sleepers planted here for a long time and we could always be very surprised."

"But I'd say that's less likely compared with them trying to repeat a 9/11-style infiltration from the outside."

Other experts and government officials say the relatively small number of domestic terrorism prosecutions is partly the result of the administration's strategy to handle some of its most dangerous suspects — such as Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed — outside U.S. courts.

As a result, only a limited number of potentially significant cases have been pursued publicly in U.S. courts.

Feds using ‘prosecutorial discretion’

Viet D. Dinh, a Georgetown law professor who headed the Office of Legal Policy at Justice before and after the attacks, said the primary strategy is to use "prosecutorial discretion" to detain suspicious individuals by charging them with minor crimes.

"You're talking about a violation of law that may or may not rise to the level of what might usually be called a federal case," Dinh said, referring to credit-card fraud and other offenses.

"But the calculation does not happen in isolation; you are not just talking about the crime itself, but the suspicion of terrorism. . . ."

"That skews the calculation in favor of prosecution."

Bush administration officials have frequently compared the strategy to the anti-Mafia campaign by former attorney general Robert F. Kennedy, who vowed to prosecute mobsters for crimes as minor as spitting on a sidewalk.

But many defense lawyers and civil liberties advocates argue that the Mafia analogy is misplaced.

David Z. Nevin represented Idaho graduate student Sami Omar Al-Hussayen, a Saudi national who was acquitted of federal terrorism charges in a closely watched trial last summer but agreed to be deported rather than fight immigration charges.

Nevin said there are key differences between current counterterrorism cases and the prosecutions of gangsters such as Al Capone, who was famously convicted of tax evasion to get him off the street.

"Everybody knew that Al Capone was committing murders and was doing all sorts of things."

"They just couldn't convict him," Nevin said.

"That's fine if you take it as a given that you have the devil here," he continued.

"The problem is that you end up with people like Sami Al-Hussayen. . . ."

"Whenever you live in that realm, you're going to make mistakes and you're going to hurt innocent people."

Using one case to build another

In the end, most cases on the Justice Department list turned out to have no connection to terrorism at all.

They include Hassan Nasrallah, a Dearborn, Mich., man convicted of credit-card fraud who has the same name as the leader of Hezbollah, or Party of God.

Abdul Farid of High Point, N.C., was arrested on a false tip that he was sending money to the Taliban and was deported after admitting he lied on a loan application.

Moeen Islam Butt, a Pakistani jewelry-kiosk employee in Pennsylvania, spent eight months in jail before being deported on marriage-fraud and immigration charges.

And there is the case of Francois Guagni, a French national who made the mistake of illegally crossing the Canadian border on Sept. 14, 2001, with box cutters in his possession.

It turned out that Guagni used the knives in his job as a drywall installer.

He was deported in March 2003 after pleading guilty to unlawfully entering the country.

"His case had nothing to do with terrorism, as far as I've ever been told," said Guagni's attorney, Christopher D. Smith.

Some of the cases, however, remain murky.

The question of involvement in terrorism lingers even after formal allegations of such ties have been dropped.

Consider the case of Enaam Arnaout, director of the Illinois-based Benevolence International Foundation, who was indicted amid great fanfare in October 2002 for allegedly helping to funnel money and equipment to al Qaeda operatives on three continents.

The charity was shut down.

Less than a year later, prosecutors dropped six of the seven charges against Arnaout, and he pleaded guilty to a single count of racketeering for funding fighters in Bosnia and Chechnya.

During a sentencing hearing in August 2003, U.S. District Judge Suzanne B. Conlon told prosecutors they had "failed to connect the dots" and said there was no evidence that Arnaout "identified with or supported" terrorism.

Bush qualifies success

The administration views the case differently.

Bush, in a speech Friday at the National Counterterrorism Center in Northern Virginia, said investigators had "helped close down a phony charity in Illinois that was channeling money to al Qaeda."

Sabin, the Justice Department's counterterrorism chief, said he could not discuss the specifics of most cases.

But he said one case in particular illustrates the government's strategy: the conviction of Abdurahman Alamoudi, who admitted to taking $1 million from Libya and using it to pay conspirators in a scheme to kill Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah.

Alamoudi, who once worked with senior U.S. officials as head of the American Muslim Council, has agreed to cooperate with federal investigators as part of a plea agreement.

Sabin said the case is "a significant success story" that shows how prosecutors can use one case to help build others.

"We have been successful in obtaining information and fueling our intelligence gathering efforts with many of these cases," Sabin said.

Research database editor Derek Willis contributed to this report.

end quotes

Ah, this thing with these box-cutters?

I thought that they were invented because these terrorists represented a large market for them, and so, some enterprising entrepreneurs here in America started making box cutters, because there was a market for them, and accordingly, there was money to be made!

SO?

What's this about using them to cut sheetrock, then?

Who in their right mind uses a box-cutter for that?

Why does this Bush administration appear so, well, "bush-league"?

"Nerve Agent Spills at Indiana Facility"

Sun Jun 12, 6:37 AM ET

NEWPORT, Ind. - About 30 gallons of a liquid containing a deadly Cold War-era nerve agent spilled at an Indiana chemical weapons depot, but it was safely contained in a sealed area and no one was injured, the Army said Saturday.

The spill occurred Friday night at the Newport Chemical Agent Destruction Facility, where more than 250,000 gallons of the agent VX are stored.

VX is a liquid with the consistency of mineral oil that can kill a healthy adult with a single pinpoint droplet.

The spill happened during a process to destroy the nerve agent by converting it into a caustic chemical called hydrolysate.

The facility has destroyed nearly 2,900 gallons of VX since the process started a month ago, the Army said.

The neutralization process is expected to take more than two years.

Workers would try to determine what caused the valve to leak Friday night and how to fix it, said Army spokeswoman Terry Arthur.

"No agent was released outside the containment area and there was no danger to workers or to the community," the Army said.

Employees in protective gear were working Saturday to clean up any surface that the liquid touched.

The Army wants to transport the hydrolysate — which has been compared to liquid drain cleaner — to a DuPont plant in New Jersey for treatment and disposal in the Delaware River.

The plan has sparked opposition in New Jersey and Delaware.

end quote

SO?

Hhhhmmm?

If we don't use nerve agents, and such like that, ah, how come we got 250,000 gallons of this VX, when all it takes is a drop to kill a healthy adult?

250,000 gallons!

Let's see now, how many drops was that to the gallon, now, which means that this 250,000 gallons could have killed off a whole bunch of people, but of course, since we don't use this stuff directly, having convenient disposable surrogates like Saddam Hussein to do the killing for us .....

And speaking of the "head man", Mr. Big, himself, what's this from OUR "top gun", here, in OUR gummint down there in Washington, D.C.?

"Cheney Deflects Calls to Close Gitmo"

By SIOBHAN McDONOUGH, Associated Press Writer

50 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday there are no plans for now to shutter the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay where terrorism suspects are held.

"The important thing here to understand is that the people that are at Guantanamo are bad people," he said.

"I mean, these are terrorists for the most part."

"These are people that were captured in the battlefield of Afghanistan or rounded up as part of the al-Qaida network," he said in an interview to be aired Monday on Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes."

Human rights activists and some lawmakers — mostly Democrats — are pressing for the prison's closure because of allegations of torture and abuse of detainees.

President Bush has said his administration is "exploring all alternatives" for detaining the prisoners.

"We've already screened the detainees there and released a number, sent them back to their home countries," Cheney said in the interview taped Friday.

"But what's left is hard core."

The prison in Cuba holds about 540 detainees.

Some have been there more than three years without being charged with any crime.

Most were captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 and were sent to Guantanamo Bay in hope of extracting useful intelligence about the al-Qaida terrorist network.

With the fate of the prison camp a leading topic on the Sunday talk shows, Sen. Chuck Hagel said the U.S. is "losing the image war around the world" and Guantanamo is one reason.

"It's identifiable with, for right or wrong, a part of America that people in the world believe is a power, an empire that pushes people around, we do it our way, we don't live up to our commitments to multilateral institutions," Hagel, R-Neb., told CNN's "Late Edition."

He contended that Pentagon leaders have failed to take responsibility for the situation, including harsh interrogation techniques and treatment of prisoners.

"This is all adding up to a very dangerous drift in this country."

" ... Not only is it going to end in disaster for us and humility for this country, but we're going to present to the world a very dangerous world if we don't wake up and smell the coffee here," Hagel said.

The Pentagon said in a statement Sunday that it "does not wish to hold detainees longer than necessary and effective processes are in place to regularly review the status of enemy combatants."

The Senate Judiciary Committee plans a hearing Wednesday on the issue of detainees.

"We've actually created a legal black hole there ... I think as long as that exists, we are going to have one more rallying cry against the United States," said Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the top Democrat on the committee.

"We're the country that tells people that we adhere to the rule of law."

"We want other countries to adhere to the rule of law."

"And in Guantanamo, we are not," Leahy told CBS' "Face the Nation."

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said closing Guantanamo would be an "overreaction," but did said the administration and Congress need to set uniform standards for interrogations and detention.

"Guantanamo Bay is a useful purpose in the war on terror, but under the current regime, under the current circumstances, it's not effectively working," Graham said.

Still, he said, the U.S. needs a place to interrogate these detainees.

"Nobody's going to say move it to Florida, South Carolina, or Vermont, so I think Cuba is as good a place as any," he said.

Time magazine reported Sunday on an 84-page document detailing the Guantanamo interrogation of one detainee, Mohamed al-Qahtani.

He was captured during the war in Afghanistan.

It was learned later he had tried to enter the U.S. in Orlando, Fla., in August 2001, but was turned away by an immigration agent at the airport.

Mohamed Atta, the Sept. 11 ringleader, was in the airport at the same time, U.S. officials have said.

Military intelligence officials at Guantanamo Bay got permission to use intensive interrogation techniques on two prisoners, including al-Qahtani, who were deemed to be important al-Qaida figures, the commander of U.S. Southern Command has said.

Time said interrogators used such techniques as dripping water on al-Qahtani's head; strip-searching him and making him stand nude; and depriving him of sleep.

At one point, after receiving fluid intravenously because he was dehydrated, al-Qahtani was told to urinate in his pants by interrogators who refused his request to use the bathroom so they could continue with their questioning, according to the account.

The Defense Department said in response that the interrogation of al-Qahtani "was guided by a very detailed plan and conducted by trained professionals motivated by a desire to gain actionable intelligence, to include information that might prevent additional attacks on America."

The Pentagon said al-Qahtani provided valuable information on the logistics of the Sept. 11 attacks and the means by which al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden evaded capture by U.S. forces.

"The Department of Defense remains committed to the unequivocal standard of humane treatment for all detainees," the Pentagon said.
___

On the Net:

Defense Department: http://www.defenselink.mil/releases/2005/n...50612-3661.html

Amnesty International: http://news.amnesty.org/pages/usa-news-eng

Joint Task Force Guantanamo: http://www.jtfgtmo.southcom.mil/

end quotes

"The important thing here to understand is that the people that are at Guantanamo are bad people," he said, "I mean, these are terrorists for the most part."

Uh, okay, Dick, I think I got some of that, anyway, so, let's see here, if all of these people you're holding captive are real bad people, and some are TAY-RISTS, then what did the others do, if you don't mind my asking, as an American citizen; unlawful carnal knowledge with a goat, or a yak, or something?

Help us out here, Dick!

If they are all bad, but only some are TAY-RISTS, what else is there?

Which, of course, brings us back to Iraq, where Dick and his crowd just want the oil, nothing else, just the oil, regardless of how many lives they have to spend to hold on to it:

U.S. Death Toll in Iraq Crosses 1,700

By PAUL GARWOOD, Associated Press Writer

48 minutes ago

BAGHDAD, Iraq - The military announced the killing of four more U.S. soldiers on Sunday, pushing the American death toll past 1,700, and police found the bullet-riddled bodies of 28 people — many thought to be Sunni Arabs — buried in shallow graves or dumped streetside in Baghdad.

The bodies were discovered as the Shiite-led government pressed to open disarmament talks with insurgents responsible for a relentless campaign of violence, which has taken on ominous sectarian overtones with recurring tit-for-tat killings.

A crackdown by Iraqi security forces in Baghdad and offensives carried out by U.S. forces in western Iraq have had only had a temporary effect in blunting the cycle of carnage in which at least 940 people have died since Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari announced his government six weeks ago.

Al-Jaafari spokesman Laith Kuba said many militant groups were reaching out to the government, seeking a place in the political process.

He urged them to lay down their arms.

Some insurgents are motivated to end their resistance, Kuba argued, by the election of an Iraqi government which put the American presence in the background, although its military is still 140,000 strong.

"Now is the right time for any group to lay down their weapons and take part in the (political) process," he said.

The offer did not include foreign extremists such as Jordanian-born al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi because "they only want to kill," Kuba said.

Four American soldiers died Saturday in two roadside bombings west of Baghdad, increasing the number of U.S. forces killed since the war began in March 2003 to at least 1,701.

Al-Zarqawi's group has claimed responsibility for multiple suicide bombings, including Saturday's attack inside Baghdad's heavily guarded Interior Ministry headquarters.

That attack killed at least three people and targeted the feared Wolf Brigade, a Shiite-dominated commando unit that Sunnis claim is killing members of their community, including Muslim clerics.

On Sunday, Gen. Rashid Flaiyeh, who runs all the Interior Ministry elite units including the Wolf Brigade, escaped an apparent assassination attempt when a mortar barrage rained down on his mother's funeral in northern Baghdad.

Eleven mourners were wounded, including two seriously, Lt. Ismael Abdul Sattar said.

Flaiyeh is Interior Minister Bayan Jabr's security adviser.

Lt. Ayad Othman said a shepherd found the bodies of 20 men on Friday in the Nahrawan desert, 20 miles east of Baghdad.

"All were blindfolded and their hands were tied behind their backs and shot from behind," Othman said.

"The assassins excavated a hole and buried them inside it and seven were found naked."

Witnesses claimed the slain men were Sunnis, according to a statement from the influential Sunni organization, the Association of Muslim Scholars.

No details were provided to support the claim, but the association said it had begun an investigation.

Eight other slain men were found shot in the head Sunday in two different locations in Baghdad's predominatly Shiite northern suburb of Shula, police Capt. Majed Abdul Aziz said.

The bodies could not immediately be identified.

"The interior minister keeps saying security is getting better, but everyday we hear of 20 bodies killed here and other 20 bodies found there," said Salih al-Mutlak, head of the prominent umbrella Sunni body, the National Dialogue Council.

The grisly discoveries were announced two days after 21 men were found slain Friday near Qaim, on the lawless Syrian frontier about 200 miles west of Baghdad.

It was feared the bodies may have been those of Iraqi soldiers who went missing Wednesday after leaving their base in Akashat, a remote village near Qaim, in a bus bound for Baghdad.

Last month, multiple batches of bodies turned up in various locations across Iraq.

Many were killed in apparent revenge slayings that have raised fears Iraq was descending into sectarian civil war.

Despite the raging violence, there were several positive developments Sunday.

French journalist Florence Aubenas and her Iraqi assistant Hussein Hanoun al-Saadi were freed Saturday after five months in captivity.

Aubenas left Baghdad at noon Sunday on a French government plane in the middle of a sandstorm that had closed the capital's international airport for two days.

Al-Saadi received a hero's welcome — hugs and kisses from more than 60 relatives and friends at his southern Baghdad home.

A band of trumpets played Arab tunes and a sheep was slaughtered to celebrate his homecoming.

On her return to France, the veteran reporter for the Liberation newspaper said she had been held in an Iraq cellar in "difficult conditions," tied up and with little water.

French officials said no ransom was paid.

In northern Iraq, the 111-member Kurdish Parliament unanimously elected veteran guerrilla leader Massoud Barzani to be the first president of Iraq's northern Kurdistan region, prompting horn-honking celebrations by supporters.

Barzani was elected to a four-year term and will also lead the Kurdish Peshmerga militia, which numbers an estimated 100,000 members.

Some 2,000 soccer fans tried to ignore the violence and watched two of Iraq's elite teams play at Baghdad's biggest sports complex, the 50,000-capacity Shaab Stadium.

It reopened to the public Sunday after it was commandeered two years ago for a U.S. military base.

Zawraa, an ancient name for Baghdad, beat Shurta, Arabic for police, 2-0 in a game that many spectators feared could be marred by a mortar attack or suicide bombing — a regular occurrence in the capital.

"We were terrified at the beginning, but when the game started we had the chance to forget about the attacks, the bombs and the violence for a little while," said Shurta fan Ghazi Faisal, a police major.

"For once there was some joy."

And winging our way back from Iraq to jeffmoskin's California, where the cats and poodles in the posh sections are being eaten by coyotes, likely in from the "Valley", and cougars are allegedly stalking, or eyeing, anyway, some of the more obese shop-til-you-drop crowd on Rodeo Drive, if that is really where they do shop, out there, what's this now?

Is nature rebelling out there, jeffmoskin?

Hello, jeffmoskin .....

Uh, jeffmoskin ......

Hhhhmmmm?

Are those cougar tracks?

No, looks more like a sea lion to me!

"Sea Lion Bites Surfer at California Beach"

Sat Jun 11, 6:46 AM ET

MANHATTAN BEACH, Calif. - A sea lion that had been charging at beachgoers bit a surfer taking a breather, then waddled into the water and swam away.

Josh Duncan came within 5 feet of the sea lion Friday when it bit him, requiring the 27-year-old surfer to get stitches and a tetanus shot for the inch-long wound on his thigh, lifeguard Capt. Mike Cunningham said.

The bite ripped through his wet suit.

In recent weeks, as many as 70 sick and dying sea lions have been lumbering ashore along Southern California.

Scientists believe they're victims of demoic acid poisoning from the seasonal red tide algae bloom.

Demoic acid is a naturally occurring neurotoxin that causes stomach distress, convulsions, central nervous system damage and sometimes death in sea lions.

The mammals ingest the acid when they eat anchovies and sardines that have consumed the toxic algae that produces it.

The sea lion that bit Duncan showed symptoms of poisoning, Cunningham said.

end quotes

Bit a surfer?

This wild animal dared to bite a surfer?

Oh, my God, that's terrible.

I think all those sea lions out there should be locked up with those TAY-RISTS in Gitmo, just to protect us, or the surfers, anyway!

Surf's up, Dude!

Just watch the sea lions, because they are having a bad hair day today, and so, they're kind of snippy, and downright so, if you ask me, anyway!

And this FYI is done as a public service for our listening audience in here, or should that be, "for our viewers"?

Rep John Conyers is trying to get 500,000 signatures on his petition to the President. You can add your name here at moveonpac.org:

http://www.moveonpac.org/tellthetruth/

"The Downing Street Memo"

By Maryellen Lake

June 10, 2005

The mainstream American media are desperately ignoring the smoking gun(s) found in the Downing Street Memo, recently released in Britain.

Even as we speak, however, Rep. John Conyers has thousands of signtures to his letter demanding an explanation of the flim-flammery contained in those brief minutes of a meeting with Tony Blair and his very own "coalition of the willing."

A few intrepid voices in the House are also calling for the empanelling of an Impeachment Inquiry.

George Bush, however, continues to insist that the memo lies.

That should come as no surprise from a President who spends every waking hour in Never-Never Land.

But Ken Mehlman of the RNC has flatly stated that anyone who has ever read the memo has discredited it.

That's interesting - no one in the British government or in MI6 has discredited it.

Are we to assume that they have never read it?

In any event, Bush's ass is very close to being put into a sling from which he may not be able to extricate himself - provided, that is, our media have the gumption to even ask him about the memo!

But nobody seems to be asking except that crazy Conyers and, by now we hope, millions of Americans who are on the Internet and signing Conyers' letter and petitions like mad.

But (no pun intended) the man whose fanny is in the most danger is Blair.

He's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.

If he admits that the memo is, indeed, authentic, he will plant Bush's fanny firmly in the fishnet of possible impeachment thereby betraying his big, bullying buddy; if he denies and lies, his own backside is in danger of getting waffle-imprinted.

Watching this unfold has the potential of becoming a new political sport!

Are we about to discover an old, old truth - that there is no honor among thieves?

Will Blair buckle and try to discredit the minutes of his own meeting?

Or will he turn on Bush to save his own tush?

Stay tuned.

Although that probably won't do you much good if your only access is to the American media.

Check out the memo itself.

Just google in Downing Street Memo and read the whole sickening thing.

No matter - we can still maintain some optimism that eventually this issue will hit the ms media so as to cause possibly several asses to land in the appropriate slings of their own making.

Dare we hope?

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/...p?articleID=611

Which somehow brings us back to Texas where ........

"Texas Governor Mobilizes Evangelicals"

By MATT CURRY, Associated Press Writer

Sun Jun 12, 2:23 PM ET

DALLAS - Even for Texas, the scene was remarkable: The governor, flanked by an out-of-state televangelist and religious right leaders, signing legislation in a church school gymnasium amid shouts of "amen" from backers who just as well could have been attending a revival.

It wasn't just the blatant blend of church and state that made the gathering in Fort Worth unusual.

Advance publicity also attracted about 300 angry protesters — unheard of for the routine business of ceremonial bill signings.

Now some wonder whether Gov. Rick Perry overplayed his hand last week trying to stick to the playbook used by old friend George W. Bush and political whiz Karl Rove, mobilizing evangelicals for last year's presidential race.

"Governor Perry and his people are just not as good as Bush and Rove," Southern Methodist University political scientist Cal Jillson said.

"Governor Perry knows the steps, but he's got no rhythm."

Perry's faith-based appeal came as he awaited possible Republican Party primary challenges from U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn in 2006.

But Jillson said the ex-Democrat risks alienating moderate Republicans turned off by an in-your-face approach to political issues with religious themes.

It's a gamble the governor seems willing to take.

Last month, he spoke to about 500 pastors in Austin at a meeting of the Texas Restoration Project, which plans to register 300,000 new "values voters" in Texas and elect candidates who reflect their conservative views.

In the private meeting, Perry championed promotion of spiritual values on the public square.

"One of the great myths of our time is that you can't legislate morality," the governor told the ministers, according to a transcript provided to The Associated Press by his campaign.

"If you can't legislate morality, then you can neither lock criminals up nor let them go free."

"If you can't legislate morality, you can neither recognize gay marriage nor prohibit it."

"If you can't legislate morality, you can neither allow for prayer in school nor prevent it," he said.

"It is a ridiculous notion to say you can't legislate morality."

"I say you can't NOT legislate morality."

Perry, a United Methodist, did not refer to the death penalty, which his denomination says devalues life and should be eliminated from criminal codes.

The governor, a capital punishment proponent, presides over the nation's most active death penalty state.

Perry's pastor, the Rev. James Mayfield of Tarrytown United Methodist Church in Austin, did not respond to e-mail or phone messages from the AP seeking comment.

Perry grew up attending both the Baptist and Methodist churches in the tiny Paint Creek community in West Texas, spokeswoman Kathy Walt said.

His religious beliefs are guided by several factors, including his understanding of scripture and conversations with "faith leaders."

"His walk of faith is a lifelong journey of a sinner who has accepted the grace of God," she said.

Ohio televangelist Rod Parsley and Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council in Washington were among the religious conservatives who shared the stage with Perry at the Fort Worth bill signing.

Parsley linked homosexuality and disease rates, and about 1,000 supporters cheered attacks on "activist judges" and the media.

Objections to Perry using a church school as a backdrop to a bill signing preceded his visit, with critics mostly focusing on separation of church and state.

"This is one of the most outrageous misuses of a house of worship for political gain that I've ever seen," said Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Washington, D.C.-based Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Perry shrugged off the complaints.

"We could have signed it in a lot of different locations," Perry said on Fox News.

"We could have signed it in a Wal-Mart parking lot, and those who are against people of faith being involved in the electoral process would still have been very much against this bill."

Perry actually signed two measures. One will impose more limits on late-term abortions and require minor girls to get written parental consent.

The other would ban same-sex marriage, but voters must approve the constitutional amendment in November.

Perkins said he sees nothing wrong with signing legislation at a Christian school, and he pointed to a consistent theme of the bill-signing: Forces are at work to exclude the religious-minded from political and civic debate.

"People of faith are not backing up, we are not giving up, we are here to stay," he said.

Luis Saenz, Perry's campaign spokesman, said Perry is not the first governor to sign a bill in a religious setting.

Political consultant Marc Campos, who was an aide to former Democratic Gov. Mark White, confirmed White signed a bill in 1984 extending workers compensation benefits to farm workers on the front steps of a Catholic shrine where Mass was held regularly.

He wrote on his Web site that he didn't recall "getting cracked on for holding a bill signing ceremony at a religious institution."

"Anti-Syrian Candidates Concede in Lebanon"

By BASSEM MROUE, Associated Press Writer

1 hour, 20 minutes ago

SOUK EL-GHARB, Lebanon - Anti-Syrian candidates apparently suffered major losses in a third round of elections Sunday to fill nearly half the seats in parliament, a senior opposition leader conceded after a campaign that led to some surprising alliances.

Walid Jumblatt said former army commander Michel Aoun, who broke opposition ranks and joined pro-Syrian groups on an anti-corruption slate, was winning in contested constituencies.

Aoun's success could hurt the opposition's drive to gain a majority in the 128-seat legislature and leave him a key player in the fight over Syrian control.

An empowered Aoun could put the brakes on the opposition's campaign to remove the pro-Syrian President Emile Lahoud.

Preliminary results and campaign estimates showed Aoun and his allies leading in several districts in Mount Lebanon and in the eastern Bekaa Valley.

In some areas, his allies were already celebrating with fireworks.

Official results were expected Monday.

Jumblatt accused Aoun, who returned from 14 years' exile in May, of being brought in by Damascus to undermine the opposition.

"Michel Aoun is a small (Syrian) tool," he told Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. television.

"True he succeeded, I concede that."

Aoun says his feud with Syria is over now that Damascus has withdrawn its army from the country and he campaigned on a platform to fight the corruption he blames for Lebanon's economic ills, including a national debt of over $30 billion.

The Christian leader said he was willing to talk with other factions in the new parliament and the priorities of his Free Patriotic Movement would be to work for a new election law, shorten the mandate of parliament's four-year term and demand the government carry out a financial audit.

Anti-Syrian forces need at least 45 more seats to win a firm grasp on Parliament and wean it of Damascus' control.

The four-stage elections end next Sunday when voters cast their ballots in northern Lebanon.

The withdrawal of Syria's army from Lebanon in April, and subsequent jockeying for power, fractured some of the longstanding pro- and anti-Syrian political alliances.

Aoun, who fought and lost a war against Syria in 1989, broke with the opposition after his return from exile, pitting himself against Jumblatt.

Jumblatt was allied with Saad Hariri, son of slain former Premier Rafik Hariri, who led a ticket to sweep the Beirut elections.

But the Druse leader also has forged ties with right-wing Christian politicians and the pro-Syrian militant group Hezbollah in the effort to defeat Aoun's slate.

Turnout among the 1.2 million eligible voters was high Sunday.

No official figures were available, but media estimated it was about 54 percent in Mount Lebanon and 49 percent in the Bekaa Valley.

By contrast, turnout was 27 percent in the May 29 voting in Beirut that kicked off the staggered voting.

Many city dwellers drove to their hometowns in Mount Lebanon, the country's most populous province, and the eastern Bekaa Valley to cast their ballots.

They brought along their children, party flags and pictures of favored candidates, Christians and Muslims mingled in a festive atmosphere.

The vote, the first since Syrian forces withdrew from Lebanon after 29 years, was largely peaceful despite some minor scuffles.

The government sent army and police reinforcements to Mount Lebanon, the historic heart of the country, after political tensions sparked violence last week.

In Souk el-Gharb, where Christian forces fought bloody battles with the Druse in the 1980s, residents were delighted by the peaceful competition.

"For me, ballot box battles are for sure much better than gunbattles," said Shahine Salibi, a 65-year-old Christian grocer.

"We want change and we want people who will fight corruption," he said, adding that he voted for a ticket backed by Aoun.

Some 100 candidates competed in Mount Lebanon for 35 seats, allocated to different sects according to Lebanon's power-sharing political system.

In the eastern Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border, 119 people were running for 23 seats.

Aoun was among the first to vote, arriving under heavy guard at a polling station in his hometown of Haret Hreik, a Shiite southern suburb of Beirut and Hezbollah stronghold.

Dozens of supporters broke into cheers and applause.

Although former enemies banded together in electoral alliances, bitter reminders of the 1975-1990 civil war remained.

In the village of Kfar Matta, where Christian militiamen killed 107 Druse in 1983 before they were driven out of the area, Druse inhabitants cast their ballots while displaced Christians voted at makeshift polling stations on another mountain ridge to avoid friction.

"This is a sad day."

"It's humiliating to have to vote here, but what can I do?"

"One has to keep hope alive," Michel Haddad said after casting his ballot in Mechref, nine miles away.

"Our leaders have reconciled, but we're still unable to go to our village."

Lahoud voted in his Christian mountain hometown of Baabdat.

He vowed to fight opposition attempts to force his resignation.

Syria withdrew its military forces from Lebanon under international pressure and mass protests that followed Hariri's Feb. 14 assassination.

But anti-Syrian Lebanese — and the United States — accuse Damascus of not fully withdrawing its intelligence operatives and perhaps even organizing political assassinations.

Syria has denied the allegations.

The Lebanese opposition blames Syria and its Lebanese allies for the murders of Hariri and the anti-Syrian journalist Samir Kassir.

Both parties deny the allegations.

We sure could use an anti-corruption slate over here, too, but where would we ever get one from?

"Bush Again Prods Congress on Agenda"

By DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press Writer

Sun Jun 12, 9:23 AM ET

WASHINGTON - The future economic security of the nation is in the hands of Congress, President Bush said Saturday.

Setting the stage for a week in which he will push stalled sections of his domestic agenda, Bush told his weekly radio audience that lawmakers need to get an energy bill to his desk within weeks and embrace his ideas for changing Social Security.

On Tuesday, the president will discuss Social Security with young people in Pennsylvania.

"Our young people understand that if we fail to act, Social Security will not be sound when they need it," Bush said, repeating the message he's carried cross-country on his campaign to change Social Security and ensure its future solvency.

"They know that the millions of baby boomers about to retire will live longer and collect benefits that the system cannot afford."

On Wednesday in Washington, he'll renew his call for Congress to act on an energy plan.

Despite opposition from the White House, a growing number of Republican and Democratic senators want to address global warming as part of the country's broad energy policy.

The Senate is schedule to take up energy legislation next week.

Whether to include a measure on climate change, such as limiting heat-trapping emissions, will be sharply debated.

The White House strongly opposes any mandatory limits on greenhouse emissions — such as carbon from burning fossil fuels — that many scientists believe are causing the earth to warm.

The House rebuffed any attempt to address global warming when it passed its energy bill in April.

If the Senate moves ahead with a climate provision, it would create yet another confrontation when the two chambers try to reconcile their differences and fashion a final bill.

"The House has passed a good energy bill."

"Now the American people expect the Senate to act," Bush said in his speech.

"For the sake of our economic and national security, Congress needs to get a good energy bill to my desk by August."

On Thursday and Friday, Bush will promote the new prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients.

Seniors will be eligible to enroll beginning in November for the voluntary benefit that begins in January.

"During the coming months, we will work to educate all of our seniors about this new benefit, so they can choose confidently the drug plan that best meets their needs," he said.

On another economic issue, the president urged Congress not to alter his budget plan.

Just six weeks ago the House and Senate passed a budget plan that looked a lot like Bush's, forecasting cuts averaging 1 percent from domestic agencies, including the Energy, Education and Agriculture departments.

Now, some lawmakers have proposed transferring billions from Bush's military and foreign aid budgets to domestic programs he wants to cut or eliminate.

"To ensure economic security for all Americans, Congress needs to keep your taxes low and be wise with taxpayers' dollars," Bush said.

And here is one of those stories from a few days ago, or so, that just kept nagging at me, and so, I went back, and here it is:

"New York governor fears anti-globalization crusaders gaining ground"

Wednesday June 01, 2005

By PHIL COUVRETTE

Associated Press Writer

MONTREAL (AP) New York Gov. George Pataki warned Wednesday that anti-globalization efforts were gaining ground, citing the stunning rejection of the EU constitution by the French and Dutch and the reluctance of many in the U.S. Congress to approve a free-trade pact with Central America.

"There is a growing sentiment against the free market, open economies and more globalization of the world's economy,'' Pataki said in a speech at the International Economic Forum of the Americas.

"We saw what might be an element of that in France when the French people voted down ratification of the European Union constitution.''

On Sunday, 55 percent of French voters said no to the proposed EU constitution, in part citing fears of job losses to outsourcing and other open-market consequences.

Dutch voters Wednesday overwhelmingly rejected the EU constitution, which was designed to further unify the 25-nation bloc and give it more clout on the world stage, but has instead polarized opinion across Europe.

Pataki also said he was doubtful that Congress would approve the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA.

"I'm not sure he'll get it through Congress,'' Pataki said of President Bush, "because there are those who are saying we have to protect the industries that are here as opposed to opening up markets both ways."

"I think that is completely wrong.''

Many Democrats complain the agreement lacks labor and environmental protections to stop abuses of workers in poor, low-wage Central America.

Republican opponents mainly come from textile areas hit hard by foreign competition or areas connected to the sugar industry, which considers CAFTA a threat to its future.

"I think we cannot reverse the tide of globalization,'' insisted Pataki.

"I think we have to make sure it is done in an intelligent and balanced way, but we cannot build barriers to free-trade.''

Pataki was paid for the speech by the Montreal Institute of Administrative Studies, a nonprofit group created to study the global economy and public administration.

His usual fee is $15,000 to $20,000.

During his visit, Pataki also had private talks with Quebec Premier Jean Charest.

Pataki spokesman Kevin Quinn said the two planned to discuss New York-Quebec issues with the main focus on border security, trade and economic development.

The Pataki aide said the two would also be finalizing plans for the third Quebec-New York economic summit to be held in Albany in October.

Quinn said Pataki would be returning to New York state Wednesday night.

Pataki held a news conference in Rouses Point on Lake Champlain just south of the New York-Quebec border earlier Wednesday to announce $1.8 million in grants to northern New York counties for a variety of projects.

end quotes

His usual fee is $15,000 to $20,000?

HUH?

Has anybody ever heard this guy speak?

He's duller than ditch-water, and that is for sure!

SO?

I wonder what they give him the money for, then?

And as to this "globalization" that Pataki is talking about, well, Iraq is a prime example of that, because over there, George W. Bush "globalized" the oil for Dick Cheney and his crowd, and you know, maybe that's what some of this anti- globalization is really all about!

People just don't like theft, and that is that, regardless of who the thief might be, or what country he might head up, either, or state, for that matter!

"We've also got to understand, in order to power the power-generating plants that are now being built in California, we need more energy!"

- George W. Bush, in a masterful dissertation on the First, Second and Third Laws of Thermodynamics, from the perspective of a Harvard MBA who is now, God help us all, president of America, as given to the engineering and scientific communities of the world, for their edification, because we just don't know any of this, while he does, Washington, D.C.; April 24, 2001

The column didn't get attached, or was removed by big brother.